AWA: Academic Writing at Auckland

It is commonly held that meta-ethical theories which ground morality in God are indefensible.  For some writers, the ancient ‘Euthyphro Dilemma’ poses an insurmountable objection to such theories[1]. The two conceptions provided by the text are roughly as follows:

• God loves X because X is good; and
• X is good because God loves X.[2]

This essay will concur that both horns of the dilemma result in unpalatable conclusions. Despite this, I will propose that a third alternative exists, a modified Divine Command Theory (DCT), which splits the horns.[3] Critics may contend that allegedly immoral and inconsistent divine commands, such as the injunction to kill witches despite another injunction prohibiting murder, constitute a threat to the theory. Conversely, I maintain that the modified DCT prevails over conceptions (a) and (b) in providing an objective, morally robust and internally consistent theory founded upon God. In defending this thesis, the validity of theism and biblical inerrancy will be assumed. My task is not to substantiate any particular theological position, but to demonstrate that the modified DCT is a cogent theory within a Judeo-Christian framework. 

Conception (a), comprising an unmodified DCT is morally and logically problematic.[4] Under the unmodified DCT, an example of ethical voluntarism, morality derives solely from God’s imperative. As the naturalistic fallacy states, any ethical truth vocalised by divine whim must therefore be subjective and arbitrary.[5] Furthermore, there is no necessary reason why two commands, one demanding and another prohibiting murder, cannot be contradictory.  There is no unchanging moral standard by which the inconsistency may be reconciled. Proponents of definition (a) must also confront the theoretical possibility that God could command morally repugnant acts, such as rapine or homicide. If an act enjoys divine sanction one is seemingly obligated to perform the act. This argument does not infer the actuality, or even plausibility, of such dictates. Indeed, for advocates such as Ockham, it is an article of faith that God’s prerogative will not endorse unmerited cruelty.[6] Nonetheless there are good reasons for inferring that even the possibility, as perhaps realised in the decree against witches, offends our moral sensibilities.  

By contrast, the modified DCT emerges unscathed from the logic of the Euthyphro. “What Euthyphro should have said”, as provocatively phrased by one writer, is a third conception:

(c)   X is good because God is good.[7]

As distinct with the unmodified DCT, goodness is anchored not in the will of God but in his essential nature. God is the paradigmatic embodiment of the Good and the yardstick for all moral judgements.[8] Although moral standards are rooted in God’s unchanging nature, moral duties are generated by his divine will.[9] Therefore the modified DCT escapes the charge of moral arbitrariness and subjectivity. The divine will must necessarily conform to the divine character, a character which in a Judaeo-Christian context is crystallised in the axiom “God is love”.[10] Adams postulates that moral obligation dissolves in the case of a morally reprehensible imperative that could only have issued from a God that is not essentially good.[11] I will further propose that, presuming God is a God of love, his imperative permits the recipient to perform acts, which in the absence of this imperative, would be iniquities.[12] 

Hence the modified theory allows for consistency between the general prohibition against murder and the command to kills witches. The latter command, by the very nature of the commander, is baptised from murder into a morally laudable killing.[13] The pertinent issue here is that God must have an adequate ethical justification for the command, consistent with his own nature.[14] An understanding of witchcraft as a pernicious abomination, of the righteous wrath of God, and of the historical context of the Jewish nation may erect a defence of sorts. Of course the merit of the defence is questionable. For my present purposes it is sufficient to state that the modified DCT permits compatibility between the injunction to kill witches and the loving nature of God.

The modified DCT is superior to (b), the conception that God perceives and conforms to an external moral source. Both theories purport to define the ontological moral ultimate. It may be suggested that the modified DCT does not split the horns of the Euthyphro dilemma but merely push the problem back a notch. Yet the resulting question is incongruous: ‘is God good because he loves the good or because he establishes it’. An ontological ultimate is necessary not only to avoid moral nihilism and infinite regression, but also to provide a foundation for morally examining the command to kill witches. The critical debate is to determine the most plausible metaphysical ultimate. Decidedly, the modified DCT triumphs over any naturalistic or abstracted ultimate, such as the platonic forms.[15] For one, abstractions do not even bear the attributes they profess to represent.[16] The casually impotent abstraction which judges murder as an evil cannot itself be considered evil. They are likewise incapable of imposing moral obligation, a critical feature of any meta-ethical theory.[17] We may thus reasonably suggest that the modified DCT offers a more coherent account of edict against witches and indeed for all such ethical scenarios. 

