To say that representations of the Ten Commandments on public property were put there for some sort of moral guidance instead of to advance a conservative agenda (and, incidentally, hawk a movie) is either as disingenuous as believing in the tooth fairy or crossing the line into lying, a form of false witness prohibited in Commandment IX of the Protestant version, Commandment VIII of the Catholic version and Commandment IX of the Jewish version (sorry, it gets complicated) ("Maryland atheist sues to remove Ten Commandments monument from Allegany County courthouse grounds," July 9). That superseded the Exodus 20 version of tablets broken by Moses in a rage at Aaron's creation and worship of the golden calf which, of course, was a violation of Commandments I and II on the original stone tablets, and of I on the current Protestant, Catholic and Jewish version. On the original tablets, the ban on lying is again Commandment IX, but it is entirely absent from the supposed "word-for-word" replacement of Exodus 34. (By the way, the ancient Jews did not use Roman numerals, although modern versions seem to believe they somehow add authenticity.)
Well, tell you what, I'll let you have your public postings of your (almost always Protestant) version of the Ten Commandments if you add the Biblical penalty for these violations: blasphemy, working on Sunday, hitting or cursing a parent, beastiality, homosexual acts and adultery. In all those cases, it is death. Making a sacrifice to any God but Jehovah takes the death penalty to the further dimension of utter destruction. And the prophet Malachi notes that those who neglect to properly glorify God better look out since the almighty will "corrupt your seed and spread dung on your faces."
What joy it would be to see the besmeared countenances of any of the multitude of professional political pastors who have forgotten the Beatitudes of Jesus if they ever read them.
Bentley Orrick, Millington