Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Bible The Ten Commandments.
  • noun A fundamental set of rules having authoritative weight.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The ten commandments or precepts given, according to the account in Exodus, by God to Moses on Mount Sinai, and originally written on two tables of stone.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The Ten Commandments or precepts given by God to Moses on Mount Sinai, and originally written on two tables of stone.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • proper noun The Ten Commandments.
  • noun Any set of rules that have the weight of authority

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the biblical commandments of Moses

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English decalog, from Late Latin decalogus, from Greek dekalogos : deka, ten; see dekm̥ in Indo-European roots + logos, word, pronouncement; see leg- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Ancient Greek δεκάλογος (dekalogos), from δέκα (deka, "ten") + λόγος (logos, "statement")

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word Decalogue.

Examples

  • As it turns out, the God who teaches Israel how to live in the Decalogue is the same God who delivered them from slavery in Egypt; God has already extended divine mercy to Israel as a basis for Israel trusting in God.

    AKMA’s Random Thoughts 2005

  • The God of the Decalogue is uniquely authoritative, cannot be fashioned after our own image (pace Feuerbach), and cannot be controlled: God is absolute, aniconic, and useless. 6 God does not exist for our use.

    AKMA’s Random Thoughts 2005

  • The Decalogue is the classical name of the Ten Commandments.

    The False Idol of Unfettered Capitalism 2009

  • That our Saviour comprised the sum of all prayers in this form, is known to all Christians; and it is confessed that such is the perfection of this form, that it is the epitome of all things to be prayed for, as the Decalogue is the epitome of all things to be practised.

    From the Talmud and Hebraica 1602-1675 1979

  • Corresponding to the two divisions of the Decalogue are the two generic virtues which the Mosaic legislation has set as its goal, piety, and humanity, or what the rabbis called charity ([Hebrew: tsdka]).

    Philo-Judaeus of Alexandria Norman Bentwich 1927

  • Leviticus is as archaic as the Code of Manu, and the Decalogue is a fossil.

    Damn! A Book of Calumny 1918

  • Corresponding to the two divisions of the Decalogue are the two generic virtues which the Mosaic legislation has set as its goal, piety, and humanity, or what the rabbis called charity ([Hebrew: tsdka]).

    Philo-Judaeus of Alexandria Bentwich, Norman 1910

  • Bodin was half way between a theist and a deist; he believed that the Decalogue was a natural law imprinted in all men's hearts and that Judaism was the nearest to being a natural religion.

    The Age of the Reformation Preserved Smith 1910

  • His memorable speech on the Decalogue is a case in point.

    Western Worthies A Gallery of Biographical and Critical Sketches of West of Scotland Celebrities 1879

  • The Decalogue should be the back-bone of a child's training: and it should be proposed on the authority of

    Moral Principles and Medical Practice The Basis of Medical Jurisprudence Charles Coppens 1877

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.