Admit it, you clicked on this thread because it said adultery!
Anyway, I do have a point. As I was preparing this morning’s Sunday school lesson for my kids,(2 & 3 graders), I thought of something. Next weeks lesson is on the Ten Commandents. I’ve already planned for us to make salt clay tablets. We will engrave the commandments themselves onto the clay when it’s soft, and let them harden.
It will be necessary to keep them short, like “Don’t murder”, “Don’t steal”, and so on. So how the heck do I condense the commandment about adultery? And how to explain if one of the kids asks what it means? Remember, these are 8 and 9 year olds for the most part. Do I just say “It means honor your promises if you are married” , or “it means you are supposed to be faithful to your wife/husband” So, one of the kids will be sure to ask “What does faithful mean?”
“It means not to get really mushy and kissy with someone you aren’t married to.”
(Adultery is often construed to mean sex between single people - and even if you are a little more liberal, its appropriate for eight and nine year olds to think “really mushy” is for married people).
Could you frame it in terms of “romance?” 8 and 9 year olds are certainly familiar with dating, and as Dangerosa said, they know that people who are having a romance get “really kissy and mushy.” Could you say that adultery is like going out on dates with and getting really mushy with someone who is not your spouse?
As to how to condense it? Wow. That’s a hard one. “Don’t fuck around?” No. “Stay true?” Too abstract. “Don’t be like J.Lo.” There ya go!
A nine year old would probably think of that more along the lines of playing games or sports. Then Baker’d have to explain there are different forms of cheating and he’d be back to square one.
Maybe just have a bunch of short commandments and leave this one as is, have it take up two lines or something, I guess)? I can’t think of any good way to shorten it.
I would side step the issue and make it more meaningful for the kids by going over the ten commandments and then having thiem decide which three commandments they are most often tempted to break and just put those on their tablets, in the interests of room. Contemplating how the comandments apply totheir actions will make them more real.
As for adultry, I’d say “It means you can’t have a boyfriend or girlfriend while you are married.”
The best I can offer is an anecdote from when I was around that age and was intensely curious as to what “thou shalt not commit adultery” meant. By that point, I knew that it had to do with a couple doing things together when they weren’t married to each other. Being curious, and not getting a direct answer when I asked people what it was, I just went up to a cohabitating couple (thinking that cohabitation was, in fact, adultery) and accused them of adultery. :o That got me a little more explanation than just asking people did, but it also got me in a bit more trouble.
After that incident, I’d really suggest that it might not be a bad idea to try to discreetly explain it as in Dangerosa’s example, but also mention that it’s when they get all “mushy and kissy” with someone who is already the wife/husband of someone else.
As for condensing it, can you just say, “Don’t commit adultery?”
Not exactly. Bearing false witness involves lying about someone else, not just any old lie: the commandment actually says, “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.” The commandment against bearing false witness prohibits defaming someone, not lying or deception in general–hence the need for other specific prohibitions against coveting, stealing, and adultery.
Huh? The usual pejorative term for premarital sex is “fornication,” not “adultery.” I have never heard of “adultery” being “construed to mean sex between single people.” Merriam-Webster defines “adultery” as “voluntary sexual intercourse between a married man and someone other than his wife or between a married woman and someone other than her husband.”
I expect that second- and third-graders can grasp “adultery” just fine. But if you aren’t willing to use the actual word, I suggest, “Don’t cheat on your spouse.”
How about “Respect (your) Marriage (Vows)” or “Be Faithful to your Spouse”
Kids that age know that if you’re married, you shouldn’t have a girlfriend/boyfriend (which is how I would put it as someone else suggested).
I vote for the "No girl/boyfriend while married’ explanation. It gets the job done and kids with different levels of innocence on the matter will all still be able to use it.
MandaJO , I really like your idea about taking three that they are tempted to break. And it will save room, not to mention salt clay.
And this morning after Sunday school I asked another teacher and she suggested “Be Faithful” I also liked the “Don’t Cheat” from mayberrydan because for “Don’t steal”, Don’t lie", and “Don’t curse” I have already decided how to explain that those don’t just mean THINGS but IDEAS as well. Maybe I can interpret it as being honest. We shall see.
Maybe I got the expanded ten commandments in CCD, cause I got a healthy dose of fornication in with my adultery. So maybe instead of often, sub in occationally. And it may be a misuse, but, as I said, with eight and nine year olds “not too much mushy stuff with anyone you aren’t married to” is a fine rule. Plenty of time to learn where to draw lines when you are a teenager.
