In Which Language Should We Pledge Allegiance?

Definitely in English.

Seems right to me.

I wonder what would happen if American students dared do this in Muslim countries.

I hope they don't have to pledge allegiance to those countries when in them. If they made a fuss about such things, though, they'd probably come home without their heads, or stay behind bars for a while.

I think it is a good idea to experience the richness of culture in our United States so this is an okay thing with me. I will add though, that I think we need to teach in English, unless it is a foreign language class, and that ESL classes should have a goal of helping students become fluent in American English.

I'd want to make sure the translations are accurate. They don't teach Arabic in this high school, so I wonder who on the faculty is able to check the translation.

It didn't hurt me to say th pledge to the flag in school. Surprised they aren't stopping the
Scouts from saying there Pledge..

I've no doubt they will change the words. But I'm planning a post on that later on.

Larry, I have heard that before WWII the scout said the pledge while raising an extended arm, open palm toward the flag. (A famous picture of the Americans of Japanese descent saluting this way in the internment camp ran in Life mag.) That salute disappeared from America after a little corporal with a funny mustache adopted it for his Nazi's.

They should be proud it is being said at all.

In as much as it is correctly translated.

There is little that is as profound or beautiful as American Nationalism.

I'm getting lost in this discussion but I appreciate all your comments.

It's none of my business. No one should have to say the pledge anyway. It's another of those things we do for political purposes. It was a dumb idea in the first place.

I don't think anyone is still required to say it. I remember over 50 years ago you could keep silent if it was against your religion. To me it's a way to make sure the ideals of this country are imprinted on our brains so we don't forget them.

Barbara,

Which ideals are mentioned in the Pledge?

The ideals which we aim for are a United States which is a republic, indivisible, under God, with liberty and justice for all. Have we achieved these ideals? Not completely. But they are the ideals on which we were founded and which people have fought to preserve and defend where present, and bring about where not. Today few know we were established as a republic. Most think we are a democracy. Many think we ought to be one. Democracies do not care about minority rights. We were once divided over economics and slavery. A war was fought over that. We were founded on Biblical principles, but it was not put into the pledge until Eisenhower's time. Liberty and justice for all is an ideal we still work to achieve and we seem to be farther from it now than we were a few decades ago. Though we are supposed to be one American nation where those from all cultures seek to be Americans first. Now it seems the focus is one separating people back into the cultures they came from rather than integrating them into one people and one nation.

Barbara,

I was hoping the late addition of "under God" was not an ideal.

Liberty and justice are ideals but I suspect that it would be the means to attain and maintain them that should be "imprinted on our brains" rather than just something to repeat as a slogan. You might also notice that there was no liberty and justice for the slaves in 1800 nor for Native Americans nor women nor the poor nor for immigrants nor for religious minorities.

Perhaps rather than saying a Pledge it would be better to teach some history. Personally, I am not willing to say "my country, right or wrong", but rather "I will be just and tolerant no matter who you are or what you believe."

I really think the U.S. was founded on the principles of the Enlightenment rather than the Bible. I also think that we were diverse from the beginning and that diversity is what made us strong.

That's where you and I will have to agree to disagree. I specifically referred to the Civil War as an attempt to right the wrong of slavery. It's obvious our world views are different. I'm not saying that all of our founders were Christians, but most did believe in Biblical principles, as did Lincoln. Abolitionists were also led by Christians. Biblical principles were incorporated into the Declaration and Constitution. Biblical principles produced the American Revolution and due process of liberty under law. The Enlightenment produced the French Revolution, which produced unrestrained license followed by horrible killing and mass fear. Perhaps you're reading the new revised history, written by those who see everything from a modern perspective of our present ideas of political correctness, and forgetting the perspective and world view of those who were living at the time.

The Civil War was not fought to end slavery. The Emancipation Proclamation was issued as a tactic to win the war. In fact, if the North had thought the reason for the war was to free the slaves they would not have supported the war. It was fought to preserve slavery but the attempt failed.

Larry, what exactly is your problem??? If you don't love the country you reside in, then move to another! You seem to have something negative to say about all posts that reflect traditional values and and rich, history of America! Do you really believe our nation is better off today than it was when the bible the pledge and absolutes were taught in our schools?? God help ya.. As for those of us who do believe in God and country, your foolish remarks are really getting old, sir.......

Are you kidding? The world is so much better off. For one, you as a woman get to have a vote, a career, an opinion. The end of slavery didn't help black people, it was moving on from traditional values. Minorities are better off. Non-Christians are included, recognized.

A thread that runs through your comments is that you feel you particular version of god that you just happened to be born indoctrinated with is somehow less ridiculous to believe in than other peoples. The blind-arrogance is distasteful.

