Without God, there are no inalienable rights

[liblady]

If God is removed from the minds of the People, then the protection of inalienable rights is also removed. For then government determines what your rights are.

gov't already determined your legal rights.

 

[liblady]

This man wants us to believe that the Founders were delusional, and never said that our rights are inalienable because they come from God.



Next time you come to a debate on the Constitution or religion, Rat, make sure you don't come as a smart ass. The Creator they were talking about wasn't a pool of slush that bacteria grow in....it was God.

You shall not murder = the right to life

You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor's & You shall not steal = the right to property

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.

"I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me." = the right to liberty


You are really being intellectually dishonest, and disingenuous in your points. You think denigrating a religion is a good debate technique because you fear religion. Look up the words of the Founders who all believe only a religious people could have the moral backbone to maintain the kind of society we enjoy under the Constitution.

nice....equating a wife with "property".

 

[Ikari]

If God is removed from the minds of the People, then the protection of inalienable rights is also removed. For then government determines what your rights are.

Not quite true. There can be natural rights without the existence of gods. Natural rights are natural and can be discovered through thought; something innate to humans. Natural rights can exist without gods.

 

[ricksfolly]

If God is removed from the minds of the People, then the protection of inalienable rights is also removed. For then government determines what your rights are.

Belief in God has nothing to do with actual rights. Those are the responsibility of the Constitution, the Supreme Court, city courts, and established precedents.

ricksfolly

 

[OldDominionWhig]

Since you started this thread with...

If God is removed from the minds of the People, then the protection of inalienable rights is also removed. For then government determines what your rights are.

then further explain your position as...

...The levels of authority run this way..... God > the People > Constitution > Federal govt.

The removal of God from the equation still leads to the People > Constitution > Federal government and does not change you correct assertion that...

...the fed govt cannot take away [un]alienable rights, because the fed govt is the most subordinate of all.

Yes, all governments are subordinate to the people they derive power from, all people not just the faithful or any particular religious sect.

My belief of God putting me on this earth by his grace does not give me the right to claim my fellow man shall lose their unalienable rights if they choose not to share my faith or its precepts. The followers of Taoism, Buddhism, Hinduism, or any other religion (or atheists) are equally entitled to the unalienable rights declared by the founders of our nation.

Before it is said in rebuttal, yes the nation was founded on Judeo-Christian values, but the founders were also front row seat holders to the religious bigotry and oppression of the “old world” and I believe they strived to wipe that mentality off the face of the earth through the examples they put forth. I believe they demonstrated how one can be devoutly religious without trampling the religious freedoms (or absolute rejection of all religions) of those who do not think like or hold the same faith as oneself.

 

[American]

Belief in God has nothing to do with actual rights. Those are the responsibility of the Constitution, the Supreme Court, city courts, and established precedents.

ricksfolly

Wrong, liberals who are mostly atheists believe rights come from govt. They have already fallen into the trap of believing rights are alienable and subject to the whims for govt. Once you believe there is no higher power then man, rights are no longer in alienable.

 

[jujuman13]

The Bible can be used to justify anything. It contains verses that condone mass genocide, along with verses about sheltering and clothing the poor and orphans.

The Bible is an incompetent book for determining law, which is why we have separation of church and state. If the Bible were our only governance, then any action by authority could be justified.

I would rather have a secular government that can be overruled by some laws than a government that can commit any action with a Biblical citation, whether it be good or bad. The former is more answerable to the people, the second is only answerable to the whim of theocratic authorities.

God has no objective law here on earth that we can discern. We can only trust the free will and choices of people to determine our fate. Since the minds of people are flawed, we cannot trust them to interpret God's will for everyone.

The Old Testamount is little more than a history book.
The New Testament seeks to establish itself as the arbiter of the religion of Christianity.
Both books were written by man or if you prefer humanity.
God such as is described did not write anything.

