READ - RESPOND - REPEAT

The Ecclesiastes 1 - Psalms connection

You know what else is neat in Ecclesiastes? The universiality of the experience that Solomon describes. Usher mentioned in a comment the other day that he'd heard stories of other rich guys on the top of the world discovering what Solomon describes and giving their testimony. I brought up Job (vastly rich but tormented) in a previous post. Well, How about David, Solomon's father and King before him...

O LORD, what is man that you regard him, or the son of man that you think of him? Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow. Bow your heavens, O LORD, and come down! Touch the mountains so that they smoke! Flash forth the lightning and scatter them; send out your arrows and rout them! Stretch out your hand from on high; rescue me and deliver me from the many waters, from the hand of foreigners, whose mouths speak lies and whose right hand is a right hand of falsehood. (Psa 144:3-8)

"O LORD, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am! Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath! Selah Surely a man goes about as a shadow! Surely for nothing they are in turmoil; man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather! "And now, O
Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you. (Psalm 39: 4-7)

Or how about the Sons of Korah...

Truly no man can ransom another, or give to God the price of his life, for the ransom of their life is costly and can never suffice, that he should live on forever and never see the pit. For he sees that even the wise die; the fool and the stupid alike must perish and leave their wealth to others. Their graves are their homes forever, their dwelling places to all generations, though they called lands by their own names. Man in his pomp will not remain; he is like the beasts that perish. (Psalm 49:7-12)

Suffering in Ecclesiastes and Job

The other day, one of my co-workers who is doing the Ecclesiastes study with me mentoned that the book reminded her of Job. Sure enough, they are both about suffering, but if you look at them they are about different kinds of suffering. Job is about physical suffering, anguish, and torment in the face of loss. Ecclesiastes is about depression, frustraion, and mental anguish in the face of wealth and comfort. The contrast brings out a couple of points.
  • Though we often try to dismiss it, psychological torment is just as real as physical suffering.
  • You can be in pain whether you are rich or poor.
My bible has a couple of cross-references from Ecclesiastes 1 into the New Testament. One of which seems to really answer the problem of Job and Ecclesiastes:

The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs--heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of
childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. (Romans 8:16-23; ESV)
You can't stick a pin into Romans without hitting something really profound, so it's hard to trim this down to just a short passage. All of Romans and especially Romans 8 seem to really speak to this question.

Bibliolatry

Did y’all know that evangelical Protestants have been accused of idolatry? Specifically of idolizing the Bible over Christ or over God.
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One of the most interesting parts of the above encyclopedia article is the reference to UNITATIS REDINTEGRATIO, (Restoration of Unity) the Catholic Church’s concession to ecumenical dealings with Protestants and with Orthodoxy. While, this Papal bull promotes ecumenical relations and outwardly congratulates Protestants on the degree to which they have taken scriptural studies, the tone of parts of it seems to imply that we are, while perhaps not heretical, certainly misguided…

21. A love and reverence of Sacred Scripture which might be described as devotion, leads our brethren to a constant meditative study of the sacred text. For the Gospel "is the power of God for salvation to every one who has faith, to the Jew first and then to the Greek".

While invoking the Holy Spirit, they seek in these very Scriptures God as it were speaking to them in Christ, Whom the prophets foretold, Who is the Word of God made flesh for us. They contemplate in the Scriptures the life of Christ and what the Divine Master taught and did for our salvation, especially the mysteries of His death and resurrection.

But while the Christians who are separated from us hold the divine authority of the Sacred Books, they differ from ours-some in one way, some in another-regarding the relationship between Scripture and the Church. For, according to Catholic belief, the authentic teaching authority of the Church has a special place in the interpretation and preaching of the written word of God.

But Sacred Scriptures provide for the work of dialogue an instrument of the highest value in the mighty hand of God for the attainment of that unity which the Saviour holds out to all.

