atoms into suns

I just saw something tonight that got me thinking, again, about the Second Commandment, which I learned as, "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord your God in vain." I was taught that that meant that using the names of God or Jesus as exclamations or expletives was a sin. Sure, I may have been taught a little more, but that's what I remember.

Once I got older and started thinking about these things again I suspected that what I'd been taught may not cover it all. I eventually decided that I thought it really meant that God really doesn't want us attaching His Name to our doings in order to give them a sense of legitimacy -- especially when we fallible humans can never quite be sure that what we're doing is really what God wants.

I liked this interpretation and stuck with it for a long time.

Tonight, as I said, I saw something that made me start wondering about it again, so I decided to do a little research, never suspecting the can of worms I'd open up.

First off, I'd forgotten that the Ten Commandments are given two or three times in the Bible. In any case, the relevant passages in my NIV Bible are:

You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

--Exodus 20:7, same as Deuteronomy 5:11

The footnote (okay, it's my NIV Study Bible) says:

20:7 misuse the name of the Lord. By profaning God's name -- e.g., by swearing falsely by it (see Lev 19:12; see also Jer 7:9 and NIV text note), as on the witness stand in court. Jesus elaborates on oath-taking in Mt 5:33-37.

And here in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (I was raised Catholic), it seems to say that we're not supposed to lie under oath nor "use it for trivial matters". (But hey, it's 2:30am, so my interpretation/paraphrase could be wrong.)

Religious Tolerance has a section on possible interpretations (scroll down), including:

• This verse originally meant that one is not to use the name of God for "any frivolous or malicious purpose or in magic."
• Until recently, the phrase "taking God's name in vain" related to contracts. They were sworn "in the name of the Lord". If the terms of a contract were broken, the offending party was said to have taken "the Lord's name in vain."
• Again, the Westminster Larger Catechism interprets this Commandment broadly to include believing in false doctrines or opposing God's truth.
• Today, it is often mistakenly interpreted as prohibiting swearing. This has nothing to do with its original meaning.

And heck, just to add more to the mix, the Religious Tolerance site offers several verses of the Qur'an for comparison:

2:224: Do not use God's name in your oaths as an excuse to prevent you from dealing justly.
73:8: Remember the name of your Lord and devote yourself to Him exclusively.

76:25 Glorify the name of your Lord morning and evening.

So now we seem to be up to several possible interpretations and variations of interpretations:

• Don't lie under oath
• Don't take an oath just to make yourself sound more honest than you are
• Don't break contracts
• Don't use the Lord's name for trivial matters
• Don't use the Lord's name to make it sound like what you're doing is His command
• Don't believe in false doctrines
• Devote yourself to God
• Don't swear

There may be more, but, like I said, it's the middle of the night and this is all my brain can handle right now.

So basically, my question to all of you is this: What's your interpretation of this Commandment?