Roy Moore, a former chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, is running for governor of Alabama on a platform to restore God and the Ten Commandments to their “rightful” place in American society.

You may remember Judge Moore's attempt to place a monument to the Commandments in the rotunda of the state's courthouse. He fought orders for its removal all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which reaffirmed the ruling of the lower courts that it must be removed.

Moore himself was then removed from office for his defiance, but not before he became something of a folk hero to great numbers of people across the country.

I'm all for the Ten Commandments, but I worry that they have become a political symbol to be worn on judges robes and enshrined in marble monuments on public property. It is beyond doubt that the Ten Commandments and other biblical legal codes have influenced the development of Western legal traditions and systems. It's also true that they speak to issues of morality. But is this all that they are?

So much of the talk about the Commandments focuses on morality, but that's not their primary focus. These Commandments define the basis of a relationship between the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and a specific group of people. This people had left behind a life of slavery to live in a covenant relationship with their God (Exodus 20:1-17; Deuteronomy 5:1-21).

Therefore, the Ten Commandments are less a legal or moral code than they are an agreement between two parties to live together in a covenant relationship. It is because this code is so religious that the debate has become so intense. In order for the public display of the Commandments to pass constitutional muster, defenders must either advocate the breaching of the wall separating church and state or they must downplay the religious dimension of the laws.

To do the latter is to violate their purpose; to do the former is to undermine constitutional protections of both church and state.

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The Ten Commandments begin with several statements that define a person's relationship with God. There are prohibitions against serving other gods, making idols, and bowing to idols (some religious traditions take this to mean refraining from saying the pledge of allegiance and voting).

There is also one about not taking the Lord's name in vain, which means more than not using profane language. The law concerning keeping the Sabbath is also very much a religious statement, although it is a directive rarely followed even by the most religious of us (at least in the broader Christian community).

With few exceptions, Christians worship on Sunday, but the Sabbath runs from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. So, no matter how you count them, the Ten Commandments are religious in intent and content. The final six (or final seven, depending on how you count them) deal with human relationships, but the commands are rooted in a primary relationship with God.

The best interpretation of the intent of these laws can be found in their summary, which calls on God's people to love God with the entirety of their being, and then to love their neighbors as they love themselves (Deuteronomy 6:4). In light of this summary, you could say that the way we treat our neighbor is an outgrowth of the way we view God.

I don't dispute the value of keeping the Ten Commandments; I just want to make sure we don't secularize them or make them a political shibboleth. Treating them as simply a legal code demeans them and rips them from their context as the foundation of a covenant relationship with God. Using them as part of a political platform not only demeans the Commandments, but it demeans God.

Instead of fighting over how and when to display the laws in the public square, perhaps we all should commit ourselves more earnestly to looking out for the best interests of our neighbors.

If we are religious, especially if we are part of the Jewish and Christian communities, then let us seek to live out our relationship with God in a way that honors God and honors our neighbors. That will be public display enough.

Dr. Bob Cornwall is pastor of First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) of Lompoc (lompocdisciples.org). Contact him at lompocdisciples.org or by writing to First Christian Church, P.O. Box 1056, Lompoc, CA 93436.

March 10, 2006