This essay has demonstrated some of the difficulties inherent in the two horns of the Euthyphro dilemma. Although the scope of the debate has simplified, it is enough to show that the modified DCT is more resistant to the challenges facing conception (a) and (b). The modified DCT presents a more morally robust and internally consistent account of the command to kill witches than its unmodified counterpart. I have also shown the modified DCT supplies a more defensible ontological ultimate than any source independent of God. Of course, the validity of both conclusions hinges upon the assumption of a theistic God who is essentially good, an assumption I have made no attempt to prove. The implications of my thesis are more modest. If Judaeo-Christian theology is presumed, the modified DCT, more soundly than conception (a) or (b), succeeds as an objective, cogent, and morally viable meta-ethical theory.

Bibliography

Adams, Robert M. “A Modified Divine Command Theory of Ethical Wrongness.” In Philosophy of Religion: an Anthology, edited by Louis P. Pojma and Michael Rea, 558-573. United States of America: Thomas Wadsworth, 2008.

“Bible Gateway”. http://www.biblegateway.com.

 Craig, William Lane. “The Indispensability of Theological Meta-ethical Foundations for Morality” Paper presented at the Christian Theological Research Fellowship meeting, AAR, November, 1996.

Hammond John L. “Divine Command Theories and Human Analogies” The Journal of Religious Ethics 14, no. 1 (1986): 216-223. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40015031 (accessed September 2).

Joyce, Richard. “Theistic Ethics and the Euthyphro Dilemma” The Journal of Religious Ethics 30, no. 1 (2002): 49-75. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.auckland.ac.nz/stable/40024776 (accessed September 2).

Kierkegaard, Soren. “Fear and Trembling.” In The Essential Kierkegaard, edited by Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong, 93-102. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000.

Levine Michael. “Adams’ modified divine command theory of ethics” Humanities, Social Sciences and Law 33, no. 2 (1994): 63-77. http://www.springerlink.com/content/t507w575p06n77m2 (accessed September 2).

Macintyre, Alasdair. “Which God ought we to obey.” In Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings, edited by Michael Peterson, William Hasker, Bruce Reichenbach and David Basinger, 573-584. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.

Morriston Wes. “The Moral Obligations of Reasonable Non-Believers: A Special Problem for Divine Command Metaethics.” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 65, no. 1 (2009): 1-10. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.auckland.ac.nz/stable/40270234 (accessed September 2).

Plato, “Euthyphro”, in Plato: Complete Works, ed. John M. Cooper and D. S Hutchinson (Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997), 9-11. 

Talbott, Thomas B. “Quinn on Divine Commands and Moral Requirements” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 13, no. 4 (1982): 193-208. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.auckland.ac.nz/stable/40024776 (accessed September 2).

Wierenga Edward. “A Defensible Divine Command Theory.” Noûs 17, no. 3 (1983): 387-407.  http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.auckland.ac.nz/stable/2215256 (accessed September 2).

[1] John L. Hammond, “Divine Command Theories and Human Analogies,” The Journal of Religious Ethics 14 (1986): 216-218, accessed September 2, 2011. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40015031; Michael Levine, “Adam’s modified divine command theory of ethics,” Humanities, Social Sciences and Law 33 (2005): 63-66, accessed September 2, 2011. http://www.springerlink.com/content/t507w575p06n77m2/; Wes Morriston, “The Moral Obligations of Reasonable Non-Believers: A Special Problem for Divine Command Metaethics” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 65 (2009): 1-10, accessed September 4. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.auckland.ac.nz/stable/40270234.

