Was Thomas Jefferson an Atheist?
Does the Constitution
Require America to Believe
What He Believed?

Jefferson never taught and never expected men to believe on his say-so that miracles never happened. He would not want that dogma taught in public schools.

Jefferson would not have wanted to be remembered for simply opposing the doctrines of the clerics. He would rather be remembered for encouraging a spirit of inquiry, such as motivated deist Simon Greenleaf of the Harvard Law School to examine the evidence for Christ's claims. (Prof. Greenleaf, the greatest American authority on the Law of Evidence, concluded that the Gospels could be proven true in any court of law.)

Testimony of the Evangelists.

But beyond that, Jefferson would want to be remembered as one who lived and encouraged a life of virtue and morality. He would not take credit for the army of people who champion "separation of church and state" as a cloak for selfish immorality and a lack of virtue.

The practice of morality being necessary for the well-being of society, He has taken care to impress its precepts so indelibly on our hearts that they shall not be effaced by the subtleties of our brain. We all agree in the obligation of the moral precepts of Jesus, and nowhere will they be found delivered in greater purity than in his discourses. — TJ to James Fishback, Sept 27, 1809, Bergh 12:315. (1809.)

Jefferson had written in 1819, "I never go to bed without an hour or half an hour's reading of something moral, whereon to ruminate in the intervals of sleep" -- to which Randall adds, "The book oftenest chosen . . . was a collection of extracts from the Bible." Henry Wilder Foote, "Introduction," The Jefferson Bible, 23

He was passionately devoted to the gospel of Jesus, which stirred him to the depths of his being and was the most powerful motive force in his life. Donald S. Harrington, "Foreward," The Jefferson Bible, 11

Speaking of "the widespread denunciation of him by his political opponents as an anti-Christian infidel or atheist," Foote observes,

[I]t is one of the minor ironies of history that such slanders should have been so generally and so long believed about the man whose knowledge of and admiration for the teachings of Jesus have never been equaled by any other President. Henry Wilder Foote, "Introduction," The Jefferson Bible, 18

It was not, however, to be understood that instruction in religious opinion and duties was meant to be precluded by the public authorities as indifferent to the interests of society. On the contrary, the relations which exist between man and his Maker and the duties resulting from those relations are the most interesting and important to every human being and the most incumbent on his study and investigation. -- TJ, Report to the Visitors [school boards] Oct 7, 1822

Sharing a hope nurtured by many Americans in the early nineteenth century, Jefferson anticipated a re-establishment of the Christian religion in its "original purity" in the United States.

Andrew M. Allison, in Thomas Jefferson: Champion of History (pp.299ff.)

  Once primitive Christianity was fully restored . . . Christianity would
  escape all danger of being eclipsed or superseded. "I confidently
  expect," Jefferson wrote in 1822, "that the present generation will
  see Unitarianism become the general religion of the United States."
  And to the Harvard professor and Unitarian Benjamin Waterhouse,
  Jefferson that same year observed: "I trust that there is not a
  young man now living in the U.S. who will not die an Unitarian.

  Gaustad, Faith of our Fathers, p. 105

Unitarians in Jefferson's day were Pat Robertson right-wingers compared to the atheistical ACLU of today.

 http://members.aol.com/TestOath/deism.htm#unitarianism

Subject: Barton's boo-boos #12 -- Jefferson
From: KEVIN4VFT
To: Separation of Church & State
Date: 4/21/99


Ed repeats the now-disproven charge that Jefferson was an atheist.
Most people knew the charge was untrue and politically-motivated.
He was not elected in spite of his being an atheist, but because the charge was known to be false.

Since no one ever responded to this post the first time around,
I'll re-post it.

Subject: Re: Barton's boo-boos #12 -- Jefferson
From: kevin4vft@aol.com (KEVIN4VFT)
Date: 21 Dec 1998 03:15:49 EST


In article <19981217151630.07300.00000653@ng-cf1.aol.com>, edarr1776@aol.com (EDarr1776) writes:

>Kevin said:  >>Discredited by whom?!? I keep asking for the footnotes<<.
>
>
>Discredited by his own lousy, inaccurate research, and his lack of accuracy
>in writing.  I posted the errata sheet here months ago, maybe more than a
>year ago. 

And nothing in that "errata sheet" (a mischaracterization, actually) discredits Barton. In fact, the research on that sheet is very much to his credit. So I'll go ahead and repost the sheet.

----------==========**********O**********==========---------

http://christiananswers.net/wall/et_Quotes.html

Unconfirmed Quotations

The following quotations have been seen and heard in numerous books, periodicals, editorials, speeches, etc. However, after expending a great deal of time and energy, we are unable to confirm their authenticity. They may still surface (a primary document from James Madison surfaced as late as 1946) but after extensive efforts to verify their veracity, we recommend that you refrain from using them at this time. One may only speculate as to how these quotes originated. In some cases, the errors appear obvious. In others, there are historical clues and possibilities. In the final analysis, the words in question are completely consistent not only with the character of these men, but also with the character of their era to include U. S. Supreme Court decisions. Nonetheless, only primary documentation will justify pulling these quotes off of the shelf. We offer brief comments where appropriate, to include supporting quotations and citations.

12. I have always said and always will say that the studious perusal of  the Sacred Volume will make us better citizens. -- Thomas Jefferson   (unconfirmed)

Jefferson's religious thoughts are well-documented. As he fought the battles of dogmatic, sectarian divisiveness, one can find religious quotations both positive and negative. Therefore, this positive reference to the Bible could easily have flowed from his pen. He indeed rejected the supernatural elements of Scripture, but he spoke favorably on the morality of the New Testament. For example, notice these excerpts from his letters. They reveal both his dislike of sectarianism, as well as his love for what he considered the pure doctrines of Jesus:

An eloquent preacher of your religious society, Richard Motte, in a discourse of much emotion and pathos, is said to have exclaimed aloud to his congregation, that he did not believe there was a Quaker, Presbyterian, Methodist or Baptist in heaven, having paused to give his hearers time to stare and to wonder. He added, that in heaven, God knew no distinctions, but considered all good men as his children, and as brethren of the same family. I believe, with the Quaker preacher, that he who steadily observes those moral precepts in which all religions    concur, will never be questioned at the gates of heaven, as to the dogmas    in which they all differ. That on entering there, all these are left behind    us, and the Aristides and Catos, the Penns and Tillotsons, Presbyterians    and Baptists, will find themselves united in all principles which are in concert    with the reason of the supreme mind. Of all the systems of morality,    ancient and modern, which have come under my observation, none appear    to me so pure as that of Jesus.[26]

To the corruptions of Christianity I am, indeed opposed; but not to the genuine precepts of Jesus himself. I am a Christian, in the only sense in which he wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines, in preference to all others.[27]

But the greatest of all the reformers of the depraved religion of His own country, was Jesus of Nazareth.[28]

Jefferson also put together his own version of the Bible, less the references to the supernatural (virgin birth, miracles, etc.). He called it The Life and Morals of Jesus, and it reveals his reverence for that part of the Bible that he found "reasonable." The Fifty-seventh Congress ordered a reprint of his work.[29] Many people have questioned his mutilation of the canon, but one is forced to agree that it would be very much in character for him to recommend studying the Bible. To deny this is to deny that he swore "upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."

26. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Albert Ellery Bergh, ed. (Washington, D. C.: The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1904), Vol. XIII, pp.377-78, letter to William Canby on September 18, 1813.

27. Bergh, Writings of Jefferson, Vol. X, p.380, letter to Benjamin Rush on April 21, 1803.

28. Bergh, Writings of Jefferson, Vol. XIV, p.220, letter to William Short on October 31, 1819.

29. Thomas Jefferson, The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1904), House of Representatives, Document No. 755, 58th Congress, 2d Session.

-------------------

We hope these comments and analyses help our readers in their own research and rhetoric. To those who have used the above quotations, do not be discouraged. They have a source. We are simply unable to take them to an original, primary document, which is the standard for which we must all strive. In this regard, we have traversed the learning curve.

As the Church/state debates continue, we are all called to a higher standard of scholarship. Advocates of a secular society use the slightest discrepancy to advance their own intolerant and bigoted agenda. Ignoring their own weaknesses and failures, they attempt to discredit both the message and messenger of America's religious history. Their efforts are futile, however, for the religious foundations of America, to include the interactions between church and state, are well-documented and easily-unearthed. Now is the time to clean things up.

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Now, just how is Barton ">Discredited by his own lousy, inaccurate research, and his lack of accuracy >in writing" by his research into the authenticity of this quote and his present refusal to publish it in his writings until primary document attestation can be found?

I grant that Jefferson exalted pagan philosophers above the Bible, and that he didn't want children to be exposed to a Bible uncensored by a philosopher such as himself. I am repulsed by this sentiment. Jefferson surely did not intend for the federal judiciary to exercise power over any state that would choose to teach its public school students the Bible.

After thorough research, Barton concludes that this oft-repeated quotation has no primary document sources. He decides not to use the quote any longer. What's wrong with that?

Ed slanders Barton.

Subject: Author of Declaration of Independence: Deist?
From: KEVIN4VFT
To: Separation of Church & State
Date: 1/13/99

In article <19990113180328.00810.00000290@ng11.aol.com>, xaosjester@aol.com (XaosJester) writes:

>The Declaration of Independence was written by Thomas Jefferson a dedicated
>deist definitely not a Christian.

"Definitely not" -- if you believe the corrupt clergy, that is. But why take their word for it? How about the verdict of Andrew M. Allison, in Thomas Jefferson: Champion of History (pp.299ff.)

      ----------==========**********O**********==========---------

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>From paragraph 1:
>When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to
>dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to
>assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which
>the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the
>opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel
>them to the separation.
>
>"...(T)he Laws of Nature and of Nature's God..." are terms used by deists to
>describe the divine.

Name one deist who used the terms, and I will name five theocrats who also used the terms, and used them before the deist did. The terms were used by theocrats who do not allow atheists to hold political office. I have already quoted Locke to this effect.

See Gary Amos' book, Defending the Declaration, chap 2, for a nice history of the concept, which goes back to Paul's letter to the Romans (chapters 1 and 2), was articulated by theologians in the 13th century, was part and parcel of Blackstone, Coke, Locke, et all, and was definitely not "deistic."

>It is not unreasonable to think that if Jefferson meant
>the laws of the bible and Jesus he would have said exactly that.

It may not be unreasonable for a late-20th century fundamentalist to think or hope that the Founding Fathers and other theocrats would have said "laws of CHEEZUZ," but it is unreasonable for anyone who has read Locke and Coke and Blackstone to suppose this. They mean "laws of the Holy Scripture" and "Savior of the world" and they spoke in those terms.

>From paragraph 2:
> We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,
>that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that
>among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
>
>You have to remember that this document was written by a deist so the
>reference to a "Creator" does not automatically mean the Christian god.

And don't forget that Jefferson's draft was revised by the Congress and reflects their more theocratic ideas, as well as the Christian people whose views they were delegated to represent. One of the members of the drafting committee was John Adams, who was castigated by the modern Supreme Court (Allegheny v. ACLU (1989)) for violating their standards of political correctness:

The history of this Nation, it is perhaps sad to say, contains numerous examples of official acts that endorsed Christianity specifically. [The footnote, 53, cites Leo Pfeffer, "quoting the explicitly Christian proclamation of President John Adams, who urged all Americans to seek God's grace "through the Redeemer of the world" and "by His Holy Spirit").] [492 U.S. 573, 605]

Note: Adams did not say "CHEEZUZ"

>From last paragraph:
>We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in
>General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for
>the rectitude of our intentions,....
>
>And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the
>protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives,
>our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
>
>"(T)he Supreme Judge of the world" and "divine Providence" do not equal
>Christianity or Jesus especially when the writer of those words is a
>confirmed deist.

The writer of those words was not Jefferson. If you look in his writings, vol 1, p. 38 you will find in his autobiography that his original draft did not contain those words, but were added by the Congress. Numerous other changes were also made.

The Declaration of Independence reflects the thinking of a nation which barred atheists from public office and which the US Supreme Court on several occasions described as a "Christian nation."

Subject: Was Jefferson an Atheist?
From: KEVIN4VFT
To: Separation of Church & State
Date: 4/22/99

Date: 31 Aug 1998 11:27:48 EDT

In article <1998083105525400.BAA09384@ladder03.news.aol.com>,
edarr1776@aol.com (EDarr1776) writes:

>Kevin said, again:  >>Atheists were not allowed to hold political office, and
>these laws were
>not declared unconstitutional until the Supreme Court applied the myth of
>"separation of church and state" to those laws in Nineteen Sixty One,
>170 years after the Constitution was ratified.<<
>1.  Atheists WERE allowed to hold office.  No one contested the legitimacy of
>Jefferson's candidacy in 1896 or 1800 or 1804, though Hamilton had made a big
>issue out of Jefferson's atheism. 

Why would Hamilton make an issue of his alleged atheism if those beliefs could have no impact on voters' decisions? Hamilton's attack presupposes that if the charge of atheism were true, Jefferson should not be elected.

Every state in the union prohibited atheists from holding office. These laws did not arise in a void. The American people believed that it was not appro- priate for an atheist to lead a Christian nation.

Ed has touted Dumas Malone as a reliable biographer of Jefferson. But at critical junctures Malone completely suppresses the evidence of the Christian character of both Jefferson and the nation, and Ed's reliance on such secular historiography leaves his own understanding of the time crippled.

In vol 3 at 481, Malone writes,

The charge of atheism was the one most pressed in this campaign: it was not only made in the public press; it was hurled from pulpits in various places, most of all probably in Connecticut. As the story goes, the time was approaching when Bibles were to be hidden in New England's wells.

