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From: smb@ulysses.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics,net.religion
Subject: Re: The Bible and the Constitution
Message-ID: <487@ulysses.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 7-Jul-83 14:17:51 EDT
Article-I.D.: ulysses.487
Posted: Thu Jul  7 14:17:51 1983
Date-Received: Mon, 11-Jul-83 01:13:45 EDT
References: <248@cbscd5.UUCP>
Organization: Bell Labs, Murray Hill
Lines: 52

Although Jefferson may not have written the First Amendment to the U.S.
Constitution, he was instrumental in writing the Bill of Rights of the
Virginia constitution -- one of the earliest official acknowledgements of
religious freedom in this country.  The colonists who fled England because
of persecution were rarely interested in freedom for others; they simply
wanted to be the ones doing the persecuting.

Nor can we accept the word of the Founding Fathers as the last word on
liberty.  The government they created was based less on the notion of
individual freedom than on delegating powers to the state governments, as
opposed to the Federal government.  The Bill of Rights is primarily a set
of restrictions on Congress; it's only in the last century or so that the
Supreme Court has held that most of those strictures apply to state
governments as well.  In the early 19th century, religious restrictions on
who could run for political office were common; Catholics, for example,
were generally barred from participation.  Others excluded were women,
blacks, the poor, etc.  My point here is that our concept of democracy has
changed considerably, generally loosening the rules and permitting greater
individual freedom.  There is no reason to treat the Federalist Papers as
revealed truth.

The idea that atheists can't be trusted, because they don't answer to any
higher authority, goes back at least to Thomas More's "Utopia".  The
government of this land permitted complete freedom of religion *except* to
atheists; the reasoning he gave was that since they held no fear of divine
punishment in the Hereafter, there was no inner check on their behavior.
Unfortunately, that sort of reasoning assumes far too much.  For one thing,
it assumes that religions are compatible.  Nonesense!  Behavior required by
some is prohibited by others.  Example:  Islam, Baha'i, and some Protestant
denominations prohibit wine; Judaism and Catholicism require it for certain
rituals.  One precept of Baha'i is the equality of men and women -- but to
fundamentalist Jews, Moslems, and Christians, women are most certainly not
equal.  I could go on, but I think you see my point.

A more serious objection is that too many people seem to turn to their
Scriptures to justify their beliefs, rather than basing their beliefs on
the Scripture they claim to follow.  I consider slavery to be the height of
immorality, but many Southerners cited Biblical justifcations for their
behavior.  Were they sincere?  Some of them undoubtedly were -- in saying
that they believed this interpretation.  Which do you think came first?

Finally, the notion that people are incapable of adhering to an ideal
that wasn't handed down from On High is simply wrong.  For one thing, the
concept that humans are inherently weak (or evil), and can only be
controlled by a Divinity or fear thereof is a thoroughly Christian notion,
and one I don't happen to subscribe to.  Yes, Stalin was evil -- but so was
Torquemeda, and he didn't think he was being hypocritical.

I've said enough for now, I think....


		--Steve Bellovin