On April 26, Susan Jacoby and Dinesh D’Souza debated one another, with the question to be “Is Christianity good for American politics.” But much of that debate focused on separation of church and state and the religious views of the founding fathers. D’Souza offered many arguments that were disingenuous at best and outright dishonest at worst. Let’s begin with his absurd arguments about Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine.
In his very first speech, D’Souza began to equivocate on this issue. As proof that Christianity is absolutely intrinsic to the American system of government, he cited the Declaration of Independence. He said that when the founders wanted to declare independence from England, they asked Jefferson to go into a room and write that document (true so far), and that Jefferson did not base the concept of inalienable rights on reason but on his contention that rights were endowed upon us by our Creator (also true).
But notice that he has already begun to subtly change the subject. The subject was Christianity, not theism. And surely he isn’t going to claim that Jefferson founded his ideas of liberty on Christianity, is he? Not explicitly, no, but by using Jefferson’s invocation of a “Creator” as a stand-in for the Christian God of the Bible, that was the core of his argument even if it wasn’t stated directly. And he returned to this again and again during the debate, that the mention of the “Creator” by Jefferson in the Declaration was evidence that Christianity was not only influential on our founding documents, but absolutely necessary for them.
Later in the debate, Thomas Paine came up (only tangentially, as he was asking Jacoby why it would be okay to put up a statue of the “anti-Christian” Paine on public property but not a statue of Jesus or Moses). Several times he used Paine as an example of an “anti-Christian” figure that Jacoby was “in love with” (Jacoby responded sarcastically by noting that, given what she knew of his private life, she could never fall in love with him).
When it came time for questions from the audience, I asked the first question and I noted the incoherence here. He uses Jefferson and his belief in a “Creator” who endowed us with inalienable rights as evidence of America’s Christian origins, yet Paine he dismisses as an “anti-Christian” figure in contrast to Jefferson. But as I pointed out, Jefferson and Paine agreed on almost everything when it came to religion and about Christianity in particular. So why, I asked, do you treat Jefferson, who rejected nearly all of the Christian mythology as false, as evidence of America’s Christian nature, while calling Paine, who rejected all the same things for all the same reasons, as an anti-Christian?
He began his answer with a blatantly false statement, that the difference between the two of them was that Jefferson accepted the ethical teachings of Jesus while Paine did not. Here is what Paine wrote in the very first chapter of the Age of Reason:
NOTHING that is here said can apply, even with the most distant disrespect, to the real character of Jesus Christ. He was a virtuous and an amiable man. The morality that he preached and practiced was of the most benevolent kind; and though similar systems of morality had been preached by Confucius, and by some of the Greek philosophers, many years before, by the Quakers since, and by many good men in all ages, it has not been exceeded by any.
Jesus Christ wrote no account of himself, of his birth, parentage, or anything else. Not a line of what is called the New Testament is of his writing. The history of him is altogether the work of other people; and as to the account given of his resurrection and ascension, it was the necessary counterpart to the story of his birth. His historians, having brought him into the world in a supernatural manner, were obliged to take him out again in the same manner, or the first part of the story must have fallen to the ground.
The wretched contrivance with which this latter part is told, exceeds everything that went before it. The first part, that of the miraculous conception, was not a thing that admitted of publicity; and therefore the tellers of this part of the story had this advantage, that though they might not be credited, they could not be detected. They could not be expected to prove it, because it was not one of those things that admitted of proof, and it was impossible that the person of whom it was told could prove it himself.
But the resurrection of a dead person from the grave, and his ascension through the air, is a thing very different, as to the evidence it admits of, to the invisible conception of a child in the womb. The resurrection and ascension, supposing them to have taken place, admitted of public and ocular demonstration, like that of the ascension of a balloon, or the sun at noon day, to all Jerusalem at least. A thing which everybody is required to believe, requires that the proof and evidence of it should be equal to all, and universal; and as the public visibility of this last related act was the only evidence that could give sanction to the former part, the whole of it falls to the ground, because that evidence never was given. Instead of this, a small number of persons, not more than eight or nine, are introduced as proxies for the whole world, to say they saw it, and all the rest of the world are called upon to believe it. But it appears that Thomas did not believe the resurrection; and, as they say, would not believe without having ocular and manual demonstration himself. So neither will I; and the reason is equally as good for me, and for every other person, as for Thomas.
