Lincoln's Christianity by Michael Burkhimer

[Gene C]

(12-14-2015 01:38 PM)maharba Wrote:  “The Bible is not my book nor Christianity my profession.”
— Abraham Lincoln, from Joseph Lewis

My earlier views of the unsoundness of the Christian scheme of salvation and the human origin of the scriptures, have become clearer and stronger with advancing years and I see no reason for thinking I shall ever change them.
-- to Judge Wakefield, after Willie's death

"In religion, Mr. Lincoln was about of the same opinion as Bob Ingersoll (atheist), and there is no account of his ever having changed.
-- Judge Nelson

And I don't think Abraham Lincoln would or should have any reason to be ashamed of being an atheist, nor should anyone else be.

Regarding the quote from Joseph Lewis.
Mr. Lewis never met Abraham Lincoln. According to Wikipedia,
"Joseph Lewis (June 11, 1889 – 1968) was an American freethinker and atheist activist, publisher, and litigator. During the mid-twentieth century, he was one of America’s most conspicuous public atheists"

Regarding the quote from a letter to Judge Wakefield.
A copy of the letter has never been found.
("Authenticity questioned by some because it allegedly does not appear in Wakefield's papers" - from Positive Atheism website

Regarding the quote from Judge Nelson
This one is hard to trace. Unable to find the original source of the quote or who Judge Nelson is.
Maharba, (backwards Abraham), can you please provide us more information on the source (who is Judge Nelson) and circumstances (letter, book, date?) of this "quote"

[maharba]

As Herndon and others have concluded, so I agree. Lincoln was an atheist. As it appears certain to me that Lincoln scorned The Thanksgiving Proclamation to others as 'just some nonsense of Sewards". But the longsuffering public, then, believed the sincerity. >>

I wonder how many (Fehenbachers included?) realized that it was Seward and not Lincoln wrote the Thanksgiving Proclamation. With this knowledge in view, it makes it all but certain that Lincoln truly was again scorning a religious themed item (appearing to be from Lincoln himself), at the same time giving out to the poor public the golden notion of himself in traditional Christian unity with them. That surely does not sound to me like 'a man evolving from atheism to deism or Christianity'.

For the benefit though of Christianized-Lincoln advocates, I have to admit that I do find these quotes,

"In regard to this great book (a bible given to him by ex-slaves), I have but to say, it is the best gift God has given to man. All the good the Saviour gave to the world was communicated through this book."

Rev Phineas Gurley said that Lincoln "now believed his heart was changed, and that he loved the Saviour, and...was his intention soon to make a profession of religion."

And it gets even worse, for my viewpoint of understanding. I have seen narratives which detail how president Abraham Lincoln was secretly baptized, in his final days. Several compelling articles detail that, online.
A parallel in the case of (atheist to reformed Christian?) Charles Darwin is given where a mysterious traveling divine 'Lady Hope' visited Darwin in his last illness and miraculously converted him on his death bed to a really good Christian. So...I suppose these things surely do happen.

[RJNorton]

(12-15-2015 09:52 PM)maharba Wrote:  I have seen narratives which detail how president Abraham Lincoln was secretly baptized, in his final days. Several compelling articles detail that, online.

Maharba, can you please post a link to this story. In the past I have read four different stories of Lincoln's alleged baptism, but they all occurred during his Springfield years, not in his final days. Ed Steers has investigated the stories of the Springfield baptism, and he has clearly been able to show they are all false. (One of the Springfield stories actually involves our old friend, David Elkins.) Offhand, I do not recall the "final days" story, so that I why I ask about it. Thanks.

[Eva Elisabeth]

(12-15-2015 09:52 PM)maharba Wrote:  I wonder how many (Fehenbachers included?) realized that it was Seward and not Lincoln wrote the Thanksgiving Proclamation. With this knowledge in view, it makes it all but certain that Lincoln truly was again scorning a religious themed item (appearing to be from Lincoln himself), at the same time giving out to the poor public the golden notion of himself in traditional Christian unity with them. That surely does not sound to me like 'a man evolving from atheism to deism or Christianity'.

