Blasphemy

Description

No. 1 "New York Times" bestselling author Alan Dershowitz proves that the religious right is misusing the "Declaration of Independence" in their drive to Christianize America. From school prayer to federal funding of faith-based programs, the religious right's drive to Christianize America and abolish the separation of church and state has sparked heated debate around the nation, in private homes and parish halls as well as in Congress and the Supreme Court. In this challenging and provocative polemic, acclaimed civil libertarian and legal educator Alan Dershowitz defends the Declaration of Independence against the religious right's attempt to hijack it for their Christianizing cause. It is more than ironic that the "Declaration", which was written by Thomas Jefferson, a fervent proponent of the separation of church and state, should be invoked in favor of a Christian America. Dershowitz decisively counters arguments that the "Declaration of Independence" was founded on biblical law, proving conclusively that there is absolutely no relation between the "Creator" and "Nature's God" referenced in the "Declaration" and the Judeo-Christian God of the Old and New Testaments.

Author description

ALAN DERSHOWITZ, the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, is one of the country's foremost appellate lawyers and a distinguished defender of individual liberties. His many books include the #1 New York Times bestseller Chutzpah and the Wiley books The Case for Israel, also a New York Times bestseller; The Case for Peace: How the Arab-Israeli Conflict Can Be Resolved; and What Israel Means to Me. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Table of contents

Acknowledgments. Introduction: Is the United States a Christian Nation? 1. The God of the Declaration: Is He the God of Today's Christian Right? 2. The Christian Right's Strategy to Turn the Declaration into a Batismal Certificate. 3. What Are "The Laws of Nature and of Nature's God"? Conclusion. Appendix: The Declaration of Independence. Notes. Index.