Ten Commandments

March 17, 2015 · updated February 15, 2022

The Ten Commandments are a set of religious and moral laws that God gave the Israelites through Moses, as recorded in the book of Exodus. The commandments address several areas of life from worship to marriage to legal proceedings. It is commonly observed that the first four commandments emphasize people's relationship with God and that the last six commandments emphasize people's relationship with other people. According to the Exodus story, Moses received the 10 commandments while on Mt. Sinai and they were originally recorded on stone tablets.