Did people know that killing, stealing, and lying were wrong before God gave Moses the 10 commandments?

Question

If so, does this suggest that morality can come from sources other than God?

Answer 1

All ten plus more were in the Egyptian book of the dead before that. Imagine if Moses plagiarized all of them Christians would also have...
"Thou shalt not be arrogant"
"Thou shalt not terrorize.

Answer 2

No. I have come to understand that the Law of God as in the ten was given to man at creation. If you was to look at the history of Adam to Jesus"sin" would still be consider by God as the transgression of his Law(1John 3:4)" Sin is the transgression of the Law".... When we qoute Romans 3:23, we understand all have sinned so it remains that those under different dispensations broke the ten commandments. That goes for satan also whom Jesus called a "murder from the begining". What has happen is that most protestants see the giving of the Law at Mt. Sinia only when both Law of God and law of Moses was joined to Israel under that covenant. Before they was given the sabbath commandment on stone tables, they already broke it in recieving of the manna in (Exd.16:28 - 29). God asked Moses " How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws ?" This was not to Moses directly but to the people, so it was evident that it did exist before he gave it to Israel. Well you may not be convinced by that explination so here is another that agrees with the first. Adam put Eve before God and that was idolatry, Cain slew Abel that was murder, Jacob lied to his father Isaac and that was baring false wittness against Esau. All these was done before Mt.Sinai and apostle Paul concluded that was why the law of Moses was added to the Ten commandments(Gal.3:10,19). I had been studying this as a Messianic Jew and couldn't put my finger on how to explain the difference in the two laws until God answered my prayers. The law of Moses is called by Paul" the book of the law" thats the same book that was put in the side of the ark of the covenant(Duet. 31:24 -26) The Ten commandments is called " The Royal Law", James 2:8 which was the one written by God and placed inside the ark(Duet.10:1-5). So it does not suggest that morality came from another source but God has his Law in the original sanctuary in heaven. That is where Jesus is at the Holy places and Paul in (hebrews 8:1-5), tells us about the ministry of christ in heaven. In revelation 11;19, John sees the temple and the ark of his covenant and that is what Moses was commanded to copy on earth.(Rev.11:19 & Exd.25:9-18)

Answer 3

God created to perfect children (Adam and Eve) They instinctivly new right from wrong. They were able to talk with God even after being thrown out of eden (harsh on gods part) People were guided by god, and other prophets until the ten commandments.
Note: I don't belive in God, but have studied many religions and can on the asssumption that God is real and you are going by what the bible says, assume that this is how people knew right from wrong.

Answer 4

interesting question. when god created man he said let us make him in our image. it is in my opinion that that the image of god would include a natural sense of right and wrong. to answer why they would have to be written in stone i would say that because we are, after all imperfect humans we may abondon the right thing to do and adopt what is wrong. if god is a god of justice as the bible would describe him-which he is- then how could he be justified in punishing wrong doers if his morals;or laws were not written and recorded for us or in this case the isrealites to follow? however as they did not have a written law before moses descended from mt. sinai i highly doubt that such acts as lying stealing and murdering were unpunishable acts. at that time the isrealites as a whole were godly people and as i said with the natural ability to tell right from wrong i do believe they had cosequences in place for misbehaving if you will

Answer 5

It only means that God was present long before the days of Moses.

Answer 6

Yes but it was all subjectivly based on the class in which you were born, i.e. it meant nothing to kill a peasent or slave if you were of a higher class, but murder of one in your class would demand retrobution.

Morality was different because there was no such thing as 'free time' and the men were hunters, farmers, pedlers etc so their entire waking life centred around eating sleeping and working. The concept of a 'loving father' or 'loving parent' has only existed since the industrial age.

Answer 7

Actually most didn't. Although many blame religion for wars, before religion, i.e., the modern kind, wars were fought all the time. War was not a question of if, but when.

The Romans, Barbarians, Mongols, Greeks, Persians, Celts, fought wars at will. Conquest and power over others was their main goal. The Spartans, were born, raised and conditioned only for war. War was what their life was for. The Vikings only goal, overall, was to conquer other lands.

Answer 8

They always knew but they were too busy doing their own thing.

They knew - in Egypt that they were being mistreated. The Israelite who told on Moses when he killed the Egyptian knew it was wrong to kill.

All the way back to Cain and Abel. Cain knew if he killed Abel, he would not have to deal with God honouring Abel above him. God told him He knew of his sin. He got an explantion of wrongdoing.

Answer 9

Yes to number 1. No to number 2.

Answer 10

Yes, the Laws of Hammurabi were in force before Revelation at Sinai, but that's not to say that there was no God before Hammurabi... The Exodus and Revelation at Mt. Sinai occurred in 1312 BCE.
.

Answer 11

DUH! God gave them a conscience, but they had become so corrupt that they were actually bowing down to statues made with their own two hands! How's THAT for stupidity?

It became obvious that these "common sense" Laws HAD to be written down because nobody was following their conscience!

If morality can come from a source other than God, please explain that.

Without an infinite Being who can see the end results of every single possible action, just exactly how DO you know that something is wrong? Wrong for you, not wrong for me. It's the age old debate, because we're only finite. Final and absolute morality MUST come from God.