Malone acknowledges that the issue of Jefferson's atheism was the major issue in the campaign. Apparently lots of people were reluctant to vote for a candidate if he was not a Christian.

One of the most powerful attacks came from Rev. Wm. Linn, a Dutch Reformed minister in New York City. In his pamphlet Serious Considerations on the Election of a President, Linn asked, "Does Jefferson ever go to church? How does he spend the Lord's Day? Is he known to worship with any denomination of Christians?" Linn continued:

Let the first magistrate to be a professed infidel, and infidels will surround him. Let him spend the sabbath in feasting, in visiting or receiving visits, in riding abroad, but never in going to church; and to frequent public worship will become unfashionable. Infidelity will become the prattle from the highest to the lowest condition in life, and universal desoluteness will follow. . . . Will you then, my fellow-citizens, with all this evidence . . . vote for Mr. Jefferson?   . . . As to myself, were Mr. Jefferson connected with me by the nearest ties of blood, and did I owe him a thousand obligations, I would not, and could not vote for him. No; sooner than stretch forth my hand to place him at the head of the nation "Let mine arms fall from my shoulder blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone" [Job 31:22].

John Adams' wife Abigail, joined the attack, charging that Jefferson was a
deist:

Can the placing at the head of the nation two characters known to be Deists be productive of order, peace and happiness?

Jefferson won largely because these charges were negated by supporters who assured the electorate that Jefferson was a Christian. Tunis Wortman wrote a pamphlet called A Solemn Address to the Christians and Patriots upon the Approaching Election of a President of the United States, in which he declared,

That the charge of deism . . . is false, scandalous and malicious -- That there is not a single passage in the Notes on Virginia, or any of  Mr. Jefferson's writings, repugnant to Christianity; but on the contrary, in every respect, favourable to it.

Dewitt Clinton, well-known New York official who served in the State Constitutional Convention and who introduced the 12th Amendment, defended Jefferson by declaring, "we have the strongest reasons to believe that he is a real Christian." Clinton said, "I feel persuaded that he is a believer" and "I feel happy to hail him as a Christian." He continued:

And let me add . . . that he has for a long time supported out of his own private revenues, a worthy minister of the Christian church -- an instance of liberality not to be met with in any of his rancorous enemies; whose love of religion seems principally to consist in their unremitted endeavors to degrade it into a handmaid of  [political] faction.

There was certainly no question anywhere as to the propriety of inquiring into a presidential candidate's religious beliefs. By law, every state made such inquiry.

Although atheists were excluded by law from public office in every jurisdiction in the western hemisphere, there were far too many people countering Hamilton with evidence of Jefferson's belief. Another biographer of Jefferson, Dickinson Adams, concludes that

unlike many other adherents of the Enlightenment, especially those in France, Jefferson's rationalism led him ultimately to an affirmation of  faith rather than a rejection of religious belief.
Jefferson's Extracts from the Gospels (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1983) p. 3.

But even though Malone admits this was the biggest issue of the campaign, he refuses to discuss it.

The long-lived conflict which the dominant clergy of that region and certain other wearers of the cloth waged against this apostle of religious freedom cannot be conveniently or appropriately treated here.

It's a six-volume biography of Jefferson, but he can't deal with the biggest issue of the election of 1800. Give me a break. All the pamphlets that were making news in that day are known to Malone, but suppressed (Rev. Linn  is not mentioned; his pamphlet peeks through in note 67, III:482).
Reading secular historians like Malone to get a picture of the spiritual state of America in 1800 is like trying to understand the Clinton presidency without mention of Monica Lewinsky.

Ed makes the logical error of concluding that because Jefferson did not DENY the charge that he was an atheist, that he was therefore truly an atheist. Ed needs to do more reading. Malone writes [III:481]:

The attitude of [Jefferson's] clerical foes can be partly explained on grounds of misunderstanding, for [Jefferson] made no effort to clarify his own position or make his personal religious opinions known. On the contrary, he regarded this as a wholly private matter which was nobody's business but his. Actually, he was a deist, not an atheist. . . .  In religion as in economics Jefferson was an advocate of laissez-faire.

Atheists were excluded from office. Charging someone with atheism would be the biggest issue in the entire campaign, as Malone admits this was in 1800.
Jefferson was a theist, a fact sufficiently known and defended to secure him the election.

Subject: Jefferson the Bible-believer
From: KEVIN4VFT
To: Separation of Church/State?
Date: 7/9/99

I wrote:

><<They were conservative, Bible-believers, who received the wrath
>of hard-core Calvinists because they doubted the Trinity, but they
>doubted it because they said the doctrine wasn't in the Bible and
>was invented by men. They were "Bible-believing Christians.">>

In article <19990708202015.23278.00012125@ng-bh1.aol.com>, witchpoet7@aol.com (WitchPoet7) writes:

>ROFLOL!!! What a crock! Tomas Jefferson rewrote the NT removing ALL
>ridiculous miracles and the resuraction and virgin birth!!
>This is a "Bible Believing Christian'?

This is typical, deceitful, slanderous, Secular Humanism.
Either that or it's just plain ignorance.
Either way, it misleads us concerning Jefferson, to conclude that he had hostility toward the Christian religion and did not want it taught in schools.
This is a false impression.
Most graduates of government schools have such false impressions. Liberty and good government are not born out of lies.

When I say "the Christian religion," I'm not talking about the Roman Catholic religion, or any priesthood or ecclesiocracy. I'm talking about the religion of Christ. TJ and I may not agree on the details, but we agree on the necessity to inquire into His teachings.

We must reduce our volume to the simple evangelists [and] select, even from them, the very words only of Jesus, paring off the amphibologisms into which they have been led by forgetting often, or not understanding, what had fallen from him.…There will be found remaining the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man. I have performed this operation for my own use by cutting verse by verse out of the printed book, and arranging the matter which is evidently his, and which is as easily distinguishable as diamonds in a dunghill. The result is an octavo of forty-six pages of pure and unsophisticated doctrines such as were professed and acted on by the unlettered Apostles, the Apostolic Fathers, and the Christians of the first century. Their Platonizing successors, indeed, in after times, in order to legitimate the corruptions which they had incorporated into the doctrines of Jesus, found it necessary to disavow the primitive Christians, who had taken their principles from the mouth of Jesus himself, of his Apostles, and the Fathers contemporary with them. They excommunicated their followers as heretics. —To John Adams. Bergh 13:389. (1813.)

This may be hostility toward the clergy, but not toward Christ. Jefferson called himself a Christian, and read the Bible (his portions, anyway) with devotion. His was not a secularizing spirit.

[Christ's] system of morality was the most benevolent and sublime probably that has been ever taught, and consequently more perfect than those of any of the ancient philosophers.…[He was] the most innocent, the most benevolent, the most eloquent and sublime character that ever has been exhibited to man. —To Dr. Joseph Priestley. Bergh 10:375. (1803.)