 

[American]

"

The evidence of [the] natural right [of expatriation], like that of our right to life, liberty, the use of our faculties, the pursuit of happiness, is not left to the feeble and sophistical investigations of reason, but is impressed on the sense of every man. We do not claim these under the charters of kings or legislators, but under the King of Kings." --Thomas Jefferson to John Manners, 1817. ME 15:124

"Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath?" --Thomas Jefferson: Notes on Virginia Q.XVIII, 1782. ME 2:227

"A free people [claim] their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate." --Thomas Jefferson: Rights of British America, 1774. ME 1:209, Papers 1:134

"The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them." --Thomas Jefferson: Rights of British America, 1774. ME 1:211, Papers 1:135

"I sincerely pray that all the members of the human family may, in the time prescribed by the Father of us all, find themselves securely established in the enjoyment of life, liberty, and happiness." --Thomas Jefferson: Reply to Ellicot Thomas, et al., 1807. ME 16:290

Is there any question that the inalienability of our rights must come from a higher power then man?

 

[Jetboogieman]

Wrong, liberals who are mostly atheists believe rights come from govt. They have already fallen into the trap of believing rights are alienable and subject to the whims for govt. Once you believe there is no higher power then man, rights are no longer in alienable.

To say these rights come from god and no one else, dimishes the importance of the founding fathers. They came up with the ideas based on many different ideas such as John Locke and others.

THEIR belief in god, has nothing to do with whether these rights CAME from god.

I believe men have the capacity to come up with such ideas. And good ideas they were, and we hopefully are always trying to perfect them.

 

[spud_meister]

Wrong, liberals who are mostly atheists believe rights come from govt. They have already fallen into the trap of believing rights are alienable and subject to the whims for govt. Once you believe there is no higher power then man, rights are no longer in alienable.

wrong, liberal whom are mostly atheists believe rights come from the collective morals of the people, and are enforced by the government.

 

[Kernel Sanders]

The rights to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness are clearly not inalienable as evidenced by the many nations that take those rights away from their citizens. It's a nice catch-phrase but doesn't mean anything more than any other rights conferred by governments

 

[American]

wrong, liberal whom are mostly atheists believe rights come from the collective morals of the people, and are enforced by the government.

Thank GOD a liberal finally admitted to what we on the right have always know about the left. Thank you, thank you, thank you for confessing your belief such as you have.

 

[spud_meister]

Thank GOD a liberal finally admitted to what we on the right have always know about the left. Thank you, thank you, thank you for confessing your belief such as you have.

care to elaborate?

 

[American]

No, don't worry about it.

 

[spud_meister]

No, don't worry about it.

awwww please?

 

[molten_dragon]

Wrong, liberals who are mostly atheists believe rights come from govt. They have already fallen into the trap of believing rights are alienable and subject to the whims for govt. Once you believe there is no higher power then man, rights are no longer in alienable.

Our rights have never been inalienable in the way you seem to think they are. Our rights have always been maleable (all it takes is amending the constitution), and they can be taken away if we break the law. That's hardly 'inalienable'.

 

[American]

Our rights have never been inalienable in the way you seem to think they are. Our rights have always been maleable (all it takes is amending the constitution), and they can be taken away if we break the law. That's hardly 'inalienable'.

That is THE problem with the left. Not only do they believe that rights are given and taken by government, they also wish to go ahead and control them. That is why no liberal should ever be in power.

 

[OldDominionWhig]

"Is there any question that the inalienability of our rights must come from a higher power then man?

I am not sure you fully understand the definition of alienability, as an adjective it means the ability to transfer ownership from one party to another and has nothing to do with deity.

Nice how you excluded the words of Jefferson that do not support your argument.

"Man [is] a rational animal, endowed by nature with rights and with an innate sense of justice." --Thomas Jefferson to William Johnson, 1823. ME 15:441

"A free people [claim] their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate." --Thomas Jefferson: Rights of British America, 1774. ME 1:209, Papers 1:134

"Under the law of nature, all men are born free, every one comes into the world with a right to his own person, which includes the liberty of moving and using it at his own will. This is what is called personal liberty, and is given him by the Author of nature, because necessary for his own sustenance." --Thomas Jefferson: Legal Argument, 1770. FE 1:376

These and many more quotes from Jefferson are found at Jefferson on Politics & Government: Inalienable Rights

 

[molten_dragon]

That is THE problem with the left. Not only do they believe that rights are given and taken by government, they also wish to go ahead and control them. That is why no liberal should ever be in power.

