This thread is the book discussion first proposed here. Anybody may join in, provided that they've read the book. The full text of the book can be found here.
I found the book unconvincing but nonetheless well worth reading. The author deserves praise for his writings in support of independence for the colonies. Likewise several of the founding fathers, including Thomas Jefferson, expressed similar ideas during their lifetimes. One can admire their political contributions while still pointing out the failures of their religious views.
Paine believed in one God. He did not believe in Jesus Christ as God nor in any other religion, but instead preached what we'd call deism. He asserted that the true God was known through the majesty of nature alone and not through any separate revelation of communication to humanity. He says:
Of course Paine never does stay focused on his new religion for very long, but instead keeps wandering back to the topic of all the things that are wrong with Christianity. In outline Paine's beliefs regarding the life of Jesus would be this: that Jesus "Jesus Christ founded no new [religious] system. He called men to the practice of moral virtues and the belief of one God. The great trait in his character is philanthropy." In Paine's view, then, all that the gospels record Jesus saying about religion and all stories involving miracles were added later and are not genuine. In sections 2 and 3, Paine claims that parts of the gospel were copied from Pagan mythology. Today, no scholar of the Bible or early Christian history believes that Paine's record of gospel origins is correct, regardless of religious outlook.
I found the book unconvincing but nonetheless well worth reading. The author deserves praise for his writings in support of independence for the colonies. Likewise several of the founding fathers, including Thomas Jefferson, expressed similar ideas during their lifetimes. One can admire their political contributions while still pointing out the failures of their religious views.
Paine believed in one God. He did not believe in Jesus Christ as God nor in any other religion, but instead preached what we'd call deism. He asserted that the true God was known through the majesty of nature alone and not through any separate revelation of communication to humanity. He says:
It is only in the CREATION that all our ideas and conceptions of a word of God can unite. The Creation speaketh an universal language, independently of human speech or human language, multiplied and various as they may be. It is an ever-existing original, which every man can read. It cannot be forged; it cannot be counterfeited; it cannot be lost; it cannot be altered; it cannot be suppressed. It does not depend upon the will of man whether it shall be published or not; it publishes itself from one end of the earth to the other. It preaches to all nations and to all worlds; and this word of God reveals to man all that is necessary for man to know of God.
Do we want to contemplate his power? We see it in the immensity of the Creation. Do we want to contemplate his wisdom? We see it in the unchangeable order by which the incomprehensible whole is governed! Do we want to contemplate his munificence? We see it in the abundance with which he fills the earth. Do we want to contemplate his mercy? We see it in his not withholding that abundance even from the unthankful. In fine, do we want to know what God is? Search not the book called the Scripture, which any human hand might make, but the Scripture called the Creation.
Such thinking hasn't exactly taken the world by storm. Atheists and agnostics today rail against this type of stuff, calling it creationism and intelligent design and dismissing it. Even among the religious there are few who'd hold to the ideas Paine put forward. It called to my mind the words of Chesterton:Do we want to contemplate his power? We see it in the immensity of the Creation. Do we want to contemplate his wisdom? We see it in the unchangeable order by which the incomprehensible whole is governed! Do we want to contemplate his munificence? We see it in the abundance with which he fills the earth. Do we want to contemplate his mercy? We see it in his not withholding that abundance even from the unthankful. In fine, do we want to know what God is? Search not the book called the Scripture, which any human hand might make, but the Scripture called the Creation.
That rather pleasant and even exciting cry that has been occasionally raised in recent years has been raised once again, the announcement of the New Religion. My criticism of that otherwise admirable diversion has always been, roughly speaking, a complaint that the New Religion was announced as appearing and never appeared.
Paine predicted in the first section that once the beneficiaries of the various revolutions were free to practice the religion of their choice, they'd reject Christianity and switch to his type of deism. The reverse happened, at least in the America. A generation after his time, de Tocqueville noted that the American people were far more dedicated to Christianity than Europeans. (In the French Revolution things went a bit differently.)
Of course Paine never does stay focused on his new religion for very long, but instead keeps wandering back to the topic of all the things that are wrong with Christianity. In outline Paine's beliefs regarding the life of Jesus would be this: that Jesus "Jesus Christ founded no new [religious] system. He called men to the practice of moral virtues and the belief of one God. The great trait in his character is philanthropy." In Paine's view, then, all that the gospels record Jesus saying about religion and all stories involving miracles were added later and are not genuine. In sections 2 and 3, Paine claims that parts of the gospel were copied from Pagan mythology. Today, no scholar of the Bible or early Christian history believes that Paine's record of gospel origins is correct, regardless of religious outlook.