Tbc/Abraham Lincoln

This is a mere footnote for now until someone figures out how to integrate it into the too-brief main Abraham Lincoln article. I found this at [1]:

...Thanks to the devotion of his mother, Nancy, who died when he was quite young, and then his stepmother, Sarah Bush, Lincoln grew to regard the Bible as a foundational tool for life. Lincoln once said: "This great book [the Bible]...is the best gift God has given to man...But for it we could not know right from wrong."

...

Despite his Christian upbringing, Lincoln did not accept Christ as his Savior until later in life. While he governed the nation by many of the principles written in God's Word, he lacked a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. After the death of his son, Willie, Lincoln heard for the first time of Christ's personal love and forgiveness for each man and woman.

He wrote: "When I left Springfield, I asked the people to pray for me; I was not a Christian. When I buried my son—the severest trial of my life - I was not a Christian. But when I went to Gettysburg?, and saw the graves of thousands of our soldiers, I then and there consecrated myself to Christ."

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Seems to me the implications of this are that Lincoln began as a Deist (a widespread stance among the earlier Founders of the USA) and later became a Christian. – AnonymousCoward 200.255.83.xxx

I don't think so. Belief in the Bible is a poor correlation to deist beliefs. The God of the Bible is hardly depicted as a watchmaker. <>< tbc

Ok, after I wrote that I thought, no, that probably isn't the right way to say it. :-) But we normally call people who "believe in the Bible" without "believing in Jesus Christ" Jews. You could probably get a best-seller and maybe a spot on Oprah from trying to defend that position (not that I'm suggesting you actually hold it!). :-) – AnonymousCoward 200.255.83.xxx

Again I have to disagree. I think you'll find that Jews today don't talk in terms of "believing in the Bible" the way Christians do. Jews are deeply grounded in tradition. Furthermore, the range of beliefs of those who "believe in the Bible" is vast. Jefferson, for instance, made a lot of anti-Christian comments, but he also funded Christian missionaries to the Indians. Mark Twain said, "It ain't the parts of the Bible that I can't understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand."

(See [2] for one citation.) <>< tbc

Fascinating. I am glad to converse with you, even though we don't agree about everything. :-) (I didn't know that about Jefferson). And for what it's worth, why do you suppose Twain said that?