> I have been debating evolution with some other people.  There were some
> quotes from Jefferson about Christianity.  The jist of these quotes were
> that Jefferson was definitely not a Christian. I was wondering if you had
> any knowledge of the writings these quotes were cited from.  If you have any
> information that would be helpful, please forward it on.  Below, I have
> given you the url to a website called "infidels.org".  This site has quotes
> and excerpts from a book on Jefferson.
>
>
http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/john_remsburg/six_historic_americans/chapter_2.html

It must be said that Jefferson was not a Chrisitian in the traditional
sense, but he definitely considered himself a Chrisitian and a true follower
of Jesus.  He wrote:

"The Christian religion, when divested of the rags in which they [the
clergy] have enveloped it, and brought to the original purity and simplicity
of it's benevolent institutor, is a religion of all others most friendly to
liberty, science, and the freest expansion of the human mind." --Thomas
Jefferson to Moses Robinson, 1801. ME 10:237

Also, he wrote regarding his compilation of what we now call the Jefferson
Bible:

"A more beautiful or precious morsel of ethics I have never seen; it is a
document in proof that I am a real Christian, that is to say, a disciple of
the doctrines of Jesus, very different from the Platonists, who call me
infidel and themselves Christians and preachers of the gospel, while they
draw all their characteristic dogmas from what its Author never said nor
saw." --Thomas Jefferson to Charles Thompson, 1816.  ME 14:385


It is interesting to note that in such a long article on Jefferson and the
Christian religion such as you cite, the above quotations are not included.
As so often happens, people assemble materials in order to prove a point
they are trying to make about Jefferson, and omit anything that might
contradict THEIR point, even though a fair explanation of Jefferson's views
on Jesus and Christianity would demand that what they omitted be included.
When the website says, "these writings clearly prove that he was not a
Christian, but a Freethinker," that statement is not quite correct, because
Jefferson considered himself a Christian.  Only by making a carefully biased
selection, and thus distorting Jefferson's views, can it be said that he was
NOT a Christian.

If you really want to see what kind of a Christian Jefferson was, examine
carefully The Jefferson Bible at:


http://www.angelfire.com/co/JeffersonBible