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May 24, 2019 - January 24, 2021
In Article III, the Constitution explicitly forbids punishing children for the crimes of their parents, even for crimes as serious as treason: “No Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.”
“Under our system of law individual guilt is the sole basis for deprivation of rights.”25 This is true; under American principles, the sins of the father cannot be visited upon the son or daughter. Yet the biblical god’s principles command precisely that.
The second commandment is no different than putting a gun to an innocent child’s head in an effort to force action from the child’s parents. It is terrorism by an all-powerful being.
From punishing innocent children to prohibiting art to banning freedom of religion, the second commandment is an anti-liberty dictate that thoroughly conflicts with America’s founding principles.
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Suppressed Speech: The Third Commandment
III. “You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not acquit anyone who misuses his name.” [or “Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.” (KJV)] — Exodus 20:7
“Call him Voldemort, Harry. Always use the proper name for things. Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself.” — Albus Dumbledore in J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, 19992
“People will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.”
But are we sure that blasphemy is really the issue here? For a god, Yahweh’s legislation is remarkably imprecise. “Misusing” or “taking a name in vain” is so vague as to mean nothing yet somehow prohibits everything.
To paraphrase Joseph Lewis, one of the greatest atheist activists of the last century: Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain? Thou canst not use the name of God in any other way.
The due process clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments require laws to “give adequate guidance to those who would be law-abiding, to advise defendants of the nature of the offense with which they are charged, or to guide courts in trying those who are accused.”
As a law, the third commandment would raise more questions than it answers: What constitutes a wrongful use of the name? Does it have to be the actual name, or will any mention of god suffice? What if you wrongfully use the name of somebody else’s god? What does it mean to use a name in vain? Any law so vague would violate the US Constitution.
Adams was certainly correct that blasphemy laws are embarrassments; they are obstructions to the human mind that stifle free inquiry. They retard progress and destroy societal well-being. Afghanistan, Egypt, Iran, Kuwait, Pakistan, and Yemen are some of the countries that actively enforce and brutally punish blasphemy today, including with whipping and execution.
Criticizing the system that claims to punish you for your thoughts is the first step against totalitarianism.
This commandment runs afoul of the First Amendment several times over, violating the two religion clauses and the speech and press clauses.
Blasphemy laws and religious restrictions on speech are un-American. This commandment stands opposed to all that makes our country great. The American who values the Constitution and the liberties it protects will stand with Adams, Jefferson, and Madison, and, as Ingersoll stated, “deny the right of any man, of any number of men, of any church, of any State, to put a padlock on the lips—to make the tongue a convict [and] passionately deny the right of the Herod of authority to kill the children of the brain.”
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Forced Rest: The Fourth Commandment
IV. “Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God; you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and consecrated it.” — Exodus 20:8–11
It would have been far better to declare a day of rest to spend with family and friends in relaxation from the rigorous week, rather than invent a lazy god.
The biblical penalty for sabbath-breaking is death.
The sabbath exists not because people need a day to worship, but because clerics need to continually reassert their role in the lives of the credulous.
This law is not about rest. It is about imposing religious conformity; about forcing people to worship and believe in a certain god. Nothing could be more fundamentally opposed to our First Amendment and founding principles than such a law. This is why the Supreme Court, although it has upheld Sunday closing laws in some instances, has struck down any religious aspects of or religious rationale for those laws.
The fourth commandment recognizes that human beings can be property: “You shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock…”
Americans tend to forget that the amendments they so often cite actually amended the Constitution. The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth amendments ended slavery as an institution, while slavery’s supporters continued to cite the holy, unalterable, infallible word of god.
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On Family Honor: The Fifth Commandment
V. “Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.” — Exodus 20:12
Not all parents are worthy of honor or respect.
Because not every parent is worthy of respect, this commandment is, to use a legal term, overinclusive: it’s a law that protects people it should not.
This commandment is not about honor and respect; it is about obedience and power.
Like the biblical god evangelicals worship, Trump is a thin-skinned authoritarian with totalitarian tendencies. He craves love and punishes any disloyalty or slight. Evangelicals have been taught to worship and adore that type of being above all others. This strain of religion cultivates a veneration for extreme authority. Studies bear this out: religious fundamentalism and a tendency to submit to authoritarianism are highly correlated.
Evangelicals believe in virgins giving birth, talking snakes, and all manner of obvious falsehoods. The religious mind is primed to accept lies. Presented with an extraordinary claim, it does not demand extraordinary evidence, but instead engages faith to overcome skepticism. Their religion has taught evangelicals to accept, rather than to question. Trump’s constant waterfall of outright lies landed on amenable minds.
The US Constitution honors individual rights over naked authority. The fifth commandment is about perpetuating religion, ensuring obedience, and venerating authority. It had no influence on America’s founding.
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Unoriginal and Tribal: The Sixth, Eighth, and Ninth Commandments
VI. “You shall not murder.” [or “Thou shalt not kill.” (KJV)]
VIII. “You shall not steal.”
IX. “You shall not bear false witness against...
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— Deuteronomy 5:17, Exodus 20...
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That these few commandments resemble some of our laws does not necessarily mean that they influenced those laws or the founding of this country. Prohibitions on theft, perjury, and murder are vital—so much so that every successful society agrees with them.
First, these principles are not exclusive or original to Judeo-Christianity. They are universal principles that all humans understand and arrive at regardless of their participation in the Judeo-Christian religion.
George Carlin’s quip on page 208, “It just depends on who’s doing the killing and who’s getting killed,” is accurate. The god of the bible allows murder if the victim believes in a different god. The biblical commandments protect only other believers. You may not murder, steal from, or bear false witness against other members of our group. This is why the first five commandments deal with god’s supremacy and how he should be worshipped, so that believers can recognize each other, the people to whom the final commandments apply. The in-group application of the final commands is why rather
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The more accurate interpretation of these four commandments might be: do not kill your neighbor or commit adultery with your neighbor or steal from your neighbor or bear false witness against your neighbor.12 Under this interpretation, which not all scholars agree with, the prohibitions are not applied equally; they are applied only to one’s neighbor. So it is permissible to kill and steal, so long as you don’t kill your neighbor or steal from your neighbor. There are different rules for people, depending on their status as a neighbor.
Do you worship my god? Only my god? Do you curse my god or do you respect him? Do you worship and rest when my god says to? Do you obey your parents and priest who tell you to worship my god? If so, you’re my neighbor and it’s important that I not kill you.
The in-group interpretation of these commandments makes even more sense given the events that follow the covenant. Shortly after receiving the commandments, the Israelites go on a killing spree. According to the bible, they commit genocide after genocide—more than seventy all told.19
In The Better Angels of Our Nature, Pinker makes the point so beautifully that it is worth reproducing in whole:
Far from the universal human meaning bestowed upon it by modern believers, “neighbor” means your clan, your tribe, your brother believer—and no one else. The basis of Judeo-Christian morality and ethics is the clan. The tribe is more important than morality; people who are different are lesser. Those who exercise their freedom of religion to worship differently will be treated as nonhumans. Does that sound like an American principle?
The books of both Matthew and Mark tell of a woman, a non-Israelite, with a sick daughter. She asks Jesus to cure the child. Jesus ignores her and his disciples urge him to send her away, but she persists. Finally, Jesus chides the woman, saying, “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” In other words, miracles are for my people, my neighbors, my children—not for dogs who worship other gods. It is not until after she has professed her faith in him, until after she calls Jesus “master” and “Lord” for the third time, that he relents, noting, “Woman, great is your
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