Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 43:172 (Oct 1886)
Article: The Sanction Of The Decalogue
Author: Talbot W. Chambers

BSac 43:172 (Oct 1886) p. 745

The Sanction Of The Decalogue

Rev. Talbot W. Chambers

Law is usually defined as a rule of action prescribed by competent authority and enforced by a penalty. The last mentioned feature is indispensable, for without it any statute, however weighty in itself or in the source from which it proceeds, is merely the expression of an opinion. It may have great moral dignity and worth but it has no legal force. Whereas the essence of law is that it commands obedience and cannot be disregarded with impunity

What now is the sanction of the law contained in the Ten Words? Something in the nature of reward and punishment is found in the third precept and in the fifth.

In the former the prohibition of the profane use of Jehovah’s name is fortified by the assurance that such use contracts guilt, an assurance that is needed because the general tendency of men is to doubt whether profaneness

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be a sin at all, or at least to consider it a trivial and insignificant transgression.1 In the latter due respect to one’s parents is strengthened by the implied promise that this will secure length of days. The quotation of this promise by the Apostle Paul (Ephes. 6:3), with the omission of the words “which the Lord thy God giveth thee.” shows that no part of the precept is local or national but that the whole is applicable to children of all nations and in all ages. It is true that some obedient children die early and others are not particularly prosperous; but as a general rule of the divine administration it is the members of well-ordered households who succeed in life. Filial piety brings a reward in the present world, quite as truly as “the hand of the diligent maketh rich.” Now in both of these cases the sanction is specific and limited to the precept in connection with which it is given. The fact is otherwise with the reason annexed to the Second Commandment. “For I Jehovah thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me; and shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments.” (Revised Version). The closest scrutiny of these words detects in them nothing that limits them to the prohibition of idolatry, but on the contrary they would be perfectly suitable to be placed at

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the close of the decalogue as a sanction of the entire series of precepts.

We may therefore rightly regard them as such. It may be added that this course has the example of Luther. In his sma...