Ecclesiastes – the author

Traditionally, Ecclesiastes has been attributed to Solomon because of the internal evidence, including the attribution, “the son of David, king in Jerusalem.” (Ecc 1:1) and the author’s wisdom (Ecc 1:12-13) and his wealth (Ecc 2). But, like pretty much everything in the Bible, some folks have challenged this traditional authorship. The most interesting suggestion I’ve seen is that the attribution, “son of David, king in Jerusalem,” is an allusion to the Messiah, Jesus Christ. Interesting, but tenuous.
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Firstly, the author says that he’s basically seen and tried everything under the sun and that it was vanity. Surely, Jesus did not think that his work was in vain. Also, Ecclesiastes 2 says that that author amassed worldly wealth and glory (Ecc 2:4-11), which is contrary to what we know of Jesus from Matthew 4, especially where he explicitly denied worldly glory…

Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, "All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me." Then Jesus said to him, "Be gone, Satan! For it is written, "'You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.'" (Mat 4:8-10)

So, I’d say the best bet is to go with the traditional authorship claim for Ecclesiastes – Solomon, Son of David, King at Jerusalem, ca945 BC.

Nothing counts but God

My current bible study is Ecclesiastes. I figure to take it at about a chapter per week for the next twelve weeks. This will give time to read each chapter several times, meditate on it, and follow all the cross-references.

Ecclesiastes 1 - All Is Vanity

The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.

Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity. What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises, and the sun goes down, and hastens to the place where it rises. The wind blows to the south and goes around to the north;around and around goes the wind, and on its circuits the wind returns.All streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full;to the place where the streams flow, there they flow again.

All things are full of weariness; a man cannot utter it;the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun. Is there a thing of which it is said, "See, this is new"? It has been already in the ages before us. There is no remembrance of former things, nor will there be any remembrance of later things yet to be among those who come after.

I the Preacher have been king over Israel in Jerusalem. And I applied my heart to seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven. It is an unhappy business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind. What is crooked cannot be made straight, and what is lacking cannot be counted.

I said in my heart, "I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over Jerusalem before me, and my heart has had great experience of wisdom and knowledge." And I applied my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also is but a striving after wind. For in much wisdom is much vexation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.

Summary - 20 centuries in 20 minutes

Why do we do the things we do? Where do our traditions come from?
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I like to facetiously say, “History doesn’t repeat itself, but historians do,” but it is apparent from this study that Christian history is rife with examples and instruction for us today. In today’s lesson you will see a giant, 20-centuries-long loop during which historical situations repeat and are handled in different, better and worse ways, throughout.
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Ecclesiastes 1:9-11
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Chapter 1
  • AD, BC, BCE (p6) (reflects current, modern relativism)
Chapter 2
  • Rule of Faith (p21)
  • Canonical Scripture (p20)
  • The fish monogram for Christ – The Greek word for fish is an anagram for the phrase “Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior.” (p24)
Chapter 3
  • Gloria Patria as a musical response to Arianism. (p30)
Chapter 4
  • Augustine of Hippo – proto-Reformer (p40)
  • Spread of Celtic Christianity (p45)
Chapter 5
  • Rise of Islam (p50)
  • Crusades (p54)
Chapter 6
  • Bernard emphasized the loving, innocent infant image of Christ as opposed to the earlier, strict judge image. (p64)
  • Valdes and the Waldensians (A.K.A. the Poor Folk of Lyons) – proto-Reformers (p65)
Chapter 7
  • Wycliffe (p74)
  • Hus (p74)
  • Erasmus (p78)
Chapter 8
  • Luther’s 95 Theses (p81)
  • 5 solas – sola scriptura, sola fide, sola gratia, solus Christus, sola Deo gratia (p80)
Chapter 9
  • TULIP – Total depravity, Unconditional election, Limited atonement, Irresistible grace, Perseverance of the saints. (p94)
  • Puritans (p96)
Chapter 10
  • Charles Wesley wrote many of the hymns we sing (p110)
  • Great Awakening (p109)
  • Deist or Christian forefathers? (p104)
Chapter 11
  • 5-Fundamentals as a response to modern liberal theology – Jesus was uniquely divine, virgin birth, died as a sacrifice for sin, will come again, and the bible is inerrant. (p123)
  • Gothic architecture (p119)
Chapter 12
  • Dead Sea Scrolls (p126) (returns us to the beginning of Christianity in a great, big, historical circle.)
  • Evolution (p130)
  • Post-modern relativism (p139)
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Ecclesiastes 3:11
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The history of God’s miraculous creation, the Church of Christ, points us back to himself through the Scriptures. With this additional insight into Church History, let’s return to the Scriptures with a prayer for the Holy Spirit to shed fresh light upon our studies.

