Talk:Ritual Decalogue

Another "Ritual Decalogue"
Given how respected Ginsberg is, we should probably cover this. (I think it was his last book.) However, I can only access snippets of it in GoogleBooks, and haven't yet found a copy.

Ah, I can splice a bit more of it together from a quotation in Smith (1997) The pilgrimage pattern in Exodus, p. 234:

H.L. Ginsberg (1982) The Israelian heritage of Judaism, p46:
 * What is more important is that the phrase "and all the rules" (w't kl hmšpṭym) which follows "all the words of YHWH" at the end of v. 3 is an interpolation, since it is wanting after the other mentions of the said "words" in 3b, 4, and 8 end. Its purpose is to [include the 'rules' (mišpaṭim) of 21.1–23.9 in the covenant of 24.3-8; but that was not the original intention of this passage. For the E elements in 24.12-18; 31.18–34.28, which relate how Moses went up to the mountain of God for forty days and nights in order to receive 'the tablets of stone on which I have inscribed the] teachings and commandments to instruct them," conclude by revealing that the tablets contained nothing other than "the terms of the covenant, the Ten Words" (34:28), and this phrase can only refer to "The First Ritual Decalogue,"62 Exod. 23:10–27.


 * 62 This term, as also (so far as I know) the very discovery that Exod. 23:10 ff. is a decalogue, is my own. The practice has hitherto been—in emulation of Johannes Wolfgang Goethe, Zwei wichtige bisher unerörterte biblische Fragen, zum ersten Mal gründlich beantwortet von einem Landgeistlichen in Schwaben, dated Feb. 6, 1773—to speak of "The Ritual Decalogue" and to apply the term to the covenant of Exod. 34:10–27. But the whole of Exod 34:10–27 is an interpolation which owes its existence to a post-Deuteromic writer, as will be demonstrated in Chapter VI. Note, therefore, that Exod 34:1 says that YHWH—not, like v.27, that Moses—will write on the tablets, and that without the intrusion of vv. 10–27 the natural referent of "and he wrote" in v.28b is the "YHWH" of v.28a. It follows that "the terms of the Covenant, the Ten Words" means the ritual decalogue of 23:10ff., whose constituent elements are identified p. [...]

— kwami (talk) 01:43, 28 March 2011 (UTC)


 * In a statement now in Archive 2, steve kap was highly critical of the "Interpretations" section, and I think some of his criticisms were reasonale. I think this is good research and precisely the kind of work we need to make the "interpretation" section more scholarly.  Ginsberg was an important scholar, although dated, and it is important to provide this scholarship in its proper context. Slrubenstein   |  Talk 20:18, 1 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Content aside, only talking about format, shouldn't it be folded in with the "Academic Interpretation" section? Otherwise, it has the impression that eductated people think this, un educated people think that. Which I don't think is the case. Steve kap (talk) 22:02, 1 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Then perhaps the whole "interpretations" and "academic interpretations" should be merged? Slrubenstein  |  Talk 12:35, 3 April 2011 (UTC)


 * I think it's useful to distinguish interpretation of the RD as a whole from the individual laws. We need better section titles, though. — kwami (talk) 16:51, 3 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Untrue. Though if you can find a reliable source that backs you up, you can mention that opinion.  - Lisa (talk - contribs) 04:31, 8 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Huh? How can an opinion be "untrue"? And why would any source address the outline of a Wikipedia article? — kwami (talk) 04:41, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

use English
As part of the ongoing attempt to purge the lede of the phrase "Ten Commandments", which is the reason the the RD is notable in the first place, we are in another edit war. The phrase עשרת הדברים is generally translated as "Ten Commandments" in English, including the translations we use for this article, so it is obviously the wording which should be used in the lede. As for the claim that "Ths is not a literal translation and in fact its meaning is quite loaded and prone to misunderstanding", that's the whole point, isn't it? If it weren't so loaded, people would write so much about the RD. And as for the claim that "it is unencyclopedic to claim that the Hebrew Bible was written in English", that's just silly. There is no such claim; we use English on English WP. Translations should be made in parentheticals or in footnotes.

