I live in Georgia’s newest city, which actually won’t be a city for a couple of months yet. But we have to get organized, and so we have to elect a mayor and city council to get the city up and running. Last evening I attended a forum for city council candidates in my district. Much of the conversation focused quite appropriately on the bread and butter of local governance–police services, planning and zoning, parks and recreation, all in the context of promises of good stewardship and fiscal responsibility. The candidates are all thoughtful, decent people, deeply involved in the affairs of the community, coaching youth sports, working on PTAs, serving on the boards of homeowners’ associations, and active in their churches. The audience consisted largely of people like them, willing to spend a couple of hours to hear out the candidates who aspire to be their public servants.
Oddly enough, however, the question (and answers) that got the biggest rise out of the audience was one that was at best peripheral to our most pressing concerns. Someone asked how the candidates would respond to an effort to post the Ten Commandments on the walls of our as yet non-existent City Hall. All four candidates said that they would resist such an effort, citing in more or less articulate ways concerns about the establishment of religion and sensitivity to the diversity of our community. Those responses elicited the only spontaneous applause of the evening.
Perhaps I’ve been blissfully unaware of the hordes of Bible-toting (or rather tablet-toting) theocrats just raring to invade and transform our little slice of, er, heaven. But my neighbors surely think it’s important for our elected officials to stand against them. This is symbolic politics at its best (or worst).
Had there been the opportunity for impromptu statements from the floor (I’m really glad there wasn’t), I might have explained to my neighbors that the issue was a lot more complicated than they (or the candidates) imagined. I would have cited the relevant Supreme Court decisions, which leave open the possibility that there is no First Amendment objection to posting the Ten Commandments, properly contextualized, on the wall of a public building, especially if the exhibit is donated by private citizens. (I would for the moment set aside my reservations about the contortions required by our current First Amendment jurisprudence.) And I would have wondered about the irony of their objections, given the fact that our meeting was taking place in a church sanctuary–the largest readily available meeting space in the neighborhood–whose appearance had in no way been altered to accommodate this particular event. If they were so worried about sending a message of exclusion, why meet here?
As I said, the question and the answers were all about symbolism. “We” are sensitive and tolerant, scrupulous about not marginalizing anyone. Except for those bigoted Bible-tumpers who live and worship somewhere else. I’ve got news for them: We’re your neighbors too. And our new city bucket list really isn’t any different from yours. What a “revelation” that would be.
October 16th, 2012 | 9:59 am
I might have explained to my neighbors that the issue was a lot more complicated than they (or the candidates) imagined.
I don’t understand your point. Were the candidates and your neighbors wrong? Are we to admire whomever brought up the issue of posting the Ten Commandments on the walls of city hall? Were you the only one there—as your quote implies—who really understood the issue?
I would think even the most ardent advocates of religion in the public square would be, by now, weary of pointless battles to post the Ten Commandments in public places. I would prefer to avoid the words “bigoted Bible thumpers,” but it seems to me insisting on posting of Ten Commandments in public places is the activity of either those who want to demagogue church-state issues or of those who defiantly want to assert that this is too a Christian nation and Jews, Muslims, and atheists should just get over it.
October 16th, 2012 | 10:21 am
And that by itself should instantly alleviate “concerns about the establishment of religion and sensitivity to the diversity of our community”?
If it was in fact “the largest readily available meeting space in the neighborhood” then they may have simply been being practical. Apparently a non-sectarian City Hall building is planned, no?
October 16th, 2012 | 10:48 am
As a matter of constitutional law, they were wrong, or perhaps misled. But that’s not so much the point as that, so far as I can tell, posting the Ten Commandments (within or without the confines of our current constitutional jurisprudence) is a non-issue on the part of those (like me) who embrace the role of religion in the public square. I don’t mean a non-issue in general, but rather (in particular) a non-issue in the run-up to the establishment of our new city.
Those who raise it are conjuring up a bogeyman, or rather defining an “other” against which “we” can define ourselves. This salvo in the culture wars was fired by those who allegedly want the conflicts to end.
As for your second point, our American heritage has a substantial Christian element, not nearly as much as the David Bartons of the world (or rather the nation) insist, but present and important nonetheless. There’s no reason not to honor this heritage. The battles over our monuments and plaques weren’t started by my fellow religious conservatives, but rather by the aggressive secularizers. Would that they were as “weary of pointless battles” to scour the public square of any reference to religion.
