Chapter III: Fifteen Reasons Why the Bible Should Not Be in the School Room

I. _The Question of Religion Involved._ Those who want the Bible read in the public schools declare it to be the word of God. Now it either is such or it is not. If taught as the word of God, such teaching would be religious and therefore, as the courts maintain, unconstitutional. If taught as a human production, would the advocates of its use in the schools be so enthusiastic to place it there? As we have previously observed, the subject of religion cannot be eliminated from any study of the Bible. The result would be the dragging of it into the public school, where of all places it should not be. It would cause dissension, disagreement, and bad feeling and bring about the very thing we do not want to happen, the dividing of the children into religious groups or sects. The object of our schools above all things is to make the forthcoming citizens Americans, not to divide them into religious or national coteries. Let religion be taught in the churches and Sunday schools. If it is of any value its worth will be communicated from these places in the lives of those who attend them. If the churches, as many of them as we have, as great effort as they make to spread their teachings, and as much wealth as they possess, to say nothing of the power of God behind them, cannot make their good influence felt without encroaching upon the public secular school, we have a right to assume that they are valueless. The Rev. Joseph Parker, the eminent English clergyman, who was opposed to thrusting the Bible into the schools, said that to do so was a reflection upon the ministry. It implied that ministers are unable to do their own work and must call upon the schoolmaster to help them.

II. _The Age of the Bible._ A book written over two thousand years ago, in the infancy of the human intelligence, before the birth of scientific knowledge, has no place as a text book in the schools of the twentieth century. But, some will urge, are not other works of antiquity studied in the schools? True, but under these circumstances: They are used in higher education; they are used for a particular purpose, as, for instance, the study of the language, history, or habits of an ancient people; there are not the controversies or other objectionable features connected with their study that would follow the Bible. Why need we go to a book so old as the Bible for our ideals? Have we not them among ourselves? We think we have. We think our Abraham Lincoln a greater and a better man than Abraham of Ur of the Chaldees. We think our Ingersoll and our Webster were greater orators than Peter and Paul. We think Shakespeare, Byron, Burns, Moore, Shelley, and our own Longfellow were greater poets than the writers of the Psalms. We think Darwin knew more about biology, Herschel more about astronomy, Lyell more about geology, Mill more about logic and political economy, and almost any physician more about medicine and surgery than were known by Moses or any other man, real or imagined, who it is alleged wrote the Bible. We think that Herbert Spencer was a greater philosophical genius of all the biblical writers, and that Benjamin Franklin was a wiser and a cleaner man morally than was Solomon. We think that Edison has done more good in the world than did Ezekiel, and that Isaac Newton proclaimed greater truths than did Isaiah. We think that Buddha, Confucius, Manu, and Zoroaster taught as good systems of morals as did Jesus. If Jesus died to save the world, thousands have also died in behalf of or on account of Jesus so the debt has many times been repaid. If Jesus died in behalf of principles which he deemed to be good, so did Bruno, Savonarola, Legate, Wightman, Ferrer, and others too numerous to mention. Bible virtues of any real value are strictly human virtues to be found in all ages and climes, among all races and religions. Is it possible that for moral teaching we must revert to the book of a people who were so far behind their neighbors that except Saul and Jonathan they had “neither sword nor spear in the hand of any of the people”? (1 Samuel xiii, 22.) And a people who had no blacksmiths, but who “went down to the Philistines to sharpen every man his share, and his coulter, and his axe, and his mattock”? (verses 19 and 20). And a people who had no mechanics among them, but when their king wanted to build a house for himself had to send to a “heathen,” Hiram, king of Tyre, for masons and carpenters? (2 Samuel v, 11.)

III. _The Bible is not a book_, but a collection of books, written hundreds of years apart, and arbitrarily, in the midst of great and stormy controversy, gathered together in one volume. There was always a dispute as to what books should compose it. The Hebrew Bible contains thirty-nine books. The King James, or Protestant English, version contains sixty-six, while the Roman Catholic or Douay version in addition to these contains the Apocrypha, making in all seventy-two. These different factions of religionists respectively reject certain books the others accept. For a history of the controversies over what books should compose the Bible, see Davidson on “The Canon,” “An Introduction to the New Testament,” by the Rev. B. W. Bacon, D.D., of the Yale Divinity School, and the article on the Canon in the Encyclopedia Biblica.