Apparently the problem with the right is that you don't live in reality. There is nothing about our rights that is inviolable. They are changeable, and can be taken away. That's simply the way things are.

Now, I agree that our rights aren't 'given' by the government. They are outlined in the constitution, but the constitution can be changed, ergo our rights can be changed. The government CAN and DOES take away the rights of people that break the law. They can fine you (taking away your right to property), they can imprison you (taking away your right to liberty), and they can even kill you (taking away your right to life).

I suppose you could say that a person serving life in prison still has a right to liberty, but if no one else is willing to act to recognize or protect that right, it means diddly squat. It's just a word then. Like I said earlier, if there is a god, he does not appear to take actions to protect or recognize the rights of human beings, therefore, rights are absolutely meaningless unless recognized and protected by other human beings.

As far as controlling rights is concerned, you're damn right I want to control what my rights are. The fact that you don't want any control over what your rights are seems very odd to me.

 

[mac]

If God is removed from the minds of the People, then the protection of inalienable rights is also removed. For then government determines what your rights are.

We can recognize inalienable rights independent of a belief in God. All we have to do is raise the value of humanity in our own minds and understand that there are rights no human can take from another without cause and due process of law.

 

[prrriiide]

This man wants us to believe that the Founders were delusional, and never said that our rights are inalienable because they come from God.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed."

Next time you come to a debate on the Constitution or religion, Rat, make sure you don't come as a smart ass. The Creator they were talking about wasn't a pool of slush that bacteria grow in....it was God.

You know, the same guy that wrote that also wrote this:

"The rights of conscience we never submitted, we could not submit. We are answerable for them to our God. The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg . . . . Reason and free inquiry are the only effectual agents against error." - Thomas Jefferson, Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom

LINK

And if you further take the time to parse out the sentence minutiae, you see that he said "by their Creator." NOT necessarily Jefferson's God or your God. If someone at the time believed that they were created by a pool of slush, then in Jefferson's eyes, that was their Creator. Jefferson believed to his core that it was not his place to determine that. It was only for the eyes of the person in question to determine FOR THEMSELVES who their Creator was or is.

Further, you emphasize the phrase "self-evident." You might want to ponder on the meaning of self-evident. That is, a meaning or concept is revealed on the face of the evidence at hand. The very phrase "self-evident" tends to negate any input from a supreme being. These truths are self-evident - meaning that we don't NEED a supreme being to grasp the concept or meaning of the truths referenced. If a supreme being were necessary to see them, the phrasing might have been along the lines of "having been revealed the truth by Him which I chuse to call God..." But it isn't phrased that way. The truths are self-evident. Meaning that they can stand alone, with no other supporting evidence or testimony necessary.

In addition, if you are going to quote either the Bible or the Declaration of Independence, you can't cherry-pick. Not only did Jefferson write the aforementioned passage in the DoI, he also wrote in that same document (em):

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

The term "nature's God" was a hallmark of the Deist philosophy at the time. Many of the Founding Fathers were NOT dogmatic Christians. They were Deists. Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, James Madison, and Thomas Paine were all deists. Thomas Paine wrote The Age of Reason, which helped to polularize and spread deism throughtout America and Europe at the time. The last sentence of the DoI:

And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

Here again, we see a term that is a hallmark of Classical Deism. Classical Deists believed that although God was the Creator, he did not intervene in the day to day operations side of the business. That he left to humans. Divine Providence was seen as the act of the Creator in giving humans reason and intellect necessary to solve the problems that they encountered, from irrigating fields to breaking away from tyrranical regimes.

In short, Jefferson's views (at the time the DoI was written; he later altered his beliefs) were that yes, there is a Creator. No, he doesn't work miracles, no he doesn't give divine inspiration, and no he doesn't play in the affairs of humans other than to give them the reason and intellect to see those affairs through to their natural conclusion. His view was that because the Creator (nature's God) gave humans reason and intellect, humans could see that the truths described in the DoI - that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness - were self-evident. They were an outgrowth of the intellect and reason bestowed upon them by the Creator, but were not bestowed by the Creator directly.

