Charles Mathieu Isidore Decaen

DECAEN, CHARLES MATHIEU ISIDORE, COUNT (1769-1832), French soldier, was born at Caen on April 13, '769. He made his name during the wars of the French Revolution under Kleber, Marceau and Jourdan, in the Rhenish campaigns. In 1799 he became general of division, and fought at Hohenlinden (Dec. 1800). Selected by Napoleon early in the year i8o2 for the command of the French possessions in the East Indies, he set sail with Admiral Linois early in March i8o3 with a small expedi tionary force, touched at the Cape of Good Hope (then in Dutch hands), and noted the condition of the fortifications there. On arriving at Pondicherry he found matters in a very critical condi tion. Though the renewal of war in Europe had not yet been heard of, the hostile preparations adopted by the Marquis Wellesley caused Decaen to withdraw promptly to the Isle of France (Mauritius), where, for eight years, he sought to harass British trade and prepare for plans of alliance with the Mahratta princes of India. They all came to naught. Linois was captured by a British squadron, and ultimately, in 181i, Mauritius itself fell to the British. Decaen then received the command of the French troops in Catalonia. He died of the cholera in 1832.

See M. L. E. Gautier, Biographie du general Decaen (Caen, 185o) ; J. Tessier, "Le general Decaen aux Indes," in Rev. Hist. vol. xv. DECALIN, a chemical substance obtained by reduction of naphthalene (q.v.) ; it is decahydronaphthalene, C, DECALOGUE, another name for the biblical Ten Com mandments, in Hebrew the Ten Words (Deut. iv. 13, x. 4; Exod. xxxiv. 28), written by God on the two tables of stone (Exod. xxiv. 12, xxxii. 16), the so-called Tables of the Revelation (E.V. "tables of testimony," Exod. xxxiv. 29), or Tables of the Covenant (Deut. ix. 9, I I, 15) (in patristic Gr. i hei &Xoyos sc. (3i0Xos or vo,uoefo La). These tables were broken by Moses (Exod. xxxii. 19), and two new ones were hewn (xxxiv. 1), and upon them were written the words of the covenant by Moses (xxxiv. 27, sqq.) or, according to another view, by God himself (Deut. iv. 13, ix. Io). They were deposited in the Ark (Exod. xxv. 21 ; I Ki. viii. 9) . In Deuteronomy the inscription on these tables, which is briefly called the covenant (iv. 13), is expressly identified with the words spoken by Jehovah (Yahweh) out of the midst of the fire at Mt. Sinai or Horeb (according to the Deuteronomic tradi tion), in the ears of the whole people on the "day of the assembly," and rehearsed in vi. 6-21. The order of the command ments varies in some ancient texts (Vatican ms. of the LXX., Nash Papyrus), and there are differences in detail between the form in which the Decalogue appears in Exodus and in Deuteron omy. Further, the term "Ten Words" does not occur in Exod. xx., but is found in Exod. xxxiv. 28, in a context which seems to imply that the words mentioned had immediately preceded this passage. Accordingly some scholars would find another Deca logue embedded in Exod. xxxiv. Io-26.

The Decalogue of Exod. xx., Deut. v.

Comparison between the two texts, especially in the law of the Sabbath, strongly sug gests that neither form is original, both having been expanded from a rather shorter common source. It seems that in the earlier commandments even this common source has been extended from a much more concise primitive form, and that the commands first took the form of simple injunctions and prohibitions of the same type as "Thou shalt not steal." Different views have been held as to the actual divisions of the Decalogue. Thus Philo regarded Exod. xx. 2-3 as the first com mandment, while the Talmud made v. 2 the first and vv. 3-6 the second, thus identifying the sins of apostasy and idolatry. In Christian circles the Roman and Lutheran Churches make the first commandment extend from v. 2 to v. 6, and distinguish the coveting of a wife from the coveting of property. (This last is only possible on the basis of the text in Deuteronomy.) The ar rangement of the Orthodox Eastern, Calvinistic and Anglican Churches takes Exod. xx. 2 as an introduction, separates the prohibition of apostasy from that of the making of images, and unites the clauses prohibiting covetousness into a single command ment. Different opinions obtain as to the date of the Decalogue. The general tendency is to place it late rather than early, though the view that the whole is Mosaic has been revived by some modern scholars (e.g., McFadyen and Volz).

The Decalogue of Exod. xxxiv. 12-26.