IV. Unless used for the purpose of teaching some foreign language, any book studied in the public schools should be written in the English language, not in a foreign or a dead language. The Old Testament was written in the ancient Hebrew, practically a dead language at the beginning of the alleged Christian era. Many translations have been made, of which John E. Remsburg says, after speaking of the English versions, Wicliffe’s, Tyndale’s, King James’s, the New Version, and the Douay: “The foregoing are but a few of the numerous versions of the Bible, ancient and modern, that have appeared. Nearly every nation of Europe has had from one to a score. Luther’s version is nearly four hundred years old, and yet Germany has seventeen translations and consequently seventeen versions before Luther’s was published. England had many besides those named.”

V. The Bible should not be read in the public schools because so many false and unfounded claims have been made for it, claims that have been nullified by the conclusions of modern science and criticism and recent investigations and discoveries. These false claims are embodied in the popular teaching of the book. It is claimed, for instance, that the first five books of the Old Testament were written by Moses in the thirteenth century B. C.; that the four gospels of the New Testament were written by those whose names appear as the writers; that Paul wrote the fourteen epistles that bear his name, and fictitious claims are made for other books. In the face of modern scholarship, which has submitted the Bible to the same scrutiny and criticism to which other books have been submitted, all these claims have been proved false and unfounded. This is so clear that the orthodox churches have split over the situation, one party accepting the old or traditional view, and the other the modern or scientific.

VI. As Archdeacon Farrar has said, all parts of the Bible are not of equal value. The sixty-six books bound into one represent every variety of literature--poetry, fiction, mythology, drama, legend, tradition, and some things possibly historical. Yet the popular teaching of the books makes no distinction between them, and uncritically places all upon the same level and gives them the same value.

VII. The Bible should not be read in the schools because it relates as facts numerous miracles, wonders, and myths, impossible in the nature of things, as the established matter-of-fact experience of mankind proves, which bear upon their face the marks of ignorance, superstition, and fraud. In the ordinary course of life we laugh at such narratives and regard them only as fairy tales. Why, then, in the instruction of youth should we teach what we ourselves dismiss as the fictitious and absurd?

VIII. The history of man proves that he has been enlightened, happy, and prosperous to the extent that he has had a knowledge of Nature and her laws, and that ignorance, superstition, and misfortune have been the result of a lack of knowledge of, and the violation of, these laws. In other words, science has been the great enlightener and civilizer. Science today is the basis for judgment in all matters pertaining to the welfare of the human race. Science has been called classified knowledge, or as Professor Clifford has said, it is “organized common sense.” “The subject of science is the human universe; that is to say, every thing that is, or has been, or may be related to man” (Lectures and Essays, page 24, R. P. A. Edition). Science is progressive. It depends upon the continued advance of knowledge, is ever alert and critical, calls everything into question and accepts nothing as true without a preponderance of evidence. The Bible should not be read in the schools because the science it teaches is that of a primitive and a barbarous age. It was in accordance with the childhood of the world, when, as Lydia M. Child says, “In the childhood of the race men thought little and believed much, just as children do.” As a book in the schools, the Bible, with its flat earth, its metallic firmament, making the sun, moon, and stars as lanterns hung out to give light to the day and the night, is a mockery and a distortion in this age of the world. Its story of creation is a fairy tale only believable in an age of ignorance. Its story of the origin of man is childish, being on a par with similar myths of ancient peoples.

