Reason without God and God without Reason, where the 'twain shall meet
In my 1968 commentary I drew a parallel between the dark side of the Enlightenment that led to the Terror of the French Revolution to far left liberalism (Socialism)and Communism. The Enlightenment hinged heavily on Reason, as opposed to superstition, particularly from the Church. Many philosophers of the time rejected God in much the same way later Communists and Socialists would.
There are those that would have you believe that The Founding Fathers of America also rejected God, that however is not true. What they rejected was a state telling the people what about God they had to believe. They rejected the state making people worship in a particular manner. By and large however, the founder's were religious men. Many on the left will point particularly to Thomas Jefferson as one who rejected God, when this is patently untrue. Jefferson rejected organized religion, he questioned deeply if Jesus was the actual son of God but Jefferson did not reject a supreme being, a quote if you will.
And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep for ever.
Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, Query 18, 1781
A belief in a Supreme Being, regardless of how each founder chose to practice that belief, is apparent in their writings. Those who do not understand this have either deliberately discounted this aspect of the Founders, or they have not read the wisdom these men left behind. The reason this is important is because the founder's believed that it was not just reason that gave people inherent rights, but that those rights also flowed from a Supreme Being giving ALL the rights to pursue Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. The idea of tolerance for all and their beliefs. The left delights in pointing out that founder's such as Jefferson and Washington had slaves and so did not extend freedom to all. They do this by ignoring the times that the country was founded in. They ignore that by utilizing the very ideals that the founders enshrined into the constitution slavery was ended. What they miss is that it is the ideals that constantly push us to pursue an ever better society, and it was the Founder's, imperfect men that they were, who gave us those ideals.
When one leaves God out of the mix and only reason exists it leads to a moral dilemma. That dilemma goes by the name of moral equivalence. A dilemma that allows men like Robespierre to come to power, men like Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Pol Pot and Saddam Hussein. And leads groups like the far left from condemning the mass murderers. It also leads the American far left to condemn the country that shelters it, instead of condemning those that have attacked that country. Moral equivalence allows monsters to come to power because they have no moral authority to answer to.
Which brings us to those who have God with no reason. One would think realistically those who so often jeer the concept of God would not find an ally in terrorists who use God as their rallying cry. Please note I use God not in a Christian terminology, but only as the terminology of a Supreme Being. The current enemies of this country do not see HUMAN rights flowing from God, they see only their concept of God who demands a society that makes women invisible, a God that demands all others submit to that societies religious precepts and those that do not deserve death. In other words this view does not provide any form of equality under the law, it provides for complete inequality as religious precept. Without reason, Islam has remained in the 13th century, awash in superstition not unlike Europe of the Dark Ages.
Yet, yet the far left cannot condemn them. The people who insist that George W. Bush is akin to Hitler cannot bring themselves to condemn an ideology that while it uses God as it's prop is truly no different than the ideology that brought us fascists, Nazi's, Communist's. They cannot because in their world view all things are relative. They attempt to be historical revisionists and prove that Islam all along has been peaceful when the reality is not so. It is as blantant a lie as if a Christian stood up and claimed that Christianity has always been peaceful, we know that is not the case, the far left has crammed that history down our throat. The difference here is that this is now 2004, the religious wars in Europe as well as those that took place between Islam and the Catholic Church are hundreds of years gone by. First the Reformation came, and then the Enlightenment, but Islam has yet to experience anything akin to either of those Western Civilization events. So yes, Islam has been very violent, and continues that violence. It has never stopped, it has always been present in their own society. It is only in the last thirty years that the modern West has had to grapple with it. Once upon a time the west believed they had vanquished the violence directed towards us from Islam. No more.
Under the guise of multiculturalism, the far left demands that the West simply allow the cultural norms of violence masquerading as religion, into our culture. To not do so is "racist". The left does not seem to grasp that it a mark of a democracy to be able to respect an adherent of a particular religion than it is to respect that religion. The tolerance that the Founder's enshrined is a tolerance towards individual people, it is not a tolerance of ideals that would wipe away that individual tolerance. The inability to see from both the left and from radical Islam that individual rights flow from BOTH reason and God, make them bedmates.
The inability to stand on moral principal is what allows the far left loonies to equate Bush to Hitler. It is what prompts Michael Moore to produce a movie that essentially shows Iraq as a peaceful wonderful country until the big bad Americans invaded. It is that same inability to stand on moral principal that allowed John Kerry to paint those who had been in Vietnam and those who were still there as akin to the army of Ghengis Khan. The same inability that prompted him to go to Paris in 1970 in an effort to parlay with the enemy, an enemy that later slaughtered hundreds of thousands of people when they had the chance to. Reason without virtue.
A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue then will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader.
Samuel Adams, letter to James Warren, February 12, 1779
Far from being rivals or enemies, religion and law are twin sisters, friends, and mutual assistants. Indeed, these two sciences run into each other. The divine law, as discovered by reason and the moral sense, forms an essential part of both.
