The First Commandment

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.” – Exodus 20:2 Did you know that when the Ten Commandments were written, they weren’t simply listed as numbers one through ten? Instead, they appeared as part of a story—a narrative. Moses was on Mount Sinai when God gave him these commandments. Later, for easier understanding, we assigned numbers to them. Interestingly, the Jewish and Christian traditions number the commandments differently. If you ask a rabbi and a Presbyterian minister what the first commandment is, you’ll receive different answers. According to tradition, the rabbi’s answer is actually correct. In the West, we tend to prefer concrete, specific things. For example, Eastern traditions might say, “God is a rock,” while we invent precise theological terms like omnipotent or omnipresent—words not found in the Bible. This desire for specificity can make us uncomfortable with