The Bishop of Oxford (England) has this to say about the teachings of these myths to children: “You can hardly exaggerate the disaster it has been to the education of children that they have been taught to associate with religion things about the creation, the flood, and the beginning of our race, which it was infallibly certain, when they grew up to read the literature of their time, they would find false and would reject as alien to the whole trend of the philosophy, science, and history of their time.” This statement, coming from a clergyman of such high standing, ought to be conclusive. We have neither the space nor the time to dilate upon the conflict between the Bible and science and the bitter struggle between religionists and the scientists. The story has been written by one of our greatest of historians, Andrew Dickson White, in his two large volumes entitled “The Warfare Between Science and Theology in Christendom.” It has been written by Draper in his “Intellectual Development of Europe” and in his “Conflict Between Science and Religion.” Read these works and see clearly the folly and the disaster of placing the Bible in the public schools. You will not then be surprised that religionists of the type of W. J. Bryan are now using their efforts to prevent the teaching of Evolution in our public educational institutions. It is only a revival of the old conflict between education and ignorance, between superstition and knowledge. The cause of it all has been the use of the Bible as a book of authority and teaching.

IX. The Bible has no place in the school room because it states as facts the grossest absurdities. It speaks of an ax swimming in the water (2 Kings vi, 5); it speaks of “an hundred and four score and five thousand” men who arose early in the morning only to find that “they were all dead corpses” (Isaiah xxxvii, 36); while we read in the ninth and tenth chapters of 1 Kings that Solomon had more gold and silver than there were in the world at that time; that the spies sent into Caanan “cut down from thence a branch with one cluster of grapes, and they bare it between two upon a staff” (Numbers xiii, 23); that “we saw the giants, and the sons of Anak, which came of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight” (verse 33), and that the rabbit chews its cud like the cow (Lev. ii, 6).

We will call the reader’s attention to the very absurd story of the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt, as shown by R. B. Westbrook, in his work, “The Eliminator: or Skeleton Keys to Sacerdotal Mysteries”; “The number of fighting men who marched out of Egypt is nowhere estimated at less than 600,000, and if this represents only one-fifth of the population, the latter must have reached 3,000,000. If we cut this down one-third, so as to be sure of our figure, we make it 2,000,000 souls. The number of the children of Israel who went into Egypt was seventy (Ex. i, 5). They sojourned in Egypt 215 years. It could not have been 430, as would appear from Ex. xii, 40. The marginal chronology makes the period 215 years, and there were only four generations to the Exodus--namely, Levi, Kohath, Amram, and Moses (Ex. vi. 16, 18, 20). How could these people increase in 215 years from seventy souls so as to number 600,000 warriors? It would have required an average number of 46 children to each father. The twelve sons of Jacob had between them only fifty-three sons. At this rate of increase, in the fourth generation there would have been only 6,311 males (providing they were all living at the time of the Exodus), instead of 1,000,000. If we add the fifth generation, who would be mostly children, the total number of males would not have exceeded 28,465.

“All the first-born males from a month old and upwards, of those that were numbered, were 22,273 (Numbers iii, 43). The lowest computation of the whole number of the people at that time is 2,000,000. The number of males would be 1,000,000. Dividing the latter number by the number of first born gives 44, which would be the average number of boys in each family, or about 88 children by each mother. Or, if where the first born were females the males were not counted, the number of children by each mother would be reduced to forty-four.

“Dan in the first generation had but one son (Gen. xlvi, 23), and yet in the fourth generation his descendants had increased to 62,700 warriors (Num. ii, 26), or 64,400 (Num. xxvi, 43). Each of his sons and grandsons must have had about eighty children of both sexes. On the other hand, the Levites increased the number of ‘males from a month old and upward’ during the thirty-eight years in the wilderness only from 22,000 to 23,000 (Num. iii, 39; xxvi, 62), and the tribe of Manasseh during the same time increased from 32,200 (Num. i, 35) to 52,700 (xxvi, 34).

“The whole population of Israel were instructed in one single day to keep the passover, and actually did keep it (Ex. xii). At the first notice of any such feast Jehovah said, ‘I will pass through the land of Egypt _this night_.’ The passover was to be killed ‘_at even_’ on the same day that Moses received the command.... After midnight of the same day the Israelites received notice to start for the wilderness. No one was to go out of his house till morning, when they were to take their hurried flight with their cattle and herds. How could 2,000,000 people, scattered over a wide district, as they must have been with their cattle and herds, have gotten ready and taken a simultaneous hurried flight at twelve hours’ notice?