October 16th, 2012 | 11:20 am
Joseph Knippenberg –
“This is symbolic politics at its best (or worst).” – Joseph Knippenberg
October 16th, 2012 | 12:25 pm
“Perhaps I’ve been blissfully unaware of the hordes of Bible-toting (or rather tablet-toting) theocrats just raring to invade and transform our little slice of, er, heaven.”
Well, they are out there in force. They infect our school boards with creationism and waste public funds fighting to post the 10 commandments instaed of actually governing. They are candidates for high public office and some unfortunately are current officeholders that cannot be voted out fast enough.
It’s a fair question of the candidates and the candidate’s answer is a proxy for how the candidate will react to many other issues.
I wouldn’t disparage people as “bible thumpers” but I can pick and choose my elected officials on how well I think they will approach their duties. If I think they will easily be diverted onto religious tangents then they won’t get my vote. Their thoughts on public display of the 10 commandments provides me a fair estimate of their positions.
“Except for those bigoted Bible-tumpers who live and worship somewhere else. I’ve got news for them: We’re your neighbors too.”
Well, if you are self-describing as a “bible thumper” then please own the damage that is done.
In the meantine, “Welcome neighbor!” I’ll see you at the coffee house and little league field. Our kids will play together.
I will vote againt you for public office. I don’t want you diverting my tax dollars for religious purposes. I don’t want you trying to sneak creationism into the public school science curriculum. I don’t want you pesterting the librarians because Harry Potter is on the bookshelves. I don’t want you misrepresenting female reproductive biology, Todd Akin, nor do I want you calling for the death penalty for children:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/08/charlie-fuqua-arkansas-candidate-death-penalty-rebellious-children_n_1948490.html
I certainly do not want you sitting on the house scicene and technology committee telling us “Evolution is Satan’s Lie”, Congressman Paul Brown.
Now, maybe *those* wackjob bible thumpers are not *your* kind of bible thumpers. Perhaps you acept solid science and solid sex education in our schools and don’t think witchcraft is taking over the library. In that case, you might get my vote–but tell me what you believe neighbor and why you aren’t like *those* bible thumpers.
October 16th, 2012 | 12:41 pm
What is it with Americans and the Ten Commandments?
I have been in parliament buildings, town halls, prefectures and law courts all over Europe and, whilst I have seen the crucifix in many of them and even the Monstrance (depicted on the porch of the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence) and the statues of patron saints, I have never once seen the Ten Commandments. The nearest thing to it is the statue of Moses holding them, high over the entrance of the Royal Courts of Justice in the Strand in London.
October 16th, 2012 | 12:42 pm
Joe McFaul,
Don’t worry, I’m not running for office, and if I were, I’d focus on the bread and butter issues of local governance.
Please try not to paint with such broad strokes. Many of the people with whom I go to church, for example, read the Harry Potter books (we did) and, when they send their kids to public schools (we don’t), focus on undoing what they regard as the damage at home.
I try not to practice “guilt by association” when dealing with people with whom I disagree and hope for the same courtesy from them.
October 16th, 2012 | 1:23 pm
I’ve always wondered to which of the ten they imagine that Jews or muslims would object.
I imagine atheists might object to the first; but surely even atheists will agree that murder (other than of unborn infants) is sorta wrongish.
October 16th, 2012 | 1:53 pm
I’ve always wondered to which of the ten they imagine that Jews or muslims would object.
Ye Olde Statistician,
I am not quite sure what you are thinking, but since the Ten Commandments are found in Exodus and Deuteronomy, they are part of the Torah. Jews don’t object to anything in the Torah.
October 16th, 2012 | 2:27 pm
Ye Olde Statistician – And there’s no one to worry about except Jews, Muslims, and atheists. Besides Christian, those are the only options.
October 16th, 2012 | 2:48 pm
Joe McFaul, I don’t think you get it. The decalogue is the starting point for western jurisprudence. One wonders why it is objectionable as an historical document. But, for whatever reason, some of Joseph’s town mates sought to make sure that no one would sully the town precincts with that kind of stuff, even though no one had proposed it.
But I guess if one rejects religion and religionists along with it, one would prefer history just went away.
October 16th, 2012 | 3:15 pm
I’m not sure what the point of this post is.
It’s perfectly logical, in my mind, why, in this day and age, people running for office would not support the posting of a sectarian religious symbol on the wall of a government building. And I don’t see anything inconsistent with temporarily holding government meetings in a church (or even permanently) and declining to post the 10 Commandments on the wall of a government building.
