Multiculturalism, America, and the Jefferson Bible Myth
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Vivek Ramaswamy recently made an interesting point.
During a Question and Answer session last week, the new sweetheart of the conservative movement was confronted with a very important question – one that all conservatives must ask, and answer correctly, if they want to pull their nation back from the catastrophe the secular liberal order created.
In Ramaswamy's Q&A, a question came up about religious liberty attorney Harmeet Dhillon's chant during the Republican National Convention (which credited the Sikh deity Waheguru with America's founding), as well as her comments afterward, which, some have inferred, suggested her support for the GOP rests greatly on the ability of Hindus to push their faith in the American public square.
The question posed to Ramaswamy, a practicing Hindu, was over his use of "God" when speaking to predominantly Christian America; specifically, the questioner asked to whom Ramaswamy is referring whenever he uses the term. Does "God" refer to Waheguru or some other Eastern deity? Or does it refer to the God of Christianity, the faith upon which America was founded?
As The Times of India put it, "The supporter expressed concerns that Ramaswamy's omission of specifying the God he referred to throughout his lecture could mislead the predominantly Christian audience into thinking he was talking about Jesus Christ."
To his credit, Ramaswamy responded cleverly. "The question of whether or not somebody of a non-Christian faith can embody and lead the United States of America at a meaningful level is an open question," he said. "Thomas Jefferson is on the other side of the question from you. Thomas Jefferson was not a traditional Christian. Do you know what the Jefferson Bible is?"
The questioner replied by saying he believed Jefferson was "an enemy of Christianity." Again, to his credit, Ramaswamy countered skillfully:
"If you believe that Thomas Jefferson, as a Deist, would've been unqualified to be US president, then I guess you and I see the future of the United States of America differently," he said.
"It so happens that he was the person who signed this document called the Declaration of Independence, which is the greatest mission statement known to a country in the history of mankind," Ramaswamy continued. "So if you view him as some kind of deviant who should've never been in the US presidency that's a permissible point of view. It's just not one that I share ... my view is very similar to that of Thomas Jefferson ... it's the commitment to the Constitution that matters whether or not you'll lead the country."
This keen response reaffirmed that Ramaswamy is a master of debate. But for those who know the history of the United States and the views of its founders (their actual views, not the twisted versions put forth to popularize the idea of secular, multicultural America), it is much easier to see the errors in his response – errors that all Americans must explore and answer.
Ramaswamy's use of Jefferson as an example of a non-Christian leading the nation is an error on two fronts.
Firstly, there is a false conclusion pulled from the premise that because Jefferson was not a traditional Christian (let's presume for a moment that this is true) when founding the nation, a person of any religion should be able to be just as American as Jefferson. On another level, the argument is: Jefferson, a non-Christian, was president and wrote the Constitution; therefore I, a non-Christian, should be able to be president as well, as long as I believe in that Constitution.
The conclusion, of course, does not logically follow from the premise. Hinduism, its beliefs, and the culture it created are far from the same thing as 18th century Deism; which grew out of an attempt to create a "rational" Christianity, but was fully culturally Christian nonetheless. Claiming that one of the Founding Fathers was a Deist and therefore anyone of any religion is just as qualified to lead that nation, is an inductive fallacy in the same way that saying Shia Islam is slightly different than Sunni, and therefore, it is interchangeable with any other religion.
The equivalence falls apart even further when you dig deeper into Jefferson's Bible and the ... let's just say, highly-misleading story of his beliefs – a narrative popularized in an America desperate to prove that it was not, in fact, foolish to bet Jefferson's nation on the roll of the dice that is the multicultural experiment.
The idea of the "Jefferson Bible," the one in which he removed all elements of the miraculous and Christ's divinity, is a complete myth. It never happened!
Jefferson compiled two religious works; one in 1804 and the second in 1820. Neither was a Bible.
As David Barton points out in his book The Jefferson Lies, America's third president was an active member of the Virginia Bible Society, an organization that distributed the full, unedited text of the Bible. In 1798, Jefferson personally financed the printing of one of America's groundbreaking editions of the Bible. He also owned many complete Bibles.