Unless, of course, you are willing to move Ten Commandments to aseret ha-dvarîm. But what's good enough for that article is good enough for this one. — kwami (talk) 17:55, 3 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Kwami, that's three reverts so far today. Are you sure you know what you're doing?  - Lisa (talk - contribs) 18:17, 3 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Please address issues for an article on the talk page of that article. Or at least tell us which article you're talking about. (For the record, the other two reverts would seem to be at extended periodic table and digraph (orthography). What they have to do with this article I don't know.) — kwami (talk) 18:42, 3 April 2011 (UTC)


 * All on this page, Kwami. 00:13, 2 April 2011, 03:44, 3 April 2011, 17:09, 3 April 2011. - Lisa (talk - contribs) 21:04, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * That's once on April 1, once on April 2, and once on April 3, in my time zone. How does that make "three reverts so far today" in any time zone? — kwami (talk) 21:45, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Once on April 2 and twice on April 3. And, of course, the original revert on 08:54, 31 March 2011. So that's four so far. Jayjg (talk) 21:49, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * So we have 2011 March 31 02:01, 2011 April 1 17:13, 2011 April 2 20:44, and 2011 April 3 10:09. Again, how is that "three reverts so far today"? — kwami (talk) 22:38, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Your time settings are different, but in any event, for reversion purposes a "day" is any 24-hour period, as you know. Jayjg (talk) 00:10, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * No matter how you cut it, you can't get "three reverts so far today" when there were not three reverts in a 24-hour period, as you know. Or under 24 hrs, or you couldn't say "so far". — kwami (talk) 00:22, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * You've now made 4 reverts in the past 48 hours. Jayjg (talk) 04:36, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Aseret ha-dvarîm is an English transliteration of a Hebrew term which does not, in fact, translate literally or directly as "Ten Commandments". The literal translation, as many sources point out, is "Ten Words". "Ten Commandments" is a common interpretation of the term. Claiming at this point in the lede that verse 28 uses the phrase "Ten Commandments" is a distortion that confuses the issue and the reader, particularly when we are also using the phrase to mean various lists of laws in Exodus in Deuteronomy. You have, in fact, argued that we should tell the reader that "Ten Commandments" means three different lists of laws in the Pentateuch; now you are also arguing that we should use it to refer to a specific two-word phrase in Exodus 34:28, a fourth meaning of the term! Explaining that the Pentateuch uses the phrase aseret ha-dvarîm - which is commonly translated as "Ten Words" or "Ten Commandments" - clarifies. Our goal here is clarity for the common reader. Jayjg (talk) 21:22, 3 April 2011 (UTC)


