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In the song Yom Shabbaton it says:

חָקוּק בִּשְׁנֵי לֻחוֹת אֲבָנִים

Translated as:As is engraved in the two Tablets of stone

The text of this song seems to imply that the commandment of shabbos is on both tablets of the Luchos while everyone who knows the basic form of the ten commandments knows its only on one side of the Luchos as yo can see in any picture of the Luchos?

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  • why the downvote?
    – simchastorah
    Nov 11, 2011 at 5:27
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    I'll explain my own downvote (not the one you asked about, inasmuch as I downvoted after you asked). The question contains to context (where's the quotation from?), no translation of the quotation, and no source for "its [sic] only on one".
    – msh210 ♦
    Nov 11, 2011 at 16:20
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    It would be very useful if you linked to the song you were quoting from, instead of assuming people could figure it out. It's always a good idea to give as much information as you can, so that people who don't know the answer can do research and maybe find something. All these zmirot probably appear online. For example, here's the song you're quoting from: zemirotdatabase.org/view_song.php?id=55
    – Menachem
    Nov 11, 2011 at 17:26
  • Thanks for the constructive criticism I hope I adressed all the Issues now
    – simchastorah
    Nov 11, 2011 at 17:46

3 Answers 3

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I'll have to find where I read this, but there is some debate on whether the 10 commandments were split into 5/5 or whether each Luach was inscribed with all 10 (I think 5 on the front and back and the other 5 on the sides).

EDIT: I posted my illustration of how the Luchot may have actually looked over here: https://judaism.stackexchange.com/a/13841/702

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Firstly, there were two sets of luchot. So Shabbat was written on two sets.

Secondly, the Torah tells us two different versions of how shabbat was written on the luchot.

Thirdly, the luchot are a set pair, like shoes. Even if I only write on the left shoe, it is still proper to say that you wrote on my shoes.

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    All reasonable answers; do you have a source for any of them?
    – msh210 ♦
    Nov 11, 2011 at 16:18
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    I like the third of these answers.
    – josh waxman
    Nov 13, 2011 at 1:41
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Luchot is plural, how can it possible be one? The rule is that when you have something in plural (e.g. apples) without a specific number (e.g. 3 apples) it means 2 apples, unless something else points otherwise. So in this case we have 2 Luchot, with 5 commandments in each.

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  • I'm not sure I understand this answer, but if you mean that luchos is a word that appears in plural only then I believe you're mistaken: it's the plural of luach.
    – msh210 ♦
    Nov 11, 2011 at 19:01
  • I didn't mean it appears only in plural. I just wrote that we speak of Luchot Habrit, upon which the commandments were written and as such they are 2.
    – rony
    Nov 12, 2011 at 19:55

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