Texas Board of Education and the Re-writing of American History

**Potemkine** · 02-17-10, 01:31 AM

Originally Posted by flame

Most of the arguments you present are against religion, namely forced state religion. Belief in God and respecting his authority is totally different.
To say their beliefs did not play a role is hard to believe. The biggest problem was organized religion had a bunch of man made garbage force fed in with it. They were against organized religion, and they believed in a supreme being. In which they believed authority to govern came from.

I dont really care what religion(or set of rules) you decide to follow. You will be a better person for it. Will it 'get you to heaven?' No

The point is these people had a strong moral fiber because of their "beliefs" and they used history as a guide to form a nation that was fair. Unlike the monarchy in Europe. They believed that God did not make kings kings, that we are created equal. There is a lot to it. To say a christian nation may not be the entire truth, but we were created a godly nation.

If by God, you mean the abstract, clock maker type God of Deism, then I would agree. I still contend that it was more history and ideological thought rather than religious based, and a solid understanding of Locke strengthens the argument.

**CivilWars** · 02-17-10, 01:34 AM

Originally Posted by CivilWars

wall of text hits civilwars for 43,384 damage. civilwars isno more.

**Cainun** · 02-17-10, 01:34 AM

Originally Posted by CivilWars

wall of text hits civilwars for 43,384 damage. civilwars isno more.

That isn't a wall of text. You fail Civil.

**CivilWars** · 02-17-10, 01:38 AM

Reply #98 is a mouthful.

**Watsyurdeal?** · 02-17-10, 01:42 AM

Ok, two things

1. Why are there so many religious threads lately

2. Who the fuck do Christians think they are? THIS IS NOT YOUR COUNTRY! It's the land of the free, not land of the Jesus freaks. And in case they forgot, we have over 10 different religions in this state alone. So this is a fail, epic fucking fail on so many levels.

EDIT: Pic removed, sorry if I offended anyone with it. But to make this simple, Christianity is not the only religion and it is not the law. So stop it with this "we are right, you are wrong" crap, you don't know any more than we do. For all we know, we could be a live tv show.

**Cainun** · 02-17-10, 01:47 AM

Originally Posted by Watsyurdeal?

Ok, two things

1. Why are there so many religious threads lately

2. Who the fuck do Christians think they are? THIS IS NOT YOUR COUNTRY! It's the land of the free, not land of the Jesus freaks. And in case they forgot, we have over 10 different religions in this state alone. So this is a fail, epic fucking fail on so many levels.

And with that, I have just one more thing to say about Christianity.

Thats a bit too much Whatsyur...

**Watsyurdeal?** · 02-17-10, 01:55 AM

pic removed

**Pint** · 02-17-10, 07:36 AM

Originally Posted by SmokenSherriff_

Here we go...

First of all your interpretation of my statement about the bible being the basis for ideas, values, beliefs is false. It is the character of God and his attributes that form the basis and ideas for people to live in harmony and flourish, or as I called it "nation building". Where are these ideas and laws found collectively ? The Bible. You wanted to toss out all the governments that existed prior to the Holy Bible and while they do date the Bible, they do not date God. Bible is nothing, for it is just a compilation of Gods teachings and men's testimonies of his existence.

First of all leave out the personal commentary, "Very silly idea", only weak people cant refrain from adding some level of emotion to cloud and slant peoples opinion for their viewpoint. No place for two people attempting to support what they believe. Not a popularity contest.

I very much do not want this to turn into a debate about the existence of god. Simply because that is not the premise per-say. Also the burden of proof is on you since your stating your opinions as facts, and that is what I am doing pointing out the weakness in your argument with your own argument. Someone else posted what model our country is based from (that was a good post btw), but I personally do not think your argument deserves that type of counter-point yet. I have never raped a woman, I have never wished to own a slave, I have never done violence to someone who did not pose a threat to myself or someone with out the ability to defend themselves, I am not religious in any sense of the word. Where did I get this seemingly innate sense of right and wrong? I have read the bible, I have a grandfather who is devote, is that why I am the way I am? My grandfather says the same thing, the bible taught him right and wrong, I believe him, mostly. It also taught him to hate gays, to think poorly of Jews since they rejected Jesus. Hes in his 80's, and to this day I know exactly what would happen in this hypothetical situation:

My grandfather is walking through a supermarket parking lot and comes across a man obviously trying to beat a woman to death with his bare hands, the man is dressed oddly and the woman has a shirt on that says "Gay+Jewish=Happiness", my grandfather would completely disregard his own safety and how his age would affect his ability to act. Even when he pulls the assaulter away and sees hes a priest, that priest would either defend himself or get his ass beat by a rickety Korean war vet . His absolute sense of ethical behavior and morality would not allow him any other action. "Women before men, children above all" is an instinctual belief of good men unless given divine permission to ignore. In short, good people will normally do good things, but in order to have a good person do bad things you need religion.(that statement that is not mine, but I can't remember who said it, might of been Voltair now that I think on it)

You make an assumption here and state it as though its fact:"the old testament (law) is no where near what any of our laws are based off ".
The old testament is filled with the idea of "loving your neighbor as yourself". This is the central idea to the flourishing of our country.........

