Miracles
 

I've been racing through one of the recent additions to my toilet library-James Patterson's 'Cradle and all'
It revolves around two teenagers from different countries who fall pregnant simultaneously yet are proven, medically, to still be virgins.
As an aside, I don't recommend it.

It reminded me of an event late last year when a statue of *The Virgin Mary*tm. began continuously weeping.
This happened in the City of Rockingham, (15 minutes from my house) south of Perth in Western Australia.

This continued for some months and despite thorough scientific testing by both church and state no explanation was determined.

Due to thousands of people flocking to witness this 'Miracle' it would have been an extremely arduous business getting to see it for myself. Basically I couldn't be arsed.

I couldn't be arsed because I knew that, even if it cried a river of rose scented tears, I would just shrug it off as a minor, but interesting mystery.

The question I pose to you all, and myself, is what would need to occur to demonstrate irrefutable proof of a 'supreme' being.

Todays 'faith' seems to rest upon a persons belief, or lack thereof, in the information being disseminated via electronic media.

Even if 'GOD' initiated a worldwide, inexplicably spectacular event but deliberately left the internet intact so we could all go "holy fuck, did you guys see that shit too?" within minutes there'd be factions screaming alien invasion, government conspiracy, planetary alignment, collapse of the earth's core, magnetic field reversal etc.

How can we be expected to believe, on faith, in the church when we can't be certain what's fact under our very noses.
Kindly refrain from pressurizing your theological flame throwers as i'm not on about 'is' or 'isn't' just how in the hell we could be sure.:confused:

I've slowly come to the conclusion that God deliberately gave everything a cause to keep us from going insane and/or wasting our mind. If God created man and in the process gave him intelligence then we needed something to do with it. If things were always happening for some inexplicable reason then the intelligence would be worthless.

I definitely think that some forms of "Miracles" are unexplainable at this point but I also believe that some day in the future a scientific cause will be determined. Does that mean God doesn't exist? I can see why people would tend to lean in that direction, but I personally just see it as proof that something other than nature brought on our ability to think.

Then again I definitely don’t believe in the church, which is a purely human creation and with it comes too many flaws that have lead to too much corruption.

This is really very easy. If God wanted to convince us of His existence, all He would have to do is make us believe, directly. It wouldn't impact free will, because acknowledging His existence wouldn't force worship, it would just provide more knowledge with which to make decisions.

The answer is even simpler than that. There can't be any proof that would convince us. The proof has to come from within, by way of personal experiences that validate our own beliefs. Incidentally, the sacred book of my religion teaches that one day irrefutable proof will be given. I don't know if the texts of other religions have the same theme or not, but I'd be interested to know.

Well, there obviously can be proof. God could prove His existence to everybody's satisfaction, if He wanted to, assuming omnipotence. Equally obviously, if He doesn't want proof to exist, then there won't be. There can be disagreement over whether there is proof, but you can't say that there couldn't be.

Look, if Jesus himself appeared to you personally and a loud booming voice from the sky in classic James Earl Jones baritone declared him to be the Alpha and Omega, the Word Incarnate, God Almighty Himself, Son of God, Messiah, Christ, and all around Good Egg, five minutes later you could look back at the whole thing and blame it on a hallucination caused by an acid flashback or any number of other things.

The problem then is that we cannot trust our senses 100%. If you want to get nitty gritty about it, that means you must discount everything you have ever seen, felt, or experienced, and everyone you have ever talked to. What does that leave you with? Just your innate thinking self. And from that, if you can logically deduce God's existence using only logic, then that would be the proof you are looking for - and really, the way you are posing the question, that would be the only solution that would fit.

No, no. You misunderstand. If God is omnipotent, then He could convince me, if He wanted to. That is the definition of omnipotent. The method doesn't matter.

Re: Miracles
 

I thought this was the question. And my answer is that perhaps out there in logic land, there is a chain of steps arising form irrefutable axioms that lead to the astounding conclusion that God exists. That would be the only defensible proof of God's existence because all external 'signs and wonders' can be discounted as being mass hallucinations or aliens buzzing the farm.


Happy Monkey, What you are saying is you want God to announce himself to you in some undeniable way, like perhaps reaching into your brain or soul and tweaking it such that you suddenly now believe in him 100%. For all we know, maybe that has happened to people. But apparently God doesn't like doing this, at least not to a lot of people.

