Thou shalt not commit adultery forbids sexual union with another's spouse and all unfaithfulness to the marriage vow, and it forbids adultery in heart and mind as well, so that lustful looking and cherishing impure desire is already guilt before God. It belongs to the last six commandments that define duty to one's neighbor, summed in love to neighbor as self, with supreme love and loyalty to God as their foundation. It was spoken by God's own voice and written by His finger on stone at Sinai, and it stands as part of His holy, changeless moral law, a transcript of His character that remains binding under the gospel and was not abolished by Christ's death. Christ restored its far-reaching spiritual claims in the Sermon on the Mount, perfectly fulfilled it in human nature, and, when confronted with the woman taken in adultery, upheld its authority while pardoning the penitent with the command to sin no more. Obedience to it with the whole law is the condition of holiness and eternal life and brings blessing, health and peace, while willful transgression is heinous sin that will be reviewed in the judgment, must be confessed and forsaken, and is cleansed only by Christ's blood.
Place Within Decalogue
Thou shalt not commit adultery belongs to the second table of stone and to the last six commandments that govern duties to one another and define duty to fellow human beings. It stands together with the prohibitions of killing, stealing, false witness, and coveting as requirements set before people today with no excuse for disobedience. It is distinct from the first four commandments that define duty to the Maker, yet faithfulness to God is the foundation for keeping it, for he who is false to God cannot be true to his neighbor. Pride breaks it by lifting self unto vanity and making a god of self, while the gospel of Christ keeps it by sanctifying the soul and expelling self-love. Its place among the last six underscores that marriage carries sacred obligations that must not be disregarded, so both parties must study marriage carefully rather than enter it impulsively. It is part of the law by which professed commandment-keepers must test conduct, so needless display in dress that spends God's time and money for self breaks these commandments and fails to love neighbor as self.
The last six, including this prohibition, are summed in brief in the command to love one's neighbor as oneself, distinct from the first four that require wholehearted, supreme love to God. The first four and the last six together are summed up in love to God and love to neighbor, and failure to keep either part proves failure in the whole. When the first commandments are loyally observed this commandment will be faithfully observed with the others, and when God has His rightful place on the throne of the heart it will be performed as directed. Love to God comprehends love for those formed in His own image, so this commandment is like unto the first, with love to God and love to man as two great principles springing from one root. The first cannot be kept while the second is broken, nor the second kept while the first is broken. Christ cites this second-table law when explaining what obedience requires and sums up these commandments in the duty to love one's neighbor as oneself.
The ten commandments are one moral code that can never be repealed while heaven and earth remain, from which all enlightened law and government comes, requiring implicit and willing obedience together with every other precept. Refusing this one precept is disloyalty to God, and its violation alone makes a person a commandment-breaker guilty of all, for the ten precepts are like links of a chain worthless if one is broken. No man has authority to flout or object to one prominent precept more than to any of the other nine, and disloyalty and general transgression by ministers, churches, and the world do not excuse disobedience or lessen the sin of the transgressor. God holds each person responsible for the observance of every one of His precepts, engraven on the two tables of stone for all mankind to endure through all time. Knowingly breaking any commandment for convenience is incompatible with trusting God. Breaking one commandment makes a person guilty of the law, and neglecting any of these last six demands leaves one convicted and wanting before God.
Those who keep the law of God in truth and righteousness obey this command together with every other command, and its principle will stand to witness against the world in the day of judgment and decide the destiny of every soul. Its restraining influence restores the moral image of God in man and keeps the individual soul in touch with the Creator, so obedience to it together with the first four must be revealed in life work with all business done according to the commandments. Professing to believe on Jesus Christ while passing over sins offensive to God and endorsing and commending sinful evil works violates this obedience. The young man's failure to love his neighbor meant that he failed to keep these last six commandments, despite thinking he had kept them. His supreme love of riches shut his eyes to the wants of his fellow men and proved he did not love his neighbor as himself, so he failed to keep this commandment together with the rest of the last six and with the first four concerning duty to God. Accepting the Sabbath entails obedience to the other commands of the Decalogue, so this precept cannot be disregarded while the Sabbath is truly kept, and reverencing the Sabbath sanctified at Creation leads to keeping it as the covenant sign and golden clasp that unites supreme obedience to God with duty to fellow man. Obeying it means not living for self and not seeking one's own enjoyment with disregard for the present and future happiness of others, while strong self-love that bestows love only on those who praise and flatter breaks it, injures close companions, and misleads them so they do not judge character correctly. The desire to accumulate property is not sinful if God is not forgotten and these six precepts are not transgressed, but transgressing them puts men and women where it is impossible to glorify God in body and spirit which are His.
Giving at Sinai
Thou shalt not commit adultery was spoken by God Himself with audible voice in the hearing of all the people, and it was given by Christ Jesus Himself as Teacher on Mount Sinai, Christ the Redeemer speaking from Sinai as the invisible King of Israel. It was proclaimed in awful grandeur with power and glory, amid smoke, flame, thunder, earthquake, trumpet, cloud and surrounding angels, so that the people trembled and stood afar off. That manner of giving reveals its importance, making known His majesty and authority as Ruler of the world and impressing the sacredness of the law and the importance of obeying it. It belongs to the instruction God gave to Moses on the mount that men must obey, to be studied with Exodus 19-24 and presented before the people in full detail in jots and tittles, needed now just as much as by the children of Israel in the days of Moses, guarding against injustice and guiding dealings with one another, calling for contention to cease and for loving as brethren with softened and subdued hearts. God delivered Israel from Egypt by His mighty power in spite of Pharaoh's opposition so that they might keep this law, and He brought them to Sinai to hear its proclamation.
It was written by God's own finger on tables of stone, engraved in Hebrew on the two stone tablets, sacred and glorious in significance. It is of divine and not human composition, standing apart from the rest of the Bible where divinely revealed truths are expressed in the words of men through dreams, visions, symbols and figures shed by the Holy Spirit into the minds and hearts of servants who embody the thought in human language with varied style, while this precept presents the divine alone without the union of the divine and the human found in Scripture as in the nature of Christ who was Son of God and Son of man. It was so written that a forgetful people could not forget it or mingle human tradition and practices with holy precepts, kept free from tradition and placed in the ark, with the solid rock signifying immutability. Its principles are also expressed and guarded by the specific judgments and statutes given to Moses, those directions clarifying duties to one another so people need not err.
It was not new at Sinai but belonged to God's moral law that already existed before it was spoken there, given to man in Eden at creation and to Adam after his fall, suited even to a holy order of beings and to angels before man was created. Adam taught it to his descendants and it was handed down through faithful generations, preserved in the ark by Noah who taught the ten commandments to his descendants, and observed by Abraham who obeyed God's voice, charge, commandments, statutes and laws. It was lost sight of during Israel's years of bondage in Egypt, where Abraham's descendants broke the covenant pledged by circumcision and went into idolatry, and after deliverance through the Red Sea they failed trial and needed to be left without excuse. Then it was proclaimed with divine power and glory to a delivered people to impress its sacredness and importance, to make known God's holiness and goodness and what the Creator expects from His creatures, and to make His government known, entrusted to Israel to preserve and hand down but not given only for Israel, rather for all people. Continual transgression called for the flood, and transgression bringing death as its penalty made necessary circumcision, the proclamation from Sinai and engraving on stone, and the death of Christ as a sacrifice to preserve the honor of the law while making escape possible.
Israel was prepared by washing, for they had to wash and cleanse their clothing before hearing that law, since the sacred law cannot be written on hearts while people remain unclean in person, clothing, or home. They were led to Sinai apart from human pride and entered solemn covenant to obey all that God had spoken, pledged as a people set apart as God's special people, and Moses recapitulated the Ten Commandments to the new generation so they would understand the need to obey. Because slavery had unfitted them to comprehend its far-reaching principles and it was not fully grasped, additional precepts were given to explain and apply the Ten Commandments, with minute directions in the judgments and laws Moses was required to write from the mouth of God while in the mount. Those judgments and statutes give minute directions about duty to one another and to the stranger and are the principles of the ten commandments simplified and stated in definite form so there need be no error, thereby guarding the commandment and drawing erring man prone to transgress back to strict obedience.
Its proclamation showed God's majesty and authority as Ruler and was meant to put His fear before the people that they sin not, to be held firmly, taught to children as God's holy, sacred, enduring and binding precepts, and kept in plain sight in every house. It is one of the ten precepts of Jehovah supreme in wisdom and authority and the foundation of all righteous and good laws, put into the mind and written in the heart, with words that are spirit and life having power to bring into subjection and enforce obedience. Those who have it there take it as the only authority they can acknowledge, living by every word of God with a good conscience, obeying the laws of the land unless they conflict with it, and when rulers require what conflicts, obeying God rather than men and sooner disobeying all men than deviating in the least.
It was made and proclaimed at Sinai by Christ, who knows every phase and principle of the law. Yet mere knowledge of it did not keep the leaders from rejecting its divine Lawgiver, for their failure to recognize Christ showed that knowing the law did not prevent that rejection.
