If America ever became a christian-run country, would "Satan made me do it" be a valid courtroom defence?

Question

For example, would rapists be acquitted on the grounds of temporary possession, would it be legal to stone prostitutes, would atheists be allowed to immigrate?

These are extreme and provocative examples, but please answer thoughtfully.

Now I will really throw fuel on the fire.... Christians have god's protection from Satan's influence, but atheists do not. So would it be acceptable for atheists to use the 'Satan defence' but not christians?

Answer 1

I feel the best example was a few years back when a boy killed his parents and his excuse was "God told me to do it". He got the death penalty. So my thoughts to your question is NO. If it doesn't work one way, it can't work the other. Good question, though!

Answer 2

To the stoning of the prostitutes thing: probably, even though Jesus specifically said in the Bible that that's not right, Christians aren't well known for their knowledge of their own Holy Book.

If this happened, the Atheists, and most peoples of theologies not Judeo-Christian, would probably have all left already.

Yes, I think it probably would be a valid courtroom defense, but I think they have, like, tests or something that they would do to see if he had been "possessed" or not.

And you'd probably be already be condemned in some fashion for being an Atheist anyway, a big green A on your chest or something. . . .

Answer 3

If this were to be a true "Christian country," then people wouldn't judge or punish anyone. Only God can judge us, and the Christian thing to do in the face of adversity is to "turn the other cheek." So in a true Christian regime, there would be no courtrooms and no punishment. What you guys are talking about is a land with Old Testament regulations, with New Testament attitudes about the AfterLife.

Answer 4

my thought on this is that if the country were Christian-run there wouldn't be stoning and immigration of athiests. Sometimes I wonder how people can just take what they hear abou the Bible and come up with these random ideas. But, pertaining more to your question....Satan made me do it would still be a valid defense becasue a Christian run country doesn't make everyone Christian and it doesn't lessen the power and influence of Satan, sadly. Also, it doesn't eliminate sin.

Answer 5

Yes, but before we go there I think you should do some research. During the inquisition it didn't matter whether you were innocent or guilty. If you were guilty they tortured and killed you and if it turned out you were innocent ( it showed in the way you died in some cases like the one where if she floats to the top or if she sinks kinda thing) then you would be in Gods Kingdom! So there you go. HAPPY NOW!

There is a book on how to get confessions from a whitch. They tortured out confessions that would make a police misfire interigation look like a day with Mr. Dress-Up ( Canadian childrens show).

Angela, you are beautiful! Unfortunatly wrong. Naive to, I am very sad to say.

Peace all!

Answer 6

NO! First because Satan is a created being and is therefore incapable of controlling another person to the point of lack of choice (1Corinthians 10:13) and second, even God does not control us; we are responsible for our own moral behavior (James 1:12).
I am giving you the verses here so that you can see for yourself that the Bible does not teach any such thing.
Man gets his worth from God's choice to make man in HIS image. God gave the Earth to Man and told man to be a good steward. God expects good stewardship, so He gave man all the equipment (physical, mental and spiritual) to carry out the job as man walked with God (2Peter 1:3-9). Man chose to go it alone, by listening to Satan, (Gen. 3) and consequently chose the curse . Christ came into the world to end that curse by choosing to atone for the sins of those who would accept His sacrifice. Satan's hold was broken on the day of the Resurrection (Easter for us). Therefore, anyone who chooses Christ as his justification for heaven, gets the Holy Spirit (of God) placed in him by God as a guarantee of God's promise of heaven. Satan cannot occupy the same place as the Spirit of God and can only do what God allows him to do.
Satan, therefore, has no hold over a Christian that the Christian does not choose. The Christian is completely responsible for his own moral choices.
Men who believed in a Sovereign God founded the United States. They believed that the Bible was God’s Word and therefore sacred and necessary for living life, not just the spiritual life. Not all of them were Christians, but most believed that God was Sovereign in the affairs of men. Our "checks and balances", and our three-part government, were patterned after the Bible’s Old Testament Laws. Thomas Jefferson, who many wrongly credit for the separation of church and state as it is today, was very strong in his stand on God's Sovereignty and His place in all law. His position of "separation of church and state" was that Government should not take a stand on any specific ways that people practice their worship. Nowhere does he say that God needs to stay out of government. He says that Government should keep their hands off religious decisions and leave it up to the person to decide. The founding fathers practiced "natural law", which is an assumed right and wrong based on the principles written in the Bible. They did not believe that you could have a government any other way. They did not practice "positive law", which is what we have today. Positive Law just defers to the “powers that be” and it is the same type of concept that allowed for people to come into power like Hitler, and Mussolini. It is the current popular worldview of our media particularly and some political parties. This worldview is not religiously neutral, but it masquerades as neutral. It discriminates against the Christian view, by trying to oust all things “God” from the public square. Most of the founding fathers believed that if the laws and principles governing our country were not based on Biblical ones, the country would collapse. We see this happening right before our very eyes, primarily since the early 1960’s. The people coming here thought that America was the Christian "promised land". They acted accordingly. It was their worldview, the Christian one, that built this country. There were times when people who said they were Christians sinned, however, the Bible never says that Christians do not sin, otherwise there would have been no reason for Jesus to come.