I concur with the author [of a recent sermon] in considering the moral precepts of Jesus as more pure, correct, and sublime than those of the ancient philosophers; yet I do not concur with him in the mode of proving it. He thinks it necessary to libel and decry the doctrines of the philosophers; but a man must be blinded, indeed, by prejudice who can deny them a great degree of merit. I give them their just due, and yet maintain that the morality of Jesus as taught by himself, and freed from the corruptions of latter times, is far superior. Their philosophy went chiefly to the government of our passions, so far as respected ourselves, and the procuring our own tranquility. In our duties to others they were short and deficient. They extended their cares scarcely beyond our kindred and friends individually, and our country in the abstract. Jesus embraced with charity and philanthropy our neighbors, our countrymen, and the whole family of mankind. They confined themselves to actions; he pressed his sentiments into the region of our thoughts, and called for purity at the fountainhead. —Bergh 10:376. (1803.)

[His] system of morals,…if filled up in the style and spirit of the rich fragments he left us, would be the most perfect and sublime that has ever been taught by man.…1. He corrected the deism of the Jews, confirming them in their belief of one only God, and giving them juster notions of His attributes and government. 2. His moral doctrines relating to kindred and friends were more pure and perfect than those of the most correct of the philosophers, and greatly more so than those of the Jews; and they went far beyond both in inculcating universal philanthropy, not only to kindred and friends, to neighbors and countrymen, but to all mankind, gathering all into one family under the bonds of love, charity, peace, common wants, and common aids. A development of this head will evince the peculiar superiority of the system of Jesus over all others. 3. The precepts of philosophy, and of the Hebrew code, laid hold of actions only. He pushed his scrutinies into the heart of man, erected his tribunal in the region of his thoughts, and purified the waters at the fountainhead. 4. He taught emphatically the doctrines of a future state, which was either doubted or disbelieved by the Jews, and wielded it with efficacy as an important incentive, supplementary to the other motives to moral conduct. —To Dr. Benjamin Rush. Bergh 10:384. (1803.)

The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of man:

1. That there is one only God, and He all perfect.
2. That there is a future state of rewards and punishments.
3. That to love God with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thyself, is the sum of religion.…

Had the doctrines of Jesus been preached always as pure as they came from his lips, the whole civilized world would now have been Christian.

—Bergh 15:383. (1822.)

Jefferson defended the teaching of religion, but opposed the teaching of sectarian dogmas (e.g., the differences between baptists and prebyterians).

The practice of morality being necessary for the well-being of society, He has taken care to impress its precepts so indelibly on our hearts that they shall not be effaced by the subtleties of our brain. We all agree in the obligation of the moral precepts of Jesus, and nowhere will they be found delivered in greater purity than in his discourses. It is, then, a matter of principle with me to avoid disturbing the tranquility of others by the expression of any opinion on the innocent questions on which we schismatize.—Bergh 12:315. (1809.)

Jefferson's attacks on Christianity are often just attacks on Plato, whom TJ despised.

I amused myself [recently] with reading seriously Plato's Republic: I am wrong, however, in calling it amusement, for it was the heaviest task-work I ever went through. I had occasionally before taken up some of his other works, but scarcely ever had patience to go through a whole dialogue. While wading through the whimsies, the puerilities, and unintelligible jargon of this work, I laid it down often to ask myself how it could have been that the world should have so long consented to give reputation to such nonsense as this. How the…Christian world, indeed, should have done it is a piece of historical curiosity. But how could the Roman good sense do it? And particularly, how could Cicero bestow such eulogies on Plato?…With the moderns, I think, it is rather a matter of fashion and authority. Education is chiefly in the hands of persons who, from their profession, have an interest in the reputation and the dreams of Plato. They give the tone while at school, and few in their after years have occasion to revise their college opinions. But fashion and authority apart, and bringing Plato to the test of reason, take from him his sophisms, futilities, and incomprehensibilities, and what remains? In truth, he is one of the race of genuine sophists who has escaped the oblivion of his brethren, first by the eloquence of his diction, but chiefly by the adoption and incorporation of his whimsies into the body of artificial Christianity. His foggy mind is forever presenting the semblances of objects which, half seen through a mist, can be defined neither in form nor dimensions. Yet this, which should have consigned him to early oblivion, really procured his immortality of fame and reverence.…It is fortunate for us that Platonic republicanism has not obtained the same favor as Platonic Christianity, or we should now have been all living, men, women, and children, pell-mell together like beasts of the field or forest.…Socrates had reason, indeed, to complain of the misrepresentations of Plato, for in truth his dialogues are libels on Socrates. —To John Adams. Bergh 14:147. (1814.)

Jefferson did not object to the teaching of "general religion." He believed the Constitution prohibited the advancement of a specific sect. But even the historians and philosophers which were cited by Ed were theistic/religious writers, who advanced the "general religion." Jefferson wanted to avoid the slander of those who said the University of Virginia was against religion:

In our university…there is no professorship of divinity. A handle has been made of this to disseminate an idea that this is an institution, not merely of no religion, but against all religion. Occasion was taken at the last meeting of the visitors to bring forward an idea that might silence this calumny, which weighed on the minds of some honest friends to the institution. In our annual report to the legislature, after stating the Constitutional reasons against a public establishment of any religious instruction, we suggest the expediency of encouraging the different religious sects to establish, each for itself, a professorship of their own tenets on the confines of the university, so near as that their students may attend the lectures there, and have the free use of our library and every other accommodation we can give them; preserving, however, their independence of us and of each other. This fills the chasm objected to ours, as a defect in an institution professing to give instruction in all useful sciences. I think the invitation will be accepted, by some sects from candid intentions, and by others from jealousy and rivalship. And by bringing the sects together and mixing them with the mass of other students, we shall soften their asperities, liberalize and neutralize their prejudices, and make the general religion a religion of peace, reason, and morality. —Bergh 15:405. (1822.)

Jefferson's attitude toward the Bible and Christianity was favorable, if not reverential.

Rumors to the contrary are based on ignorance,
hostility (coming from insulted clergy),
or atheist bias (abusing and exploiting Jefferson's statements
for purposes which were not Jefferson's).

Further reading: Gaustad, Sworn on the Altar.

Subject: Re: Jefferson the Bible-believer
From: KEVIN4VFT
To: Separation of Church/State?
Date: 7/10/99

In article <19990710001534.12830.00008963@ng-fx1.aol.com>, edarr1776@aol.com (EDarr1776) writes of Jefferson:

>Not your run-of-the-mill Pat Robertson-loving guy.

If TJ could see the clash between the socialist and anti-religious policies of the ACLU and the decentralist and moral policies of Robertson, TJ would be more comfortable with Robertson. The words "piety" and "morality" are frequently found on Jefferson's lips, never "secularism." TJ opposed the machinations of paper money finance and central banking, which Robertson also opposes.

I am as uncomfortable with Robertson's pentecostal irrationalism as Jefferson would be. But the ACLU has destroyed moral virtue, the importance of which Jefferson was well aware of.

Pat Robertson's theology is a little wacko, but his conservative southern democrat political policies are much closer to TJ's agrarianism than the urban socialistic ACLU-types.

