John21
10-22-2006, 01:38 AM
...It [the Jefferson Bible] is a document in proof that I am a real Christian, that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus, very different from the Platonists, who call me infidel and themselves Christians and preachers of the gospel, while they draw all their characteristic dogmas from what its author never said nor saw. (Jefferson)
Description in a letter to John Adams:
In extracting the pure principles which he taught, we should have to strip off the artificial vestments in which they have been muffled by priests, who have travestied them into various forms, as instruments of riches and power to themselves. We must dismiss the Platonists and Plotinists, the Stagyrites and Gamalielites, the Eclectics, the Gnostics and Scholastics, their essences and emanations, their logos and demiurgos, aeons and daemons, male and female, with a long train of … or, shall I say at once, of nonsense. We must reduce our volume to the simple evangelists, select, even from them, the very words only of Jesus, paring off the amphibologisms into which they have been led, by forgetting often, or not understanding, what had fallen from him, by giving their own misconceptions as his dicta, and expressing unintelligibly for others what they had not understood themselves. There will be found remaining the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man. I have performed this operation for my own use, by cutting verse by verse out of the printed book, and arranging the matter which is evidently his, and which is as easily distinguishable as diamonds in a dunghill.
Article from Harper's titled "Jesus Without The Miracles - Thomas Jefferson's Bible" (http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/2005/Jesus-Without-Miracles1dec05.htm)
Link to full-text version (http://www.angelfire.com/co/JeffersonBible/)
The editor suggests that The Jefferson Bible be read as Thomas Jefferson intended, without even thinking about what was left out or moved from one place to another. His purpose was to present a code of morals, suitable for instruction in ordinary living, not a code of religious dogmas and supernatural beliefs. It is the editor's hope that readers of The Jefferson Bible will be better able to appreciate the strikingly sublime ethical philosophy of Jesus when his words are separated from the other doctrinal issues, and that they will be able to agree with Jefferson that these "doctrines of Jesus are simple and tend all to the happiness of man."
Description in a letter to John Adams:
In extracting the pure principles which he taught, we should have to strip off the artificial vestments in which they have been muffled by priests, who have travestied them into various forms, as instruments of riches and power to themselves. We must dismiss the Platonists and Plotinists, the Stagyrites and Gamalielites, the Eclectics, the Gnostics and Scholastics, their essences and emanations, their logos and demiurgos, aeons and daemons, male and female, with a long train of … or, shall I say at once, of nonsense. We must reduce our volume to the simple evangelists, select, even from them, the very words only of Jesus, paring off the amphibologisms into which they have been led, by forgetting often, or not understanding, what had fallen from him, by giving their own misconceptions as his dicta, and expressing unintelligibly for others what they had not understood themselves. There will be found remaining the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man. I have performed this operation for my own use, by cutting verse by verse out of the printed book, and arranging the matter which is evidently his, and which is as easily distinguishable as diamonds in a dunghill.
Article from Harper's titled "Jesus Without The Miracles - Thomas Jefferson's Bible" (http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/2005/Jesus-Without-Miracles1dec05.htm)
Link to full-text version (http://www.angelfire.com/co/JeffersonBible/)
The editor suggests that The Jefferson Bible be read as Thomas Jefferson intended, without even thinking about what was left out or moved from one place to another. His purpose was to present a code of morals, suitable for instruction in ordinary living, not a code of religious dogmas and supernatural beliefs. It is the editor's hope that readers of The Jefferson Bible will be better able to appreciate the strikingly sublime ethical philosophy of Jesus when his words are separated from the other doctrinal issues, and that they will be able to agree with Jefferson that these "doctrines of Jesus are simple and tend all to the happiness of man."