How to explain the Ten Commandments to Gen Z
There is plenty about modern life to cause celebration and aggravation in equal measure. Thankfully, old hand Christopher Howse and young gun Guy Kelly are here to dissect the way we live now...
You can’t win. Louisiana has passed a law obliging every state-funded classroom to display the Ten Commandments. Some fathers and mothers are suing, despite this probably being the last chance to persuade their little darlings to honour them.
But when the poet AH Clough wrote verses satirising the Ten Commandments, or at least their bourgeois observance, people took him seriously. The couplet many now embrace as a rule of thumb is: ‘Thou shalt not kill; but need’st not strive/Officiously to keep alive.’
Readers now think how kind, in days gone by, was the ‘old man’s friend’ pneumonia, especially when the parental home’s value is being eaten up by care fees. That wasn’t what Clough, who died in 1861, had in mind. He was more worried about children dying through want.
Anyway, like the Seven Dwarfs, everyone asked to name the Ten Commandments can remember most, but few can get all. (Bashful is a killer.) In relation to this, something funny happened last year. A drama serial called The Sixth Commandment gained wide praise (‘mesmerisingly watchable’ – The Telegraph). Now to me, and many others, the Sixth Commandment is: ‘Thou shalt not commit adultery.’ But Sarah Phelps, the writer, meant it to refer to, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ I’m not saying she made a mistake. The confusion is less simple.
The Church of England has canon law, a part of the law of the land. No one can be confirmed, it says, without being able to say the Ten Commandments. In the days when children learnt their catechism, they were asked archaically: ‘Which be they?’ And off went the infant Bertie Wooster, keen to gain the Scripture Knowledge prize, rattling off all X, of which VI, like Bashful, is the killer.
But Catholics number them differently, lumping together false gods and graven images, but distinguishing wisely between coveting your neighbour’s wife and coveting his ox. As a consequence, the sixth is about adultery.
In 1604 a law required the Ten Commandments to be set up in every church. That was two centuries before America bought Louisiana from Napoleon, and at the time no one complained.
My main concern is that the poor Gen Z and Alpha kids of Louisiana won’t understand the Ten Commandments in their traditional form. To that end, I offer a translated version. The state has my permission to use it on any and all literature.
Thou shalt have no other gods before me
This one’s for you, Swifties. She comes second, yeah?
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image
That Timothée Chalamet stan account has to go. We don’t make the rules, He does.
Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain
Jesus H Christ on a bike, you will not Goddam swear in this house.
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy
It’s good to have a screen break and put down the vape for a bit on Sundays. Say, why don’t you read a book instead? In fact, why don’t you read the greatest book of all? It’s got snakes, demons, miracles, plagues and a very handsome protagonist…
Honour thy father and thy mother
What your dad gets up to in his shed is of no concern to you. And if Mum likes a little glass or five of Whispering Angel while she watches Gardeners’ World, making throaty purrs every time Monty Don appears with the dog in his powerful yet tender arms, you are to make no judgment.
Thou shalt not kill
Note: this does not apply when a friend responds to your hilarious message about last night with the word, ‘Dead.’
Thou shalt not commit adultery
You may think Jesus was a ‘low-key softboy simp’, but he never had a ‘straycation’ from his one true love: us. Nor should you.
Thou shalt not steal
Look, just because Cecil from next door’s TalkTalk password is ‘Cecil123’ and he gave it to us on a Post-it note for the fridge ‘in case he forgets’, does not mean you can use it to circumvent the non-negotiable policy on Fortnite after 10pm.
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour
Just as snitches get stitches, telltales get impaled. Besides, Cecil has enough on his plate without your nonsense.
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house
Ignore the fact your parents regularly refer to ‘Rightmove porn’ when idly scrolling the iPad. They should know better.
