I’d like to see schools teaching real-life skills such as driving. When I think of my school days, we did a lot of silly stuff that had little relevance to real life.
Nowadays, I often remember being introduced to various Bible stories. These were certainly relevant, and still are. I do appreciate that. I sometimes criticize Roman Catholic teachings, but I heard very little of the silly stuff in school. It was more Bible focused – though it was a Roman Catholic school.
I also think that it’s good to have some teaching on physical and mental health. I didn’t know much about mental health as a child. When I became an evangelical Christian at 18, I remember people speaking about it. I read some books about counselling. It was a trendy topic in our circles. And nowadays there’s a huge amount of resources about addressing your mental health everywhere. Some might even think there’s too much emphasis on it, but its no harm to know some strategies to avoid things such as anxiety and depression.
One positive thing about spending so much time in school doing pointless stuff is that it prepares you for the world of work. I did sometimes enjoy my various careers, but much of the time, it felt like school felt – dreading Monday mornings. But then again, you looked forward to the evenings and the weekends. I would like it if they stopped homework – or at least made it voluntary. I hated homework. I was a teacher myself at one stage, and I dished it out, but it was expected of me. A
And when I was a child, the teachers used to beat us with a stick if we got an answer wrong. I remember getting confused about the Roman Catholic version of the 10 commandments. I got mixed up between the last and second last. One says “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife” and the other says “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s goods”. I confused them and got whacked for it 😀 – something thats still vivid in my memory. Maybe it helped to avoid coveting 😀.
The protesant version is a single command and covetting in general. And the Bible doesn’t number them. It just gives them in one passage, but it does mention elsewhere that there are 10.
So, the protestant version has two at the beginning, while the Roman Catholics have only one. Protestants think that the Roman Catholics want to play down the part about images (because of holy pictures and statues etc.) – so they merge it with the first instead of making it a command of its own.
Here’s the passage in question anyway – without any numbers (apart from numbered verses 😀) – from the copyright-free web Bible:
Exodus 20:1-17
20 God spoke all these words, saying, 2 “I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
3 “You shall have no other gods before me.
4 “You shall not make for yourselves an idol, nor any image of anything that is in the heavens above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5 you shall not bow yourself down to them, nor serve them, for I, Yahweh your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and on the fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 and showing loving kindness to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.
7 “You shall not misuse the name of Yahweh your God, for Yahweh will not hold him guiltless who misuses his name.
8 “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 You shall labor six days, and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to Yahweh your God. You shall not do any work in it, you, nor your son, nor your daughter, your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your livestock, nor your stranger who is within your gates; 11 for in six days Yahweh made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore Yahweh blessed the Sabbath day, and made it holy.
12 “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land which Yahweh your God gives you.
13 “You shall not murder.
14 “You shall not commit adultery.
15 “You shall not steal.
16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.”
And here are a couple of “commandment” songs. As I often do, I’m drifting away from today’s prompt, but maybe the whole idea of a prompt is to set me thinking rather than answering the question. And no-ones gonna hit me with a stick if I don’t give the right answer 😀.
Hibernia Gospel 