Interpreting God's morality

[Afterthought]

A couple of questions that I've seen and am wondering how to answer, especially if morality for humans is whatever God tells us to do.


1) "If morality is whatever God tells us to do, then what if God suddenly decided killing was right? If you say God is consistent with His character, then look at the OT where all sorts of strange laws that had nothing to do with morality were given." From which is referenced some OT ceremonial laws (such as not allowing foreigners to the Passover) and some places where God decides to harm people (like the flood and Pharaoh when he had Abram's wife). I don't know if I could appeal to God being consistent with His character anyway if morality for humans is doing whatever God says, because then we have God bound to something? Also, how would you respond to the question?

2) "Even if you solve the problem of absolute morals, there are so many different interpretations within Christianity, so isn't it useless and doesn't solve any problems?" How would you respond? (I wasn't actually asked these questions by this person, who is insanely hardened against Christianity anyway; I merely just saw the questions and am wondering how to respond if I were asked them by someone in the future)

 

[steadfast7]

I would start by saying that we only see but a sliver of the infinite depth and breadth of the way God thinks and works. Don't make Job's mistake of needing to fit God's ways into our peanut logic. We will no doubt find that we wrong and ought to repent in dust and ashes because we were not able to see the complete picture. Let us just trust that the Holy One knows what he is doing and he does all things well.

 

[Afterthought]

Any more thoughts from anyone?

 

[InSlaveryToChrist]

"If morality is whatever God tells us to do, then what if God suddenly decided killing was right? If you say God is consistent with His character, then look at the OT where all sorts of strange laws that had nothing to do with morality were given."

The above assertion fails to grasp what is meant by the immutability of God -- what precisely it applies to. Here is an appropriate distinction by A.W. Pink:

First, God is immutable in His essence. His nature and being are infinite, and so, subject to no mutations. There never was a time when He was not; there never will come a time when He shall cease to be. God has neither evolved, grown, nor improved. All that He is today, He has ever been, and ever will be. "I am the Lord, I change not" (Mal. 3:6) is His own unqualified affirmation. He cannot change for the better, for He is already perfect; and being perfect, He cannot change for the worse. Altogether unaffected by anything outside Himself, improvement or deterioration is impossible. He is perpetually the same. He only can say, "I am that I am" (Ex. 3:14). He is altogether uninfluenced by the flight of time. There is no wrinkle upon the brow of eternity. Therefore His power can never diminish nor His glory ever fade.

Secondly, God is immutable in His attributes. Whatever the attributes of God were before the universe was called into existence, they are precisely the same now, and will remain so forever. Necessarily so; for they are the very perfections, the essential qualities of His being. Semper idem (always the same) is written across every one of them. His power is unabated, His wisdom undiminished, His holiness unsullied. The attributes of God can no more change than Deity can cease to be. His veracity is immutable, for His Word is "forever settled in heaven" (Ps. 119:89). His love is eternal: "I have loved thee with an everlasting love" (Jer. 31:3) and "Having loved His own which were in the world, He loved them unto the end" (John 13:1). His mercy ceases not, for it is "everlasting" (Ps. 100:5).

Thirdly, God is immutable in His counsel. His will never varies. Perhaps some are ready to object that we ought to read the following: "And it repented the Lord that He had made man" (Gen. 6:6). Our first reply is, Then do the Scriptures contradict themselves? No, that cannot be. Numbers 23:19 is plain enough: "God is not a man, that He should lie; neither the son of man, that He should repent." So also in 1 Samuel 15:19, "The strength of Israel will not lie nor repent: for He is not a man, that He should repent." The explanation is very simple. When speaking of Himself. God frequently accommodates His language to our limited capacities. He describes Himself as clothed with bodily members, as eyes, ears, hands, etc. He speaks of Himself as "waking" (Ps. 78:65), as "rising early" (Jer. 7:13); yet He neither slumbers nor sleeps. When He institutes a change in His dealings with men, He describes His course of conduct as "repenting."

