Alexander Hamilton Religious Beliefs Essay

In this research I identify the religious views of John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and George Washington and link their beliefs to the cause of American Independence. Then, I explain the religious causes that made the American Revolution necessary and provide the reasons why the Declaration of Independence was religiously justifiable. Though unclear, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, John Adams, and James Madison held Deist beliefs. Alexander Hamilton’s religion after youth was unknown. The founding fathers who held on to Deist beliefs highly valued religious pluralism, but since the British government was opposed to it, the founding fathers sought independence

A better understanding of the religious cause for American Independence can be acquired by analyzing the religious views of the founding fathers.

Religious Views

Benjamin Franklin. Benjamin Franklin was not a Christian but rather a Deist who integrated some of the Christian doctrines into his own (Fea, 2011). To Benjamin Franklin, “God was someone who just merely answered prayers” (Fea, 2011). His attempt to revise the Lord’s Prayer so that it wouldn’t sound bothersome to his contemporary politicians showed that he was more concerned about other politicians than preserving the original words of God (Walters, 1999, p. 146).

His belief in Deism is explicitly presented in his autobiography. Benjamin Franklin said that in the early years of his teenage life, he questioned the validity of the Bible, especially the book of Revelation. He was handed by his parents several books intended to refute the points of the Deists against the Bible. However, when he read the books, he found the Deists’ arguments to be more appealing than the counterclaims against the arguments, and so he became a Deist (Franklin, 1916, p.

Alexander Hamilton’s true religion after his youth was unknown, but in his youth he was a conventional Christian. “Robert Troup, his college roommate, noted that Hamilton was ‘in the habit of praying on his knees night and morning’” (Hamilton, 1840). Alexander Hamilton’s understanding of biblical ideas from his youth is shown in the process of writing of the Constitution. “Alexander Hamilton understood the sinfulness of man and believed that governmental power should be divided and that laws would safeguard the rights of the people” (Eidsmoe, 1995, p. 1). However, to determine his true religion was difficult because he showed spiritual indifference as well in the writing of the Constitution. Hamilton’s peers understood that Hamilton himself remembered important things, but when he was asked “why the framers omitted the word God from the Constitution, Hamilton replied, ‘We forgot’”(Chernow,