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LIE # 2

Thomas Jefferson Founded a
Secular University

Jefferson was involved in many educational endeavors, but his greatest, and certainly the one dearest to his heart, was his founding of the University of Virginia. If one accepts the modern mischaracteriza-tion that Jefferson was antireligious and hostile to Christianity, it then becomes logical to assert that he would promote the secular and oppose the religious in his educational endeavors—especially at his beloved university. Reflective of this proposition, modern academics claim:

Jefferson also founded the first intentionally secularized university in America. His vision for the University of Virginia was for education finally free from traditional Christian dogma. He had a disdain for the influence that institutional Christianity had on education. At the University of Virginia there was no Christian curriculum and the school had no chaplain. Its faculty were religiously Deists and Unitarians.

—Professor Daryl Cornett, Mid-America Theological Seminary¹

After Jefferson left the presidency in 1809, he embarked on . . . the University of Virginia. . . . A Deist and a secular humanist, Jefferson rejected the religious tradition that had provided the foundation for the colonial universities.

—Professor Anita Vickers, Penn State University²

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No part of the regular school day was set aside for religious worship. . . . Jefferson did not permit the room belonging to the university to be used for religious purposes.

—Professor Leonard Levy, Southern Oregon State University, Claremont Graduate School³

The university which Thomas Jefferson established at Charlottesville in Virginia was . . . distinctly and purposely secular.

—Professor John Brubacher, Yale University, University of Michigan; Professor Willis Rudy, Fairleigh Dickinson University⁴

Many others make similar declarations, and several of their recurring claims are worthy of investigation.

1. Did Jefferson have a disdain for the influence of Christianity on education?

2. Did he found the first intentionally secular university in America?

3. Did he hire only Deists and Unitarians for his faculty?

4. Did he exclude chaplains and religious curriculum from the school?

Most Americans would probably answer “yes” to these four questions, for they have been told repeatedly by many of today’s writers, both academic and journalistic, that Jefferson was an ardent secularist. But what if this is wrong? What if Jefferson’s own education, one that so thoroughly prepared him for the national and international scene, had been largely religious and personally satisfying to him? If such was the case, then it is illogical to assert that Jefferson would seek to exclude from others that which had benefited him; so let’s begin with a look at Jefferson’s own education.

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Jefferson was born in 1743. As a youngster he attended the Anglican St. James’ Church of Northam Parish with his family. The church was pastored by the Reverend William Douglass, and from 1752 to 1758 Jefferson attended the Reverend Douglass’ school. In 1758 his family moved to Albemarle County and attended the Anglican Fredericksville Parish Church, pastored by the Reverend James Fontaine Maury, and from 1758 to 1760 Jefferson attended the Reverend Maury’s school. In 1760, after having been trained in religious schools, the seventeen-year-old Jefferson entered William and Mary, another religious school directly affiliated with the Anglican Church.

Part of Jefferson’s daily routine at the college included morning and evening prayers from the Book of Common Prayer with lengthy Scripture readings. Scottish instructor Dr. William Small, the son of a Presbyterian minister, was Jefferson’s favorite instructor. Jefferson later acknowledged: “It was my great good fortune, and what probably fixed the destinies of my life, that Dr. William Small of Scotland, was then professor.”⁵

Interestingly, many of the best instructors in early America were Scottish clergymen. As noted historian George Marsden affirmed, “[I]t is not much of an exaggeration to say that outside of New England, the Scots were the educators of eighteenth-century America.”⁶ These Scottish instructors regularly tutored students in what was known as the Scottish Common Sense philosophy—a method under which not only Jefferson but also other notable Virginia Founding Fathers were trained, including George Washington, James Madison, George Mason, Peyton Randolph, Richard Henry Lee, and Thomas Nelson. Gaillard Hunt, head of the manuscript division of the Library of Congress, reported:

One reason why the ruling class in Virginia acted with such unanimity [during the Revolution] . . . was that a large proportion of them had received the same kind of education. This usually came first from clergymen.⁷

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The Scottish Common Sense approach was developed by the Reverend Thomas Reid (1710–1796) to counter the skepticism of stridently secular European writers and philosophers such as Hume, Rousseau, Voltaire, and Malby. Reid’s approach argued that common sense should shape philosophy rather than philosophy shaping common sense. He asserted that normal, everyday language could express philosophical principles in a way that could be understood by ordinary individuals rather than just so-called elite thinkers and philosophers.

The principle tenets of Scottish Common Sense philosophy were straightforward:

1. There is a God

2. God placed into every individual a conscience—a moral sense written on his or her heart (cf. Jeremiah 31:33; Romans 2:14–15; Hebrews 8:10; 10:16; etc.)

3. God established “first principles” in areas such as law, government, education, politics, and economics, and these first principles could be discovered by the use of common sense

4. There is no conflict between reason and revelation. Both come directly from God, and revelation fortifies and clarifies reason

This is the philosophy under which Jefferson was educated at William and Mary. After completing his studies there, Jefferson entered five years of legal training with distinguished attorney and judge George Wythe, who later became a signer of the Declaration of Independence. A central subject of Jefferson’s legal studies was English jurist Sir William Blackstone’s four-volume Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765–1769).

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That work was an important legal textbook not only for Jefferson but for all American law students. Founding Father James Iredell, a ratifier of the US Constitution who was placed on the US Supreme Court by President George Washington, affirmed that Blackstone’s Commentaries was “the manual of almost every student of law in the United States.”⁸ Jefferson affirmed that American lawyers used Blackstone’s with the same dedication and reverence that Muslims used the Koran.⁹

In this indispensable legal text, Blackstone forcefully expounded the four prime tenets of Scottish Common Sense philosophy:

Man, considered as a creature, must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator. . . . This will of his Maker is called the law of nature. . . . These are the eternal immutable laws of good and evil to which the Creator Himself in all His dispensations conforms, and which He has enabled human reason to discover so far as they are necessary for the conduct of human actions. . . . And if our reason were always . . . clear and perfect, . . . the task would be pleasant and easy; we should need no other guide but this. But every man now finds the contrary in his own experience: that his reason is corrupt and his understanding full of ignorance and error. This has given manifold occasion for the benign interposition of Divine Providence, which . . . hath been pleased at sundry times and in divers manners to discover and enforce its laws by an immediate and direct revelation. The doctrines thus delivered we call the revealed or Divine law, and they are to be found only in the Holy Scriptures. . . . Upon these two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation, depend all human laws; that is to say, no human laws should be suffered to contradict these.¹⁰

These same four Scottish Common Sense tenets were subsequently included by Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence.

