July 4, 1776 - July 4, 2011

[Complexity]

No.
Why did you add your "every single one" and claim it is my maintenance?
Not "every single one," as if that matters, and as if I care if one or some weren't.

My mistake, then.

What percentage of the 'founding fathers' were theists?

What does it matter whether any, some, most, or all of them were theists?

 

[westprog]

I hope you're joking. THe Renaissance was basically started by the reintroduction of Greek culture to Europe after the Dark Ages. The Greek texts were kept in Churches, but the weren't translated. Aquinas was the first European to seriously deal with Aristotle and he was forced to rewrite a great deal of his work to hide that influence.

Aquinas. Now, tell me again - Christian or not?

Greek philosophy was incorporated into Christian religion by Christian philosophers. This happened well before the Renaissance.

But go ahead, find me the Christian ideas that support those individual rights. All you're doing is engaging in some weak stretching of the word "Christian" to mean something so broad that it loses any explanatory value.

Copernicus discovered that the sun was the center of the Earth despite the best efforst of Christianity. Likewise, the Constitution evinces philosophies and concepts that were directly contradictory to the express teaching of the major Christian churches.

Like what? The Constitution was accepted by the overwhelming Christian population of the country. Are you seriously asserting not just that it was entirely uninfluenced by their beliefs, but that it was in direct contradiction? How come Christianity and support of the Constitution are still supported and believed in by the majority of Americans?

Except you're just making crap up. Or you're using "Greek" to mean something entirely different than the set of artists and thinkers that are typically meant.

 

[TraneWreck]

Aquinas. Now, tell me again - Christian or not?

Again, if you're argument is that a "Christian idea" is anything generated by a Christian, you're being very silly.

Aquinas discovered Aristotle, realized how much more interesting it was than the Bible, and began a life-long goal of reconciling the two. As time went on, he moved more and more away from Church dogma to the philosophy. This was not favored by the Church, and they made him rewrite his theories to re-establish the primacy of Biblical theory.

IN the same way, Galileo's work was so offensive to the church that they punished him severely. Galileo was a Christian. Are the theories of Galileo "Christian theories?"

It makes little sense.

Greek philosophy was incorporated into Christian religion by Christian philosophers. This happened well before the Renaissance.

I would recommend reading the "Condemnation of 1277." They went after "Aristotelian logic" savagely. Anyone advancing those theories would be excommunicated. Several of Aquinas' ideas were on that list.

Like what? The Constitution was accepted by the overwhelming Christian population of the country. Are you seriously asserting not just that it was entirely uninfluenced by their beliefs, but that it was in direct contradiction? How come Christianity and support of the Constitution are still supported and believed in by the majority of Americans?

Like "freedom of religion." Very few major churches were of the opinion that people should be allowed to believe what they want.

The separation of Church and state ran directly contrary to the prevailing European political ideas.

The concept of vesting political power in the people, not a royal ruling by God's will or the Church itself, is a notion that has no presence in Christian thought on any level and contradicts what they major churches say.

Nothing of value has been learned from studying the Bible. The best Christianity can do is accept the important things people have learned by other means.

 

[tsig]

Thank you. That's the bleedin' obvious accepted.



If you think that the history of Western Thought involved people suddenly getting bright ideas out of a clear sky, then you might have a point. But none of the concepts encapsulated in a secular form in the Constitution were dreamed up in a vacuum. To think that would be ahistorical and an absurdity.

The very ideas of personal rights and responsibilities which the US Constitution exemplifies spring from the Christian concept of the individual soul. Whether or not the people who wrote the US Constitution considered themselves Christians is beside the point.

Really?

"We have all sinned and come short of the glory of god".

 

[Robin]

So if you deliberately left Christianity out then why did you decide to solely debate those who mentioned Christianity

Because their repeated point was repeatedly irrelevant to my own. Christianity is not the point. How many times do I have to say it? How many times will you refuse to hear?

What? You decided to debate only those posts which were irrelevant to yours?

If a is irrelevant, must I say so?

No. But you started a whole new thread to say so.

If a post is relevant, and I agree, disagree or am undecided, must I say so?
Must I respond to every post?

