By the way, isn’t it odd that we refer to profanity as “swearing” and uttering “oaths.”  That’s not what those words mean, though, is it?  To swear an oath is to make a promise, specifically a promise guaranteed by some collateral outside oneself.  I swear an oath on the Bible, or on my mother’s grave, or on my honor as a warrior, or “may God strike me dead.”  This is in fact what Jesus forbade, when he admonished his followers, “Do not swear—by heaven or earth or anything else.  Let your word be your bond.”  He was saying, in effect, that if you swear certain things are true by some oath to heaven or otherwise, then it implies that when you’re not swearing that oath, there is less of a guarantee that you are telling the truth or intending to keep your word.  If I have to get you to swear on the Bible to tell the truth, it implies that if you haven’t sworn on the Bible to tell the truth, you might feel more comfortable lying to my face.  That’s awful.  If you say it, it should be true.  Giving yourself license to lie should not be your default position, from which you occasionally deviate as indicated by the occasional use of a sworn oath.

Particularly ironic, then, isn’t it, that when we do make people swear, we ask them to swear on the Christian Bible, which specifically forbids swearing oaths on things like the Bible?