Paul Brandon wrote:
At 1:02 PM -0500 12/13/04, Dennis Goff wrote:
I only skimmed the interview, but it appears that Flew has become a deist much in the model of Thomas Jefferson.
I hope not.
Jefferson was a very 'soft' Deist who believed that Jesus, while not
himself divine, was divinely selected (see Jefferson's Bible).
This is not consistent with true 'wind-it-up-and-let-it-run' Deism.
My understanding is that the "softness" was a product mainly of Jefferson's *public* statements about religion (the man had a political repuatation to defend, after all, no les so than today's politicians). His private beliefs (though variably expressed) seem to have praised Christian ethics, but not to have included a robust form of divinity (except in a vague Enlightenment "glory of nature" form) much at all.
--
Christopher D. Green
Department of Psychology
York University
Toronto, ON M3J 1P3
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