Turn!

I was talking to a 24-year old Christian girl about memory verses today and I asked if she remembered Ecclesiates 3. She looked at me blankly. "Come on," I prodded. "You must remember the Byrds' song, 'Turn, Turn, Turn!'" Another blank look. So I dug up the video and she admitted to having heard a different version. I must be getting old.
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Though I have to admit, the following is a great rendition of the song too...


The Seventh Commandment

Thou shalt not commit adultery. (Exodus 20:14; KJV)

Though I prefer the readability of the NIV and lately, of the ESV, I chose King James Version for today’s post. The poetry of the 1611 Divines lends an unforgettable lilt to a commandment forbidding a very base thing.
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Did you ever wonder about the word, adultery? I have. Is it related to the word, adult in some sense, like an adult movie? As it turns out, no.
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The word, adult, is derived from a past-tense form of the Latin word, adolescere, meaning ‘to mature’, whereas adultery is from the Latin word adulterare, meaning ‘to corrupt.’ An interesting related word is skullduggery, which is derived from the Scottish sculdudrie, meaning ‘adultery’ or perhaps from sculduddery, meaning ‘bawdry or obscenity.’
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So, next time you hear someone refer to a movie as ‘adult’ don’t associate that with the positive connotation of maturity. You can, instead, translate that in your mind to ‘obscene,’ which word literally means, ‘not to be shown on stage.’

Young heroes of the faith

Today a co-worker of mine was looking for instances in the bible of children or younger or smaller people doing great things. Here's what we came up with...
  • Joseph, after being sold into slavery by his older brothers, works his way into the King's confidence, eventually saving his family from starvation and assuring his people many good years in Egypt. (Gen 37-50)
  • David was too small to fight in the war and ended up being a water boy, but was the only one brave enough to fight and kill Goliath. Despite many great faults, David was a man after God's own heart. (1 Sam 17)
  • Timothy was a young minister but was appointed to be the teaching elder within the church at Ephesus. Paul instructed Timothy to let no man despise you because of your youth (1Tm4:12)
  • Elihu waited patiently for his elders to correct Job, only speaking when they failed so miserably with their advice. though younger, he set all of the elders straight. (Job 32)
  • Abel's sacrifice was pleasing to God, whereas his older brother's sacrifice was not. (Gen 4)
  • Samuel was the young apprentice of Eli when God called him directly. in an age during which prophecy was rare, God chose this youngster to speak to. (1 Sam 3)
  • John leapt within his mother's womb when she met Mary bearing Jesus. The youngest character in the bible recognized the Messiah - the central character about whom the whole Bible revolves. (Luk 1:41-42)
  • Pharoah's daughter saves Moses from the river and her father's death sentence. (Exodus 2)
  • Esther, a beautiful young woman saved her people from the scheming Haman. (Esther 2-)
  • Stephen, one of the first deacons, refers to his listeners as brothers and fathers, implying that he was lecturing to his elders things that they should have known and understood already.
  • Gideon was the least (youngest?) man of his family, which was the weakest family of his tribe. But God used him and his ragtag band of 300 to defeat the Philistines and deliver the Israelites. (Judges 6;15f)

How about y'all? Can you think of more or better examples?