BTW, if you're interested in having some kind of theocracy, you're the one who should do the relocating. Maybe you could find Christian version of Iran somewhere - all the same religion, all the time, and no doubters.

Your entitled to your opinions, KC, just not your assumed facts...;-)

Life can be rather tragic for those who have enough or even plenty to live on but little to nothing to live for.

"I really think the U.S. was founded on the principles of the Enlightenment rather than the Bible."

The idea of the Enlightenment era ideas as superior and being opposed to the all-encompassing wisdom of the Bible has always caused me to chuckle. Here we have the greatest book ever written that was here before the period of the Enlightenment and remains after that period is long over despite the most concerted attempts, including those in the period of the Enlightenment, to see its annihilation. The only thing you can hope to do is annihilate the Christians because that's the only way you think you can get rid of the principles of the bible. You can go to all that trouble, and you still will find that the principles of the Bible still exist and are the ones under which you are subservient. They are the only principles upon which anything has been derived because they are irrefutable natural laws which of themselves contain the truths of the universe. That those natural laws have been ordained by a God you don't accept is moot.

Sue. I saw this in the main feed:

""I really think the U.S. was founded on the principles of the Enlightenment rather than the Bible."

Thinking you said that I rushed over here because I thought you had gone off your rocker. But, it wasn't your quote after all. I didn't think you would say something like that.

I like your response.

Whether I had said that or not, I know a few people who would...oh, never mind. Thanks for knowing me at least well enough to think that was out of character, though.

"Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations, may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong."
That is the original quote by naval hero Stephen Decatur.

What does that quote have to do with this any more than any other quote? It's not as if it were ever part of the Pledge of Allegiance. I don't think that the rather nationalist quote makes much of a point for you, but maybe I'm missing something.

"The idea of the Enlightenment era ideas as superior and being opposed to the all-encompassing wisdom of the Bible has always caused me to chuckle. Here we have the greatest book ever written that was here before the period of the Enlightenment and remains after that period is long over despite the most concerted attempts, including those in the period of the Enlightenment, to see its annihilation. The only thing you can hope to do is annihilate the Christians because that's the only way you think you can get rid of the principles of the bible. You can go to all that trouble, and you still will find that the principles of the Bible still exist and are the ones under which you are subservient. They are the only principles upon which anything has been derived because they are irrefutable natural laws which of themselves contain the truths of the universe. That those natural laws have been ordained by a God you don't accept is moot." - Sue

I'm of the mind that BRILLIANCE should often be repeated. ;]

Thanks, but it's just so obvious, Mark-John. The way some of these people have tried to determine the minds of the Founders, you'd think they were all alters of The Amazing Kreskin.

= It was fought to preserve slavery but the attempt failed. = I think Larry meant to preserve the Union. Anyway historians still disagree. Of interest, few of the articles of cessession adopted by the states in rebellion mention states rights. In fact, they mention that the Northern States were ignoring Federal Mandates to not interfere with slavery and to return runaways.
The convention 50 years after the war to push for veteran benefits for former confederates laid out the concept of 'states rights' and 'abusive tariffs' as the reason for the war. Since most US textbooks were coming out of Texas and Tennessee, that concept soon became accepted as the reason for the war.
Still in debate.

James,

The North fought to preserve the Union. The South fought to preserve slavery. It was a war of the Southern rich fighting against the Northern rich.

K.C.,

Though I would not have expressed the sentiments in those terms I agree overall with the main thrust of your comments.

We tend to idealize the people and times of the past casting some as flawless heroes and some as purely evil villains. In truth, there was both blame and virtue on all sides (there were more than two sides, of course).

Sue,

When was the Bible formed? (Shortly after 300 CE.) When was the Enlightenment? (In the 1600-1700s in Europe.) Each state in Europe after about 800-1000 claimed to be a Christian state founded upon and following the Bible.

The Bible does not talk about representative democracy and democratic republics and voters. The Bible does not refer to the inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The Bible does not talk about no taxation without representation. But those ideas do come from the Enlightenment intellectuals.

I quote from the Wikipedia article on the Age of Enlightenment:
"The new intellectual forces spread to urban centres across Europe, notably England, Scotland, the German states, the Netherlands, Russia, Italy, Austria, and Spain, then jumped the Atlantic into the European colonies, where it influenced Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson, among many others, and played a major role in the American Revolution. The political ideals of the Enlightenment influenced the American Declaration of Independence, the United States Bill of Rights, the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, and the Polish–Lithuanian Constitution of May 3, 1791."

