C
Charlemagne_II
Guest
I have heard arguments that he did believe and arguments that he did not.
What say you?
What say you?
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T
tonyrey
Guest
"But the challenges of a presidency, the angst of the Civil War and the 1862 death of his 11-year-old son would push Lincoln to consider God in ways he never had before, said White, who added that religion is something most Lincoln biographers have skimmed over.
Lincoln’s second inaugural address points to his eventual embrace of religion in midlife, White said. The speech, which was just 701 words long, mentions God 14 times and quotes the Bible four times, with two references to the Old Testament and two to the New Testament. In comparison, there were zero biblical references in his first inaugural and just one Bible quote in all previous inaugural addresses combined.
After his son’s death, Lincoln also developed a strong relationship with a Presbyterian minister named Phineas Densmore Gurley. And after his own death in 1865, Lincoln’s secretary John Hay found an untitled and undated document in Lincoln’s desk that both questioned God’s presence in the midst of the Civil War and offered affirmation that God was somehow a silent actor in the war. Hay called it: Meditation on the Divine Will."
http://news.discovery.com/history/president-abraham-lincoln-religion-god-110415.html
Lincoln’s second inaugural address points to his eventual embrace of religion in midlife, White said. The speech, which was just 701 words long, mentions God 14 times and quotes the Bible four times, with two references to the Old Testament and two to the New Testament. In comparison, there were zero biblical references in his first inaugural and just one Bible quote in all previous inaugural addresses combined.
After his son’s death, Lincoln also developed a strong relationship with a Presbyterian minister named Phineas Densmore Gurley. And after his own death in 1865, Lincoln’s secretary John Hay found an untitled and undated document in Lincoln’s desk that both questioned God’s presence in the midst of the Civil War and offered affirmation that God was somehow a silent actor in the war. Hay called it: Meditation on the Divine Will."
http://news.discovery.com/history/president-abraham-lincoln-religion-god-110415.html
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ASimon
Guest
He may have believed at one point. He might also have been a politician who saw political capital in appearing to be a Believer.I have heard arguments that he did believe and arguments that he did not.
What say you?
I would think it’d be essentially impossible to know for sure. I think Obama is, for all intents and purposes, an atheist, this despite his occasional references to God in his speeches. He might also be a very soft Christan, or even a deist. The point is, he’s President now, and not 150 years ago, and we still can’t be totally sure where he comes down on this question. So anyone who tries to claim certain knowledge on this question for Lincoln is likely fooling themselves.
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tonyrey
Guest
That view conflicts with the fact that he was a man with moral integrity…
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ASimon
Guest
We have no idea to what extent he was a man of moral integrity. That he turned out to be a fairly strong opponent of slavery says nothing about whether he’d be capable of lying about his faith to gain political advantage.
My point is that we don’t know. Lincoln gets the benefit of history’s doubt by having been President 150 years ago, and then being assassinated.
If it helps, I can totally buy the idea that he embraced Faith as a response to dealing with various hardships and tragedies in this life. Many people do. As do many people who gravitate toward religion just because they get older.
C
Charlemagne_II
Guest
tonyrey
That view conflicts with the fact that he was a man with moral integrity…
Right, and he was never a mind to shy from telling it the way it is.
In the middle of the Civil War he made Thanksgiving Day an official holiday. To whom can anyone be thankful if not God. Here is the proclamation. Does he sound like an atheist or a theist? Should it be answered that he is just culling public favor?
*A Proclamation.
The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consiousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.
By the President: Abraham Lincoln
William H. Seward,
Secretary of State
*
More to the point, is there anywhere in Lincoln’s writing (public or private) where he comes across as a man without a God?
That view conflicts with the fact that he was a man with moral integrity…
Right, and he was never a mind to shy from telling it the way it is.
In the middle of the Civil War he made Thanksgiving Day an official holiday. To whom can anyone be thankful if not God. Here is the proclamation. Does he sound like an atheist or a theist? Should it be answered that he is just culling public favor?
*A Proclamation.
The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consiousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.
By the President: Abraham Lincoln
William H. Seward,
Secretary of State
*
More to the point, is there anywhere in Lincoln’s writing (public or private) where he comes across as a man without a God?
C
Charlemagne_II
Guest
ASimon
**If it helps, I can totally buy the idea that he embraced Faith as a response to dealing with various hardships and tragedies in this life. Many people do. As do many people who gravitate toward religion just because they get older. **
I take it you are not here disparaging the judgment of people who suffer hardship and enter old age.
One could, of course, also suggest that atheists become atheists in their youth just because they are too young to have thought things through?
**If it helps, I can totally buy the idea that he embraced Faith as a response to dealing with various hardships and tragedies in this life. Many people do. As do many people who gravitate toward religion just because they get older. **
I take it you are not here disparaging the judgment of people who suffer hardship and enter old age.
One could, of course, also suggest that atheists become atheists in their youth just because they are too young to have thought things through?
A
ASimon
Guest
Generally less likely, at least in America. Maybe in Scandinavia, where the youth are far less exposed to religion.ASimon
One could, of course, also suggest that atheists become atheists in their youth just because they are too young to have thought things through?
C
Charlemagne_II
Guest
ASimon
**Generally less likely, at least in America. Maybe in Scandinavia, where the youth are far less exposed to religion. **
Yes, it is virtually dead there. I have been to Stockholm several times. That is a city where nobody ever holds a door open for you as a Christian courtesy.
I am still reading Peter Hitchens’ book, The Rage against God. At the age of fifteen he became a rabid atheist. By the age of thirty he realized how simply arrogant and naive he had been at fifteen. He hadn’t thought things through until, as a news reporter, he had seen some of life in the countries without Christianity … especially in Russia…
**Generally less likely, at least in America. Maybe in Scandinavia, where the youth are far less exposed to religion. **
Yes, it is virtually dead there. I have been to Stockholm several times. That is a city where nobody ever holds a door open for you as a Christian courtesy.
I am still reading Peter Hitchens’ book, The Rage against God. At the age of fifteen he became a rabid atheist. By the age of thirty he realized how simply arrogant and naive he had been at fifteen. He hadn’t thought things through until, as a news reporter, he had seen some of life in the countries without Christianity … especially in Russia…
C
Charlemagne_II
Guest
In a lecture delivered 15 years after Mr. Lincoln’s death, Joshua F. Speed recalled a visit to President Lincoln at the Soldiers’ Home: “As I entered the room, near night, he was sitting near a window intently reading his Bible. Approaching him I said: “I am glad to see you so profitably engaged.’ ‘Yes,’ said he, “I am profitably engaged.’ ‘Well,’ said I, ‘if you have recovered from your skepticism, I am sorry to say that I have not.’ Looking me earnestly in the face and placing his hand on my shoulder, he said: ‘You are wrong, Speed. Take all of this book upon reason that you can and the balance on faith, and you will live and die a happier and better man.’” Lincoln scholar Wayne Temple wrote: “Lincoln had greatly modified his religious beliefs since Speed at Springfield in 1841. It appears, the longer Lincoln lived, the closer he felt to God and the more he relied upon God for sustenance.’”
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