For what its worth, Jesus had something to say about this. After Jesus died and came back. Thomas said he wouldn't believe what the other apostles said until he felt Jesus' wounds himself. Well, Jesus shows up and makes Thomas touch his wounds. Jesus then says "Because thou hast seen me, Thomas, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen and have believed."

Don't aske me why, but the Christian idea of God has him not wanting us to have proof, he wants us to have faith. Go figure.

I didn't say I wanted it, just that He could do it. And I suspect that the only way for there to be irrefutable proof would be to remove the inclination to refute it.My theory is that it's because the people who set up the mythology had no proof to offer.

Why would the inclination to refute it be instilled in the first place?

Perhaps God only offers proof to as many people as he needs or wants.

Kierkegaard, I think, said that the fact that humans have a concept of God is proof that he exists.

God, not Kierkegaard.

novice, I think, said that the fact 'some' humans have a concept of god is proof of a deep rooted psychological dissatifaction with their inability to rationalise their seemingly pointless existence.

I guess we'll have to wait for proof either way as the lack of it allows either quote to stand.

The question is whether or not we will be able to recognise or acknowledge it in these cynical times.

Would the election of a Libertarian in the 04 presidential election do the trick?

Now *that* would certainly be a miracle!

I personally do not believe in miricales...

I think God, not in the form of the Christian depiction of God - just a higher power - gives us a choice to believe or not.

And with that, he does not fully prove himself. Even if he did, there will still be skeptics and those who do not believe. But I think tha fact that we must rely on our faith, not whether this or that is scientificly possible, is the intention that God may have - if any.

Though, that's comming from someone who is barely just exploring the possibility of a higher power.

Like I said - Personally, don't believe in them - But you never know what may happen in my life to change that.

I think my definition of god doesnt work with this exercise. If i believed in A god( a sentient, self aware, self contained entity) then i would say i'd have to have some otherwise impossible and grandois feat that was of a permanent nature....something like giant(100 ft tall+) stone letters appearing overnight that say "There IS a god"

however, my definition of GOD is the GOOD in all people. I am convinced of it's existence on a daily basis whenever i witness a kind act, or love between two people.

as far as slarti and hmonkey's debate, i think monkey is right.....if there was a specific omnipotent "god", he could prove his existence to any and all by simply making it so.

"Any technology, sufficiently advanced, is indistinguishable from magic."

I think it was Aasimov who said that, but using that as a caveat it's reasonable to put forward the idea that the only difference between a weeping statue and an atomic blast is that we know how the atomic blast happens and how to reproduce it.

And following the clock backwards we get electricity (lightning) and then fire and all of the many things we've figured out over time.

What we end up with is that miracles are either unexplained phenomena or charlatanry.

It will all come in time.

Come in time? Now that would be a miracle.

Dude, just get USA PATRIOT and the DMCA repealed (and no similar laws passed) within the next 2 years and I'll start worshipping you. Within reason; no virgin sacrifice, sorry. And you better drop me a note stating which church and such.

I'm a Christian. But I don't buy Catholicism, in fact I find many tenets of the Catholic Church are contrary to what's written in the bible. So I wonder about the Catholic-specific miracles. Why does the virgin Mary always appear in tortillas/certain wallpaper patterns/cloud formations at pilgrimage sites? Are these messages from God to man, mass hallucinations, or misinterpreted natural phenomena? The statues of Abe Lincoln never cry blood. If you're Catholic, have you ever considered the possibility that these visions are demonic in origin or caused by the combined psychic powers of 300 ardent believers all gathered in one place praying for a miracle?

You get into weird territory fast with miracles. [connect to original question] Don't these miracles serve to confuse rather than prove the existence of God?

I think that miracles form a more important part of Catholicism than many other forms of Christianity. It's the basis of their saint system. So Catholics are looking for miracles more actively. If I found a tortilla that had a mark that looked like Lincoln, I'd say "Hey check this out, it looks like Lincoln!", and then eat it. Or maybe sell it on Ebay. But I wouldn't consider it a miracle.

On the other hand, if I was always looking around for miracles, and I saw a potato that looked sort of like a hooded woman, maybe I'd latch on to that as justification for my earlier effort.

