Why doesn't the church remove or change the second commandment of Deuteronomy, since it completely contradicts the modern view of Christianity and the church?

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3 Answers

  1. In the question, you already give a value judgment, and this is a false approach to studying the object. When you study a particular object, you are armed not with skeptical analysis, but with your own prejudices. With this arrangement of things, you will never get the right answer to a question if you start answering it yourself.

    I understand you are a Muslim. Let me remind you that, for example, among the Persians in Iran, on certain Islamic holidays, it is customary to give each other postcards with the image of the Messenger of Allah. Very beautiful postcards showing a young man (young Prophet Mohamed) wearing a turban with flowers. Given the fact that Islam is very fanatical about ritualism and unquestioning observance of any written rules in the Koran, it is better to ask your own co-religionists, even if they are heretics from your point of view, that is, Shiites.

    This is the first point, now the second point. On the territory of Saudi Arabia (actually the birthplace of Islam) there are many ancient monuments of Islam. One of these architectural monuments is classified. Why? Because the Saudi government is concerned that the letter-eaters of Islamic law will simply destroy the architectural monument of Islam (most likely unique), and world culture and, most importantly, Muslims will lose one of the oldest sources about their own religion. What is unusual about this mosque, which dates back to the 7th-8th centuries? Inside it there are frescoes similar to the Byzantine ones and there are not only animals and people depicted, but also the Prophet Mohamed himself. Therefore, such a radical demand for the image did not arise immediately in Islam.

    Now, what would be possible to rewrite the Decalogue, that is, the Law of Ten. The Bible, namely the Old Testament, unlike the Koran, is not a free retelling of the Torah, in which you can throw out everything that you do not like and add something from yourself, it is a strict translation from the original language. Naturally, with any translation, the meaning may be distorted (especially when there is such a time gap between us and the moment of creating the text), but this is not as fatal as with a free retelling under the author's editorship of desert nomads.

    The Decalogue is not a set of strict rules, if you break them, you will certainly go to Hell. This is a summary of what a person should do and what not to do to the best of his ability if a person wants to conquer the Kingdom of Heaven.

    Now about images in Christianity. You see, a person builds his material culture based on his own physiological nature. A person has eyes, so he will create something with his eyes. Icons are not idols, as it was, for example, in the ancient religion. For pagans, a statue/image is not just an image of a deity, it is a temporary receptacle (mailbox, so to speak) of the deity. On this subject, that is, to the deity, sacrifices are made. There is no such thing in Christianity. An icon is not a receptacle for God, angels, or saints. An icon is just a consecrated image. Christians focused on the visual physiological nature of a person because they could afford it-this is dictated by culture. Christianity originated in the settled urban cultures of the monotheistic Middle East and ancient Greek-Roman paganism. Islam was born among nomadic pastoralists. It is not very convenient to constantly carry tablets with images, or even a statue at all, so that every time at the bivouac you can arrange an altar for this very thing and pray. For this reason, the nomads had to pray as Muslims pray now, comfortably on a mat, by the way, they originally prayed for the sun,moon and stars.
    The meaning of the second commandment is precisely what kind of attitude a person has, and not that a person does not have the right to show his creative abilities (by the way, the ability to create is a gift from God) and create works of art, including images of God himself in the form of a wise old father, for example. This does not mean that this is what God looks like. Christians never materialize God. Everyone knows perfectly well that this is just an image, but it helps the believing Christian to focus on prayer. In Christianity, there was a struggle with images. In the history of the Roman Empire, there is even a whole era of iconoclast emperors. However, the arguments that confirmed the status of images were accepted, and entire theological works were written on this issue by Christian thinkers. If this is proven by time, then it is justified. By the way, Christians who deny images still exist among Protestants, and many denominations are very enthusiastic about hanging Byzantine icons in their churches today, although this was simply unthinkable for them 200 years ago. It is very strange to watch how they, Protestants, “pray” staring at the school table with their heads down, on which a bad Russian word with three letters is scratched. This is despite the fact that these people are carriers of a settled urban culture, where there are a lot of opportunities to create an image and the value of vision is very high, and not some early medieval nomadic pastoralists from deserts or steppes.

  2. Because to change something either by adding or subtracting to the Covenant of God (whether Old or New) is fraught with the most serious punishment, which is repeatedly warned about in that very Scripture :

    18 I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds anything to them, in order to impose the God of plagues that are written in this book;
    19 and if anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, have to take away the God part out of the book of life and in the Holy city and that are written in this book.
    20 He that bears witness to these things saith, Lo, I come quickly. Amen. Yea, come, Lord Jesus!
    (Rev.22:18-20)

    32 Whatever I command you, do it carefully; do not add to it or take away from it.
    (Deut.12:32)

    And then, God as the Supreme Being has the ability-the ability to convey His Word to humanity without distortion-HE is the Lord and by this Word will judge humanity. Otherwise, everything becomes abstract.vague and hazy..A covenant is still a Contract, and God knows how to keep it.

    And then, as far as I understand, the question is about icons and their veneration – but this applies only to a part of Christianity, and not to everything as you have deigned to write.

  3. Because the ten commandments were given to Moses by God himself, and not invented by the church. The Church is only a servant of God, so it has no right to change anything in the Bible. And the modern view of religion has no role in its existence, because there were many views, but religion remains.

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