The Ten Commandments

In the spring of 1957, I was nine years old. In that year, the fifth most financially successful motion picture of all time was released. Cecil B. Demille’s “The Ten Commandments”, the epic story of Moses and the rescue of the children of Israel from bondage in Egypt, was heralded as a brilliant piece of modern movie technology and a very moving and exciting story. I remember vividly going with my parents on a spring evening to see the picture. It was indeed a little too “adult” for a child of that day, but it is one of my most memorable movie experiences. I enjoyed it so much that I was allowed to return for two more matinee showings of the movie that had taken hold of my imagination. I was allowed to catch the township bus, attend the movie alone at the Capitol Theatre and return home by myself. I am sure that the cost of the afternoon, including popcorn was less than one dollar.

I was enthralled by the grandeur of God and His relationship with Charlton Heston who convincingly played a youthful as well as an elderly Moses. The movie is packed with special effects like God cutting the Ten Commandments into stone tablets with His powerful voice and what appeared to be lightening flashes. The images of the hovering green misty disease that killed the Egyptian first born, during the night of the first Passover, I remember like yesterday. The Israelite multitude passing through the parted Red Sea appeared very real to a child. The violence of the subsequent drowning of the Egyptian army was something to behold. I realize now so many years later that I was greatly affected in a spiritual way by the film. Now that I am biblically literate, I am aware that there were many historical and biblical inaccuracies within the film. When I watch parts of the movie now each and every Easter on some television station, I am somewhat amused by the very stiff dialogue that doesn’t seem to flow nor is it very realistic to the modern ear. That didn’t seem to matter to a nine year old who has maintained for fifty three years a sense of reverence in reviewing the Ten Commandments as they are found in Exodus 20: 3-17.

1 "You shall have no other gods before Me.

2 "You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth;

3 "You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.

4 "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

Six days you shall labor and do all your work,

but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God.

5 ¶ "Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the LORD your God is giving you.

6 "You shall not murder.

7 "You shall not commit adultery.

8 "You shall not steal.

9 "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

10 "You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s."

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