Conservative vs Liberal

Inalienable does not mean "non-transferable". It means it cannot be transfered, surrendered or taken.

An inalienable right is a right that cannot be alienated.

But Scriptute says that the murderer dies.

The passage you provided disproves your claim in two ways -

1. The prohibition against murder is based on God (on God's image) not on a human right.

2. The murderer is to be alienated from his life.

There is no way around this. You were mistaken.

But if you consider the DOI to be strictly in context of government interaction with the governed then you have a human right based on restriction (the intent of the founding fathers).

Men do not have the right to take another's life. In the context of the DOI, then, our lives are protected as a right because it restricts the other.

The Constitution does not exist to give rights but to restrict government.

 

Non-transferable means it cannot be transfered.

And inalienable INCLUDES that it cannot be transferred.

But inalienable means it cannot be alienated from the person. It can't be transferred, taken away, surrendered, etc.

 

Look at it this way-

If you have a right to life and commit murder, and your life is justly taken from you, then your right to life was not (by definition) inalienable because it was justly alienated from you.

 

Immutable means "not mutable". If something is immutable then that thing cannot be mutable.

Inalienable means "not alienable". It cannot be alienated from a person (it cannot be taken, transferred, or surrendered).

Non-transferable means something cannot be transferred.

Inalienable rights are non-transferable. They cannot be transferred. They also cannot be taken (the point of the Declaration of Independence). And they cannot be surrendered.


That said, please explain why the founding fathers felt it necessary to say we have a NON-TRANSFERABLE right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness among other NON-TRANSFERABLE rights.

You are backing yourself into an indefensible (not able to be defended) position.

 

To keep it simple, let's just look at the three named in the DOI (the DOI mentions there are more, but among them are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness).

Let's look at liberty.

The DOI calls liberty an inalienable right.

Now, you suggested this could mean "non-transferable" (the founding fathers were concerned that the government would try to transfer our liberty to another). This does not make since because "all men" already have it (per the DOI).

So "non-transferable" does not work.

I suggest that the founding fathers were concerned about a government taking away human rights. Their case is that we - being human - have qualities innate to our beings that the government (or other people) have no right to take away.

But if we look at man individually, these "rights" are not inalienable. A man can be alienated from the right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness upon committing a crime. He could also be alienated from the right to life by killing another person.

The DOI was not making a theological statement, but instead was declaring independence from a government that exceeded its proper bounds.

 

If life is an inalienable right posses by man then it is unjust to alienate that right from man.

The point of Scripture is that we do not have a right to lives. We exist by God's grace - not rights.

 

No. The argument is those things are self evident inalienable rights.

In the context of human events, I agree with the DOI (it constrains government). But theogically men are not endowed by God with the inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

 

???

Who thinks the DOI seeks to govern God?

All I am saying is we exist not by human right but by God's grace.