Did most ancient
peoples show their loyalty to the gods by their lives and deeds or
by the ceremonies of the ritual and the offerings which they
brought to the altars? The first great prophet Amos declared that
Jehovah hated and despised feasts and ceremonies unless accompanied
by deeds of justice and mercy.
The decalogue in Exodus 34 may well represent the original commands
which Moses laid upon the nation, but the higher moral sense of
later editors has truly recognized the superiority of the ethical
commands of the familiar decalogue in Exodus 20 and given it the
commanding place which it richly deserves. (For a probable
literary history of this decalogue see _Hist. Bible_ I, 194-5.)
The two decalogues of Exodus 20 and 34 are not duplicates the one
of the other, but rather supplement each other. The one defines
the obligation of the nation, the other of the individual. The
Hebrews long continued to retain in their homes the family images
inherited from their Semitic ancestors. Not until the days of Amos
and Isaiah did the prophets begin to protest against the calves or
bulls and the cherubim in the sanctuaries of Northern Israel, and
even in the temple at Jerusalem.
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