THE COMMANDMENTS.—PART 1.
By A. C. Spicer
Attention is here called to the septenary period, and to the use of the full number seven in Genesis, and then we pass their consideration for the present, reserving a full discussion thereof till the same subjects are reached in Exodus. The use of the full number seven, so as to be significant, we notice in Gen. 4: 15, 24; and the mention of the septenary cycle, which has its basis in the fact that God worked six days in creating the heavens and the earth and the things therein and rested on the seventh day, is noticeable in Gen. 29: 18, 20, 27, 28, 30; and in 33: 3; and 41: 26, 33; especially so in 29: 27, 28 where the week is specifically mentioned, and in 41: 26, 33; where the representative seven years of plenty and seven years of famine are foretold by Joseph. The last chapters of Genesis are full of profound interest, presenting as they do the characters of Israel (Jacob) and Joseph, so fully in conformity with the requirements of the moral law as to leave not the least doubt that they were fully instructed therein and kept the commandments of God. We will now close this examination of Genesis by a brief of our observations and conclusions therefrom. 1. “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.” Jacob and Rachel and their household evidently understood this commandment definitely. It may be paraphrased thus: “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.” This obligation clearly seems to have been known by Adam, Cain, Abel, Seth, Enoch, Noah, Lamech, Abraham, Melchisedec, Isaac, Jacob, and even by the Assyrians, Ruel and Laban, and by the sons and household of Jacob,—more, by nearly all the ancients—just as definitely and as well as by the generations of Israel after the giving of the law formally from Mt. Sinai. Indeed, it seems almost, from the record in Genesis, that the knowledge of God and of his commandments, and the obligation to worship him was more general, and was heeded with more scrupulous care by the ancients than in later times. But this seeming may be only a result of the brevity of the ancient record. 2. “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image,” &c. Jacob and Rachel and their household were evidently instructed in this commandment. Gen. 31: 19, 30-35; 35: 1-5. 4. “Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy,” &c. The Sabbath was instituted in Eden and given to man before his fall by transgression. Gen. 2: 2, 3. 5. “Honor thy father and thy mother,” &c. Noah and his sons understood this commandment, and Ham was cursed for violating it. Gen. 9: 21-25. 6. “Thou shalt not kill.” Cain’s guilt and confession exhibited his knowledge of this commandment, Gen. 4: 13; while in verse 23 Lamech confesses to a violation of it, and in verse 24 says: “If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and seven,” thus exhibiting his understanding of the enormity of the crime. Furthermore, God definitely and formally announced to Noah, Gen. 9: 5, 6, “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed.” 7. “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” If it may be doubted that Adam and Eve were directly taught this precept by God personally, and fully instructed in the law of chastity and purity, as suggested above, it is certain that even Pharaoh of Egypt possessed a knowledge of the sin of adultery as was manifested in the case of Sarah, Gen. 12: 14-20; while from chapter 20 we not only learn that Abimelech, king of Gerar, knew it to be a sin, but also that God directly instructed Abimelech in respect thereto in very strong and positive language. Gen. 38 shows in the plainest language, in the case of Judah and Tamar, that this commandment was known, that the violation of it was a great sin, and that those guilty of this sin were denominated and characterized by language of reproach, nearly the same as now used. So also is it positively certain that Joseph persistently refused to be seduced into this sin, saying, “How can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?” 8. “Thou shalt not steal.” Jacob, Rachel and Laban apparently understood this eighth command, as did the sons of Jacob; and the crime of theft is denominated by these persons by its proper name, and by them regarded as deserving the greatest punishment, even death. 10. “Thou shalt not covet,” &c. The violation of this commandment must necessarily precede the violation of the eighth; and as it appears that that precept was known and its violation regarded as a very great sin, so this tenth one must have been known. Besides, it is shown that covetousness was one of the great sins of Adam and Eve in Eden; that Cain coveted the divine favor received by Abel and became envious, and exhibited guilt. Jacob was scrupulously careful not to even appear to covet any thing of Laban’s. Jacob and his sons manifested the same scrupulous care in respect to any thing that belonged to the governor of Egypt. The same care is often manifest in Abraham’s life. Finally, from chapters 18: 19, and 26: 3-5 we learn definitely that Abraham “kept the way of the Lord;” “kept his charge” (in respect to God’s covenant with him, and the circumcision and the sacrificial offerings therefore required), “his commandments, his statutes, and his laws,” which he was to teach in turn to his children and household, and command obedience thereto. 1. Fact: Before the transgression in Eden, the representatives of the race were placed on probation or trial, and were held responsible for rectitude of conduct, subject to God’s government and providence, with a law, or system of laws, whose sanctions were everlasting life as the reward for obedience, and death as the penalty for disobedience. Inference: Therefore moral law, or a system of moral laws, to guide the conduct of man in the development of moral character, was seen by God to be essential to man in his state of innocence and before his fall by sin, the same as since his sin. 2. Fact: The Sabbath institution and the marriage institution were made for man before his fall by sin. It appears also that the Sabbath institution was just as definitely and especially given to man then and there in Eden by God, as was the marriage institution. Though upon the first of these institutions is based the fourth commandment of the decalogue as subsequently given from Mt. Sinai in language adapted to the then existing conditions and relations, and upon the second is based the seventh commandment, yet these institutions do neither of them derive their sacredness from the decalogue; but the fourth commandment guards and protects the sacredness of the Sabbath institution, while the seventh guarantees that of the marriage institution. Inference: Law being essential to regulate and govern the conduct of man in his relations to his fellow-man and to his Maker in a state of innocence (as seen), as well as in a state of sin; and as, in a righteous government, where and when the reason for a law exists, there and then that law must be, therefore the whole law must have been given in Eden. 3. Fact: God’s government, from the nature of his character, must have been, from the first, a government administered in justice and righteousness. Inference: Therefore, the law regulating and protecting the Sabbath and the law regulating and guarding marriage (which institutions must have been essential to man from the first or they would not have been given), essentially as subsequently engraved on the tablets of the law, must have been given to Adam before the fall by sin, and to his immediate posterity after the transgression. 