President Abraham Lincoln’s Biblical Leadership

While recent American presidents have sometimes quoted the Bible or made use of biblical terms, President Abraham Lincoln not only quoted the Bible frequently, but openly acknowledged that while he was seeking God’s direction on how to lead the nation, it was Scripture that shaped his leadership.

by Gordon Leidner

It is widely known that Abraham Lincoln went through a period of skepticism when he was a young man. But less commonly known is that as he matured, particularly during his years as President, he completely changed regarding his faith in the Bible and in God’s intervention in human affairs. He became increasingly dependent on the Bible, describing it as “the best gift God has given to man” when he was in the White House, and aspired to read it every day while president. The summer before he was assassinated, he admonished his old friend, skeptic Joshua Speed, to take all the Bible “upon reason that you can, and the balance on faith.” According to his White House friend Noah Brooks, Lincoln strove to pray every day. According to Lincoln’s secretary John Nicolay, the president earnestly asked others to pray for him.

Throughout his adult life, Lincoln quoted or alluded to the Bible in written correspondence and speeches over two hundred times. These quotes were drawn from both the Old and New Testaments, and were used primarily for moral suasion, expression of personal faith, or support of political argument. Notably, during his two campaigns for the Senate in the 1850’s, he used Scripture in dozens of speeches to validate his declamations that slavery was morally wrong.

Moral Leadership

After taking office as president, he relied increasingly on the Bible to raise the northern people to a higher moral plane by including quotes of or allusions to Scripture in his inspiring speeches, state papers, and letters. He believed his appeals to the Bible compelling, not only for maintaining the morale of the northern people during the war, but also for adding the objective of abolishing slavery to the war’s original goal of preserving the Union.

Lincoln also read the Bible for personal inspiration and wisdom. In 1862 he wrote to Quaker minister Eliza P. Gurney that he “desired that all of my works and acts may be according to his [God’s] will, and that it might be so, I have sought his aid.” He followed up this statement with an allusion to the book of Job, chapter 29 verse three, saying to Guerney that he would endeavor “to do my best in the light which he affords me.”

In 1862 Lincoln began questioning whether he should free the slaves, whether slavery was a national sin, and—if so—whether the Almighty would extract retribution on the country for this sin.

During his presidential years Lincoln seemed to delve deeply into the book of Job. Along with Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, Job is one of the “wisdom” books of the Bible, and would have been a perfect source of answers to the questions Lincoln was asking of God. It is known that Lincoln studied the book of Job because it is quoted or alluded to twelve times in the Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. There is also the testimony of Elizabeth Keckley, Mary Lincoln’s White House confidant, who said she once witnessed the president reinvigorated by reading Job.

While Lincoln was seeking an answer to the question “Should I free the slaves?” many ministers of the gospel were proclaiming that the Bible did not support the abolition of slavery. But in Job chapter 31, Job declares that he considered his slaves equal to himself, their master. In giving his reason Job asked, “Did not he that made me in the womb make him [the slave]? and did not one [God] fashion us in the womb?”

Lincoln alluded to Job 12:23 in an important communication in early 1862, in which he acknowledged that it was up to the “Divine Being who determines the destiny of nations” whether the United States would survive. Lincoln also alluded to Job 23:13 multiple times, including in the Second Inaugural Address where he proclaimed, “the Almighty has his own purposes,” as well as in his famous “Meditation on the Divine Will,” where he concluded that “the will of God prevails.”

Lincoln called on Job 42:6 in his October 20, 1864 “Proclamation of Thanksgiving,” advising the people to “reverently humble themselves in the dust and thence offer up penitent and fervent prayers and supplications” to God. (It is hard to imagine this sort of religious supplication being issued above the signature of an American president today).

Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address

Of course, Lincoln read and pondered many books of the Bible, but these examples from Job reveal how deeply he contemplated Scripture in his search for answers. Although these uses of Scripture were inspirational, nothing can compare to what is often called Lincoln’s greatest speech, the Second Inaugural Address, delivered only five weeks before his assassination.

The Second Inaugural is more of a sermon to the nation than a political speech. Using the language of the King James Bible, Lincoln directly quoted Scripture three times and alluded to it six times, presenting his conclusions about those questions of sin, judgement, and retribution which he had been pondering for two years. In the first half of the address, he briefly pointed out that the devastating war was at last ending, and that despite the denials of many people, slavery had “somehow” been the cause of that war.

In the second half of the address, Lincoln boldly admonished both the northern and southern people in a manner that we would never hear from any poll-conscious president today. Rather than boasting that the South had been at fault or that the North had been right, he laid blame for the awful conflict upon the entire nation. He postulated that although both sides “read the same Bible,” neither side had discerned that they had taken slavery past “God’s appointed time.” Consequently, the Almighty saw it as America’s great “offense” (a term that is interpreted as “sin” in modern Bible translations such as RSV and ESV) that had caused the war. Even though Lincoln had been quoting the Bible in his attacks on slavery for years, he did not claim he had been right and others wrong. Lincoln acknowledged his own tardiness on this issue. Even though he had concluded that slavery was an evil in God’s eyes, Lincoln had made no previous proclamation that slavery was the nation’s “sin.” Now he claimed the war was the Almighty’s punishment for both the North and South.

Who, Lincoln asked, has the right to question the retribution of the Lord? Through study of the Bible, Lincoln had learned that “the Almighty has his own purposes.” God can require that “every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword.” Lincoln concluded that Americans could not refute this, but could only acknowledge that “the judgements of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.” (Psalm 19:9)

Lincoln did not end his sermon solely on this note of Old Testament judgement. He had concluded that God offers not only judgement, but also redemption. Lincoln drew primarily on the New Testament in his conclusion, alluding to five Bible verses:

With malice toward none; with charity for all [allusion to Colossians 3:8 and 14]; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds [allusion to Psalm 147:3]; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan [allusion to James 1:27]—to do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations [allusion to Romans 12:18].

Lincoln’s conclusion did, in fact, echo the teachings of Christ: Let us forgive our enemies, care for the needy, and seek peace. Lincoln not only knew his Bible, but he also lived in it and was led by it. We can only pray the same for the Presidents to come.

A note on the sources for this article:

All Lincoln quotes within this article are taken from either The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln (Published in 9 volumes, plus supplement, by the Abraham Lincoln Association in 1953, Roy P Basler, ed.) or Abraham Lincoln and the Bible: A Complete Compendium by Gordon Leidner (Southern Illinois University Press, 2023).

For further reading:

Many respected Lincoln scholars have proclaimed that Abraham Lincoln was NOT a Christian, basing their arguments on what I consider to be incomplete research. To see part of my reasons for questioning their opinions, see my Review of Allen C. Guelzo’s excellent book Redeemer President, published in the Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association at doi: https://doi.org/10.3998/jala.5206

Gordon Leidner is an independent researcher and author of several Lincoln books, including “Abraham Lincoln and the Bible: A Complete Compendium” (Southern Illinois University Press, 2023). He is a board member of the Abraham Lincoln Institute, a past president of the Lincoln Group of the District of Columbia, and the author of academic articles on the transformational leadership skills of Abraham Lincoln.