He ain't no Moses

by David Grand
September 4, 2003

To do my duty, I must obey God." So said Judge Roy Moore in defying a federal district court ruling to remove a 5,280-pound rock containing the Ten Commandments from the Alabama Supreme Court rotunda, which he and some helpers had installed during off-hours one night in 2001. Wow! The Lord told him to do that? And here I thought he only spoke directly to Jerry Falwell, Oral Roberts and Pat Robertson.

And I can't help but wonder how his army of supporters would feel if a Judge Omar Muhammad had snuck into the Alabama Judicial Building one night to place a monument bearing a few select words from the Quran. They'd undoubtedly be outraged at the idea that he was pushing an alien religion upon them. And would probably respond by saying, what he did was wrong. For this is a "Christian" nation established on "Christian" principles, and ergo, it's "our" country. Right.

His open defiance of the First Amendment forbidding the government from endorsing any religion - that is, a separation of church and state for the benefit of each - conjured up memories of Governor George Wallace standing in the doorway of the University of Alabama in 1963, trying to block the court-ordered enrollment of two black students. But then again, Southern leaders thumbing their nose at federal court orders is as traditional as a seven-layer wedding cake, a la Georgia's Lester "pickax" Maddox, Arkansas' Orval Faubus and Mississippi's Ross Barnett.

Now, from what little I know about the Ten Commandments (other than that many today view them as mere suggestions), God gave them to Moses - with whom he spoke to quite often - on Mount Sinai, thereby establishing a covenant with the Israelite people. But when he came down cradling the two stone tablets (he'd have never made it down if they were inscribed on a two ton rock like "Roy's Rock," he found many of his followers were worshipping an image of a calf made out of gold. And in a fit of anger, he smashed the tablets on the ground. God, in turn, was so infuriated that he (or she) threatened to abandon them for the sin of idolatry, a big no-no in the Commandments. But Moses saved the day by climbing all the way back up Mount Siani to intercede on their behalf with God, who graciously consented to give him a second set of the Ten Commandments. (Bet he'd never gotten a third set.) The Israelites placed them in a chest of acacia wood, referred to as the Ark of the Covenant, and carried it to Palestine, where it was then moved to King Solomon's temple in Jerusalem (Similar chests are now used in all synagogues to hold the Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible.) But Solomon, for all his wisdom, was guilty of a grave sin by allowing his many foreign wives to build altars to their divinities, which may account for why God allowed his temple to be destroyed in 586 BC by the Babylonians. Legend has it that the Ark of the Covenant was rescued and moved elsewhere. But where it was taken and where it is now (if it still exists) remains an unsolved mystery. However, if it's eventually found, that'd be the greatest discovery of all times. And one can only imagine all the rejoicing there'd be in Israel.

Now, I'm not questioning Judge Moore's reverence - or obsession some would say - for the Ten Commandments, since for him it's been a good way of gaining notoriety far beyond his role as a jurist, and in getting appointed as a circuit court judge in 1992 and in his 2000 campaign for chief justice, in which he described himself on billboards as "The Ten Commandments judge." But ultimately, it was his refusal to obey the commandments of his colleagues on the court that burst his bubble What hypocrisy that is, Moore's lawyers argued, when "the Ten Commandments are displayed, more subtly and often surrounded by secular legal symbols, in other government buildings around the country." But as Federal Judge Thompson said in his ruling, Roy's Rock is "nothing less than an obtrusive year-round religious display... and that the only way to miss the religious or nonsecular appearance of the monument would be to walk through the Alabama State Judicial Building with one's eyes closed." A federal appeals court agreed, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to issue a stay in the case.

Not all is lost, however, for if he has to turn in his robe, he could always return to dabbling in professional kickboxing which he did in an earlier life. At least there, he'd know for sure when he's been knocked out, even if the Ten Commandments were sewn on his trunks.