Category: history

Politifact Debunks Bryan Fischer's Christianity Only View of the First Amendment

Just as I did in 2011, yesterday Politifact debunked Bryan Fischer’s claim that the founders said religion but meant Christianity.
On his 12/10/13 Focal Point broadcast, Fischer said:

By the word religion in the First Amendment, the founders meant Christianity.

Not so.
Politifact’s Punditfact writers consulted Baylor’s Thomas Kidd, Rutger’s Jan Ellen Lewis and Virginia Foundation for the Humanities Fellow John Ragosta to provide the complete picture. Fischer believes Muslims should not have the right to build any new mosques. His topic on the broadcast was claims for First Amendment protections by Satanists.
I doubt this comeuppance will distract Fischer from misleading his American Family Association audience. Such facts have come to light before. His own organization, the AFA, publicly disagreed with him in 2011 but he continues to preach his fictions. Fischer’s argument is an extension of David Barton’s Christian nationalist perspective. Barton has defended the view that the First Amendment only applies to monotheistic religions.

Historical Problems In Mark Driscoll's Death By Love

In doing some reading in preparation for a post comparing a passage from Dan Allender’s book The Wounded Heart with Mark Driscoll’s and Gerry Breshears’ book Death by Love, I found a glaring historical error in Death by Love. On page 170, Driscoll and Breshears wrote:

As an aside, James Arminius was John Calvin’s son-in-law and greatly appreciated Calvin. He said that, after the Scriptures, he believed Calvin’s writings to be the most profitable study for God’s people. Therefore, the acrimony that sometimes flares up between Calvinists and Arminians need not be so if the examples of Calvin and Arminius are followed by their followers.

When I say I found it, I should say I learned of it reading other blogs. For instance, about that claim, Westminster Theological Seminary professor R. Scott Clark wrote,

This is historical nonsense. Calvin married the widow Idellete de Bure in 1540. She brought to the marriage two children, a son and a daughter.1 Jean and Idellette were married for nine years. In that time she bore him a son, Jacques, who, in 1542, died in infancy.2  Idellete herself died in 1549 leaving Calvin a widower. Even if he had a surviving daughter, she would have been born in the early 1540s. Arminius was born in 1560. Calvin’s hypothetical (biological) daughter would have been about 47 when Arminius married. That’s unlikely and, as it happened, contrary to fact. Arminius married the daughter of a prominent merchant in 1590.

The paragraph above from Death by Love is a mixed bag. While it is not true that Arminius was Calvin’s son-in-law, it is true that Arminius respected Calvin’s commentaries on the Bible.  On the other hand, Calvin died in 1564 and Arminius was born in 1560, so we don’t have any example of Calvin and Arminius as contemporaries to follow.
According to Arminian blogger William Birch, Driscoll and Breshears get the theology of Arminius wrong as well, especially on total depravity.
UPDATE: R. Scott Clark identifies another historical problem with Driscoll’s book on doctrine with the help of a book by Kevin Giles.
Stay tuned…
See also:
On The Allegations Of Plagiarism Against Mark Driscoll (12/2/13)
Zombies, Plagiarism And Mark Driscoll Helped Me Write This Blog Post (12/3/13)
Mark Driscoll And His Church On Plagiarism (12/4/13)
Janet Mefferd Removes Evidence Relating To Charges Of Plagiarism Against Mark Driscoll; Apologizes To Audience (12/4/13)
Ingrid Schlueter Resigns From Janet Mefferd Show Over Mark Driscoll Plagiarism Controversy (12/5/13)
Who’s Talking About The Mark Driscoll Plagiarism Controversy? (12/7/13)
IVP Says Bible Commentary Improperly Appeared In Book by Mark Driscoll; Mars Hill Church Responds, Blames Researcher Mistakes for Errors (12/9/13)
Mars Hill Church Alters Statement on Mark Driscoll Plagiarism Controversy (UPDATED) (12/10/13)
Mars Hill’s Sermon Series Battle Plan Reveals Background of Mark Driscoll’s Book on Peter (12/10/13)
Mars Hill’s Sermon Series Document Reveals Background of Mark Driscoll’s Book on Peter, Part Two (12/12/13)
Mars Hill Church, Mark Driscoll and the Case of the Disappearing Links (12/16/13)
See all posts on this topic here.
 