Now many (most) of the Enlightenment thinkers were also Christians and they did not think their political ideas opposed in any way either the Bible nor the Christian faith. So I have no idea where you got the following idea:
"The idea of the Enlightenment era ideas as superior and being opposed to the all-encompassing wisdom of the Bible has always caused me to chuckle." Why you would think that the Enlightenment era ideas were considered to be superior to or opposed to the Bible is beyond me.

"The Bible does not refer to the inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

It absolutely does; those are natural laws. If you understood the New Testament, that it is based on agape love, you would understand every human being's right to those things, whether American or not. Those are what we call principles. From those principles have evolved many different thoughts, some political, some sociological. The laws of the Bible, The Ten Commandments, fulfilled in the New Testament under the law of love, are immutable laws and when we apply them with enlightened minds (depending on what you consider to be enlightened, of course) they form fair governments, at least theoretically. Where they go in practice because we remain sinners is another issue.


Me: "The idea of the Enlightenment era ideas as superior and being opposed to the all-encompassing wisdom of the Bible has always caused me to chuckle."

You: "Why you would think that the Enlightenment era ideas were considered to be superior to or opposed to the Bible is beyond me."

It seems to me that you think they are. If I had been the one to say that many of the Enlightenment thinkers were also Christians, either you or someone else would have piped up that they were Deists. That misses the point, but it also implies that Christians would not be Enlightenment thinkers because it's some kind of inferior thought process when it is instead the very thought from which the Enlightenment had its genesis as basically you just admitted.

Sue,

You write that the Bible does refer to the inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Please give me chapter and verse since you clearly have found them in the Bible and I have not.

----------

You say I think that the Enlightenment era ideas are superior to and opposed to the Bible. Please provide a quote of my written words which support your belief. I did write just above "Now many (most) of the Enlightenment thinkers were also Christians..." which contradicts your belief.

I explained HOW it was referred, which is different from expilicit examples that you seem to want, and so I can see that you're still confused. Let me see whether this example will help you or not.

In this sentence above, "Those are what we call principles. From those principles have evolved many different thoughts, some political, some sociological," I was tempted to add "some religious." Some religions have also taken their ideas from the Bible. This is why there are so many sects of Christianity. Although what they claim is referred to in the Bible, it's a matter of interpretation. For instance, what I say is proof that there is a Trinity, and the verses I use to back that up, will be argued by some not to mean the same thing. I still base my belief in a Trinity on that idea from the Bible.

Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are just about everywhere you look in the New Testament message of love for one's neighbor. There is almost nothing in the New Testament that won't relate to at least one of those things,and sometimes a combination of them. As I said, you don't understand the New Testament as I understand it, but I am sure that the religious men, many of whom were brought up in schools where all their learning of every subject centered around the Christian religion, entertained the thoughts that are the foundation for the Declaration of Independence and our Constiitution for the first tiime long before they ever had any inkling that they would be a part of such things. They are principles that you derive from how the Bible teaches you to live your life. It is difficult to make someone who didn't have that kind of training, or who had it but didn't understand it then, understand it now.


Maybe I was being unfair when I said that you might have been one of the ones piping up that they were Deists, but I've been through that so many times here, even though you didn't say that in your comments now, I had to head it off at the pass, so to speak. I didn't wish this to turn into that argument and that is why I said what I did.

I've got to add here that you have me chuckling again when I think of you asking for the particular verses. In light of the recent mass murders, there's more concentrated talk on curbing the incidence of those kinds of crimes by reducing the amount of violence in video games and movies. Whether you think that will work or not is not at all my point and I couldn't care less for my purposes here whether you think it will or won't. The point is that if you were to be speaking of one of these crimes and you were on the side of those who don't think it makes a difference, would you be asking for the specific video game or movie that enacted the exact crime of violence causing it? It's all in what you feed your mind generally that makes it think the kinds of things it thinks. There are messages the mind gets from viewing whatever it views. It doesn't matter whether the violence is an exact replica of what you've viewed unless you're literally a moron who has no capacity whatsoever for extrapolation.

Oh, I just thought of something else. When I was referring to "you" I was referring to the general "you," not anyone specific. I know that you tend to take things very personally, so let me make that clear, just in case. It's so tedious to get involved here sometimes.

Sue,

I regret that you did not choose to provide any biblical citations in your response.

I hope you can understand my position and why I attribute the founding father's expressed ideals to the ideals given expression by Enlightenment authors.

Larry, I regret that sometimes generalities can be inclusive of what we had hoped they might not. You have a good day.

In English.

Thanks, Karen.

In English like the most of us were taught.

I'm of similar opinion, Betty.

English!

English English English. In the Muslim countries they do not allow passages from their Qur'an to be recited in anything but Arabic. Political Correctness is destroying this country.

Which language? None.
Other countries don't have Pledges to their government. Imagine if you heard about North Korea having their children stand every day and salute the flag. You'd have just two thoughts, indoctrination and I expect that from totalitarians.