No, which makes it all the more puzzling that you decided only to reply to posts you claimed were irrelevant to yours

Must I respond to any post?
Can I make whatever points I want to make?
Must I please you?

Why did you start a thread on a subject that you were not interested in debating?

Why the above histrionics when someone tries to debate the issues you brought up in our OP.

Opinion noted. Again.

Contradictions noted. Again.

 

[westprog]

Again, if you're argument is that a "Christian idea" is anything generated by a Christian, you're being very silly.

If a Christian has an idea about prime numbers or radiation from the Sun, then it's reasonable to separate that from his religious beliefs. However, to say that Aquinas was a Christian philosopher is not "being very silly". It would be very silly to say anything else.

Aquinas discovered Aristotle, realized how much more interesting it was than the Bible, and began a life-long goal of reconciling the two. As time went on, he moved more and more away from Church dogma to the philosophy. This was not favored by the Church, and they made him rewrite his theories to re-establish the primacy of Biblical theory.

IN the same way, Galileo's work was so offensive to the church that they punished him severely. Galileo was a Christian. Are the theories of Galileo "Christian theories?"

It makes little sense.



I would recommend reading the "Condemnation of 1277." They went after "Aristotelian logic" savagely. Anyone advancing those theories would be excommunicated. Several of Aquinas' ideas were on that list.

And yet the condemnation of Galileo was not only because he contradicted the Bible - it was because he departed from the position espoused by Aristotle. And Galileo's defence of heliocentralism was based in part of the Augustinian interpretation of the Bible, which allowed for a metaphorical interpretation.

Like "freedom of religion." Very few major churches were of the opinion that people should be allowed to believe what they want.

The separation of Church and state ran directly contrary to the prevailing European political ideas.

The concept of vesting political power in the people, not a royal ruling by God's will or the Church itself, is a notion that has no presence in Christian thought on any level and contradicts what they major churches say.

Nothing of value has been learned from studying the Bible. The best Christianity can do is accept the important things people have learned by other means.

I find this discussion interesting, because it illustrates the danger of accepting a non sequitor and working on the basis that it is true. There's an argument that because the Founding Fathers were largely Christians, or at least had religious beliefs, that therefore the Constitution should be interpreted in this light, in spite of the fact that the document itself is entirely secular, and refers to religion only in the context of leaving it out of government.

It's perfectly reasonable to reject the false argument - but it's not reasonable to reject the correct premise. To pretend that the people who wrote and adopted the Constitution were uninfluenced by Christian thought is a foolish idea.

The leading figure in writing the Constitution was Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson regarded the thoughts and teachings of Christ as being of sufficient interest that he produced his own version of the Bible, with references to miracles removed. How anyone can equate that to Christianity having no influence upon him beggars belief.

 

[westprog]

Really?

"We have all sinned and come short of the glory of god".

And that contradicts my statement how? It's a reference to the belief that each individual has personally fallen short. It's not a statement of collective sinfullness.

 

[Robin]

And that contradicts my statement how? It's a reference to the belief that each individual has personally fallen short. It's not a statement of collective sinfullness.

Christianity is completely based on the idea of collective sinfulness and collective redemption.

Look at the Apostles Creed for example.

 

[Robin]

Democracy comes to us from the Greeks. From the Romans we get the idea of the separation of powers and checks and balances.

From the Romans we also have the idea of the leader being the first among equals.

Of course not all Romans got to be equal, but neither did all Americans at the birth of the USA.

 

[Robin]

Add to the the growing idea of the Enlightenment that rationality rather than superstition should be our guide, throw in some technically brilliant jurists and smart philosophers and we have the US Constitution.

I guess there could also be some influence from Christianity. For example the idea that religion happened when a couple of people gathered together to be religious made the idea of a state religion superfluous.

Of course that hadn't worked in practice for all the centuries leading up to the 18th. Christianity had been happy to cosy up to every tyrant it could find and had set up a few of its own.

It could even be that people gathering together in small groups in order to organise localised churches was the fire behind the rebirth of bottom up organisation.

And a religion based on the idea of restraint in the face of hostility might have been a basis for civil stability at a time when a large land could not be governed centrally.

So I guess there could be something of a Christian influence in there.