I'm reasonably certain the crying statues are bunk. They often say that scientists are baffled, but usually it is because the scientists are not allowed to do real research. Plus, what is really needed is a magician, not a scientist, to check for all the things that the magician would have done to get that effect.

Actually, for many of those 'look at the Virgin Mary in a french fry', and even the statues and paintings that cry, the Catholic Church makes no official acknowledgement of them. With saints, they look more to things like miraculous healings.

Right. I was thinking more along the lines of the general attitude of the religion. Catholics place more importance on miracles in general, so they are more succeptible to believing in them.

Arthur C. Clarke.

The statement is sometimes referred to as "Clarke's Law."

Herein lies the problem. I think Jim made the point that "God" would simply make us believe in him. It would just become so.

What if there existed a sufficiently advanced alien race with the technology to duplicate this phenomonon (do doo de doodo).

Presumably a race this advanced would, of course, have mastered the heretofore (to us) insurmountable problem of faster than light travel.

The point being, we would be as ignorant of the duplicity as a medieval serf confronted by a working television in his mud thatch hovel.

To continue the metaphor of the medieveal serf ...

Would we be terrified?

Or entertained?

Correct. It would not be enough to convince an outside observer. But for those affected, it would be considered proven. And God could make sure there were no unaffected outside observers.

actually, monkey made that point first.....i just agreed. on the assumption(which i do not happen to subscribe to) that there is a sentient god.


use the force, luke

If you take it far enough, it becomes reducto ad absurdum, but what is the practical breakpoint of omnipotence?

Omnipotence is unprovable, because you're trying to prove an infinite value.

To an aborigini, a gun is a magic weapon. Point it at an opponent, squeeze a lever and that opponent dies. Propellents, and ballistics and all of that aren't a knowable factor to them.

And thanks for correction Wolf.

Omnipotence is also relative. Compared to *you* tiny asshats, I'm omnipotent. Compared to say....the devil....I'm just a badass.


Tangent: Someone please tell Howard Dean to stop praying. It's over.

To throw a wrench in things, couldn't a sufficiently advanced alien also be able to make everyone believe they are a god when in fact they are just aliens. I don't mean through showing you bad-ass weapons or abilities, I mean through poking into your brain using a mind control ray or nanosurgery and making you BELIEVE they are gods.

You reading Childhood's End again, slarti?

GREAT BOOK

the aliens' devil image was a memory echo from the future, if i recall that part right?

Straczynski used a variation of the Childhood's End concept in Babylon 5. I'm rewatching that show on DVD, and we recently saw the episode where Kosh (a member of a species which genetically programmed the image of angels into younger species) gives G'kar a vision. It's a spiritual epiphany for G'kar, who then becomes a bit of a Jesus-figure, but it has an extremely creepy undertone because it was essentially mind control by an alien.

If there is no God, then all us religious nuts are gullible, misguided fools who use the notion of a higher power as a crutch for not dealing with reality.

If there is a God, then all the atheists are blinded, self-deluding fools who are playing with eternal damnation like it's a game of checkers at the corner store.

If we are controlled by an alien race, we're probably nothing more than a source of entertainment. Kind of reality TV for the cosmos.

We're probably overestimating our own importance in the grand scheme of things, in any event. I still say the safest bet is God. Even if hell doesn't exist, at least you won't go there, and religious arguments played out in the public arena make alien TV ratings go up during sweeps week.

Using that math, the best bet would be whichever religion threatens the worst hell.

An odd way to pick a philosophy.

As long as you're comfortable with the notion that your God will find your worst-case-scenario equation to be the equivalence of faith.

Personally I find that kind of moral equation to be the ultimate cop-out. And personally, I find the notion of a God demanding belief as the ticket out of eternal torment to be directly at odds with any notion of love, fairness, etc. that I have found here on earth.

Frankly my worst-case scenario is leading my entire life in fear of some centuries-old claptrap bullshit fairy tale somebody handed down, all dependent on some afterlife that there is no evidence of, in a world where people always seem to make shit up when they can't explain things.

Most of my ideas are recycled, I just never remember from where.