You may want to try reading Nikita's comment, KC? ;-)

I did. Did you? Nothing to do with my comment. It talks about people reading from the Qur'an. No oaths to government.

Or are you trying to say that this issue has something to do with Americans reading the Bible in another language (which of course they do - 100s of other languages).

In my country all people coming to live in the UK as UK citizens have to pledge their allegiance. The pledge is not to the country but to our Monarch Queen Elizabeth.

The United Kingdom’s Pledge of Allegiance

1. I pledge allegiance to Her Majesty Elizabeth Windsor, to her family and to the monarchy for which it stands: three kingdoms under one queen, infinitely stratified, with such liberties as are granted to the people by parliament and such justice as a judiciary that also makes the laws may allow.

2. I acknowledge that all governmental authority is derived from the Crown and denounce the heresy that is should be derived from the people.

3. Being a Catholic/Hindu/atheist/Methodist/agnostic/Baptist/Muslim/other I recognize the supremacy of the Church of England in all spiritual matters and its right to a privileged place in the government of my new country. Furthermore I freely acknowledge my obligation to give financial support to that Church and recognize the right of its archbishops to sit in the legislature for as long as they hold office in the Church of England and without benefit of election. I acknowledge that the separation of church and state has no place in the traditions of this nation and is therefore of no merit.

4. I renounce for my own part and on behalf of my offspring all aspiration to the office of head of state, accept that second class status is the highest which subjects of the monarch may achieve and acknowledge that only members of the Windsor family, being of Protestant European ancestry, are fit to hold that office.

5. I renounce all claims to the status of equal citizen and accept my duty as a subject to defer to those superior in civil rank whether their status be inherited at birth or bestowed by Her Majesty the Queen.

6. I acknowledge that my civil rights are those bestowed by Parliament, which that same Parliament may remove at any time of its choosing. Acknowledging that an unwritten and ill-defined constitution, subject to such interpretation as expediency may require, is the best guarantee of the rights of free Britons, I disclaim any desire for my rights as a citizen or the powers of the state and the limits to those powers, to be set out in writing,

7. I accept my duty to uphold the laws of this nation and will not, therefore, speak or act in such a manner as might advance a republican form of government, such being alien to the traditions and contrary to the law of my new land. I renounce all claims to sit in the legislature, serve as a police officer or take office as a judge if my beliefs are republican in nature.

@ Graham, we have an Oath of Allegiance for new citizens. It is totally different then the pledge that is talked about here.

I don't see what it hurts to say the pledge in other languages. I went over and read some of the comments on the article you linked to and people are being more than stupid. Half of them would lose their mind if they knew that the pledge was written by a Socialist.

When I posted this on Facebook, a close friend of mine made the case that saying the pledge in one's own language might make it mean more. Thanks for pointing out the origins of the pledge. I just found this short history of it.

I first said the pledge without the "under God" phrase.

Then the government added that in.
Also changed our motto from "E Pluribus Unum" (From many; one)
to "In God We Trust."

So that's what happened to the melting pot and why our cultures no longer assimilate into just Americans.

Well said, Barbara.

busted the trust our founders had in what they set up.

On June 14, 1954, President Eisenhower signed the bill officially adding "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance. The President remarked that, "Millions of our schoolchildren will daily proclaim in every city and town the dedication of our nation and our people to the Almighty."
But trust me folks, that wasn't enforcing religion. The SCOTUS has so ruled time and again (often relying on the arguement that it is so repetitious that it becomes meaningless and doesn't influence childrens' minds.)
OK. I guess so.
Now Johnny and Janie, recite, then write these spelling word ten times each night until the test...

So they are all standing around saying the same thing in different languages and the loud speaker is interpreting Arabic. Can anyone say: CHAOS!!!!

ok, but say it in what language?
LOL

I think they choose a different language each week, or occasionally change it when the club comes up with a new language they want to try. I think people are supposed to use the same language on any given week. I wasn't there. Just read the article. If everyone uses the same language on a given day and it isn't English, then many people won't understand what they are saying.

That still sounds like chaos. If they are doing this to learn different languages, this isn't going to accomplish that goal. It sounds like one of those "distract" techniques.

Speaking of chaos, years ago when everybody was in a flurry over the wording, I suggested replacing 'God' with 'Insert Preference' thus the little kiddies at that point could say Jesus, Buddha, Isanagi, Allah, Nobody (for atheists), or whomever they pray to. It would empower the kids and only produce a second or two of cacaphony, (except for the agnostic kids that would fall behind while saying 'one nation under or maybe not under a God who may or may not exist'.)
Unfortunately some folks thought I was serious and I got some majorly abusive letters!