More recently in one
of my blogs, as an aside, I asked if my readers if they could remember the Ten
Commandments and in particular, if you could remember their order. (Exodus 20 –
link)
Without wishing to
enter into the debate as to the accuracy of David Cameron’s words or have a
debate on the nature of a Christian country, I thought that I would have a
crack at looking at these commandments and seeing how they are practiced in the
life of the country.
To get the positive
side, you need to start in the second half of the Ten Commandments.
Commandments numbers
6, 8 and 9 are directly applicable. You shall not kill (No. 6); you shall not
steal (No. 8) and you shall not bear false witness (No. 9). Perjury is still a
criminal offence, even if it seems a somewhat strange commandment to have in
your top ten.
So that is three out
of ten. What about the rest. Let’s finish the lower part of this group of ten
(Numbers 5 to 10).
There are two “family
commandments”. Honour your mother and father (No. 5) and you shall not commit
adultery (down at No. 7). I have no statistics on the first one. It is not
enshrined in law or the culture in any way. Most people make efforts to maintain
a close relationship with their parents, although I am not sure whether this
has anything to do with “our being a Christian Country”. At least there are no
laws saying that we should despise our parents, so 1/2 point for this one.
No comment is
necessary from me regarding Number 7, except to note that most people would
regard a law criminalising or attaching any sort of blame to adultery, as being
at the very least uncharitable and uncaring and quite possibly unchristian. The
“I can do whatever I want to” culture that describes a large part of the
English culture sits very comfortably with this.
I should try to deal
with Number 10, which is about coveting, or rather “not coveting”. This is a
slightly tough one, if only because it is not a word used very much these days.
We are not supposed to covet or “wish longingly for” (per the American Heritage
Dictionary) anything that belongs to our neighbour.
I am not sure that I
have ever wanted to have the specific object that was currently owned by (say)
my neighbour or a friend. I have been encouraged to think about acquiring
something that I had not considered before. Actually taking it, covered by
Number 8 (stealing) and taking your neighbours wife is already dealt with under
Number 7 (Adultery).
But Commandment Number
10 here looks at the emotions of “wanting” something that we have seen
elsewhere, and tells us that this is wrong. It tells us to be satisfied with what we have.
If that is the case (and I not sure that it is), then there is not much public
data as to how much “coveting” goes on in England. It is said that we are “a
consumerist society”, so I would assume that quite a lot of “coveting” goes on,
so I am going to give us a zero for this one.
So we are left with
this first four. This is unfortunate as they are all to do with God / Religion
and England is not a very religious country. I will continue as I started and
work backwards.
“Remember the Sabbath
day, to keep it holy” (Number 4). I exaggerate the point when I say that this
has been transformed to “The Sabbath shall a day of shopping”. For most people,
Sunday is still a day when we do not have to go to work, and the buses do not all
run on a Sunday, so maybe 1/2 a point for this one.
Number 3 reminds us
not to take God’s name in vain. Definitely no points here. At least 80% of the
population, who regularly use a variety of expletives, religious and secular to
cover eventualities, such as hitting thumbs with hammers or missing a train or
just as additional words to be used in normal everyday sentences. Furthermore,
any laws to forbid and punish the use of such words would be regarded as
laughable and probably an infringement of our civil liberties.
Number 2, “You shall
not make a graven image (of God)…….” perhaps just does not apply. As most
people in England have no particular belief in God, it is hard to see how they
might make a graven image. I will assume that this applies mainly to those who
recognise Commandment Number 1, “You shall have no other God besides me”).
The statistics on
church-going show that England as a nation in slow but steady religious
decline. What it does not tell us, is what people believe privately. The 2001
census in the U.K. indicated that just less that 50% of people believed in God.
Presumably this means that nearly 50% of the population does believe in God. I
think that this is good enough for half marks on numbers 1 and 2.
So all in all, that
makes 4 ½ marks out of ten. Teacher says
“England could do better, if he (or she) tried.”