James Wilson early American Congressman
The far left, the dark side of the Enlightenment. They slide the slippery slope of moral equivalence, and they have nominated John Kerry.
Red
There are those that would have you believe that The Founding Fathers of America also rejected God, that however is not true. What they rejected was a state telling the people what about God they had to believe. They rejected the state making people worship in a particular manner. By and large however, the founder's were religious men. Many on the left will point particularly to Thomas Jefferson as one who rejected God, when this is patently untrue. Jefferson rejected organized religion, he questioned deeply if Jesus was the actual son of God but Jefferson did not reject a supreme being, a quote if you will.
And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep for ever.
Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, Query 18, 1781
A belief in a Supreme Being, regardless of how each founder chose to practice that belief, is apparent in their writings. Those who do not understand this have either deliberately discounted this aspect of the Founders, or they have not read the wisdom these men left behind. The reason this is important is because the founder's believed that it was not just reason that gave people inherent rights, but that those rights also flowed from a Supreme Being giving ALL the rights to pursue Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. The idea of tolerance for all and their beliefs. The left delights in pointing out that founder's such as Jefferson and Washington had slaves and so did not extend freedom to all. They do this by ignoring the times that the country was founded in. They ignore that by utilizing the very ideals that the founders enshrined into the constitution slavery was ended. What they miss is that it is the ideals that constantly push us to pursue an ever better society, and it was the Founder's, imperfect men that they were, who gave us those ideals.
When one leaves God out of the mix and only reason exists it leads to a moral dilemma. That dilemma goes by the name of moral equivalence. A dilemma that allows men like Robespierre to come to power, men like Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Pol Pot and Saddam Hussein. And leads groups like the far left from condemning the mass murderers. It also leads the American far left to condemn the country that shelters it, instead of condemning those that have attacked that country. Moral equivalence allows monsters to come to power because they have no moral authority to answer to.
Which brings us to those who have God with no reason. One would think realistically those who so often jeer the concept of God would not find an ally in terrorists who use God as their rallying cry. Please note I use God not in a Christian terminology, but only as the terminology of a Supreme Being. The current enemies of this country do not see HUMAN rights flowing from God, they see only their concept of God who demands a society that makes women invisible, a God that demands all others submit to that societies religious precepts and those that do not deserve death. In other words this view does not provide any form of equality under the law, it provides for complete inequality as religious precept. Without reason, Islam has remained in the 13th century, awash in superstition not unlike Europe of the Dark Ages.
Yet, yet the far left cannot condemn them. The people who insist that George W. Bush is akin to Hitler cannot bring themselves to condemn an ideology that while it uses God as it's prop is truly no different than the ideology that brought us fascists, Nazi's, Communist's. They cannot because in their world view all things are relative. They attempt to be historical revisionists and prove that Islam all along has been peaceful when the reality is not so. It is as blantant a lie as if a Christian stood up and claimed that Christianity has always been peaceful, we know that is not the case, the far left has crammed that history down our throat. The difference here is that this is now 2004, the religious wars in Europe as well as those that took place between Islam and the Catholic Church are hundreds of years gone by. First the Reformation came, and then the Enlightenment, but Islam has yet to experience anything akin to either of those Western Civilization events. So yes, Islam has been very violent, and continues that violence. It has never stopped, it has always been present in their own society. It is only in the last thirty years that the modern West has had to grapple with it. Once upon a time the west believed they had vanquished the violence directed towards us from Islam. No more.
Under the guise of multiculturalism, the far left demands that the West simply allow the cultural norms of violence masquerading as religion, into our culture. To not do so is "racist". The left does not seem to grasp that it a mark of a democracy to be able to respect an adherent of a particular religion than it is to respect that religion. The tolerance that the Founder's enshrined is a tolerance towards individual people, it is not a tolerance of ideals that would wipe away that individual tolerance. The inability to see from both the left and from radical Islam that individual rights flow from BOTH reason and God, make them bedmates.
The inability to stand on moral principal is what allows the far left loonies to equate Bush to Hitler. It is what prompts Michael Moore to produce a movie that essentially shows Iraq as a peaceful wonderful country until the big bad Americans invaded. It is that same inability to stand on moral principal that allowed John Kerry to paint those who had been in Vietnam and those who were still there as akin to the army of Ghengis Khan. The same inability that prompted him to go to Paris in 1970 in an effort to parlay with the enemy, an enemy that later slaughtered hundreds of thousands of people when they had the chance to. Reason without virtue.
A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue then will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader.
Samuel Adams, letter to James Warren, February 12, 1779
Far from being rivals or enemies, religion and law are twin sisters, friends, and mutual assistants. Indeed, these two sciences run into each other. The divine law, as discovered by reason and the moral sense, forms an essential part of both.
James Wilson early American Congressman
The far left, the dark side of the Enlightenment. They slide the slippery slope of moral equivalence, and they have nominated John Kerry.
Red
posted by redcrabtree | 8:47 PM
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