Signposts to Freedom

In this book, Lochman presents an ethic illuminated by the Ten Commandments. In wrestling to discover the meaning of human life, both individual and social, his deepest concern has been with freedom under the law. Lochman points out that no human society, however well equipped technologically, can exist without a moral basis, without convictions that are more than mere opportunism, pragmatism, and calculated self-interest. This moral basis is provided by the Ten Commandments, the Magna Charta of freedom.

Lochman discusses current problem areas of personal, sexual, and social ethics: worship of false gods, anxiety, the work ethic and the cult of success, murder, terrorism, suicide, abortion, euthanasia, the death penalty, war, the new morality, and new understandings of shared life in marriage.

We have not been left to fend for ourselves in the ordering of our lives. The guidance afforded by the Ten Commandments, far from hindering or enslaving, in fact encourages and liberates us. The Ten Commandments are 'signposts to freedom.'
--from the Preface


Of the fifty or more books I have read on the Ten Commandments, Jan Milic Lochman's Signposts to Freedom has to be in the top two or three. His biblical scholarship is impeccable. His grasp of the positive, inspiring meaning of the commands is second to none. And his ability to communicate these powerful insights to a broad readership is impressive. Four stars on all counts!

-David W. Gill, author of Doing Right: Practicing Ethical Principles


All who teach the faith and all who seek faith and understanding will find treasure here.

--David Lewis, translator


Jan Milic Lochman was a professor of theology at Basel, lived in Czechoslovakia until 1968 where he was a pastor and professor. He also wrote 'Living Roots of Reformation', 'Encountering Marx, and Church in a Marxist Society.'