Enduring Moral Authority
The commandment belongs to God's moral law, which is holy, just, good and perfect, a transcript of His character and an expression of His righteousness. That law is binding, solemn and unchangeable, changeless, eternal and immutable as His throne, spoken at Sinai and written by God on stone, and it endures forever as the unchangeable standard of right conduct by which every case will be reviewed in judgment. It sets out principles and rules for everyone, including men, women and children, wise, just and good, allowing no sinless departure from its standard, and the standard is never lowered to suit human weakness. No commandment can be discarded or amended by human beings, for the ten delivered from Sinai are moral and unchangeable.
It remains binding in letter and spirit under the gospel and did not die with Christ, for His death did not abolish it but proves its immutability. Christ died to vindicate the law, paying the debt caused by transgression and showing by example how to keep it, and to refuse its authority is to trample on God's law. It is distinct from the ceremonial law, from sacrificial offerings, circumcision and ceremonies that ceased when type met antitype, while the moral law remains binding in every age. The statutes explaining duties between people, including those concerning marriage, clarify and reinforce the moral law and were given to preserve Israel from the practices of idolatrous nations, and the need for such restraint and discipline remains in a corrupt age. To claim that the prohibition of adultery and restraint of sexual immorality, including taking a neighbor's wife, has been abolished removes no guilt but encourages uncleanness and turns grace into license, and those who so teach while claiming to serve Christ deny Him by life and character.
It was given in great love to order human conduct and restrict life to what increases real happiness in this life and fitness for heaven, to guard from sin, regulate life, and lead to virtues that ennoble and sanctify heart and mind. It lies at the foundation of all civilized national and domestic government and of all right, civil and family law, and of prophets and apostles, given to bless, keep and protect people, to preserve them in integrity and bring humanity into harmony with divinity by teaching what is right in dealings with one another. It can be kept, for Christ took human nature, passed over the ground where Adam stumbled, redeemed that failure by perfect obedience and resistance to temptation, and proved man can keep God's law and through His merits be a final overcomer. Keeping it requires not only the letter that specifies how to walk to please God but also the spirit that points to Jesus Christ as the atoning sacrifice through whose merits the sinner can fulfill its requirements, abiding in Christ's love as Christ abode in the Father's love, showing perfect harmony between law and gospel. Whoever breaks one of these least commandments and teaches men so by word, action or interpretation lessening its sacred claims shall have no place in the kingdom of heaven, for it says to every transgressor that death is certain, but every repentant soul turning to the Saviour shall as surely be saved because Christ died for men.
Though entrusted to Israel to preserve and hand down, it was proclaimed at Sinai so all mankind could understand God's requirements, expressing the character of the Sovereign of the universe and covering the whole duty of humanity. Its principles are for people of every nation and tongue, for all nations, ages and classes, binding on all people until the end of time, whose just claims are to be upheld and whose authority all must finally acknowledge. At the judgment the law will be presented as the standard of righteousness; people are judged by its principles, obedience to God's perfect law is a prerequisite of salvation and a condition of salvation, and its righteous principles determine whether people receive life or death, leaving no one with excuse for sin. No human authority can change, discard or set it aside.
It is a central testing truth whose importance must not be displaced by disputes over minor matters, with binding claims and solemn injunctions that must be set forth clearly and distinctly just as given, proclaimed in God's own voice from Sinai amid awful grandeur so people would recognize its importance. Those who have received the baptism of the Holy Spirit urge its claims and press obedience upon rulers and subjects of earthly nations, showing that everyone works in harmony either with God or with the great rebel, and its commandments are not to be treated as unimportant or represented in a cheap or careless way. When its solemn words are repeated many are impressed, sinners tremble, many awake to a sense of duty, and find from experience that it is perfect for converting the soul. Obedience to all ten marks God's people as distinct and provokes the dragon's opposition, so lowering the standard would remove that distinction, and loyalty to it calls for moral courage despite opposition and contempt. It must be shown with a certain trumpet sound rather than in a tame and voiceless way, for it carries God's solemn and vital requirements, His justice and His denunciation of sin, draws a firm distinction between good and evil and cannot be treated as a dead letter. To interpret the Bible to please the unrenewed heart, to degrade God's love to weak sentimentalism making little distinction between good and evil, to keep God's justice and the requirements of His law out of sight, and to reject the Bible as the foundation of faith is to make it of no effect, and Christ is as verily denied by that course as by open unbelief.
It was given by God as Ruler of the world, proclaimed from Sinai in awful grandeur to be observed, and setting aside any one of these commandments and presenting in its place observance of a day that bears no sanctity is usurping an authority that infringes upon divine prerogatives and will be dealt with by Jehovah. Obeying a human law such as the Sunday Sabbath would compel transgression of the laws of Jehovah, while human enactments that conflict with the laws of God bear not the stamp of divine approval, so God must be obeyed rather than men. It was spoken with a Thus saith the Lord, carrying divine authority that stands above the maxims, customs and precepts of men handed down from generation to generation through scribes, Pharisees and rabbis. In Christ's time those customs and traditions were made all-essential and regarded as of more force even than the ten commandments, so that the precepts and teachings of men were dwelt upon as of more value than the words of God, and this kept His disciples back from advancing in knowledge and becoming efficient workers. Christ upheld the commandments as an expression of truth in its purity and distinguished them from human maxims and traditions, whose authority was wrongly treated as more important than theirs.
What Adultery Forbids
The command forbids literal outward adultery, including a wife's unfaithfulness to marriage vows and sexual union with another's spouse, and its plain meaning cannot be twisted to make such unfaithfulness acceptable to God. To teach that such unfaithfulness is not offensive and does not break the commandment is to make it void, wrest Scripture, and bring destruction on self and ruin on souls led astray. Its restrictions were disregarded when the children of Seth chose wives as they pleased from Cain's descendants, drawing worshipers of God into sin and loss of holy character. Violation through sexual misconduct with more than one person brings guilt before God, deeply distresses a spouse, and leads others astray when the guilty holds trusted leadership. A minister's sacred position and profession of faith do not excuse an impure proposal or make it less sinful, and taking advantage of trust to pursue such advances violates the plain command and must be rejected rather than treated as harmless.
The command forbids adultery in heart and mind as well as act, so looking with lust and cherishing lascivious thoughts, desires, dispositions and unholy passions in secret is already adultery and as guilty as open violation. Violation with the body follows the mind's impurity, for a mind given to lust cannot remain consecrated and a body used for impure acts cannot glorify God or be preserved in sanctification and honor. Obedience therefore means yielding the body as an instrument of righteousness and keeping it free from impurity, obeyed from the heart out of love for its pure principles and not merely assented to in theory. Those who profess it while cherishing lust and making provision to please self live a lie, for whom truth loses vitalizing power while sin strengthens, leaving them without strength, confidence and efficiency. The unholy passions that find marriage a barrier to gratifying lust are the primary cause of lax views of marriage and of putting away a wife for trivial offenses that lead to wretchedness, suffering, crime and sin.
The command is broken by a married man or woman loving another person and keeping the mind continually on transgression even if the act does not follow, by coveting another's spouse, and by showing improper affection and undue familiarity. It is broken by placing romantic love upon one who is not one's wife, including loving another before divorce and continuing that love after the wife has obtained divorce, with loving before divorce the worse transgression, and by spoken longing to be free from an unloved wife and by secret plans carried on under falsehood and deception instead of open conduct. It is broken by married men and married women showing affection and giving undue attention to persons of the opposite sex, being unduly familiar with unmarried women, and by frivolous conduct leading toward transgression. True sanctification keeps the mind in strict obedience, so disregarding marriage law while claiming sanctification and inability to sin is a satanic counterfeit that sanctifies sin, working as lovesick sentimentalism progressing to open transgression in fatal self-righteousness. Keeping the command requires great care in companionship and friendship to guard the soul from peril and to shun even the appearance of evil that would lower principle and sap belief, while professing to keep the fourth commandment while breaking the seventh is deception recorded in heaven as deceiver and adulterer, laying a stumbling block, bringing stigma on conscientious Sabbathkeepers, and requiring immediate rebuke, separation and withdrawal of misplaced confidence.
The command forbids licentious indulgence, unlawful intimacy, unholy practices, impurity and debasing conduct, including kissing, sitting on the lap, encircling the waist, sensual looks and deportment, lying in bed together, gathering women as a wife would, and frivolous familiarity. It is transgressed when married men pursue or encourage intimate attention from young women or other married women, and familiar attention between married men and young women or between married people clouds judgment, weakens resistance and leads to impure thoughts and conduct. Such familiarity must be rejected at its first approach since it weakens resistance to temptation and endangers moral purity. A married man who gives improper attention to other women breaks God's commandments and causes his wife great suffering. Those who defend the fourth commandment while violating the seventh by unholy practices are still transgressing God's law, charged as adultery in the heavenly record.
The command binds ministers and watchmen handling sacred things as well as others, and sexual sin violates God's law even when committed in religious work, dishonoring the body and making a person unfit to teach while continuing in it. Exploiting sacred trust through visiting and counseling to take liberties, prying into secrets of married life, stirring discontent between husband and wife, encouraging lovesick sentimentalism, and alluring with claims of spiritual harmony or union so that indulgence appears righteousness is aggravated crime that defiles, corrupts others, breaks down the moral standard, perverts judgment to call sin righteousness, and brings reproach on the cause. For a watchman advocating the binding claims of holy law, yielding to lower passions, infatuation, deliberately seeking women's society, walking into temptation and failing to abstain from appearance of evil works ruin and shipwreck of faith, spreads a bewitching snare, gives enemies occasion to reproach the faith, and perplexes those beginning to see light. Decided transgression unfits a man to act in ministry unless converted, and the sin is witnessed by God as Watcher who sees actions and hears words, registered in heaven's books, to be felt and confessed to God and brethren with clean work rather than covered, its blot removed only by Christ's blood.