(I’m not one of these people who goes around complaining that all religious symbols need to be torn down from public places. They don’t offend me in the least. I think they should stand as a testament to our Christian history and heritage.)
October 16th, 2012 | 3:35 pm
Mike Melendez –
It had no precursors?
October 16th, 2012 | 3:44 pm
“The decalogue is the starting point for western jurisprudence.”
The friezes on the US supreme court building go back to Menes (~3200 BCE) and Hammurabi (~1700 BCE) before they get to Moses (~1300 BCE).
October 16th, 2012 | 4:38 pm
The decalogue is the starting point for western jurisprudence.
Mike Melendez,
The above is a pretty extravagant claim, as others have pointed out.
One wonders why it is objectionable as an historical document.
The answer is that it is not objectionable if displayed on government property as a historical document. It is objectionable if it is displayed on government property for religious purposes.
October 16th, 2012 | 7:19 pm
Re: Jews, Christians, muslims, and atheists as only options.
So think it through. It wasn’t an exhaustive laundry list. Which of the ten would a Buddhist find objectionable? They’re pretty basic, after all.
(The decalogue is the starting point for western jurisprudence.) ….. It had no precursors??
Not directly. Other kings and emperors had law codes; but the trick is to trace them through actual history into Western law, meaning the codified system of law that emerged in the Early Middle Ages. No one in Burgundy had much access to the Code of Khammurapi. Just because it’s older, it doesn’t make it a precursor. Most of the kingdoms and principalities modeled theirs on the first codified law in that milieu: Church canon law. That is the reason for one of the more remarkable features of Western law: viz., the presumption that human beings are capable of reaching correct moral conclusions by reason (i.e., synderesis). There is a discussion of the Early Medieval Legal Revolution in the first part of Toby Huff’s The Rise of Early Modern Science.
The plebs forced the patricians of Rome to post all the laws of the Republic in the Forum because legal behavior was defined by strict obedience to a collection of individual commands. One had to know the commands. (That’s what makes the Code of Khamurapi such a congeries of individual minute regulations.) But in the Western/Christian tradition, each person is presumed capable of knowing by nature that theft is wrong, (etc.) IOW, there is a natural law underlying the positive law.
October 16th, 2012 | 8:52 pm
“Which of the ten would a Buddhist find objectionable? They’re pretty basic, after all.”
Well, depending on which numbering you use:
The first tells you which god to worship; I can see Buddhists (and pretty much anyone who doesn’t follow an Abrahamic religion) objecting to that, and even some of those objecting to having such a declaration on a government building, implying that the government has the power and authority to tell its citizens which god to worship (which, of course, can change).
The second tells you not to have any other gods; again, I can see Buddhists and others objecting.
The third says no graven images, which I can certainly see Buddhists objecting to if the government takes that to mean that Buddhists can’t have statues of Buddha.
The fifth tells Buddhists which day to worship; since some Buddhists use a lunar calendar, the day of the week that is holy to them changes.
Just keep the government OUT of the religion business. Religious freedom is pretty basic, after all.
October 17th, 2012 | 8:56 am
Ye Olde Statistician
The principle influence in early mediaeval law (from the Sack of Rome in 410 to the Edict of Pistris in 864) was undoubtedly Roman law
Throughout Italy and Gaul, south of the line from Geneva in the East to the mouth of the Charante in the West, Roman law has been in force continuously from Caesar’s conquests to the present day. Not for nothing was this part of France (about two-fifths) known as « Le pays de droit écrit » – The country of the written law.
One thinks of the great maxims of Ulpian – “Justice is a firm and constant intention to give to each his due” (D.1.1.10 pr) and “The precepts of the law are these: to live uprightly, not to harm another, to give to each his due” (D 1.1.10.1)
Ulpian and his fellow-jurists, like Julian, Modestinus, Paulus, Papinian and Pomponius are the founders of modern jurisprudence. They acknowledged both a “law of nature” and a law of nations (the ius gentium), representing the rules and institutions common to all people, living in society.
In fact, the similarity between the Mosaic and Roman laws, not only in general outline, but in many points of detail is so striking that it impelled one writer (whether Jewish or Christian is unknown, but certainly a lawyer and Hebrew scholar) to write the Collatio Legum Mosaicarum et Romanarum, or Collation of the Laws of Moses and the Romans. Internal evidence shows it to have been written between 294 and 313.