 

[westprog]

Jefferson was hostile to organised religion in general, and had little time for the Christian churches. What did he think of the teachings of Christ in the bible?

the primitive and genuine doctrines of this most venerated reformer of human errors.

So claiming that Jefferson disliked religion, that he despised priests, that he regarded religious belief as something personal, that he strongly opposed favouring one religion over another - all of that is probably true, and can be justified by things that he said. However, to claim that he was entirely uninfluenced by Christianity is just false. As for Jefferson, so for the rest of them.

 

[Robin]

The leading figure in writing the Constitution was Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson regarded the thoughts and teachings of Christ as being of sufficient interest that he produced his own version of the Bible, with references to miracles removed.

More of a pamphlet than a book I would imagine.

How anyone can equate that to Christianity having no influence upon him beggars belief.

To say that Jefferson had an interest in his own version of Christianity is very far from saying Christianity had an influence on the US Constitution.

I have just looked through the US Constitution and I can't see anything that I could tie back to a Christian influence.

 

[Robin]

Jefferson was hostile to organised religion in general, and had little time for the Christian churches. What did he think of the teachings of Christ in the bible?

Why emasculate the quote?

Here is the full version:

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 Minerva 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.”​

So I don't think he is referring to all the teachings of Christ in the Bible.

In fact it seems that Christianity has not had much influence on his view about Jesus.

 

[westprog]

Why emasculate the quote?

Because I already summarised his opinions. I wasn't suppressing them.

Here is the full version:

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 Minerva 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.”​

So I don't think he is referring to all the teachings of Christ in the Bible.

I would have thought it quite clear that his admiration of Christ relates to the teachings and not the miracles. What else would it be, his dress style?


Clearly he regards the mystical element to Jesus' teachings as erroneous and silly. However, he regards his teachings (at least some of them) on behaviour and society as praiseworthy.

In fact it seems that Christianity has not had much influence on his view about Jesus.

I think you'll find that Jesus and Christianity are fairly strongly linked.

 

[westprog]

More of a pamphlet than a book I would imagine.

You don't have to imagine, you can buy the thing.

Jefferson Bible on Amazon, $10.88, a bit pricy for a pamphlet.

To say that Jefferson had an interest in his own version of Christianity is very far from saying Christianity had an influence on the US Constitution.

No, not very far. Very close, in fact.

I have just looked through the US Constitution and I can't see anything that I could tie back to a Christian influence.

Then you need to look harder at how the concepts in the US Constitution were arrived at. This was not a year zero situation.

 

[Robin]

I would have thought it quite clear that his admiration of Christ relates to the teachings and not the miracles. What else would it be, his dress style?

You obviously did not read what I said.

I think you'll find that Jesus and Christianity are fairly strongly linked.

Do you think that Jefferson's view of Jesus is strongly linked to the Christian view of Jesus?

I think that you will find that Christianity holds that Jesus was the only begotten Son of God who performed miracles and died for the redemption of mankind and rose from the dead and ascended to heaven and will come again to judge the living and the dead.

I am pretty sure I didn't just imagine that those things are part of Christianity.

I think you will find that these are not just incidental beliefs or side issues. They are pretty central to the whole religion.

Someone who doesn't believe any of those things are true about Jesus is not much influenced by Christianity.

 

[Robin]

You don't have to imagine, you can buy the thing.

Jefferson Bible on Amazon, $10.88, a bit pricy for a pamphlet.

I don't have to imagine it because I have just completed reading the online version of it.

And yes, that is pretty pricy for a pamphlet. I imagine they fill it out with introductions, prefaces, end notes etc.

By the way the Jefferson Bible is something of a misnomer, it only really covers Matthew, Mark, Luke and John

It reminds me of school when they showed us "Easy Rider" with all the drug references removed.

A short and very confusing film.

No, not very far. Very close, in fact.

How do you work out that? Why does the fact that he had a view of Jesus that is very different from the one espoused by Christianity imply that Christianity must have influenced a political document he has written?

Then you need to look harder at how the concepts in the US Constitution were arrived at. This was not a year zero situation.

I never said it was. In fact I have already set out how some of the concepts were arrived at - democracy, separation of powers etc.