Subject: Re: Jefferson the Bible-believer
From: KEVIN4VFT
To: Separation of Church/State?
Date: 7/21/99

In article <19990720165301.14982.00000228@ng-cn1.aol.com>, rknocke@aol.com (RKNOCKE) writes:

>
>Thomas Jefferson to John Adams August 20, 1820.
>
> "When once we quit the basis of sensation, all is in the wind. To talk of
>immaterial existences, is to talk of nothings. To say that the human soul,
>angels, God are immaterial, is to say they are nothings, or that there is no
>God, no angels, no soul. I cannot reason otherwise: but I believe I am
>supported in my creed of materialism by the Lockes, the Tracys and the
>Stewarts. ... "Rejecting all organs of information, therefor, but my
>senses,
>I rid myself of the pyrrhonisms with which an indulgence in speculations
>hyperphysical and antiphysical, so uselessly occupy and disquiet the mind. A
>single sense may indeed be sometimes deceived, but rarely; and never all our
>senses together, with their faculty of reasoning. They evidence realities,
>and there are enough of these for all the purposes of life, without plunging
>into the fathomless abyss of dreams and phantasms. I am satisfied, and
>sufficiently occupied with the things which are, without tormenting or
>troubling myself about those which may indeed be, but of which I have no
>evidence."

I don't understand Jefferson's contention that God is not immaterial. Jefferson had a few obscure beliefs.

I hope this quote isn't offered as proof that Jefferson believed that God was material, and since there is no evidence of an immaterial God, that therefore God doesn't exist. That would be a false conclusion, because Jefferson DID believe that God existed.

I think that every Christian sect gives a great handle to atheism by their general dogma that without a revelation there would not be sufficient proof of the being of a God.…On the contrary, I hold (without appeal to revelation) that when we take a view of the universe in its parts, general or particular, it is impossible for the human mind not to perceive and feel a conviction of design, consummate skill, and indefinite power in every atom of its composition. The movements of the heavenly bodies, so exactly held in their course by the balance of centrifugal and centripetal forces; the structure of our earth itself, with its distribution of lands, waters, and atmosphere; animal and vegetable bodies, examined in all their minutest particles; insects, mere atoms of life, yet as perfectly organized as man or mammoth; the mineral substances, their generation and uses—it is impossible, I say, for the human mind not to believe that there is, in all this, design, cause, and effect, up to an ultimate cause, a Fabricator of all things from matter and motion, their Preserver and Regulator while permitted to exist in their present forms, and their regeneration into new and other forms.

We see, too, evident proofs of the necessity of a superintending power to maintain the universe in its course and order. Stars, well known, have disappeared, new ones have come into view; comets, in their incalculable courses, may run foul of suns and planets, and require renovation under other laws; certain races of animals are become extinct; and were there no restoring power, all existences might extinguish successively, one by one, until all should be reduced to a shapeless chaos.

So irresistible are these evidences of an intelligent and powerful Agent that, of the infinite numbers of men who have existed through all time, they have believed, in the proportion of a million at least to a unit, in the hypothesis of an eternal pre-existence of a Creator, rather than in that of a self-existent universe. Surely this unanimous sentiment renders this more probable than that of the few in the other hypothesis. Some early Christians, indeed, have believed in the co-eternal pre-existence of both the Creator and the world, without changing their relation of cause and effect. —To John Adams. Bergh 15:425. (April 11, 1823.)

Jefferson's views on the existence of God (whatever they were) were not representative of the Founding Fathers as a whole, and his beliefs were not incorporated into the Constitution.

Subject: Re: Jefferson the Bible-believer
From: KEVIN4VFT
To: Separation of Church/State?
Date: 8/2/99

It is increasingly difficult for me to believe that Ed is not deliberately and knowingly attempting to mislead the readers of this Board.

Not a single person who signed the Constitution believed that if someone claimed that his "religion" commanded him to engage in polygamy or human sacrifice, that the Constitution forced the State to remain "neutral" between the competing claims of Christians and pagans, and prohibited the State from enacting laws based on the Bible which prohibited polygamy and human sacrifice.

The first time in American Legal History when the Supreme Court used Jefferson's "wall of separation" imagery was in the late 1800's when the Court upheld statutes against polygamy based on the fact that this is a Christian nation and polygamy is anti-Christian. The polygamists claimed the practice was part of their religion, and their beliefs were sincerely held. The Court rejected their "religious freedom" claim, even though Mormon theology claimed the practice was eternally mandated..

I wrote:

>>Obviously I don't agree with this crazy theology, but my point was that the Constitution does not guarantee "religious freedom" for all, only those who -- within acceptable legal limits -- look and act like Christians. >>

In article <19990730224527.01159.00001270@ng-xc1.aol.com>, edarr1776@aol.com (EDarr1776) writes:

> Kevin lied:

The US Supreme Court held that one's religious belief does not give one freedom to commit acts which are proscribed by a Christian nation acting under the law of God in the Bible. The truth of Christianity transcends all other religious truth-claims. There is no absolute right to "religious freedom," only freedom within Christian parameters.

[Nota bene: I'm harsh on Kevin here because he knows better. He's read the stuff; he knows his statement above is not true. He makes it anyway hoping no one will call his bluff, and knowing it's such an obscure point that in most company no one would be able to point to contrary evidence.]

Let's see if Ed can point to any contrary evidence. A respected scholar, perhaps, who says that the nineteenth-century Supreme Court actually held that all religions are on a par, and whatever someone's religion prescribes must not be proscribed by law. A scholar that explains why my analysis is wrong.

Consider what Jefferson said about religious freedom.

http://members.aol.com/TestOath/Reynolds.htm

In his autobiography Jefferson recounted the passage of the law he proposed to secure religious freedom in Virginia, the Statute for Religious Freedom: "Where the preamble declares, that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed, by inserting the word "Jesus Christ," so that it should read, "a departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;" the insertion was rejected by a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and the Mahometan, the Hindoo, and the Infidel of every denomination."
[See Life and Selected Writings of Thomas Jefferson, (Modern Library, p. 46)]

Jefferson SAYS that's what they intended, but that's not correct. They did not agree with Jefferson on the validity of all religions. Beliefs are protected, but actions are not. The Standard by which actions are judged is Christianity, not Hindooism. Jefferson is here writing more as propogandist for his religious views than unbiased historian.

A very good case can be made that Jefferson favored no government at all, let alone one stuck in on religion.

I would agree with Jefferson's libertarianism, but the ACLU emphatically does not.

Had the founders intended Christian behavior, they should have written it into the Constitution.

The Constitution only brought together the states for the limited purposes of delegating power to a federal government sufficient to provide for the common defense. Probably the greatest concern of all the states was to make sure that religion appeared NOWHERE in the federal constitution. It is because the Founders (in their concurrent role as leaders of their respective states) jealously guarded their Christianity that they gave the feds NO POWER AT ALL over religion.