Mississippi missionaries at Malawi

A video... (Google video does not integrate properly with Google Blogger, so I can only post the link. Click on the link to see the video.) http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3775214202663584994
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We had the distinct pleasure of having Sam and Leanne McDonald speak at our church tonight.
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Optimism reigned in the 19th century. Europe suffered no major wars and human technology seemed to leap forward. Agricultural revolution, industrial revolution, railroad, steamship, etc… In many ways things felt like they would all be alright. That nature was succumbing to the human will.
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Modern optimism and reason led to the development of modern liberal theology, characterized by the idea that religion is about emotion and is therefore a different domain from that of reason (For instance, see Steven Jay Gould’s essay, Nonoverlapping Magisteria). You see the effect of that in modern Gothic revival architecture, hymns and praise music that are more about feeling than about biblical theology, and the idea in some churches that religion is a woman’s thing and reason is a man’s thing.
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Critics like Schleiermacher reconstructed the historical Jesus and Bible into symbols, legends, myths, and metaphors about the human spirit and condition. Christianity became about, “the universal fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, and the infinite worth of the human soul.” This had the good effect of focusing people on the response of the “Social Gospel” to the human condition.
  • William Carey lit a fire of interest in missions and increased the number of missionaries outside Europe 1000 times within a century.
  • Robert Raikes started the idea of Sunday Schools.
  • Angelina and Sarah Grimke crusaded for Women’s Rights.
  • William Wilberforce worked to outlaw slavery in Britain.
  • Sojourner Truth preached against slavery in the U.S.
  • William Booth organized the Salvation Army
  • Wealthy Brits formed the YMCA
Did you know American Presbyterians are (were?) revival people? Take Cane Ridge Kentucky (p117), for instance. There were actually two lines of thought in Presbyterianism following the Great Awakening: the more liberal, more charismatic, more humanist “New Lights” and the more conservative, traditional, strictly-subscriptionist “Old Lights.”
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One of the effects of events like Cane Ridge was to reduce the importance of the mainline denominations in America, leading to non-denominational churches, like the Churches of Christ, Disciples of Christ, and Christian Churches. This time period was also the beginning of the Seventh Day Adventists.
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The dilution of the gospel led to leaders like Pope Pious IX and Dwight Moody calling for people to resist the allure of modern liberal theology.
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The Niagara Conference defined “The Five Fundamentals” of the Christian Faith - sort of a minimalist Christianity.
  • Jesus was uniquely divine.
  • Jesus was born of a virgin.
  • Jesus died as a sacrifice for sins.
  • Jesus will come again.
  • The Bible is inerrant.
Next Week: 20th century

Amazing Grace/May the Circle be Unbroken

Here is some more gospel bluegrass to follow on the heels of my previous post...
Elise forwarded me this email today. Cute - but it doesn't sound like a kid wrote it. My favorite parts are the account of Solomon's 500 porcupines and the story of Judas Asparagus.

In the beginning, which occurred near the start, there was nothing but God, darkness, and some gas. The Bible says, 'The Lord thy God is one, but I think He must be a lot older than that. Anyway, God said, 'Give me a light!' and someone did. Then God made the world.

He split the Adam and made Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, but they weren't embarrassed because mirrors hadn't been invented yet. Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating one bad apple, so they were driven from the Garden of Eden. Not sure what they were driven in though, because they didn't have cars.

Adam and Eve had a son, Cain, who hated his brother as long as he was Abel. Pretty soon all of the early people died off, except for Methuselah, who lived to be like a million or something.

One of the next important people was Noah, who was a good guy, but one of his kids was kind of a Ham. Noah built a large boat and put his family and some animals on it. He asked some other people to join him, but they said they would have to take a rain check.

After Noah came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob was more famous than his brother, Esau, because Esau sold Jacob his birthmark in exchange for some pot roast. Jacob had a son named Joseph who wore a really loud sports coat.

Another important Bible guy is Moses, whose real name was Charlton Heston. Moses led the Israel Lights out of Egypt and away from the evil Pharaoh after God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh's people. These plagues included frogs, mice, lice, bowels, and no cable. God fed the Israel Lights every day with manicotti.

Then he gave them His Top Ten Commandments. These include don't lie, cheat, smoke, dance, or covet your neighbor's stuff. Oh, yeah, I just thought of one more: Humor thy father and thy mother. One of Moses' best helpers was Joshua who was the first Bible guy to use spies. Joshua fought the battle of Geritol and the fence fell over on the town.

After Joshua came David He got to be king by killing a giant with a slingshot. He had a son named Solomon who had about 300 wives and 500 porcupines. My teacher says he was wise, but that doesn't sound very wise to me.

After Solomon there were a bunch of major league prophets. One of these was Jonah, who was swallowed by a big whale and then barfed upon the shore. There were also some minor league prophets, but I guess we don't have to worry about them.

After the Old Testament came the New Testament. Jesus is the star of the New Testament. He was born in Bethlehem in a barn. (I wish I had been born in a barn, too, because my mom is always saying to me, 'Close the door! Were you born in a barn?' It would be nice to say, 'As a matter of fact, I was.')

During His life, Jesus had many arguments with sinners like the Pharisees and the Democrats. Jesus also had twelve opossums. The worst one was Judas Asparagus. Judas was so evil that they named a terrible vegetable after him.

