Lysimachus, Where does the bible say that there is a heavenly ten commandments?
I am glad that you asked this question.
Heaven's Original Ten Commandments
The Earthy Tables - an Exact Transcript of the Heavenly
~ by Lysimachus
We see in the sacred pages of Revelation that John the revelator saw the Testimony in the Temple of Heaven. As we will now see, this "Testimony" in heaven is an exact transcript of the Tables given to Moses at Sinai:
In Revelation 11:19 we read:
"And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament." (Revelation 11:19)
Now let's compare Revelation 11:19 with 15:5:
"And after that I looked, and, behold, the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven was opened." (Revelation 15:5)
The word "temple" here in the Greek is
"naos", which has allusion to the "inner shrine" of a temple, and the word for "tabernacle" here is
"skene", which means the entire "sanctuary". This means that the "Temple OF the tabernacle OF the testimony" is referring directly to the "testimony" contained in the Most Holy Place of the Heavenly Sanctuary, where it is encased in the Ark of the Covenant.
Now let's employ "scripture with scripture" to decipher what this "testimony" in heaven actually is. The Lord told Moses the following concerning the Two Tables of Stone:
"And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I shall give thee." (Exodus 25:16)
"And thou shalt put the mercy seat above upon the ark; and in the ark thou shalt put the testimony that I shall give thee." (Exodus 25:21)
As we can see, the Tables of Stone were called the
"testimony". Further texts to collaborate this are established in the following:
"And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him upon mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God." (Exodus 31:18 )
"And Moses turned, and went down from the mount, and the two tables of the testimony were in his hand: the tables were written on both their sides; on the one side and on the other were they written." (Exodus 32:15)
"And it came to pass, when Moses came down from mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony in Moses' hand, when he came down from the mount, that Moses wist not that the skin of his face shone while he talked with him." (Exodus 34:29)
Once again, the Lord our God has given us enough information for which to clearly see that the Ten Commandments given to Moses were an exact transcript of the original testimony in heaven. This fact is further validated by the following point:
"Then went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel: (10) And they saw the God of Israel: and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his clearness. (11) And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he laid not his hand: also they saw God, and did eat and drink. (12) And the LORD said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there: and I will give thee tables of stone [The original Hebrew can also be translated "OF the stone"] ,and a law, and commandments which I have written; that thou mayest teach them." (Exodus 24:9-12)
This passage stresses that God gave His Ten Commandments FROM heaven. He gave Moses a
COPY!
It has been argued that it is "speculation" to determine what laws are found on the Testimony in heaven. With this I ask: If we are unaware what laws are written on Heaven's testimony, how can we be judged by them according to James 2? And if we do not know what laws are contained on these original tables, what is Christ mediating for? Which sins is He interceding for? Also what kind of God would not make them known to His created beings? The answer to this question is: He has made them known to us! He has given us enough information to see that the Tables given to Moses were a transcript of the Heavenly Original!
Notice the following written by a well-known evangelist in the mid 20th century by the name of Allen Walker:
There is a reason why the Ten Commandments were placed inside the ark, and it must not be overlooked. The ark was the most sacred article in the temple. It was placed in the holy of holies, and over it were cherubim (angels) of glory. (Hebrews 9:5.) It was from the mercy seat that mercy and grace were dispensed to the penitent transgressor. Of the angels at the ends of the ark it was written:
The cherubims shall stretch forth their wings on high, covering the mercy seat with their wings, and their faces shall look one to another; toward the mercy seat shall the faces of the cherubims be. Exodus 25:20. These angels were to look down upon the ark, showing the respect which Heaven has for Gods law. God further said,
There I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubims. Verse 22. Above the ark was the throne of the Infinite, and inside the ark was the law of love containing the principles of the divine government. David prayed,
Thou that dwells between the cherubims, shine forth. Psalm 80:1. God dwelt mystically
between the cherubims in the earthly sanctuary; and there mercy had its seat, or source, and from there pardon was granted for the violation of the law of love in the ark.
All this constituted
figures of the true sanctuary in heaven, and today
Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us. Hebrews 9:24. There Jesus, as our High Priest, mediates for sinners. But what is sin? We have the answer in 1 John 3:4:
Sin is the transgression of the law. Which law? We find the answer in Revelation 11:19:
The temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament. There we find the real ark; there we find the real Priest; there we find the real mediation; and there we find
the ark of his testament - the real Ten Commandments after which the earthly was patterned.