Violating the command knowingly after time to consider is not ignorance or small offense but deliberate disregard revealing depraved character, reproved and exposed by its truth, requiring complete transformation and genuine reform. Breaking it more than once is serious crime on forbidden ground, where profession of principle and zeal does not make conduct right, and lack of remorse leaves risk of sinning again, with deeply ingrained wickedness giving little hope of change. It condemns adulterous and licentious conduct even when someone professes to keep God's commandments, and calls for confession to God and to those wronged. One who commits sexual unfaithfulness cannot rightly claim to do no wrong, and repentance must be genuine with reform, for leaving the person or place does not change the heart and concealing sin without evidence of repentance does not correct it.
Guarding Marriage and Purity
The commandment hedges marriage about with sacred restriction, allowing no legal separation except for adultery itself. It condemns lax views that treat marriage as a mere barrier to lust and that lightly put away a spouse for trivial reasons. By forbidding adultery not only in outward act but in the heart, it exposes the unholy passions that lead to such trifling with divorce. In this way the marriage vow is made sacred and the family is protected.
The marriage vow stands as a sacred safeguard and bulwark to protect the family. Its restraint is binding, and those who disregard the commandments sow disobedience to reap disobedience. If its restraint were wholly removed, the marriage bond would no longer protect a person, and he who had power could, if he desired, take his neighbor's wife by violence. Then lust and sexual violence would go unchecked, and peace, rest, and happiness would be banished from the earth. The civilized world would be turned into a horde of robbers and assassins.
Obedience to the last six commandments, to which this prohibition belongs, calls for entering marriage thoughtfully with a true sense of its sacredness and obligations rather than impulsively. Both parties must study marriage carefully and recognize that it carries sacred obligations that must not be disregarded. Contemplating marriage with one who is still bound to another violates the law and the thought should be rejected as soon as it arises. A woman who connects her life with a man who already has a wife and children is guilty of adultery, for the man remains accountable to God for his work in connection with his wife and children, and no woman has right as a child of God to join her life to him. Pursuing a married person out of guilty love is likewise forbidden, for it threatens the innocent spouse and family.
Christ and Gospel Light
The law spoken at Sinai was spoken through Christ, who knew the full reach and dignity of every commandment, including the prohibition of adultery. Against the reduction of that law to a cold code of commands and traditions, He restored its true light and taught its far-reaching claims, revealing its true character as holy, just, good, and the enduring standard of righteousness as long as heaven and earth endure. That teaching was given with special fullness in the Sermon on the Mount, where the great principles of the last six commandments were opened beyond the technical interpretations of the scribes. The same clear, ringing voice that proclaimed the law on Sinai later commanded the cleansing of the temple at Jerusalem, where priests and rulers were transgressing it by perverting worship into extortion and robbery through unfair transactions and unholy traffic in the outer courts that oppressed the poor who came seeking forgiveness.
When asked what good thing must be done to have eternal life, Jesus answered to keep the commandments and named the prohibition of adultery together with doing no murder, not stealing, not bearing false witness, honoring father and mother, and loving the neighbor as self. The young ruler claimed to have kept all these from his youth up, and Jesus then called him to be perfect by going and selling what he had and giving to the poor to have treasure in heaven, and coming to follow Him. His claim was false, for his supreme love of riches shut his eyes to the wants of his fellow men and proved he did not love his neighbor as himself, so he failed to keep this commandment together with the rest of the last six, which hang on love to neighbor, and with the first four concerning duty to God. The lawyer likewise recognized these last six as part of the law's full requirements for eternal life, and neglecting any of them left him convicted and wanting before God; knowingly breaking any commandment for convenience is incompatible with trusting God.
The accusers who brought the guilty woman claimed she had committed adultery and that Moses' law required her to be stoned, with the witnesses in the case to cast the first stone. Their appeal to the commandment was a pretext to trap Jesus, since acquitting her could be portrayed as contempt for Moses' law, while condemning her could be portrayed as assuming authority reserved to the Romans. They had themselves led her into sin in order to lay the snare, and their own lives held guilty secrets which Christ traced before them in the dust. Exposed as guilty and condemned in the presence of infinite purity, they went away one by one, revealing His stainless purity and their guilt and hypocrisy. He pitied the woman, did not set aside the law and did not condemn her, but sent her away with the command to sin no more, showing that pardon is given with the requirement to leave the sin.
Like every precept of the law, the commandment condemns sin, and Christ perfectly fulfilled the law in human nature, obeying the Ten Commandments and redeeming Adam's failure by perfect obedience and resistance to temptation. By so doing He vindicated God's justice in requiring perfect obedience and proved that man can keep God's law and through His merits be a final overcomer. Through faith the repentant, obedient person receives Christ's perfection to cover transgression, and through His sacrifice transgressors may be forgiven and through His help enabled to obey its commands. Keeping it requires not only the letter that specifies how to walk to please God but also the spirit that points to Jesus as the atoning sacrifice through whose merits the sinner can fulfill its requirements, abiding in His love as He abode in the Father's love and showing perfect harmony between law and gospel. When a person abides in Christ and shares in the divine nature, thoughts, purposes, and actions come into harmony with God's will as expressed in this holy law that defines righteousness, enabling obedience to every divine precept; whoever breaks one of these least commandments and teaches men so by word, action, or interpretation lessening its sacred claims shall have no place in the kingdom of heaven. People cannot attain the spiritual perfection it requires by themselves or by a self-made standard, for claims to sanctification while disregarding it are false, but through union with Him they may share in the divine nature and overcome through His merits, with the repentant soul turning to the Saviour as surely saved because Christ died for men.
Judgment Salvation and Blessing
The prohibition is one of ten authoritative commands that express divine righteousness and goodness, forming the immutable standard of character by which every case will be reviewed and destiny decided as life or death. It belongs to the last six that define and require love for other people, so obedience is evidence of genuine saving knowledge and eternal life is the reward for keeping the two great principles of love to God and love to others. At Christ's return its authority will be revealed in majesty, and those who have despised or transgressed its holy precepts will then recognize it and understand their guilt, with no excuse left for sin. Spoken from Sinai as the conditions of life, obedience gives free access again to the tree of life lost through disobedience, and it serves as the guide to life and the rule by which people are judged.
Obedience to it with the whole law sanctifies humanity and shows a willing relationship with the heavenly Father, honoring sacred law and authority by acting justly, purely and truly. When attention is called to these ten precepts pointing out human duty and their light is seen, rejection brings responsibility, while doing the divine will brings knowledge of doctrine whether it is of God. As a father's laws obeyed bring order and happiness to his family, so obedience to the laws that control the divine kingdom brings order, while disobedience brings confusion, guilt and death. Its prohibition carries an implied promise that obedience brings blessing while disobedience brings danger and unhappiness.
The command is not arbitrary but a safeguard meant to protect from the harm caused by transgression, and received in Christ it works purity of character and brings happiness in obedience and joy through eternal ages. Its principles govern human existence and, if carried out in life, would keep out and prevent the curse of disease now flooding and spread through the world. Continual transgression of the natural laws bound up with it is continual transgression of divine law, for indulging lustful passions violates both moral law and the laws governing human life and brings suffering, disease and misery. Following its moral principles safeguards against wrong habits and immoral practices, while violating its precepts is linked with violation of physical law and harm to health and happiness; taking any course that needlessly expends vitality or beclouds the intellect sins against God and fails to glorify Him in body and spirit, which are His. Light now shines clearly on health reform so that living a perfect life is seen to require obeying these laws, and making natural law plain and urging obedience accompanies the third angel's message, leaving ignorance no excuse.
When its solemn words with binding claims are set forth clearly and repeated, many are impressed, sinners tremble, many awake to a sense of duty, and find from experience that it is perfect for converting the soul. Its requirements reach the heart, requiring purity in secret thoughts, desires and dispositions, so that even breaking one commandment is disloyalty; they reveal sin and show the sinner the need of Christ. Its truth has weight and gives the plain principles of heaven under which every soul must bow in humility and contrition, for sin is sin and must be called by its right name and not glossed over. Departing from it while claiming to do the will of heaven puts feet on the very brink of ruin, but coming to Jesus Christ in humility brings cleansing by His blood from all sin and every glossed-over iniquity and opens eyes that have been blind. David transgressed this law through his sin, and the law exposed him and brought him to conviction; he repented before God and relied on Christ's blood for pardon, an example that the Spirit still awakens conscience to bring the commandments to remembrance through preaching Christ crucified, His love and infinite sacrifice.