It is in vain to attempt to palliate or disguise this matter. The story, so far as relates to the supernatural part, has every mark of fraud and imposition stamped upon the face of it. Who were the authors of it is as impossible for us now to know, as it is for us to be assured that the books in which the account is related were written by the persons whose names they bear. The best surviving evidence we now have. respecting this affair is the Jews. They are regularly descended from the people who lived in the time this resurrection and ascension is said to have happened, and they say ‘it is not true.’ It has long appeared to me a strange inconsistency to cite the Jews as a proof of the truth of the story. It is just the same as if a man were to say, I will prove the truth of what I have told you, by producing the people who say it is false.
That such a person as Jesus Christ existed, and that he was crucified, which was the mode of execution at that day, are historical relations strictly within the limits of probability. He preached most excellent morality, and the equality of man; but he preached also against the corruptions and avarice of the Jewish priests, and this brought upon him the hatred and vengeance of the whole order of priest-hood. The accusation which those priests brought against him was that of sedition and conspiracy against the Roman government, to which the Jews were then subject and tributary; and it is not improbable that the Roman government might have some secret apprehension of the effects of his doctrine as well as the Jewish priests; neither is it improbable that Jesus Christ had in contemplation the delivery of the Jewish nation from the bondage of the Romans. Between the two, however, this virtuous reformer and revolutionist lost his life.
That is absolutely identical to what Jefferson said on the subject repeatedly in his private letters to John Adams, Benjamin Rush and others — that Jesus was a man with an excellent ethical system but that the gospel writers perverted his views, piled mythology upon fact (Jefferson compared this to looking for diamonds in a dunghill) and invented supernatural stories that made nearly all of the gospels unreliable and dishonest.
I noted that Jefferson called the Biblical God “cruel, capricious, vindictive and unjust” and that he had referred to the gospel writers as a “band of dupes and imposters.” Paine said nearly identical things. Both rejected the virgin birth, the resurrection, atonement for sin and all claims that Jesus was divine or had ever claimed to be, while both also accepted that the ethical teachings of Jesus, the man, were excellent and worthy of emulation.
Their views are virtually indistinguishable. Yet one is presented as having written Christian principles into our system of government while the other is presented as the exact opposite, as someone who opposed Christianity entirely. This is only the first example of D’Souza’s utter dishonesty in dealing with historical facts. There will be many more examples over the next few days.
26 comments
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wscott
May 1, 2012 at 11:51 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Pedantic clarification: wasn’t he referring specifically to the God of the Old Testament here? Doesn’t change your point, but it’s a good observation that the OT and NT versions of God have next to nothing in common apart from their names.
Modusoperandi
May 1, 2012 at 11:57 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I am shocked! Shocked to find gambling in this establishment!
Gregory in Seattle
May 1, 2012 at 11:59 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Arguing a Christian (or at least theist) basis for American from the Declaration of Independence is absurd and shows an abject ignorance of American history, not that I would expect better from D’Souza. All it does is outline the case for armed rebellion, and since the power of a king was held at the time to be mandated by God, it comes as no suprise that Jefferson would make an appeal to God — excuse me, “Our Creator” — for a view that overruled the divine right of kings. Establishing that basis in the opening lines, Jefferson never goes back to it: all of the complaints leading to insurrection are political, not religious. Then there is the fact that the Declaration of Independence has no force of law whatsoever.
As for the differences between Jefferson and Paine, I think that it comes up because Jefferson was much more circumspect with his views, largely keeping them to private correspondences. Paine, on the other hand, could be described as a Gnu Deist, a firebrand who was more than willing to expound his views in the public forum. Paine wrote “The Age of Reason” while Jefferson never allowed “The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth” (aka the Jefferson Bible) to be published during his lifetime. The result is that while the two men held very similar views, it is much easier to overlook them in Jefferson.
tommykey
May 1, 2012 at 12:04 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Did D’Douchebag use his standard “I feel like a mosquito at a nudist colony” line on Ms. Jacoby?