October 17th, 2012 | 9:10 am
YOS –
No one’s claiming that medieval legislators consulted the laws of Lipit-Ishtar directly. But the Hebrew laws developed in the context of, and in many cases from, those antecedent codes. Christianity developed from Judaism, and Christianity had a strong influence on Western legal developments, it cannot be denied. (Though not always a positive influence, note.)
The thing is, presenting the Ten Commandments without that historical context is inaccurate and “symbolic politics at its best (or worst).”
October 17th, 2012 | 2:33 pm
I am not sure when the Ten Commandments became the set of commandments for Christians. People may remember this from Matthew 19:
Note first that when Jesus refers to “the commandments,” the young man asks which ones. When Jesus responds, four of the five commandments he lists are from the Decalogue, but the last one is not. Jesus is definitely not saying, “Keep the Ten Commandments.” Also I don’t believe anyone would claim that Jesus was saying that only the five commandments he listed were the ones that should be kept. Jews recognize 613 commandments and certainly do not limit themselves to the Ten Commandments. I found this interesting comment while researching the topic:
Ye Olde Statistician said, “I’ve always wondered to which of the ten they imagine that Jews or muslims would object.” Well, it turns out there is a plausible reason why Jews actually might object to posting the Ten Commandments as a separate list, even though they would obviously not object to any of the individual commandments themselves.
October 17th, 2012 | 3:33 pm
True, you can make an excellent case for Roman law as well. The West is the marriage of Athens and Jerusalem, as they say, and even by the time of Trajan the Christian outlook was having an impact on Roman thought.
But surely we would be concerned if a plaque to honor Roman Law, with panic-stricken people crying that the Government was about to impose emperor-worship — or at the very least imperial-colonialist rule over the peasants in flyover country.
Or is it only the wife in this marriage who is to be tossed aside?
+ + +
Brian Westley
The first tells you which god to worship
YOS
Whoever “I” is. [The source of all being.] But surely, to put Race or Party or Nation in the place of the Highest Good would be objectionable only to the unfavored Races, outlawed Parties, and People Not Like Us.
Brian Westley
….government has the power and authority to tell its citizens which god to worship (which, of course, can change).
YOS
One would have to be pretty stupid and/or easily hysterical to think that a public display in a county courthouse would mean anything like that. Of course, we have been growing accustomed to government ruling every aspect of our lives; but it would not have been a danger to a republic. Test: how much fretting over such matters was engaged in by the people who wrote the laws that are being cited in the cause?
Brian Westley
The second tells you not to have any other gods
YOS
Well, it is logically impossible to have more than one God; but not even Jews and muslims suppose there are no other lesser divine beings. At a Hindu temple complex south of Chennai, it was explained to me that all the lesser gods were simply avatars or manifestations of the One God, with Brahma, Vishnu, and Kali being the trinity representing that unity.
Brian Westley
The third says no graven images … if the government takes that to mean that Buddhists can’t have statues of Buddha.
YOS
You mean like Catholics and Orthodox can’t have statues of Christ or Mary or….? The prohibition is on worshiping blocks of wood, not using them for decoration or a means of focusing attention.
Brian Westley
tells Buddhists which day to worship
YOS
Actually, it doesn’t specify a particular day. It does tell employers they have to give you a day off and not work you like a slave all week long. But now with cell phones, one is expected to be on-call 24/7.
+ + +
Actually, the obstreperousness doesn’t lie in such matters, only in the overheated hysterics that desecrate crosses raised by WW1 vets to their comrades, or erase teeny little crosses from the city seal of Los Angeles so they can pretend the city did not grow around a Franciscan mission. That sort of Puritanism never has worked out well, no matter what Highest Good has been pushed on people.
October 18th, 2012 | 6:56 am
YOS
A plaque honouring Roman Law? Well, outside virtually every Mairie and law court in France one sees the fasces, topped with the Phrygian bonnet.
I rather like it – the axe and rods represent the coercive power of the magistrate (the imperium) and the cap of liberty was worn by newly emancipated freedmen as a symbol of liberty.
October 18th, 2012 | 8:04 am
YOS –
What if the plaque were presented to the “Government” by emperor-worshipers?
Not everyone thinks ‘worship’ itself is a good thing, though…
October 28th, 2012 | 8:59 pm
Can’t we all get along?
Aren’t there too many religions (and religeous beliefs) to go around; all grounds for disagreement among the children of (essentially the same) God?
Haven’t we fought enough wars in the name of Religion, where Religion was used as a thin veneer to hide the underlying (economic) motivations to slaughter each other?
Just some questions from a simple minded citizen.
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