“The Israelites, with their flocks and herds, reached the Red Sea, a distance of from fifty to sixty miles over a sandy desert, in three days! Marching fifty abreast the able-bodied warriors alone would have filled up the road for seven miles, and the whole multitude would have made a column twenty-two miles long, so that the last of the body could not have been started until the front had advanced that distance--more than two days’ journey for such a mixed company. Then the sheep and cattle must have formed another vast column, covering a much greater tract of ground in proportion to their number. Upon what did these two millions of sheep and oxen feed in the journey to the Red Sea over a desert region, sandy, gravelly, and stony alternately? How did the people manage with the sick and infirm, and especially with the seven hundred and fifty births that must have taken place in the three days’ march?” (pages 85, 86, 87.)

In addition to this we need say nothing of the story of the flood or other ridiculous Bible tales. The land of Caanan is described in the Bible as “a land flowing with milk and honey,” as a rich land, where gold and silver were as abundant as stones. We turn from this high sounding Jewish boast to the description of it as given by General Furlong, of the British army, who had marched over every mile of it:

“The area of Judea and Samaria is, according to the above authority, 140 × 40 = 5,600 square miles, which I think is certainly one-fourth too much, my own triangulation of it giving only 4,500, or a figure of about 130 × 35. I will, however, concede the allotment of 5,600, but we must remember that, as a rule, the whole is a dismal, rocky, arid region, with only intersecting valleys, watered by springs and heavy rain from November to February inclusive, and having scorching heats from April to September. Even the inhabitable portions of the country could support only the very sparsest population, and I speak after having marched over it and also a considerable portion of the rest of the world. In India we should look upon it as a very poor province; in some respects very like the hilly tracts of Mewar or Odeypoor in Rajpootana, but in extent, population, and wealth it is less than a small principality.”

Why should we place a book in the schools which teaches such falsehoods when all around us are the grand truths of Nature?

X. The Bible should not be read in the schools because it teaches oriental tyranny and kingcraft, against which our fathers fought and offered their life blood. “Fear God, honor the king” (1 Peter ii, 17). “Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; or to the governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praises of them that do well” (verses 13 and 14). “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God” (Romans xiii, 1). This is contrary to the principles of Americanism as taught by the founders of our republic, and has no place in the instruction of the young Americans of today in our public schools.

XI. As one of the most progressive nations in the world we have granted woman equal rights with man. The Bible should not be read in our schools because it teaches the subjugation, degradation, and oriental slavery of women prevalent in the age and country in which it was written. “Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children: and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee” (Genesis iii, 16). “Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands” (Col. iii, 18). “As the church is subject unto Christ so let the wives be subject to their own husbands in everything” (Eph. v, 24). “Let your women keep silence in the churches, for it is not permitted unto them to speak, but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law. And if they would learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home; for it is a shame for a woman to speak in church” (1 Cor. xiv, 34, 35). “Ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands.... For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection to their own husbands; even as Sarah obeyed Abraham calling him lord” (1 Peter iii, 1–6). “Let women learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over a man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression” (1 Tim. ii, 11–14). Modern civilization has bidden defiance to these words of Paul. We would ask the good W. C. T. U. ladies who are working to place the Bible in the public schools to ponder over these words of the apostle, as well as over many other biblical passages. We would call their attention to the despicable idea of marriage taught by Jesus in Matt. xix, 10–12, and by Paul in the seventh chapter of 1 Corinthians. In the Old Testament the father selects a husband for his daughter, and is allowed to sell her as a slave (Ex. xxi, 7). Let these ladies, who are the right bower of the priest and parson, read and think over this passage: “When a man hath taken a wife, and marries her, and it come to pass that she find no favor in his eyes, ... then let him write her a bill of divorcement, and give it in her hand, and send her out of his house” (Deut. xxiv, 1). Yet this is not quite so bad as the teaching of Jesus forbidding divorce at all except for the cause of adultery. Let them read and think of the following:

“Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will raise up evil against thee in thine own house, and I will take thy wives before thine eyes, and give them unto thy neighbor, and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight of the sun” (2 Samuel xii, 11).