 * No, it's not a "fourth meaning of the term", it simply is the term, whose reference scholars have debated. The phrase "Ten Commandments" in its biblical context translates only one thing, aseret ha-dvarîm, or the Greek or Latin translation of aseret ha-dvarîm. That is uncontroversial. It you think there is some controversy, pls provide a reference.
 * It doesn't literally mean "ten words", but is even more general than that. More like "ten items". But the traditional English translation, the translation used by the KJV and by most 20th-century bibles, and the most familiar English translation (and for most the only familiar translation) is "the ten commandments". Using the Hebrew aseret ha-dvarîm doesn't "clarify for the common reader" who only knows the phrase in its English translation.
 * Saying that we need to use the Hebrew rather than the English because the English is ambiguous (as if the Hebrew weren't!) is like saying we need to call Jesus Yēšûă‘ because there's a guy named Jesus down the street. We add the etymology of a phrase in a parenthetical, a footnote, or a section on etymology. We don't use it as the general term of reference. — kwami (talk) 22:38, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, it literally means "Ten Things" or perhaps "Ten Items". In any event, we're using an English transliteration here precisely because we need to disambiguate between
 * a) "Ten Commandments" meaning Exodus 20:2–17
 * b) "Ten Commandments" meaning Deuteronomy 5:6–21
 * c) "Ten Commandments" meaning a two-word Hebrew phrase in Exodus 34:28
 * d) (according to you) "Ten Commandments" meaning Exodus 34:11-26.
 * Because the lede refers to all these different things, it must be careful to be explicit about which meaning is meant. And, generally, it is; except, in this case, where you are arguing we should introduce ambiguity for reasons that are unclear. If we were mentioning Jesus Franco in the lede of the Jesus article, we'd also have to disambiguate them in some way; it turns out that writing aseret ha-dvarîm is a much easier way of disambiguating than writing "the phrase in Exodus 34:28 that is usually translated as 'Ten Commandments'", and is obviously much more clear than the ambiguous wordings you have been trying to insert. Jayjg (talk) 23:57, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Saying "the phrase 'Ten Commandments'" makes it clear that we're speaking of the words themselves, not what they refer to. That's the normal way of disambiguating such things in English. There are two things here: the phrase itself, which occurs three times in the OT (we of course identify which one we're talking about), and the passages the phrase refers to. The latter, regardless of what they are, are obviously not what we mean, because we have dab'd w the wording "the phrase 'Ten Commandments'". Putting it in Hebrew clarifies nothing; I can simply parrot your argument back to you:
 * ... we're using an English translation here precisely because we need to disambiguate between
 * a) Aseret ha-dvarîm meaning Exodus 20:2–17
 * b) Aseret ha-dvarîm meaning Deuteronomy 5:6–21
 * c) Aseret ha-dvarîm meaning a two-word phrase in Exodus 34:28
 * d) (according to you) aseret ha-dvarîm meaning Exodus 34:11-26.
 * Because the lede refers to all these different things, it must be careful to be explicit about which meaning is meant.
 * That, of course, makes no sense, but neither does the original argument. — kwami (talk) 00:22, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * We don't call them all the same thing, though; rather, we call none of them "Ten Commandments", specifically to avoid ambiguity. Instead, in the lede we call a) and b) the "Ethical" Decalogue of Exodus 20:2-17 and Deuteronomy 5:6-21, we call d) Exodus 34:11-26 or the Ritual Decalogue, and we call c) aseret ha-dvarîm. That's good, clear writing that the reader can easily understand. Now you want to call c) the "Ten Commandments", despite insisting that we cannot call a) or b) the "Ten Commandments", and despite the fact that it turns clarity into ambiguity. That's an inconsistent argument that, of course, actually "makes no sense", and is bad writing to boot. Jayjg (talk) 01:42, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * No, that's not good, clear writing, because the average reader does not know Hebrew. I'm not turning c) into 'the TCs', the KJV turned it into 'the TCs'. The majority of modern English translations of the Bible also turn it into 'the TCs'. The average reader knows it as 'the TCs'. Therefore that is how we translate it as well. — kwami (talk) 03:13, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Your view that your wording is better is unique to you, whereas at least four other editors here agree with my rationale. You've reverted this sentence 6 times now, and been reverted in turn by 3 different editors. Wouldn't it make more sense to accept the obvious consensus? Jayjg (talk) 03:53, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Not when it violates NPOV. I don't know if this offends religious sensibilities or what the problem is, but accepting it would be rather like accepting the consensus that astrologers have for astrology. The point is very simple: the RD is notable, not because it's a recasting of the CC, but because an oft-repeated reading of Exodus is that it's the Ten Commandments—and yet it's not the Ten Commandments of traditional and popular conception. The term "Ten Commandments" is key: without that, it would just be another passage in Exodus. Yet several of you are intent on distancing it as much as possible from the phrase "Ten Commandments". I don't know why you feel so strongly about this, but none of you have given a good reason for it. — kwami (talk) 04:04, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Your wording violates NPOV, is unclear, and is bad writing; those are all very good reasons not to use it, and you clearly haven't given any good reason for using it. That's the consensus here, because it's factual and accurate. Focus on making arguments about article content, not irrelevant and policy violating speculations about other editors' "religious sensibilities" or what you imagine they "feel strongly" about. Jayjg (talk) 04:33, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Considering that you just demonstrated above that you don't know what English is, or how it differs from Hebrew, I'm not sure how much value to place in your opinion of what "bad writing" is. I see your version as clearly violating NPOV, being unclear, and being bad writing, and you haven't given any good reason for using it, so where does that leave us? WP is written in English. That's the default. I don't need an argument to adhere to the default language, you need an argument to depart from it. So far all you've said is that Hebrew is clearer to our readers than English is, and that "ten things" is less ambiguous than "ten commandments". Neither holds water. — kwami (talk) 05:06, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Please review this comment. Your comment was about me. Try again. Jayjg (talk) 05:18, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Jayjd, please review "This is not a forum". What specific changes, based on sources, do you propuse? Steve kap (talk) 00:04, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * His revert makes that clear. — kwami (talk) 00:22, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * I too like Jay's version better.It is clearer IMO. I will revert to it.--Mbz1 (talk) 03:47, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * How is it clearer, it your opinion? — kwami (talk) 05:01, 5 April 2011 (UTC)


