Was Benjamin Franklin a Christian?

[jumuhamd]

I've always heard that Benjamin Franklin was either an atheist or a deist, but a friend just sent me a link to a video clip claiming that he was a Christian. The video presents 8 quotes of Franklin claiming to believe in Christ. Does anyone know if these quotes are legitimate or if they are taken out of context?

Here's the link to the video that I received: http://youtu.be/1Ac4HHKtETA

[abaris]

"Lighthouses are more helpful than churches."

"He (the Rev. Mr. Whitefield) used, indeed, sometimes to pray for my conversion, but never had the satisfaction of believing that his prayers were heard." Franklin's Autobiography

"In the affairs of the world, men are saved, not by faith, but by the want of it."

"Some volumes against Deism fell into my hands. They were said to be the substance of sermons preached at Boyle's Lecture. It happened that they produced on me an effect precisely the reverse of what was intended by the writers; for the arguments of the Deists, which were cited in order to be refuted, appealed to me much more forcibly than the refutation itself. In a word, I soon became a thorough Deist."

"I have found Christian dogma unintelligible. Early in life, I absenteed myself from Christian assemblies."

[Jenny A]

I don't think Franklin was a Christian in the ordinary sense of the word, though like any well educated western man on his time period he was well versed in scripture. You can come up with quotes in which Franklin said the Christian doctrine was absurd, as well as quotes about religion providing a good moral foundation. And what he believed seems to have varied over his lifetime. But, I don't think he even could have recited the Nicene Creed with exact truthfulness.

He did publicly pray, and he referred often to the creator. And I don't think he was what we mean by deist today. That is that he certainly either believed or wanted to believe in a god that was interested in mankind. And he thought a lot of the moral philosophy of Jesus.

This letter to an atheist is telling: Letter to an Atheist


He doesn't condemn the man's reasoning but he does warn of what men unbound by religion might do.

[Cato]

Anyone sincerely interested should read his autobiography. Free at The Gutenberg Project: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20203

Also, this is taken from his letter to Ezra Stiles a month before his death:

Here is my Creed: I believe in one God, Creator of the Universe. That He governs it by his Providence. That he ought to be worshipped. That the most acceptable Service we can render to him, is doing Good to his other Children…. I think the System of Morals [devised by Jesus] and his Religion as he left them to us, the best the World ever saw, or is likely to see; but I apprehend it has received various corrupting Changes, and I have with most of the present Dissenters in England, some Doubts as to his Divinity.

[FatAndFaithless]

An interesting take on it. http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/ser...fs/1014592

If you can consider him a Christian, he was one of the most watered down Christians possible, even to the point of not really believing Jesus was divine at all.

[Drich]

The declatation of his acknoweledgement (in the various links provided) of God makes Him a deist not an atheist.

[jumuhamd]

"I have found Christian dogma unintelligible. Early in life, I absenteed myself from Christian assemblies."

BTW, your last quote is known to be spurious. It's from the 1980's book Toward the Mystery by William Edelen.

Do you have any information on the quotes that were cited in the video?

[FatAndFaithless]

The declatation of his acknoweledgement (in the various links provided) of God makes Him a deist not an atheist.

Right, as were many of the founding fathers.

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Do you have any information on the quotes that were cited in the video?

Dude, try googling it yourself, we aren't a search engine.

[Alex K]

I find many American's treatment of the founding fathers as some kind of messianic figures, whose intentions were magical, mildly amusing. Of course it is nice to have some sort of reference frame to point to, but damn it, who cares what they thought and believed? Does anyone find democratic principles, secularism, the constitution to be persuasive because some old farts said so? What if it turned out that Hitler of all people was secretly ghost writing the bill of rights as a joke (*)? It would make no difference at all.


(*) anachronism used on purpose to heighten drama

[Napoléon]

I find many American's treatment of the founding fathers as some kind of messianic figures, whose intentions were magical, mildly amusing. Of course it is nice to have some sort of reference frame to point to, but damn it, who cares what they thought and believed? Does anyone find democratic principles, secularism, the constitution to be persuasive because some old farts said so? What if it turned out that Hitler was secretly ghost writing the bill of rights as a joke? It would make no difference at all.

Indeed, it's the values that are important, not the people who preach them.