Starting on Sunday, I plan to post contributions from historians about they think is important for us to know about Thanksgiving. I have asked numerous historians to send something in and I am very happy with what I have received so far.
Watch for this daily series to begin on Sunday afternoon.
To read all posts in the series, click Thanksgiving 2014
Category: history
Ted Cruz's Father Spreads Barton's Fables in Church
In private conversations with evangelical leaders about David Barton’s pseudo-history, I have been asked what harm Barton’s fables cause. After all, many of the founders were orthodox Christian and religious devotion was more respected then than now, so what does it hurt if Barton stretches the truth a little? He is basically on the right side of things so what’s the problem?
There are many problems with that line of thinking, most of which I don’t have time to address now. However, one I will note is that the lies spread and grow. They get bigger. Another one is that once the horse gets out of the barn, you can’t often get it back in. Even when Barton pulls back a bit and gets a bit more honest, his followers don’t necessarily follow suit.
Case in point: Rafael Cruz, the father of big Barton fan Ted Cruz in a speech at John Hagee’s church recently. Right Wing Watch brings the sad news.
[youtube]http://youtu.be/sZJh7MUI_GY[/youtube]
Cruz’s big applause line was a complete fiction. As long time readers know, Robert Aitken printed the first English Bible in America. Congress gave an endorsement after the fact and recommended the work for its religious and artistic merits but did not order it to be printed for use in schools at any level. Cruz plagiarized Barton and told a huge whopper on top of it.
After being hammered on the matter for years (and having that story removed from a Focus on the Family broadcast), Barton changed his rendition of the Aitken story a bit to make it a little more accurate. However, did Rafael Cruz get the memo? Not at all; in fact, he embellished Barton’s fable by saying Congress ordered the Bible to be “the principle textbook in primary schools, high schools and universities.” None of that is true. All I can think of is this Progressive commercial:
[youtube]http://youtu.be/moqX4t04yYo[/youtube]
Cruz then channels Barton on the role of Solomon Grayzel in the 1963 Abington v. Schempp case. He essentially says what Barton says which is almost never a sign of an accurate presentation.
Prominent evangelicals apparently don’t think the rules apply to them. Plagiarize, stretch the truth, do whatever, it matters not for the cause is just.
Barton and Barna: If We Don't Do Something We Didn't Do Before, We're Doomed
And so it begins. The hype for George Barna and David Barton’s new book, U-Turn will be familiar to anyone who is aware of the Christian nationalist pitch. Charisma “News” has the story, which is really an ad for the book:
The United States became a unique, prosperous and admired nation because of its faith in God and the willingness of the people to abide by God’s standards and principles. Over time, however, the urge to glorify oneself rather than God has seriously eroded the strength and potential of the nation.
Based on shocking new research and compelling interviews, FrontLine’s newly released book, U-Turn, combines George Barna’s and David Barton’s unique insights and cultural analysis to demonstrate the moral and spiritual underpinnings that made the United States great, its decline over the past forty years and a detailed road map for the future.
How can America right the ship?
“Unless we invite God to be at the center of our process and operate in strict accordance with His principles, we are doomed to continue our downward slide,” Barna and Barton write. “Because He has proven Himself to be a merciful ruler, though, if we will humble ourselves before Him, there is hope. U-Turn will describe the radical action Americans must take in partnership with God to restore the nation.”
There is nothing new about this. This is the same Christian nationalist doctrine Barton has pushed for decades. Unless we do something we didn’t do before — make Christian doctrine the “center of our process” — then we are doomed as a nation. This simplistic prescription is based on a tendentious reading of history which is nothing new for Barton. For instance, Barton says the Constitution quotes the Bible verbatim. This, of course, is not true but is consistent with the faulty reading of history Barton wants us to believe. If he can get us to believe we once had the evangelical God at the “center of our process” and once self-consciously operated “in strict accordance with His principles,” then Barton has leverage to press these concepts today as political objectives.
When it comes to Barton’s status as an historian, Charisma probably hopes that the public has a short memory. The Charisma News piece neglects to mention The Jefferson Lies which was pulled from publication by Thomas Nelson in 2012.