Maharba, it would be nice if you at times could react to replies to you, e.g. as for what I wrote about Herndon's bias, and my latest post at all, and Roger's excellent post #96. That would perhaps help to advance the discussion. So far you have mainly repeated yourself over and over (like a scratched record), greatly ignoring others' replies and valid points made to you.

I think way more than you expect know that Seward drafted the TP, and I don't find it striking - Lincoln was busy enough. Again I ask you, do you draw the same conclusion from the fact that the Pope lets others write is speeches, and call him an atheist, truly scorning religion?

[Gene C]

Abraham backwards, may I suggest a book, if you have not already read it, that has been discussed on this site, Lincoln's Herndon. It will confirm and challenge you in some of your understanding of Herndon. It is very interesting and well written by a respected Lincoln historian.

http://rogerjnorton.com/LincolnDiscussio...ht=Herndon

[maharba]

I may have conflated the timing of Lincoln's baptism with old newspaper clippings which embellish. Maybe Lincoln was prior baptised in Springfield, but managed well to conceal it all the years...for reasons unknown. I can understand the comfort that Christians who had lost their sons in a War to either sustain The Articles of Association (which Lincoln claimed established The Union) or 'to provide a new birth of freedom', would provide from knowing that Abraham Lincoln was a baptised Christian too. With Darwin, there is the parallel: atheists disdaining that The Lady Hope really saved him, and Christians not willing to believe Darwin passed into the nether regions denying Christ. To my point of view, there is no real debate about either case, no matter how many lengthy annotated denials or florid victorian professions of faith.

And with the Pope, Eva, he surely must be a divine but I won't comment on either his politics or religion.
And I will look for that book on Herndon, Gene.

[L Verge]

If backwards Abraham considers "no real debate," why are we continuing to discuss the atheist vs. Christian principles of Mr. Lincoln?

[Eva Elisabeth]

(12-16-2015 01:38 PM)maharba Wrote:  And with the Pope, Eva, he surely must be a divine but I won't comment on either his politics or religion.

I'm afraid something in you reply makes me think you didn't understand my point. And, I agree with Laurie, I don't feel you really seek discussion.

[L Verge]

From the National Humanities Center as part of an explanation of America's belief in Manifest Destiny:

Not surprisingly, however, it remained for Abraham Lincoln to provide the most complex but nonetheless clear statement of the idea that America has a sacred duty to itself and to the world to preserve and protect liberty and democracy. In 1837, as a young man of 28, Lincoln gave an address to the Springfield, Illinois Lyceum. It was a time of great social and political turmoil. Illinois was riven with violence over the question of the abolition of slavery. In Alton, Illinois an anti-abolitionist mob recently had murdered the abolitionist editor, Elijah Lovejoy, destroyed his printing press and burned his office and house. In this atmosphere of intense political strife, Lincoln used his Lyceum address to call his fellow Illinoisans (and Americans) to turn to the basic democratic and liberal tenets the American national creed—the American Civil Religion—and embrace them and hold them as deeply as they held their private religious beliefs. Only such a common national faith, he argued, could provide the real and lasting foundation that would hold the sprawling, diverse, and conflict-ridden nation together.

During the Civil War Lincoln found these beliefs sharply challenged and at the same time gave them their most eloquent and powerful expression. Lincoln had always kept his questing and often skeptical spirituality closely guarded, but as the war ground relentlessly on, his beliefs and speeches took on not a sectarian but a deeply Old Testament tone. The cadence and words of his Gettysburg Address accentuate his message: the Union, “the last best hope of earth,” was fighting for the sacred cause of liberty. “It is for the living,” he declared, “to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last true measure of devotion . . . that this nation under God, shall have a new birth of freedom . . . and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth.”

