Response to Richard Carrier’s Alleged “Rebuttal” (2012) Eric Laupot Richard Carrier’s reasoning in “Severus Is Not Quoting Tacitus: A Rebuttal to Eric Laupot” is too muddled to review in its entirety. Most leading scholars and Latinists are at variance with his conclusions. Most problematic is that Carrier begs the question from the beginning because he […]

Is the Bible the Word of God? Emmett F. Fields 1983 This essay was written to be delivered as a lecture and is worded accordingly. It was part of a two day debate with a Fundamentalist minister. For each evening there are two parts, one of thirty minutes and a conclusion of ten minutes. This […]

The Higher Religions (1996) Emmett F. Fields   I must take issue with Dr. Paul Kurtz and Free Inquiry magazine (Fall 1996) in concluding that Humanism is not a religion. If there were religious liberty in America the question of the religious status of Humanism, and the other Higher Religions, would be simply a matter […]

Atheism: An Affirmative View (1980) Emmett F. Fields What is Atheism that it survives? Every religion, from earliest times, has hated and condemned those who could not believe whatever it was that those old religions happened to believe. Throughout the ages there have been the ‘intellectual outlaws’ who have questioned the “unquestionable,” and doubted even […]

Preface About the Author Edwin Henry Wilson was born on August 23, 1898, in Woodhaven, New York. He was raised in Concord, Massachusetts, where he attended the First Parish Church, a Unitarian fellowship. Wilson’s father had no use for the church; it was his mother who introduced him to Unitarianism, albeit of the conservative variety. […]

CHAPTER 9 Style and Semantics It is my contention that those who signed "A Humanist Manifesto" in 1933 sought verbal integrity and a semantic change from traditional religious terms in order to clarify their naturalistic approach. However, as is the case with most editorial matters, a great deal of the response to the written word […]

CHAPTER 8 Unitarian Humanists Who Feared a Creed Some of the men who declined to sign "A Humanist" Manifesto" were active writers in the humanist movement before and after the publication of the document. Four of them were Unitarian in background and affiliation, and, of them, two were published in the same issue of The […]

CHAPTER 7 Critiques from Humanists Who Did Not Sign Several important individuals did not sign "A Humanist Manifesto" but contributed substantially through their criticisms. The following four men are of varied backgrounds and professions and, precisely for that reason, the manifesto editors made concerted efforts to obtain their endorsements. We very much wanted the manifesto […]

CHAPTER 6 Early Responses from Signers Dr. E. A. Burtt Dr. E. A. Burtt of Cornell University’s Sage School of Philosophy, was one of the most prompt and thorough critics of the proposed manifesto. Six years later, in the first edition of his excellent book, Types of Religious Philosophy, Dr. Burtt placed religious humanism in […]

CHAPTER 5 The Editing Process That there was no one writer of "A Humanist Manifesto" becomes clear as one reviews the editing process. Following the receipt of Dr. Sellars’ first draft and some initial correspondence, the meetings of an editorial committee-Curtis Reese, A. Eustace Haydon, Raymond Bragg, and myself-were convened by Bragg and held in […]

CHAPTER 4 "A Humanist Manifesto" – The Beginning Raymond B. Bragg, as the associate editor of The New Humanist, initiated the project that resulted in the 1933 publication of "A Humanist Manifesto." In a letter dated February 17, 1970, reminiscing about the early stages, Bragg wrote: "The fact is that my job as Secretary of […]

CHAPTER 3 The New Humanist – Sponsor of the Manifesto The New Humanist was started in 1927, while I was studying in Europe as a Cruft Fellow, an award for graduating seniors. The first issue-volume one, number one-appeared in 1928. Examination of the brief record of this periodical preceding the publication of "A Humanist Manifesto" […]

  CHAPTER 2 The Background of Religious Humanism The history of religious humanism in the twentieth century, as it appeared in North America, has yet to be adequately written. The modern humanist movement emerged from liberal religious change at the end of the previous century and the beginning of this one . The influence of […]

CHAPTER 18 The Manifesto’s Long-Term Impact Over the decades since 1933, the radical nature of "A Humanist Manifesto" continued to be a source of controversy. Among the long-term effects of the manifesto, perhaps one of the most significant is the generation of a second manifesto in 1973. The forty interim years saw dramatic cultural and […]

  CHAPTER 17 Twenty Years Later: Symposium-Parts I and II While the first manifesto was never revised, debate over the need for revision or for a new document continued. So much so, that twenty years later, a symposium was published containing the views of the twenty-seven surviving signers (John Dewey, Bernard Fantus, William Floyd, Maynard […]

CHAPTER 16 Six Years Later: A Call to Revise the Manifesto As we’ve seen, soon after "A Humanist Manifesto" was published in 1933, there were those who, for various reasons, wanted a revision of the document, and the call continued in the ensuing years. Dr. Charles Francis Potter, who had reprinted the manifesto in his […]

  CHAPTER 15 Responses from Individuals Comments on the manifesto received from individuals after publication were important to us because part of the motivation behind publishing the manifesto was to catalyze discussion and promote the development of humanism. Edgar S Brightman One valued letter came from Edgar S. Brightman, who was then teaching in the […]

  CHAPTER 14 Reactions from the Media Concurrent to its appearance in The New Humanist, the manifesto was released to the media. Both Albert Dieffenbach of Boston and Charles Francis Potter of New York had expressed their willingness to help with publicity, and undoubtedly their expertise was useful. The press releases yielded some surprising results. […]

Chapter 13 Publication of "A Humanist Manifesto" In desperation to meet the deadline for The New Humanist in which "A Humanist Manifesto" would first appear publicly, I crossed the last "t" and dotted the final "i," making some purely minor typographical corrections, and sent it to the printer. I did this even though Bragg and […]

CHAPTER 12 Responses to the Final Draft Having taken into consideration both the criticisms and suggestions we received, the final draft was completed and sent to everyone who had agreed to sign, as well as to the principal advance critics. The responses to the draft were diverse. Some authorizations to sign came by wire in […]

CHAPTER 11 Distinctions Between Literary and Religious Humanism In retrospect, I think it was inevitable that some persons would be overlooked who should have been asked to sign the manifesto and others asked whose positions were not fully known. We were, after all, working under pressure, with no budget, and with very little clerical help. […]

CHAPTER 10 The Search for Signers – Round Two With the editorial process completed, "A Humanist Manifesto" was ready to submit to a wider group of signers as a finished document. The considerations that went into deciding who to invite and who not to invite to endorse it were many. After much discussion, a list […]

CHAPTER 1 "A Humanist Manifesto" – A Historic Document When thirty-four individualists agree upon anything, it is an unusual event-especially when there is a preponderance of ministers involved. Even though "reasonable minds at work on the same or similar facts" are presumed to arrive at similar conclusions, this is not always the case. Yet in […]

Bibliography Ames, Edward Scribner. 1949. Religion. Chicago, IL: John O. Pyle (also, New York, NY. Henry Holt and Company, 1929). -. 1919. The Psychology of Religious Experience. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company. Ames, Van Meter (editor). Prayers and Meditations. 1970. Chicago, IL: The Disciples’ Divinity House, University of Chicago. Applying Basic Principles. 1983. Oak Brook, […]

The Genesis of a Humanist Manifesto by Edwin H. Wilson CONTENTS PREFACE 1. A Humanist Manifesto–A Historic Document 2. The Background of Religious Humanism 3. The New Humanist–Sponsor of the Manifesto 4. “A Humanist Manifesto”–The Beginning 5. The Editing Process 6. Early Responses from Signers 7. Critiques from Humanists Who Did Not Sign 8. Unitarian […]