Conference on Faith and History: Taking It To The Streets: Engaging Bad History In Public
I just returned from the Conference on Faith and History which was held at Pepperdine University from September 24-28. On Saturday, I presented a paper as part of a panel titled, Professors, Prisoners, and the Polls: Engaging the Past in the Public Square. The session was chaired by Dwight Brautigam, Huntington University. Other papers given were: “In God We Trust”: Teaching Faith In and Through the U.S. Capitol, by Fred Beuttler, Carroll University and former Deputy Historian for the U.S. House of Representatives, and Teaching History Behind Bars: The Public Platform of a Texas Maximum Security Prison, presented by John Wilsey, professor at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. The featured commenter was Jonathan Boyd, InterVarsity Press.
The abstract is below, the full paper is at the link.
Abstract
David Barton is a popular Christian writer who specializes in making a public case that America is a Christian nation. Immensely popular with conservative Christians, Barton distorts historical events to support conservative political positions in the present day. Up until recently, left-leaning and progressive critics have led the way in calling out Barton’s historical errors in the public square.
However, in 2012, David Barton published a book on Thomas Jefferson that generated much public reaction, most of it critical, from Christian scholars. Along with co-author Michael Coulter, I published a book length critique of Barton’s work on Jefferson. Eventually, publisher Thomas Nelson listened to the critics and pulled Barton’s book from publication.
This episode was unprecedented in that a Christian publisher pulled a New York Times bestselling book due to vocal public complaints from Christian scholars. What can be learned from this situation?
I take the position that Christian historians and other scholars should engage their brethren in critical scholarship when other avenues have not brought resolution. Myth-busting in this situation can serve the Kingdom and our vocation by placing a quest for truth above narrow in group interests. In-group pressures are often so strong that no real change will occur if those within the Christian community do not raise issues publicly.
Read the entire paper.
Read all posts on the Conference on Faith and History.
The Christian Right and the Search for a Usable Past
The final session I attended at the Conference on Faith and History was titled “The Christian Right and the Search for a Usable Past.” Gregg Frazer, Professor of History at The Master’s College chaired the session and provided closing comments.
Three papers were presented:
1. “Fallen Walls and Open Doors: An Analysis of David Barton as a Christian Historian,” by Matt McCook, Professor at Oklahoma Christian University.
In my view, McCook started out on thin ice by referring to Barton as an historian. However, from there, the presentation improved as he revealed many familiar illustrations of Barton faulty historical work. Not surprisingly, McCook called for historians to present the narrative accurately without efforts to shape the past into a politically useful one.
Quotes/paraphrases:
A religiously ambiguous Thomas Jefferson is not useful to the Christian right.
Walls such as have been established by David Barton must come down.
2. “Popularizing a Usable Past: The Providence Foundation, Kirk Cameron, and the Legacy of Francis Schaeffer” by Grove City College graduate Charles Cotherman who is now at the University of Virginia.
Cotherman compared and contrasted Kurt Cameron’s movie Monumental with Francis Schaeffer’s How Shall We Then Live? Both efforts used history to effect the culture war and both were less than stellar on historical precision according to academic historians. However, Cotherman presented evidence that Schaeffer’s efforts resulted in the intellectual betterment of some evangelicals who went into scholarly work via Schaeffer’s inspiration. However, such results are not likely to derive from Cameron’s movie. The amateur historians recruited by Cameron are too fact-challenged to lead to any positive result.
Quotes/paraphrases:
Cameron’s Monumental reflects decrease in public intellectualism.
Schaeffer would roll over in his grave at the praise for the aesthetics of the Monument to the Forefathers.
3. “In the Stream of God’s Sovereign Plan”: Providential History and Nostalgia in the American Quiverfull Movement by Emily Hunter McGowin student at the University of Dayton.
Emily discussed the historical revisionism of G. Botkin who is at the forefront of the Quiverfull Movement (having many children and raising them in accord with strict gender roles).
Quotes/paraphrases:
Members of the Quiverfull movement are members of restorative nostalgia.
Nostalgia tells it like it wasn’t.
Summary/discussion:
Gregg Frazer then summarized the papers and hit his sweet spot with a couple of quotes/paraphrases that summed up the session:
Complicit in the promotion of bad history are the media, political organizations, churches etc. who invite David Barton to speak.
Historical revisionists find what they set out to find.
Gregg was right on target and even though difficult encouraged Christian historians to keep “pushing the boulder up the hill” in a Sissyphus-like effort to bring historical integrity to Christians. Probably many Christians would be surprised to find out the extent of the distance between Christian historians and Christian advocacy groups on matters of historical accuracy.