If the law that was in the ark was abrogated at the cross, Christ is mediating for the transgression of an abrogated law!
These are irrefutable truths which escape the mind of the man who holds this sacred law in contempt. The very fact that the original of this law is in heaven, where Christ, our High Priest, mediates His blood for pardon, shows how impossible it would be for this law to be done away with. No stronger argument could be produced to prove that the Ten Commandments is not abolished.
And today, just as in the earthly ark, it must read, The seventh day is the Sabbath, else it would not be a true pattern.
In the Old Testament sin is defined as doing
somewhat against any of the commandments of the Lord concerning things which ought not to be done (Leviticus 4:27); and in the New Testament it is the same:
Sin is the transgression of the law. (1 John 3:4.) In the Old Testament these commandments of the Lord were kept in the ark, in the holy of holies, where God dwelt. This ark was called the ark of the testimony. Years after the cross John was permitted to see the temple above, and he says there was seen in Gods temple the ark of his testament. So there it is today, defining sin; and there Jesus is, too, mediating His blood for the transgression of the law.
~ Source:
Allen Walker The Law and the Sabbath, pp. 60-61, [Hard-copy version: pages 119-120]
It is important to realize that the New Testament employs itself as the antitype of Old Testament types. This means that the New Testament employs itself as the focal point in fulfillment of Old Testament patterns. Exodus 25:9-40 describes on how the Sanctuary materials were made after a pattern, and the Hebrew for pattern is
"tabniyth", and it means a form, plan, figure, image--equivalent to "tupos" in the Greek.
In Hebrews 8:5 the sanctuary was an
"example" and
"shadow" of heavenly things. In Greek, the word for
example is
"hupadeigma", which means an
"example, an imitation, a figure, a copy", and the word for shadow is
"skia" means an
"image cast by an object and representing the form of that object." These words are very similar to
"tupos" and
"antitupos".
So in essence, the Mosaic sanctuary was a pattern, a miniature model, a type of heavenly things. With this in mind, it becomes clear that the local and literal settings of the land of Palestine, Jerusalem, the Temple, and the Jews, were a type of the worldwide saints with the Heavenly Jerusalem being the capital of the saints. The saints of the New Covenant make up the spiritual Davidic Sanctuary, and the New Testament Saints come to God through the Priestly Ministry of Christ in the Heavenly Sanctuary--the Antitypical interpretation shows that the literal settings of Ancient Israel served as a Type, or a Pattern, of worldwide Spiritual Israel.
With this in mind, to conclude that the laws written on the Tables of Stone given to Moses are somehow
"different" from the laws engraved in Stone in heaven would be a
"perversion of the scriptures", for that would mean that the Ark of God's Testament in Heaven is truly not a copy of the original after all! We don't need to guess how heaven's version reads. We know that during this time of earthly crises, heaven's Testimony contained in the Ark have been
"adapted" for mankind's
fallen condition. Thus we know
that at least now, while there is sin, God's original Ten Commandments in heaven read the same as the earthly tables, for heaven's temple right now is
centered on the redemption of mankind--and this is precisely why after the millennium,
"no temple will be seen in the New Jerusalem (See Rev. 21:22).
We must remember that the very reason why the "Ark of the Testament" is called the "Ark of the Testament" is because the "Testimony" is
inside the Ark! Otherwise it would be the "Ark of Nothing", or the "Ark of
THIN AIR".
The words of Paul and James demonstrate, without a shadow of doubt, that the Ten Commandments are still binding in the New Covenant.
In Romans 7:7, Paul says:
"What shall we say then? is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet."
Q) Let us raise the question: Where did Paul derive the phrase "Thou shalt not covet"?
Answer: The answer is obvious. Paul could only have derived it from the Moral Ten Commandment law, demonstrating that Paul himself recognized its perpetuity. Why, not even Christ ever quoted this commandment! He well knew that God's faithful people are to live in accordance to His Royal Precepts--the original Tables of Stone that dwell in the Ark of the Covenant in the Heavenly Sanctuary!
Paul continues in chapter 13:
"(8) Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. (9) For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. (10) Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law." (Romans 13:8-10)
We see then how Paul repeats commandments for which Christ did not even stress. One might argue here that Paul is stressing these are the only important commandments out of the Ten. But that argument does not work for Paul mentions the importance of honoring our father and mother in Ephesians 6:1-3, and does not in Romans 13.
In All Peace that Passes Understanding,
~ Lysimachus
