Must moral law be divinely inspired?

[JPolin]

I'm an agnostic, largely because I have not taken the time to study religion or read religious texts. I found it premature to make a determination one way or the other without an informed opinion. Now I attend a fairly conservative graduate school, and one of my classes concerns the Western moral tradition. For the first time I'm devoting significant attention to issues of moral philosophy from Greek philosophy all the way up to Deconstructionism/Post-modernism.

The central contention of the Western (Judeo-Christian) tradition is that law (in a moral sense, i.e. "natural law") derives its authority from a higher power. Thus the 10 Commandments serve as the objective basis for right and wrong in Western civilization. A transcendental divine presence (God), in this conception, issues the 10 Commandments and serves as the bedrock upon which this moral foundation lies. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, natural law offers a guidance towards the good (in an Aristotilian sense i.e. Nicomachean Ethics), which will aid people towards a path of salvation.

If one does not believe in this objective natural law, however, one must look for an alternate source of moral clarity. For thinkers of the Enlightenment, Reason became the center of the moral universe. Many Enlightenment thinkers believed in Deism, where a transcendental presence created the universe but does not have any influence on material events thereafter. With Reason as God, moral philosophy became a subjective matter, something determined in the minds of men.

Here lies a significant problem, though. If the moral basis for law is to be determined by men, which men shall determine it? In this subjective world, how does one decide which men how others shall live. The eventual outcome of the concept of divine Reason is the eventual moral relativism and Deconstructionist thought of modern times.

Subjective morality and blind faith in flawed reason have led to the worst excesses of human history. Both Nazism and Soviet Communism speak to failures of human-based moral systems. Moral relativism and deconstructionism have both eroded the foundations of morality without providing an alternative source of authority.

Thus I now understand the necessity of having an objective right and wrong. And this is not a uniquely Western concept. While the Judeo-Christian tradition calls its values the 10 Commandments, all major world religions believe that it is wrong to kill, steal, etc., and right to honor family. Since many of these basic precepts are common to all religions, it seems reasonable to me that they assume a certain transcendental value of truth.

But the next leap is one I'm not able to make. If there is a transcendental set of truths, there must be a divine presence responsible for these truths. In order for this natural law to have any real meaning, one must have faith. And as rationalistic as I am, I can't really come to terms with this concept of faith.

So there's the conundrum. Am I right to assume that moral/natural law necessitates a divine presense? If so, how does one make the connection to understanding the nature of that presense? If not, where does one obtain the authority to craft laws, as well as right and wrong?

[jim grass]

Can we please move this stuff away from this forum to the "Other Topics Forum".
Its common sense this stuff does not belong here.
This topic has absolutely nothing to do with poker psychology.
Absolutely dick all.

jim grass

[JPolin]

Sklansky and others has found this section appropriate to talk about various philosophical issues. Since I respect those opinions a great deal more than I respect yours, you should go f*** off.

[Demana]

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The central contention of the Western (Judeo-Christian) tradition is that law (in a moral sense, i.e. "natural law") derives its authority from a higher power.

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Am I right to assume that moral/natural law necessitates a divine presence?


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In short, yes. There needs to be a higher presence which validates that that natural law is the correct one to follow. Without it, that natural law is no different than any other.

<tangent correlation: think about the Fundamental Theorem of Poker. We follow it, the FToP aka "Natural Law", because we believe that Mathematics and Logic, as the higher powers, are correct (...not exactly the right word...) >

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If so, how does one make the connection to understanding the nature of that presence?


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I don't think that you can. Understanding requires judgment and judgment limits the nature of that presence into something that you can understand. If you consider the presence to be a "higher power", you have just limited it to that, "a higher power". No longer can it be a lower power, or not a power at all, etc. because it has been labeled. And it doesn't matter that you can change your mind about what something is, it will still be limited to the new idea.

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If not, where does one obtain the authority to craft laws, as well as right and wrong?


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The authority is given to you by people who are dependant on you to tell them what to do.

[Mayhap]

If a moral law is adopted by the species and it leads to furtherance in the evolution of the species, then it is divinely inspired because such adoption requires collaboration of all the minds in the species or the overmind of the species ... If y'all catch my drift.
/M

[burningyen]

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Subjective morality and blind faith in flawed reason have led to the worst excesses of human history. Both Nazism and Soviet Communism speak to failures of human-based moral systems. Moral relativism and deconstructionism have both eroded the foundations of morality without providing an alternative source of authority.

