More Faith & Political Power: Writing in today's New York Times, my favorite Republican apologist, David Brooks, cites Lincoln's argument for why he would not listen to objections from his cabinet for freeing the slaves in 1862: "[Lincoln] said he had made a solemn vow to the Almight that if God gave him victory at Antietam, [he] would issue the decree" (the Emancipation Proclamation). Evidently, Lincoln played a gambler's game with God—the kind of game small boys make on the athletic field: Let me get a hit my time at bat, and I'll go to church Sunday.
Later, Brooks asserts that "When great leaders make daring leaps, they often feel themselves surrendering to Divine Providence, and their strength flows from their faith that they are acting in accordance with transcendent moral truth." I'm sure Hitler would agree. Was their ever a man who was more convinced that his hand was guided by "transcendent moral truth"?
Lincoln desperately needed people to believe that divine providence was guiding his hand. He lived in a land shriven with race hatred, even as it struggled with the moral rectitude of clensing itself of the sin of slavery through a baptism of fire and blood.
Like today, Lincoln's was a time of religious renewal, and as in our time religion was often the justification for all sorts of acts, both good and ill.
Personally, I have no problem with a judge arguing that our code of laws, our Constitution, was derived in part from the laws set forth in the Old Testement of the Bible. I believe he is correct in his assertion. People have been told to follow The Ten Commandments for thousands of years. They set forth beliefs about correct behavior common to almost every culture. And they themselves are set forth in a document, The King James Bible, that heavily influenced all things English. Regardless of the beliefs of the men who wrote down our Constition, the Ten Commandments must have been in the backs of their minds, so to speak, when they composed it.
However, an historical, literary, philosophical truth cannot justify demogoguery. When that same judge wants to prop up a two-ton statue of The Ten Commandments in his courthouse, he is not simply bearing witness to the aforementioned truth, he is attempting to intimidate all who enter the courthouse with his own power.
As Buffy Summers says in Buffy, the Vampire Slayer, "It's the power, it's always about the power."
Later, Brooks asserts that "When great leaders make daring leaps, they often feel themselves surrendering to Divine Providence, and their strength flows from their faith that they are acting in accordance with transcendent moral truth." I'm sure Hitler would agree. Was their ever a man who was more convinced that his hand was guided by "transcendent moral truth"?
Lincoln desperately needed people to believe that divine providence was guiding his hand. He lived in a land shriven with race hatred, even as it struggled with the moral rectitude of clensing itself of the sin of slavery through a baptism of fire and blood.
Like today, Lincoln's was a time of religious renewal, and as in our time religion was often the justification for all sorts of acts, both good and ill.
Personally, I have no problem with a judge arguing that our code of laws, our Constitution, was derived in part from the laws set forth in the Old Testement of the Bible. I believe he is correct in his assertion. People have been told to follow The Ten Commandments for thousands of years. They set forth beliefs about correct behavior common to almost every culture. And they themselves are set forth in a document, The King James Bible, that heavily influenced all things English. Regardless of the beliefs of the men who wrote down our Constition, the Ten Commandments must have been in the backs of their minds, so to speak, when they composed it.
However, an historical, literary, philosophical truth cannot justify demogoguery. When that same judge wants to prop up a two-ton statue of The Ten Commandments in his courthouse, he is not simply bearing witness to the aforementioned truth, he is attempting to intimidate all who enter the courthouse with his own power.
As Buffy Summers says in Buffy, the Vampire Slayer, "It's the power, it's always about the power."
posted by Jim | 11:52 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home