Why do liberals lie about our founding fathers?
Consider these whoppers:
...the large number of founding fathers who were agnostics.
Message 24118889
More than a hundred and fifty years later, the majority of the men who wrote our Constitution and founded our nation were Deists. They believed in a Divine Creator, but did not think that the Creator had any interest in or influence on the daily lives of men. They did not believe the Bible was the word of God. They were not Christians. That's probably why the words God, Jesus, Bible, and Christian appear nowhere in the Constitution.
I am referring to Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Ben Franklin, Thomas Paine, etc. Those who claim that this nation was founded on Christian principles are simply interpreting history to suit themselves.
Message 24113741
Lets review the facts. There were 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence. There were 55 delegates to the Constitutional Convention which produced the Constitution.
Of the Founding Fathers that produced these founding documents, one was a deist, Benjamin Franklin. Two were officially Unitarians, John Adams and Robert Paine (no relation to Thomas). One other, Thomas Jefferson was a unitarian in his beliefs, though an active and observant member of the Anglican/Episcopal church. Both Jefferson and Adams considered themselves devout Christians and said so. There were four current or past ministers. Thomas Paine, deist, had nothing to do with either the Declaration or the Constitution.
These liberal secularists would have a major problem with any of the founding fathers is they were to come back. Regard:
Thomas Jefferson:
"And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God?"
“The god who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time: the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them. “
“I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever.” (Jefferson writing about the injustice of slavery and revealing he believed in a righteous Old Testament type God who punished nations for their sins.)
"The reason that Christianity is the best friend of government is because Christianity is the only religion that changes the heart."
"I am a Christian, that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus Christ."
John Adams:
"The Christian religion is, above all the religions that ever prevailed or existed in ancient or modern times, the religion of wisdom, virtue, equity and humanity, let the Blackguard Paine say what he will."
“I have attended public worship in all countries and with all sects and believe them all much better than no religion, though I have not thought myself obliged to believe all I heard.”
"The Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount contain my religion."
“Howl, Snarl, bite, Ye Calvinistick! Ye Athanasian Divines, if You will. Ye will say, I am no Christian: I say Ye are no Christians: and there the Account is ballanced. Yet I believe all the honest men among you, are Christians in my Sense of the Word." (Adams letter to Jefferson)
en.wikipedia.org
“The general principles upon which the Fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity…I will avow that I believed and now believe that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and the attributes of God.”
[June 28, 1813; Letter to Thomas Jefferson]
“We recognize no Sovereign but God, and no King but Jesus!”
[April 18, 1775, on the eve of the Revolutionary War after a British major ordered John Adams, John Hancock, and those with them to disperse in “the name of George the Sovereign King of England." ]
“[July 4th] ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty.”
[letter written to Abigail on the day the Declaration was approved by Congress]
"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." --October 11, 1798
"I have examined all religions, as well as my narrow sphere, my straightened means, and my busy life, would allow; and the result is that the Bible is the best Book in the world. It contains more philosophy than all the libraries I have seen." December 25, 1813 letter to Thomas Jefferson
"Without Religion this World would be Something not fit to be mentioned in polite Company, I mean Hell." [John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, April 19, 1817]
"Jesus is benevolence personified, an example for all men… The Christian religion, in its primitive purity and simplicity, I have entertained for more than sixty years. It is the religion of reason, equity, and love; it is the religion of the head and the heart." (Letter to F.A. Van Der Kemp, December 27, 1816)
George Washington:
"Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion."
"It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible."
Isaac Potts, who was Washington's temporary landlord at Valley Forge the winter of 1777-78, gave a famous account of Washington's resolution. As Potts was traveling the dark forest, he heard some distance from him a voice that became more intense as he approached its origin. Washington was praying for the new nation, for guidance, and for the men under his command.
As Potts approached, he saw the Commander-in-Chief of the armies of the United Colonies on his knees in prayer to the Creator and Ruler of the Universe. Potts, a Quaker, returned to his home and his wife where he declared, "I have seen this day what I shall never forget. Till now I have thought that a Christian and a soldier were incompatible; but if George Washington be not a man of God, I am mistaken, and still more shall I be disappointed if God does not through him perform some great thing for his country."
shalomjerusalem.com
James Madison:
”[A] watchful eye must be kept on ourselves lest, while we are building ideal monuments of renown and bliss here, we neglect to have our names enrolled in the Annals of Heaven.” (James Madison, encouraging William Bradford to be sure of his own salvation)
“I have sometimes thought there could not be a stronger testimony in favor of religion or against temporal enjoyments, even the most rational and manly, than for men who occupy the most honorable and gainful departments and [who] are rising in reputation and wealth, publicly to declare their unsatisfactoriness by becoming fervent advocates in the cause of Christ; and I wish you may give in your evidence in this way.”(Madison urging William Bradford to make a public witness of his Christiianity)
Now for the one and only real deist among the founding fathers, Benjamin Franklin:
"I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth--that God governs in the affairs of men... If a sparrow cannot fall to the ground unseen by him, is it probable an empire could arise without his aid? I firmly believe this, and I also believe that without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building not better than the builders of Babel."
Even Franklin was a believer who looked to God for aid in establishing the new nation.
Accordingly, one can see the claim that the Founding Fathers were liberal secularists, agnostics, or even mostly deists is nonsense. But to quote Jefferson again:
“He who knows nothing is closer to the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.
