Posted on 08/22/2005 7:59:14 AM PDT by dukeman
I guess if you believe that....its nice.
A good antidote to this is A History of the American People, by Paul Johnson.
History is SO DRY. Nobody raising the dead, no seas dividing, no pillars of flame, no walking on water. BOOOOOOOORING!
Interesting but flawed from the very beginning.The italicized line says more about Barton's own views than anything else.Start with the premise "One reason Bible history is interesting and American history is not...". Naturally, this is purely subjective.
I'd say if you find fantasy more interesting than historical fact, you're bound to find the Bible infinitely more interesting than American history.
Barton first reached prominence when he put together a piece called "America's Godly Heritage", which tried to make the case that the Founders and Framers intended for America to have a "Christian" government. He himself admitted that he was "inspired" to produce this piece, making his historical judgement questionable.
Later, some prominent historians challenged his work. It turned out that several key "quotes" he used to make his case could not be verified, making them most likely fictitious.
To his credit, he admits their unverifiabilty. Nevertheless, it proved him to be a sloppy historian.
Of course, some of these alleged "quotes" continue to pollute the debate on this topic.
-Eric
As for fantasy vs. fact, one of the things which grips me about Christianity is its solid foundation in factual history.
BTW, I like your Ben Franklin quote. What a great American!
And I suppose from your biting response -that you ignore the central point being made by the historian David Barton.
Our errant public schools have revised American history to
edit God-or the founders reliance on Scriptural authority
from our history books. Was not until long after I left the
sterile halls of American academia that I first heard an
unedited version of Ben Franklins speech of June 28,1787.
A speech that was once taught in public school.Years after that I wa senlightened that Webster in his History of the
United States taught a history closer to reality than I was taught back in the sixties in public school.
Thanks for posting. This is a very interesting article, and I have bookmarked it to check his references.
However, I have spent time checking Mr. Barton's references before and have never found an error. The Wallbuiders offer videos buttressing their contention that America's founders did NOT intend to build a wall between church and state in the manner in which it has been widely interpreted today.
Many people seem to find that concept threatening. Our town's librarians banded together in an attempt to keep the Wallbuider videos out of the local library -- not even allowing them there for discussion purposes. Their reasoning? The videos had not been reviewed by the New York Times and therefore were deemed "suspicious". I might add that there are 3 shelves of books and videos in our library on Satanism and witchcraft that are there for public perusal. But 2 little videos proposing the idea that some of the Founding Fathers may have been believing Christians were considered "too dangerous" and possibly "offensive".
The Library Board (I was President at the time) over-ruled the Librarians after careful review of he donated materials and the videos were allowed on the shelves. I haven't looked recently, but I would be willing to bet that they have been "lost" in the interim. The Board spent hours checking references and quotes used by Mr. Barton in production of the videos and could not find anything wrong in them.
Unlike so many other famous "historians" who appear regularly on the liberal talk show circuit? You know the ones I mean -- the ones who have made millions of dollars on their books and who later were convicted of plagierism, or worse?
No question, politically correct history is booooring. Back when I took an American history course, it consisted almost entirely of tarriffs, which as I recall had a habit of going up and down. As I also recall, it was bad for the country when they went up, and also bad when they went down. Afterwards I concluded that the writer of the text was a Marxist, who believed that cultural phenomena and individual behavior are nothing but an empty "superstructure" on the all-important base of economics.
The best way to learn American history is through good historical novels, by writers like Kenneth Roberts, Winston Churchill (the American novelist, not the PM), and the like, or simply through early novels that portray the everyday life of people in their times.
Tell that to a bunch of pre teens in Sunday School class as they squirm through it bored to tears.
God Bless
Following your link -- it appears to me that your "unverifiable" quotes all seem to have ample verifiability from contemporary sources, even if the original documents no longer exist. This is hardly in the same league as Doris Kearns Goodwin!
All that aside, even "unverifiable" material belongs where it can be compared to other sources and judged on the value of its content. Do we keep "Mein Kampf" out of our schools and libraries?
Oh, geesh. Is there ANY thread you crevo maniacs won't try to hijack?
It becomes flawed when he presumes to project his opinion on Americans in general, and thereafter treat that opinion as a fact in his thesis. His idea that Americans find Biblical history engaging,but American history not, is a flawed assumption from the start.
Read "the Fourth Great Awakening" and you will get taste of the major ways Christianity has defined our character.
This, by the way is not a new idea. The heavy, heavy influence of Religion on American society has always been known by the academics. They just won't write on the subject as they would be ostracized by their peers.
Every day archaeologists are uncovering more Biblical sites and proving that writings some regard as "myths" are actually accurate history. The same goes for the ancient Greek and Roman historians. Get on SunkenCiv's ping list, and you will be amazed at what you learn!
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