Its truth must enter the heart where sin and guilt originate and not merely be read outwardly, for disobeying it disregards divine requirements even when the transgression seems small by human judgment. It contains a principle of heavenly origin to govern life in every particular, a transcript of character of value because it came forth from God, unchangeable to meet man in his fallen condition, a safe guide, foundation to build on, rule to live by, and standard by which judgment comes, requiring firm standing on "It is written" without turning aside. Any doctrine without these ten precepts as foundation is unsafe, and one who does not make them the foundation of life practice works on the enemy's side. Keeping it reveals love for the Supreme Ruler and calls for more than professing faith, for it belongs to the last six comprised in loving neighbor as self and requires that love become part and parcel of being, shown in daily life, in unselfish kindness, tender pity, daily benevolence and helping one another. Human life is brief and probation short, so Christ's self-denying, self-sacrificing life must be earnestly copied in keeping it, and those who do so will compose His kingdom, enjoying the bliss of heaven themselves and adding to that bliss by reflecting the character of Him who is the light and joy and glory of heaven.
Seriousness Repentance and Discipline
Adultery is a grave, knowing violation of the commandment, not a small offense and not a sin of ignorance. It is heinous sin regarded with horror, which God does not wink at, and its violation brings severe judgment, displeasure and punishment. Light treatment of it by the church brings God’s displeasure, corrupts the young, weakens His people, and can cause His presence to depart from the congregation. This is especially serious while God is purifying a people zealous for good works. Anciently those who committed it were put to death outside the camp, and the abolition of stoning has led people to indulge the sin and regard it as minor, though it is no less serious now.
The commandment belongs to God’s law expressing His character and standard of righteousness, and its truth must enter the heart where sin and guilt originate. Disobeying it disregards God’s requirements even when the transgression seems small by human judgment. It stands among the last six precepts defining duty to fellow human beings, and breaking any of them is incompatible with being in favor with God. A heart defiled by sin fails to keep it, and Israel’s disobedience to commandments beyond the Sabbath brought God’s displeasure and punishment.
Breaking the commandment defiles the camp and requires arousing, cleansing and decided movements to cure the existing evil, and those who fail to act will not be clear. Continued breaking of it makes God’s people a sister to fallen Babylon, with churches corrupted and filled with every foul spirit, a cage for every unclean and hateful bird. Confession and sorrow alone do not make continued church fellowship or access to the house of God appropriate; those who commit this sin should be suspended from the church and its privileges, and the church should take strict, thorough action against it. The commandment applies to both old and young, remains binding, and those who keep the fourth commandment should live by the principles of all ten given at Sinai.
Professing to keep the fourth commandment while breaking the seventh is deception, a reproach to the cause and an offense to God. It is broken by gathering around a company of women who accompany a man from place to place as a wife would accompany her husband, disgracing their womanhood and wifehood, with all licentious, unchristianlike deportment and undue familiarity with married and unmarried women. Such a course is recorded in the ledger of heaven as deceiver and adulterer creeping into houses and leading captive women who ought to have wisdom, foresight and judgment. It lays a stumbling block before those who would believe the truth and brings upon all conscientious Sabbathkeepers the stigma rightly deserved by the offender. It therefore requires immediate rebuke and discountenancing, with separation from him and withdrawal of misplaced confidence, because unhappiness and ruin lie in the path of being led by him and many souls are destroyed by such satanic sophistry.
Harrison Smith and Sarah committed adultery, hid their wrongdoing, and compounded it with deceit, violating not this commandment only. Their secret acts and even their thoughts are known to God and recorded, bringing guilt and divine judgment and serious reproach to the church. Those who excuse or minimize such sin share blame by calling evil good; the offenders should remain outside the church, and any repentance must be shown in a life of continual repentance.
God as Watcher and Holy One sees actions and hears words, and secret acts, words and thoughts are registered in the books of heaven. Breaking the commandment includes intimate physical fondness and sexual union with another man’s wife, including kissing, sitting on the lap, encircling the waist, sensual looks and deportment, and lying in bed together. Such iniquity and adultery betrays sacred trust, especially aggravated in a watchman upon the walls of Zion or minister whose fall reproaches the cause of God. A man who gathers women around him through deception and behaves toward them as though they were his wife breaks it even while professing to keep the Sabbath, bringing reproach on those who faithfully keep the seventh day. The sin must be felt and sensed rather than covered, confessed to God and to brethren and to those wronged with clean work, and its foul blot removed only by the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ.
Among the Maories a person guilty of adultery was excluded from recognition in every tribe, deprived of property, and treated thereafter as an outlaw, showing how seriously the violation of the seventh commandment was regarded. Violating its demand for chastity belongs to a wider disregard for God’s law, with unchastity treated as a common sin that people often commit without shame.
Daily Obedience and Application
Thou shalt not commit adultery governs how people deal with one another and must be brought into business transactions and every line of work, forbidding every touch of injustice, oppression, robbery, deception, dishonest practice and secret taking of advantage. Dealing justly keeps its principles, while unjust dealing violates God's will, misrepresents His character, dishonors Him, becomes a stumbling block to others, and calls for thorough self-examination, cleansing and practical correction. No plea of working for God's cause or advancing His work can justify breaking it, for God will never be in league with its violation nor vindicate it, accepts no unjust transaction, and His cause is free from every taint of injustice and can gain nothing by such means. Gaining advantage by oppression and robbery and by taking away the individuality and rights of members of God's family is abhorrent to Him, and prosperity will not attend moves that ignore these holy principles.
The commandment belongs to the Ten Commandments whose authority extends to the laws God established in the human body, and its precepts are as truly divine as the laws governing the body written on every nerve and fiber. Needlessly violating those natural and physical laws is violation of God's law and sin against the Creator, as serious as breaking the commandments, whether done carelessly or willfully. Indulging depraved appetite, lust and lustful passions violates God's law, beclouds the intellect, excites the lower passions, needlessly expends vitality, fails to glorify Him in body and spirit which are His, and brings the curse of disease now flooding the world that obedience would keep out. Health reform helps people recognize this sin, teaches that breaking the body's natural laws is sinful, and calls them to obey the laws God established in their being, with self-restraint in appetite revealing whether they are governed by principle. Light is now shining clearly so that to live a perfect life these laws must be obeyed, making natural law plain and urging obedience to it accompanies the third angel's message, so ignorance is no excuse for continual transgression.
Parents must teach the commandment with the whole law to children in the home when rising up and sitting down, when going out and coming in, and onward to their own children, stating plain decided requirements and prohibitions of what must and must not be done. Children are to be taught to respect and obey these commands from principle, with No said without loss of temper but decidedly and meant, firmly refusing disorder, careless handling of things, throwing things on the floor or in the dirt, and quenching every undesirable habit when it first appears, training them from earliest years to be neat, cleanly and orderly because heaven is orderly and every family must be disciplined to orderly ways. Neglect of that loving home authority sends children to the street for education and makes drunkards, while universal obedience in loving God and keeping His commandments as the whole duty of man would stop thefts, robberies and murders and the filling of jails and prisons with criminals from prevailing crime and wickedness.
The law of chastity given from Sinai after deliverance from Egypt requires the highest regard for purity and forbids looseness in manners, carelessness about chastity, unchastity as serious sin strongly abhorred by God, and taking liberties with women that transgress it. It applies especially to male physicians in attitude and treatment toward women patients in medical work and to all in responsible positions and every line of work, guarding against moral danger so that human conduct does not dishonor God or become a stumbling block. All who live by the Sinai laws including this commandment may be safely trusted. Both Testaments frequently and forcefully rebuke unchastity, and its place among the Ten Commandments written on stone for universal government amid awe-inspiring signs of God's presence shows its gravity.
God's holy law cannot be written on hearts of those whose habits contradict it, as Israel had to cleanse clothing before hearing it at Sinai, so high profession of faith, mighty works, or merely observing the Sabbath outwardly does not honor it or save the soul. It must be obeyed from the heart out of love for its pure principles, with inward practical honoring of all ten written on the heart and conscientious surrender of every habit, practice and sin that closes the door against Jesus, not merely assented to in theory or taught while holding a wrong course and making provision to please self. Those who profess purity while cherishing lust in the heart live a lie, for whom truth loses vitalizing power while sin strengthens, leaving them without strength, confidence and efficiency as workers. Knowingly breaking any commandment for convenience is incompatible with trusting God, and claiming sanctification while ignoring it or replacing it with a self-made standard is spurious, with professing the fourth commandment while breaking the seventh recorded as deception.
Its principles must be practiced in daily life, for doing them is the clearest sermon about the law, and neglecting obedience is flagrant sin that disheartens those who honor its claims and can turn others away from truth. Had it with the other commandments been obeyed with heart and mind, the wickedness now seen in cities and the world would never have existed, and obeying it brings knowledge that the Lord is sanctification and redemption and would bring great change. It means just what it reads, and no man or company of men can change it. It is to be vindicated by obedience and strong arguments, printed in plain letters in a prominent place so people can know it, with old-time reverence and just, pure and true action, including just treatment and restitution for wrongs such as those to the colored race and refusal of Freemasonry honors and worldly conformity under opposition.
Disregarding it beyond the Sabbath is still sin breaking God's higher law written by His own finger on stone, which is part of God Himself, and transgressing it is disloyalty to His government calling transgressors back to allegiance. It must be obeyed with strict regard by holy and faithful observers, for disobedience carries definite penalty, punishment surely follows transgression, and recorded cases from Eden onward with Adam and Eve, the law given in Eden with its penalty, their temptation, fall and punishment prove that the wages of sin is death and God's retributive justice never fails. God is great and holy and jealous, will not entrust His flock to those perverted by cherished errors, bears patiently and warns before punishing, but persistent refusal to obey brings judgment intended to awaken transgressors to sin and peril.