 

[prrriiide]

I question people who can't find any rights in the Bible. Try the Ten Commandments to start, then read about who set those commandment. Life and property are easily found in those commandments. I'm not here to do your research for you.

It might be instructive here to compare and contrast the Ten Commandments with the Code of Ur-Nammu, which pre-dates the Ten Commandments by about 900 years (according to Rabbinical dating) or 1700 years (according to contemporary Biblical scholars). Ur-Nammu founded the 3rd Sumerian Dynasty of Ur in southern Mesopotamia. The Code of Hammurabi of Babylon is also instructive. It pre-dates the Ten Commandments by about 500 years (rabbinical) or 1300 years (biblical).

I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; 3 Do not have any other gods before me. 4 You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents, to the third and the fourth generation of those who reject me, 6 but showing steadfast love to the thousandth generation of those who love me and keep my commandments.

The ancient Mesopotamians were a polytheistic culture, so there is no analogy in the Codes. There are prologues to both which list a ponoply of gods responsible for the kingships of Ur-Nammu and Hammurabi.

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.

Again, there is no direct analogy to this in the Codes.

Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. 9 For six days you shall labour and do all your work. 10 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. 11 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.

These first three commandments are entirely geared towards Mosaic Law, and as such don't really translate to the Mesopotamian belief structure. Since the Mesopotamian model pre-dates the Mosaic one, we have to assume that this is the part of the Law that makes Judaism different from Mesopotamian religion (establishing a monotheism, and setting aside a special time to honor that God).

Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

The Code of Ur-Nammu makes no such parental references, but the Code of Hammurabi is rife with them:

Law 157: If any one be guilty of incest with his mother after his father, both shall be burned.
Law 192: If a son of a paramour or a prostitute say to his adoptive father or mother: "You are not my father, or my mother," his tongue shall be cut off.
Law 194: If a man give his child to a nurse and the child die in her hands, but the nurse unbeknown to the father and mother nurse another child, then they shall convict her of having nursed another child without the knowledge of the father and mother and her breasts shall be cut off.
Law 195: If a son strike his father, his hands shall be hewn off.

There are many, many other references to the nature of parent-child relationships, most of them dealing with financial and inheritance matters.

You shall not murder.

First law, Code of Ur-Nammu:

1. If a man commits a murder, that man must be killed.

You shall not commit adultery.

Code of Hammurabi:

Law 129: If a man's wife be surprised (in flagrante delicto) with another man, both shall be tied and thrown into the water, but the husband may pardon his wife and the king his slaves.
Law 130: If a man violate the wife (betrothed or child-wife) of another man, who has never known a man, and still lives in her father's house, and sleep with her and be surprised, this man shall be put to death, but the wife is blameless.
Law 155: If a man betroth a girl to his son, and his son have intercourse with her, but he (the father) afterward defile her, and be surprised, then he shall be bound and cast into the water (drowned).

6th & 7th laws, Code of Ur-Nammu:

6. If a man violates the right of another and deflowers the virgin wife of a young man, they shall kill that male.
7. If the wife of a man followed after another man and he slept with her, they shall slay that woman, but that male shall be set free.

You shall not steal.

Code of Hammurabi:

Law 6: If any one steal the property of a temple or of the court, he shall be put to death, and also the one who receives the stolen thing from him shall be put to death.
Law 8: If any one steal cattle or sheep, or an ass, or a pig or a goat, if it belong to a god or to the court, the thief shall pay thirtyfold; if they belonged to a freed man of the king he shall pay tenfold; if the thief has nothing with which to pay he shall be put to death.
Law 21: If any one break a hole into a house (break in to steal), he shall be put to death before that hole and be buried.
Law 22: If any one is committing a robbery and is caught, then he shall be put to death.
Law 25: If fire break out in a house, and some one who comes to put it out cast his eye upon the property of the owner of the house, and take the property of the master of the house, he shall be thrown into that self-same fire.