“Their children shall be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses shall be spoiled and their wives ravished” (Isaiah xiii, 16).

“I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished” (Zech. xiv, 2).

“Let their wives be bereaved of their children and be widows” (Jer. xviii, 21).

Wherever the Bible speaks of woman, from the first chapter of Genesis to the last chapter of Revelation, its ideas are low and vile. Those ideas have no place in the school room and are unfit for the reading of children and young people anywhere. The late G. W. Foote once said that the day would come when it would be the proud boast of woman that she had never contributed a line to the Bible.

XII. The best thoughts of the best men, both Christian and non-Christian, at the present day are turned to the question of how to avert war, the curse of the world during the past ten years. The Bible should not be read in the schools because from cover to cover it teaches, commends, authorizes, and lauds the practice of men killing each other. The best evidence of this is the Bible itself. The word war occurs within its lids just two hundred and thirty-five times--threats of war, rumors of war, devastations of war. The following are a few of them: “The Lord is a man of war, the Lord is his name” (Exodus xv, 3); “He teacheth my hands to war” (1 Sam. xxii, 35). See also Psalms xviii, 34, and cxliv. “And thou shalt consume all the people, which the Lord thy God shall deliver thee, thine eye shall have no pity upon them” (Deut. vii, 16); “Of the cities of these people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save nothing alive that breatheth; but thou shalt utterly destroy them” (Deut. xx, 16, 17); “And they warred against the Midianites, as the Lord commanded Moses; and they slew all the males.... And the children of Israel took all the women of Midian captives, and their little ones, and took the spoil of all their cattle, and all their flocks and all their goods. And they burned all their cities wherein they dwelt, and all their goodly castles with fire” (Numbers xxxi, 10).

These passages are typical of the Old Testament. To quote further would be superfluous and wearisome. In the second chapter of Deuteronomy, fourth and eighth verses, we find a thorough justification for the marching of the Germans through Belgium in the late European war, an outrage against all international law and the established rules of justice which govern nations in their intercourse with each other.

Read the fourteenth chapter of Numbers and Deuteronomy ix, 23, and see why all of the children of Israel twenty years old and over were doomed to spend the remainder of their lives in the wilderness. Why? Because they refused to _war_ against the inhabitants of the land of Canaan. When the people told Jeremiah that they would go into Egypt where they would be free from war (Jeremiah xlii, 14), the Lord replied that war would also follow them there and that the sword “shall overtake you there in the land of Egypt, and the famine, whereof ye were afraid, shall follow close after you there in Egypt; and there ye shall die” (verse 16). When Israel and Syria were without a war for three years it was considered a matter worthy of special mention (1 Kings xxii, 1); and God gave Judah a special dispensation from war. Jesus said: “I came not to send peace but a sword” (Matthew x, 34). He said (Luke xxi, 24), “And they shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations.” “And he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one” (Luke xxii, 36). But, say some bibliolaters, he meant the “sword of the spirit!” Read, however, the fiftieth verse of the same chapter; “And one of them smote the servant of the high priest, and cut off his right ear.” With what did he do this, the sword of the spirit? And there still was war, even in heaven (Rev. xii, 7).

As Archdeacon Farrar well said, “The Bible is a barbarous book, written in a barbarous age for a barbarous people.” Do we want this book read in our public schools against the best thought, the highest learning and the most humanitarian views of this age? The people who advocate its reading there require watching.

XIII. The Bible should not be read in the public schools because it contradicts itself nearly two hundred times. We will give a few illustrations:

“And he said, _Thou shalt not see my face_: for there shall no man see me and live” (Ex. xxxiii, 20).

“_And the Lord spake unto Moses face to face_, as a man speaketh unto his friend” (11).

“And the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, _hearing a voice_, but seeing no man” (Acts ix, 7).