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Even though Jefferson’s own personal education at the elementary, secondary, and postsecondary levels consistently incorporated religious instruction, today’s writers repeatedly insist that it was the secular European Enlightenment rather than Scottish Common Sense that was the greatest influence on Jefferson’s thinking. For example:

In Europe, the Enlightenment centered around the salons of Paris and was famous for the “philosophes”—popular philosophers—such as Voltaire, Montesquieu, Diderot, Rousseau. . . . American political leaders like Jefferson . . . were heavily influenced by Enlightenment thinking.¹¹

The European Enlightenment was an intellectual movement that subjected theological, philosophical, scientific and political dogma to critical analysis. . . . Deism was popular among many Enlightenment thinkers, including Thomas Jefferson.¹²

[T]he Declaration of Independence . . . remains the best example of Enlightenment thought.¹³

Far too many of today’s writers, consumed by the spirit of Academic Collectivism, regularly regurgitate each other’s claims that Jefferson’s philosophy and the Declaration were products of the secular European Enlightenment. Yet Jefferson himself forcefully disagreed, and when some in his day had suggested that he based the Declaration on the writings of other philosophers, he responded, “[W]hether I had gathered my ideas from reading or reflection I do not know. I know only that I turned to neither book nor pamphlet while writing it.”¹⁴

In fact, he specifically asserted that the Declaration of Independence was “an expression of the American mind”¹⁵ (emphasis added) rather than a lexicon of European ideas. He even proclaimed that “the comparisons of our governments with those of Europe are like a comparison of heaven and hell.”¹⁶

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This is not to say that the Enlightenment had no influence in the American Founding; it certainly did. However, the crucial distinction regularly overlooked (or ignored) by many of today’s writers and academics is the fact that Enlightenment writers can be divided into two distinct groups: those with an overtly Christian viewpoint (such as Baron Puffendorf, Hugo Grotius, Richard Hooker, and William Blackstone), and those with an overtly secular viewpoint (such as Voltaire, Denis Diderot, David Hume, Claude Adrien Helvetius, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Sir Nicholas Malby, and Guillaume Thomas François Raynal).

It was primarily the Christian writers, not the secular ones, upon which Jefferson and the other Founders relied. In fact, political researchers have conclusively documented that the four Enlightenment writers cited most frequently during the Founding Era were Charles Montesquieu, William Blackstone, John Locke, and David Hume.¹⁷ Of the four, only Hume is from the secular group.

But if the Founders relied primarily on Christian thinkers rather than secular thinkers, then why was Hume the fourth most cited? After all, unlike the other three, he openly declared, “I expected in entering on my literary course that all the Christians . . . should be my enemies.”¹⁸

So why Hume? Because the Founders regularly cited him in order to refute his political theories rather than endorse them. John Adams described him as an atheist, deist, and libertine,¹⁹ James Madison placed him among “bungling lawgivers,”²⁰ and John Quincy Adams denounced Hume as “the Atheist Jacobite.”²¹ Hume and his writings were also roundly criticized by other Founders, including John Witherspoon,²² Benjamin Rush,²³ and Patrick Henry.²⁴

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But what about Jefferson? If Jefferson was indeed antireligious, then perhaps he would be drawn toward Hume as a kindred spirit. Such was definitely not the case. To the contrary, Jefferson found Hume “endeavoring to mislead, by either the suppression of a truth or by giving it a false coloring.”²⁵ He even regretted the early influence that Hume had once had upon him, candidly lamenting:

I remember well the enthusiasm with which I devoured it [Hume’s work] when young, and the length of time, the research, and reflection which were necessary to eradicate the poison it had instilled into my mind.²⁶

Jefferson was similarly forthright in his criticism of other secular Enlightenment writers, including Guillaume Thomas François Raynal (known as Abbé Raynal). Jefferson described his works as “a mass of errors and misconceptions from beginning to end,” containing “a great deal of falsehood”²⁷ and being “wrong exactly in the same proportion.”²⁸ He even described Raynal as “a mere shrimp.”²⁹ Such vehement denunciations of leading secular Enlightenment writers are certainly not consistent with a Jefferson who was supposedly greatly influenced by them.

So if secular Enlightenment writers were not a primary force in shaping Jefferson’s thinking, then who was? Jefferson himself answered that question, declaring that “Bacon, Newton and Locke . . . [are] my trinity of the three greatest men the world had ever produced.”³⁰

Francis Bacon, a British philosopher, attorney, and statesman, called the“Father of Modern Science,”³¹ is known for developing the process of inductive thinking and creating the scientific method. Historians have declared that “[T]he intellect of Bacon was one of the most powerful and searching ever possessed by man.”³² Bacon was by no means secular; rather, he was quite the opposite. In his noted work De Interpretatione Naturae Prooemium (1603), he declared that his threefold goal was to discover truth, serve his country, and serve the church. He asserted that the vigorous pursuit of truth would always lead one directly to God:

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[A] little philosophy inclineth man’s mind to atheism; but depth in philosophy bringeth men’s minds about to religion.³³

Bacon was famous for penning many religious works, including Essays, Ten in Number, Combined with Sacred Meditations and the Colors of Good and Evil (1597); The Proficiencies and Advancement of Learning, Divine and Human (1605); On the Unity in Religion (1612); On Atheism (1612); Of Praise (1612); as well as a translation of some of the psalms (1625). This outspoken and famous Christian writer and philosopher who never separated God or religion from science or government was the first of Jefferson’s triumvirate of the world’s greatest individuals.

The second in his list was Isaac Newton, an English statesman, mathematician, and scientist, credited with birthing modern calculus and discovering the laws of universal gravitation. Newton did extensive work in physics, astronomy, and optics and was the first scientist to be knighted for his work. Strikingly, however:

He spent more time on theology than on science; indeed, he wrote about 1.3 million words on Biblical subjects. . . . Newton’s understanding of God came primarily from the Bible, which he studied for days and weeks at a time. . . . Newton’s theology profoundly influenced his scientific method. . . . His God was not merely a philosopher’s impersonal First Cause; He was the God in the Bible Who freely creates and rules the world, Who speaks and acts in history.³⁴

Among Newton’s many theological works were his Observations Upon the Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse of St. John (1733) and Notes on Early Church History (c. 1680) among many others. And throughout his scientific works, Newton also maintained a distinctly Biblical Creationist view—such as in his 1687 Principia (considered “the greatest scientific book ever written”³⁵) in which he stated:

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This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. And if the fixed stars are the centres of other like systems, these, being formed by the like wise counsel, must be all subject to the dominion of One.³⁶

This Christian theologian and philosopher was the second of Jefferson’s trinity of personal heroes.

