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Notes on the Founding Fathers and the Separation of
Church and State
Introduction
Many well-meaning Christians argue
that the
Why do some Christians imagine these
men are Christians? Besides a desperate desire that it should be so, in a
selective examination of their writings, one can discover positive statements
about God and/or Christianity. However, merely believing in God does not make a
person a Christian. The Bible says that "the fool says in his heart, there
is no God." Our founding fathers were not fools. But the Bible also says
"You say you believe in God. Good. The demons also believe and
tremble."
Merely believing in God is insufficient
evidence for demonstrating either Christian principles or that a person is a
Christian.
Perhaps, to start, it might be
beneficial to remind ourselves of what a Christian might be: it is a person who
has acknowledged his or her sinfulness, responded in faith to the person of
Jesus Christ as the only one who can redeem him, and by so doing been given the
Holy Spirit.
The early church summarized the Christian message
in six points:
1. Jesus came from God.
2. You killed him.
3. He rose again on the third day.
4. He sent the Holy Spirit
5. Repent and be baptized.
6. He's coming back.
An individual who would not
acknowledge this much of the Christian message could not, by any stretch of the
imagination, be called a Christian. The founding fathers of this country did
not acknowledge this message. In fact, they denied it.
Founders of the American
Revolution
Thomas Jefferson created his own version of the gospels; he was uncomfortable with any
reference to miracles, so with two copies of the New Testament, he cut and
pasted them together, excising all references to miracles, from turning water
to wine, to the resurrection.
There has certainly never been a
shortage of boldness in the history of biblical scholarship during the past two
centuries, but for sheer audacity Thomas Jefferson's two redactions of the
Gospels stand out even in that company. It is still a bit overwhelming to
contemplate the sangfroid exhibited by the third president of the United States
as, razor in hand, he sat editing the Gospels during February 1804, on (as he
himself says) "2. or 3. nights
only at
In his Notes on Virginia,
The legitimate powers of government
extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury
to my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no
god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. (Dumas Malon,
Jefferson The President: First Term 1801-1805.
Thomas Paine was a pamphleteer whose manifestoes encouraged the faltering spirits of
the country and aided materially in winning the War of Independence. But he was
a Deist:
I do not believe in the creed
professed by the Jewish Church, by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by
the
Regarding the New Testament, he wrote
that:
I hold [it] to be fabulous and have
shown [it] to be false...(Roberts, p. 375)
About the afterlife, he wrote:
I do not believe because a man and a
woman make a child that it imposes on the Creator the unavoidable obligation of
keeping the being so made in eternal existance
hereafter. It is in His power to do so, or not to do so, and it is not in my
power to decide which He will do. (Roberts, p. 375)
John Adams, the second U.S. President rejected the Trinity, the deity of Christ, and
became a Unitarian. It was during Adams' presidency that the Senate ratified
the Treaty of Peace and Friendship with
As the government of the United
States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion - as it
has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility
of Musselmen, - and as the said States never have
entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan
nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arrising
from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony
existing between the two countries. (Charles I. Bevans,
ed. Treaties and Other International Agreements of the
This treaty with the Islamic state of
Benjamin Franklin, the delegate to the Continental Congress and the Constitutional
Convention. He has frequently been used as a source for positive
"God" talk. It is often noted that
In this situation of this Assembly,
groping as it were in the dark to find political truth, and scarce able to
distinguish it when present to us, how has it happened, Sir, that we have not
hitherto once thought of humbly applying to the Father of lights to illuminate
our understandings?....I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live,
the more convincing proofs I see of this truth - that God governs in the
affairs of men. (Catherine Drinker Bowen. Miracle
at Phaladelphia: The Story of the Constitutional Convention, May to September 1787.
It is rarely noted that
Yet whether the Doctor had spoken
from policy or from faith, his suggestion had been salutary, calling an
assembly of doubting minds to a realization that destiny herself sat as guest
and witness in this room.
About March 1, 1790, he wrote the
following in a letter to Ezra Stiles, president of Yale, who had asked him his
views on religion. His answer would indicate that he remained a Deist, not a
Christian, to the end:
As to Jesus of Nazareth, my Opinion
of whom you particularly desire, I think the System of Morals and his Religion,
as he left them to us, the best the world ever saw or is likely to see; but I
apprehend it has received various corrupt changes, and I have, with most of the
present Dissenters in England, some Doubts as to his divinity; tho' it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never
studied it, and I think it needless to busy myself with it now, when I expect
soon an Opportunity of knowing the Truth with less Trouble...." (Carl Van Doren. Benjamin Franklin.
He died just over a month later on
April 17.
Deism
Certainly it is generally the case
that these people believed in God, but it was not the God of Christianity.
Deism began in the eighteenth century and was very popular in
1. that
there is one 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.
Why do Christians want the founding
fathers to be Christians?
Is it because they wish the best for these people?
Hardly.
It is because they hope that by demonstrating they were Christians, they can
justify their political agenda. Rather than wanting something new (the
injection of Christianity into government) they seek to restore something they
imagine has been lost.