“And they that were with me saw indeed the light, and were afraid; but _they heard not the voice_ of him that spake to me” (xxii, 9).

Jesus said, “If any man hear my words, and believe not, _I judge him not_: for _I came not to judge the world_, but to save the world” (John xii, 47).

“For the Father judgeth no man; _but hath committed all judgment to the son_” (v. 22).

“And the anger of _the Lord_ was kindled against Israel, and he moved David against them to say, Go, number Israel and Judah” (2 Samuel xxiv, 1).

“And _Satan_ stood up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel” (1 Chronicles xxi, 1).

“The Jews therefore said unto him, _It is not lawful for us to put any man to death_” (John xviii, 31).

“The Jews answered him, We have a law, and _by our law he ought to die_” (John xiv, 7).

What women visited the tomb on the morning of the resurrection?

“The first day of the week cometh _Mary Magdalene_, early when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre” (John xx, 1).

“In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came _Mary Magdalene and the other Mary_ to see the sepulchre” (Matt. xxviii, 1).

“Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre.... It was _Mary Magdalene, and Joanna, and Mary the mother of James, and other women_” (Luke xxiv, 10).

At what time in the morning did they visit the tomb?

“At the rising of the sun” (Mark xvi, 2).

“When it was yet dark” (John xx, 1).

Where did Jesus first appear to his disciples?

“Then said Jesus unto them (the women) Be not afraid; go tell my brethren _that they go into Galilee_, into a mountain where Jesus had appointed them. And when they saw him they worshiped him; but some doubted (Matt. xxviii, 10, 16, 17).

“And they rose up the same hour, and _returned to Jerusalem_, and found the eleven gathered together, and them that were with them, saying, The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared unto Simon.... And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them” (Luke xxiv, 33, 34, 36).

Did the disciples know that Jesus would arise from the dead? According to Mark x, 32, 33 and 34, they did:

“And he took again the twelve, and began to tell them what things should happen unto him, saying, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem; and the Son of man shall be delivered unto the chief priests, and unto the scribes, and they shall condemn him to death, and shall deliver him to the Gentiles; and they shall mock him, and shall scourge him, and shall spit upon him, and shall kill him; _and the third day he shall rise again_.” Yet John xx, 9 distinctly says, “_For as yet they knew not the scripture, that he must rise again from the dead._”

Did John the Baptist know Jesus when he came unto him to be baptized? He did, according to Matt. iii, 13, 14: “Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him. But John forbade him, saying, _I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?_”

Yet John himself admits that he did not know him:

“_And I knew him not_: but he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the spirit descending and remaining on him, the same is he that baptizes with the holy ghost. And I saw, and bare record, that this is the Son of God” (John i, 33).

There is also another very material contradiction as to what the centurion at the cross said:

“Now when the centurion, and they that were with him, watching Jesus, saw the earthquake, and those things that were done, they feared greatly, saying, ‘_Truly, this was the Son of God_’” (Matt. xxvii, 54).

Luke gives an entirely different version:

“Now when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying, _Certainly this was a righteous man_” (xxiii, 47).

Are works necessary for salvation, or is faith alone sufficient? “Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified” (Galatians ii, 16). “If righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain” (21). “Therefore, we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law” (Romans iii, 28).

“But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead” (James ii, 20). “For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also” (26). “Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only” (24).

“And I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob by the name of God Almighty, _but by my name Jehovah was I not known to them_” (Exodus vi, 3). “_And Abraham called the name of the place Jehovah-jireh_” (Genesis xxii, 14).

These are but a few of the contradictions of the Bible, selected at random from hundreds.

