Day 270: The Ten Commandments

The "ten words" are pronounced by God in the midst of a theophany (“The LORD spoke with you face to face at the mountain, out of the midst of the fire"). They belong to God's revelation of himself and his glory. the gift of the Commandments is the gift of God himself and his holy will. In making his will known, God reveals himself to his people. CCC 2059

In today's reading, the Catechism discusses the "ten words" or Ten Commandments revealed by God as found in Exodus 20:2-17 and Deuteronomy 5:6-21. They were the foundation of the moral law given to Israel and were written by God Himself on stone tablets. In Christ, these "ten words" weren't abolished, but instead were perfectly fulfilled, and we are invited to rediscover them by obediently following Him (CCC 2053).

The Catechism Compendium summarizes how Jesus interpreted the Law:

Jesus interpreted the Law in the light of the twofold yet single commandment of love, the fullness of the Law: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And the second is like it: you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 22:37-40). (#435)

The Catechism Companion Vol III has some good commentary on this:

In the Gospel, Jesus points back to the Old Covenant and makes it clear that the Ten Commandments are not rejected. They are something that Jesus affirms and amplifies... We do not love the commandments because they are rules. We love them because they are coming from and revealing the heart of God. God reveals that he actually cares about us. If he did not care about us, he would not care what we do. He reveals that we, our choices, and our lives matter... We see how much God loves us when we know it actually matters to him how we live. (p. 56)

Moses Breaking the Tablets of the Law (1659) by Rembrandt