Weekend Roundup: Mark Driscoll's Plagiarism Woes, Barton And The Homeless Pastor Legend, Neo-Confederate Leader In FL High School, Knockout Game A Myth, Pastor's Housing Disallowed

Mark Driscoll and plagiarism – Seattle megachurch pastor Mark Driscoll was accused of plagiarism by Janet Mefferd on her November 21 broadcast. Initially, she questioned Driscoll about using concepts and terms without proper citation. Jonathan Merritt at Religion News Service covered the story the next day. Given the nature of the evidence, I thought the matter might drop at that point. However, Mefferd dug deeper and found instances where it appears Driscoll took passages nearly verbatim from a commentary written by D. A. Carson. Merritt also has that story.
Driscoll has his defenders but he also has some pretty persuasive critics, particularly this professor writing at First Things. I plan to look at this issue in more detail next week, but my initial thought is that the newer charges are more convincing and require some kind of response from Driscoll and his publisher.
David Barton’s Facebook Page – I already posted on this but either due to Thanksgiving or the lack of novelty, David Barton’s reposting of a urban myth as though it was a true story has gone without much comment.  It still remains on his Facebook page, having been shared over 1,000 times, even though many commenters pointed out that the story is false. It is encouraging that some commenters expressed negative reactions. For instance, this one:

I’m surprised to see this known-to-be-false story posted here. It would be one thing to post it for the moral lesson aspect and say so in your comments, but it’s another to pass it along as if it were a true story without any such commentary. If you don’t realize that this story is just social media rumor, then how many other stories have you passed along that were also false? Consider this my goodbye notice.

The response to the allegations against Driscoll remind me a bit of the uproar over Thomas Nelson pulling Barton’s book in August of 2012. Barton’s defenders came out in force to attack those who raised concerns. Some of that has happened already with Meffferd being the focus of attacks from those who support Driscoll.
Michael Peroutka in Spanish River High School – I think this matter may get some attention next week. Michael Peroutka is a board member of the League of the South who spoke at a FL public high school on Tuesday. When his dba name Institute on the Constitution came to a school district in Springboro, OH, there was a major negative reaction among parents. I wonder if the same will occur in Boca Raton.
Is the knockout game a myth? – Alan Noble at Christ and Pop Culture makes a pretty compelling case that the hysteria over an upsurge in racially motivated attacks by black mobs is unwarranted.
In other news, ministers may not be able to take a housing allowance if a new court ruling holds up.
 

Fake Story Of Jeremiah Steepek Posted On David Barton's Wallbuilders Facebook Page

With this caption — Church Members Mistreat Homeless Man in Church Unaware It Is Their Pastor in Disguise — David Barton’s Wallbuilders Facebook page posted the pretend story of a pastor who dressed as a homeless man in order to make a point to his church. The fictional story has been debunked by Snopes and Glenn Beck’s The Blaze. I can’t find any indication in the post that Barton realizes that the story is false.
Once he realizes what he has done, he will probably say he knew it was a fiction story all along. However, of real interest to me is the discussion on the post. Multiple commenters have posted that the story is false and some are upset about it. In this discussion thread, one can see how people respond to finding out something that they thought was true is not really true. Some are disillusioned, some defend Barton, some say the accuracy doesn’t matter because it is a nice story and others indicate that truth and accuracy do matter when the story has been portrayed as true. Some seem to believe it anyway. Credibility is the issue.
He also tweeted the false story without comment:


We’ve been around this block many times with Mr. Barton. Let’s see how he handles this one.

Reclaim America Now Motto Is Falsely Attributed To Thomas Jefferson

On November 19, Larry Klayman’s Reclaim America Now engaged in a “second American revolution” protest. The goal of the protest was to force Obama, Reid and Boehner out of office. Obviously, they didn’t succeed.
Lots of tea party people attended the rally and the organizers and speakers wrapped themselves up in the founders, even employing an actor to portray George Washington (see the picture below). Also in that picture is the likeness of Thomas Jefferson on a poster with the motto:

When the government fears the people, there is liberty.


While Jefferson’s name is not on the poster, it seems clear that they believe Jefferson was responsible for the quote.
However, according to the Monticello Foundation, this is a quote often falsely attributed to Jefferson. The good folks at Monticello tell us:

We have not found any evidence that Thomas Jefferson said or wrote, “When government fears the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny,” or any of its listed variations.

Rather, the quote appears to come from John Basil Barnhill, in a published 1914 debate with socialist Henry Tichenor. On page 34, Barnhill says

Where the people fear the government you have tyranny. Where the government fears the people you have liberty.

Barnhill does not attribute the quote to anyone and the Monticello researchers were unable to find it in any of Jefferson’s writings.
I don’t know, of course, if the false attribution is purposeful or due to ignorance. In either case, the organizers have misled their followers in order to whip up revolutionary sentiment. I hope Klayman’s rhetoric of revolution and false attribution of the founders doesn’t tip somebody over the edge.