”
Thomas Jefferson
Which would only be a surprise to "patriots" who don't bother to learn any actual history but only listen to rubbish.
Message 24118921
Now we realize who has failed to learn any actual history, preferring rubbish instead.
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More on Adam's religion:
John Adams Under the Historical Microscope
By Gary DeMar
One of the difficulties in answering Brooke Allen’s “Our Godless Constitution,” which appeared on The Nation’s website on February 3rd, is that her sources are not footnoted.1 There’s no way of identifying the context. Any piece of literature can be made to say anything if it’s taken out of context. The most famous, of course, is the biblical statement, “There is no god” (Ps. 14:1). In addition to making some baseless comments about the Constitution and the Treaty of Tripoli and ignoring reams of other pertinent historical sources, she offers up John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Thomas Paine as witnesses for her case. I can understand Adams and Jefferson, but Paine? Paine’s Common Sense (1776) was popular in the colonies, but his anti-Christian polemic the Age of Reason wasn’t published until 1795, six years after the Constitution was ratified. He played no part in the establishment of the new nation.
A few years ago, I responded to an article by Barbara Ehrenreich that was written for Time magazine in the same style as Allen’s article for The Nation. Of John Adams, Ehrenreich wrote: “Adams once described the Judeo-Christian tradition as ‘the most bloody religion that ever existed.’”2 Like Allen’s use of Adams, Ehrenreich never referenced a source for her quotation. So I did a little digging and found the following that appeared in his Diary dated July 26, 1796:
The Christian religion is, above all the Religions that ever prevailed or existed in ancient or modern Times, the Religion of Wisdom, Virtue, Equity, and humanity, let the Blackguard [Thomas] Paine say what he will; it is Resignation to God, it is Goodness itself to Man.3
There is no need to reconcile these two quotations because Ehrenreich quotes Adams out of context. Adams actually stated, “As I understand the Christian religion, it was, and is, a revelation. But how has it happened that millions of fables, tales, legends, have been blended with both Jewish and Christian revelation that have made them the most bloody religion that ever existed?”4 In this letter, Adams defended biblical revelation against its many corruptions, certainly a worthy and needed enterprise even today.
Norman Cousins, in introducing the religious views of Adams, writes that he “could be as eloquent and rhapsodic about the principles of Christianity as he could be scathing about the abuses carried on in its name.”5 Again, there is nothing unusual about this. It happens today. In fact, I could be depicted in a similar light if someone picked through the thousands of pages I’ve written over the years. I’ve said a number of harsh things about the way Christianity is practiced today, but none of these would be an indictment of Christianity itself.
Adams was not able to peer far enough into the future to see what political regimes would accomplish in the name of atheism, but he certainly had his suspicions. He believed that “the Hebrews have done more to civilize men than any other nation,” and that God “ordered the Jews to preserve and propagate to all mankind the doctrine of a supreme, intelligent, wise, almighty sovereign of the universe,” which he believed “to be the great essential principle of morality, and consequently all civilization.”6 Adams understood that the legal system of Israel was a model for the nations. Those nations that throw off the laws of the Bible are doomed.
Adams believed that republican governments could be supported only “by pure Religion or Austere Morals. Public Virtue cannot exist in a Nation without private [virtue], and public Virtue is the only Foundation of Republics.” As for his sons, he told his wife to “Let them revere nothing but religion, Morality and Liberty.”7 And what about clergymen who spoke out on “social issues,” an anathema to Allen? What was Adams’s opinion? While Adams believed in liberty, he also recognized that only a moral people can live in a condition of liberty.
It is the duty of the clergy to accommodate their discourses to the times, to preach against such sins as are most prevalent, and recommend such virtues as are most wanted. For example,—if exorbitant ambition and venality are predominant, ought they not to warn their hearers against those vices? If public spirit is much wanted, should they not inculcate this great virtue? If the rights and duties of Christian magistrates and subjects are disputed, should they not explain them, show their nature, ends, limitations, and restrictions?8
Adams chides those who laud and praise a clergyman “as an excellent man and a wonderful preacher” when he supports their cause, “ut if a clergyman preaches Christianity, and tells the magistrate” something that the magistrate does not want to hear, then the clergyman is castigated for his views. Not much has changed in more than two-hundred years. The critics of the Right never seem to condemn those clergymen on the Left who support liberal causes in the name of religion. A double standard exists, and Allen refuses to admit it.9
americanvision.org
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Some facts about John Quincy Adams, son of John Adams and one of four Unitarians who have served as President which should serve to give the lie to the depiction of early Unitarians as anti-Christian secularists:
When it was feared that Christian influence was waning in New England, he prepared a lecture on Truth, which he delivered in many places. The premise was: "A man to be a Christian must believe in God, in the Bible, in the Divinity of the Savior's mission, and in a future state of rewards and punishments."
Adams wrote a series of letters to his son on "The Bible and its Teachings" which were published in the New York Tribune, in which he stated: "I have myself for many years made it a practice to read through the Bible once every year. I have always endeavored to read it with the same spirit and temper of mind which I now recommend to you; that is, with the intention and desire that it contribute to my advancement in wisdom and virtue ... My custom is, to read four or five chapters every morning, immediately after rising form my bed. It employs about an hour of my time, and seems to me the most suitable manner of beginning the day."
forerunner.com |
