A Democratic Theocracy

I highly recommend reading Noah Feldman’s excellent Divided by God. Note that I’m not recommending this book because it supports all of my own views on the subject- it doesn’t. I don’t entirely agree with Feldman’s conclusion, but the book delivers a ton of insight into not only the intentions of the Founding Fathers, but how our perception of those intentions have changed over time. It presents a good middle ground, I think, between my sort of views (and yours, I suppose, it seems we pretty much completely agree on this subject), and those of your peers in the Christian right.

Home run!

Nathan, I’m afraid your position is philosophically untenable.

1) There is no objectivity with respect to non-physical laws (i.e. morality, criminal behavior, etc as opposed to physical laws like gravity). There is only subjective, religious belief to dictate the structure and content of a legal framework.

2) Not all religious beliefs are compatible (they are often mutually contradictory). Thus not all legal frameworks are compatible.

3) Therefore the selection of any legal framework is subjective and discriminatory.

The belief that we can entertain multiple mutually exclusive legal paradigms is, sadly, nonsense. Many post-enlightenment political philosophers would like to think that we can somehow have a non-discriminatory government, but it is not possible.

“”"guaranteed our right to worship whatever god we want to, many gods, or none at all, “”"

This is interesting. I’d like to see a document from one of the founders that actually says this, because to date all I’ve actually seen is their reference to various denominations (”religions”) of the christian religion, and have never seen a reference to polytheism, atheism, etc.

Cheers,
Matthew

1) There is no objectivity with respect to non-physical laws (i.e. morality, criminal behavior, etc as opposed to physical laws like gravity). There is only subjective, religious belief to dictate the structure and content of a legal framework.

There are other beliefs than religious ones that can dictate the structure and content of a legal framework. Still subjective, though.

2) Not all religious beliefs are compatible (they are often mutually contradictory). Thus not all legal frameworks are compatible.

True, but not all legal frameworks need be based on religious beliefs. Please, I have heard it argued many times that morality is exclusively based on religion, but this is simply not the case and I beg you not to waste my time with such an argument.

3) Therefore the selection of any legal framework is subjective and discriminatory.

Subjective, yes, but not necessarily discriminatory: not if the legal framework in question is not based on religious belief, and does not lend special value to religious practices over other ones. Under such a system (which, for the most part, we have), some religions might feel discriminated against, because there will be some laws that exist for purely social reasons that will infringe on the practicing of certain belief systems. For instance, a cult that practices brainwashing followed by suicide will not be tolerated under such a legal framework. But you can hardly call this discriminatory. Of course we cannot grant exemptions from the law for every belief system. Instead, we must not grant exemptions for any belief system, but only legislate morality when there are compelling social reasons in evidence.

“””guaranteed our right to worship whatever god we want to, many gods, or none at all, “””

This is interesting. I’d like to see a document from one of the founders that actually says this, because to date all I’ve actually seen is their reference to various denominations (”religions”) of the christian religion, and have never seen a reference to polytheism, atheism, etc.

In fact you are correct, Matthew. There is no mention of atheism in any documents from the founders, however you should note that the word was not ‘in vogue’ at the time as it is now. ‘Atheist’ was almost never used by those we would now consider atheists to describe themselves; it was only used a derogatory term used by religious leaders, and often used against those whom we would not now call atheists.

Deism, which was in intellectual circles at the time the equivalent of atheism today, is also not found in official documents. However, it is found in much of the personal correspondence of many of the founders. You are certainly aware of Jefferson and Madison’s deism, but perhaps less well known as deists are Ethan Allen, Thomas Paine, Washington (he never alluded to it during his life, but afterwards several close friends, including the minister at his church, attested that he was in fact a deist), and Franklin.

But times have changed. We now have substantial populations of non-Christian citizens in the United States. Jews, Muslims, polytheists of various stripes, and even atheists. Would you seriously advocate a rule of Christian law merely because Christians possess a simple majority? Would you have us take on the characteristics of, say, Iran?

Matthew, you said:
“There is no objectivity with respect to non-physical laws.”

