this post was submitted on 01 Aug 2024
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This seems like a good spot for a reminder that Thomas Jefferson edited his own copy of the bible to remove all of the magical/religious elements and left only the philosophical lessons.
And then there was Thomas Payne, who was as close to an overt atheist as you could get in the 18th century without having someone come up behind you and slit your throat.
There's also a long list of great quotes here from the founders-
https://liberalamerica.org/2014/10/27/88-founding-father-quotes-that-will-enrage-the-religious-right/
-- John Adams
And he was one of the more religious ones.
There were many spicy quotes during the Enlightenment -- the founding fathers were reflecting a common sentiment among the educated classes in Europe. Anyone interested in that time period would enjoy Peter Gay's book about it. It's incredibly well-written and much less dry than a book about that subject has any right to be.
One can be part of the system and recognize its faults.
Yeah, there were some people sort of bucking the system, and probably some closeted atheists, but criticizing the church for its corruption and failures is no different than us doing the same about our government today.
The next line after the quote is:
So not necessarily an anti-deity statement, but more an acknowledgement that the Church is a system by which European rulers reinforce their power and wealth. The whole letter to Taylor from Adams really rants about the church’s power and attempts to control people’s lives.
I don't disagree. Like I said, Adams was one of the more religious founders. He wasn't anywhere near as extremely anti-religion as people like Madison. But that's why I chose Adams.
If you want a good Madison quote:
And then, going back to Franklin, was him suggesting America should be building lighthouses, not churches.
Madison’s quote closely mirrors Adams’ for sure, noting the church just being another power structure used by the wealthy.
Franklin is one of the only founders I haven’t read much about, mostly because he seems too good to be true and there’s a lot of worship surrounding him. I feel like I could never get an honest look at him.
There's plenty of bad things about Franklin. For one thing, he cheated on his wife all the time, often with women who were also married. And really didn't care who knew about it either.
He was also rumored to have had many affairs. This shows that he not only invented the lightning rod, he probably also had one.
He was basically just channeling Seneca, who wrote this circa 65 CE (in his Letters from a Stoic, which are a great read)
and
and
and
--Ethan Allen, Reason: The Only Oracle of Man
Payne was a proto anarchist. His response to coming to America was “this no king thing is awesome but let’s look at the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and maybe since we’re on their land consider that they might be living better lives than us.
I don't really think that was a risk. My understanding is it was more like: "well this is what smart people have believed for centuries- what idea do you have for where we came from?"
Blasphemy was still illegal in many countries, and could even be a capital crime. And even in the ones that weren't, there were plenty of bloodthirsty religious fanatics.
It is certainly easier to argue for an atheist position in an age of science, but atheism itself goes at least as far back as Diagoras of Melos in Ancient Greece. He threw an idol of a god into a fire and said that if gods existed, they would stop the idol from burning. He got chased out of Melos for his trouble. That sort of thing is why, even thousands of years later, if you were an atheist, you didn't admit it.
You could go as far as deism in the Enlightenment, but the Enlightenment was already in full swing in Britain when Thomas Aikenhead was executed for blasphemy due to being an atheist.
Anyway to get a copy of this?
https://uuhouston.org/files/The_Jefferson_Bible.pdf
Or another version: https://archive.org/details/TheLifeAndMoralsOfJesusOfNazarethJeffersonBibleByThomasJefferson/page/n119/mode/2up
I really want to emphasize that Jefferson was not a good guy, not morally good at all, definitely raped his slave Sally Hemmings who was probably younger than 15 when it started but at least 15 (Jefferson was in his 40s). Prevented her from fleeing his rape house when he took her to France by promising he'd free her whole family and her when they got back, and then didn't (because he wanted to keep raping her, probably). Oh and also, her brother went to France with them and learned French cooking for Jefferson, and the ice cream recipe he used for Jefferson is still served to this day at Mt Rushmore as Thomas Jefferson's ice cream. Even though it's not his.
https://www.vox.com/2016/4/8/11389556/thomas-jefferson-sally-hemings-book
This is not a man with a good moral backbone. For reference, literally no other founder did anything like this. Sure, many cheated - with adults who weren't their personal child slaves. This is extremely disturbing, and before anyone goes to defend him, really ask yourself why you're empathizing with Jefferson here and not poor Sally.
There are better philosophers out there.
Wow you got me, I'm actually a racing racist and pedo just because I mentioned that one of the most prominent founding fathers was not terribly religious (??)
What a terribly bad faith interpretation of their comment. Theyre making the point that while it's neat that Jefferson de-religioned the bible, and left the philosophy, Jefferson himself wasn't exactly an ethical paragon and that should be remembered. It wasn't an attack against you.
They replied to me, and it had nothing to do with the topic at hand (the founding fathers' religious beliefs). It's like barging into a conversation about the autobahn yelling GUYS, HITLER WAS REALLY BAD! I WANT YOU TO KNOW THAT!
I mean, the broader thread has been talking about the philosophy and such included in the Jefferson bible. Seems pretty reasonable to put a note on a link to the thing just for the edification of anyone that checks it out.
Its more akin to being adjacent to a conversation about the history of the autobahn, and being the one to say "so for anyone who's not aware, the autobahn was largely built by the Nazis"
It wasn't an attack on you, just context for those who weren't aware.
What? Where did I state that?
I'm giving context to people reading your suggestion -that Jefferson isn't a saint and we have evidence he was engaging in some really immoral actions, even for the time. That's relevant when we are talking about philosophy and how he may have used this work to justify some of these beliefs.
It's fine to like a work and be critical of that work. Critical thinking is good.
Great, thankfully I didn't say any of those things, so I'm not sure why you're calling me out on a conversation you seem to be having only with yourself. What a weird interjection to make. Should I always include a disclaimer warning people not to go on a rampage against the Marcomanni if I mention Meditations?
Sure, give whatever historical context you like. To me, a woman, that he was a rapist is highly notable. Women have been calling out rapist men, because they tend to be Bad Guys in general who have certain beliefs that are Bad (which is what enables them to rape). What Jefferson did with his slave is like a horror movie. It's genuinely disturbing to think about. Would you like to be some 40 year old guy's fuck meat at age 15? How about at the age you are now?
It's like if people started talking about R Kelly's music - and I'm like hey, for context, many of these girls he's talking about were child victims - it changes his music. Thomas Jefferson factually did those things and it should be part of his history when we talk about his philosophies and morals.
I would wholeheartedly agree with you if that was little-known, but — and I admit, I'm guessing here — I'd be very surprised if most people on Lemmy don't know he was a slaveowner and a rapist. This place is basically a commune of nerds with strong left-wing political opinions. I really don't think we need to preface things that everyone here already knows are bad. We're also talking about slavery, but don't feel the need to point out that actually, slavery is really not great (something that might be important to remind others of on, say, Twitter).
Cool, so if it is known, then me adding historical context as a starting point for a greater conversation about how his philosophy and morals lined up with his life as we understand it - is perfect for Lemmy :)
~2MB PDF! There was more left than I expected!