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Compliance with the big laws
Some friends of mine have been discussing the ten commandments recently, and after going through them one by one, we're averaging between 10 and 40 percent compliance. By far, the biggest stumbling block has been the two "thou shall not covet" rules. The commandment with the highest compliance rate is "thou shall not kill," so far no one's fessed up on that one.
Anyhow, here's my results:
First: "Thou shalt have no other gods before me."
Broken on a fairly regular basis. Lots of other stuff is ahead of the big guy.
Second: "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image."
Broken on a fairly regular basis. My TV has all sorts of graven images on it.
Third: "Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain"
The frequency with which this is broken probably automatically qualifies me for hell without having to worry about any of the others.
Fourth: "Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy."
This one is broken in combination with the first one especially during football season, though lack of NFL doesn't prevent me from finding other stuff to do on the sabbath.
Fifth: "Honour thy father and thy mother."
Heh, heh, heh. Only when they deserve it. I think that they'd agree that honor isn't exactly forthcoming. Fortunately, I'm gonna burn in hell with my sibs too.
Sixth: "Thou shalt not kill."
Woo hoo! One I haven't broken yet. Unless being a Texan counts, considering the 300 plus people the state has killed. Or being an American counts, and we're in active war killing people every day. Maybe purgatory?
Seventh: "Thou shalt not commit adultery."
Yes, but I didn't know he was engaged the first time. The second time (same session) I knew. Again with the purgatory.
Eighth: "Thou shalt not steal."
A pack of that zebra striped fruit gum when I was a kid. And my vet forgot to charge me for the heartworm medicine last week and I knew it but didn't bring it to her attention. And a bookcase from target that for some reason wasn't scanned. All have some sort of extenuating excuse (except the gum), but I'm sure I'm going to hell.
Ninth: "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour."
Nope. To the best of my knowledge I've never perjured myself. If the commandment is expanded to lying, there are a lot of white ones that could get me into some serious trouble.
Tenth: "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's."
This commandment, as demonstrated by my reaction while going on a home tour this weekend, is impossible to follow. I covet on a regular basis. I'm encouraged to covet, the capitalist system is based on coveting, and I feel that this commandment is unAmerican.
Result:
I'd say that I'm somewhere between twenty and twenty five percent compliance depending on how well the cases are argued.
I'm burning in hell.
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