Of his two religious works, the first (1804) was inspired by a sermon suggesting the best way to share Christianity with Native Americans was to produce a simple abridged version of the four Gospels.
This work, titled The Philosophy of Jesus of Nazareth, being Extracted from the Account of His Life and Doctrines Given by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, was drawn solely from the Gospels, and was an abridgement of the major doctrines of Christianity designed to promote the faith to heathen tribes.
Over many years, Jefferson repeatedly demonstrated his interest in bringing Christianity to the Native Americans; for example, he signed a treaty and a federal act for propagating the Gospel among them.
His second work (1820) was titled The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth. It was Jefferson's attempt at a solution to morality; its sole purpose was to collect and present the key moral teachings of Christ in one short collection.
Jefferson read the teachings of over thirty philosophers, and after doing so, found that those of Jesus were the best. He compiled 50 of Christ's moral teachings into one book – a work, Barton points out, that is filled with accounts of the miracles of Jesus.
Jefferson was far from the anti-Christian Deist that many today present him as. One of the best representations of Jefferson's beliefs comes from the writings of his grandson, Thomas Jefferson Randolph, who was 34 when Thomas Jefferson died.
"His moral character was of the highest order," Randolph writes, "founded upon the purest and sternest models of antiquity, softened, chastened and developed by the influences of the all-pervading benevolence of the doctrines of Christ – which he had intensely and admiringly studied."
"As a proof of this," Randolph continues, "he left two codifications of the morals of Jesus – one for himself, and another for the Indians; the first of which I now possess: a blank volume, red morocco, gilt, lettered on the back 'The Morals of Jesus' – into which he pasted extracts in Greek, Latin, French and English, taken textually from the four Gospels, and so arranged that he could run his eye over the readings of the same verse in four languages."
"In his contemplative moments, his mind turned to religion, which he studied thoroughly. He had seen and read much of the abuses and perversions of Christianity; he abhorred those abuses and their authors, and denounced them without reserve. [Yet] He was regular in his attendance on church, taking his prayerbook with him. He drew the plan of the Episcopal Church in Charlottesville – was one of the largest contributors to its erection, and contributed regularly to the support of its minister. I paid, after his death, his subscription of $200 to the erection of the Presbyterian church in the same village."
Randolph then reminisces, "A gentleman of some distinction calling on him, and expressing his disbelief in the truths of the Bible, his reply was, 'Then, sir, you have studied it to little purpose.'"
The pious man, who studied Christianity in his "contemplative moments"; the man who built churches and paid for them out-of-pocket; the man who abhorred perversions of Christianity and regularly attended church; the man who wrote two books on Christ, one for the conversion of the Indians and the other for his own edification; the man steeped in the depths of Western culture – far from being an example of the interchangeability of the Idea of America with any and all faiths or cultures, shows us exactly what rich tradition filled the mind of even the "least Christian" of the Founding Fathers.
The Constitution, the document Ramaswamy called the "greatest mission statement known to a country in the history of mankind," came out of only one specific culture, faith and tradition for a reason, and was written for the "posterity" (the children) of those who founded the nation.
This of course doesn't mean others cannot agree with it and even believe in it and uphold that legacy, as I believe Ramaswamy likely does. But it is important to understand the true source of a great thing, and to recognize that while people can convert to that great thing, this is not the same as claiming all cultures and religions are interchangeable at scale with it.
Jefferson himself, like most (if not all) of the Founding Fathers, knew America could not be multicultural. This knowledge was the driving force behind his push for federal efforts to Westernize and Christianize the native tribes. Because wise men understand that unity brings strength, whereas numerous disconnected and diverse peoples competing against each other within a nation will only ever bring destruction.
Arthur is a former editor and consultant. Born in India to missionary parents, he spent his early career working in development for NGOs in Asia, Central America, and Africa.
Arthur has an educational background in history and psychology, with certifications from the University of Oxford and Leiden in the economics, politics, and ethics of mass migration and comparative theories in terrorism and counterterrorism. He is currently launching CivWest, a company focused on building capital to fund restorative projects and create resilient systems across the Western world.
Brilliant words; and thank you once again.