Actually, I was being deliberately flippant, because it frustrates me sometimes that some people seem to think that faith is some kind of mental illness. IME, certain people use the excuse that since some Christians are asshats, it's evidence that God doesn't exist. Nobody ever questions that kind of logic. Others claim to need some kind of quantitative proof -- that's at least a legit argument. That annoys me a little, but not as much as the ones who want to be exempt from any kind of established behavioral guidelines, and who get their feelings stepped on whenever you suggest there might be such a thing as right or wrong.

I haven't seen alot of that here, mostly people are intelligent (if kinda hostile towards my belief system). It's more what I witness in my day-to-day life. You know, I don't care who sticks their peepee in who or what, it doesn't affect me in the least. But people claiming that their souls have been spit on because someone put a cross by the road, or had a bible study group at school, etc. etc., is retarded.

blahblahblah. lunch time, anyway.

I think this is a bit of a bogeyman. There are really very few people who truly amoral, and they usually have the excuse of a chemical imbalance in the brain. Even the philosophers who theorize that there are no universal truths don't run around raping and killing.

But "established" is no longer an excuse for a "behavioral guideline" that is hurtful to someone, no matter how outnumbered they are. For much of history, "we've always done it this way" was considered an extremely powerful argument. The radical original leaders of the United States started the process of removing that mentality, and the US changed the world. In my opinion, humanity has advanced more in the last 200 years than in the rest of the history of the species, more so in the civilizations that are less bound by tradition.

Of course, not all traditions are bad. We need to pick and choose which ones are useful, and which ones are based on our baser instincts. Unfortunately, when some people fight tooth and nail to defend the worst traditions, they cast a pall on some of the better ones. For example, The people screaming "God hates fags!" and equating it to polygamy are more likely to promote polygamy than convince anyone else to hate gay people.

There are nuts on both sides, of course, and I dislike PC police just as much as I dislike people pushing creationism in the classroom. I consider zero-tolerance to be a synonym for mindless, and I abhor clothing restrictions, be it religious iconography or heavy metal T-shirts. When a student-run Bible study class is banned, all that does is fuel the people who would like Bible study to be mandatory.


And please don't consider me hostile to your beliefs - consider me interested in lively debate.

beer + religion + midnight = o_O
 

I'm not thinking in extremes, but in terms of the darker shades of grey. Prostitution, for example. Completely sane, intelligent people can be found on both sides of that issue. Some say that since God's word says it's wrong, it's wrong, and brook no argument. Others feel prostitution is no more morally abhorrent than having a drink or two after band practice (which I've just done, so bear with me :beer: ). In the warm chewy center are the rest of us, who might feel that it's wrong for a married man to hire a prostitute behind his wife's back, but can accept a quadriplegic's use of one, simply because the quadriplegic has no other sexual outlet available to him/her. Of course the "middle ground" refers to a far wider range of opinion than that, but you get the idea.

So, who's right? Certainly not all viewpoints can be equally valid, since at least two of them are mutually exclusive of one another.

Prostitution encourages the spread of disease, breaks up relationships, and is tied to all kinds of other anti-social behavior, from hard drug use to petty theft to murder. Unless you don't have a brain, you have to admit that much. Maybe the answer is to legalize it and let it fall under government regulation and supervision. The US government can't even regulate the senatorial haircut budget, much less the world's oldest occupation. Please.

So, we have decided as a society that whoring is generally unsavory, bad for the client, bad for the whore, bad for the populace at large. Even the pimp, who gets all the money, doesn't exactly get invited to join the local rotary club.

Well, guess what? That's what the bible says. I believe that God condemns prostitution because it's bad for His creation, not because He has some kind of problem with people having orgasms. The 'morality' aspect (in the Christian sense) encompasses not only the earthly consequences of engaging in prostitution, but adds the component of obedience to God, who has supposedly set down His rules and expects His followers to abide by them.

I can already feel the condescending, negative vibes from some of you; not just because I'm being a little sanctimonious, but because I'm invoking my "fairy-tale, white-bearded imaginary friend" -- worse yet, I have been capitalizing pronouns referring to Him. Isn't that just precious? :angel: To be perfectly honest, I can't claim that I'm not deliberately being 'religious' just to invite more fun arguments :). I don't think I am; it feels like respect for my God, who I claim to worship. Let the chips fall where they may, I guess.

