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This page is taken from America OnLine's "Separation of Church and State" Bulletin Board. (Jump works only for AOL subscribers.) I was told by one of the Secular Humanist contributors that Christianity had nothing to do with the legal system created by the Founding Fathers. My response:
Subject: Re: The Decalog & U.S. law -- Sixth Commandment
From: kevin4vft@aol.com (KEVIN4VFT)
Date: 09 Jan 1999 18:19:10 EST
In article <19990102133927.05500.00005977@ng-fa2.aol.com>, xaosjester@aol.com (XaosJester) writes:
| >Kevin says: "All you
asserted was that [all] other cultures prohibit the same >things prohibited in the Bible. You did not prove that the Common Law >was based on Chinese or Arabic law or the code of Hammurabi." > >I did not try to prove what common law was based on. What I did prove was >that it was not based on the decalog. |
Let's review his original post and see if there really is any "proof."
In article <19981229154902.11217.00003483@ng37.aol.com>, xaosjester@aol.com (XaosJester) writes:
| >The claim by many christian
accomadationists that the decalog is the basis of >U.S. law is patently false and easily disproved. > >Thou shalt not kill. > >Even before the code of Hammurabi there have been laws against murder. |
And this proves that the Common Law and early American law were based on Hammurabi, rather than the Ten Commandments??!
It is clear that those who settled on these shores came to establish a law-order based on Christianity, in order to further Christianity.
Their law codes were explicitly based on the Bible. One of the most famous of these codes, the Body of Liberties (1641), had the Bible references in the margin:
94. Capitall Laws.
1. (Deut. 13. 6, 10. Deut. 17. 2, 6. Ex. 22.20)
If any man after legall conviction shall have or worship any other god, but the lord god, he shall be put to death.2. (Ex. 22. 18. Lev. 20. 27. Dut. 18. 10.)
If any man or woeman be a witch, (that is hath or consulteth with a familiar spirit,) They shall be put to death.3. (Lev. 24. 15,16.)
If any person shall Blaspheme the name of god, the father, Sonne or Holie Ghost, with direct, expresse, presumptuous or high handed blasphemie, or shall curse god in the like manner, he shall be put to death.
(p.274)4. (Ex. 21. 12. Numb. 35. 13, 14, 30, 31.)
If any person committ any wilfull murther, which is manslaughter, committed upon premeditated malice, hatred, or Crueltie, not in a mans necessarie and just defence, nor by meere casualtie against his will, he shall be put to death.5. (Numb. 25, 20, 21. Lev. 24. 17)
If any person slayeth an other suddaienly in his anger or Crueltie of passion, he shall be put to death.6. (Ex. 21. 14.)
If any person shall slay an other through guile, either by poysoning or other such divelish practice, he shall be put to death.7. (Lev. 20. 15,16.)
If any man or woeman shall lye with any beaste or bruite creature by Carnall Copulation, They shall surely be put to death. And the beast shall be slaine, and buried and not eaten.8. (Lev. 20. 13.)
If any man lyeth with mankinde as he lyeth with a woeman, both of them have committed abhomination, they both shall surely be put to death.9. (Lev. 20. 19. and 18, 20. Dut. 22. 23, 24.)
If any person committeth Adultery with a maried or espoused wife, the Adulterer and Adulteresse shall surely be put to death.10. (Ex. 21. 16.)
If any man stealeth a man or mankinde, he shall surely be put to death.11. (Deut. 19. 16, 18, 19.)
If any man rise up by false witnes, wittingly and of purpose to take away any mans life, he shall be put to death.12. If any man shall conspire and attempt any invasion, insurrection, or publique rebellion against our commonwealth, or shall (p.275) indeavour to surprize any Towne or Townes, fort or forts therein, or shall treacherously and perfediouslie attempt the alteration and subversion of our frame of politie or Government fundamentallie, he shall be put to death.
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See the copy on the web at the Hanover Historical Texts Project
There is NOTHING in the Constitution that overthrows the Biblical Basis for America's Law, or forbids future legislatures from drafting legislation which they believe is required by the Bible.
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