In his brief second inaugural address, delivered only six weeks before his assassination, Lincoln explored the relationship between American freedom and Divine Will. He knew that nations often, if not always, claimed God or the Gods for their side. So, acknowledging that “neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained,” Lincoln addressed the fact that both North and South invoked God as their partisan: “Both read the same Bible and Pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other.” But he made it unmistakably clear that though he did not and could not really know God’s Will, he did know that God intended to end slavery, no matter what it took. Lincoln powerfully invoked a Jeremiad like vision of an all powerful and deeply offended God that would reign “woe” down upon those by peoples through ‘whom the offense cometh.’ “If we suppose that American slavery is one of those offences,” he declared, “which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God ascribe to Him?” “Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray,” Lincoln continued, “that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled up by the bondsman’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said, . . . so still it must be said ‘the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.’” Here it all is: the idea that the United States represents “the last best hope” that—the belief that an all powerful, not fully comprehendible God, governs the affairs of humankind, and that this God held the whole nation, not just the South, accountable for the existence of slavery in its midst, for the violation of its appointed mission. Finally, unlike most proponents of the idea that “America is a nation called to a special destiny by God,” he refrains from claiming God as the agent of Northern victory, even though as the second inaugural makes clear he had come to believe the Almighty was the ultimate agent of “the mighty scourge of war” that He had visited upon the nation for the sin of slavery.

[maharba]

When Abraham Lincoln lost his first run to the Reverend Peter Cartwright, it came home to him just how poorly received his atheism was to the Illinois voter. I wonder if Lincoln had lived in and ran for office in say Massachusetts, he would come out better, even if known as an atheist. On the other hand, I wonder what might have taken place if, during the bloodiest War in our history and millions suffering, Abraham Lincoln had delivered a speech free of golden biblical platitudes and plainly
said, "I myself am an atheist. I derive The Union origin from the 1774 Articles of Association, and for that cause your sons and fathers are waging this War"? He just might have lost the 1864 election.

[Gene C]

(12-17-2015 01:46 PM)maharba Wrote:  I wonder what might have taken place if

This is your lucky day, you don't have to wonder anymore.
Here's what would have happened...
Lincoln would have lost the nomination to Chase.
Chase would have lost the election to McClellan.
And today we would all be drinking out of Dixie Cups.

[maharba]

"When I left Springfield I asked the people to pray for me. I was not a Christian. When I buried my son, the severest trial of my life, I was not a Christian. But when I went to Gettysburg and saw the graves of thousands of our soldiers, I then and there consecrated myself to Christ. Yes, I do
love Jesus." - President Abraham Lincoln

I wonder what the reading of this one is on the Fehrenbacher
scale?

[RJNorton]

The quote is not included in the Fehrenbachers' book. From what I can tell this quote comes from The Lincoln Memorial Album—Immortelles. One entry is titled, "Reply to an Illinois clergyman." The clergyman is not named. IMO the Fehrenbachers would give this quote an "F" had they chosen to include it. My guess is that it is not included as the source is nameless.

I found the quote on p. 366 here.

IMO there is insufficient evidence to support this quote as being legitimate.

[Eva Elisabeth]

Wiki words it as follows:
"1865: Memory book
Following Lincoln's assassination a memory book, The Lincoln Memorial Album—Immortelles, in which people could write their thoughts includes some comments on Lincoln's religion. One entry, written by a well-known Presbyterian minister, the Rev. John H. Barrows, claimed that Lincoln had become a Christian in 1863 but provided no evidence..."[and then follows the said quote.]
I agree with Roger - I doubt Lincoln said this. While I do think there's reliable evidence he believed in (a probably Christian) God he never (reliably, to my knowledge) spoke of Jesus that way.

[My Name Is Kate]

Why is it that so many people who are atheists, argue their beliefs (or lack thereof) with an almost religious fervor? There may be no God (though I personally believe there is), but why in the world would anyone WANT for there to be no God? I'm no expert on Lincoln and practically all that I do know about him has been learned on this forum, but I see no evidence at all that he was an atheist. He may not have been a Christian either (belief in Christ as Savior), but he certainly did seem to have Christian values. Why not just leave it at that? Do you think that if Lincoln was an atheist, or that if Einstein was an atheist, or that if a certain number of the world's greatest thinkers could be proved to be atheists, that would prove there is no God? What is the point of arguing about it?