Thus I now understand the necessity of having an objective right and wrong.

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You confuse the recognition of moral relativism with false morality. And then you conclude that the failure of moral relativism to lead to desirable results therefore "necessitates" the existence of an objective morality. I think your logic is seriously flawed.

I do believe in objective morality, but I don't see why that necessitates a belief in a divine presence. Would this divine presence be subject to morality? If so, why? Did the divine presence create morality? If so, could he/she/it uncreate it? Would it still be objective morality? Was that divine presence's creation of morality an amoral act? And if the divine presence is *not* subject to morality, then why are we?

Just because our human brains are flawed doesn't mean pure reason is any less of an authority as a source of morality.

[Cerril]

I would suggest that the poster you're replying to isn't far off, and that the 'other other topics' forum might be more appropriate.

The main reason I suggest this is that, while you can certainly make the case you describe, this is a forum for psychology (and philosophy) as it relates to 'general gambling'.

Even the 'red text' (David Sklansky et al) posts are part of an on topic thread relating to how reason and religion relate to the poker mindset (which benefits from pure reason). The original thread has been long buried and since the other religious topics have tended to get a little off topic or go far afield but they are all part of the same discussion, just broken up into multiple pieces.

So if I were to post a religion thread I would probably go to the 'other other topics' forum, but I doubt anyone will close it here.

[Cerril]

Yes and no. Moral law needs to have a reason for its existence. If there is an absolute right and wrong, then you need to be able to answer the question 'why?'

However, that answer doesn't necessitate a deity per se. In fact, a natural moral law (to use a term from another post) would have good as its own entity.

Unfortunately things get even hazier from this point forward. You need to answer what 'Good' is and why that is so. A utilitarian defines Good in terms of what will provide the most benefit for the largest number of people (and usually 'benefit' is defined in terms of happiness). Under his morality, there is a right thing to do in every circumstance and it is absolute, but there is no deity.

You are correct in one of your observations, though, that because morality must at some level be defined, the ones who define it open themselves up to question. A deity eliminates the need to question things (though questioning His translators becomes an option, obviously).

In my own little world, my morality is based on reason given some assumptions that are unreasonable on the surface but which hold up surprisingly well under close scrutiny. That said, my 'morality' is only there to govern my actions and interactions and I don't expect anyone else to follow it just because I say so, I would need to convince them (or they would need to find it on their own).

[MBTIGUY]

Let me say how much I appreciate your thoughfulness on this critical issue for there is much more than just the subject of morality at stake. If there is, in fact, a divine presence from which morality comes into being, then all mankind needs to understand this presence, what is demanded from it, and the cost of rebellion against it. If the cost is merely returning to the dust from which we came, then morality may not be a big deal. But if the cost has eternal consequences, I want to be absolutely certain what I believe and why.

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Am I right to assume that moral/natural law necessitates a divine presense?

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I believe yes.

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If so, how does one make the connection to understanding the nature of that presense?

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As a Christian, I believe that God has solved that problem for us. More than 600 years prior to the event, the prophet Isaiah foretold of the coming of Immanuel which means "God with Us". Specific aspects of the life of Immanuel were also predicted in great detail by Isaiah. Many other prophecies foretold the same but I point to Isaiah because the copies of this writing found in the Dead Sea Scrolls preceded Christ's birth by several hundred years, i.e. they weren't made up after the fact. Jesus Christ is, in fact, God in human flesh who came so that we could see and know who God was and what He was like.

Therefore, you can easily begin to make this connection by reading what the Bible has to say about Jesus. While any of the four gospels would suffice, a great place would be the Gospel of John which was written by one of Jesus' closest disciples for the purpose of explaining that this man was indeed God in human flesh.
For someone who is a self-described "rationalist" (I have been so described), I would recommend reading The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel.

[CrisBrown]

Hi JPolin,

I would suggest that you read the essays of Thomas Aquinas (on natural law), as well as the Hart-Fuller Debates (on the legal justification for the Nuremburg trials), and the works of John Rawls (on the philosophical basis of law). You are walking a very well-worn path, and there are lots of resources out there for a serious inquiry. Why reinvent the wheel?

Cris