Second Law, Code of Ur-Nammu:

2. If a man commits a robbery, he will be killed.

You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

Code of Hammurabi:

Law 2: If any one bring an accusation against a man, and the accused go to the river and leap into the river, if he sink in the river his accuser shall take possession of his house. But if the river prove that the accused is not guilty, and he escape unhurt, then he who had brought the accusation shall be put to death, while he who leaped into the river shall take possession of the house that had belonged to his accuser.
Law 3: If any one bring an accusation of any crime before the elders, and does not prove what he has charged, he shall, if it be a capital offense charged, be put to death.

14th, 28th, and 29th Laws, Code of Ur-Nammu:

14. If a man accused the wife of a man of adultery, and the river ordeal proved her innocent, then the man who had accused her must pay one-third of a mina of silver.
28. If a man appeared as a witness, and was shown to be a perjurer, he must pay fifteen shekels of silver.
29. If a man appears as a witness, but withdraws his oath, he must make payment, to the extent of the value in litigation of the case.

You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.

Apparently the Mesopotamians and Babylonians weren't concerned with covetousness, and due to their polytheism graven images were de rigeur. However...

Your use of the Ten Commandments as an example of why there are no inalienable rights without God (in the Judeo-Christian sense) falls far short. The Code of Ur-Nammu and Hammurabi pre-date the Ten Commandments by several centuries (more than a millenia, in the case of Biblical scholar dating). As far as who set the Ten Commandments, it is up to the individual as to whether they believe God Himself carved them in stone or not. But the fact of the matter is that most of the principles laid out in those commandments were not original, nor were they likely unknown to the children of Isreal.

Indeed, the New Kingdom Dynasties of ancient Egypt (of which the Pharohs of Moses - Thutmose III [the Pharoh of the oppression], and Amenhotep II [the pharaoh of the Exodus] were part) held many of the tenets of the Ten Commandments in their laws. The death penalty was granted for murder, treason, robbery of the royal tombs, perjury (bearing false witness) and judicial bribery. Theft was punishable by fine of 2-3 times the value of the good stolen from a person, and 80-100 times the value when taken from the state (Pharoh). Adultery was punishable by a thousand strokes of the rod for a man, and amputation of the nose for a woman.

Now...and this is important to your argument...IF one declares that the Ten Commandments spell out the basis for the inalienable rights of the DoI and therefore are not available without the presence of the Judeo-Christian God, how, then do you account for a presence of those concepts that pre-dates the Ten Commandments by over a millenia in some cases and in absentia knowledge of the Judeo-Christian God to those who codified those concepts into ancient law?

 

[CriticalThought]

Did people seriously spend 8 pages debating a consequences of beliefs fallacy?

Let's consider the facts.

1. If God does exist, then inalienable rights couldn't exist without God because nothing could exist without God.
2. If there isn't a God, then clearly inalienable rights do exist because humans still managed to conceive them without a God.

Therefore, the real question of this thread is not whether inalienable rights would exist if there was no God, but whether humans would still consider them "inalienable" if they determined there was no God. The thread title suggests that failure to believe in God results in no inalienable rights. That is an appeal to the consequences of beliefs fallacy. If people determined there was no God, it would not necessarily mean that they would cease to believe that some rights are inalienable.

It is simple logic.

Of course, the sad thing is that the OP is demonstrating a lack of faith with this thread. He is more or less arguing that even if there is no God, the illusion of a God must be perpetuated in order to justify the argument of inalienable rights.

 

[tlmorg02]

I think people need to read more about the Founders before idolizing them as Christian heros. Most of them questioned whether God existed at all.

 

[mac]

I think people need to read more about the Founders before idolizing them as Christian heros. Most of them questioned whether God existed at all.

Most Christians do, at some point in their life or another. So what? Nearly every one of the founding fathers has some writing of some sort on the issue and all at least allude to being Christian. That's not to say that I believe that we're a Christian Nation because the founding fathers were Christians, but nor do I feel that calling into question their religious beliefs serves any purpose either.