Ten Commandments Trivia
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109 free Ten Commandments trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
This Ten Commandments trivia quiz covers the Decalogue from the mountain to the movie screen. The first half is scripture and history: where and how the commandments were given, the forty days, the tablets that were smashed and replaced, where the second set was kept, why the Hebrew name means "the ten words", how Jews, Catholics, Lutherans, Samaritans and Muslims count and read them differently, the ancient papyrus that preserves them, and the American courtroom battles over posting them in schools. The second half is Cecil B. DeMille's 1956 epic: Charlton Heston, Yul Brynner, Anne Baxter and Edward G. Robinson, the Broadway show that landed Brynner the part, the actress rejected for not filling out the costumes, the baby in the basket, the voice of God, the 360,000-gallon Red Sea, the Disney animators behind the pillar of fire, the budget, the Oscar and the annual Passover-and-Easter TV airing that has run since 1973. Easy questions suit Sunday-school graduates and anyone who has caught the film on television; the expert ones are for people who know their Septuagint from their Samaritan Pentateuch. Every answer was checked against the Wikipedia articles on the commandments and the film and their cited sources before publishing, and each question shows its citation once you have answered.
30 of 109 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which Alabama chief justice was ousted for defying a federal order to remove his Ten Commandments monument?
Roy Moore
Roy Moore had the 5,280-pound granite monument installed overnight in Alabama's judicial building in 2001; removed in 2003, he was elected chief justice again in 2012.
Q 02On which mountain were the commandments revealed?
Sinai
Mount Sinai, which parts of the Bible call Horeb, is where Exodus 19–20 places the revelation, amid thunder, lightning, smoke and a loud trumpet blast.
Q 03What were the Israelites worshipping when Moses came down and smashed the first tablets?
A golden calf
Exodus 32 says the Israelites, fearing Moses was gone, pressed Aaron to make a golden calf from their gold earrings; Moses smashed the tablets when he saw them dancing around it.
Q 04Where did Moses place the second set of Ten Commandments tablets?
The Ark of the Covenant
Moses put the second tablets in the Ark of the Covenant, and 1 Kings 8:9 says that when the Ark entered Solomon's Temple, nothing else was inside it.
Q 05Which other name for the Ten Commandments comes from Greek?
The Decalogue
The Decalogue comes from the Greek dekalogos, 'ten words', after the phrase the Septuagint, the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, used for them.
Q 06How long does the Bible say Moses spent on the mountain receiving the Ten Commandments?
Forty days and forty nights
Exodus 24:18 says Moses was on the mountain forty days and forty nights; the cloud had covered it for six days first, and he was called in on the seventh.
Q 07Besides Exodus 20, which book of the Bible contains a second full version of the commandments?
Deuteronomy
Deuteronomy 5 repeats the commandments in Moses's farewell speeches, with a different reason for the Sabbath: remembering slavery in Egypt rather than God's rest on the seventh day.
Q 08Which commandment does Ephesians 6:2 call the first one with a promise attached?
Honour thy father and mother
Ephesians 6:2–3 calls 'Honour thy father and mother' the first commandment with promise, quoting Exodus 20:12's pledge that your days may be long in the land.
Q 09On which day of the week is the Sabbath commandment observed in Judaism?
Saturday
Jewish Shabbat is the seventh day, Saturday, kept from Friday dusk to Saturday nightfall; most Christians moved their day of rest to Sunday, the day of the resurrection.
Q 10The Samaritan version of the Ten Commandments adds a command about which sacred mountain?
Mount Gerizim
The Samaritans count the usual ten as nine and make the tenth an order to build an altar on Mount Gerizim, where all sacrifices are to be offered.
Q 11The Nash Papyrus contains the commandments followed by the opening of which prayer?
The Shema
The Nash Papyrus, a fragment from Egypt dated to about 150–100 BC, sets the commandments just before the Shema; the Mishnah says Temple priests recited the two in turn.
Q 12During which festival are the commandments read aloud in synagogue, besides the regular Torah cycle?
Shavuot
Shavuot marks the giving of the Torah, and the commandments are read on its first day; many Jews also stay up all night studying and eat cheesecake.
Q 13Which Church Father's Ten Commandments numbering, used by Catholics and Lutherans, splits coveting in two?
Augustine
Augustine of Hippo merged the bans on other gods and on images into one commandment; the Greek Fathers kept them apart, the count Orthodox and Reformed churches still use.
