The Samaritan Version of the Tenth Commandment

Abstract

The Samaritan Pentateuch (SP) concludes with a Tenth Commandment concerning the building of an altar after the seemingly unrelated Ninth Commandment prohibiting coveting with which the Masoretic Text (MT) concludes. This paper suggests that the logic behind the juxtaposition of these two commandments is verbal resonance between the verb , covet, in the Tenth Commandment of MT and Exod 34,24 SP justifies the addition of a commandment about building an altar to the commandment of , you shall not covet (the Tenth Commandment in MT and the Ninth in SP), because of the occurrence of the same phrase in the two texts in which it is found. The logic of the juxtaposition is thus similar to that in the organization of many Deuteronomic laws which are also linked by apparent verbal connections. By emphasizing the importance of the holiness of space in the Decalogue, a concept absent in MT's version, the Samaritans effectively highlighted a concept that the Priestly legislators tended to de-emphasize in comparison with their Deuteronomic counterparts. SP's incorporation into the Decalogue of a law concerning the holiness of space may reflect the fact that most Samaritans did not share the exilic experience of Judeans. The exile may have led Judeans to de-emphasize holiness of space, something they had lost with exile from the land and the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, emphasizing instead the holiness of time, including the Sabbath and the festivals. SP's Tenth Commandment may thus reflect not only the Samaritan attachment to Mount Gerizim but also their greater interest, relative to most Judeans, in holiness of space.