The third was English philosopher and political theorist John Locke. Locke was intimately involved with politics in England and also played a large role in shaping America, including writing the 1669 constitution for the Carolina Colony.³⁷ He also penned numerous works on education, philosophy, government, empiricism, and religion.

Today’s writers frequently describe Locke as a deist (or at least a follower of an early form of deism),³⁸ but historians of earlier generations described him as a Christian theologian.³⁹ After all, Locke wrote a verse-by-verse commentary on Paul’s Epistles⁴⁰ and also compiled a topical Bible, called a Common Place-Book to the Holy Bible,⁴¹ that listed verses by subject for easy study reference. And when antireligionists attacked Christianity, Locke defended it in his book The Reasonableness of Christianity as Delivered in the Scriptures (1695).⁴² When attacks continued, Locke responded with A Vindication of the Reasonableness of Christianity (1695)⁴³ and then with A Second Vindication of the Reasonableness of Christianity (1697).⁴⁴ Furthermore, in his Two Treatises of Government (1689)—the work specifically relied upon by Jefferson and the other Founders as they drafted the Declaration⁴⁵—Locke invoked the Bible over 1,500 times.⁴⁶

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Jefferson studied not only Locke’s governmental and legal writings but also his theological texts. His own personal summation of Locke’s view of Christianity clearly shows that he definitely did not consider Locke to be a deist. According to Jefferson:

Locke’s system of Christianity is this: Adam was created happy & immortal. . . . By sin he lost this so that he became subject to total death (like that of brutes [animals]) to the crosses & unhappiness of this life. At the intercession however of the Son of God this sentence was in part remitted. . . . And moreover to them who believed their faith was to be counted for righteousness [Romans 4:3, 5]. Not that faith without works was to save them; St. James, chapter 2 says expressly the contrary [v. 14–26]. . . . So that a reformation of life (included under repentance) was essential, & defects in this would be made up by their faith; i.e. their faith should be counted for righteousness [Romans 4:3, 5]. . . . [A]dding a faith in God & His attributes that on their repentance He would pardon them [1 John 1:9]; they also would be justified [Romans 3:24]. This then explains the text “there is no other name under heaven by which a man may be saved” [Acts 4:12], i.e., the defects in good works shall not be supplied by a faith in Mahomet, Fo [i.e., Buddha], or any other except Christ.⁴⁷

Francis Bacon, Issac Newton, and John Locke—each an outspoken Christian thinker and philosopher—were described by Jefferson as “the three greatest men the world has ever produced.”⁴⁸

So, to the question of whether Jefferson rejected his own personal educational experience because it had been so thoroughly infused with religion, the answer is a clear “No!” Jefferson was involved with many educational endeavors throughout his life, and he consistently took deliberate actions to include religious instruction in each.

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For example, when a grammar school was being established in Jefferson’s area in 1783, he wrote to the Reverend Dr. John Witherspoon, the head of Princeton (a university that trained Presbyterians for Gospel ministry), to request one of Witherspoon’s students as an instructor for the school.⁴⁹ In 1792 Jefferson again wrote the Reverend Witherspoon about another local school “in hopes that your seminary . . . may furnish some person whom you could recommend” to be the assistant to “the head of a school of considerable reputation in Virginia.”⁵⁰

What would Jefferson expect from students trained by the Reverend Dr. Witherspoon? Certainly not a secular approach to education. On the contrary, not only did Witherspoon teach the Scottish Common Sense philosophy, but he also specifically instructed his students:

That he is the best friend to American liberty who is the most sincere and active in promoting true and undefiled religion, and who sets himself with the greatest firmness to bear down profanity and immorality of every kind. Whoever is an avowed enemy of God, I scruple not to call him an enemy to his country.⁵¹

When Jefferson needed teachers for schools in his area, he called on a leading religious educator to send him religiously trained instructors.

In 1794, after Jefferson had returned home from serving as secretary of state for President George Washington, he contacted a member of the Virginia legislature about bringing the Geneva Academy from Europe to Virginia. The Geneva Academy was established in 1559 by Reformation theologian John Calvin.⁵² In this school, the Bible was an indispensable textbook and students from the school became missionaries all over Europe;⁵³ and Jefferson wanted to bring this famous religious school to his state.

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In 1803, while serving as president, Jefferson met with Presbyterian minister Gideon Blackburn at the White House about opening a missionary school for Cherokees near Knoxville, Tennessee. The school was to include religious instruction as a primary part of its studies, and President Jefferson directed Secretary of War Henry Dearborn to give federal money to help the school achieve its objectives.⁵⁴

In 1804 President Jefferson negotiated the purchase of the Louisiana Territory. With authority over that region transferring from the French to the Americans, those living there were uncertain as to what changes might result. Sister Therese Farjon, Mother Superior of a Catholic school and convent in New Orleans, therefore wrote President Jefferson asking what the status of their religious school would now be under American government. Jefferson responded:

Your institution . . . by training up its young members in the way they should go [Proverbs 22:6], cannot fail to ensure it the patronage [support] of the government it is under. Be assured that it will meet with all the protection my office can give it.⁵⁵ (emphasis added)

In 1805 President Jefferson was elected head of the board of trustees for the brand new Washington, DC, public schools.⁵⁶ He told the city council that he would “willingly undertake the duties proposed to me—so far as others of paramount obligation will permit my attention to them”;⁵⁷ that is, he would do what he could for the city schools with the caveat that his presidential duties came first. Robert Brent, therefore, served as head of the trustees, instead of Jefferson, but as trustee, Jefferson did contribute much to the new school system and is credited with being “the chief author of the first plan of public education adopted for the city of Washington.”⁵⁸ When the first report of the Washington public schools was released to demonstrate the progress of the students in the new schools, it noted:

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Fifty-five have learned to read in the Old and New Testaments and are all able to spell words of three, four, and five syllables; twenty-six are now learning to read Dr. Watts’ Hymns and spell words of two syllables; ten are learning words of four and five letters. Of fifty-nine out of the whole number admitted [enrolled] that did not know a single letter, twenty can now read the Bible and spell words of three, four, and five syllables; twenty-nine read Dr. Watts’ Hymns and spell words of two syllables; and ten, words of four and five letters.⁵⁹

Additionally, during the same time that Jefferson was working with the DC public school system, the board on which he served approved two of the schools being run by ministers, the Reverend Robert Elliott and the Reverend Richard White.⁶⁰ The Reverend Elliott was also allowed to use the school building concurrently as a meeting place for his church.⁶¹

In short, Jefferson was involved with many educational endeavors prior to establishing the University of Virginia in 1819, and in none of them was there any attempt to exclude religious instruction. To the contrary—in each case he took intentional steps to include or preserve it. So with this background, what about the four oft-repeated claims about Jefferson excluding religion from the university he founded?

