47 pages • 1 hour read
The Age Of Reason
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Key Figures
Thomas Paine (The Author)
Thomas Paine (1737-1809) was an English-born radical who wrote bestselling political pamphlets in support of the American and French Revolutions. He also designed bridges, revered science, and embraced Deism.
Paine is most famous for his major political treatises. Common Sense (1776), published in the American colonies, argued against monarchy and likely did more to hasten the declaration of US independence from Great Britain than any other pamphlet. The American Crisis (1776-1783) was a series of essays written to bolster sagging enthusiasm for the American Revolutionary War. Rights of Man (1791), published in two parts, offered a spirited defense of the French Revolution, as well as far-sighted proposals for peace and social welfare. Age of Reason, therefore, represents a departure from Paine’s characteristic political focus.
Paine, however, regarded Age of Reason as an extension into the religious realm of principles for which he had argued in the political realm. The leading doctrines of the American and French Revolutions had been rooted in human reason: liberty, equality, natural rights, etc. Paine envisioned a corresponding revolution of faith. He argues for Deism both because he believes it to be true and because he believes it to be consistent with the revolutionary spirit of the age.
On a personal level, Paine suffered for his beliefs. During France’s 1793-1794 Reign of Terror, he was arrested and imprisoned on account of his political principles, which had compelled him to argue against the execution of Louis XVI and resist the Revolution’s indiscriminate violence. When he returned to America, he found that the vast majority of Americans shared his political views, but they despised him for his attack on Christianity. In 1809, only six people attended Paine’s funeral in New York.
The Creator God
The God who appears in Age of Reason is the Deist God. He is the Almighty, the Creator of the Heavens and Earth. According to Deist belief, God created the world and then left it alone to function according to natural laws discoverable by human reason. This is Paine’s God.
Although Deists share this monotheistic faith with other traditional religions, the God of Deism is not the God who appears in the Old and New Testaments. Paine, in fact, regards the Jewish and Christian stories of God as blasphemous. For instance, he rejects the idea of a “chosen people” and chastises the Jewish authors of the Old Testament for attributing man’s wickedness to God’s will. Paine also regards the Christian story of the Immaculate Conception as an affront to God.
Furthermore, there is no place in Paine’s theology for suffering or salvation. The Creator God appears in Age of Reason as just, wise, and merciful, incapable of the cheap tricks Christians call “miracles.” Likewise, the Creator God would never resort to revelation by text or least of all by prophecy. He reveals Himself through His Creation.
Jesus Christ
The New Testament tells the story of Jesus Christ, whom Christians believe to be the Son of God. According to the four books of the Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born to the Virgin Mary. As a man, Jesus preached moral doctrines, performed miracles, and claimed to be the divine incarnation, the Son of God. He was arrested and crucified before rising from the dead and ascending into Heaven in the presence of his apostles. The life of Jesus Christ, as told by the Gospels, constitutes the foundation of Christianity.
Paine does not believe a word of it. In Part 1, Paine describes Jesus as an admirable man who espoused good moral philosophy and might even have been a martyred revolutionary against the Jewish priesthood, but Jesus was not, according to Paine, the Son of God. After analyzing the text of the New Testament in Parts 2 and 3, however, Paine’s attitude hardens. Near the end of Part 3, Paine declares that the Christian texts are pure fabrication, and he does not believe that Jesus Christ ever even existed as a historical figure.
Moses
In the Old Testament’s Book of Exodus, Moses leads the Israelites out of captivity in Egypt. Wielding the power of God, Moses parts the Red Sea and performs other supernatural feats. Moses also receives the Ten Commandments directly from the hand of God.
In Age of Reason, Moses appears primarily in Part 2, Chapter 1, where Paine conducts a lengthy examination into the Old Testament and, using internal evidence related to history and chronology, concludes that the Old Testament is not authentic. Moses, for instance, is reputed to have been the author of the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Testament. Paine argues, however, that internal evidence proves Moses could not have written these books, in which case, according to Paine, their authority vanishes. Paine also describes Moses as one of the Bible’s “detestable villains” (79).
The Prophets
Throughout Age of Reason, Paine pays special attention to the Biblical prophets. In Part 2, Chapter 1, Paine probes nearly every book of the Old Testament in search of historical and chronological evidence that undermines attributions of authorship, but for the books of the supposed prophets he focuses less on authorship and more on the actual prophetic claims. In the Book of Isaiah, for instance, Paine is more interested in the substance of Isaiah’s prophecies than the question of whether Isaiah himself wrote the book that bears his name.
There are several reasons for Paine’s intense focus on prophecies. First, he simply does not believe they happened. As a Deist, Paine rejects all forms of divine revelation other than the observable Creation. Second, Paine argues in Part 1 that the Biblical prophets were actually poets or musicians—claiming that the ancient Hebrew word signifying prophet actually meant poet—in which case thousands of years of religious belief would have turned on errors of comprehension or translation.
Finally, prophecies connect the Old and New Testaments. The Book of Matthew, for instance, cites at least 12 Biblical prophecies said to foretell the coming of Jesus Christ. In Part 3, Paine attempts to prove that these prophecies, based on internal textual evidence alone, could not have referred to Jesus Christ, in which case, as far as Paine is concerned, the entire Christian story crumbles.
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