In the Landover Baptist thread, I was in a bit of a side discussion with Thunderball, who claimed that the Bible forms the basis of the laws of Western society. I challenged him on that fact, and asked which specific Biblical passages he meant. His first reply was, "Well, the 10 Commandments are a pretty obvious one..."
This is, of course, a great fallacy. The 10 Commandments absolutely do not form the basis of our laws. In fact,
in several cases, our laws are specifically opposite to what is demanded by the 10 Commandments.
Let's examine this further. For the sake of this discussion, I will only be referring to Canadian law, but most of my points would apply equally to any other Western democratic nation.
We must first, though, define our terms. As
this wikipedia article shows, different Judeo-Christian religions define the Commandments in slightly different ways. I am opting to use the interpretation of the Roman Catholic church, since, as of the
2001 census, it was the largest religion in Canada (43.2% of Canadians identified themselves as Catholic).
The 10 Commandments, as interpreted by the Roman Catholic Church, are as follows:
1. I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents, to the third and fourth generation of those who reject me, but showing steadfast love to the thousandth generation of those who love me and keep my commandments.
That's awfully wordy, but the gist of this Commandment is that God demands that we worship him and him alone. This, of course, is exactly contrary of the right to religious freedom as granted in the Charter, which states Canadians are free to worship any god(s) or no god at all.
2. You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not acquit anyone who misuses his name.
According to the second Commandment, blasphemy is wrong. According to the Charter, Canadians have the right of free speech, allowing us to blaspheme until we're blue in the face.
3. Observe the sabbath day and keep it holy, as the LORD your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God; you shall not do any work—you, or your son or your daughter, or your male or female slave, or your ox or your donkey, or any of your livestock, or the resident alien in your towns, so that your male and female slave may rest as well as you.
First, we have the fact that God implicitly condones slavery here, but in all enligtened Western nations, slavery is outlawed. Furthermore, keeping slaves is specifically prohibited by Article 4 of the
UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Let's ignore that for the moment, however. This Commandment is stating that we must not work on the Sabbath day, for God demands that it be a day of rest and worship. In Canada, there was formerly a law (The Lord's Day Act) which prohibited businesses to be open on Sunday. This law was struct down in its entirety as being a violation of the Charter in 1985, after a Calgary pharmacist had been charged with violating the act and he took his case to the Supreme Court (
R. vs. Big M Drug Mart, Ltd.).
4. Honor your father and your mother, as the LORD your God commanded you, so that your days may be long and that it may go well with you in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.
I'm not quite sure what God means when he asks us to honour our parents, but there is certainly no legal requirement to do so.
5. You shall not kill.
Ah, here we are at the half-way point of the list, and finally we have a Commandment that matches up with a law. However, laws against murder exist in all societies, whether they have a Judeo-Christian heritage or not. Moreover, laws against murder existed in civilizations that pre-dated the 10 Commandments. Nearly 400 years before the estimated time of Moses's life, the Babylonian civilization followed the
Code of Hammurabi, the first known written code of laws. Naturally, it prohibited murder.
6. Neither shall you commit adultery.
While it is justifiably grounds for divorce and is almost universally recognized as being immoral, there is no law against cheating on one's spouse.
7. Neither shall you steal.
See #5. Laws against theft exist in every society and pre-date the 10 Commandments. There is certainly no religious basis for those laws.
8. Neither shall you bear false witness against your neighbor.
Likewise, laws against perjury are also universal across societies of all religious backgrounds.
9. Neither shall you covet your neighbor's wife.
and
10. Neither shall you desire your neighbor's house, or field, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
What's this, the thought police? I'm free to desire anything I damn well please. There's no law that says I can't be jealous of my neighbour's green lawn or 60" HDTV. Wanting to keep up with the Jones's is a time-honoured North American pasttime.
And what's up with God again implicitly allowing slavery. :P
So, the finaly tally is as follows: only three of the 10 Commandments (5, 7, 8) actually match Canadian law (and the laws of other Western democratic nations); however, those three offenses are regarded as being wrong by all societies and all religions, and laws prohibiting them existed in civilizations that pre-dated Moses. The laws of Canada run totally counter to three other Commandments (1, 2, 3), and the law makes no comment regarding the remaining four (4, 6, 9, 10), thereby making them perfectly legal.