But instead, in Article VI, they wrote that no religious tests could be required of any office holder anywhere in the U.S.

Art VI says absolutely nothing about the States, and the States understood this. Many of them had precisely the religious tests banned by Art. VI. The Supreme Court understood this until 1961.

The simple facts of history contradict you, Kevin, and no pile of off-the-mark quotes from any number of so-called patriots will overcome the simple fact that when it came time to write down the laws,

The Constitution does not create laws. Those laws already existed. Laws against polygamy already existed, and they continued to exist as long as America remained a Christian nation. It is an egregious misunderstanding of the American system to claim that the Constitution said much of anything at all about about what the states could make criminal.

the founders wrote down laws that created a religiously neutral nation,

This is simply not true. The Framers of the Federal Constitution returned to their home states and drafted constitutions which excluded atheists from office and criminalized polygamy. They kept the federal government out of religion so that the States could remain there.

a secular government bound to protect the religious freedoms of all citizens regardless the citizen's belief.

Subject: Re: Anarcho-Pacifist Theocracy
From: KEVIN4VFT
To: Separation of Church/State?
Date: 8/2/99

I wrote:

><<<And if it weren't already obvious, Jefferson's beliefs re: God
>were NOT a part of the Declaration of Independence.
>Congress modified it to reflect the heritage of this non-deist
>Christian nation. >>>>

In article <19990728212050.13366.00003087@ng-bd1.aol.com>, witchward@aol.com (Witchward) writes:
>
>Sorry Kevin but you're just plain lying here.

Say I'm "mistaken" if you have any evidence to support the claim.
Your claim that I'm "just plain lying" exhibits the poverty of your own position.

>The Declaration of Independence
>is completely Jefferson's work.

You obviously missed a previous post in which I placed Jefferson's draft and the revision committee's final draft approved by Congress.

If you look in his writings, vol 1, p. 38 you will find in his autobiography that his original draft did not contain the words "Supreme Judge of the World." Those words were added by the Congress. Numerous other changes were
also made.

In his original draft of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson had written:

And for the support of this declaration, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.

But Congress amended it to read:

And for the support of this declaration, [with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence,] we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.

The Declaration of Independence reflects the thinking of a nation which barred atheists from public office and which the US Supreme Court on several occasions described as a "Christian nation." Congress and the nation did not bow down to Jefferson's out-of-step views on religion.

Subject: Re: Jefferson the Bible-believer
From: KEVIN4VFT
To: Separation of Church/State?
Date: 8/2/99

In article <19990730142437.01163.00001050@ng-xc1.aol.com>, hypatiasm@aol.com (Hypatia SM) writes:

>
>-------
>
>"I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson]
>
>-------

Why? If God is the god of deists, he never intervenes in human history.

>
>"...difference of opinion is advantageous in religion. The several sects
> perform the office of a common censor over each other. Is uniformity
> attainable? Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the
> introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned;
> yet we have not advanced an inch towards uniformity. What has been the
> effect of coercion? To make one half the world fools, and the other half
> hypocrites. To support roguery and error all over the earth."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, "Notes on Virginia"]
>
>-------

Uniformity of denominational doctrines, that is.
Did Jefferson support uniformity of belief in the rights of man? Yes.
Uniformity of belief in the duty to act morally? Yes. As seen in the next quote:

>
>"Let us, then, fellow citizens, unite with one heart and one mind. Let us
> restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which
> liberty and even life itself are but dreary things.

Did Jefferson believe that the teachings of Christ were a threat to liberty and brought about tyranny? Not even close.

> And let us reflect
> that having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which
> mankind so long bled,

WHICH intolerance is this? The pure doctrines of Christ? TJ would deny it.

> we have yet gained little if we countenance a
> political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of a bitter and
> bloody persecutions."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson]
>
>-------
>
>"I do not find in orthodox Christianity one redeeming feature."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson]

"Orthodox" being defined by politically-powerful clergy.
And in something of an exaggeration, Jefferson excludes liberty, harmony and affection from "orthodoxy," even though Jefferson would admit that in their best moments the clergy taught these things.

This heated rhetoric is not helpful in determining the legal "original intent" of the Constitution.
>
>-------
>
>"...let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which
> error of opinion may be tolerated, where reason is left free to combat it".
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, 1st inaugural address, March 4, 1801]
>
>-------

And how does this quote support the idea that the federal judiciary has the power under the constitution to force municipal schools to remove the Ten Commandments from their classrooms?

>
>"They [preachers] dread the advance of science as witches do the approach
> of daylight and scowl on the fatal harbinger announcing the subversions
> of the duperies on which they live."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson]
>
>-------

If "science" is defined as the myths of Darwinism, then I applaud "preachers."
If "science" means the facts of the natural world, then I reject "preachers."
Virtually all great naturalists and scientists of Jefferson's day were Christians.
None of them saw any conflict between "facts" and morality.
Facts and neo-platonic theological speculation, maybe.

>
>"I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world,
> and do not find in our particular superstition (Christianity) one redeeming
> feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson]
>
>-------

Science Versus Theology
John C. Calazza
Review of Understanding the Present: Science and the Soul of Modern Man, by Bryan Appleyard, New York: Doubleday, 1992 235 pp. $23.50.
Modern Age: A Quarterly Review, Vol. 37, No. 3, p.260
Science once spoke with a single voice, and when it did, it was the guarantor of human knowledge in Western culture. When Jefferson spoke of "self-evident" truths, the chief exemplar of such truth that he had in mind was Newton's mechanical system. The decline of the authority of science in the twentieth century has seen the rise of irrationalism, superstition, and nature worship. Scientific rationality is, unfortunately, the only kind of rationality we know, and now we are losing faith in it. The recent decline of discourse among contending viewpoints and groups who simply shout slogans at each other is a consequence of our declining faith in reason, which poses obvious cultural, social, and political dangers. The chief danger may be that as we lose faith in science, we will not find modes of reason, more humane and more open to the reality of moral law and religious revelation, to replace it.

>
>"I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American
> people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting
> an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,'
> thus building a wall of separation between church and State."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, letter to Danbury Baptist Association]
>

But according to the US Supreme Court (1890), Jefferson did not preclude the legal enforcement of Christian morality upon non-Christian religions, if the practices of those religious contravened Christian morality and threatened the well-being of this Christian nation.