Thou shalt not commit adultery forbids sexual union with another's spouse and all unfaithfulness to the marriage vow, and it forbids adultery in heart and mind as well, so that lustful looking and cherishing impure desire is already guilt before God. It belongs to the last six commandments that define duty to one's neighbor, summed in love to neighbor as self, with supreme love and loyalty to God as their foundation. It was spoken by God's own voice and written by His finger on stone at Sinai, and it stands as part of His holy, changeless moral law, a transcript of His character that remains binding under the gospel and was not abolished by Christ's death. Christ restored its far-reaching spiritual claims in the Sermon on the Mount, perfectly fulfilled it in human nature, and, when confronted with the woman taken in adultery, upheld its authority while pardoning the penitent with the command to sin no more. Obedience to it with the whole law is the condition of holiness and eternal life and brings blessing, health and peace, while willful transgression is heinous sin that will be reviewed in the judgment, must be confessed and forsaken, and is cleansed only by Christ's blood.
Place Within Decalogue
Thou shalt not commit adultery belongs to the second table of stone and to the last six commandments that govern duties to one another and define duty to fellow human beings. It stands together with the prohibitions of killing, stealing, false witness, and coveting as requirements set before people today with no excuse for disobedience. It is distinct from the first four commandments that define duty to the Maker, yet faithfulness to God is the foundation for keeping it, for he who is false to God cannot be true to his neighbor. Pride breaks it by lifting self unto vanity and making a god of self, while the gospel of Christ keeps it by sanctifying the soul and expelling self-love. Its place among the last six underscores that marriage carries sacred obligations that must not be disregarded, so both parties must study marriage carefully rather than enter it impulsively. It is part of the law by which professed commandment-keepers must test conduct, so needless display in dress that spends God's time and money for self breaks these commandments and fails to love neighbor as self.
The last six, including this prohibition, are summed in brief in the command to love one's neighbor as oneself, distinct from the first four that require wholehearted, supreme love to God. The first four and the last six together are summed up in love to God and love to neighbor, and failure to keep either part proves failure in the whole. When the first commandments are loyally observed this commandment will be faithfully observed with the others, and when God has His rightful place on the throne of the heart it will be performed as directed. Love to God comprehends love for those formed in His own image, so this commandment is like unto the first, with love to God and love to man as two great principles springing from one root. The first cannot be kept while the second is broken, nor the second kept while the first is broken. Christ cites this second-table law when explaining what obedience requires and sums up these commandments in the duty to love one's neighbor as oneself.
The ten commandments are one moral code that can never be repealed while heaven and earth remain, from which all enlightened law and government comes, requiring implicit and willing obedience together with every other precept. Refusing this one precept is disloyalty to God, and its violation alone makes a person a commandment-breaker guilty of all, for the ten precepts are like links of a chain worthless if one is broken. No man has authority to flout or object to one prominent precept more than to any of the other nine, and disloyalty and general transgression by ministers, churches, and the world do not excuse disobedience or lessen the sin of the transgressor. God holds each person responsible for the observance of every one of His precepts, engraven on the two tables of stone for all mankind to endure through all time. Knowingly breaking any commandment for convenience is incompatible with trusting God. Breaking one commandment makes a person guilty of the law, and neglecting any of these last six demands leaves one convicted and wanting before God.
Those who keep the law of God in truth and righteousness obey this command together with every other command, and its principle will stand to witness against the world in the day of judgment and decide the destiny of every soul. Its restraining influence restores the moral image of God in man and keeps the individual soul in touch with the Creator, so obedience to it together with the first four must be revealed in life work with all business done according to the commandments. Professing to believe on Jesus Christ while passing over sins offensive to God and endorsing and commending sinful evil works violates this obedience. The young man's failure to love his neighbor meant that he failed to keep these last six commandments, despite thinking he had kept them. His supreme love of riches shut his eyes to the wants of his fellow men and proved he did not love his neighbor as himself, so he failed to keep this commandment together with the rest of the last six and with the first four concerning duty to God. Accepting the Sabbath entails obedience to the other commands of the Decalogue, so this precept cannot be disregarded while the Sabbath is truly kept, and reverencing the Sabbath sanctified at Creation leads to keeping it as the covenant sign and golden clasp that unites supreme obedience to God with duty to fellow man. Obeying it means not living for self and not seeking one's own enjoyment with disregard for the present and future happiness of others, while strong self-love that bestows love only on those who praise and flatter breaks it, injures close companions, and misleads them so they do not judge character correctly. The desire to accumulate property is not sinful if God is not forgotten and these six precepts are not transgressed, but transgressing them puts men and women where it is impossible to glorify God in body and spirit which are His.
Giving at Sinai
Thou shalt not commit adultery was spoken by God Himself with audible voice in the hearing of all the people, and it was given by Christ Jesus Himself as Teacher on Mount Sinai, Christ the Redeemer speaking from Sinai as the invisible King of Israel. It was proclaimed in awful grandeur with power and glory, amid smoke, flame, thunder, earthquake, trumpet, cloud and surrounding angels, so that the people trembled and stood afar off. That manner of giving reveals its importance, making known His majesty and authority as Ruler of the world and impressing the sacredness of the law and the importance of obeying it. It belongs to the instruction God gave to Moses on the mount that men must obey, to be studied with Exodus 19-24 and presented before the people in full detail in jots and tittles, needed now just as much as by the children of Israel in the days of Moses, guarding against injustice and guiding dealings with one another, calling for contention to cease and for loving as brethren with softened and subdued hearts. God delivered Israel from Egypt by His mighty power in spite of Pharaoh's opposition so that they might keep this law, and He brought them to Sinai to hear its proclamation.
It was written by God's own finger on tables of stone, engraved in Hebrew on the two stone tablets, sacred and glorious in significance. It is of divine and not human composition, standing apart from the rest of the Bible where divinely revealed truths are expressed in the words of men through dreams, visions, symbols and figures shed by the Holy Spirit into the minds and hearts of servants who embody the thought in human language with varied style, while this precept presents the divine alone without the union of the divine and the human found in Scripture as in the nature of Christ who was Son of God and Son of man. It was so written that a forgetful people could not forget it or mingle human tradition and practices with holy precepts, kept free from tradition and placed in the ark, with the solid rock signifying immutability. Its principles are also expressed and guarded by the specific judgments and statutes given to Moses, those directions clarifying duties to one another so people need not err.
It was not new at Sinai but belonged to God's moral law that already existed before it was spoken there, given to man in Eden at creation and to Adam after his fall, suited even to a holy order of beings and to angels before man was created. Adam taught it to his descendants and it was handed down through faithful generations, preserved in the ark by Noah who taught the ten commandments to his descendants, and observed by Abraham who obeyed God's voice, charge, commandments, statutes and laws. It was lost sight of during Israel's years of bondage in Egypt, where Abraham's descendants broke the covenant pledged by circumcision and went into idolatry, and after deliverance through the Red Sea they failed trial and needed to be left without excuse. Then it was proclaimed with divine power and glory to a delivered people to impress its sacredness and importance, to make known God's holiness and goodness and what the Creator expects from His creatures, and to make His government known, entrusted to Israel to preserve and hand down but not given only for Israel, rather for all people. Continual transgression called for the flood, and transgression bringing death as its penalty made necessary circumcision, the proclamation from Sinai and engraving on stone, and the death of Christ as a sacrifice to preserve the honor of the law while making escape possible.
Israel was prepared by washing, for they had to wash and cleanse their clothing before hearing that law, since the sacred law cannot be written on hearts while people remain unclean in person, clothing, or home. They were led to Sinai apart from human pride and entered solemn covenant to obey all that God had spoken, pledged as a people set apart as God's special people, and Moses recapitulated the Ten Commandments to the new generation so they would understand the need to obey. Because slavery had unfitted them to comprehend its far-reaching principles and it was not fully grasped, additional precepts were given to explain and apply the Ten Commandments, with minute directions in the judgments and laws Moses was required to write from the mouth of God while in the mount. Those judgments and statutes give minute directions about duty to one another and to the stranger and are the principles of the ten commandments simplified and stated in definite form so there need be no error, thereby guarding the commandment and drawing erring man prone to transgress back to strict obedience.
Its proclamation showed God's majesty and authority as Ruler and was meant to put His fear before the people that they sin not, to be held firmly, taught to children as God's holy, sacred, enduring and binding precepts, and kept in plain sight in every house. It is one of the ten precepts of Jehovah supreme in wisdom and authority and the foundation of all righteous and good laws, put into the mind and written in the heart, with words that are spirit and life having power to bring into subjection and enforce obedience. Those who have it there take it as the only authority they can acknowledge, living by every word of God with a good conscience, obeying the laws of the land unless they conflict with it, and when rulers require what conflicts, obeying God rather than men and sooner disobeying all men than deviating in the least.
It was made and proclaimed at Sinai by Christ, who knows every phase and principle of the law. Yet mere knowledge of it did not keep the leaders from rejecting its divine Lawgiver, for their failure to recognize Christ showed that knowing the law did not prevent that rejection.