(puts little train back on tracks) My point is that I get frustrated when people snigger at the fact that I believe there is a God who will hold us accountable for what we do. Far from being a crutch, my beliefs make my life more complex, if only because I usually fail to live up to them. A crutch. lol. I almost deleted all my "StaceyV's-husband-is-a-twat" posts because I spent an hour questioning the morality of taking shots at him. Yah. You too can become a Christian and enjoy the 'escapist fantasy'. Bite me.

I don't feel attacked, HM. If everyone agreed with me I would have lost interest in this place after the first hour. :rolleyes: I haven't even gotten a chance to respond to your second paragraph yet. I'm just out of feisty for one night.

That's funny - I get frustrated when people tell me that my beliefs will result in suffering eternal torment. But sniggering...! Oh dear, that must be really rough for you! I can hear you getting all tense and uneasy from here! However do you cope?

Xtians who complain about judgementalism: :flipbird: You haven't got a clue until 20 fifth-graders come up to you one-by-one to tell you you're going to hell.

Re: beer + religion + midnight = o_O
 

Actually, no they're not. The people who oppose it on religious grounds shouldn't do it. The others should take into account the reaction of their significant other, if any. There's no difference in that sense between that and, say, not keeping Kosher. A big problem for the deeply religious, could be painful for loved ones, and if you're unattatched, who's gonna know or care? The problem only arises when the religious people try to stop other people from doing it.Don't be so quick to denigrate the police. Everything illegal gets tied together. Prostitutes only need pimps because they need protection - from predators and from police. If it was legal, they could set up a safety-oriented facility, with medical testing facilities and good security. In fact they've done this with the Bunny Ranch (nsfw) in Nevada, where there have been no drug, theft, murder, or disease problems. I vaguely recall some tax problems, but that hardly separates them from any other business (except perhaps in the zeal for enforcement).Hey, I do the same thing. It's no skin off my nose, it's a harmless convention, and it can sometimes sort out pronoun ambiguity.If you run into those people, ignore them. But please try not to ignore people who don't share your faith, and therefore don't want to be bound by the aspects of morality that are justified only by your faith. Just as the US government doesn't require all food to be Kosher, it should not support the religious strictures against homosexuality (to mention one current event). People within a religion can subject themselves to that religion's rules, but the religion must not attempt to force it's rules on others.

Monkey, for a guy who didn't think far enough to buy a truck to deliver my furniture, you're an intelligent and eloquent sumbitch. Kudos.

UT, it appears you've got a lot of baggage to deal with but that's what probably makes you such a likable guy. Love ya, man.:joylove:

(A full 5-piece Samsonite deluxe, buddy. But not heavy enough to keep me from slogging it through a decent life.)

Re: beer + religion + midnight = o_O
 

What's this we shit paleface? :)

In all seriousness, I have trouble taking moral and ethical advice from a group of people who have absolutely no way of proving that they have the one true answer, even though they all claim that they do. Especially when that group can't get on the same page as far as something as simple as homosexuality. To wit:

Romans:
1:26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:

1:27 And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.

1:28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;

1:29 Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,

1:30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,

1:31 Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:

1:32 Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.

Or, to quote Sam Kinnison, paraphrasing the Pope, "Suck a dick, lose the kingdom, romans 1."

And now we have the sanctioning of a gay priest.

Time to get on the same page together before you come to me trying to get me on that page.

Re: Re: beer + religion + midnight = o_O
 

The Catholic Church has been doing it for years. The Episcopals are just catching up (as usual).

Heh. Glad to see my vibe-reading skills are still working.

If I couldn't cope with people sniggering, do you think I'd deliberately invite it in an open forum? Your knee is jerking a little, I think. Anyway, if you think Christians are bad about judging non-Christians, you should see us let loose on each other. But if you want me to think we have a monopoly on the judgement thing, you're going to have to keep trying. One street preacher can incite a full-on riot of self-righteous atheists. We, on the other hand, require a full gay pride parade to get worked up. (ducks)

Actually, I would think being militant gay is similar to being a militant Christian in some respects. You always have to wonder if you're safe to let someone know, but once you get over your fear, you're shoving it in peoples faces all the time.

And we can't wave to each other in the liquor store, so they actually have it easier.
edited to fix a misleading pronoun.