1. Was the University of Virginia Founded as a Secular University?

Three distinctive features characterized universities founded in America prior to Jefferson’s University of Virginia. Those universities (1) were founded and controlled by one particular denomination, (2) housed theological seminaries for training ministers for that specific denomination, and (3) had prominent ministers from that denomination serving as president of the university.

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Reflective of this pattern, in 1636 Harvard was founded by and for Congregationalists to train Congregationalist ministers (so, too, with Yale in 1701 and Dartmouth in 1769). In 1692 the College of William and Mary was founded by and for the Anglicans to train Anglican ministers (as was the University of Pennsylvania in 1740, Kings College in 1754, and the College of Charleston in 1770). In 1746 Princeton was founded by and for Presbyterians (as was Dickinson in 1773 and Hampden-Sydney in 1775). In 1764 the College of Rhode Island (now Brown University) was founded by and for the Baptists. In 1766 Queens College (now Rutgers) was founded by and for the Dutch Reformed. In 1780 Transylvania University was founded by and for the Disciples of Christ, and so on.

Departing from this pattern, Jefferson and his Board of Visitors (or regents) specifically founded the University of Virginia to be America’s first transdenominational school—a school not affiliated with one specific denomination but rather one that would train students from all denominations. By so doing, Jefferson was actually implementing the plan advocated by evangelical Presbyterian clergyman Samuel Knox of Baltimore.

In 1799 the Reverend Knox penned a policy paper proposing the formation of a state university that would invite many denominations to establish multiple theological schools rather than just one, so they would work together in mutual Christian cooperation rather than competition.⁶² Jefferson agreed with Knox’s philosophy, and it was this model that he employed at his University of Virginia. (In fact, Jefferson invited the Reverend Knox to be the very first professor at the university,⁶³ but because of a miscommunication, Knox did not respond to the offer in a timely fashion, so his teaching slot was finally offered to someone else.⁶⁴)

With its transdenominational model, the University of Virginia did not incorporate the three features so commonly associated with other universities at that time. This has caused modern critics to claim that it was founded as a secular university—a claim that will be shown to be completely false. Nearly forty years earlier in 1779, Jefferson had already demonstrated his affinity for this type of interdenominational cooperation and Christian nonpreferentialism in his famous Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom, which disestablished the Anglican Church as the official denomination of Virginia and instead welcomed all denominations with equal legal standing.

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The charter for the new university had been issued by the state legislature, so the school was required to conform to the denominational nonpreferentialism set forth not only in the Virginia Statute but also in the Virginia Constitution—another document that Jefferson had helped author. But many today wrongly misinterpret Jefferson’s denominational nonpreferentialism to be secularism, and they also erroneously point to what Jefferson did with his own alma mater’s Professor of Divinity as another alleged “proof” of his commitment to religion-free education.

In 1779, when Jefferson became governor of Virginia, he was placed on the board of William and Mary. At that time he introduced legislation to recast the school—an accomplishment known as the Jefferson Reorganization. According to Professor Leonard Levy of Oregon State University:

Jefferson’s first proposal on higher education came in 1779. His Bill for the Amending of the Constitution of the College of William and Mary stated that the college consisted of “one school of sacred theology, with two professorships therein, to wit, one for teaching the Hebrew tongue, and expounding the Holy Scriptures; and the other for explaining the commonplaces of Divinity and controversies with heretics.” . . . Jefferson proposed to abolish . . . the school of theology with its professorships of religion.⁶⁵

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Did Jefferson indeed propose to abolish “the school of theology with its professorships of religion”? Apparently so, for Jefferson himself acknowledged:

I effected, during my residence in Williamsburg that year, a change in the organization of that institution by abolishing . . . the two professorships of Divinity.⁶⁶

So it appears that Professor Levy was right—that Jefferson did seek to secularize higher education. At least it appears that way until one reads the rest of Jefferson’s explanation, and then it becomes evident that his intention was exactly the opposite. Jefferson explained:

The College of William and Mary was an establishment purely of the Church of England; the Visitors [i.e., Regents] were required to be all of that Church; the professors to subscribe its thirty-nine [doctrinal] Articles; its students to learn its [Anglican] Catechism; and one of its fundamental objects was declared to be to raise up ministers for that church [i.e., the Anglican Church]. The religious jealousies, therefore, of all the Dissenters [those from other denominations] took alarm lest this might give an ascendancy to the Anglican sect.⁶⁷

Jefferson abolished the School of Divinity because it was solely an arm of the state-established Anglican Church, and he wanted to open the college to greater involvement by those from other Christian denominations. Further evidence that his reorganization of the college was not secular was his stipulation that “[T]he said professors shall likewise appoint from time to time a missionary of approved veracity to the several tribes of Indians.”⁶⁸ Jefferson took steps to ensure that the Gospel was promoted at William and Mary but not just according to the thirty-nine Anglican articles and that church’s denominational catechism.

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In the same manner Jefferson sought to ensure that the University of Virginia would also reflect denominational nonpreferentialism. He therefore invited the seminaries of many denominations to establish themselves on the campus, explaining:

We suggest the expediency of encouraging the different religious sects [denominations] to establish, each for itself, a professorship of their own tenets on the confines of the university so near as that their students may attend the lectures there and have the free use of our library and every other accommodation we can give them. . . . [B]y bringing the sects [denominations] together and mixing them with the mass of other students, we shall soften their asperities [harshness], liberalize and neutralize their prejudices [prejudgment without an examination of the facts], and make the general religion a religion of peace, reason, and morality.⁶⁹

Jefferson observed that a positive benefit of this approach was that it would “give to the sectarian schools of divinity the full benefit of the public [university] provisions made for instruction”⁷⁰ and “leave every sect to provide as they think fittest the means of further instruction in their own peculiar tenets.”⁷¹ Jefferson pointed out that another benefit of this arrangement was that students could “attend religious exercises with the professor of their particular sect,”⁷² and he made clear that students would be fully expected to actively participate in some denominational school.⁷³

Jefferson and the Visitors (regents) also decided that there should be no clergyman as president and no Professor of Divinity because it might give the impression that the university favored the denomination with which the university president or professor of divinity was affiliated.⁷⁴ But the fact that the school did not have a specific professor of divinity did not mean that it was secular.

