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The Ten Commandments

Charlton Heston as Moses in The Ten Commandments, 1956. Directed by Cecil B. DeMille. Paramount Pictures.

Starring Charlton Heston and directed by Cecil B. DeMille, The Ten Commandments dramatizes the life of Moses and the exodus from Egypt. This still shows the moment when Moses receives the Ten Commandments from God. DeMille used details of the life of Moses not only from the Hebrew Bible but also from the New Testament and the Qur’an. The movie used many of the sets, costumes, and props from the 1954 film The Egyptian (20th Century Fox) and used Egyptian wall paintings as a source for creating dance choreography. In a further attempt at historical accuracy, DeMille required that all light-eyed actors in the movie wear brown contact lenses.   

 

Charlton Heston as Moses in the 1956 film The Ten Commandments.

migration of the ancient Israelites from Egypt into Canaan

A West Semitic language, in which most of the Hebrew Bible is written except for parts of Daniel and Ezra. Hebrew is regarded as the spoken language of ancient Israel but is largely replaced by Aramaic in the Persian period.

A collection of first-century Jewish and early Christian writings that, along with the Old Testament, makes up the Christian Bible.

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