[2] I have paraphrased from Plato, “Euthyphro”, in Plato: Complete Works, ed. John M. Cooper and D. S Hutchinson (Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997), 9-11. 

[3] I owe the phrase ‘Modified Command Theory’ to Robert M. Adams, “A Modified Command Theory of Ethical Wrong,” In Philosophy of Religion: an Anthology, ed. Louis P. Pojma and Michael Rea. (United States of America: Thomas Wadsworth, 2008), 558, although the theory, as I have formulated it, lends itself more closely to  William Lane Craig, “The Indispensability of Theological Meta-ethical Foundations for Morality” (paper presented at the Christian Theological Research Fellowship meeting, AAR, November, 1996), and Edward Wierenga, “A Defensible Divine Command Theory” Nous 17 (1983), 388, accessed September 4, 2011. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.auckland.ac.nz/stable/2215256

[4]  Thomas B Talbott, “Quinn on Divine Commands and Moral Requirements,” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 13 (1982): 193, accessed September 2, 2011. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.auckland.ac.nz/stable/40024776.

[5] Alasdair Macintyre, “Which God ought we to obey.” Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings, ed. Michael Peterson, William Hasker, Bruce Reichenbach and David Basinger. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 575-6.

[6] Robert M. Adams, “A Modified Command Theory of Ethical Wrong,”, 559

[7] Richard Joyce, “Theistic Ethics and the Euthyphro Dilemma” The Journal of Religious Ethics 30, (2002): 50, accessed September 2, 2011. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.auckland.ac.nz/stable/40024776.

[8] Alasdair Macintyre, “Which God ought we to obey”, 576;  William Lane Craig, “The Indispensability of Theological Meta-ethical Foundations for Morality.

[9] Ibid; Edward Wierenga, “A Defensible Divine Command Theory” 388.

[10] 1 John 4:16b NIV. The assumption underpinning the modified DCT is of course that of God’s love. The question that I have not tackled is the epistemic concern of how we can ascertain if God’s nature really is defined by love. It will suffice here to indicate the chief features of the believer’s faith in God’s love: (1) a favourable emotional attitude toward God and (2) a sentiment of gratitude; as identified in Robert M. Adams, “A Modified Command Theory of Ethical Wrong,” 568; and (3) a personal encounter with God; as recognised in Alasdair Macintyre, “Which God ought we to obey”, 578.

[11] Robert M. Adams, “A Modified Command Theory of Ethical Wrong”, 561. It is also worth noting the difference here between Adams postulation of the DCT and the one presented here. Adams admits the possibility that God could command cruelty for its own sake, yet contends that the coherency of the DCT would fall apart if such was the case. I have defended a DCT whereby it is logical impossibility for God to act in such a manner by virtue of his own essential nature. For the purposes of my thesis the difference is insignificant. 

[12] William Lane Craig, “The Indispensability of Theological Meta-ethical Foundations for Morality.

[13] This baptism of the otherwise sinful into a morally obligation is in contrast to the view proposed in Soren K Kierkegaard, “Fear and Trembling.” The Essential Kierkegaard, ed.  Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 93, which postulates a “teleological suspension of the ethical.” The modified DCT does not transcend or suspend the ethical but rather defines it.  

[14] Robert M. Adams, “A Modified Command Theory of Ethical Wrong”, 559 recognises that the important element is not the nature of the act but the moral justification behind it. 

[15] Robert M. Adams, “A Modified Command Theory of Ethical Wrong,” 565-567 presents a slightly different analysis. Adams’ asserts that the believer does value some things independently of God but these evaluations do not infer ethical judgements. I am more inclined to agree with the view proposed in Alasdair Macintyre, “Which God ought we to obey”, 584 which states that any exterior value is judged I a manner authorised by God. In any case Adams is adamant that these independent value have no immediate implication on his, or indeed my, DCT. 

[16] William Lane Craig, “Why are (some) Platonists so insouciant” Philosophy 86 (2011). www.reasonablefaith.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=8791. 

[17] Ibid.