BLASPHEMY, literally, defamation or evil speaking, but more peculiarly restricted to an indignity offered to the Deity by words or writing. By the Mosaic law death by stoning was the punishment for blasphemy (Lev. xxiv. 16) . The 77th Novel of Justinian assigned death as the penalty, as did also the Capitu laries.
In England before the Restoration blasphemy, in common with atheism and heresy, was cognizable in the Ecclesiastical Courts only, unless it was in any way political ; and since it was not easy to distinguish scurrilous language against religion from heretical opinions, the blasphemer not seldom went to the stake. The last burnings pro salute animae were in 1612, and it was not until 1677 that the writ of de haeretico comburendo with all process thereon and all punishment of death was swept away by 29 Car. 2. C. 9. Blasphemy as distinguished from false doctrines, however, remained cognizable by the Ecclesiastical Courts, but spiritual censures had lost their sting, and since the Star Chamber and Court of High Commission, which formerly dealt with blasphemy on the political side, were extinct, the King's Bench claimed juris diction. The common law doctrine was first laid down by Hale C. J. in Tayler's Case in 1675, where the indictment was for words only (1 Vent. 298). "Although," said the Chief Justice, "such words were of ecclesiastical cognisance, yet the allegation that religion is a cheat tends to the dissolution of all government, and such kind of wicked and blasphemous words were not only an offense against God and religion but a crime against the law, State and Government and therefore punishable in this court. An in dictment lay for saying the Protestant religion was a cheat, for [by] taking away religion all obligations to Government by oaths, etc., ceaseth, and Christian religion is part of the law itself." Tayler was found guilty and, as part of his punishment, stood in the pillory in Westminster Palace yard with a paper on his head inscribed with the charge, "For blasphemous words tending to the subversion of all government." W oolston's Case (1 Fitzg. 64) in 1728 completes the doctrine. "We do not," said Lord Raymond, "meddle with any difference of opinion, we interfere only where the very root of Christianity is itself struck at." This view was confirmed by Lord Mansfield in Evans v. Chamberlain of London (17 62) (2 Burn's Ecc. Law, 207), when he said : "The common law of England knows no prosecution for mere opinions," and by Mr. Justice Erskine in Shore v. Wilson (1842) (9 Cl. and Fin. 534) when he said : "It is indeed still blasphemy, punishable at common law, scoffingly or irreverently to ridicule or impugn the doctrine of the Christian faith ; yet any man may, without sub jecting himself to any penal consequences, soberly and reverently examine and question the truth of those doctrines which have been essential to it." In his directions to the jury in Reg. v. Bradlaugh and Reg. v. Ramsay and Foote (1883) (15 Cox C. C. 217 and 230), Lord Coleridge C. J. declared that it is no longer true to say that "Christianity is part of the law of the land." To maintain that merely the denial of the truth of Christianity is indictable is absolutely untrue. If the decencies of controversy are observed, even the fundamentals of religion may be attacked without a per son being guilty of blasphemous libel. He was followed by Philli more J. in R. v. Boulter (1908) (72 J.P. 189) who said: "A man is free to speak and to teach what he pleases as to religious mat ters, though not as to morals, . . . but if, not for the sake of argument, he were to make a scurrilous attack on doctrines which the majority of people hold to be true, in a public place where passers-by may have their ears offended, and where young persons may come, he will render himself liable to the law of blasphemous libel." Here the defendant had become a public nuisance. In Bowman v. Secular Society Ltd. (1917), A.C. 406, Lord Sumner in an exhaustive review of the law doubted whether the maxim that Christianity is part of the law of the land was ever regarded to such an extent as to make any attack upon it, apart from scur rility, a criminal offence. It was held by the House of Lords that assuming the objects of the defendants to involve a denial of Christianity, (1) they were not criminal, inasmuch as the propaga tion of anti-Christian doctrines, apart from scurrility or profanity, did not constitute the offence of blasphemy; and (2) they were not illegal in the sense of rendering the Society incapable of acquiring property by gift, which was accordingly valid.
Profane cursing and swearing is made punishable by the Pro fane Oaths Act 1745, which directs the offender to be brought before a justice of the peace, and fined 5s., 25., or Is., according as he is a gentleman, below the rank of gentleman, or a common labourer, soldier, etc.
By the law of Scotland the penalty for blasphemy was death, but by an Act of 1825, amended in 1837, blasphemy was made punishable by fine or imprisonment or both.
In the United States the statutes of the several States on blas phemy did not abrogate the common law in all cases, but provided for particular proceedings and punishment. (H. H. L. B.)