I am the Lord thy God

"I am the LORD thy God" (KJV, also "I am Yahweh your God" NJB, WEB, Hebrew: אָֽנֹכִ֖י֙ יְהוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֑֔יךָ, romanized: ’Ānōḵî YHWH ’ĕlōheḵā, Ancient Greek: ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ Κύριος ὁ Θεός σου, romanized: egṓ eimi ho Kúrios ho Theós sou) is the opening phrase of the Ten Commandments, which are widely understood as moral imperatives by ancient legal historians and Jewish and Christian biblical scholars.

[citation needed] The introduction to the Ten Commandments establishes the identity of God by both his personal name and his historical act of delivering Israel from Egypt.

By saying, "I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery", it introduces him by name to establish his authority behind the stipulations that follow.

[7][8][9][10] The text follows an ancient royal treaty pattern, where the speaking monarch begins by identifying himself by name and notable deeds.

Yahweh thus establishes his position relative to the Israelites, who are expected to render complete submission, allegiance, and obedience to him.

[4] The covenant logic establishes an exclusive relationship in which the subject population may have only one sovereign, as expressed explicitly in thou shalt have no other gods before me.

[19][20][21] The teaching of Moses and the experience of Israel when they departed from it are used to support the insistence that believers abstain from idolatry and sexual immorality.

[22] The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that “The first commandment summons man to believe in God, to hope in him, and to love him above all else.”[23] It cites the requirement of the Shema, that “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your strength”[24] and the answer Jesus gave when tempted by Satan.

Adoring God, praying to him, offering him the worship that belongs to him, fulfilling the promises and vows made to him are acts of the virtue of religion which fall under obedience to the first commandment.In their explanation of the first commandment, the Catechism quotes Justin Martyr's dialogue to support their teaching that Christians and Jews have trusted the same God.

[28] In his commentary on the first commandment, Calvin describes superstition as akin to a wife committing adultery in front of her husband.

The words, “before me,” go to increase the indignity, God being provoked to jealousy whenever we substitute our fictions in his stead; just as an unfaithful wife stings her husband’s heart more deeply when her adultery is committed openly before his eyes.Martin Luther describes the first commandment as prohibiting both the literal honoring of other gods as well as trusting in idols of the heart: money, good works, superstition, etc.

Therefore the heathen really make their self-invented notions and dreams of God an idol, and put their trust in that which is altogether nothing.

Thus it is with all idolatry; for it consists not merely in erecting an image and worshiping it, but rather in the heart, which stands gaping at something else, and seeks help and consolation from creatures, saints, or devils, and neither cares for God, nor looks to Him for so much good as to believe that He is willing to help, neither believes that whatever good it experiences comes from God.Like Calvin, Matthew Henry considers “I am the Lord thy God” to be a preface.

God asserts his own authority to enact this law in general: "I am the Lord who command thee all that follows."

Because God is the Lord—Jehovah, self-existent, independent, eternal, and the fountain of all being and power; therefore he has an incontestable right to command us.

Though that covenant of peculiarity is now no more, yet there is another, by virtue of which all that are baptized are taken into relation to him as their God, and are therefore unjust, unfaithful, and very ungrateful, if they obey him not.

Herein, God asserts his own authority to enact this law; and proposeth himself as the sole object of that religious worship which is enjoined in the four first commandments.

1.Because God is the Lord, Jehovah, self - existent, independent, eternal, and the fountain of all being and power; therefore he has an incontestable right to command us.

In his exposition of Exodus 20 on the “Thru The Bible” radio program,[33] J. Vernon McGee, quotes Romans 1:21-25 and Colossians 3:5 to support his assertion that the idolatry forbidden by the first commandment includes not only the worship of idols and foreign gods, but also idols of the heart such as greed, alcohol, and sexual immorality.

But whoever embraces it or kisses it or honors it or sprinkles on it or washes it or anoints it or dresses it or puts shoes on it, transgresses a negative commandment.

The essence of the commandment [forbidding] the worship of false gods is not to serve any of the creations, not an angel, a sphere, or a star, none of the four fundamental elements, nor any entity created from them.

The phrase "I am the Lord your God" אנכי יהוה אלהיך appears a number of times in the Hebrew Bible outside of the Decalogue.

In a similar manner, Leviticus 19 gives additional commands regarding separation from mediums and spiritists, the honoring of the aged, and kindness to foreigners.

The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.

Declare with the sound of joyful shouting, proclaim this, Send it out to the end of the earth; Say, “The Lord has redeemed His servant Jacob."