Answer 7

The 'devil made me do it' excuse wouldn't be valid any place, Christian or not.
It would be wrong to stone a prostitute. Period.
In the king james old testament, the punishment for rape is death. It wouldn't matter if any thing possessed him or not.

There is never going to be any Christian "political system" of any kind ever. It is never going to happen.
The Christian 'kingdom of heaven' is in heaven, not on earth.
Nowhere in the new testament are Christians commanded to set up any political system of any kind.

There are no Christian-run countries, and there aren't going to be any. No one who really reads the new testament would want to set up another earthly government.
The ones we have are bad enough.

Answer 8

In ancient Jewish tradition Satan is simply an angel doing the work that God assigned to Satan to do.

The word Satan means challenger. With the idea of Satan challenging us, or tempting if you will. This description sees Satan as the angel who is the embodiment of man's challenges. This idea of Satan works closely with God as an integral part of Gods plan for us. His job is to make choosing good over evil enough of a challenge so that it becomes clear to us that there can be only one meaningful or logical choice.

Contrast this to Christianity, which sees Satan as God's opponent. In Jewish thought, the idea that there exists anything capable of setting itself up as God's opponent would be considered polytheistic or setting up the devil to be an equally powerful polarity to god or a demigod.

Oddly, proof for The Christian satan/devil mythology is supposedly found in the ancient Jewish texts that were borrowed to create the bible. One can’t help but wonder how Christians came up with such a fantastically different interpretation of Gods assistant Satan in their theology.

Other hints about Satan’s role in human relations can be seen if you look at the name Lucifer. It’s meaning in the original tongue translates as Light bearer or light bringer. Essentially the bringer of enlightenment. The temptations of the Satan idea bring all of us eventually into Gods light. Hardly the Evil entity of Christian mythology.

Love and blessings
don

Answer 9

I think you are confusing the idea of having a country with a Christian base for the law and that of one run by one particular Christian group. The founding fathers didn't want the country run by one church group but did want one in which there was freedom for all to persue their religion.

Answer 10

sorry to inform you but our USA is allready run by fanatical christian groups. The laws are written in it. The ignorance of it is abundant. there is no escaping the facts.

-today alcholics hide behind a bottle as druggies hide behind their dealers

-prostitutes are respected by the christian bible...

-We "americanize" those who join the USA legally so what is your point....

there will always be a jihad trying to undermine the inquisition of the christians. I am gladdened by this. There should be more people that stand against the tyrranical religions and oppose the "various gods" that people worship to try and stay in the "humane" standard of which we all know to be needed to sustain life and happiness.