 * I too support the use of the actual Hebrew phrase, followed by the various English translations. It is obvious that this is necessary for the logical flow of this section. Repeatedly reverting and saying "use English" is far from helpful when so obviously outnumbered by editors who feel differently. Kwami, if you want to get anywhere close to a version that might satisfy you, you will need to work towards consensus and not reverting. You might have personal problems with the consensus version (which appears to be a defining feature in some of your edit wars that I've witnessed), but please recognise the need for consensus. Would it help if we got the page protected to force consensus forming? JFW &#124; T@lk  06:46, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * But we've always used the Hebrew. That's not the issue. It's not about style, or bad writing, or ambiguity: The several editors here have consistently tried to downplay the "Ten Commandments" aspect of this, which after all is the whole point of the article: the RD text is given its own name precisely because it *is* called the "Ten Commandments", at least in the opinion of the scholars who use the term RD. How can we in good faith downplay that central aspect? It's like the astrology article, where we have a consensus (among astrologers) of downplaying the fact that it's pseudoscience. At first they tried deleting that term altogether; now they're trying to water it down by saying 'some' people 'consider' it to be pseudoscience. We have a parallel development here: First they tried deleting the article, then they tried deleting statements that the RD is called the TCs, now they're claiming it isn't called 'the TCs', it's called 'aseret ha-dvarîm', as if there were any real difference. People don't posit the RD because of how Exodus reads in just the Hebrew; the connection is just as apparent in translation. I wouldn't have such a problem if they could (or would) support this with sources, but they're pushing a personal POV against the weight of the sources. So no, when people try compromising the integrity of an article, I'm not willing to compromise. Not that I'm not willing to accept criticism; many of the "aseret ha-dvarîm doesn't mean 'Ten Commandments'" editors have made valuable contributions to the article, correcting some severe problems with it, and I'm glad for it. — kwami (talk) 07:32, 5 April 2011 (UTC)


 * You are still repeatedly editing against the views of a number of editors. In Ex 34, the standard view is that "aseret ha-dvarîm" refers to the 10C listed in Ex20. The only way to apply these to the ten commandments listed in Ex 34 you would need to apply an interpretation that has not existed until the 19th century. The phrase "Ten Commandments" (with capitals) cannot be applied to the RD without modifiers. Your latest version suggests that by using the words "aseret ha-dvarîm" at the end of the RD, that turns the RD into Ten Commandments. This is wrong. It will continue to be wrong.
 * The section in the Pentateuch that uses the words "aseret ha-dvarîm" is separated by the RD by a section break in all classical versions of the Torah. In a Torah scroll, a new line is used here (see here, marked with a {פ}). As you know, the chapter numbering in the Bible was introduced by Christians. There is therefore no reason to presume that the section using the words "aseret ha-dvarîm" has any logical relationship with the other. According to Jewish tradition, some sections were dictated to Moses in a completely different order (for instance, Numbers 1:1 was obviously dictated a month after Numbers 9:1 - hence the Talmud's pronouncement אין מוקדם ומאוחר בתורה / the sections of the Torah are not arranged in chronological order, see e.g. Babylonean Talmud Pesahim 6b).
 * Nothing will ever be resolved in this article unless we can get the above crystal clear. JFW &#124;  T@lk  13:36, 5 April 2011 (UTC)


 * You may disagree with that interpretation, but this article is not about what we think. It's about what our sources say. And we have multiple RS's that the phrase refers to the RD. These includes several Jewish scholars who read the Torah in Hebrew.
 * The traditional division in the Torah is exactly the kind of view I've repeatedly asked for. If you can find a ref that says as much, we should add it to the article.
 * However, the oldest Torahs aren't all that old either. At least not compared to when Exodus is supposed to have been written. If you want to argue that the phrase TCs cannot refer to the RD because of that section break, that the section break is original to the text, you need a ref to support it. And then it will only support the traditional POV, since our sources disagree on this point.
 * As for putting the TCs in lower case, that again is OR. Every English translation I'm aware of uses upper case for 'the Ten Commandments' in v. 28. We should follow our sources here just as we do elsewhere. — kwami (talk) 20:04, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

I wasn't suggesting that my POV above should be added to the article, but it goes to show why traditional folk have such enormous difficulty with the RD. Again, of course, the traditional view is that the Torah as we have it in the present form is essentially unchanged since 3300 years ago. I think you are currently the only person who insists on the changes that you wish to make, so I suggest that accept consensus, or alternatively go through the dispute resolution process. JFW &#124; T@lk  21:48, 5 April 2011 (UTC)