4. Fact: These two institutions and their regulating and protecting laws were no more essential to man to regulate and govern him in his relations to his fellow-man and his Creator, either before or after he had sinned, than each of the other precepts of the decalogue. All ten precepts of the moral code were and are essential to provide for all relations and all duties and to secure all rights and all rectitude, and any code less inclusive than the decalogue would have been, and would now be, incomplete and imperfect as a rule for the development of moral character, and a law for the government of a moral life and a moral community. Inference: Therefore, the other eight precepts of the decalogue must also have been given to man at first in Eden, to guard from the beginning all the sacred interests which they are respectively designed and adapted to secure and protect. 5. Fact: From the creation of man God has been accustomed to hold him responsible for rectitude of conduct and a strictly moral life, and in all times and places to reward the obedient and punish the disobedient. To this fact all the ancients, obedient and disobedient, equally bear testimony. That sanctions by rewards and punishments have been administered to man by God, either directly by special providences, or by general laws, is a universally attested and universally known and acknowledged fact. But rewards and punishments were and are sanctions of law. And these sanctions, as administered anciently and from the beginning, were general in character and of universal application, and were evidently designed to enforce and secure general and universal moral rectitude of life. No one was exempt from their application. Inference: Law, then, or a system of laws, must have existed then and there at and from the very first existence of man, which these sanctions were designed to enforce, and must have been general and universal in character. 6. Fact: These sanctions—rewards for obedience and punishments for disobedience—were from the first existence of man in Eden, and before the fall, as far as revealed, and ever after the sin of the race, of the same uniform nature and character, substantially, as since the incorporation of the decalogue on Mt. Sinai. Inference: Therefore the law or system of laws, to which those attached as appropriate and enforcing sanctions, must have been substantially the same as the decalogue. 7. Fact: Adam and Eve, at and from the very first, were held responsible for moral rectitude of conduct, as were all their immediate and remote posterity subsequently. They were promptly punished for their first disobedience, as their posterity were ever punished for disobedience subsequently. But it would have been unjust and contrary to the known character of God and of his providences and government, to have held man responsible to law and to have punished him for a violation of a law of which he was ignorant, which had never been published, of which he had never had nor could have any knowledge. Enlightenment—knowledge—is essential to moral action, and hence to moral responsibility. Inference: Therefore, the moral law must have been taught to man before his fall, and must have been proclaimed to all thereafter who were held responsible thereto, and must have been known by all those, as a people, in all ages, who transgressed the same and were punished therefor; as well as by those who obeyed and were rewarded. 8. Fact: Cain and Abel offered sacrifices to God, and Abel’s sacrifice was more acceptable than Cain’s, because it was of the firstlings of the flock and required the shedding of typical blood. On descending from the ark after the flood had subsided (Gen. 8: 20, 21), “Noah builded an altar unto the Lord, and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt-offerings on the altar,” which the Lord approved. Would either of these, unaided and untaught of God, have been led to offer such sacrifices? Certainly not. And would either of them, untaught of God, have been able to understand that those offerings were typical of the great sacrifice of the Son of God upon the cross, for sin, and that blood was to be shed typical of Christ’s blood to be shed four thousand or two thousand years thereafter? And would Noah, untaught of God, have been led to make the distinction between the clean and the unclean of beasts and of fowls that he did, and just in accordance with the law of sacrifices and ceremonies, as afterwards given by God? Manifestly he would not. Abraham was directly instructed by God, afterward, to make offerings to him just in agreement with the Mosaic ceremonial ritual, which Abraham did. Gen. 15: 9, 10. And in Gen. 22, we have the memorable account of the grand trial of Abraham’s sublime faith and obedience, in his being asked to offer his only and greatly beloved son Isaac a sacrifice to God. Again, note this fact, the law of sacrifices and ceremonies is based directly upon the moral law of the decalogue, and is designed to honor and enforce the moral law, by providing types of the great atonement for sin, in the violation of that moral law. Now, is it reasonable to suppose that the ancients, including Cain, Abel, Noah and Abraham, were so definitely and carefully instructed in the ceremonial law of sacrifices (and we will here include the law of circumcision as the token of the covenant with Abraham), which was secondary and based on the moral law as primary (and designed to aid, for a limited time only, in securing obedience to said moral law and conformity therewith as well as to keep alive faith in a promised atonement for sin), and were yet left ignorant of, and uninstructed in, the primary moral law—the67decalogue? By no means. Inference: It is therefore again inferred that the moral law, substantially as engraved on the tables of stone and delivered from Mt. Sinai, was promulgated, entire, in Eden, and immediately after the first transgression of man, and was carefully taught to those ancient people, and a knowledge thereof transmitted from generation to generation down through all those centuries to the day of its repetition and formal reannouncement from Mt. Sinai; for that knowledge must have been essential to, and coextensive with, man’s responsibility to the law, which responsibility everywhere appears.