in such a way that the universe performed according to immutable laws. These laws were God’s “Providence.” But the deists understood this providential creation very differently from any idea that God intervened in history in a providential way. One of the more extreme examples of this philosophy is found in the thought and work of Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson produced a highly edited version of the Bible from which every reference to the miraculous had been expunged, every instance of the miraculous
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