The Lorax
May 1, 2012 at 12:24 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
As soon as you mentioned the Declaration, I knew he was cheating. The Declaration isn’t law and never was, it was just a bitch-slap to the king. Oh sure, it may give insight into who the Founding Fathers were and what sort of ideas they had, but that doesn’t matter; they voted and laid down in law our system of government, and that was that. Any other ideas they might have had can only change them from a historical standpoint; it cannot and should not affect our culture today.
If it came to light that every Founding Father was actually a closet atheist, does anyone really think that Christians would stop thinking of America as a Christian nation? Of course not. And neither should that logic apply if the Founding Fathers were all Christian, Catholic, Muslim, Jewish, Jedi, Pastafarians, or Last Tuesdayists. Christians want America to be a Christian nation, so they will pretend it is, and no argument can sway them the other way. It’s pointless even to debate, because they have refused to listen.
jws1
May 1, 2012 at 12:25 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Jefferson was wrong. Jesus damn well better have been the only son of the only god, because if he was just a man then we can never say that he was a “great moral teacher.” If not divine, then Jesus’ message makes him a lunatic or a monster.
Thank you for this point, Mr. C.S. Lewis and Mr. Hitchens.
Chiroptera
May 1, 2012 at 12:29 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
jws1, #6: …because if he was just a man then we can never say that he was a “great moral teacher.” If not divine, then Jesus’ message makes him a lunatic or a monster.
Well, if that is an inescapable conclusion, then it is better to accept it and deal with it than to believe in mythology just to avoid an unpleasant truth.
jws1
May 1, 2012 at 12:32 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Agreed. Lunatic and monster, guilty as charged. Wholly unworthy of emulation much less worship.
keansimmons
May 1, 2012 at 12:37 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Paine wrote:
“He was a virtuous and an amiable man. The morality that he preached and practiced was of the most benevolent kind;” and “Jesus Christ wrote no account of himself, of his birth, parentage, or anything else. Not a line of what is called the New Testament is of his writing. The history of him is altogether the work of other people;”
And Jefferson concurred. These two statements are incongruent. How could Paine come to the conclusion that is the first statement? Especially given some of the statements attributed to him in the NT.
cptdoom
May 1, 2012 at 12:41 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
In fact, if you follow the logic of historian David Starkey (known best for his Monarchy series on BBC), Jefferson was simply taking sides in a long-running debate among the English about the limitations, if any, on the power of kings. Are kings answerable only to God – as the French held and as the Tudor/Stuart families tried to mimic – or do they rule by consent of the people, which was the ancient Anglo-Saxon conception of kingship? We can see exactly where Jefferson comes down on the question through the Declaration, in which he is also echoing the complaints that led Charles I to lose his head a century before.
Seriously? Because it seems to me the parable of the Good Samaritan is sound moral teaching no matter what the mortal or immortal status of the storyteller may be.
jws1
May 1, 2012 at 12:47 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Yes, seriously. Vicarious redemption is repulsive and disgusting.
matty1
May 1, 2012 at 1:03 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
There are a lot of moral and immoral points in the New Testament. As you might expect from a book compiled out of multiple sources each with their own agenda it takes work to persuade yourself that there even is *a* message.
Anyway the trilema depends on the total accuracy of the text. Question that, and most historians do, and it is no longer clear that the grandiose (insane) claims to divinity are from the same source as stuff like The Good Samaritan. Incidentally Mr Jefferson seems to have thought along these lines since he apparently removed supernatural references from his own Bible.
Still if we absolutely have to pick one prong I’m going with lunatic.
matty1
May 1, 2012 at 1:10 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Also see wikipedia’s take on the question http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis%27s_trilemma#Criticisms
Reginald Selkirk
May 1, 2012 at 2:05 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Which reminds me of my favourite philosophical conundrum. If God is omnipotent, is there a rock so large that His hitting Himself in the head with it could explain the change of personality He underwent in between the OT and the NT?
slc1
May 1, 2012 at 2:08 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Re Reginald Selkirk @ #14
Nah, Yahweh was just born again after the demise of Yeshua of Nazareth.