Q 21According to Exodus 31:18, what were the stone tablets of the commandments written with?
The finger of God
Exodus 31:18 says the tablets were 'written with the finger of God', the same phrase Pharaoh's magicians used when they failed to copy the plague of lice.
Q 22Which surah of the Quran describes Moses meeting God on the mountain and receiving the tablets?
Al-A'raf
Surah Al-A'raf says Moses asked to see God, watched the mountain crumble to dust and fainted, and was then given tablets holding commandments on all things.
Q 23In one rabbinic pairing, "I am the Lord thy God" matches which second-tablet commandment?
Thou shalt not murder
Q 14In which 1980 case did the Supreme Court strike down Kentucky's classroom commandments law?
Stone v. Graham
Stone v. Graham (1980) held that Kentucky's statute requiring the Ten Commandments on every classroom wall had no secular legislative purpose and so failed the Lemon test.
Q 15Which state's governor signed a 2024 law mandating the commandments in every public school classroom?
Louisiana
Louisiana's H.B. 71, signed in June 2024, was ruled 'unconstitutional on its face' that November, but in 2026 the full Fifth Circuit lifted the injunction.
Q 16Which civic group donated the granite Ten Commandments monument that the Supreme Court let stand at the Texas Capitol?
Fraternal Order of Eagles
The Fraternal Order of Eagles began by posting the commandments in juvenile courts to steer troubled youth; its 1961 gift to Texas survived a 5–4 Supreme Court ruling in 2005.
Q 17George Mendenhall likened the covenant form of the Ten Commandments to the treaties of which ancient empire?
The Hittites
Mendenhall likened it to the vassal treaties of the Hittites, which open by recalling the great king's favours, as the commandments open by recalling freeing Israel from Egypt.
Q 18Jewish tradition counts 613 commandments in the Torah, known in Hebrew by which name?
Mitzvot
Rabbi Simlai counted 613 mitzvot: 365 bans for the days of the solar year and 248 positive commands for the body's limbs; bar mitzvah means 'son of commandment'.
Q 19Dekalog, a ten-part television series built around the commandments, came from which country?
Poland
Krzysztof Kieślowski's Dekalog (1989) was made in Poland for Polish television; its ten hour-long films all unfold in one Warsaw housing estate, each loosely tied to a commandment.
Q 20In Matthew 19, after listing five of the commandments, Jesus adds which further command?
Love thy neighbour as thyself
In Matthew 19:18–19 Jesus lists five commandments and then adds 'Love thy neighbour as thyself' from Leviticus 19:18; Paul likewise sums up the second-tablet commands with it in Romans 13:9.
Rabbi Chanina ben Gamliel's pairing in the Mekhilta sets 'I am the Lord thy God' opposite 'Thou shalt not murder', because spilling blood diminishes the image of God.
Q 24Which ancient Jewish text reads the commandment against stealing as a ban on kidnapping people?
The Talmud
The Talmud reasons that the ban on stealing sits beside murder and adultery, both capital crimes, so it must mean kidnapping; scholar Albrecht Alt later argued the same.
Q 25Who produced, directed and narrated the 1956 film The Ten Commandments?
Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil B. DeMille even appears on screen to introduce the epic, and it was the last film he directed before his death in 1959.
Q 26Who plays Moses in the 1956 epic The Ten Commandments?
Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston plays Moses, and the director cast the actor's three-month-old son, Fraser, as the infant Moses in the basket.
Q 27Who plays Rameses, the Pharaoh who says 'So let it be written, so let it be done', in The Ten Commandments?
Yul Brynner
Yul Brynner plays Rameses II, the Pharaoh whose decrees end 'So let it be written, so let it be done'; the National Board of Review named him Best Actor of 1956 partly for this role.
Q 28Who plays the scheming princess Nefretiri in the 1956 epic The Ten Commandments?
Anne Baxter
Anne Baxter plays Nefretiri, the princess torn between Moses and Rameses; a decade earlier she had won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for The Razor's Edge.
Q 29Which greylisted star did the 1956 epic The Ten Commandments cast as the treacherous overseer Dathan?
Edward G. Robinson
Edward G. Robinson, greylisted after the HUAC hearings, plays Dathan; in his memoir All My Yesterdays he wrote that the director 'returned me to films' and 'restored my self-respect'.
Q 30Which studio released the 1956 epic The Ten Commandments?
Paramount
Paramount had also released the director's 1923 silent version, which held a Paramount record for 25 years until he broke it again.