Jesus was a great man. He healed many leopards and even preached to some Germans on the Mount. But the Democrats and all those guys put Jesus on trial
efore Pontius the Pilot. Pilot didn't stick up for Jesus. He just washed his hands instead.

Any way's, Jesus died for our sins, then came back to life again. He went up to Heaven but will be back at the end of the Aluminum. His return is foretold in the book of Revolution..

David Crowder

I like a lot of contemporary praise music, but I also like folk and bluegrass. Somehow David Crowder slipped past my radars until recently. Check this out...

During the 17th and 18th centuries you can see the development of this idea of separation of church and state. You also see the development of both scientific reason and spiritual holiness in religion.
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The Pilgrims did not sail from Amsterdam to America based on a grand idea of religious tolerance and freedom. They wanted to set up a properly-run theocracy based on Reformed Puritan ideas. We’ve already seen from the oppression of the Anabaptists in the Old World, that Reformed Christianity was susceptible to the same ills as (capital-C) Catholic Christianity.
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Roger Williams was offered the position of pastor at a Congregationalist church but turned it down because he disagreed with entanglement of church with secular authority. He evangelized to the Indians and eventually made the statement that the Indians were the true owners of this land. The authorities exiled him and, after wintering with the Indians, bought some land from them and founded Providence, which was to become Rhode Island. (See p106 quote)
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Anne Hutchinson was a midwife who led women’s meetings each week to discuss the pastor’s sermon. A “woman of ready wit and bold spirit,” Anne soon had 60 people attending her meetings. She claimed that Christians aren’t bound to obey human laws and was accused of treason. She was so sharp that they could not prove any charges against her until she claimed to inspiration by the Holy Spirit (that old debate again – scripture vs. tradition vs. spirit). She was banished and fled to Providence.
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Salem Witch Trials – Some children, caught playing occult games, claimed to have been ‘witched by the house servant. Fear of this witchcraft spread throughout the community and there began to be trials. Accused witches were subjected to various tests and tortures to get them to confess. This turned out to be exacerbated by a host of things (possible ergotism, neighbor vs. neighbor feuds, desire for more state lands).
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Isaac Newton made a great leap forward in science when he showed that gravity could be the force that was driving Copernicus’ and Galileo’s assertions about the motions of the heavens. People were astounded at the simplicity and power of his explanation.
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Deism was rampant. This is the belief that God created and started the world but then left it to run by its natural, reasonable processes – sort of like a clockmaker. People like to debate whether the various founders were Christian or Deist, but it can be difficult to separate the two or categorize any particular person because of the Reason and Logic ideas that were widespread in the educated community.
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But it seems that you can’t go too far off-track before revival takes place among a faithful remnant. Revivalism took two important forms during this period – Pietism in England and The Great Awakening in New England.
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In England, the Pietism movement took the form of small groups that got together to promote awakening, holiness, and the exercise of spiritual disciplines (prayer, fasting, etc…). These became ‘holy clubs,’ which later became the ‘Methodist’ movement within the Church of England. A couple of the early Methodist leaders were John (the “Methodist”) Wesley and Charles (the “Hymnist”) Wesley, who attended holy club meetings led by their mother, Susanna.
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George Whitefield, Calvinist Methodist (no, that’s not an oxymoron) preacher was so influential that it was his sermons in particular that were first called, ‘The Great Awakening.’
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Jonathan Edwards, New England Congregationalist pastor, preached ‘Sinners in the hands of an Angry God.’ Everybody seems to associate him with shouting hellfire and brimstone but he was a cool, quiet speaker – frighteningly so. He would literally scare the hell out of people. He may have come to regret the emotional approach to the Awakening because it seemed to almost inoculate people against subsequent preaching.
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So, what have we seen during this time period? Development of…
  • Methodist movement and the Great Awakening
  • Scientific reason and deism
  • Separation of Church and State
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Toward the end of this time period (ca 1789) you can see the full development of this idea of separation of church and state. The first article of the Bill of Rights:
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Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

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The debate remains, was this establishment clause instituted by deists based in scientific reason to protect the state from the church or by Christian forefathers to protect the church from the state?

ONLY 2 MORE WEEKS OF THIS STUDY. . .Next week: Optimism. Final week: Modernism and Postmodernism.