Enduring Moral Authority
The commandment belongs to God's moral law, which is holy, just, good and perfect, a transcript of His character and an expression of His righteousness. That law is binding, solemn and unchangeable, changeless, eternal and immutable as His throne, spoken at Sinai and written by God on stone, and it endures forever as the unchangeable standard of right conduct by which every case will be reviewed in judgment. It sets out principles and rules for everyone, including men, women and children, wise, just and good, allowing no sinless departure from its standard, and the standard is never lowered to suit human weakness. No commandment can be discarded or amended by human beings, for the ten delivered from Sinai are moral and unchangeable.
It remains binding in letter and spirit under the gospel and did not die with Christ, for His death did not abolish it but proves its immutability. Christ died to vindicate the law, paying the debt caused by transgression and showing by example how to keep it, and to refuse its authority is to trample on God's law. It is distinct from the ceremonial law, from sacrificial offerings, circumcision and ceremonies that ceased when type met antitype, while the moral law remains binding in every age. The statutes explaining duties between people, including those concerning marriage, clarify and reinforce the moral law and were given to preserve Israel from the practices of idolatrous nations, and the need for such restraint and discipline remains in a corrupt age. To claim that the prohibition of adultery and restraint of sexual immorality, including taking a neighbor's wife, has been abolished removes no guilt but encourages uncleanness and turns grace into license, and those who so teach while claiming to serve Christ deny Him by life and character.
It was given in great love to order human conduct and restrict life to what increases real happiness in this life and fitness for heaven, to guard from sin, regulate life, and lead to virtues that ennoble and sanctify heart and mind. It lies at the foundation of all civilized national and domestic government and of all right, civil and family law, and of prophets and apostles, given to bless, keep and protect people, to preserve them in integrity and bring humanity into harmony with divinity by teaching what is right in dealings with one another. It can be kept, for Christ took human nature, passed over the ground where Adam stumbled, redeemed that failure by perfect obedience and resistance to temptation, and proved man can keep God's law and through His merits be a final overcomer. Keeping it requires not only the letter that specifies how to walk to please God but also the spirit that points to Jesus Christ as the atoning sacrifice through whose merits the sinner can fulfill its requirements, abiding in Christ's love as Christ abode in the Father's love, showing perfect harmony between law and gospel. Whoever breaks one of these least commandments and teaches men so by word, action or interpretation lessening its sacred claims shall have no place in the kingdom of heaven, for it says to every transgressor that death is certain, but every repentant soul turning to the Saviour shall as surely be saved because Christ died for men.
Though entrusted to Israel to preserve and hand down, it was proclaimed at Sinai so all mankind could understand God's requirements, expressing the character of the Sovereign of the universe and covering the whole duty of humanity. Its principles are for people of every nation and tongue, for all nations, ages and classes, binding on all people until the end of time, whose just claims are to be upheld and whose authority all must finally acknowledge. At the judgment the law will be presented as the standard of righteousness; people are judged by its principles, obedience to God's perfect law is a prerequisite of salvation and a condition of salvation, and its righteous principles determine whether people receive life or death, leaving no one with excuse for sin. No human authority can change, discard or set it aside.
It is a central testing truth whose importance must not be displaced by disputes over minor matters, with binding claims and solemn injunctions that must be set forth clearly and distinctly just as given, proclaimed in God's own voice from Sinai amid awful grandeur so people would recognize its importance. Those who have received the baptism of the Holy Spirit urge its claims and press obedience upon rulers and subjects of earthly nations, showing that everyone works in harmony either with God or with the great rebel, and its commandments are not to be treated as unimportant or represented in a cheap or careless way. When its solemn words are repeated many are impressed, sinners tremble, many awake to a sense of duty, and find from experience that it is perfect for converting the soul. Obedience to all ten marks God's people as distinct and provokes the dragon's opposition, so lowering the standard would remove that distinction, and loyalty to it calls for moral courage despite opposition and contempt. It must be shown with a certain trumpet sound rather than in a tame and voiceless way, for it carries God's solemn and vital requirements, His justice and His denunciation of sin, draws a firm distinction between good and evil and cannot be treated as a dead letter. To interpret the Bible to please the unrenewed heart, to degrade God's love to weak sentimentalism making little distinction between good and evil, to keep God's justice and the requirements of His law out of sight, and to reject the Bible as the foundation of faith is to make it of no effect, and Christ is as verily denied by that course as by open unbelief.
It was given by God as Ruler of the world, proclaimed from Sinai in awful grandeur to be observed, and setting aside any one of these commandments and presenting in its place observance of a day that bears no sanctity is usurping an authority that infringes upon divine prerogatives and will be dealt with by Jehovah. Obeying a human law such as the Sunday Sabbath would compel transgression of the laws of Jehovah, while human enactments that conflict with the laws of God bear not the stamp of divine approval, so God must be obeyed rather than men. It was spoken with a Thus saith the Lord, carrying divine authority that stands above the maxims, customs and precepts of men handed down from generation to generation through scribes, Pharisees and rabbis. In Christ's time those customs and traditions were made all-essential and regarded as of more force even than the ten commandments, so that the precepts and teachings of men were dwelt upon as of more value than the words of God, and this kept His disciples back from advancing in knowledge and becoming efficient workers. Christ upheld the commandments as an expression of truth in its purity and distinguished them from human maxims and traditions, whose authority was wrongly treated as more important than theirs.
What Adultery Forbids
The command forbids literal outward adultery, including a wife's unfaithfulness to marriage vows and sexual union with another's spouse, and its plain meaning cannot be twisted to make such unfaithfulness acceptable to God. To teach that such unfaithfulness is not offensive and does not break the commandment is to make it void, wrest Scripture, and bring destruction on self and ruin on souls led astray. Its restrictions were disregarded when the children of Seth chose wives as they pleased from Cain's descendants, drawing worshipers of God into sin and loss of holy character. Violation through sexual misconduct with more than one person brings guilt before God, deeply distresses a spouse, and leads others astray when the guilty holds trusted leadership. A minister's sacred position and profession of faith do not excuse an impure proposal or make it less sinful, and taking advantage of trust to pursue such advances violates the plain command and must be rejected rather than treated as harmless.
The command forbids adultery in heart and mind as well as act, so looking with lust and cherishing lascivious thoughts, desires, dispositions and unholy passions in secret is already adultery and as guilty as open violation. Violation with the body follows the mind's impurity, for a mind given to lust cannot remain consecrated and a body used for impure acts cannot glorify God or be preserved in sanctification and honor. Obedience therefore means yielding the body as an instrument of righteousness and keeping it free from impurity, obeyed from the heart out of love for its pure principles and not merely assented to in theory. Those who profess it while cherishing lust and making provision to please self live a lie, for whom truth loses vitalizing power while sin strengthens, leaving them without strength, confidence and efficiency. The unholy passions that find marriage a barrier to gratifying lust are the primary cause of lax views of marriage and of putting away a wife for trivial offenses that lead to wretchedness, suffering, crime and sin.
The command is broken by a married man or woman loving another person and keeping the mind continually on transgression even if the act does not follow, by coveting another's spouse, and by showing improper affection and undue familiarity. It is broken by placing romantic love upon one who is not one's wife, including loving another before divorce and continuing that love after the wife has obtained divorce, with loving before divorce the worse transgression, and by spoken longing to be free from an unloved wife and by secret plans carried on under falsehood and deception instead of open conduct. It is broken by married men and married women showing affection and giving undue attention to persons of the opposite sex, being unduly familiar with unmarried women, and by frivolous conduct leading toward transgression. True sanctification keeps the mind in strict obedience, so disregarding marriage law while claiming sanctification and inability to sin is a satanic counterfeit that sanctifies sin, working as lovesick sentimentalism progressing to open transgression in fatal self-righteousness. Keeping the command requires great care in companionship and friendship to guard the soul from peril and to shun even the appearance of evil that would lower principle and sap belief, while professing to keep the fourth commandment while breaking the seventh is deception recorded in heaven as deceiver and adulterer, laying a stumbling block, bringing stigma on conscientious Sabbathkeepers, and requiring immediate rebuke, separation and withdrawal of misplaced confidence.
The command forbids licentious indulgence, unlawful intimacy, unholy practices, impurity and debasing conduct, including kissing, sitting on the lap, encircling the waist, sensual looks and deportment, lying in bed together, gathering women as a wife would, and frivolous familiarity. It is transgressed when married men pursue or encourage intimate attention from young women or other married women, and familiar attention between married men and young women or between married people clouds judgment, weakens resistance and leads to impure thoughts and conduct. Such familiarity must be rejected at its first approach since it weakens resistance to temptation and endangers moral purity. A married man who gives improper attention to other women breaks God's commandments and causes his wife great suffering. Those who defend the fourth commandment while violating the seventh by unholy practices are still transgressing God's law, charged as adultery in the heavenly record.
The command binds ministers and watchmen handling sacred things as well as others, and sexual sin violates God's law even when committed in religious work, dishonoring the body and making a person unfit to teach while continuing in it. Exploiting sacred trust through visiting and counseling to take liberties, prying into secrets of married life, stirring discontent between husband and wife, encouraging lovesick sentimentalism, and alluring with claims of spiritual harmony or union so that indulgence appears righteousness is aggravated crime that defiles, corrupts others, breaks down the moral standard, perverts judgment to call sin righteousness, and brings reproach on the cause. For a watchman advocating the binding claims of holy law, yielding to lower passions, infatuation, deliberately seeking women's society, walking into temptation and failing to abstain from appearance of evil works ruin and shipwreck of faith, spreads a bewitching snare, gives enemies occasion to reproach the faith, and perplexes those beginning to see light. Decided transgression unfits a man to act in ministry unless converted, and the sin is witnessed by God as Watcher who sees actions and hears words, registered in heaven's books, to be felt and confessed to God and brethren with clean work rather than covered, its blot removed only by Christ's blood.