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In fact, Jefferson had actually increased the number of Professorships of divinity by encouraging each denomination to have “a professorship of their own tenets” at the school.⁷⁵ And the decision not to have just one exclusive professor of divinity also did not mean that the university would have no religious instruction. To the contrary, Jefferson personally directed that the teaching of “the proofs of the being of a God, the Creator, Preserver, and Supreme Ruler of the Universe, the Author of all the relations of morality and of the laws and obligations these infer, will be within the province of the Professor of Ethics.”⁷⁶

As he explained:

[T]he relations which exist between man and his Maker, and the duties resulting from those relations, are the most interesting and important to every human being, and the most incumbent on his study and investigation.⁷⁷

Jefferson simply transferred the responsibility of religious teaching from the traditional professor of divinity to the professor of ethics. All students would be given general Biblical teaching about man’s obligations to God and the injunctions to observe Biblical morality. Jefferson also made clear that religious instruction would encompass the many religious beliefs on which Christian denominations agreed rather than just the few specific theological doctrines that distinguished each particular one.⁷⁸ Any instruction about specific narrow doctrines would occur in the various denominational schools attached to the university.

This nondenominational approach caused Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, and others to give the university the friendship and cooperative support necessary to make it a success. Consider Presbyterian minister John Holt Rice as an example.

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Holt was a nationally known evangelical leader with extensive credentials. He founded the Virginia Bible Society,⁷⁹ started the Virginia Evangelical and Literary Magazine to report on revivals across the country, was elected national leader of the Presbyterian Church, and offered the presidency of Princeton (but instead accepted the chair of theology at Hampden-Sydney College). Rice fully supported and promoted the University of Virginia,⁸⁰ but this would not have been the case had the university been perceived to have been affiliated with just one denomination. As Rice explained:

The plan humbly suggested is to allow Jews, Catholics, Protestants, Episcopalians, Methodists, Baptists, any and all sects, if they shall choose to exercise the privilege, to endow professorships, and nominate their respective professors. . . . [T]he students shall regularly attend Divine worship, but in what form should be left to the direction of parents; or in failure of this, to the choice of the students. In addition to this, the professors in every case must be men of the utmost purity of moral principle and strictness of moral conduct.⁸¹

Furthermore, when construction of the university began, the special ceremony at the laying of its cornerstone included both the reading of Scripture and a prayer—activities specifically arranged by Jefferson and the Board of Visitors. Notice the desires expressed in the university’s founding prayer:

May Almighty God, without invocation to Whom no work of importance should be begun, bless this undertaking and enable us to carry it on with success. Protect this college, the object of which institution is to instill into the minds of youth principles of sound knowledge, to inspire them with the love of religion and virtue, and prepare them for filling the various situations in society with credit to themselves and benefit to their country.⁸² (emphasis added)

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Clearly, then, Jefferson’s own writings and the records of the university, along with the explanations given by ministers who supported the school, all absolutely refute any notion that the University of Virginia was a secular institution. Instead, it was the nation’s first prominent transdenominational school.

2. Was Jefferson’s Faculty Composed of Unitarians?

Jefferson established ten teaching positions at the university,⁸³ and none of the professors filling them was a Unitarian. In fact, when two of the original professors (George Tucker, professor of moral philosophy, and Robley Dunglison, professor of anatomy and medicine) were later asked whether Jefferson had sought to fill the faculty with Deists or Unitarians, Professor Dunglison succinctly answered:

I have not the slightest reason for believing that Mr. Jefferson was in any respect guided in his selection of professors of the University of Virginia by religious considerations. . . . In all my conversations with Mr. Jefferson, no reference was made to the subject. I was an Episcopalian, so was Mr. Tucker, Mr. Long, Mr. Key, Mr. Bonnycastle, and Dr. Emmet. Dr. Blaetterman, I think, was a Lutheran, but I do not know so much about his religion as I do about that of the rest. There certainly was not a Unitarian among us.⁸⁴ (emphasis added)

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Professor Tucker agreed, declaring:

I believe that all the first professors belonged to the Episcopal Church, except Dr. Blaetterman, who, I believe, was a German Lutheran. . . . I don’t remember that I ever heard the religious creeds of either professors or Visitors [Regents] discussed or inquired into by Mr. Jefferson, or anyone else.⁸⁵

Jefferson simply did not delve into the denominational affiliations or specific religious beliefs of his faculty; what he sought was professors who were competent and qualified in knowledge and deportment. As he once told his close friend and fellow educator Dr. Benjamin Rush:

For thus I estimate the qualities of the mind: 1. good humor; 2. integrity; 3. industry; 4. science. The preference of the first to the second quality may not at first be acquiesced in [given up], but certainly we had all rather associate with a good-humored, light-principled man than with an ill-tempered rigorist in morality.⁸⁶

It was by applying such standards that Jefferson once invited Thomas Cooper to be professor of chemistry and law,⁸⁷ but when it became known that Cooper was a Unitarian, a public outcry arose against him and Jefferson and the university withdrew its offer to him.⁸⁸

Obviously, this type of original primary-source evidence concerning Jefferson and the religious views of his faculty is ignored by many of today’s writers. But Professor Roy Honeywell of Eastern Michigan University was a professor from a much earlier period who actually did review the original historical evidence. He correctly concluded:

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In general, Jefferson seems to have ignored the religious affiliations of the professors. His objection to ministers was because of their active association with sectarian groups, in his day, a fruitful source of social friction. The charge that he intended the University to be a center of Unitarian influence is totally groundless.⁸⁹

3. Did Jefferson Bar Religious Instruction from the Academic Program?

In 1818 Jefferson and the university Visitors publicly released their plan for the new school. In addition to announcing that it would be transdenominational and that religious instruction would be provided to all students, Jefferson took further intentional steps to ensure that religious training would occur.

