Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God (Part One)



By R. Andrew Myers - Posted at Virginia is for Huguenots:

Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to obey God rather than men. (Acts 5.29)

"Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God." -- This famous saying of both Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin is said to have been on the epitaph of John Bradshaw (1602-1659), a British judge who presided over the trial of King Charles I, when his body was re-interred in Jamaica (where it was taken by his son to protect it from the fury of the Restoration towards regicides).

"Men must be governed by God, or they will be ruled by tyrants." -- William Penn

"Man will ultimately be governed by God or by tyrants." -- Benjamin Franklin

As our nation draws closer to another Fourth of July commemoration of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, I thought it would be worthwhile to trace some of the known or probable influences of history upon the writing of our national Declaration of Independence and to quote relevant extracts [I am cognizant of the fact that Thomas Jefferson was not a professing Christian, and that many Enlightenment influences among the American Founding Fathers of the late 18th century have affected our nation for ill, particularly with respect to the U.S. Constitution, but this series of posts concerns the major influences upon our other national charter, many of which were Calvinistic].


See also:

Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God and the Declaration of Independence (pdf)

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