Texts in Conversation
The Hebrew Bible ends the Ten Commandments in Deuteronomy with the command against coveting. The Samaritan Pentateuch adds the same Mount Gerizim altar command it places in Exodus, making Gerizim worship part of the Ten Commandments.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Deuteronomy 5:21
Hebrew Bible
20 “You must not offer false testimony against another. 21 You must not desire another man’s wife, nor should you crave his house, his field, his male and female servants, his ox, his donkey, or anything else he owns.” 22 The Lord said these things to your entire assembly at the mountain from the middle of the fire, the cloud, and the darkness with a loud voice, and that was all he said. Then he inscribed the words on two stone tablets and gave them to me.
Samaritan Deuteronomy 5:21
Samaritan Penteteuch
Samaritan
20 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. 21 Thou shalt not desire thy neighbour's wife, neither shalt thou covet thy neighbour's house, his field, his manservant, or his maidservant, his ox, or his ass, or any thing that is thy neighbour's. And when it so happens that LORD God brings you to the land of Caanan, which you are coming to posses, you shall set-up there for you great stones and plaster them with plaster and you write on the stones all words of this law. And it becomes for you that across the Jordan you shall raise these stones, which I command you today, in mountain Grizim. And you build there the altar to the LORD God of you. Altar of stones. Not you shall wave on them iron. With whole stones you shall build the altar to LORD God of you. And you bring on it ascend offerings to LORD God of you, and you sacrifice peace offerings, and you eat there and you rejoice before the face of the LORD God of you. The mountain this is across the Jordan behind the way of the rising of the sun, in the land of Caanan who is dwelling in the desert before the Galgal, beside Alvin-Mara, before Sechem. 22 These words the LORD spake unto all your assembly in the mount out of the midst of the fire, darkness, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness, with a great voice: and he added no more. And he wrote them in two tables of stone, and delivered them unto me.
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Notes and References
... Yet, the literary contextualization of this pastiche of instructions is important in another way. By placing these decrees in a literary context (Exodus 20 || Deuteronomy 5) prior to the Covenant Code altar laws (Exodus 20:24-26), the centralization decrees (Deuteronomy 11:31-12:31), and the Mount Gerizim/Mount Ebal instructions (Deuteronomy 27:1-26), the writers effectively suggest a continuity of identity among the Covenant Code altar instructions, the Mount Gerizim altar, and the central altar. Elements within the Covenant Code decrees, the centralization instructions, and the Mount Gerizim/Mount Ebal commands echo what was previously revealed in the Ten Commandments. ...
Knoppers, Gary N.
"Altared States: The Altar Laws in the Samaritan and Jewish Pentateuchs, and Their Early Interpreters" in Langlois, Michael (ed.) The Samaritan Pentateuch and the Dead Sea Scrolls
(pp. 110-111) Peeters, 2019
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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