XIV. The Bible should not be read in the public schools because it teaches, by direct commands, by the praise of them, by acknowledgment of their habitual use as a matter of custom, the taking of intoxicating liquors. Many of us may not believe the eighteenth amendment, as interpreted by the Volstead act, to be the best means of abrogating the evils of intemperance. All thinking men, however, believe that the use of alcoholic beverages, considering the evils that result therefrom, should be reduced to a minimum. The words “wines” and “strong drink” occur in the Bible about two hundred and forty times. Among these are to be found some passages condemning drunkenness. This is of no special moment, as no moral code in the world upholds intoxication, while the Mohammedan Koran distinctly condemns the use of alcoholic liquors and stands for total abstinence. In the Bible, total abstinence is commanded under special circumstances. For illustration, a Nazarite must not drink during the period of his separation. When that period is passed he may drink all he wishes. (See Numbers vi, 3, 20.) Jehovah said unto Aaron, in his official capacity as high-priest: “Do not drink wine or strong drink, thou, nor thy sons with thee, _when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation_, lest ye die” (Leviticus x, 9). Why? “That ye may put difference between holy and unholy, and between clean and unclean; and that ye may teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the Lord hath spoken unto them by the hand of Moses” (10, 11). He wanted his priests to be entirely sober when performing their priestly functions, and what employer does not? King Lemuel was taught by his mother, “It is not for kings, O Lemuel, it is not for kings to drink wine nor for princes strong drink: lest they drink and forget the law, and pervert the judgment of any of the afflicted” (Proverbs xxxi, 4, 5). Yet in the sixth and seventh verses is this imperative command as to other people: “Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine to those that be of heavy hearts. Let him drink and forget his poverty and remember his misery no more.”

Moses told the children of Israel: “Ye have not eaten bread, neither have ye drank wine or strong drink: that ye may know that I am the Lord your God” (Deut. xxix, 6). But this was in the wilderness, where no bread or liquors were to be had. But what does he say in the fourteenth chapter, twenty-sixth verse, after giving directions as to what is lawful to eat? “And thou shalt bestow that money for whatsoever thy soul lusteth after, for oxen, or for sheep, _or for wine, or for strong drink_, or for whatsoever thy soul desireth.” Jesus said, “Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine”--because it was wrong to do so? On the contrary, “until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God” (Mark xiv, 25). We admit such temperance passages as are to be found in Proverbs xx, 1, and in Isaiah v, 11. These refer strictly to the abuse, not to the moderate use of alcoholic liquors.

Let us now look at other passages where the use of intoxicants is not only commended but commanded. We have space to refer to but a few of them. “Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach’s sake” (1 Timothy v, 23); “Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart, for God now accepteth thy good works” (Eccles. ix, 7); “Corn shall make the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids” (Zech. ix, 17); “They shall plant vineyards and drink the wine thereof” (Amos ix, 14); “Wine maketh glad the heart of man” (Ps. xiv, 15); “Wine, which cheereth God and man” (Judges iv, 13); “In the holy place shalt thou cause the strong wine to be poured unto the Lord for a drink offering” (Num. xxviii, 7); “Honor the Lord with thy substance, and with the first fruits of all thine increase; so shall thy barns be filled with plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new wine” (Proverbs iii, 9, 10).

When God decided that the human race was so bad that he would have to drown everybody he selected one man and his family to be saved--Noah. Yet when the flood had subsided, and all returned to dry ground, Noah got drunk (Genesis ix, 20–24). When God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, he saved another drunkard, Lot. How this gentleman conducted himself while under the influence of wine would not make a very edifying subject for a Sunday school lesson (See Genesis xix, 30–38). David got drunk himself and danced before the ark in a state of nudity, after giving each of all the people “a flagon of wine” (2 Samuel vi, 14, 16, 19). Yet God said, “David ... a man after mine own heart, which shall fulfill all my will” (Acts. xiii, 22). God also gives David two other unqualified certificates of character (See 1 Kings xiv, 7, 8; xv, 5). When Solomon erected the great temple he gave his laborers “twenty thousand baths (nearly 17,500 gallons) of wine” (2 Chronicles ii, 10). Jeremiah, one of God’s favorite prophets, tempted the Rechabites, who were total abstainers, to drink (See Jeremiah xxxv, 2). Yet this same God on another occasion said, “Woe unto him that giveth his neighbor drink, that puttest thy bottle to him and makest him drunken” (Habakkuk ii, 15).