Reality: nothing has been lost. It
wasn't there to start with. Therefore the whole concept of "taking back
Recent Misinformation on
the Concept of Separation of Church and State
Some Christians are currently arguing
that the concept of separating church and state was not in the minds of the
founding fathers, and that it is a recent and pernicious doctrine that is the
result of Supreme Court decisions in the 1950's and 60s.
This simply isn't true.
Separation of church and state is not
something the Supreme Court invented in the 1950's and 60's. The phrase itself
appears in a letter from President Thomas Jefferson to the Danbury Baptist
Association of Danbury, Connecticut, on Jan 1, 1802.
The Baptist Association had written
to President Jefferson regarding a "rumor that a
particular denomination was soon to be recognized as the national
denomination."
Notice the phrasing in the U.S.
Constitution, Article VI, paragraph 3:
The Senators and Representatives
before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all
executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several
States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but
no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or
public Trust under the United States. (emphasis
added)
The concept of the separation of
church and state appears in the 1963 Baptist Faith and Message (a revision of
an earlier statement where it also appears) adopted by the Southern Baptist
Convention:
God alone is Lord of the conscience,
and He has left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men which are
contrary to His Word or not contained in it. Church and state should be
separate. The state owes to every church protection and full freedom in the
pursuit of its spiritual ends. In providing for such freedom no ecclesiastical
group or denomination should be favored by the state
more than others. Civil government being ordained of God, it is the duty of
Christians to render loyal obedience thereto in all things not contrary to the
revealed will of God. The church should not resort to the civil power to
carry on its work. The gospel of Christ contemplates spiritual means alone
for the pursuit of its ends. The state has no right to impose penalties for
religious opinions of any kind. The state has no right to impose taxes for the
support of any form of religion. A free church in a
Look at what Roger Williams, the
founder of
The Church and State need not be,
Williams insisted, inextricably linked: 'A Pagan or Antichristian Pilot may be
as skillful to carry the Ship to its desired Port, as
any Christian Mariner or Pilot in the World, and may perform that work with as
much safety and speed.' 'God requireth not an Uniformity of Religion to be inacted
and inforced in any
William's plea for Separation of
Church and State stemmed far less, Harold Laski
writes, from tender concern for men's consciences than from 'a fear that their
unity meant the government of the Church by civil men and thus a threat to its
purity.' Popular control of the Church through elected magistrates Williams
thought evil since it gave the Church 'to Satan himself, by whom all peoples
natural are guided.' The precise intention of Scripture could not be
ascertained, he believed, with the icy certainty claimed by the
In his tract on the topic of
religious toleration Williams madesome
important points:
...Fourthly. The doctrine
of persecution for cause of conscience, is proved
guilty of all the blood of the souls crying for vengeance under the altar.
Fifthly. All civil states, with their officers of justice, in their respective
constitutions and administrations, are proved essentially civil, and therefore
not judges, governors, or defenders of the spiritual, or Christian, state and
worship.
Sixthly. It is the will and command of God that, since the coming of his Son the
Lord Jesus, a permission of the most Paganish,
Jewish, Turkish, or antichristian consciences and worships be granted to all
men in all nations and countries: and they are only to be fought against with
that sword which is only, in soul matters, able to conquer: to wit, the sword
of God's Spirit, the word of God.
Seventhly. The state of the
Eighthly. God requireth not an
uniformity of religion to be enacted and enforced in any civil state; which
enforced uniformity, sooner or later, is the greatest occasion of civil war,
ravishing of conscience, persecution of Christ Jesus in his servants, and of
the hypocrisy and destruction of millions of souls.
Ninthly. In holding an enforced uniformity of religion in a civil state, we must
necessarily disclaim our desires and hopes of the Jews' conversion to Christ.
Tenthly. An enforced uniformity of religion throughout a nation or civil state, confounds the civil and religious, denies the
principles of Christianity and civility, and that Jesus Christ is come in the
flesh.
Eleventhly. The permission of other consciences and worships than a state professeth, only can, according to God, procure a firm and
lasting peace; good assurance being taken, according to the wisdom of the civil
state, for uniformity of civil obedience from all sorts.
Twelfthly. Lastly, true civility and Christianity may both flourish in a state or
kingdom, notwithstanding the permission of divers and contrary consciences,
either of Jew or Gentile... (Roger Williams. The Bloudy
Teneent of Persecution for the Cause of Conscience Discussed, 1644. excerpted from A.T. Mason. Free Government in the Making.
Notice what Ulysses S. Grant said in
his seventh annual address (State of the Union address) to the Congress,
December 7, 1875:
As this will be the last annual
message which I shall have the honor of transmitting
to Congress before my successor is chosen, I will repeat or recapitulate the
questions which I deem of vital importance which may be legislated upon and
settled at this session:
First. That the States shall be required to afford the opportunity
of a good common-school education to every child within their limits.