For example, he directed the professor of ancient languages to teach Biblical Greek, Hebrew, and Latin to students so that they would be equipped to read and study the “earliest and most respected authorities of the faith of every sect [denomination].”⁹⁰ Jefferson also wanted the writings of prominent Christian authorities to be placed in the university library. In August 1824 he asked Visitor (or regent) James Madison to prepare a list of Christian theological writings to be included on its shelves.⁹¹

Madison returned his recommendations to Jefferson, which included the early works of the Alexandrian Church Fathers, such as Clement, Origen, Pantaenus, Cyril, Athanasius, and Didymus the Blind. He also included Latin authors such as Saint Augustine; the writings of Saint Aquinas and other Christian leaders from the Middle Ages; and the works of Erasmus, Luther, Calvin, Socinius, and Bellarmine from the Reformation era. Madison’s list also contained more contemporary theologians and religious writers such as Grotius, Tillotson, Hooker, Pascal, Locke, Newton, Butler, Clarke, Wollaston, Edwards, Mather, Penn, Wesley, Leibnitz, Paley, and others.⁹²

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In addition to religious instruction given by the professor of ethics and the professor of ancient languages, Jefferson personally ensured that religious study would also be an inseparable part of the study of law and political science. As he explained to a prominent judge:

[I]n my catalogue, considering ethics as well as religion as supplements to law in the government of man, I had placed them in that sequence.⁹³

Jefferson also approved of worship on campus, acknowledging “that a building . . . in the middle of the grounds may be called for in time in which may be rooms for religious worship.”⁹⁴ He later ordered that in the university Rotunda, “one of its large elliptical rooms on its middle floor shall be used for . . . religious worship.”⁹⁵ He further declared that “the students of the university will be free and expected to attend religious worship at the establishment of their respective sects”⁹⁶ (emphasis added).

Jefferson took many deliberate steps to ensure that religious instruction was an integral part of academic studies. Clearly, then, the claim that there was no Christian curriculum or instruction at the University of Virginia is demonstrably false and easily disproved by Jefferson’s own writings.

4. Did the University of Virginia Have Chaplains?

The modern claim that the University of Virginia had no chaplains is also easily disproved by original documents, including early newspaper ads that the university ran to recruit students from surrounding areas.

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In the Washington newspaper the Globe, the Reverend Septimus Tuston (identified in the ad as the chaplain of the university and who later became the chaplain of the US House of Representatives and then the US Senate) discussed religious life at the school, reporting:

[I]n the original organization of this establishment [i.e., the University of Virginia], the privilege of erecting theological seminaries on the territory [grounds] belonging to the university was cheerfully extended to every Christian denomination within the limits of the state.

In the present arrangement for religious services at the university, you have all the evidence that can with propriety be asked respecting the favorable estimate which is placed upon the subject of Christianity.

The chaplains, appointed annually and successively from the four prominent denominations in Virginia [Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Baptist, and Methodist], are supported by the voluntary contributions of professors and students. . . .

Beside the regular services of the Sabbath, we have . . . also a Sabbath School in which several of the pious students are engaged.

The monthly concert for prayer is regularly observed in the pavilion which I occupy.

In all these different services we have enjoyed the presence and the smiles of an approving Redeemer . . . [and i]t has been my pleasure on each returning Sabbath to hold up before my enlightened audience the cross of Jesus—all stained with the blood of Him that hung upon it—as the only hope of the perishing.⁹⁷ (emphasis added)

Another ad run by the university similarly noted:

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Religious services are regularly performed at the University by a chaplain, who is appointed in turn from the four principal denominations of the state. And by a resolution of the faculty, ministers of the Gospel and young men preparing for the ministry may attend any of the schools without the payment of fees to the professors.⁹⁸ (emphasis added)

It was the custom of that day that university faculty members receive their salaries from fees paid by the students directly to the staff, but the University of Virginia waived those fees for students studying for the Gospel ministry. So, if the school was secular, as claimed by so many of today’s writers, then why did it extend preferential treatment to students pursuing religious careers? Surely a truly secular university would have given preference to students who were not religiously oriented.

The University of Virginia did indeed have chaplains, albeit not in its first three years (the university opened for students in 1825). At the beginning, when the university was establishing its reputation as a transdenominational university, the school had no appointed chaplain for the same reason that there had been no clergyman as president and no single professor of divinity: an ordained clergyman in any of those three positions might send an incorrect signal that the university was aligned with a specific denomination. But by 1829, when the nondenominational reputation of the university had been fully established, President Madison (who became rector of the university after Jefferson’s death in 1826) announced “that [permanent] provision for religious instruction and observance among the students would be made by . . . services of clergymen.”⁹⁹

The university therefore extended official recognition to one primary chaplain for all the students, with the chaplain position rotating annually among the major denominations that Jefferson identified as the Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, and Anglicans.¹⁰⁰ In 1829 Presbyterian clergyman Rev. Edward Smith became the first chaplain at the University of Virginia. It was an official university position-but unpaid. In 1833, after three-fourths of the students pledged their own money for the chaplain’s support, Methodist William Hammett became the first paid chaplain. He led Sunday worship and daily morning prayer meetings in the Rotunda. In 1855 the university built a parsonage to provide a residence for the university chaplain. Many of the school’s chaplains went on to religious careers of renown, including Episcopalian Joseph Wilmer; Presbyterians William White, William H. Ruffner, and Robert Dabney; and Baptists Robert Ryland and John Broaddus. Clearly, the University of Virginia did have chaplains.

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In short, first-hand source documents, especially Jefferson’s own writings, incontestably refute all four modern assertions about the alleged secular nature of the University of Virginia. If anyone examines the original sources and claims otherwise, they are, to use the words of early military chaplain William Biederwolf, just as likely to “look all over the sky at high noon on a cloudless day and not see the sun.”¹⁰¹

There is one other aspect of Jefferson’s philosophy toward religion in education that draws much attention from those who would paint him as an irreligious, atheistic man. In a highly publicized letter to his nephew Peter Carr, Jefferson tells him to “question with boldness even the existence of a God.”¹⁰² Taken out of context this admonition does seem condemning—which is why Deconstructionists and Minimalists have lifted just this one line from a very long Jefferson letter. They deliberately misrepresent the full letter in order to make it seem that Jefferson was recommending exactly the opposite of what he was actually telling his nephew.

Jefferson had raised Peter as the son he never had—his only son was stillborn in 1777. Peter’s father, Dabney, was Jefferson’s brother-in-law and one of Jefferson’s closest friends. While Peter was still a young boy, Dabney died and was buried on the grounds at Monticello. Jefferson then stepped in to help raise the young Peter.

