4
November 1646 A.D. Massachusetts
Bay Colony—Illegal to Deny Bible as Word of God
Graves,
Dan. “Illegal to Deny the Bible.” Christianity.com. Jul 2007.
http://www.christianity.com/church/church-history/timeline/1601-1700/illegal-to-deny-the-bible-11630114.html. Accessed 6 Jun 2014.
Suppose the U.S. Congress passed
a law making it illegal to deny the Bible as the Word of God? Today, the
Supreme Court would quickly rule that such a law is unconstitutional because it
violates religious freedom guaranteed by the First Amendment of the American
Constitution. But did you know that on this day, November 4,
l646, the little Massachusetts Bay Colony passed just such a law?
For the Puritans, who founded
the colony, and for John Cotton, one of their most prominent preacher-leaders,
it made sense for them to have a theocratic (God-directed) government in which
the laws ruling society were also the laws of God as found in the Bible.
Yet the Puritans did not
strictly combine church and state. They recognized that church and state had
different purposes--one was for the salvation of souls; the other
was for the preservation of society through justice. Both, however, had their
source in God, and both should look to the Bible as the source for standards,
direction, and guidance.
Most Puritans used the Geneva
Bible translation. Its preface summarized what the Bible meant by calling it
the "light to our path, the key to the kingdom of heaven, our comfort in
affliction, our shield and sword against Satan, the source of all wisdom, the food
for our souls, and the glass in which we see God's face."
For the Puritans, it was
unthinkable that the teachings of the Bible were meant to deal only with a
narrow religious sphere. They believed the Scriptures provided the rule and
guidance for all of life--government, economics, education, church, family, and
morals. And so, on this day, November 4, 1646 the
Massachusetts Puritans passed a law prohibiting their people from denying that
the Bible is the Word of God. The penalty for persistence in this error was
death. The same act also set a fine of five shillings for failing to attend
church on Sunday.
Bibliography:
2. Mead, Sidney E. "John Cotton" in Encyclopedia of American
Biography. Edited by John A. Garraty. New York: Harper and Row,
1974.
Last updated July,
2007.
No comments:
Post a Comment