Editor's note: This is the second in a two-part series about a week of living biblically. The columnist decided, in the spirit of author A.J. Jacobs, to live by the Ten Commandments - literally. She sacrificed a paper lamb whenever she broke a commandment. To read about the rest of her week, see her column from last Tuesday www.thepost.ohiou.edu.
Honor you father and your mother. At first glance, I wasn't really sure how I should go about following this commandment literally. It's not like my parents are here telling me what to do. I drew a blank on how I would go about honoring them. Monday I decided that calling my dad to say hi would be a good start. I'll admit that my parents often hear from me when I need something. So I thought that calling my dad simply to express affection would be pretty honoring. The conversation was short but pleasant enough, and I felt really good after hanging up. I could tell my dad was glad to hear from me. I made a mental note to call him more often.
You shall not murder. Check. You shall not commit adultery. Check. I knew commandments eight nine and ten would be tricky if I were to follow them literally. You shall not steal. Easy enough. But if I were to be literal about it, stealing could be referring to anything. Only a few days into my biblical week, I realized what I steal: time. A lot of it. If I'm at my job and instead of working I'm on Gmail chat or Twitter, I'm stealing from the university. Because I'm paid to work reception, doing anything else and still being paid for it is the equivalent of stealing. Lambs five through 12 were sacrificed at the altar of stealing time.
You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife
nor his male servant nor his female servant nor his ox
nor his donkey
nor anything that is your neighbor's. When Jacobs focuses on living biblically by the 10th commandment, he started by making a list of all the things he covets daily. Within a few hours he has a pretty extensive lists ranging from a Treo PDA to George Clooney's fame. He points out that the final of the Ten Commandments is the only one that regulates a state of mind rather than a behavior, making it arguably the hardest one to follow in a year (or week) of biblical literalism.
My list of coveting is about two pages long. In three days, I coveted my friends' cars, grades, boyfriends, organizational skills and laptops, just to name a few. Tackling a mind-over-matter feat is no small task, and I spent the mental majority of my week trying to redirect my thoughts away from comparison. Jacobs' approach to the no coveting rule was to focus on following the biblical list of dos that stretched out before him. With that magnanimous task, there would be no time for coveting. So, I tried to do the same: focus on being proactive and focusing on whatever I have - something like mental blinders on a horse race. With this kind of resolve, I lost only four more lambs to coveting the rest of the week.
At the end of my biblical week I had sacrificed a staggering 66 paper lambs. Living as a biblical literalist was mentally exhausting. I had a perpetual check list of dos and don'ts running through my head, and by Sunday, I was glad to peel off the list of commandments I taped to my planner a week ago. It didn't take long to realize that I am not nearly as moral as I like to think I am. I'd wager to say that the average student would fall into this category as well. Unlike Jacobs, I didn't have to grow a beard, wear unmixed fibers, stone adulterers, or build a hut to discover the extent of biblical implications on its follower's lifestyle. However, I discovered I'm a fan of interpretation over literalism any day. Otherwise I'd be cutting out paper lambs until kingdom come.
Leah Hitchens is a junior studying journalism. Send her an e-mail at lh303105@ohiou.edu.
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Opinion
Leah Hitchens
