Let's compare the Biblical 10 Commandments to the Satanic Temple's Seven Fundamental Tenets. People will often claim the 10 Commandments from the Bible are morally superior and claim them as foundational. But is that the case?
The 10 Commandments.
- You shall have no other gods before Me.
- You shall make no idols.
- You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
- Keep the Sabbath day holy.
- Honor your father and your mother.
- You shall not murder.
- You shall not commit adultery.
- You shall not steal.
- You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
- You shall not covet.
6, 8 and 9 are given. If you have to be told to not lie, steal and kill then you have some serious problems. And they're basically universal laws anyways. Those aren't radical, noteworthy, ground breaking or worth bragging about.
The rest? How does that help make us better people? 1, 2, 3 and 4 don't and exist only to serve and satisfy Jehovah's ego. You can cut them all out and morally and ethically not be any better or worse for it. But as you can be a good person without they are unnecessary.q
5 is entirely backwards as respect is to be earned amd a blanket "honor your parents (same goes for elders)" has excused , justified and normalized far too much abuse. Thou shalt be someone your child is proud to have as a parent would have been vastly superior.
9 isn't necessarily a problem. If someone is in an open/polygamist then just mind your own damn business. If not, cheating on your partner isn't good, but the Bible doesn't specify that. George Carlin said it better with "thou shalt be faithful and honest to thy provider if thy nookie."
10, yeah that's not really bad until it becomes greed and destructive. It gets us places, it gets things done, helps add meaning to our lives and let's us grow and develop. What is also does, and why it belongs with the first four, is it exists to serve those who wrote it and enforce it. Don't desire what we have because you'll make god mad. Don't blame us for telling you not to upset the status quo, it's god who made it a very special important rule.
Now let's look at the Seven Fundamental Tenets frim the Satanic Temple.
I One should strive to act with compassion and empathy toward all creatures in accordance with reason.
II The struggle for justice is an ongoing and necessary pursuit that should prevail over laws and institutions.
III One’s body is inviolable, subject to one’s own will alone.
IV The freedoms of others should be respected, including the freedom to offend. To willfully and unjustly encroach upon the freedoms of another is to forgo one's own.
V Beliefs should conform to one's best scientific understanding of the world. One should take care never to distort scientific facts to fit one's beliefs.
VI People are fallible. If one makes a mistake, one should do one's best to rectify it and resolve any harm that might have been caused.
VII Every tenet is a guiding principle designed to inspire nobility in action and thought. The spirit of compassion, wisdom, and justice should always prevail over the written or spoken word.
Compassion, empathy, justice, freedom and bodily autonomy? These don't even exist in the 10 but go a long way in making the world a better place.
Letting our best method of objectively gathering information about the world and universe around us? Especially today when we can si easily gather a world of information at our fingertips why shouldn't this be a guiding principle?
VI is something the Bible won't see until Jesus, so it's clearly not part of the 10.
VII Not only summarizes the first ones, it goes a step further by saying let the spirit of compassion, wisdom and justice prevail over the written word. That goes against much of Christianity, especially American Evangelicism.
How exactly are the even that good? Especially in regards to American amd Constitutional values why shouldn't we instead put the Seven Fundamental Tenets in courthouses?