In fact I have studied quite quite a lot of the underpinnings of the document in the jurisprudence and political philosophy that preceded it through the years.

Can you point at some specific part of the US Constitution and point out some specifically Christian influence in the way it was arrived at?

 

[TraneWreck]

If a Christian has an idea about prime numbers or radiation from the Sun, then it's reasonable to separate that from his religious beliefs. However, to say that Aquinas was a Christian philosopher is not "being very silly". It would be very silly to say anything else.

You jump all over the place. If Aquinas, a Christian, develops an idea that is so rejecting by Christianity that anyone espousing it will be excommunicated, is that idea "a Christian theory?"

You're being purposefully vague with your position on this.

And yet the condemnation of Galileo was not only because he contradicted the Bible - it was because he departed from the position espoused by Aristotle. And Galileo's defence of heliocentralism was based in part of the Augustinian interpretation of the Bible, which allowed for a metaphorical interpretation.

First of all, that happened several centuries after Aquinas and the condemnation of Aristotelian logic. Nevertheless, only the work of Aristotle that could be contorted to match a Biblical understanding of the universe was accepted. This lead to both bad science and bad philosophical interpretation.

But that's neither here nor there, do we call the work of Galileo "Christian science?"

I find this discussion interesting, because it illustrates the danger of accepting a non sequitor and working on the basis that it is true. There's an argument that because the Founding Fathers were largely Christians, or at least had religious beliefs, that therefore the Constitution should be interpreted in this light, in spite of the fact that the document itself is entirely secular, and refers to religion only in the context of leaving it out of government.

Then give me "an interpretation in that light." Show me the parts of the Constitution that are "influenced by Christian thought."

What's interesting about this discussion is that you're

It's perfectly reasonable to reject the false argument - but it's not reasonable to reject the correct premise. To pretend that the people who wrote and adopted the Constitution were uninfluenced by Christian thought is a foolish idea.

Oh, they were absolutely "influenced" by Christian thought. They knew all the theories, understood their impact on society, and intentionally left them out of the Constitution.

This is your argument as it's been presented so far:

"The Founders were influenced by Christianity because they were Christians. The proof of this lies in the fact that they were Christians. I do not need to provide any link between ideas espoused by the Church or contained in the Bible, it's sufficient to merely repeat that they were Christian (except for those that really weren't Christian, but they were still influenced by Christianity because everyone around them was Christian)."

You could make the same argument about a group of Satanists in 1780. Even though their ideas expressly reject Biblical claims, they're still "influenced by Christianity" through their rejection of it.

Once again, you've just adopted a concept of "influed by" that has no explanatory value. Under your definition it's impossible for any Christian to produce anything other than "Christian theories" even if they contradict doctrinal teachings.

I guess that means Hitler was espousing "Christian theories" since he grew up in the Church (Godwin!).

The leading figure in writing the Constitution was Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson regarded the thoughts and teachings of Christ as being of sufficient interest that he produced his own version of the Bible, with references to miracles removed. How anyone can equate that to Christianity having no influence upon him beggars belief.

This is such sloppy reasoning. Because you still haven't explained what you mean by "Christian influence" nor have you provided any examples of anything in the Constitution developed by that process, you're just repeating the same inchoate notion over and over.

 

[TraneWreck]

Then you need to look harder at how the concepts in the US Constitution were arrived at. This was not a year zero situation.

You've repeated this a number of times. It has nothing to do with anything. No one is arguing that the Constitution magically sprung from the Earth.

Obviously a philosophical legacy led to the ideas for the Constitution. Those ideas, however, were not developed through a study of the Bible or the development of Church doctrine (what most people mean when they say "Christian Theories"). It was developed specifically from Enlightenment thinkers who intentionally set aside religious notions when establishing their social contract.

 

[tsig]

You've repeated this a number of times. It has nothing to do with anything. No one is arguing that the Constitution magically sprung from the Earth.

Obviously a philosophical legacy led to the ideas for the Constitution. Those ideas, however, were not developed through a study of the Bible or the development of Church doctrine (what most people mean when they say "Christian Theories"). It was developed specifically from Enlightenment thinkers who intentionally set aside religious notions when establishing their social contract.

When all you have is a hammer every problem must be a nail.