This passage con tains a number of precepts, and if we are to see here the original "Ten Words" referred to in v. 28, it is clear that we have them in a greatly expanded form. It is, moreover, far from certain as to how we are to apportion the "Ten Words" among the precepts contained in these verses. We may, perhaps, find the best ar rangement as follows (I) prohibition of worship paid to other gods, (2) prohibition of molten images, (3) observance of the feast of unleavened bread, (4) the feast of weeks, (5) the feast of the ingathering at the beginning of the year, (6) the seventh day rest, (7) firstlings and firstfruits (separated in the text as it stands), (8) prohibition of leaven with sacrificial blood, (9) sacrificial fat must not be left over till the morning, (1 o) a kid must not be seethed in its mother's milk.

It goes without saying that other arrangements are possible, and none is wholly satisfactory. But on any identification of the individual precepts, two features stand out clearly. In the first place the provisions are all ritual rather than ethical, and in the second place, while some of them are equally adapted to a nomad people in the wilderness and to a settled agricultural community, others could only have applied to the conditions of the latter. It is worth noting that most of the precepts are found also in the "Book of the Covenant" (Exod. xx.–xxiii. E.), where they occur unconnected with one another. This fact, together with the very simple type of ritual enjoined, has suggested a Judaean rather than an Ephraimite origin for Exod. xxxiv. 12-26.

The Decalogue in Christian Theology.

Following the New Testament, in which the "commandments" summed up in the law of love are identified with the precepts of the Decalogue (Mark x. 19; Rom. xiii. 9; cf. Mark xii. 28 ff.), the ancient Church emphasized the permanent obligation of the ten commandments as a summary of natural in contradistinction to ceremonial pre cepts, though the observance of the Sabbath was to be taken in a spiritual sense (Augustine, De spiritu et litera, xiv. ; Jerome, De celebratione Paschae). The mediaeval theologians followed in the same line, recognizing all the precepts of the Decalogue as moral precepts de lege naturae, though the law of the Sabbath is not of the law of nature, in so far as it prescribes a determinate day of rest (Thomas, summa, Imalldae qu. c. art. 3 ; Duns, Super sentential, lib. iii. dist. 37). The most important mediaeval expo sition of the Decalogue is that of Nicolaus de Lyra; and the 15th century, in which the Decalogue acquired special importance in the confessional, was prolific in treatises on the subject (Anton inus of Florence, Gerson, etc.) .

Important theological controversies on the Decalogue begin with the Reformation. The question between the Lutheran (Augustinian) and Reformed (Philonic) division of the ten com mandments was mixed up with controversy as to the legitimacy of sacred images not designed to be worshipped. The Reformed theologians took the stricter view. The identity of the Decalogue with the eternal law of nature was maintained in both churches, but it was an open question whether the Decalogue, as such (that is, as a law given by Moses to the Israelites), is of perpetual obligation. The Socinians, on the other hand, regarded the Deca logue as abrogated by the more perfect law of Christ ; and this view, especially in the shape that the Decalogue is a civil and not a moral law (J. D. Michaelis), was the current one in the period of the 18th century rationalism. The distinction of a per manent and a transitory element in the law of the Sabbath is found, not only in Luther and Melanchthon, but in Calvin and other theologians of the Reformed church. The main controversy which arose on the basis of this distinction was whether the pre scription of one day in seven is of permanent obligation. It was admitted that such obligation must be not natural but positive; but it was argued by the stricter Calvinistic divines that the pro portion of one in seven is agreeable to nature, based on the order of creation in six days, and in no way specially connected with anything Jewish. Hence it was regarded as a universal positive law of God. But those who maintained the opposite view were not excluded from the number of the orthodox. The laxer concep tion found a place in the Cocceian school.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.-Geffcken, UIber die verschiedenen Eintheilungen des Bibliography.-Geffcken, UIber die verschiedenen Eintheilungen des Dekalogs and den Einfluss derselben auf den Cultus; W. Robertson Smith, Old Test. Jew; Church, pp. where his earlier views (1877) in the Ency. Brit. are largely modified (cf. also Eng. Hist. Rev. [ 1888] p. 352) ; Montefiore, Hibbert Lectures (1892) , Appendix 1; W. R. Harper, Internat. Crit. Comm. on Amos and Hosea, pp. 58-64 (on the position of the Decalogue in early pre-prophetic religion of Israel) ; C. A. Briggs, Higher Criticism of Hexat., pp. 189-21o; see also EXODUS and DEUTERONOMY. (W. R. S.; S. A. C.)