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In 1785, when Peter was fifteen years old and Jefferson was on an overseas assignment, he began to write Peter from Europe. He addressed the direction that the young man’s education should take, instructing him not only about the importance of character (“give up science, give the earth itself and all it contains, rather than do an immoral act”¹⁰³) but also about diligently pursuing the study of history, philosophy, and poetry. He especially recommended that Peter read:

Virgil, Terence, Horace, Anacreon, Theocritus, Homer; read also Milton’s Paradise Lost, Shakespeare, Ossian, Pope’s and Swift’s works, in order to form your style in your own language. In morality, read Epictetus, Xenophontis Memorabilia, Plato’s Socratic dialogues, Cicero’s philosophies.¹⁰⁴

The next year Peter was accepted to William and Mary (Jefferson’s alma mater). The following year, 1787, George Wythe agreed to tutor him in Latin and Greek.¹⁰⁵ When Jefferson learned of this latter development, he was thrilled and told Peter: “I am sure you will find this to have been one of the most fortunate events of your life.”¹⁰⁶ A year later Wythe accepted Peter as a law student, just as he had done with Jefferson some twenty-five years earlier.

The famous letter containing the phrase so abused today was written by Jefferson to his nephew in Peter’s second year at William and Mary. The letter contains recommendations to Peter about his studies in four areas: Italian, Spanish, moral philosophy, and religion. The fourth section on religion was by far the longest in the letter, and it is in that part of his extensive epistle that Jefferson advised Peter to “question with boldness even the existence of a God.”¹⁰⁷

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Secularist and antireligious authors have made this short phrase the sole focus of that long letter,¹⁰⁸ but the rest of the letter makes abundantly clear that Jefferson was actually instructing Peter in apologetics. The term apologetics originated in 1733 and indicates an intelligent presentation and defense of major traditional elements of religious faith.¹⁰⁹

Jefferson believed that the time had come for the seventeen-year-old Peter to know not just what he believed but why he believed it—and to be able to defend his beliefs. Peter believed in God and Christianity, but Jefferson urged him to examine both sides of the question of the existence of God, study opposing arguments, and then come to a conclusion he could ably defend. (This is exactly what the Bible advises in 1 Peter 3:15: to be able to get the reason for one’s belief.)

The Founding Fathers regularly encouraged their own children and other youth to learn and use apologetics, to learn both sides of a religious issue. This is apparent in many of their writings. For example, Elias Boudinot, a president of Congress and a framer of the Bill of Rights, wrote to his daughter, Susan, after Thomas Paine had attacked the Bible in his famous Age of Reason.¹¹⁰ He assured her that an open-minded examination of the evidence easily proved the existence of God and the truth of the Bible.

God in His infinite wisdom has given us sufficient evidence that the revelation of the Gospel is from Him. This is subject to rational inquiry and of conviction from the conclusive nature of the evidence; but when that fact is established, you are bound as a rational creature to show your full confidence in His unchangeable veracity and infinite wisdom by firmly believing the great truths so revealed.¹¹¹

Founding Father John Witherspoon, a signer of the Declaration and the president of Princeton, agreed with the use of this type of apologetics.¹¹² And the Reverend Ezra Stiles, a conservative theologian and the president of Yale who had served as a chaplain during the American Revolution, also encouraged direct challenges to traditional religious beliefs. He was fully convinced that through apologetics one could withstand and answer all attacks. As he acknowledged:

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Religious liberty is peculiarly friendly to fair and generous disquisition [systematic inquiry]. Here, Deism will have its full chance; nor need Libertines [morally unrestrained individuals] more to complain of being overcome by any weapons but the gentle, the powerful ones of argument and truth. Revelation will be found to stand the test to the ten-thousandth examination.¹¹³

Jefferson, by telling his nephew Peter to “question with boldness even the existence of a God,” was doing exactly what the leading theologians and educators of his day similarly encouraged. Yet, for making the same recommendation made by prominent religious leaders, Jefferson is somehow proved today to be an antireligious secularist? Ridiculous.

Jefferson was thoroughly convinced that the existence of God was so self-evident and irrefutable that it could be easily proved even apart from the Scriptures.¹¹⁴ In fact, he believed that arguing the existence of God from a position of blind faith, without resort to the proofs of reason, actually hurt Christianity. As he explained:

I think that every Christian sect [denomination] gives a great handle to atheism by their general dogma that without a revelation there would not be sufficient proof of the being of a God. . . . So irresistible are these evidences of an intelligence and powerful Agent, that of the infinite numbers of men who have existed thro’ all time, they have believed in the proportion of a million at least to unit [i.e., a million to one] in the hypothesis of an eternal pre-existence of a Creator.¹¹⁵

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Recall that Jefferson’s education took the Scottish Common Sense approach. It attacked European skepticism, praised the compatibility of reason and revelation, and demonstrated the superiority of evidence in all challenges. Jefferson had been trained in this vein of apologetics and it was in that same spirit that he challenged Peter to question—that is, to examine—the evidence of God’s existence. In light of this background, consider the now infamous section from Jefferson’s letter.

Note first that the controversial religious section in Jefferson’s letter to Peter is very lengthy. Therefore, in opposition to Minimalism (where everything is reduced to one-line platitudes that require no thought or reasoning), that portion of the letter will be fully presented here so that its context is clear. Second, notice that throughout the letter Jefferson attempted to take a neutral position on many religious issues. He set forth the popular arguments both for and against various religious doctrines, presenting the major arguments to which Peter would undoubtedly be subjected. Yet throughout the letter, Jefferson’s bias in favor of his belief in God clearly comes through, despite his well-intentioned attempt to be position neutral.

Here is the section of the letter in question, in its entirety.