>-------
>
>"In every country and in every age the priest has been hostile to
> liberty; he is always in allegiance to the despot, abetting his
> abuses in return for protection of his own."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, letter to Horatio Spofford, 1814]
>
>-------

How often must we hear this erroneous equation of Christianity and Catholicism? One can be against priests and still be FOR Christ.

http://members.aol.com/Patriarchy/No_Ecclesiocracy/index.htm

>
>"... I am not afraid of priests. They have tried upon me all their various
> batteries of pious whining, hypocritical canting, lying and slandering. I
> have contemplated their order from the Magi of the East to the Saints of the
> West and I have found no difference of character, but of more or less
> caution, in proportion to their information or ignorance on whom their
> interested duperies were to be played off. Their sway in New England is
> indeed formidable. No mind beyond mediocrity dares there to develop
>itself."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, letter to Horatio Spofford, 1816]
>
>-------

<yawn>

>
>"Do not be frightened from this enquiry by any fear of its consequences.
> If it ends in a belief that there is no god, you will find incitements to
> virtue in the comfort and pleasantness you feel in its' exercise, and the
> love of others which it will procure you. If you find reason to believe
> that there is a god, a consciousness that you are acting under his eye, and
> that he approves of you, will be a vast additional incitement."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, on advising a nephew on
> a critical examination of the Bible]
>
>-------

Thus showing that TJ believed that belief was "vastly" better than unbelief.

>
>"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are
>injurious
> to others. But 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]
>
>-------

"If I am god, then my neighbor is the devil."
-- Jean Paul Sartre

TJ was wrong. Eventually, the tares mature and become a threat to social order.

>
>"In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty.
> He is always in alliance with the despot.... they have perverted the purest
> religion ever preached to man into mystery and jargon, unintelligible to all
> mankind, and therefore the safer engine for their purpose."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to Horatio Spafford, March 17, 1814]
>
>-------

Note that TJ says Christianity is "the purest religion ever preached to man."

>
>"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man
> and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his
>worship,
> that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not
> opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole
> American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law
> respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise
> thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and State."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, letter to Danbury Baptist Association, CT.
> "The Complete Jefferson" by Saul K. Padover, pp 518-519]
>
>-------

Not only do Secular Humanists take quotes out of context and ignore the interpretation of those quotes by the US Supreme Court, they just keep repeating these quotes over and over. We have already read this excerpt from the letter to Danbury (above).

>
>"Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under which weak minds are
> servilely crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal
> for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of
> a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of
>reason
> than that of blindfolded fear."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, letter to Peter Carr, Aug. 10, 1787]
>
>---------

Name one Christian who disagrees with this.
What Jefferson perhaps failed to consider is that if man is not created in the image of God, then there is no such thing as reliable "reason."
Belief in "reason" presupposes the Christian world-view. Consistent atheists are now denying the very concepts of "reason" and "proof."


>"Where the preamble declares, that coercion is a departure from the plan of
>the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed, by inserting the
>word 'Jesus Christ,' so that it should read, 'a departure from the plan of
>Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;' the insertion was rejected by
>a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle
>of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and the
>Mahometan, the Hindoo, and the Infidel of every denomination."
> [See "Life and Selected Writings of Thomas Jefferson,"( Modern
>Library, p. 46)]
>-------

Jefferson's opinion, not any statement of the legislature of its purposes.

>
>"It is too late in the day for men of sincerity to pretend they believe in
> the Platonic mysticisms that three are one, and one is three; and yet that
> the one is not three, and the three are not one. But this constitutes the
> craft, the power and the profit of the priests."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to John Adams, 1803]
>
>-------

More diatribe against priests. Nothing here to prove that the Founders intended to transform America from a nation "under God" to an irreligious, atheistic nation.

>
>"But a short time elapsed after the death of the great reformer of the
> Jewish religion, before his principles were departed from by those who
> professed to be his special servants, and perverted into an engine for
> enslaving mankind, and aggrandizing their oppressors in Church and State."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to S. Kercheval, 1810]
>
>-------

More against the corruptions of Christianity, but nothing against the idea that the State has a duty to conform itself and its laws to the principles of the uncorrupted, priestless religion founded by Christ, which TJ says is "the purest religion ever preached to man."

>>"History I believe furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people
> maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade
> of ignorance, of which their political as well as religious leaders
> will always avail themselves for their own purpose."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to Baron von Humboldt, 1813]
>
>-------

More and more and more and more. Secular Humanists are either complete idiots for failing to distinguish between priestly corruptions of Christianity, or they are deliberately misleading, by trying to convince readers that the Founders were against uncorrupted priestless Christianity as well.

>
>"On the dogmas of religion, as distinguished from moral principles,
> all mankind, from the beginning of the world to this day, have been
> quarreling, fighting, burning and torturing one another, for
> abstractions unintelligible to themselves and to all others, and
> absolutely beyond the comprehension of the human mind."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to Carey, 1816]
>
>-------

Still more evidence that Jefferson did not oppose the teaching of the "moral principles" of Christianity in public.

>
>"But the greatest of all reformers of the depraved religion of his own
> country, was Jesus of Nazareth. Abstracting what is really his from the
> rubbish in which it is buried, easily distinguished by its lustre from
> the dross of his biographers, and as separable from that as the diamond
> from the dunghill, we have the outlines of a system of the most sublime
> morality which has ever fallen from the lips of man. The establishment
> of the innocent and genuine character of this benevolent morality, and the
> rescuing it from the imputation of imposture, which has resulted from
> artificial systems, invented by ultra-Christian sects (The immaculate
> conception of Jesus, his deification, the creation of the world by him,
> his miraculous powers, his resurrection and visible ascension, his corporeal
> presence in the Eucharist, the Trinity; original sin, atonement,
>regeneration,
> election, orders of the Hierarchy, etc.) is a most desirable object."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to W. Short, Oct. 31, 1819]
>
>-------

How about teaching this pure morality to students?
Is there any evidence at all that Jefferson believed the federal judiciary could keep local schools from doing so?

>
>"It is not to be understood that I am with him (Jesus Christ) in all his
> doctrines. I am a Materialist; he takes the side of Spiritualism; he
> preaches the efficacy of repentence toward forgiveness of sin; I require
> a counterpoise of good works to redeem it.

What a silly mistake on Jefferson's part. Jesus does not teach the need for good works???

Mat 7:23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from Me, ye that work iniquity.

Mat 25:35 For I was an hungered, and ye gave Me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave Me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took Me in:
Mat 25:40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me.

Luke 13:9 And if it bear fruit, well: and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down.

John 15:8 Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.

Either Jefferson just hadn't studied the Bible very well, or he was exaggerating to make a point. And his point was not that the federal judiciary has the power under the Constitution to order municipal schools to stop teaching Christian morality.

>
> Among the sayings and discourses imputed to him by his biographers, I find
> many passages of fine imagination, correct morality, and of the most lovely
> benevolence; and others, again, of so much ignorance, so much absurdity, so
> much untruth, charlatanism and imposture, as to pronounce it impossible that
> such contradictions should have proceeded from the same being. I separate,
> therefore, the gold from the dross; restore him to the former, and leave the
> latter to the stupidity of some, the roguery of others of his disciples. Of
> this band of dupes and imposters, Paul was the great Coryphaeus, and the
> first corruptor of the doctrines of Jesus."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to W. Short, 1820]
>
>-------

An enlightenment myth, disproven by the Calvinist scholar J. Gresham Machen (The Origin of Paul's Religion, 1925). See also his book Christianity and Liberalism.

