Alabama Supreme Court

[Lincoln]

Jefferson was a Christian. He believed in God and that was who he was referring to regardless of your attempts at distortion.

[Lincoln]

Who is "natures God" Boris? Why do you avoid the question? Did he change gods in one paragraph?

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
And I didn't selectively quote anything, as the source I pulled the text from only had the one paragraph on it, which was all I was looking at.

Sure. Yeah, OK.

Any more red herrings you guys have to avoid the subject?

What's the subject again? This is my second post in the thread and we don't seem to be talking about Moore any longer.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Lincoln
Jefferson was a Christian. He believed in God and that was who he was referring to regardless of your attempts at distortion.

He was not a metaphysical Christian, as has been shown in this thread already. He considered himself "Christian" in the sense that he viewed Jesus as a great philosopher. He did not ascribe to the divinity of Jesus, and in fact outrightly rejected it. That's why he removed all references to the supernatural from his Bible:

http://www.angelfire.com/co/JeffersonBible/

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/jesus/jefferson.html

Jefferson discovered a Jesus who was a great Teacher of Common Sense. His message was the morality of absolute love and service. Its authenticity was not dependent upon the dogma of the Trinity or even the claim that Jesus was uniquely inspired by God. Jefferson saw Jesus as

"a man, of illegitimate birth, of a benevolent heart, (and an) enthusiastic mind, who set out without pretensions of divinity, ended in believing them, and was punished capitally for sedition by being gibbeted according to the Roman law."

[Elok]

Actually, in all honesty Jefferson wasn't much of a Christian. He saw Jesus as a fascinating philosopher and dismissed the parts about divine origin as ludicrous superstition. He wound up doing a hackjob on the gospels to make them more in line with what he thought their proper direction should be. The guy wasn't lacking in sheer gall, obviously. I believe the "Jefferson Bible" was traditionally given to incoming Presidents for several years...

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Lincoln
Who is "natures God" Boris? Why do you avoid the question? Did he change gods in one paragraph?

Why do you capitalize "god" when he doesn't, Lincoln?

And I addressed this above...it's the deist view, which bears no relation to Yahweh whatsoever. So where are the Ten Commandments and metaphysical Christianity figuring into that view? Nowhere.

[Lincoln]

Yes, I know that Jefferson was not a so called orthodox Christian but he certainly knew that God does not mean abiogenesis from matter and energy as you asserted earlier.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Lincoln
Yes, I know that Jefferson was not a so called orthodox Christian but he certainly knew that God does not mean abiogenesis from matter and energy as you asserted earlier.

Gee, considering abiogenesis wasn't even a scientific concept in 1776, that's a big "duh." But the deist view of creation and a creator was far more similar to that view than to the Christian one, which figures an intervening god. Deism believes that the laws of nature are what drive the universe, and those laws were set in motion by the initial moment of creation. Beyond that, the force of creation doesn't interfere. There's only a minor difference between this view and atheism, in that deists believe the creating force was a deity, while atheists do not. There's no metaphysical difference beyond this.

So saying deists like Jefferson would think the Ten Commandments is an edict from god is patently ludicrous, since his god would never issue any such edicts.

[Lincoln]

I have to go to bed. You are right that this thread is about the ten commandments and I engaged in a threadjack. But the sort answer to your question is that Jefferson's God would write the 10 commandments. He did not believe as you suppose he did. You might want to study his lengthy correspondence with John Adams. He clearly spells out his beliefs in the letters. Anyway, good night...

[Mordoch]

Uh, when talking about Christianity, Jefferson wrote things such as the following.

The Christian god can easily be pictured as virtually the same god as the many ancient gods of past civilizations. The Christian god is a three headed monster; cruel, vengeful and capricious. If one wishes to know more of this raging, three headed beast-like god, one only needs to look at the caliber of people who say they serve him. They are always of two classes: fools and hypocrites."
-- Thomas Jefferson

And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerve in the brain of Jupiter. But may we hope that the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in these United States will do away with this artificial scaffolding, and restore to us the primitive and genuine doctrines of this most venerated reformer of human errors." --Thomas Jefferson, Letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823

It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. -Thomas Jefferson

http://www.angelfire.com/ky/nogod/quote.html

Our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, any more
than our opinions in physics or geometry."

Thomas Jefferson

and here's another one from a slightly different source

The following is ARTICLE 11 of the Treaty of Tripoli, 1796, 1806

As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion,-as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Musselmen, and as the
said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

http://www.vision2020.moscow.com/Archives/2002/0207/msg00585.html

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Mordoch
and here's one from George Washington

That's a misapplication, AFAIK. That text comes from the Treaty of Tripoli, which was not authored by Washington.

But Jefferson did refer to the metaphysical aspects of the Bible as a dunghill.

[Mordoch]

Corrected now.

[Ned]

The concept of equality of men that leads to "consent of the governed" and democracy began with Christianity which held that we were all born equal - created equal, this even though democracy itself had existed in previous times. This principle had a powerful effect on the Roman Empire in that many slaves were Christian and were equal in the eyes of the Lord with their masters. This lead to better treatment of slaves, and the abolition of slavery in modern times.

This Christian concept of equality also is found in our Declaration of Independence. It is also in our Constitution in a number of respects, including the 13th and the 14th amendments.

People who deny that Christianity had a profound impact on the philosophical underpinnings of Western civilization are in denial.

[mindseye]

Personally, I'm inclined to go with the eight associate judges when they reminded Moore:

No man is above the law.

Not even Alabama Chief Justice Moore.

[mindseye]

Wow, my TrollGuard just lit up like a friggin' xmas tree! WTF?

Great Caesar's ghost! LINCOLN IS BACK!

Summer cross-burning sessions must be winding down.