I have heard a third “religion” espoused, one that was the assumption of the founders of the United States. Not that man was good or bad, just that man is weak.
Throughout our constitution, this idea is reflected in the subdivision of power, the difficulty of creating new laws, and a clear list of rights the government shall leave alone, as they are natural, not given or taken away by government.
They knew that the constitution was not perfect, that it was written by imperfect men, not by heaven, and would need to be changed by imperfect men for changing times. They knew that there were good men and that there were bad men, but the vast majority are between the two.
Left to our own devices, most men are seldom bad. But when tempted, it is all too easy for the vast majority to become corrupted. But this as well is not a permanent state of being, except for the truly evil few.
Even abhorrent practices like slavery were rationalized as taking people from a truly evil state in Africa, and redeeming them with some education and religion. Alcohol prohibition was a foolish effort to make weak men good (possibly the war on drugs as well).
A standing army was hated and feared until WWII, because it might be used against the people by a weak willed tyrant. And isolationism was seen as protecting America from the iniquity found in the rest of the world.
Bad men, like Bill Clinton, have long proclaimed their goodness, yet can only be seen through the lens of weakness. Good men who likewise truly wanted to be good, have been so pressured by the expectations of goodness that they become corrupt, like Jimmy Swaggart. Likewise, to be seen through the lens of weakness.
Click my screen name and scroll down to “Emory Report” for the background on America’s founding principles.
America’s Framers held the biblical worldview that man is not _basically_ good.
The caution, “Caveat Emptor” (”Let the buyer beware”) isn’t borne from a belief in the basic goodness of ones fellow man.
I think the Temperence folks underestimated the strength of that weakness.
Man has always had a choice, even in the Garden.