Good Morning.
And God spoke all these words, saying: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.” (Exodus 20:1-2)
No doubt by design, the commandments given to us from Mount Sinai are categorized into two sections. The first tablet contains man’s duties toward God -– the first five commands while the second tablet contains man’s duties toward his fellow man. That the ten commands were written this way upon two tablets demonstrates that all the Law of “hangs” upon two commands just as Messiah said.
Yeshua answered him, “The first of all the commandments is: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ This is the first commandment. And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31)
If you recall, I previously mentioned how that Judaism considers all of the commandments within the Scripture falls under the one of the Ten Commands given at Sinai. If that is so, because those ten address the principles contained within these two, then we must conclude that all of the commandments God gave to His people somehow fall under the category of “Love God” or “Love your neighbor.” Perhaps that is why Jesus said that all the other commandments “hang” on these two (Matthew 22:40).
When we do as we are instructed, we are demonstrating that we love God and we love our fellow man. In other words, we can’t pick and choose the parts of His Word we like and dismiss what we don’t care for; everything in His Word has a purpose. To approach the Scriptures as a menu where we feel free to order a la carte and make substitutions is not the right approach. God has His reasons for telling us to do or not to do and that is why is is imperative to remember that He is “the LORD your God who brought you out of the house of bondage.”
Blessings and Shalom,
Bill
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