The New Commandments

What would be the new commandments god would choose today? Seeing the current list of god’s favorite bug-bears made me wonder what message I would have chosen to convey if I was a creator of the universe. What, if anything, would an all powerful and all-knowing being wish to convey to their lowly creatures (should he/she/it have existed of course)? Putting myself in the shoes (or sandals) of this being for a few minutes, some of the questions I ask myself are:

Would he be so obsessed with being loved? After all, if I create an ant-farm for my amusement, I don’t expect all the ants to spend the rest of their lives falling over themselves to tell me how great I am and to worship me for their monotonous existence. (Oh, and let’s not forget about how we are all created as sinners and spend the rest of our lives atoning for them). God knows that it would be nice to be idolised, but is that really a reason to create the universe?
Shouldn’t he have used such a wonderful opportunity to talk about some real issues? Slavery? Racism? Sexism? Nuclear war? Climate change? Have these not been more damaging to millions of people than “coveting thy neighbour’s car” (or wife for that matter)?
Would god not have ignored the confines of time in setting these commandments if they were to be eternally relevant? After all there are more people living on the planet now than any time before. Would we not have expected to see a few commandments in there that didn’t make any kind of sense to those of the time but that would make a lot of sense today? Such as, “Thou shalt not waste all your time on social media and porn sites!”
What about things like countries, migration, nationalism, famine? Surely he could have instructed that land borders were not what he intended when he created earth? Especially when half the world’s population is thriving, and the rest are in poverty?
And if he knew he was going to send his only son down to earth one day, would a loving father not have said something like “Dudes, if you touch my boy, you’ll be in some serious shit.”
Would god really have all the insecurities of a middle-eastern alpha male from a few thousand years ago (see Alpha God by Hector A. Garcia)? He seems to be obsessed with making sure women (in particular) behave themselves and his punishments seem to reflect those of a rather primitive society...

How does god do it?

But the god of the bible doesn’t seem to be fussed by some of these questions. He wastes not one, but four commandments on his own ego! Love me or you’ll burn. Did I mention you better not love anyone else or you’ll burn? And don’t get me started on you worshipping inanimate objects (thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image)! Light the barbeque.

After all that, we only have 6 commandments left for the other stuff. A lot of the remaining commandments could be summed up in a single line. “Thou shalt not be assholes to each other.”

To make matters worse he doesn't seem to take his own commandments seriously. How many of his own commandments does god break? You be the judge.

Take 2

So if we think about re-writing the 10 commandments, we can pretty much cover all the 10 “that god gave us” in two new commandments:

I’m a great guy and you really should love me. Seriously. I’m cool. Nobody could ever be cooler than I am. I designed cool. (Wait, is that me or Trump speaking?).
Be nice to other people! Just to be clear: I mean love your family. Don’t steal stuff; that’s not cool. Don’t be a schmuck to women and children. Seems strange saying this because it’s so obvious but hating someone because of their skin pigment is just plain stupid and I, your god, don’t like stupid. If someone wants to lie with a man, woman, both, or neither, it’s not your problem. Just focus on getting yourself laid – that’s why I gave you that thing. Oh, ahem…I feel a bit stupid saying this because I doubt anyone would be so dumb, but you can’t own people, ok? A human cannot possibly be another human’s property – only mine. I know, stating the obvious right? Now I feel a bit stupid myself…

…phew, that’s cool. We did that all in 2 commandments. That gives us another 8 to play around with. But hey, I’m god. So, if I decide there’ll be 7, 9 or maybe 11 or even 12 commandments, what you gonna say about it?

How about these?

I designed this place for you. I made all the mountains, seas, animals, stars. Yo, I even made the dinosaurs. Sorry you never got to see them. I let that asteroid go by mistake while I was still trying get it into the right shape. Man was I pissed with myself. So, please don’t wreck the place like I did! Don’t chop down the trees and dig holes everywhere. And for god’s sake (hey, that’s me – isn’t that cool?), don’t just throw your shit everywhere.
While I’m at it, I made the earth for all of you. You can’t just build walls everywhere to keep other people out. Who says that you can have that piece of land and nobody else can? Did someone make you god while I wasn’t looking? I see everything remember. Yes, even that! No point blushing about it. Anyway, back to walls – if I wanted one there, I would have put it there myself. What’s with that super big wall between the USA and Mexico anyway? Oh wait, that hasn’t been built yet, but just wait a few thousand years, you’ll see.
I’m going to be making some really clever people. Ok, I make a lot of stupid ones too. But these clever guys – they may finally figure out that E = mc². Neat huh? I designed that equation myself. When you clever people finally figure that out, please don’t go and make a bomb with it. See commandment 2 above. Bombs are not nice to people. Remember, don’t be an asshole.
In a few thousand years, I’m going to be sending my son to earth to remind you about what I’ve said. Some of those stupid people I spoke about above will have forgotten all of this stuff already. He’s going to make himself pretty unpopular by being such a nice guy. You guys better not kill him because he’s my boy. If you do, I may need to drop another asteroid “by mistake”.

Oh. Did I say 7 or 8 commandments? I’ve decided that 6 is more than enough. There’s not much else to say. Moses, get yourself over here and stop talking to that burning bush! Have you lost the plot? Should I give these commandments to someone who’s not hallucinating? Are you sure?

Ok. Here are the 6 commandments. Go and spread the news…