Reginald Selkirk
May 1, 2012 at 2:12 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Also found in the Declaration of Independence: “The laws of Nature, and of Nature’s God.” That doesn’t sound Christian at all.
Anri
May 1, 2012 at 2:51 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“Lunatic, Liar, or Lord!”
Howabout “Legend”?
I mean, so long as we’re counting on alliteration to make things sound lots more truthier.
bksea
May 1, 2012 at 3:13 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Where in the Bible does it say anything about rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? Unless you are expected to be happy by being granted liberty to spend your life grovelling at the feet of a jealous god.
Chiroptera
May 1, 2012 at 3:29 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
You’da thunk that Jefferson would have put a few Bible quotes in the Declaration if his Christian faith was really so instrumental in his political philosophy.
It is also interesting that the Constitution, which actually sets up the Federal Government, doesn’t even mention God at all, let alone any explicitly Christian references.
d cwilson
May 1, 2012 at 4:01 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Which explains why people like Barton hate it so much.
kermit.
May 1, 2012 at 5:10 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
jws1: Yes, seriously. Vicarious redemption is repulsive and disgusting.
That’s mostly Paul’s doing. Jesus seemed mostly(1) concerned with living the hermit life or poverty and obsession with God. More of a Zen monk than king.
I’m not a big fan of utter poverty, unqualified pacifism, and a solely religious state of mind. Simple life is OK, and peaceful warrior is OK, and devoting much of one’s mind to gardening or jazz or cancer research or whatever is great. I’m not a big fan of Jesus.
But he wasn’t a monster. He called himself the Son of God, but he called everyone else the Children of God. I think he was talking more about altered states than he was about magical get out of jail free cards. Teachers of Zen and such are often not well understood, especially if they are being paraphrased by other people with an agenda.
(1) Assuming he existed at all, and that the quotes by him are actual quotes.
M Groesbeck
May 1, 2012 at 10:43 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@16 –
The “Nature’s God” bit still sounds to me quite a bit like Spinoza. And Spinozan deism/pantheism still sounds to me quite a bit like atheism for people who don’t want to admit it or just want a vague sense of religious self-righteousness.
cactuswren
May 2, 2012 at 12:43 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Lewis’s false trilemma is based on an implicit false dilemma, seasoned with a dose of poison for the well.
The unspoken dilemma behind Lewis’s argument is, “Either every word attributed to the man Jesus is to be accepted as true and right and good, OR every word attributed to the man Jesus must be rejected as false and wrong and evil.” And it’s at this point in Lewis’s formulation that the well gets poisoned; because (in his view) either you accept that Jesus was God, or you think that the parable of the Good Samaritan was a product of “the Devil of Hell”. Either you believe in the divinity of Jesus, or you accept that “Love thy neighbor” is no more valid or useful than “I am a poached egg”.
Modusoperandi
May 2, 2012 at 1:22 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
To be fair, “I am a poached egg” has served me well.
dogmeat
May 2, 2012 at 8:38 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
The lunatic, liar, lord approach is as flawed as Pascal’s wager. Co-opted hippy-monk dude is another viable answer. The New Testament is almost all “He said, she said,” leaving us with little idea what an historical “Jesus” might have said, if he existed at all. Given the bogus stories we have regarding the lives of historically documented individuals from just two hundred years ago, it isn’t hard to see what is possible when one begins with an obscure, little known figure from the provinces.
andrewryan
May 8, 2012 at 5:30 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I don’t think that the Dalai Lama is a lunatic or a liar, but neither do I think he’s genuinely holy. That doesn’t mean I have to reject everything he says as nonsense, and it doesn’t mean he can’t have any good ideas. CS Lewis seemed to believe that anyone who believed false things of that magnitude would automatically stand out as being obviously sociopathic or deranged. The real world is not so simple – people compartmentalise. People with messiah complexes often do manage to amass large groups of followers. They wouldn’t be able to if they lacked charisma or the ability to sound wise or come up with genuinely wise words.