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Texas House passes bill mandating the Ten Commandments be displayed in schools: I have questions [1]

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Date: 2025-05-25

The Texas House has passed a bill that mandates the Ten Commandments be displayed in all public school classrooms. Now, it has to go to the state senate. And should it pass there (spoiler alert: it will), it next goes to Gov. Abbott, who will sign it into law.

Interestingly, the bill has no mechanism for rendering a failure to display the commandments a crime. Therefore, there is no penalty if a school district tells the state to jog on. Why? I doubt that was an oversight. If no one is prosecuted for failure to comply, that cuts off one route for the law to be appealed.

Or perhaps the state realizes that prosecutions could inspire increased Democratic turnout in local elections. Or maybe it was something else.

The bill TX SB10 also spells out the exact verbiage for the theocratic display. It uses as its source Exodus 20:1–17 as it is translated in the King James Version.

Why did they choose a foreign translation? Why not the American Standard Bible, the New American Standard Bible, the New American Bible, or the New American Standard Bible 1995? They all sound a lot more patriotic. Their one concession was to remove the "u" from honour and neighbour.

Note: The New American Bible is the only approved Bible for American Catholics, so that explains why that one was kicked to the curb. No true Texan Bible-thumper will risk the taint of papism — especially as the current Pope preaches concern for the poor, the needy, and immigrants.

More importantly, these fundamentalist Christians — and it is the fundamentalists, not mainstream Christians, promoting this state interference in free thought — have left a lot of the text out. I expect it's because they know kid's attention spans are short. And when you are trying to addict children to your product, you have to keep the marketing snappy.

Religious proselytizers are no different from tobacco companies. They knew it was essential to get children hooked on their product before their minds matured. They also understood the importance of brand loyalty.

Fortunately, in 1998, state AGs and the nation's largest tobacco companies agreed to a master settlement agreement prohibiting the use of certain types of advertisements and forbidding tobacco manufacturers from "directly or indirectly targeting youth in their promotional activities, or engaging in activities with the primary purpose of initiating, maintaining, or increasing youth smoking."

Sadly, we will not see this kind of common sense from red-state AGs today. It will be left to the US Supreme Court to do the right thing. That is not a proposition the wise bettor would stake much on.

Anyway, for any reader interested in what the original text says and what was left out here is the Exodus 20:1-17 KJV. The bolded words are what made it into the bill. I have offered some thoughts between the dialogue boxes

And God spake all these words, saying,

I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.

Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

"No other gods"? How will a MAGA worship Trump?

Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image , or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:

Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.

I'm not surprised they elided the part about "visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation." Republicans justify cutting social programs today by saying they want to protect tomorrow's children and grandchildren. The optics of punishing the unborn, because their grandfather was shtupping his secretary, are not good.

Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain ; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.

Do you know who takes the Lord's name in vain? Yes, the MAGA godhead .

Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.

Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:

But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:

For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

Dear God, the House passed the final version of the bill today. It's Sunday. Are they blind to hypocrisy? (rhetorical). Will Texas businesses now close on Sunday? If they don't, I will have to think that the legislatures haven't read the Ten Commandments. Or if they have, they don't take them seriously

Honour thy father and thy mother : that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.

I'm fine with that. As I am with the following four.

Thou shalt not kill.

Thou shalt not commit adultery.

Thou shalt not steal.

Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.

However, how can capital punishment be allowed if you are not allowed to kill someone? In addition, is there a secular democracy anywhere in the world that allows killing, theft, or perjury? Is there any atheist authority or philosophy that says any of this is kosher?

The Bible passage ends.

Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house , thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife , nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.

I'm like Jimmy Carter . I have coveted. I'm pretty sure my wife has coveted too. Thank God. If it weren't for "keeping up with the Joneses," the American economy would grind to a halt. If thought crime consigns us to hell, we are all going to the hot place. If you show me someone who claims they haven't coveted, I will show you a liar,

One final thought. One Representative, Candy Lucas, who was for the bill, explained her rationale. "It is incumbent on all of us to follow God's law and I think we would all be better off if we did." Really? Where's her evidence? Crime in the US is higher in the Bible Belt than it is in the godless Northeast. How does Candy explain that?

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