An attack on secularism?

[The Celtic Viking]

You are not addressing the issue here. When the system gives the judge leeway in determining a sentence, why is it not acceptable for him to be influenced by Biblical principles? You would say it would be OK for him to be influenced by any non-religious source of morality I expect. Why is a belief suddenly not OK when it involved God?

Because then it would be religious - ergo, in direct conflict with secularism. You do know what secularism is, don't you?

Scottish law was overhauled in the wake of our Reformation in 1560. The biggest single influence came from the Dutch, since we had close commercial and religious ties with them (with them being another Calvinist country). And as I said earlier, we developed the idea of the 'two kingdoms' church/state model, and commisary courts were implemented to replace the old canon law used through church courts, and bring the law into line with Protestant principles.

Is this supposed to be an argument for why biblical morality has had "a significant influence on western law"?

Well in the God Delusion Dawkins argued that our 'morality' has an evolutionary purpose, I thought a lot of atheists would buy into that.

"Buy into"? Really? Sounds like you think it's not true. Tell me, which tribe do you think would fare best, all else equal: one that thought killing each other was okay, or one that thought it was not okay? Hint: humans as a social species have always (and especially when living in smaller tribes) depended upon each other for survival.

Why is secular humanist morality OK, but Biblical morality not? Secularism means the institutionalised separation of church and state, not state-enforced atheism.

Wow. Just... wow. State-enforced atheism would be if the state tried to stop the people from believing in any god. That is not the same thing as not allowing religious people to force their religious values onto other people. Sheez.