The first miracle of Jesus was the transforming of water into wine (John ii, 3–11), and in Luke vii, 33, 34, are these words: “For John the Baptist came neither eating bread, nor drinking wine; and ye say, He hath a devil. The Son of man is come eating and drinking; and ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and a wine bibber, a friend of publicans and sinners.”

Bible advocates of temperance sometimes quote the following passages from Paul, as evidence, to them, of Bible teaching of total abstinence.

“It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor anything whereby thy brother stumbleth, or is made weak.” (Romans xiv:21.)

Also, “Wherefore, if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the word standeth, lest I make my brother to offend.” (1 Corinthians viii:13).

It will be noticed in the first that _flesh_ comes before wine, while in the second, wine is not mentioned at all. When you read the context in both cases you will find that Paul is merely warning his hearers against meat offered to idols and that wine is only mentioned incidentally. But when you turn to 1 Timothy, v:23, Paul imperatively says, “DRINK NO LONGER WATER, BUT USE A LITTLE WINE FOR THY STOMACH’S SAKE, AND THINE OFTEN INFIRMITIES.”

When confronted by these texts and the facts which they carry, bibliolaters are driven to the entirely false and fictitious plea that Bible wine was not intoxicating, that it might drown but could not produce a drunk. We have no space here to discuss this makeshift. If the reader is interested and wishes to pursue the subject, we refer him to John E. Remsburg’s book, “The Bible,” pages 398–399; to the article on “Wine and Strong Drink,” in that monument of scholarship, “The Encyclopedia Biblica”; to that well-known orthodox work, Smith’s “Bible Dictionary,” and to “Religion and Drink,” by Rev. E. A. Wasson.

Under our liquor laws as at present interpreted a priest, preacher, or rabbi is permitted to purchase all the drink he desires for “sacramental” purposes, while a physician is limited in the amount he can prescribe for his patients. Why this unjust discrimination? If liquor is a bad thing, why is it made good in the “sacrament”? This is merely a trick common with the church to evade the force of the civil law, just as is its effort to force the Bible into the public schools. We, as citizens, protest against the unbridled fanaticism or base hypocrisy of these people, who deny to others the privileges they claim for themselves, then add insult to injury by trying to force upon the country by law a book which advocates, teaches, abets, preaches, and practices what they want by law forbidden.

XV. The entire idea under which they wish to place the Bible in the schools is wrong. Why glorify one book above another? Any book to be of service to a reader must be his servant, not his master. The real question is, not what does a book say, but what does it say in accord with the facts of life, nature, reason and experience? If a book answers that test it is not necessary to praise it eternally, to say nothing of asking special laws for its recognition. The idea has been well expressed by the poet Lowell in these words:

“Slowly the Bible of the race is writ,
And not on paper leaves or leaves of stone;
Each age, each kindred, adds a verse to it,
Texts of despair or hope, of joy or moan;
While swings the sea, while mists the mountains shroud,
While thunder’s surges burst on cliffs of cloud,
Still at the prophet’s feet the nations sit.”

No volume can be made large enough to contain this BIBLE, yet to it all other books must conform.

Transcriber’s Note

Some inconsistencies in spelling, hyphenation, and punctuation have been retained.

This file uses _underscores_ to indicate italic text and =equals= to indicate bold text. Small capitals changed to all capitals.

p. 8: added “in” after “belief” (Action or conduct indicating a belief in)

p. 12: changed “of” to “to” (on earth peace to men of good will)

p. 24: changed “depotism” to “despotism” (never rises above the merest despotism)

p. 24: changed “in” to “is” (Much less is Christianity or any other system)

p. 24: changed “almightly” to “almighty” (It is not almighty and we are not to look)

p. 31: changed “summonded” to “summoned” (The teacher, summoned as a witness)

p. 32: changed “ther” to “their” (put to death for participating in their production)

p. 41: “Wicliffe’s” left as-printed; this name has many variant spellings.

p. 46: changed incorrect citation “xl” to “xlvi” (Gen. xlvi. 23)

p. 61: changed “prohpet’s” to “prophet’s” and “nation’s” to “nations” (Still at the prophet’s feet the nations sit)