Moses, Eleazar the priest, and all the leaders of the people went to meet them outside the camp. But Moses was furious with all the military commanders who had returned from the battle. "Why have you let all the women live?" he demanded. "These are the very ones who followed Balaam's advice and caused the people of Israel to rebel against the LORD at Mount Peor. They are the ones who caused the plague to strike the LORD's people. Now kill all the boys and all the women who have slept with a man. Only the young girls who are virgins may live; you may keep them for yourselves.

As you approach a town to attack it, first offer its people terms for peace. If they accept your terms and open the gates to you, then all the people inside will serve you in forced labor. But if they refuse to make peace and prepare to fight, you must attack the town. When the LORD your God hands it over to you, kill every man in the town. But you may keep for yourselves all the women, children, livestock, and other plunder. You may enjoy the spoils of your enemies that the LORD your God has given you.

If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father. Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her.

Rape victims forced to marry their attacker? Makes me fucking want to vomit. That's gods law.

If within the city a man comes upon a maiden who is betrothed, and has relations with her, you shall bring them both out of the gate of the city and there stone them to death: the girl because she did not cry out for help though she was in the city, and the man because he violated his neighbors wife.

Anyone arrogant enough to reject the verdict of the judge or of the priest who represents the LORD your God must be put to death. Such evil must be purged from Israel. (Deuteronomy 17:12 NLT)

If a man lies with a male as with a women, both of them shall be put to death for their abominable deed; they have forfeited their lives." (Leviticus 20:13 NAB)

If even then you remain hostile toward me and refuse to obey, I will inflict you with seven more disasters for your sins. I will release wild animals that will kill your children and destroy your cattle, so your numbers will dwindle and your roads will be deserted. (Leviticus 26:21-22 NLT)

Cursed be he who does the Lords work remissly, cursed he who holds back his sword from blood. (Jeremiah 48:10 NAB)

If you buy a Hebrew slave, he is to serve for only six years. Set him free in the seventh year, and he will owe you nothing for his freedom. If he was single when he became your slave and then married afterward, only he will go free in the seventh year. But if he was married before he became a slave, then his wife will be freed with him. If his master gave him a wife while he was a slave, and they had sons or daughters, then the man will be free in the seventh year, but his wife and children will still belong to his master. But the slave may plainly declare, 'I love my master, my wife, and my children. I would rather not go free.' If he does this, his master must present him before God. Then his master must take him to the door and publicly pierce his ear with an awl. After that, the slave will belong to his master forever. (Exodus 21:2-6 NLT)

I'm getting bored doing cut and paste from the bible. It also makes me feel ill reading this stuff, more so since people read it and still manage to blow sunshine and rainbows out about the virtue it supposedly has. God's character gets you in prison or beaten to death on the street by someone like me, or smokin, or any one of us. You wouldn't even think twice on it, if the USA was around back then me and my friends would be driving all over "Christian" nations killing people with prejudice and the American people would be behind us 100% Americans would wave banners for us when we got back to the states telling us what a good job we did, "Gave those dirty Christians what for!" "American soldiers kill bad guys dead" "Hang Moses high!" "Down with Abraham", I wish it was the case being a war vet from killing these people would get me free beers for life.

We have a good country despite our Christian origins, not because of them.

More examples of their belief in God and his teachings being the only foundation that the way our nation was founded could work and vice versa. It is a road map to nation building but cant be used by non believers. It just wont work.

Check out the demographic on religion for Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Japan and about 10 others. Then check out their crime rates, the % of population in prison, the quality of education. Even if your right Smokin and we owe everything to God and the bible....Wait for it......Here it comes.....We are better off ignoring that, burying it as deep as we can get it and never ever looking at that fact again. We are incredibly lucky that you are not right.

AMS

**~~hawgballs~~** · 02-17-10, 09:12 AM

Originally Posted by flame

Most of the arguments you present are against religion, namely forced state religion. Belief in God and respecting his authority is totally different.
To say their beliefs did not play a role is hard to believe. The biggest problem was organized religion had a bunch of man made garbage force fed in with it. They were against organized religion, and they believed in a supreme being. In which they believed authority to govern came from.

I dont really care what religion(or set of rules) you decide to follow. You will be a better person for it. Will it 'get you to heaven?' No

The point is these people had a strong moral fiber because of their "beliefs" and they used history as a guide to form a nation that was fair. Unlike the monarchy in Europe. They believed that God did not make kings kings, that we are created equal. There is a lot to it. To say a christian nation may not be the entire truth, but we were created a godly nation.

Because most of the founding fathers might have thought that thre was some sort of higher power does not mean, by default, that they built a "godly nation", whatever that means.

**Negotiator** · 02-20-10, 12:00 PM

I was linked to this thread. I guess I find it interesting, but most of it is just lots of people posting mountains of evidence to support their worldview. I will try to keep my post simple.

One: I think it is obvious that our country has been influenced by a belief in God.

Two: It is obvious that our country has been influenced by Christianity.

Therefore it makes sense that this be discussed in our history books. Now, I think Christians should be careful when the cross and the flag start holding hands. This is not at ALL what Jesus' ministry was about. In fact, it was quite the opposite.

Now, just some other questions I'd like to throw out there.

Do you think that if our country was rid of all Christians and Christianity we would be a more morally guided country or less?

Do you think that it is or is not important for a country to be morally guided?

If there were no churches in America, would the poor and sick be helped more or less?

You can probably tell which worldview I am coming from, but I think these are important questions to ask.