I had what you would call a religious up bringing. Basically, as children we were taught the 10 commandments at a very tender age. In fact the 10 commandments have played such a large role in my life that I cannot remember exactly when I first learned them. I remember having to learn them by heart for Sunday school, but that was more of trying to remember what order the 10 commandments came in rather than mastering what they were. Because the 10 commandments have practically been a part of my life since I was a little child, I have not spent much time contemplating on them. As with so many aspects of my faith I have just accepted the 10 commandments as given, as a fact of life, as if they had been there forever. I have spent more time pondering them recently due to the media attention of having the 10 commandments displayed in public buildings. I had to shed my previous assumptions and review exactly what the 10 commandments are and why someone may be offended seeing them in print. I had to stop and reflect if I had just accepted without questions something that may be offensive just because it has always been there in my life.
After thinking about each of the 10 commandments I have arrived at the conclusion that for me they are not offensive. I would not feel discriminated against or violated in any way seeing them in print. The message with each of them is transparent to me and in general I feel they provide me with a good guide on how to conduct my life in a decent and courteous way. I respect others' rights to have differing beliefs and embrace the fact that not everyone has the same set of beliefs that I have. In fact I think life would be boring if we did all think the same and had the same beliefs. Without diversity, life would not have all those multi-color charm and exoticness.
I have to admit that trying to recall the 10 commandments in the right order was a true test of memory. I could remember all of them but trying to get the middle ones in the right order was quite a challenge. I mentioned this to my husband and he could not understand why being in a particular order mattered at all. I thought he had a good point that it was not really important what order I remember them in or what exact wording I used to articulate them, it was the core idea underlining each of the 10 commandments that was the true meaningful message that we are to take to heart.
I understand that we are not all from the same belief system, but I still cannot understand why someone would be offended by seeing the 10 commandments in print. There are many billboards and bus advertisements that I find offensive, but I know there are others that disagree with me. If I find something offensive I try to look at something that is more appealing to me. We do not all need to believe the same things in order to exist together, we do not even need to understand each others beliefs, we just need to learn tolerance. Hey, maybe I just came up with the 11th commandment! http://The-Arts-Magazine.com provides readers with the latest reviews, articles, commentaries and write-ups on all arts, theater, music, films and related topics.
