Benjamin Franklin was America’s first and foremost multi-hyphenate. The printer-publisher-author-scientist-postmaster-civic organizer-internationally renowned inventor-diplomat had, unsurprisingly, eclectic religious beliefs.
Born in Boston in 1706 into a large, strongly Christian family, Franklin grew up in Puritan-influenced Boston, where churchgoing, prayer, Bible study, and Sabbath observance were central to life. His family attended Old South Church. While his father initially hoped his son would become a minister, as a teenager, young Benjamin began questioning traditional Calvinist Christianity. He rejected the doctrine of predestination and became skeptical of organized religion and religious dogmatism. The future Founder, however, did not abandon religion altogether. Instead, he continued to believe in God, providence, morality, prayer, and the civic value of religion. As he later put it in his Autobiography, “I never doubted, for instance, the existence of the Deity; that he made the world, and govern’d it by his Providence; that the most acceptable service of God was the doing good to man; that our souls are immortal; and that all crime will be punished, and virtue rewarded, either here or hereafter.”
No wonder, then, that as Franklin’s Revolutionary spirit developed over decades, he often utilized biblical themes, imagery, and language to advocate for independence.
Learning from the Bible Before It’s Too Late
In 1747, roughly thirty years before the fight for American freedom, Franklin published a pamphlet titled Plain Truth in response to the threat of French and Spanish attacks on Pennsylvania and the colony’s reluctance to organize an effective defense. His central argument was that Pennsylvania needed to defend itself rather than rely on Britain or neighboring colonies. The then-forty-one-year-old criticized Pennsylvania’s pacifist Quaker political leadership, arguing that religious objections to military action had left the colony vulnerable.
By turning to the story of Laish, a Canaanite city in Judges 18, Franklin offered a warning to Pennsylvania. He recounted how the tribe of Dan, one of the twelve ancient tribes of Israel, sent spies to scout Laish and discovered a people living “CARELESS,” “QUIET,” and “SECURE”—a society that felt safe because it had never been attacked and therefore had made no preparations for war. The Israelites recognized this vulnerability and conquered the city with only six hundred armed men. Franklin saw Laish as an analogue to Pennsylvania and argued that, just as the people of Laish mistakenly assumed they were safe, Pennsylvanians were dangerously complacent about the possibility of attack. He concluded by explicitly warning his readers to learn from the biblical example: “Not so far from Zidon, however, as Pennsylvania is from Britain; and yet we are, if possible, more careless than the People of Laish!—As the Scriptures are given for our Reproof, Instruction and Warning, may we make a due Use of this Example, before it be too late!”
As Thomas Kidd notes in Benjamin Franklin: The Religious Life of a Founding Father, Franklin then drew further into his repertoire of ancient sources, citing the Jewish scholar and historian Josephus regarding the Roman conquest of Jerusalem. Franklin surmised that “Heaven, justly displeas’d at our growing Wickedness,” was “determin’d to punish this once favour’d Land.”
Franklin’s usage of biblical imagery spoke to the communal character and its pressing need for self-defense. During the spring of 1748, Philadelphians held a grand procession before the Provincial Council, flying silk regimental colors. One of their flags proclaimed “Jehovah Nissi,” “The Lord is our Banner,” a reference to the name of the altar Moses built at Rephidim after the Israelites won a battle against the Amalekites in Exodus 17:15. Another showed David as he slung the stone that killed the giant warrior Goliath as described in the book of Samuel.
The Freedom to Fight
Eight years later, on December 18, 1755, Franklin published an essay titled “A Dialogue between X, Y, and Z” in his Pennsylvania Gazette. The piece unfolded as a sharp debate between three local citizens arguing over the colony’s newly passed Militia Act of 1755.
X began by mocking the law as weak because it relies entirely on volunteers rather than forced conscription. Y shared his frustration but felt a deep sense of urgency, fearing imminent French and Native American attacks on their borders. Z, representing Franklin’s voice, then stepped in to defend the act. He explained that the law deliberately respects Quaker pacifism while providing a legal framework for willing citizens to organize and elect their own officers.
Z argued that true security in a free society must be voluntary. X and Z then used the biblical accounts of Deuteronomy 20 and Gideon’s army in Judges 7 to defend Pennsylvania’s militia system. Their exchange recounts how biblical military law allowed those who were fearful or unwilling to fight to leave the army, emphasizing that fear could spread among otherwise courageous soldiers: “What Man is there that is fearful and fainthearted? let him go and return unto his House; lest his Brethrens Heart faint as well as his Heart” [Deuteronomy 20:8]. Franklin then compared what he called this biblical “sifting” to Pennsylvania’s militia, arguing that those who remained would be genuinely committed to defending the colony rather than being forced into service. He concluded that the system would ensure that “all that engage will be hearty,” because those who objected to the militia could simply refuse to participate.