 * But since that is the traditional reading, we should include it in the article! We say nothing about the section break in the Torah.
 * 3300 BP? Really? We have no evidence the Torah is that old. Most estimates I've seen are than the older large texts are ca. 800 BCE, but they have presumably been redacted many times since. Our Jackson ref says of the TCs = the RD, "That, no doubt, is the sense intended by the redactors", and he was working off the Hebrew. Ginsberg even believed the RD was an interpolation, and the phrase 'TCs' originally referred to the covenant code! I have not seen any ref by any of these scholars to the section break, and I imagine that it is not considered original to the text. (Though I do not know that, which is why I'd like to see more on this.)
 * So, as far as I can see, the recent changes are not supported by our refs, and even go against them. DR may be the way to go. — kwami (talk) 22:15, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Which "recent changes" are you referring to? As to the traditional view on the age of the Torah, this is not the right forum for that discussion, but 3300 years ago is the age and there is just as little evidence for redactors and J and E and whatever not. JFW &#124; T@lk  22:38, 5 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Changing English to Hebrew, and making the phrase TCs lower case.
 * {פ} is just a Masoretic marker, BTW. It has no more to do with content than the Christian chapter numbers do. — kwami (talk) 03:44, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

English to Hebrew is necessary (according to a large number of editors) because of the ambiguity in translating these words. You would be editing against consensus by changing that back.

You really don't need to point out to me that {פ} is a Masoretic marker. I tried to explain the relevance of paragraph and section breaks in the Torah. According to the traditional view, it has an awful lot to do with content. JFW &#124; T@lk  09:59, 8 April 2011 (UTC)


 * “..tradional view”- Is this part of the same tradition that sees these texts as being dictated to Moses?  If so, let’s remind ourselves that this is a minority point of view.  Almost fringe, maybe.    I mean, Moses is a fictional character, after all.  Steve kap (talk) 15:33, 8 April 2011 (UTC)


 * I think you'll find that while it might be a minority view amongst atheists using the internet, it is a strongly held view by the very large number of people who elect to read the Bible literally. Fringe it is not. They may not be as enlightened as you, but that does make their views illegitimate. Your view that Moses is fictional is similarly disputed by roughly the same people. There's WP:TRUTH and there's WP:NPOV; last time I checked, the latter was a vital content policy. Are you were to assist in the writing of this article, or are you using the talk page as a forum again? JFW &#124; T@lk  16:26, 8 April 2011 (UTC)


 * It may be that they believe strongly, and they may be a large number, but those that think Moses penned the bible certainly are a minority, even among the religious.  And yes, I do think keeping MPOV from receiving undue weight IS assisting in writing the article, even if members of that minority might find it irritating. Steve kap (talk) 17:11, 8 April 2011 (UTC)


 * JFDWolff, perhaps I misinterpreted what you were saying. Yes, of course, in the traditional view Masoretic markings have everything to do with content. However, for biblical scholars who use terms like RD, they have little or nothing to do with content. When you said, In a Torah scroll, a new line is used here (see here, marked with a {פ}). As you know, the chapter numbering in the Bible was introduced by Christians. There is therefore no reason to presume that the section using the words "aseret ha-dvarîm" has any logical relationship with the other, I took that to mean that we should follow the Masoretic rather than Christian divisions, when both are recent compared to Exodus. I think it would be valuable to add a mention of that marker and how it relates to the traditional POV if you can find a ref for it. I just don't see how it's relevant to the POV this article is concentrating on: Our sources make it abundantly clear that scholars using terms like "RD" do see Ex34:28 as part of the same narrative as the rest of Ex34. — kwami (talk) 01:17, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Passover & Unleavened Bread
The last paragraph of the Academic Interpretation section reads Several scholars believe that the commandment numbered 8 above is a later addition, for here Passover called by its modern name. Elsewhere none of the feasts have their modern names; Passover, for example, is called the Feast of Unleavened Bread in commandment 3. Number of issues with this. First, no citations. Second, it refers to commandment numberings "above" which are not in the text above it. Third, there is a confusion between Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread. The Passover (Pesach) is the lamb sacrifice ritual and feast which occurs the evening before the Feast of Unleavened Bread. By the modern times, the two have been conflated and both are often referred to as Passover (even the Wikipedia article on Passover fails to clearly differentiate the two). The Ritual Decalogue text does not conflate the two (which is evident, for example, in the sacrifice being required to be consumed by the morning, whilst Hag HaMatzot is not a one evening feast, but rather lasts a week). Whatever the source is for this assertion (again, no citation is given), the source would seem to not be a reliable source if it does not know there is a difference between Pesach and Hag haMatzot. — al-Shimoni  (talk) 09:06, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

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