Re: Re: beer + religion + midnight = o_O
 

It should be noted again that I don't care who diddles whom, and don't think government services, housing etc. should be denied to citizens based on whom they diddle. [/disclaimer]
Religion is an integral part of each individual (in some cases, the lack of religion is that person's religion). You can't separate it from the rest of your life, like it's a hobby. Well for some people it is. Like TV preachers.
At any rate, when you have a nation of people with religious beliefs of one flavor or another, those beliefs are going to play a role in public policy. I side with the people who think that "separation of church and state" was intended to prevent the govt. from setting up a state religion. All of our laws either have roots in the judeo-christian ethic, or are mirrored by similar concepts from that ethic, whether or not they were implemented with a religious intent. The notion of an American government that is completely devoid of any religious influence is a myth. In fact, a pure democracy would be impossible to attain. Religion are us, we is religion.

I postulate a God who is so certain he's created a universe with no evidence of his existence, that he sends to eternal damnation anyone who believes in him despite this.

So much for Pascal's Wager.

Re: Re: Re: beer + religion + midnight = o_O
 

This is absolutely untrue. Is far as I can tell, only the vice laws and certain aspects of common law have any judeo-christian influence. The vast majority of our laws couldn't have been conceived of centuries ago, much less millennia. And actually, most of the laws that do coincide with judeo-christian values are pretty common to most human civilizations. Also remember, Christianity originally had a problem with interest-bearing loans, which is the foundation of the US economy. (This is why Jews got the "shylock" stereotype. Not being Christian, they were allowed to make interest-bearing loans, and disallowed from just about everything else)A pure democracy is exactly equivalent to pure communism - a horror. Living in a land of majority rules, with no protection for minority rights and opinions would be the death of progress.

Re: Re: Re: beer + religion + midnight = o_O
 

You've been drinking haven't you. There's no other explanation for that post, except possibly trolling for your own amusement.

All of our laws either have roots in the judeo-christian ethic, or are mirrored by similar concepts from that ethic, whether or not they were implemented with a religious intent.

Um, Mr. Noodle sir?

~~~

"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 "Jesus Christ," so that it would read "A departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;" the insertion was rejected by the great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination."

-Thomas Jefferson, Autobiography, in reference to the Virginia Act for Religious Freedom

~~~

"The whole history of these books [the Gospels] is so defective and doubtful that it seems vain to attempt minute enquiry into it: and such tricks have been played with their text, and with the texts of other books relating to them, that we have a right, from that cause, to entertain much doubt what parts of them are genuine. In the New Testament there is internal evidence that parts of it have proceeded from an extraordinary man; and that other parts are of the fabric of very inferior minds. It is as easy to separate those parts, as to pick out diamonds from dunghills."