Second. No sectarian
tenets shall ever be taught in any school supported in whole or in part by the
State, nation, or by the proceeds of any tax levied upon any community. Make
education compulsory so far as to deprive all persons who can not read and
write from becoming voters after the year 1890, disfranchising none, however,
on grounds of illiteracy who may be voters at the time this amendment takes
effect.
Third. Declare church and state forever separate and distinct, but each
free within their proper spheres; and that all church property shall bear its
own proportion of taxation (emphasis added). (A
Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents. Vol. X.
Here is a quotation from the Encyclopedic Index of A Compilation of the Messages and
Papers of the Presidents, published in 1917:
Religious
Freedom. - The First Amendment to the
Constitution of the
It should be clear, from these quotations, that the concept of separating church and state
is hardly of recent invention in the
If this is a "Christian"
nation, then why did
I think it is a big surprise to the
Jewish people who have been living here for longer than my ancestors (who only
got here in the middle of the 19th century) to think that this is a
"Christian" nation. If it were "Christian" then there would
be religious requirements to be a part of it and to participate in the public
arena. If this were a Christian nation, then why are so few Americans
Christians? Even the most optimistic
I believe that those who talk about
"restoring" prayer to the public school have a misunderstanding of
the Supreme Court ruling and have failed to carefully think through their
position. The Supreme Court decided in 1962 that for the school administrators
to write prayers and read them over the intercoms to the students was wrong. It
is hard for me to figure out how anyone in their right mind would think it's a
good idea for the state to compose prayers and force them on people.
So why would you want to "restore"
government sponsored religiosity? Students and faculty and other employees are
free to pray for themselves if they want; that has never been a problem
(admittedly, some examples of overzealous administrators who didn't understand
the issue, who tried to stop individuals from exercising their religious
beliefs, can doubtless be found; but that is the exception, not the rule. That
there are murderers is not proof that murder is legal.).
As a Baptist, I frankly would be
bothered by a Moslem or a Hindu writing a prayer for my child. I no more want
them imposing their religious views on me and mine than they would want me to
impose my Baptist beliefs on them. And what about the
agnostics and atheists? They no more wish to be inundated by religious
concepts in school than I would like to have my children inundated by their
beliefs (or lack thereof).
The attempt in the public arena is
toward neutrality; certainly it is a tough ideal to reach, and certainly there
are a lot of mistakes made on all sides. Certainly, too, in the past there has
been a lot of inconsistency in these ideals. But the ideal remains
nevertheless.
The history of the
The American Revolution,
at its Foundation, was Unscriptural
At its foundation, our American
revolution was unscriptural. Therefore I have a hard time seeing how our
government could have been founded on Christian principles, when its very
founding violated one:
Submit yourselves for the Lord's sake
to every authority instituted among men: whether to the king, as the supreme
authority, or to governors, who are sent by him to punish those who do wrong
and to commend those who do right. (1 Peter 2:13-14)
No matter how you cut it, the
founding fathers were revolting against the King of England. It should be
remembered that Peter wrote these words while
What Peter wrote seems perfectly
clear and unambiguous; furthermore, it is consistent with what Jesus said about
his kingdom not being a part of this world (John 18:23 and 36).
As a Christian, it would be very
difficult to justify armed revolt against any ruler. Passive resistance to
injustice and evil, as embodied in the concept of civil disobedience, however,
does have Scriptural precedent (as for instance in the case of the early
Christians described in Acts 5:28-29:
"We gave you strict
orders not to teach in this name," he said. "Yet you have filled
Peter and the other apostles replied:
"We must obey God rather than men!" (see
also Acts 4:18-20)
Civil disobedience means obeying a
higher, moral law, but willingly suffering the consequences of your actions and
submitting to the authority of those in power to arrest or even kill you for
your disobedience. Peter and the others were arrested, and many of them were
ultimately martyred. But they never participated in violent protest, nor did
they resist those in authority by violence.
Conclusion
Certainly many of the early
immigrants to the
As Pastor Richard T. Zuelch pointed out in his letter to the Los Angeles
Times on August 14, 1995:
Gordon S. Wood, in his 1992 book,
"The Radicalism of the American Revolution," states that, by the
1790's only about 10% of the American population regularly attended religious
services - to quote just one statistic. Not exactly an indication of a
wholehearted national commitment to Christianity!
It is a matter of simple historical
fact that the
We Christians do ourselves no favor by bending history to suit our prejudices or to
accommodate wishful thinking. Rather than continue to cling to a "Moral
Majority"-style fantasy that says America is a Christian nation that needs
to be "taken back" from secular unbelief (we can't "take
back" what we never had), it would be much healthier for us Christians to
face reality, holding to what Jesus himself said in the Gospels: that
Christians should never be surprised at the hostility with which the gospel
would be greeted by the world, because most people would fail to believe in
him, thereby strongly implying that, in every age and country, Christianity
would always be a minority faith. (Rev. Richard T. Zuelch,
Letter to the Editor, Los Angeles Times, August 1995)
The
For additional
information, check out:
Critique of David Barton's
"America's Godly Heritage"
Notes on the Separation of Church and State