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4. Religion. Your reason is now mature enough to examine this object. In the first place, divest yourself of all bias in favor of novelty and singularity of opinion. Indulge them in any other subject rather than that of religion. It is too important, and the consequences of error may be too serious. On the other hand, shake off all the fears and servile prejudices under which weak minds are servilely crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God, because if there be One, He must more approve the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear. You will naturally examine first the religion of your own country. Read the Bible then, as you would Livy or Tacitus. The facts which are within the ordinary course of nature, you will believe on the authority of the writer, as you do those of the same kind in Livy and Tacitus. The testimony of the writer weighs in their favor in one scale, and their not being against the laws of nature does not weigh against them. But those facts in the Bible which contradict the laws of nature must be examined with more care and under a variety of faces. Here you must recur to the pretensions [claims] of the writer to inspiration from God. Examine upon what evidence his pretensions are founded and whether that evidence is so strong as that its falsehood would be more improbable than a change of the laws of nature in the case he relates. For example, in the book of Joshua we are told the sun stood still several hours. Were we to read that fact in Livy or Tacitus, we should class it with their showers of blood, speaking of statues, beasts, &c. But it is said that the writer of that book was inspired. Examine, therefore, candidly what evidence there is of his having been inspired. The pretension [claim] is entitled to your inquiry, because millions believe it. On the other hand, you are astronomer enough to know how contrary it is to the law of nature that a body revolving on its axis, as the earth does, should have stopped, should not, by that sudden stoppage, have prostrated animals, trees, buildings, and should after a certain time have resumed its revolution, and that without a second general prostration. Is this arrest of the earth’s motion, or the evidence which affirms it, most within the law of probabilities? You will next read the New Testament. It is the history of personage called Jesus. Keep in your eye the opposite pretentions. 1. Of those who say He was begotten by God, born of a virgin, suspended and reversed the laws of nature at will, and ascended bodily into Heaven; and 2. Of those who say he was a man, of illegitimate birth, of a benevolent heart, enthusiastic mind, who set out without pretensions to Divinity, ended in believing them, and was punished capitally for sedition by being gibbeted according to the Roman law, which punished the first commission of that offence by whipping, and the second by exile or death in furca. See this law in the Digest, Lib. 48, tit. 19, 28. 3. and Lipsius, Lib. 2. De Cruce, cap. 2. These questions are examined in the books I have mentioned under the head of religion and several others. They will assist you in your inquiries, but keep your reason firmly on the watch in reading them all. Do not be frightened from this inquiry by any fear of its consequences. If it ends in a belief that there is no God, you will find incitements to virtue in the comfort and pleasantness you feel in its exercise, and the love of these which it will procure you. If you find reason to believe there is a God, a consciousness that you are acting under His eye and that He approves of you will be a vast additional incitement. If that there be a future state, the hope of a happy existence in that increases the appetite to deserve it; if that Jesus was also a God, you will be comforted by a belief of His aid and love. In fine, I repeat you must lay aside all prejudice on both sides, and neither believe nor reject anything because any other person or description of persons have rejected or believed it. Your own reason is the only oracle given you by Heaven, and you are answerable not for the rightness but uprightness of the decision. I forgot to observe when speaking of the New Testament that you should read all the histories of Christ, as well of those whom a council of ecclesiastics have decided for us to be pseudo-evangelists, as those they named Evangelists, because these pseudo-evangelists pretended to inspiration as much as the others, and you are to judge their pretensions by your own reason and not by the reason of those ecclesiastics. Most of these are lost. There are some, however, still extant, collected by Fabricius, which I will endeavor to get and send you.¹¹⁶

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By way of note, Jefferson’s reference to the “pseudo-evangelists” and “Fabricius” is almost completely foreign to today’s Modernists and therefore is often wrongly assumed to be an attack on the Scriptures or the Epistles. It was not. The term evangelists was a concrete and well understood term in the Founding Era, often utilized in courts of law,¹¹⁷ and specifically meant the four Gospels as written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.¹¹⁸ So what does “pseudo-evangelists” mean? Does it mean the writings of the other Apostles such as Paul and Peter? And who is Fabricius?

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In 397 AD the Synod of Carthage met and canonized the books that formed the inspired Scriptures.¹¹⁹ At that time many other books, including what were known as the Gnostic Gospels (such as the Gospel of Marcion, the Gospel of Apelles, the Gospel of Bardesanes, the Gospel of Basilides, and others) were rejected; it was determined that they were not Divinely inspired. They were thus considered to be written by “pseudo evangelists.” In 1713 and 1723 German scholar Johann Albert Fabricius made compilations of the Gnostic Gospels, and just as Jefferson urged Peter to read the canonized Scriptures, he also encouraged him to read and investigate noncanonized books (such as those compiled by Fabricius) in order to understand the debate over which parts of the Bible were actually inspired.

Jefferson was not being antireligious in his letter to Peter; he was simply trying to be neutral so as to encourage Peter to reach his own conclusions. As Jefferson scholar Dr. Mark Beliles accurately points out:

Since Jefferson used in the letter the words “some people believe” when expressing both orthodox and unorthodox opinions, it cannot be proven that he was personally in favor of either. Scholars often quote excerpts from it to prove his unorthodoxy, but one could just as easily quote Jefferson’s phrase from this letter which said “Jesus . . . was begotten by God, born of a virgin, suspended and reversed the laws of nature at will, and ascended bodily into heaven.”¹²⁰

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And Jefferson historian Robert Healey points out what he sees as a positive bias toward faith in the letter, explaining that “after saying to Peter Carr, ‘Question with boldness even the existence of a God,’ he writes a few lines further on, ‘Your own reason is the only oracle given you by heaven’” (emphasis added).¹²¹ Additionally, in the section of the letter immediately preceding his advice on religion, Jefferson told Peter:

He Who made us would have been a pitiful bungler if He had made the rules of our moral conduct a matter of science. . . . The moral sense, or conscience, is as much a part of man, as his leg or arm.¹²²

This is a clear declaration by Jefferson that man was created by God and endowed by Him with a conscience—two of the primary tenets of Scottish Common Sense. His statement that our reason was given us by Heaven is yet another of its four precepts. And, as already shown above, Jefferson had no personal doubts about the existence of God; to him, it was self-evident that God existed; it was also a belief held worldwide by what he called a margin of a million to one. So while Jefferson attempted to remain neutral in setting forth the possible options of belief to Peter (and largely succeeded), he definitely held a strong, personal, pro-God position.

Jefferson’s advice to Peter about discovering and confirming for himself the foundation for his religious beliefs might just as easily have come from today’s leading Christian apologists, whether Josh McDowell, Ray Comfort, Lee Strobel, or Ravi Zacharias. These apologists similarly advise Christians to know what they believe, why they believe it, and how to defend those beliefs.

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In summary, Jefferson’s letter to Peter definitely does not prove irreligion on the part of Jefferson, nor can it be used to show Jefferson was promoting secular education among his own family members. Jefferson has a long record of deliberately, purposefully, and intentionally including religious instruction in all educational endeavors in which he took part, and this is especially true concerning his beloved University of Virginia.