by David Barton
The condition of Jefferson’s private personal theology and Christian faith in his last years might be questioned, but what cannot be questioned is the fact that throughout his life, Jefferson was pro-Christian and pro-Jesus in his beliefs, demeanor, and public endeavors.
CONCLUSION
Thomas Jefferson: An American Hero
Our examination of historical primary-source documents has clearly demonstrated that the picture of Jefferson’s faith and morals painted by modern critics is definitively wrong. Any point his critics make might initially seem to be irrefutable, but once the rest of the story is told, reality emerges and truth can prevail. Thus, let us review the modern Jefferson lies.
1. DNA evidence has not proved that Jefferson fathered any children outside of his marriage to Martha. His moral reputation was attacked two centuries ago by enemies attempting to besmirch him during a presidential election, but the charges were groundless, not based on any fact. Jefferson, knowing that God knew the truth, regularly appealed to Him as his judge on this issue. He actually longed for the time when the Great Judge would not only clear him of any moral wrongdoing but also prove the accusations false. There is absolutely no historical, factual, or scientific evidence to tarnish the sexual morality of Jefferson. He therefore deserves to be listed alongside John Adams, Benjamin Rush, Roger Sherman, and so many other Founding Fathers whose reputations of moral purity remain untainted to this day.
2. Jefferson enjoyed a thoroughly religious education and was not responsible for instituting secular, religion-free education in any educational endeavor in which he was involved. Because he worked extensively to disestablish a state-approved denomination and to institute denominational nonpreferentialism, he therefore founded America’s first trans- or nondenominational university. He ensured that multiple Christian denominations would be an active part of university life and that Christian instruction and activities would definitely occur on campus.
3. Jefferson did not write a Bible, not of any kind. He did create two religious works about Jesus that were exactly what he titled them. The first was an abridgment of the New Testament for the use of the Indians and the second was a compilation of the moral teachings of Jesus for his own personal study and meditation. In both he included multiple references to the supernatural and miraculous. Jefferson was a supporter of organizations that widely distributed the Bible. He owned a number of Bibles that he personally used and studied, was a member of the Virginia Bible Society, and financially supported the printing of Bibles. He gave Bibles to younger family members, and the Bible was openly used in institutions he helped start or direct, from Washington’s public schools to the University of Virginia.
4. Jefferson was not a racist who opposed blacks and civil rights but rather was a lifelong unwavering advocate for emancipation. He was largely unsuccessful because of the state of Virginia in which he lived but it was not from a lack of effort or desire on his part. Had his efforts been undertaken in any state north of his own, he likely would be heralded today as one of America’s leading early civil rights advocates. He was regularly praised by subsequent generations for his civil rights efforts and was favorably invoked by numerous civil rights leaders, both black and white. Jefferson referenced religious beliefs and teachings as the basis of his views on emancipation and equality, repeatedly declaring that because God was just, He would eventually bring slavery to an end in America, one way or another.
5. Jefferson regularly incorporated religious activities into public settings and invoked the “separation of church and state” phrase only to affirm the historic understanding that the government had no authority to stop, inhibit, or regulate public religious expressions. He therefore called for days of prayer, introduced religious bills in the state legislature, signed numerous federal acts promoting religious groups and activities, and facilitated official churches in the US Capitol, Treasury Building, War Office, and Navy Yard. Were Jefferson alive today, he would undoubtedly be one of the loudest voices against a secularized public square.
6. Jefferson did not hate clergy, but he did repeatedly denounce the Period II clergy who participated in the unholy alliance of “kingcraft and priestcraft.” He similarly reprobated American clergy who supported “law religion” that sought the establishment of a particular denomination in a state. Such clergy viewed Jefferson as their enemy (and he, they), but clergy who sought denominational nonpreferentialism were outspoken advocates and supporters of Jefferson. Jefferson praised many clergy, wrote letters of recommendation for them, gave generously to their churches, and recruited them to run for political office. Jefferson was the hero of countless clergy and remained close friends with many of them throughout his long life.
7. Jefferson was not a secularist, deist, or atheist. He never wavered from his belief that God actively intervened in the affairs of men. He thus regularly prayed, believing that God would answer his prayers for his family, his country, the unity of the Christian church, and the end of slavery. And while he always called himself a Christian, he ended his life as a Christian Primitivist, being in personal disagreement with some orthodox theological tenets of Christianity that he had affirmed earlier in life, although still holding fast to many other traditionally sound theological tenets. But notwithstanding his own personal theological difficulties over specific doctrines, there never was a time in his life when Jefferson was not pro-Christian and pro-Christianity.
