I am currently reading Mark David Hall’s “Did America Have a Christian Nation?” This book is intended to be a general refutation of those who insist that America’s founders, as a whole, were not Christian but instead were Deists. Hall concedes that one can make a good case that Benjamin Franklin, Ethan Allen, and Thomas Paine were public Deists, though Franklin said some might odd things for a Deist. Hall then goes on to concede that Thomas Jefferson and John Adams were, in their private letters and lives, before their presidencies, Deists. However, at that point says everybody else that is typically painted as a Deist (Madison, Washington, and Hamilton) are men, from whom, there is a mixed testimony from their letters and actions and as such Hall refuses to concede these men to the Deist column.
If any of you are familiar with the writings of John Eidsmoe, Hall is similar though Hall gives a bit more detail on the Founders and their Christianity and doesn’t quite get as far out on a limb does as Eidsmoe sometimes did.
But as to the question of the book title, “Did America Have A Christian Foundation,” there is a corresponding question that has to be asked; If America didn’t have a Christian foundation then what religious foundation did it have?
Now, there are many, including those who want to make America’s founding as one based on Enlightenment Rationalism, who will insist that America had no religious foundation and that it was founded as a “secular” State. However,the answer “none” is not an option. All nations without exception have a religious foundation and operate consistent with some expressed religion.
How do I know this?
I know this because every nation has some law order. Every law order, in turn, is dependent upon some a-priori conception of “right and wrong.” Every a-priori notion of “right and wrong” in turn is based on some God or god concept. One simply cannot legislate on law apart from right and wrong and one can not adjudicate right and wrong apart from a God or a god concept who or which provides the standard for the right and wrong that law proclaims upon. Finally, every God or god concept yields a religion that serves as the outworking of the will of that God or god concept in the whole of the social order and nation.
What this means is that all nations without exception have a religious foundation and operate consistent with some expressed religion. It is not just that Israel has Talmudism for its foundation or that Saudi Arabia has Islam as its foundation or that Japan has Shintoism as its foundation, it is the case that every nation (as well as every family and individual) has some religion as a foundation.
Anyway… give Mark David Hall’s book, “Did America Have A Christian Foundation,” out for a spin. If you are a Christian you will find encouraging insights.
Addendum
It really is irrelevant whether or not America had a Christian foundation in terms of whether America today should have a Christian foundation. Even if America didn’t have a Christian foundation (something I strongly disagree with) that would have no bearing on the fact that all nations are responsible to bow the knee to Christ right now so that law (as well as education, politics, family life, etc.) is to be built on a Christian foundation.