Violating the command knowingly after time to consider is not ignorance or small offense but deliberate disregard revealing depraved character, reproved and exposed by its truth, requiring complete transformation and genuine reform. Breaking it more than once is serious crime on forbidden ground, where profession of principle and zeal does not make conduct right, and lack of remorse leaves risk of sinning again, with deeply ingrained wickedness giving little hope of change. It condemns adulterous and licentious conduct even when someone professes to keep God's commandments, and calls for confession to God and to those wronged. One who commits sexual unfaithfulness cannot rightly claim to do no wrong, and repentance must be genuine with reform, for leaving the person or place does not change the heart and concealing sin without evidence of repentance does not correct it.
Guarding Marriage and Purity
The commandment hedges marriage about with sacred restriction, allowing no legal separation except for adultery itself. It condemns lax views that treat marriage as a mere barrier to lust and that lightly put away a spouse for trivial reasons. By forbidding adultery not only in outward act but in the heart, it exposes the unholy passions that lead to such trifling with divorce. In this way the marriage vow is made sacred and the family is protected.
The marriage vow stands as a sacred safeguard and bulwark to protect the family. Its restraint is binding, and those who disregard the commandments sow disobedience to reap disobedience. If its restraint were wholly removed, the marriage bond would no longer protect a person, and he who had power could, if he desired, take his neighbor's wife by violence. Then lust and sexual violence would go unchecked, and peace, rest, and happiness would be banished from the earth. The civilized world would be turned into a horde of robbers and assassins.
Obedience to the last six commandments, to which this prohibition belongs, calls for entering marriage thoughtfully with a true sense of its sacredness and obligations rather than impulsively. Both parties must study marriage carefully and recognize that it carries sacred obligations that must not be disregarded. Contemplating marriage with one who is still bound to another violates the law and the thought should be rejected as soon as it arises. A woman who connects her life with a man who already has a wife and children is guilty of adultery, for the man remains accountable to God for his work in connection with his wife and children, and no woman has right as a child of God to join her life to him. Pursuing a married person out of guilty love is likewise forbidden, for it threatens the innocent spouse and family.
Christ and Gospel Light
The law spoken at Sinai was spoken through Christ, who knew the full reach and dignity of every commandment, including the prohibition of adultery. Against the reduction of that law to a cold code of commands and traditions, He restored its true light and taught its far-reaching claims, revealing its true character as holy, just, good, and the enduring standard of righteousness as long as heaven and earth endure. That teaching was given with special fullness in the Sermon on the Mount, where the great principles of the last six commandments were opened beyond the technical interpretations of the scribes. The same clear, ringing voice that proclaimed the law on Sinai later commanded the cleansing of the temple at Jerusalem, where priests and rulers were transgressing it by perverting worship into extortion and robbery through unfair transactions and unholy traffic in the outer courts that oppressed the poor who came seeking forgiveness.
When asked what good thing must be done to have eternal life, Jesus answered to keep the commandments and named the prohibition of adultery together with doing no murder, not stealing, not bearing false witness, honoring father and mother, and loving the neighbor as self. The young ruler claimed to have kept all these from his youth up, and Jesus then called him to be perfect by going and selling what he had and giving to the poor to have treasure in heaven, and coming to follow Him. His claim was false, for his supreme love of riches shut his eyes to the wants of his fellow men and proved he did not love his neighbor as himself, so he failed to keep this commandment together with the rest of the last six, which hang on love to neighbor, and with the first four concerning duty to God. The lawyer likewise recognized these last six as part of the law's full requirements for eternal life, and neglecting any of them left him convicted and wanting before God; knowingly breaking any commandment for convenience is incompatible with trusting God.
The accusers who brought the guilty woman claimed she had committed adultery and that Moses' law required her to be stoned, with the witnesses in the case to cast the first stone. Their appeal to the commandment was a pretext to trap Jesus, since acquitting her could be portrayed as contempt for Moses' law, while condemning her could be portrayed as assuming authority reserved to the Romans. They had themselves led her into sin in order to lay the snare, and their own lives held guilty secrets which Christ traced before them in the dust. Exposed as guilty and condemned in the presence of infinite purity, they went away one by one, revealing His stainless purity and their guilt and hypocrisy. He pitied the woman, did not set aside the law and did not condemn her, but sent her away with the command to sin no more, showing that pardon is given with the requirement to leave the sin.
Like every precept of the law, the commandment condemns sin, and Christ perfectly fulfilled the law in human nature, obeying the Ten Commandments and redeeming Adam's failure by perfect obedience and resistance to temptation. By so doing He vindicated God's justice in requiring perfect obedience and proved that man can keep God's law and through His merits be a final overcomer. Through faith the repentant, obedient person receives Christ's perfection to cover transgression, and through His sacrifice transgressors may be forgiven and through His help enabled to obey its commands. Keeping it requires not only the letter that specifies how to walk to please God but also the spirit that points to Jesus as the atoning sacrifice through whose merits the sinner can fulfill its requirements, abiding in His love as He abode in the Father's love and showing perfect harmony between law and gospel. When a person abides in Christ and shares in the divine nature, thoughts, purposes, and actions come into harmony with God's will as expressed in this holy law that defines righteousness, enabling obedience to every divine precept; whoever breaks one of these least commandments and teaches men so by word, action, or interpretation lessening its sacred claims shall have no place in the kingdom of heaven. People cannot attain the spiritual perfection it requires by themselves or by a self-made standard, for claims to sanctification while disregarding it are false, but through union with Him they may share in the divine nature and overcome through His merits, with the repentant soul turning to the Saviour as surely saved because Christ died for men.
Judgment Salvation and Blessing
The prohibition is one of ten authoritative commands that express divine righteousness and goodness, forming the immutable standard of character by which every case will be reviewed and destiny decided as life or death. It belongs to the last six that define and require love for other people, so obedience is evidence of genuine saving knowledge and eternal life is the reward for keeping the two great principles of love to God and love to others. At Christ's return its authority will be revealed in majesty, and those who have despised or transgressed its holy precepts will then recognize it and understand their guilt, with no excuse left for sin. Spoken from Sinai as the conditions of life, obedience gives free access again to the tree of life lost through disobedience, and it serves as the guide to life and the rule by which people are judged.
Obedience to it with the whole law sanctifies humanity and shows a willing relationship with the heavenly Father, honoring sacred law and authority by acting justly, purely and truly. When attention is called to these ten precepts pointing out human duty and their light is seen, rejection brings responsibility, while doing the divine will brings knowledge of doctrine whether it is of God. As a father's laws obeyed bring order and happiness to his family, so obedience to the laws that control the divine kingdom brings order, while disobedience brings confusion, guilt and death. Its prohibition carries an implied promise that obedience brings blessing while disobedience brings danger and unhappiness.
The command is not arbitrary but a safeguard meant to protect from the harm caused by transgression, and received in Christ it works purity of character and brings happiness in obedience and joy through eternal ages. Its principles govern human existence and, if carried out in life, would keep out and prevent the curse of disease now flooding and spread through the world. Continual transgression of the natural laws bound up with it is continual transgression of divine law, for indulging lustful passions violates both moral law and the laws governing human life and brings suffering, disease and misery. Following its moral principles safeguards against wrong habits and immoral practices, while violating its precepts is linked with violation of physical law and harm to health and happiness; taking any course that needlessly expends vitality or beclouds the intellect sins against God and fails to glorify Him in body and spirit, which are His. Light now shines clearly on health reform so that living a perfect life is seen to require obeying these laws, and making natural law plain and urging obedience accompanies the third angel's message, leaving ignorance no excuse.
When its solemn words with binding claims are set forth clearly and repeated, many are impressed, sinners tremble, many awake to a sense of duty, and find from experience that it is perfect for converting the soul. Its requirements reach the heart, requiring purity in secret thoughts, desires and dispositions, so that even breaking one commandment is disloyalty; they reveal sin and show the sinner the need of Christ. Its truth has weight and gives the plain principles of heaven under which every soul must bow in humility and contrition, for sin is sin and must be called by its right name and not glossed over. Departing from it while claiming to do the will of heaven puts feet on the very brink of ruin, but coming to Jesus Christ in humility brings cleansing by His blood from all sin and every glossed-over iniquity and opens eyes that have been blind. David transgressed this law through his sin, and the law exposed him and brought him to conviction; he repented before God and relied on Christ's blood for pardon, an example that the Spirit still awakens conscience to bring the commandments to remembrance through preaching Christ crucified, His love and infinite sacrifice.