>
>-------
>
>"And I have no doubt that every new exam"The office of reformer of the
>superstitions of a nation, is ever more dangerous. Jesus had to work on the
>perilous confines of reason and
> religion; and a step to the right or left might place him within the
> grasp of the priests of the superstition, a bloodthirsty race, as cruel
> and remorseless as the being whom they represented as the family God of
> Abraham, of Isaac and of Jacob, and the local God of Israel. That Jesus
> did not mean to impose himself on mankind as the son of God, physically
> speaking, I have been convinced by the writings of men more learned than
> myself in that lore."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to Story, Aug. 4, 1820]
>
>-------

Then Jefferson needs to study some more.
But whatever the outcome of his study, it has no bearing at all on the issue of "separation of church and state" and the original intent of the Framers of the Constitution.

>
>"All persons shall have full and free liberty of religious opinion; nor shall
> any be compelled to frequent or maintain any religious institution."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, 1776]
>
>-------

Not a single member of the Religious Right would disagree with this.
So why post it? Answer: in the hopes that some gullible person might be misled to believe that Jefferson believed that the federal judiciary was given the power under the constitution to keep municipal schools from teaching "the purest religion ever preached to man."

>
>"The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of man.
> But compare with these the demoralizing dogmas of Calvin:
> 1. That there are three Gods.
> 2. That good works, or the love of our neighbor, is nothing.
> 3. That faith is every thing, and the more incomprehensible
> the proposition, the more merit the faith.
> 4. That reason in religion is of unlawful use.
> 5. That God, from the beginning, elected certain individuals
> to be saved, and certain others to be damned; and that no crimes
> of the former can damn them; no virtues of the latter save."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to Benjamin Waterhouse, Jun. 26, 1822]z
>
>-------

This is emotional diatribe, not serious scholarship. Calvin did not teach what Jefferson says he taught. This is TJ at his worst.
But whatever Calvin taught, it does not have any bearing on the Original Intent of the Constitution on the issue of whether the federal judiciary was given the power under the constitution to keep municipal schools from teaching "the purest religion ever preached to man."

>
>"Creeds have been the bane of the Christian church
> ... made of Christendom a slaughter-house."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to Benjamin Waterhouse, Jun. 26, 1822]
>
>
>-------

The corruption of the original teachings of Christ and Christian morality has nothing to do with the issue of whether the federal judiciary was given the power under the constitution to keep municipal schools from teaching "the purest religion ever preached to man."

>
>"The truth is, that the greatest enemies of the doctrine of Jesus are those,
> calling themselves the expositors of them, who have perverted them to the
> structure of a system of fancy absolutely incomprehensible, and without any
> foundation in his genuine words. 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 classified with the fable of the generation of Minerva in
> the brain of Jupiter. But we may 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, to John Adams, Apr. 11, 1823]
>
>
>-------

No wonder Jefferson did not want any ecclesiocracy to receive power and favored legal status from the State. No wonder that not a single member of the Religious Right disagrees.What IS a wonder is why all these quotes were posted????

>
>"The metaphysical insanities of Athanasius, of Loyola, and
> of Calvin, are, to my understanding, mere lapses into polytheism,
> differing from paganism only by being more unintelligible."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, to Jared Sparks, 1820]
>
>
>-------

Ha ha. Quite a sense of humor, Tom.
Now how is all this anti-clerical fulminating relevant to the issue of whether the federal judiciary was given the power under the constitution to keep municipal schools from teaching "the purest religion ever preached to man."

>
>"...no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship
> or ministry or shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions
> or belief, but all men shall be free to profess and by argument to maintain,
> their opinions in matters of religion. "
>
> [Thomas Jefferson]
>
>
>-------

But those who are irreligious and immoral have no rights to violate valid Christian laws passed by Christian legislatures.

>
>"..our civil rights have no dependance on our religious
> opinions, any more than our opinions in physics or geometry"
>
> [Thomas Jefferson]
>

This opinion of Jefferson was not shared by more than a handful of Framers. It was not made a part of the nation's organic law. A man will be denied his civil rights if he believes in and practices human sacrifice.

As to whether a man's opinion about any ecclesiastical tenet has any bearing on his civil rights, there is not a single member of  the religious right who would say it should.

>
>-------
>
>"It is error alone that needs the support of
> government. Truth can stand by itself."
>
> [TJ, Notes on Virginia, 1782]
>
>
>-------

Does that mean there should be no laws against murder, theft, and rape?

>
>"...If we did a good act merely from the love of God and a belief that is
> pleasing to him, whence arises the morality of the Atheist? It is idle to
> say, as some do, that no such thing exists. We have the same evidence of
> the fact as of most of those we act on, to wit: their own affirmations,
> and their reasonings in support of them. I have observed, indeed, generally
> that while in Protestant countries the defections from the Platonic
> Christianity of the priests is to Deism, in Catholic countries they are to
> Atheism. Diderot, D'Alembert, D'Holbach, Condorcet are known to have been
> among the most virtuous of men. Their virtue, then, must have had some
> other foundation than love of God."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Law, June 13, 1814]
>
>-------

Maybe so. But no LOGICAL foundation. If man is the impersonal and meaningless product of chemical mutations, what logical basis is there for making theft a crime? Why should I not grab for all the gusto I can? What virtue inheres in my NOT confiscating the wealth of my neighbor if it enhances my own survival???

>
>"He is less remote from the truth who believes
> nothing, than he who believes what is wrong."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson]
>-------

So if one group of people believe that what is taught in schools is "wrong," students should be taught NOTHING at all??? By what standard do we determine what is right and wrong?

>"The Christian priesthood,
will this string of irrelevant anti-catholic quotes never end?!?
>finding the doctrines of Christ levelled to every
>understanding and too plain to need explanation, saw, in the mysticisms of
>Plato, materials with which they might build up an artificial system which
>might, from its indistinctness, admit everlasting controversy, give
>employment for their order, and introduce it to profit, power, and
>pre-eminence. The doctrines which flowed from the lips of Jesus himself are
>within the comprehension of a child;
so why should they not be taught in schools?
>but thousands of volumes have not yet explained the
>Platonisms engrafted on them: and for this obvious reason that nonsense can
>never be explained."
> [Thomas Jefferson]
>
>-------
>
>"I consider the government of the United States as interdicted by the
> Constitution from intermeddling with religious institutions, their
> doctrines, discipline, or exercises. This results not only from the
> provision that no law shall be made respecting the establishment or
> free exercise of religion, but from that also which reserves to the
> States the powers not delegated to the United States. Certainly,
> no power to prescribe any religious exercise, or to assume authority
> in religious discipline, has been delegated to the General Government."
>
> [Thomas Jefferson in a letter to Samuel Miller, The Writings of
> Thomas Jefferson, Albert Bergh, ed. (Washington, DC: The Thomas
> Jefferson Memorial Association, 1904), Vol. XI, p.428,
> letter on January 23, 1808.]
>

So every Supreme Court decision on religion since 1947 have been in error.
The federal judiciary simply has no power to impose the religion of Secular Humanism on municipal schools.

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