Michael Coogan on the Ten Commandments: The Ten Commandments have become a focal point in the culture wars that divide society. Held to be a concise summary of what God wants everyone to do--and mostly not to do--they have been displayed in public spaces to remind all of their supposedly unchangeable message.   But if the Ten Commandments were given directly by God, then why does the Bible have different versions of these supposedly divinely given rules? Why do modern displays abridge and alter them? Why have both Jews and Christians throughout history sometimes ignored and even disobeyed them? Are all of the values these ancient and historically conditioned laws express still valid today?    As a biblical scholar I have been both amused and troubled by how the Ten Commandments have been wrenched from their original context and made into a kind of graven image, not to be examined or challenged. In this book I trace the history of the Ten Commandments from Moses to Cecil B. DeMille and the United States Supreme Court. I do so without presuppositions or dogmatic constraints, paying close attention to what they actually say. Contrary to many pastors and politicians who view the Ten Commandments as a timeless code, I conclude that some of the specific prohibitions and some of the values underlying them are no longer appropriate or acceptable in a modern, pluralistic society. Others, however, enshrine more universal ideals, that should be honored, although not by public display.