Its truth must enter the heart where sin and guilt originate and not merely be read outwardly, for disobeying it disregards divine requirements even when the transgression seems small by human judgment. It contains a principle of heavenly origin to govern life in every particular, a transcript of character of value because it came forth from God, unchangeable to meet man in his fallen condition, a safe guide, foundation to build on, rule to live by, and standard by which judgment comes, requiring firm standing on "It is written" without turning aside. Any doctrine without these ten precepts as foundation is unsafe, and one who does not make them the foundation of life practice works on the enemy's side. Keeping it reveals love for the Supreme Ruler and calls for more than professing faith, for it belongs to the last six comprised in loving neighbor as self and requires that love become part and parcel of being, shown in daily life, in unselfish kindness, tender pity, daily benevolence and helping one another. Human life is brief and probation short, so Christ's self-denying, self-sacrificing life must be earnestly copied in keeping it, and those who do so will compose His kingdom, enjoying the bliss of heaven themselves and adding to that bliss by reflecting the character of Him who is the light and joy and glory of heaven.
Seriousness Repentance and Discipline
Adultery is a grave, knowing violation of the commandment, not a small offense and not a sin of ignorance. It is heinous sin regarded with horror, which God does not wink at, and its violation brings severe judgment, displeasure and punishment. Light treatment of it by the church brings God’s displeasure, corrupts the young, weakens His people, and can cause His presence to depart from the congregation. This is especially serious while God is purifying a people zealous for good works. Anciently those who committed it were put to death outside the camp, and the abolition of stoning has led people to indulge the sin and regard it as minor, though it is no less serious now.
The commandment belongs to God’s law expressing His character and standard of righteousness, and its truth must enter the heart where sin and guilt originate. Disobeying it disregards God’s requirements even when the transgression seems small by human judgment. It stands among the last six precepts defining duty to fellow human beings, and breaking any of them is incompatible with being in favor with God. A heart defiled by sin fails to keep it, and Israel’s disobedience to commandments beyond the Sabbath brought God’s displeasure and punishment.
Breaking the commandment defiles the camp and requires arousing, cleansing and decided movements to cure the existing evil, and those who fail to act will not be clear. Continued breaking of it makes God’s people a sister to fallen Babylon, with churches corrupted and filled with every foul spirit, a cage for every unclean and hateful bird. Confession and sorrow alone do not make continued church fellowship or access to the house of God appropriate; those who commit this sin should be suspended from the church and its privileges, and the church should take strict, thorough action against it. The commandment applies to both old and young, remains binding, and those who keep the fourth commandment should live by the principles of all ten given at Sinai.
Professing to keep the fourth commandment while breaking the seventh is deception, a reproach to the cause and an offense to God. It is broken by gathering around a company of women who accompany a man from place to place as a wife would accompany her husband, disgracing their womanhood and wifehood, with all licentious, unchristianlike deportment and undue familiarity with married and unmarried women. Such a course is recorded in the ledger of heaven as deceiver and adulterer creeping into houses and leading captive women who ought to have wisdom, foresight and judgment. It lays a stumbling block before those who would believe the truth and brings upon all conscientious Sabbathkeepers the stigma rightly deserved by the offender. It therefore requires immediate rebuke and discountenancing, with separation from him and withdrawal of misplaced confidence, because unhappiness and ruin lie in the path of being led by him and many souls are destroyed by such satanic sophistry.
Harrison Smith and Sarah committed adultery, hid their wrongdoing, and compounded it with deceit, violating not this commandment only. Their secret acts and even their thoughts are known to God and recorded, bringing guilt and divine judgment and serious reproach to the church. Those who excuse or minimize such sin share blame by calling evil good; the offenders should remain outside the church, and any repentance must be shown in a life of continual repentance.
God as Watcher and Holy One sees actions and hears words, and secret acts, words and thoughts are registered in the books of heaven. Breaking the commandment includes intimate physical fondness and sexual union with another man’s wife, including kissing, sitting on the lap, encircling the waist, sensual looks and deportment, and lying in bed together. Such iniquity and adultery betrays sacred trust, especially aggravated in a watchman upon the walls of Zion or minister whose fall reproaches the cause of God. A man who gathers women around him through deception and behaves toward them as though they were his wife breaks it even while professing to keep the Sabbath, bringing reproach on those who faithfully keep the seventh day. The sin must be felt and sensed rather than covered, confessed to God and to brethren and to those wronged with clean work, and its foul blot removed only by the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ.
Among the Maories a person guilty of adultery was excluded from recognition in every tribe, deprived of property, and treated thereafter as an outlaw, showing how seriously the violation of the seventh commandment was regarded. Violating its demand for chastity belongs to a wider disregard for God’s law, with unchastity treated as a common sin that people often commit without shame.
Daily Obedience and Application
Thou shalt not commit adultery governs how people deal with one another and must be brought into business transactions and every line of work, forbidding every touch of injustice, oppression, robbery, deception, dishonest practice and secret taking of advantage. Dealing justly keeps its principles, while unjust dealing violates God's will, misrepresents His character, dishonors Him, becomes a stumbling block to others, and calls for thorough self-examination, cleansing and practical correction. No plea of working for God's cause or advancing His work can justify breaking it, for God will never be in league with its violation nor vindicate it, accepts no unjust transaction, and His cause is free from every taint of injustice and can gain nothing by such means. Gaining advantage by oppression and robbery and by taking away the individuality and rights of members of God's family is abhorrent to Him, and prosperity will not attend moves that ignore these holy principles.
The commandment belongs to the Ten Commandments whose authority extends to the laws God established in the human body, and its precepts are as truly divine as the laws governing the body written on every nerve and fiber. Needlessly violating those natural and physical laws is violation of God's law and sin against the Creator, as serious as breaking the commandments, whether done carelessly or willfully. Indulging depraved appetite, lust and lustful passions violates God's law, beclouds the intellect, excites the lower passions, needlessly expends vitality, fails to glorify Him in body and spirit which are His, and brings the curse of disease now flooding the world that obedience would keep out. Health reform helps people recognize this sin, teaches that breaking the body's natural laws is sinful, and calls them to obey the laws God established in their being, with self-restraint in appetite revealing whether they are governed by principle. Light is now shining clearly so that to live a perfect life these laws must be obeyed, making natural law plain and urging obedience to it accompanies the third angel's message, so ignorance is no excuse for continual transgression.
Parents must teach the commandment with the whole law to children in the home when rising up and sitting down, when going out and coming in, and onward to their own children, stating plain decided requirements and prohibitions of what must and must not be done. Children are to be taught to respect and obey these commands from principle, with No said without loss of temper but decidedly and meant, firmly refusing disorder, careless handling of things, throwing things on the floor or in the dirt, and quenching every undesirable habit when it first appears, training them from earliest years to be neat, cleanly and orderly because heaven is orderly and every family must be disciplined to orderly ways. Neglect of that loving home authority sends children to the street for education and makes drunkards, while universal obedience in loving God and keeping His commandments as the whole duty of man would stop thefts, robberies and murders and the filling of jails and prisons with criminals from prevailing crime and wickedness.
The law of chastity given from Sinai after deliverance from Egypt requires the highest regard for purity and forbids looseness in manners, carelessness about chastity, unchastity as serious sin strongly abhorred by God, and taking liberties with women that transgress it. It applies especially to male physicians in attitude and treatment toward women patients in medical work and to all in responsible positions and every line of work, guarding against moral danger so that human conduct does not dishonor God or become a stumbling block. All who live by the Sinai laws including this commandment may be safely trusted. Both Testaments frequently and forcefully rebuke unchastity, and its place among the Ten Commandments written on stone for universal government amid awe-inspiring signs of God's presence shows its gravity.
God's holy law cannot be written on hearts of those whose habits contradict it, as Israel had to cleanse clothing before hearing it at Sinai, so high profession of faith, mighty works, or merely observing the Sabbath outwardly does not honor it or save the soul. It must be obeyed from the heart out of love for its pure principles, with inward practical honoring of all ten written on the heart and conscientious surrender of every habit, practice and sin that closes the door against Jesus, not merely assented to in theory or taught while holding a wrong course and making provision to please self. Those who profess purity while cherishing lust in the heart live a lie, for whom truth loses vitalizing power while sin strengthens, leaving them without strength, confidence and efficiency as workers. Knowingly breaking any commandment for convenience is incompatible with trusting God, and claiming sanctification while ignoring it or replacing it with a self-made standard is spurious, with professing the fourth commandment while breaking the seventh recorded as deception.
Its principles must be practiced in daily life, for doing them is the clearest sermon about the law, and neglecting obedience is flagrant sin that disheartens those who honor its claims and can turn others away from truth. Had it with the other commandments been obeyed with heart and mind, the wickedness now seen in cities and the world would never have existed, and obeying it brings knowledge that the Lord is sanctification and redemption and would bring great change. It means just what it reads, and no man or company of men can change it. It is to be vindicated by obedience and strong arguments, printed in plain letters in a prominent place so people can know it, with old-time reverence and just, pure and true action, including just treatment and restitution for wrongs such as those to the colored race and refusal of Freemasonry honors and worldly conformity under opposition.
Disregarding it beyond the Sabbath is still sin breaking God's higher law written by His own finger on stone, which is part of God Himself, and transgressing it is disloyalty to His government calling transgressors back to allegiance. It must be obeyed with strict regard by holy and faithful observers, for disobedience carries definite penalty, punishment surely follows transgression, and recorded cases from Eden onward with Adam and Eve, the law given in Eden with its penalty, their temptation, fall and punishment prove that the wages of sin is death and God's retributive justice never fails. God is great and holy and jealous, will not entrust His flock to those perverted by cherished errors, bears patiently and warns before punishing, but persistent refusal to obey brings judgment intended to awaken transgressors to sin and peril.