DECALOGUE
It has a unique position as written on stone tablets by “the finger of God” (Ex. 31:18; Deut. 10:4: in this last passage the word used is “debarim”, “the ten words”, and of there “decalogue”).
It is also designated “the words of the covenant” (Ex. 34:28). It was after hearing these ten commandments, proclaimed by God Himself in such a way that all the people heard them, that the Israelites said to Moses: “Come near, and hear all that the Lord our God says; and you will tell us everything that the Lord our God tells you, and we will hear and do” (Deut. 5:27).
The two stones are also called “the tables of testimony” (Ex. 34:29), and were deposited in the ark of the covenant (Ex. 20:20; 1 Kings 8:9; Heb. 9:4) , above which there were two cherubs as guardians of the rights of God together with the mercy seat.
Paul refers to God’s giving of the two tables of stone to Israel (who, although full of grace and mercy, could not absolve the guilty), in the midst of glory, when he describes the commandments written on them as “ministry.” of death”, in contrast to that which speaks of the glory of the ministry of the Spirit, of the testimony of Christ, which is righteousness for everyone who believes, having been made a propitiation “through faith in his blood, to show his righteousness, because of having passed over, in his patience, the sins previously committed, with a view to showing at this time his righteousness, so that he may be the righteous one, and the one who justifies him who is of the faith of Jesus” (2 Cor. 3:7-11; Rom. 3:25-26).
The Decalogue is the demand of divine justice demanded of sinful man, incapable of fulfilling it, and therefore under the just condemnation of God; It is grace that makes us sharers, by faith, in the justice of God as a free gift, with regeneration to a new life in holiness and justice (Rom. 4).