I disagree. Once we define morality, we can be moral realists. Let’s say it’s “concern over the effects of one’s actions/inactions on the experiences of other conscious beings.” That means we can objectively talk about morality, using questions and answers about happiness and suffering to make moral decisions. A system like utilitarianism (see some good essays on utilitarian.net), which values objective effects on the universe (these objective effects are subjective experiences occurring in minds, like pleasure and pain) rather than more subjective goals based on rules or perceived duties. It focuses on the most happiness for the most people, while judging acts based on their effects on individuals and their desires, which universally are happiness and the avoidance of suffering. The most famous utilitarian ethical philosopher today is Peter Singer, who says (note that this is an objective standard):

Actions are moral if they increase pleasure and happiness while reducing pain and suffering.

Here is a great blog article discussing the moral bias that utilitarianism tires to fight against: http://www.overcomingbias.com/2006/12/philosophers_on.html

George,

“”"There are other beliefs than religious ones that can dictate the structure and content of a legal framework. Still subjective, though.”"”

I suppose you could say not all subjective beliefs are religious, but that’s basically semantics (any subjective belief is characterized by faith, or else it is not subjective).

“”"In fact you are correct, Matthew.”"”

I never thought I would hear those words from you.
My point, of course, is that 18th the century connotation of the word “religion” was entirely different than what it is understood today to be.

“”"But times have changed. We now have substantial populations of non-Christian citizens in the United States… Would you have us take on the characteristics of, say, Iran?”"”

Prescriptive governmental philosophy is very difficult, because of the spaucity of models we have to glean from. We have examples of relatively mono-ethnic theocracies (i.e. the post-conquest Hebrew nation of the old test), but the New Testament branching multi-ethnic body is then set in a Roman system with no indication of a necessary return to such a theocracy.

Because of the NT account, I do not believe in a return to OT theocracy. I also do not believe that it is the church’s job to legislate morality of those outside the church.

However, we do have a government that allows much greater participation for citizens than when Paul was writing his letters, so I do think Christians should be involved with government. This will inevitably involve a law framework that is subjective, which in this case will be based on the moral system of the Bible.

Your question regarding majority/minority enforcement is entirely beside the point - that many belief systems are contradictory, and thus not compatible at all.

Cheers,
Matthew

Ubuntu,

“”"I disagree. Once we define morality, we can be moral realists.”"”

So what are you disagreeing about? As soon as you concede that morality must be defined, you have lost objectivity.

Utilitarianism is a subjective belief system that places “moral value” on physical gratification. It is entirely non-unique and non-objective.

-Matthew

However, we do have a government that allows much greater participation for citizens than when Paul was writing his letters, so I do think Christians should be involved with government. This will inevitably involve a law framework that is subjective, which in this case will be based on the moral system of the Bible.

Of course Christians should be involved with government. As should Muslims, Jews, and atheists. And all of them have the right to argue for legislation and policies based on their beliefs, including religious ones. However, it will then be up to the courts to strike down any legislation that is based solely on religious belief without any societal reasons.

The problem is that theists will then dress their religiously motivated complaints in social language. ‘Gay marriage is a detriment to society,’ for instance. Or, ‘not teaching the Bible in schools is a detriment to society because that is the only way for children to learn morals’. So we will have to be very vigilant for these arguments.

Dembski actually discusses this, though in a different context, in The Design Inference: essentially, religious motivation is different from religious purpose. Anti-gay-marriage legislation is entirely the latter. It is dressed up in the language of societal purpose, but it is clearly intended to serve an entirely religious purpose. A more gray-area example would be abortion. Many on the left would argue that anti-abortion activism is both religious motivated and for a purely religious purpose, but I would disagree. I see a clearly negative societal effect springing from abortion (though in many cases a specific positive effect can outweigh the general negativity of abortion).

But I don’t see how “in this case will be based on the moral system of the Bible” follows. We of course cannot agree on any moral system which will cater to the specifics of every person’s religion. What we can do is avoid outlawing anything for purely religious purpose. Laws formulated to prevent secular evils may infringe on the practices of various religious sects, but that can’t be the concern of our legal system.

George,

I’m not able to address any of the content of your vacuous response so long as you continue to pretend that “social evils” are somehow objectively defined.

When you find a way to use math and maybe physics to define morality and social justice, then we can discuss how this compares to Christian/Jewish/Islamic/Atheistic values.