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, January 24, 1814

~~~

"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law."

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, February 10, 1814

Well, Bruce, I wasn't trolling, but I did expect some resistance. It's become quite chic (again) to deny any biblical connection to America's founding documents. I need some time to get my research together, but I hope to be able to defend myself with documentation in the next day or so.

I thought I was done writing research papers :rolleyes: but I can't throw the bait in the water and not fight the fish, I suppose.

I do have some Jeffersonian material handy, though. Both sides of the religion debate want Jefferson to be "theirs" and skew his quotes/letters, etc. to fit their bias. Jefferson himself seemed to be two-faced on the issue, claiming one thing in public and another in private writings. That's politics, I suppose. But he did claim to be a Christian, albeit not in the traditional sense. Sort of a semi-Deist Christian with Humanist/Unitarianism leanings, if that's even possible. He believed in God and believed in an afterlife, but denied the deity of Christ. He cherry-picked his personal faith out of the Biblical texts he liked best, while ignoring the rest, and compiled them into what is popularly known as the Jefferson Bible. Here's a couple of widely-quoted passages from letters he wrote in the early 1800's:

"The Christian religion, when divested of the rags in which they (the clergy) have enveloped it, and brought to the original purity and simplicity of it's benevolent institutor, is a religion of all others most friendly to liberty, science, and the freest expansion of the human mind." -- letter to Moses Robinson, 1801

Jefferson waxes eloquent on his compilation, what we term the Jefferson Bible: "A more beautiful or precious morsel of ethics I have never seen; it is a document in proof that I am a real Christian, that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus, very different from the Platonists, who call me infidel and themselves Christians and preachers of the gospel, while they draw all their characteristic dogmas from what its Author never said nor saw." -- to Charles Thompson, 1816

To say that Jefferson did not draw on his Biblical influences when drafting what was to become the founding document of a fledgling nation is absurd.

A good Jefferson source

I gotta get some sleep if I'm going to be in the library tomorrow.....

I think you'll find Franklin and a number of the original rabble rousers share the same views. They were thinkers and "cherry picked" their beliefs, religious and secular from everywhere, as they were wealthy, educated and traveled.

I won't discourage any quotes from Jefferson (or anyone else), but I would be more impressed with examples of legal concepts that originate with the Bible. I don't think that many people would argue that Jesus didn't have any good ideas, and obviously the Bible's presence would be felt in any document from the era. But very little of the law is based on it.

But I'm willing to look at examples.

A good tack to take. I'd be curious to see any laws that are rooted in Leviticus...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

20:8 And ye shall keep my statutes, and do them: I am the LORD which sanctify you.

20:9 For every one that curseth his father or his mother shall be surely put to death: he hath cursed his father or his mother; his blood shall be upon him.

20:10 And the man that committeth adultery with another man's wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.

20:11 And the man that lieth with his father's wife hath uncovered his father's nakedness: both of them shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

20:12 And if a man lie with his daughter in law, both of them shall surely be put to death: they have wrought confusion; their blood shall be upon them.

20:13 If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

20:14 And if a man take a wife and her mother, it is wickedness: they shall be burnt with fire, both he and they; that there be no wickedness among you.

20:15 And if a man lie with a beast, he shall surely be put to death: and ye shall slay the beast.

20:16 And if a woman approach unto any beast, and lie down thereto, thou shalt kill the woman, and the beast: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

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Man I miss that old time religion. Not...

or they shall all go unto the howard stern show and tell us all about it that there be no wickedness among us that we would have otherwise been unaware of.

I suppose since the point is to find Biblical roots for American founding documents, all I should need is a Bible and copies of the documents.
First, lets get the Leviticus thing out of the way. Further on in the same book:
"Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, because this is how the nations that I am going to drive out before you became defiled. Even the land was defiled; so I punished it for its sin, and the land vomited out its inhabitants. But you must keep my decrees and my laws. The native-born and the aliens living among you must not do any of these detestable things. For all these things were done by the people who lived in the land before you, and the land became defiled. And if you defile the land, it will vomit you out as it vomited out the nations that were before you." -- Lev. 18:24-28
Simple cause and effect. If you want your race to survive, don't engage in (all the things listed in the preceding verses). And while the sexual laws were punishable by death, in the same book, banishment was listed as an alternate punishment. Lev. 18:29
What is it about the sex thing that gets people so uptight, anyway? Troubleshooter, why didn't you mock the following:
(gonna steal your format)
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20:9 When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest.

20:10 Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor and the alien. I am the Lord your God.

20:11-12 Do not steal. Do not lie. Do not deceive one another. Do not swear falsely by my name and so profane the name of your God. I am the Lord.

20:13 Do not defraud your neighbor or rob him. Do not hold back the wages of a hired man overnight.

20:14 Do not curse the deaf or put a stumbling block in front of the blind, but fear your God. I am the Lord.

etc. etc......dueling Bible verses is getting tiresome, It's your right to detest Christianity and biblical truth, but constantly trying to minimize it to some kind of anti-sex document is not just erroneous, but childish.

By the way, that's kind of the point of Jesus. His death made the law a guideline for our lives rather than a list of acts that were literally punishable, as they were in the fledgling days of Israel.

Romans 3:19-20 - "Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law, rather, through the law we become conscious of sin."

Getting back on track...Happy Monkey, here's a few examples that have a direct parallel. There is no way of proving or disproving individual verses' contribution to founding documents, but the themes are the same:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…" Declaration of Independence

"There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for you are all one in Christ Jesus." - Galatians 3:28


"No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court." - U.S Constitution, Art. III, Section 3, Paragraph 1

"On the testimony of two or three witnesses a man shall be put to death, but no one shall be put to death on the testimony of only one witness." - Deut. 17:6


"..but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted." - U.S Constitution, Art. III, Section 3, Paragraph 2

"Fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor children put to death for their fathers; each is to die for his own sin." - Deut. 24:16

Edited to add that Blackstone depended heavily on scripture as well, and he was a favorite of the FFs