On none of these seven points was it difficult to establish truth. Each inquiry was answered by plentiful personal statements directly from Jefferson and those closest to him. Those multiple declarations resoundingly refute the modern lies about his faith and morals.
The reason that an investigation of Jefferson’s faith and morals was even necessary is the deplorable slip in accurate historical knowledge over the past half-century. We briefly touched on the five modern tools of historical malpractice in an earlier chapter:
1. Deconstructionism pours out a steady flow of negatives about traditional heroes, values, and institutions through sniping remarks, belittling criticism, and inaccurate portrayals. It poses “a continuous critique” to “lay low what was once high.”1 Consequently, even though Jefferson was venerated and honored for generations, today he is regularly attacked, belittled, and dismissed with pejorative epithets such as “rapist,” “deadbeat dad,” “vindictive racist,” “slave-owning, serial slave, sex addict,” and more.
2. Poststructuralism rejects absolutes such as God or truth, instead asserting that each individual must interpret history for himself, basing its meanings on one’s personal views rather than on objective standards. It encourages individual anarchy against traditional, national, unifying values and institutions, and citizens are made to be part of interest groups rather than allowed to stand individally. Hence, Jefferson is examined as an individual only in order to identify the group into which he should be placed, whether it is that of racists, Enlightenment writers, secularists, immoral slaveholders, Freethinkers, or any other.
3. Modernism examines historical incidents and persons as if they lived today rather than in the past, thereby separating history from its context and producing many flawed conclusions. Because it is certain that no state university today would include religious activities and classes for all its students, then it must have also been that way then, and so Jefferson’s views on education were definitely antireligious. Because religious expressions today must be separated from the public square, it must have been that way two centuries ago, and so Jefferson was clearly a secularist. Because clergy today do not attack candidates from the pulpit as was done then, Jefferson’s comments about the specific clergy who lied about him clearly indicate that he hated all clergy. Such are the suppositions of Modernism.
4. Minimalism unreasonably insists on oversimplicity and reducing everything to easy answers that don’t require thinking or analysis, condensing complex situations into one-line characterizations and squeezing historical individuals into preconceived, pr
eshaped molds they do not fit. Since Jefferson made some comments late in life rejecting specific tenets of Christianity, he is therefore deemed a lifelong atheist, so there is no need to investigate any of the complicated spiritual cycles through which he traveled or even to take note of the adverse effects of Christian Primitivism and Restorationism upon him. These are simply dismissed out of hand because they are too complex for popular consideration.
5. Academic Collectivism relies on the claims of “experts” rather than original documents as the standard for truth. It advances an incestuous system of peer review as the measurement for whether a historical fact is accurate or errant. Thus, modern professors quote each other in their declarations that the University of Virginia was secular and had no chaplain, that Jefferson hired only Unitarians to be its instructional staff, that Jefferson penned the first Amendment, and so forth, when in reality Jefferson’s own writings, documents of the university, and the testimony of original professors prove exactly the opposite.
The countless errors resulting from these five historical malpractices have so thoroughly infused modern textbooks, the Web, and popular knowledge that it has now become difficult for the average citizen to even discern when history is being misrepresented. But recognition is the first step to avoidance; that is, once one knows what the five tools are, it becomes much easier to spot them and avoid being caught in their errors.
Because early detection helps defeat an enemy, recognition training has always been a regular part of military preparation. For this reason, GIs in World War II were regularly grilled and tested on the identification of Axis tanks and planes so that they would be able to quickly spot and destroy enemy forces. Similarly, the reason animals are caught in traps is that they don’t recognize the snare into which they have stepped; once a beaver, wild hog, or any other animal learns to recognize the device, it is no longer effective. This is why 2 Corinthians 2:11 reminds us that if we can identify Satan’s traps, then he won’t have an advantage over us.
This same principle should guide our approach to the study of history: recognize and avoid the traps of historical malpractice. But once you recognize a trap, there is more. It is not enough simply to personally avoid the trap; it must also be exposed and removed so that others will not be injured. Thus, when a soldier discovers an IED, minefield, RPG, or weapons cache, he takes steps to neutralize and remove the danger so that no one else will be harmed by inadvertently stumbling into it.
The best means for overcoming the five modern historical traps is given in Romans 12:21, which instructs us to defeat the evil with the good—that is, not just to avoid evil ourselves but also to apply its antithesis, or its antidote, to neutralize the effect of its poison. For example, praise prevails over criticism, light over darkness, gentleness over anger, humility over arrogance, and so on. So what is the antithesis for each of the five poisons so often injected into American history today?
