The Bible on Sonya
As another example of the deliberate malice that lies behind so many right wing talking points, please briefly consider the following, about Sonya Sotomayor:
"Sonia Sotomayor: Measured by the Word of God and Found Wanting"
Oh, that sounds serious. The writer argues:
"According to Deuteronomy, the first and foremost qualification for the office of a judge, is that the person be “wise and understanding."
This person quotes the biblical text as follows:
"In Deuteronomy chapter 1, we learn that God instructed Moses to “take you wise men, and understanding” and appoint them “judges,” charging them to “judge righteously” without “respect of persons in judgment...."
So, the first qualification to be a judge is not to be "wise and understanding." It is to be a man. That sort of lets Sonya Sotomayor out, huh? Can't argue with that.
"Sonia Sotomayor: Measured by the Word of God and Found Wanting"
Oh, that sounds serious. The writer argues:
"According to Deuteronomy, the first and foremost qualification for the office of a judge, is that the person be “wise and understanding."
This person quotes the biblical text as follows:
"In Deuteronomy chapter 1, we learn that God instructed Moses to “take you wise men, and understanding” and appoint them “judges,” charging them to “judge righteously” without “respect of persons in judgment...."
So, the first qualification to be a judge is not to be "wise and understanding." It is to be a man. That sort of lets Sonya Sotomayor out, huh? Can't argue with that.
Comments
Second he must swear or affirm that “I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”
In the short time that the American people have had to appraise whether Judge Sotomayor would be true to these oaths, it is becoming increasingly apparent that even her supporters—from the President on down—have backpedaled. In an attempt to soften her statement that a “Latina woman” judge would be superior to a “white male” jurist, President Obama said that “I am sure that she would have restated it.” Others have chimed in, including the President’s press secretary who dismissed the matter as just a mistake in the choice of words."
Instead of straw manning the site, why not give a little context and show that their argument wasn't that she is a women, but rather she is not wise nor is she responsible enough to uphold the oaths necessary to be in the position.
Of course I wasn't suggesting what you say. What I was suggesting is the idiocy of basing our judgments about our government on what it says in the bible. Only a few lines from this verse in Deuteronomy, God says that he has made the Jews as numerous as the stars. Do you really believe that there were a hundred billion or so of them, stacked up like cordwood in the Sinai?
"Only a few lines from this verse in Deuteronomy, God says that he has made the Jews as numerous as the stars"
I believe this only if you agree that Obama was talking about walking when he said:
"If you're walking down the right path and you're willing to keep walking, eventually you'll make progress."
You really aren't reading for understanding, rather you are reading to try and find something to criticize in a Book you do not even understand. Words are fickle things.
Here's another little tidbit from the same chapter we've been discussing, Deuteronomy I (direct translation from the Hebrew:)
7. Turn you, and take your journey, and go to the mount of the Amorites, and unto all the places nigh thereunto, in the plain, in the hills, and in the vale, and in the south, and by the seaside, to the land of the Caananites, and unto Lebanon, unto the great river, the river Euphrates.
8. Behold, I have set the land before you: go in and possess the land which the Lord sware unto your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to give unto them and to their seed after them.
In other words, Israel should stretch from the Mediterranean to the Euphrates, or all of current Israel and Jordan, and half of Iraq; also, depending on how you interpret the above, big chunks of Lebanon and Syria.
Are you good with that? Remember, this is the divinely inspired word of God. Reject part, reject it all, at least as far as thinking that you are really going to get meaningful political advice there.