In the Landraad of Galle in 1782, twenty witnesses were asked if they knew the Ten Commandments, and particularly the Ninth Commandment. All of them had claimed to be Christians. Some were able to recall it, others could not. One witness said that he knew the Ten Commandments but could not recall the ninth. Another said that he did not know because from the time he was young he had been too busy working for the Dutch East India Company, and yet another said that he had not learned the Ten Commandments, only “Our Father.” This question aimed to prove that the witnesses should not take the oath if they did not know the commandment against false testimony. This is consistent with the principle underlying a legal oath, which is expected to bind the conscience of the swearer. Bereft of normative meaning, the oath loses its value and applicability. Unsurprisingly, European powers displayed an inherent lack of trust in colonised subjects. Testimonies, the oath, and a perception of trust were inherently interconnected.

Colonial agents often improvised the corporal form of the oath to enable the smoother functioning of judicial bodies. In eighteenth-century Sri Lanka, the Dutch colonial government found that potential swearers were mostly nominal Christians who had few scruples about giving false oaths.