This argument allowed Franklin to portray Pennsylvania’s military organization as consistent with biblical precedent rather than opposed to religious principles. And it allowed him to express his beliefs that a free people must avoid complacency, committed defenders should be distinguished from the unwilling, and citizens needed to take responsibility for protecting their liberty.
That same year, Franklin also wrote “A Parable Against Persecution.” Composed in a deliberate imitation of biblical language and presented as though it were a lost chapter of Genesis, Franklin offered it during a period when religious diversity and debates over religious toleration were especially significant in colonial Pennsylvania.
In the story, Abraham welcomes a weary traveler into his home but later drives him out after discovering that the man worships God differently. God then rebukes Abraham, pointing out that he himself has patiently tolerated the traveler’s beliefs for nearly two hundred years. Abraham recognizes his error, searches for the man, and restores his hospitality. Through this invented “ancient” episode, Franklin argued that if God tolerates religious differences, human beings have no justification for persecuting people because of their faith.
Divine Providence in Pennsylvania
Following the success of the Revolution, Franklin saw Hebraic imagery as capturing the spirit of the surprising, miraculous-like victory over the British. On July 4, 1776, he was appointed, alongside John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, to design the Great Seal of the United States. Franklin submitted for consideration: “Moses standing on the Shore, and extending his Hand over the Sea, thereby causing the same to overwhelm Pharoah who is sitting in an open Chariot, a Crown on his Head & a Sword in his Hand. Rays from a Pillar of Fire in the Clouds reaching to Moses, to express that he acts by Command of the Deity. Motto, Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God.” While the suggestion eventually was subjected to death-by-committee, the offering encapsulates the continued impact the Bible had on Franklin’s thinking and the collective soul of the nation.
Franklin, well into his later years, continued to use biblical imagery, now inserting Hebraic themes into debates over the Constitution.
During the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia on June 28, 1787, as the oldest delegate, eighty-one-year-old Franklin spoke after weeks of disagreement and deadlock. Franklin called on the delegates to turn to divine providence, reminding them that during the Revolution they had prayed for God’s protection and believed their prayers had been answered. He asked why they had stopped seeking that assistance now that they were deciding how to establish the new nation’s government. “I have lived, Sir, a long time and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth—that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without [H]is notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without [H]is aid?” he mused. Drawing directly on Scripture, he continued, “except the Lord build the House they labor in vain that build it” [Psalm 127:1]. He went on to warn that without divine assistance the leaders of the nascent nation would fare “no better than the Builders of Babel” [Genesis 11:1–9]. Franklin therefore proposed that the Convention begin each day with prayer, asking for “the assistance of Heaven” and blessings upon their deliberations.
The next year, in a 1788 essay published under the pseudonym “K,” Franklin drew on the biblical story of Korah’s rebellion in Numbers 16–17 to defend the proposed Constitution against Anti-Federalist opposition. He compared the thirteen American states to the twelve tribes of Israel, portraying the Constitution’s framers as Moses and Aaron, leaders appointed under divine authority to guide a newly liberated people. Franklin argued that just as Korah had challenged Moses and Aaron under the pretense of protecting the people’s liberties, the Anti-Federalists were exploiting Americans’ fear of centralized power for their own political interests. He observed that the Israelites were “a people jealous of their newly acquired liberty,” but warned that such jealousy became dangerous when manipulated by “artful men, pretending public good, with nothing really in view but private interest.” Through this analogy, Franklin presented opposition to the Constitution as a repetition of biblical rebellion against legitimate authority, suggesting that resistance to a government established for the common good could undermine the very liberty it sought to protect. He further reinforced this argument through his faith in divine providence, writing, “I have so much faith in the general government of the world by PROVIDENCE,” that he could hardly believe a matter so consequential to the welfare of present and future generations would proceed without divine guidance.
By invoking the Israelites’ struggle to establish a divinely sanctioned government, Franklin framed the Constitution as part of a larger providential narrative in which political freedom required unity, responsible leadership, and resistance to self-interested dissent. Biblical wisdom, according to Franklin, was a necessary part of the nation’s political future.
It is worth noting, by way of conclusion, that Benjamin Franklin didn’t simply quote from the Good Book; he also supported the People of the Book. In 1788, the same year he cited Moses in support of the Constitution, he donated five pounds to Congregation Mikveh Israel, the oldest formal Jewish congregation in Philadelphia, to help pay off its construction debts. In this way, his Jewish neighbors could continue to publicly read from the Bible, which the philanthropic Founder viewed as a source of inspiration and guidance for all Americans, independent of their beliefs.