Today is the birthday of America’s first international celebrity and most consistently interesting Founding Father. Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston on January 17, 1706.
With little formal education, he became a writer, printer, philanthropist, philosopher, political leader and scientist. Franklin, alongside Thomas Jefferson, was probably the best example of the American Enlightenment Man. And, like Jefferson and other men of his times, Benjamin Franklin was skeptical of organized religion.
But proponents of America as a “Christian nation” and those who favor public prayer often cite Benjamin Franklin’s entreaty that the Constitutional Convention –then seemingly at an unbreakable impasse– open its daily debates with a prayer. What they conveniently leave out is what actually happened following that suggestion.
Alexander Hamilton first argued that if the people knew that the Convention was resorting to prayer at such a late date, it might be viewed as an act of desperation. Nonetheless, Franklin’s motion was seconded. But then Hugh Williamson of North Carolina pointed out that the convention lacked funds to pay a chaplain, and there the proposition died. Franklin later noted,
The convention, except three or four persons, thought prayers unnecessary.
Late in his life, Franklin wrote what could almost pass for a modern New Age statement of faith:
“Here is my creed. I believe in one God, creator of the universe.
That he governs it by his Providence. . . . That the soul of man is immortal, and will be treated with justice in another life respecting its conduct in this. . . . As to Jesus of Nazareth. I think the system of morals and his religion . . . the best the world ever saw or is likely to see; but I apprehend it has received various corrupting changes, and I have . . . some doubts as to his divinity.”He added, “I have ever let others enjoy their religious sentiments. . . . I hope to go out of the world in peace with all of them.”
Franklin died on April 17, 1790.
Here’s a link to a Library of Congress website celebrating Franklin on his 300th birthday in 2006.
http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/franklin/introduction.html
You can read more about Franklin and his accomplishments and impact in Don’t Know Much About History and America’s Hidden History
