p. 6 | Note and Comment by Editor

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 22, 1907

Note and Comment

By Editor

An inconsistent or untrue position necessarily involves the development of peculiar arguments to sustain it. We see this illustrated continually in the arguments put forward in the attempt to prove this to be a Christian nation. In one of these “proofs” put forward by the editor of the Home Herald occurs the following:—

Not only is Christianity recognized as our national religion, but Christian institutions are recognized and defended.

In Turkey there are certain Christian institutions that are recognized as such by the Turkish government, and are defended as well as that government has power to defend them. Therefore Turkey also must be a Christian nation. There are certain Christian institutions in Persia, recognized as such by the Persian government, and defended by the organized power of the realm. Therefore Persia also has joined the list of Christian nations—if the argument holds, Japan is now a model defender of the Christian institutions established within her jurisdiction. The Israelites of old asked, “Is Saul also among the prophets?” So might we ask, Is Japan also among the Christian nations?

This argument is no more peculiar, however, than another used with the same end in view in the same article. We read:—

The verdict of the Supreme Court of Arkansas, in Shover versus the State, 10 English, 263, may be found duplicated in court decisions of nearly all the States. In that case the court said: “Sunday, or the sabbath, is properly and emphatically the Lord’s day, and is one among the first and most sacred institutions of the Christian religion. This system of religion is recognized as constituting a part and parcel of the common law, and as such, all the institutions growing out of it, or in any way connected with it, are entitled to the most profound respect, and can rightfully claim the protection of the lawmaking power of the State.”

Now the Supreme Court of Arkansas has no right to set apart a sabbath to Jehovah. Neither has the Supreme Court of any other State or of the United States. To do so is to dictate to the Almighty. But because the Supreme Court of that State has done so—has put itself in the place of God, telling him what he must receive in the nature of a Sabbath, and telling the people what they must render to him in the way of Sabbatic observance—that presumptuous act is put forth as an argument to prove that this is a Christian nation. It would have been an act of modesty as well as of judicial wisdom for even so august a body as the Supreme Court of Arkansas to let the Lord select the day which he would designate as his, and to let him tell us what day that is. In defiance of these principles, however, the court names the day, and because it does so, its action proves this nation to be what its Constitution shows it can not be—a Christian nation.