Ten Commandments

[Guest Taoist_Saint]

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[Guest Taoist_Saint]

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[Guest Taoist_Saint]

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[Guest TheProudDuck]

Tao,

Maybe we could view a Ten Commandments inscription (like the one at the Supreme Court) as a recognition of their role in developing the concept of the rule of law, and acknowledging the significant part thinking about God played in the American founding. We obviously don't have to make the actual content of the Commandments into laws (or at least not all of them; nobody seems to mind the "don't steal/kill/lie" parts that much).

Many of the people who oppose public inscriptions of the Ten Commandments oppose their basic premise -- that there is any source of ethics that is superior to, or independent of, what a majority of people happen to think at any given moment. That's what Pope Benedict meant with his comment about a "dictatorship of relativism"; Socrates criticized the same thing.

[Guest Taoist_Saint]

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[Guest TheProudDuck]

Tao,

What would be the connection between Taoist/Muslim/Mormon/Buddhist/Hindu scriptures and the development of American law? And without such a connection, what would be the point of posting those scriptures in an American courthouse?

I guess you could make the case that posting the scriptures of other lawgiving religions might call attention to the universal human aspiration to order society with laws, investing what goes on in a courthouse with a broader significance than usually is inspired by a dingy 1970s building full of scruffy plaintiffs' lawyers, chiseling litigants, and rickety ancient escalators that have a nasty habit of devouring the maintenance staff alive. But let's keep in mind that some of us have to actually walk through these courthouses, and don't want to bang our shins on a monument every few feet to each spaced-out mystic or another who ever claimed a divine revelation.

Proportion, young grasshopper.

[Guest Taoist_Saint]

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[Guest TheProudDuck]

Tao,

You might consider that plenty of American Christians are as willing as I am to be exposed to "strange foreign ideas" and to "face reality."

[Lindy]

Originally posted by Taoist_Saint@Apr 25 2005, 06:53 PM

Well, obviously I am being sarcastic about making the Laws of Moses into American laws.

Interesting point you make...the purpose of the Ten Commandments in a courthouse is to symbolize that there is a higher power originating our laws.

Then I agree, they should be there on display. 

But other religions should be represented equally.  The Ten Commandments should stand next to:

1.  The Tao Te Ching (acknowledging the higher power of Tao, which is the LAW of the universe)

2.  Muslim Shariah Law (although very harsh like the Laws of Moses, it is just a symbol of the higher power, right?)

3.  Buddhist Scriptures that relate to morality....specifically teachings on Karma, which deal with morality.

4.  Hindu scriptures (I am not familiar with them, but I believe they have some moral teachings).

5.  Brigham Young's speeches about Blood Atonement...this would be very popular in Texas and other "Red" states.

Sarcastic or not TS~ I do think you have a point about the different religions and their morals that apply. But I would keep the display to the top 8 religions or so, thinking that every other religion would have to have some of the basic moral/values as those displayed.

PD~ Question? Because of our nations ever increasing melting pot of cultural differences, do you really see a problem with the possibility of "reminding" people of the laws, or the moralistic nature of each religion? I wouldn't put up anything that said "honor others who believe in what you do....kill or torture the rest", but I'm sure that there are honorable moral values that could be found in each religion.

[Guest TheProudDuck]

Lindy,

I sometimes suspect that diversity of culture and religion is often used by ideologues who don't particularly like any religion, to force all religion completely out of the public sphere -- thus ensuring that religion's role in society is reduced absolutely, as the public sphere continues to expand with the growth of government. That is, it's less a matter of Hindus being offended by a posting of the Ten Commandments, than of secularists using Hindus' presumed offense at the posting of a reminder of a religion other than their own as an excuse to secularize everything.

In response to the alarmists who say that if we don't have a completely secular public sphere, we'll have outbreaks of religious violence -- I give Americans (as a whole and not individually) more credit than that. I think our national consensus on matters of faith is that we like to be religious, but not too much. We get uncomfortable with religious extremes, whether the extreme is fundamentalism or militant atheism.

For almost 200 years, the American consensus on church-state relations was that a bland, ecumenical "ceremonial deism" was acceptable, but government endorsement of sectarian religion was not. Then the sixties came along and put the kibosh on "ceremonial deism," too. Part of the result of this was a polarizing of American religion, with the more traditional-minded factions within American Protestantism developing a bit of a persecution complex, and the more liberal factions going all mushy. I sometimes wonder if we might have a little more religious consensus if the federal courts hadn't clobbered the consensus-style public religion that was ruled unconstitutional from the early sixties onward.

[Guest Taoist_Saint]

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[Guest Taoist_Saint]

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[Guest Taoist_Saint]

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[Guest Taoist_Saint]

Have a nice summer!