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[BrianW]

Why do you think the founders (or Jefferson, who authored this phrase) used the term Creator instead of "God" or "Our Lord"?

Maybe bacause it sounded better in oration than "The Supreme Architect", while still asserting the belief that a supreme being created the universe and that the self evident truths and the endowed rights flow from that one God by using observation and reason.

[dnf777]

Maybe bacause it sounded better in oration than "The Supreme Architect", while still asserting the belief that a supreme being created the universe and that the self evident truths and the endowed rights flow from that one God by using observation and reason.

You explained why he didn't use "The Supreme Architect", not why he didn't use "God". There's lots of words that don't fit nicely into oration. "God" fits very easily, is one syllable, yet he chose NOT to use it. Why is that? I think it was a very tactful way to acknowledge a god, in keeping with the spirit of what this country would be founded upon......not endorsing, nor prohibiting the practice of any religion. Why is that so hard for many to admit?

[depittydawg]

http://www.examiner.com/christian-tv...o-church-video

Notice anything odd?

Yeah, he looks like a dork in that Bow Tie...

[YardleyLabs]

Maybe bacause it sounded better in oration than "The Supreme Architect", while still asserting the belief that a supreme being created the universe and that the self evident truths and the endowed rights flow from that one God by using observation and reason.

You might be right, but I suspect that Jefferson was a little more ambivalent. He absolutely did not accept the Bible as anything approaching a text to be believed literally (witness the Jefferson Bible) and, while he sometimes said things consistent with deist beliefs, he also questioned almost every aspect of faith and creation.

While Jefferson was not in the majority among our forefathers, the 18th century was a period when questioning fundamental assumptions about religion and the existence of a god was not that unusual. Adams declared Jefferson to be an atheist during the 1802 Presidential campaign, and had some basis for his assertion. It says something about the state of the country at that time that Jefferson was elected despite the fact that many accepted the charges against him and he never denied them. In later years, Adams and Jefferson corresponded about religion and Adams, a Unitarian, was strong in encouraging Jefferson to publish the Jefferson Bible. Both Jefferson and Adams believed that Jesus was a special and important man, but both rejected the notion that he was in any manner a manifestation of God. Both were also heavily influenced by Thomas Paine, who was instrumental in bringing them together following Jefferson's retirement from politics. Paine, in his treatise of the Rights of man, was much more explicit is describing those fundamental rights as being the product of Nature, rather than any deity.

In The Age of Reason, written after the Revolution but reflecting much of the opinion at the time, Paine wrote:

I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish Church, by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by the Turkish Church, by the Protestant Church, nor by any Church that I know of. My own mind is my own Church. [Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason]

[BrianW]

God...yet he chose NOT to use it. Why is that?

Since I don't have the ability to channel Jefferson, I don't "know" why he used the words he did anymore than you do, hence my use of maybe.
"Maybe" it was because he had already used the term " the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God".
My point was, I was referring to a self described atheist's statement that the term "Creator" was ambiguous. To someone that believes in God, the term isn't ambiguous at all. I think it asserts a monotheistic point of view that was inclusive of Judaism, Christianity etc and yes maybe even Islam without being preferential and without taking the "label" of that one God, hence also "with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence". He could have used "God" (as it is a implied label thereof) or "our Lord" there too, but didn't (and I don't claim to know why he didn't there either.)

but I suspect that Jefferson was a little more ambivalent. He absolutely did not accept the Bible as anything approaching a text to be believed literally (witness the Jefferson Bible) and, while he sometimes said things consistent with deist beliefs, he also questioned almost every aspect of faith and creation.

... Adams declared Jefferson to be an atheist during the 1802 Presidential campaisgn, and had some basis for his assertion. It says something about the state of the country at that time that Jefferson was elected despite the fact that many accepted the charges against him and he never denied them.

There are indeed many studies & writings of Jefferson, including some that contradict the "atheist" label;
He was raised as an Anglican and always maintained some affiliation with the Anglican Church. He was also known to contribute
financially, in fair proportion, to every denomination in his town

Certain evangelicals, who were also his political opponents, tried very hard to make Jefferson's religion a factor in elections. They filled the press with scurrilous attacks on his "deistical" beliefs. He made it his steadfast policy never to respond to any of these attacks or, indeed, to make any public statement at all concerning his faith

Jefferson's earliest writings on religion exhibit a natural theology, a heavy reliance on reason, and the belief that morality comes not from special revelation but from careful attention to the inward moral sense. In a letter to his nephew Peter Carr in 1787, Jefferson advised, "Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a god." But questioning the existence of God is not the same as denying that existence.

In contrast to your statement of not believing the Bible literally, there are parts that he most certainly appears to:
Writing in 1803 to the Universalist physician Benjamin Rush, Jefferson wrote, "To the corruptions of Christianity, I am indeed opposed; but not to the genuine precepts of Jesus himself. I am a Christian, in the only sense in which he wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines, in preference to all other;

[YardleyLabs]

Since I don't have the ability to channel Jefferson, I don't "know" why he used the words he did anymore than you do, hence my use of maybe.
"Maybe" it was because he had already used the term " the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God".
My point was, I was referring to a self described atheist's statement that the term "Creator" was ambiguous. To someone that believes in God, the term isn't ambiguous at all. I think it asserts a monotheistic point of view that was inclusive of Judaism, Christianity etc and yes maybe even Islam without being preferential and without taking the "label" of that one God, hence also "with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence". He could have used "God" (as it is a implied label thereof) or "our Lord" there too, but didn't (and I don't claim to know why he didn't there either.)



There are indeed many studies & writings of Jefferson, including some that contradict the "atheist" label;
He was raised as an Anglican and always maintained some affiliation with the Anglican Church. He was also known to contribute
financially, in fair proportion, to every denomination in his town

Certain evangelicals, who were also his political opponents, tried very hard to make Jefferson's religion a factor in elections. They filled the press with scurrilous attacks on his "deistical" beliefs. He made it his steadfast policy never to respond to any of these attacks or, indeed, to make any public statement at all concerning his faith

Jefferson's earliest writings on religion exhibit a natural theology, a heavy reliance on reason, and the belief that morality comes not from special revelation but from careful attention to the inward moral sense. In a letter to his nephew Peter Carr in 1787, Jefferson advised, "Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a god." But questioning the existence of God is not the same as denying that existence.

In contrast to your statement of not believing the Bible literally, there are parts that he most certainly appears to:
Writing in 1803 to the Universalist physician Benjamin Rush, Jefferson wrote, "To the corruptions of Christianity, I am indeed opposed; but not to the genuine precepts of Jesus himself. I am a Christian, in the only sense in which he wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines, in preference to all other;

I agree with almost everything you have said. However, Jefferson's notion of "Christian" did not encompass any notion of Christ as a manifestation of God. The purpose of the Jefferson Bible was to strip away all claims of miraculous behavior in an effort to reveal the nature of Jesus the man. The Jesus that emerges in Jefferson's version is a true rebel, rejecting all authority (particularly in matters of religion) and focusing almost exclusively on the importance of acts or good works, rather than beliefs, as the basis of salvation (see The Jefferson Bible, Beacon Press). In saying that he was a Christian in the only sense that Jesus ever asked of anyone, Jefferson was supporting a view of Jesus as a great moral philosopher who never claimed to be a deity or asked to be worshiped.