The effects and influences of Deconstructionism can be avoided by training oneself to search out the rest of the story and discover if there is a second view or whether there are positive aspects of the account that were omitted from the original portrayal. Of course, the negatives will always be easy to find, just as they were in Numbers 13 and 14 when ten of twelve leaders went into a land filled with milk and honey but came back talking only about its giants and problems. Joshua and Caleb demonstrated in that story that while the negatives are indeed present and cannot be ignored, the positives must also be pointed out: it was a vast, abundant, verdant land of prosperity and plenty just waiting to be entered. Identifying the negatives comes naturally; acknowledging the positives takes deliberate effort.
Thomas Jefferson understood this and therefore refused to let negatives prevail in his conversations. His grandson recalled learning this lesson directly from Jefferson.
He [my grandfather] spoke only of the good qualities of men, which induced the belief that he knew little of them; but no one knew them better. I had formed this opinion, and on hearing him speak very favorably of men with defects known to myself, [I] stated them to him; when he asked if I supposed he had not observed them (adding others not noted by me, and evincing [demonstrating] much more accurate knowledge of the individual character than I possessed), observing, “My habit is to speak only of men’s good qualities.”2
Especially in today’s Deconstructionist-dominated environment, it will always be easy to find (or concoct) negatives about any historical figure, but it will require deliberate effort to identify the positives that have been omitted. And omission is one of the most egregious but most effective tools of revisionists.
This point was brilliantly made by Dr. Paul C. Vitz, a professor at New York University. He was contracted to review history textbooks through a grant from the Department of Education and after examining those texts, he concluded:
Over and over, we have seen that liberal and secular bias is primarily accomplished by exclusion, by leaving out the opposing position. Such a bias is much harder to observe than a positive vilification or direct criticism, but it is the essence of censorship.3
In fact, he observed a strikingly aggressive secularist tendency among those texts:
And the facts are clear: religion, especially Christianity, has played and continues to play a central role in American life. To neglect to report this is simply to fail to carry out the major duty of any textbook writer—the duty to tell the truth.4
It is indeed the duty of those who present history to tell the truth—to tell the whole truth, not just a part of it. As John Adams explained:
[T]ruth and right are invariably the same in all times and in all places. . . . But passion, prejudice, interest, custom, and fancy are infinitely precarious [unstable]; if therefore we suffer our understandings to be blinded or perverted by any of these . . . we shall embrace errors.5
Very simply, when we don’t tell the whole truth but are “blinded or perverted” by passion or bias, then “we shall embrace errors.”
One of the best ways to find the complete story about an individual is not through a sterile academic study whereby one slice out of a complex historical life is extracted and analyzed under a modern microscope. Rather, the best means is by examining the full life, events, and writings of an individual.
In the case of Thomas Jefferson, one of the easiest ways to check his complete story is to read some of the earlier biographies about him, such as the 1858 three-volume set by Henry Stephens Randall. Even today, this work is still considered the most authoritative ever written on Jefferson, for Randall was the only biographer approved by the family and given full access to the family papers, records, family members, and family remembrances. Many other early biographies of Jefferson are also worth the read6 and are usually available for reading online or downloading, as is Randall’s work.7
In short, an antidote for Deconstructionism is to get the full story, especially the part that includes the good things. Lady Margaret Thatcher once wisely repeated the words of a great educator on this point.
Teach them [children] everything that is best in life—teach them all the good things our country has done—and you will find we shall get a very much better education.8 (emphasis added)
The remedy for the second device, Poststructuralism, is (1) to acknowledge individuality—to examine the person himself rather than the various groups and agents to which others are trying to attach him and (2) to recognize and acknowledge fixed and absolute overarching transcendent principles. For example, citizens are entitled to enjoy their God-given inalienable rights (as specified in the Bill of Rights) not because they belong to any particular group but rather because they are individual human beings. Someone does not receive the right of habeas corpus or religious expression or self-protection because he or she belongs to the majority or the minority, is black or Latino, is male or young. Rather, it is because those rights are bestowed on every individual by our Creator. Recognizing individuality is the approach that God takes: everyone is accountable
to God individually rather than as part of some group; God provides salvation to individuals not groups. So, too, good history focuses on an examination of the individual and not just his group.
And because Poststructuralism also encourages personal interpretation of history based on how one “feels” about the person or event, individual feelings must be set aside in the quest for truth. It really doesn’t matter how someone “feels” about Jefferson or whether or not they like him; what matters are facts and truth. As James Madison affirmed, “For what is the object of our discussion? Truth, sir—to draw a true and just conclusion.”9