Recently the state of Louisiana passed a law requiring that all public school classrooms post the biblical ten commandments on the wall. After he signed the law, Governor Jeff Landry said“ If you want to respect the rule of law, you’ve got to start from the original law giver, which was Moses.” What I find hypocritical here is that conservatives like Landry will use the bible as justification for their actions, and then reject specific passages from that bible when they are confronted with them. For example, let's take a look at how Moses himself enforced one of those commandments from the King James version of the bible, Numbers chapter 15 verse 32-36:
Now while the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering sticks on the Sabbath day. And those who found him gathering sticks brought him to Moses and Aaron, and to all the congregation. They put him under guard, because it had not been explained what should be done to him.Then the Lord said to Moses, “The man must surely be put to death; all the congregation shall stone him with stones outside the camp.” So, as the Lord commanded Moses, all the congregation brought him outside the camp and stoned him with stones, and he died.
Yes, that's god working through Moses saying that a man who gathered sticks on the Sabbath should be put to death. Now, obviously, Landry wouldn't pass a law giving the death penalty to anyone gathering sticks on the wrong day. But if he's going to use Moses as an example of a righteous law giver, why should he reject the way Moses carried out that law? If the argument is that times have changed since then, why use Moses as an example at all? As is so often the case in this country, politicians quote the parts of the bible that they like and ignore the rest, assuming that very few people have actually read the whole thing. So passages from the book of Leviticus condemning male homosexuality are quoted, and other passages sentencing women found not be to a virgin on their wedding night to death, are not.
While supporters of the law have shrugged off objections by pointing out that the paper with the commandments in the classroom can't be more than 11 by 14 inches large, and can therefore be easily ignored by students who don't want to look, it's clear what's going on here. This isn't just about this one law, this is about states testing the boundaries of a conservative Supreme Court to allow religion in public school classrooms. If the conservatives win here, and there's a good chance that they will, they won't stop: soon there will be laws mandating crosses in classrooms, and before you know it we'll be back to debating whether or "Intelligent Design" can be taught along with evolution in public schools. This is despite the fact that that gussied up version of creationism was thrown out of public schools years ago, sadly, the desire of conservative Christians to impose their beliefs on others and officially proclaim America as a Christian nation never seems to end, even as more and more Americans every year say that they have no religious affiliation.
Much like the conservative desire to allow school vouchers that would use public funds to pay for children to go to religious private schools, putting more religious imagery into public schools is all about trying to influence the next generation of Americans into following their conservative beliefs. Much like the debate around so called "critical race theory", conservatives want their values fed to the children of America so that they can stay in power for as long as possible. The youth are the future, and they want to control them.
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