If something is still unclear, here you can read the full treatise: The Attributes of God by A.W. Pink-The Immutability of God

 

[Contra_Mundum]

1) Will God ever decide that murdering is moral? What in all that God has revealed about himself already leads anywhere close to that direction?

2) There's a difference between a "positive" command, and a strictly moral command. A "positive" command might be something you told your child to do: "make up your bed." It could be a one-time thing, or a regular thing. There isn't anything intrinsically moral about it, other than a moral "background," or the fundamental duty for a child to obey his parents.

Beside the moral law, God indeed gave Israel plenty of culturally unique commands, usually subsumed under the ceremonial aspect; there were also cultic regulations and judicial/social laws for the nation. The laws about how to dress, how to cut hair, and like matters were rules that made and kept Israel unique from the surrounding nations. There was a greater purpose in all that, namely an object lesson and Messianic pointer for the whole world. And the law as a whole is likened by Paul to a period of "minority" for a church "under-age," until Christ should come. A time of discipline.

3) Yes, anything God commands is moral. And he may tighten or loosen that which he enforces, or that which he makes explicit. But he has encouraged us to think of him as consistent through his revelation. If you and I would like to be consistent, but cannot be--not to the imposed standards from outside, or even to our own standards (hypocrisy)--God is able to be so, and wills himslef to be. If something changes, relative to man in the commands of God, then something has changed about us--either in our being or our circumstances. In any case, God is also in control of those changes, and he has a morally sufficient reason for everything he does, and all that he expects of us, at whatever time he calls for it.

4) God is TRUE to himself, and more than we're able to be. God keeps his Word, and better than any of us. He chose to make covenant, and bind himself to promises in order to show himself faithful. Again, this is something he is free to do; and if he has done, who dares to charge him with an inconsistency? That he was supremely free, and now he is not because he made a promise? This is trying to bind God with an absurdity. But it is an internal, voluntary constraint. If he denies himself, the world goes out of existence. He is the only constraint on his own freedom; but it is his WILL to act precisely as he has. There isn't some "higher standard" by which he is held. The absurdity is in the puny creature, who tries to render God impotent or irrelevant by language-games.

5) There's all kinds of different standards of atheistic "morality," including cannibalism and Naziism. So, what complaint does the questioner have against such individuals or societies? He has none. He operates under a "might-makes-right" ultimate philosophy, which is guided only by what he hopes is a mindless evolutionary process that has selected him and his genes to triumph over lesser creatures, and lesser humans. If he is right about the world, then it makes perfect sense for him to get to the top of the heap, and try to live like an absolute monarch, impregnate all the women in his power, kill all his rival males (whoever he cannot make his obedient soldier, farmer, or slave-drone).

Saying there are untold "kinds" of Christians or Christian morality, is like saying there are as many "maths" as there are answers given to a given problem. The implication is that there is NO yardstick, there is NO subordination of a reader to an author's text because there's no such thing as successful communication of meaning. That is an absurd expectation, and it defies common sense and human experience. It is possible to analyze texts for their intrinsic meaning, as well as getting closer or farther away from that meaning. It is possible to agree to what a text means, while disagreeing with its content, or another analyst's judgment as to its worth. It's possible to gain consensus between several people, or even a majority of them, at least for a time. It is possible to analyze all of this, and to come to a "moral" conclusion on the whole.

In the end, you can expose the ridiculous bias of persons who simply "don't like" what the Bible has to say; as well as persuading the truly searching person that most of us have the tools (if not the will) to study the Bible for the message it contains. No one is really interested in the hater's biographical reasons for not being a Christian or accepting the Bible's message or morals. The student of Scripture is interested in the content of Scripture for what it says about itself. I am concerned for truth, and not interested in pluriform contrary opinions from those who may not share my passion and method of getting there.

 

[MW]

then look at the OT where all sorts of strange laws that had nothing to do with morality were given.

Let's be renewed in the spirit of our minds! If there is anything "strange" in these OT laws it surely has to do with our ignorance of their true nature and function; and I think we would see that they had everything to do with morality once their true nature and function were properly understood.

 

[Ryft]

"If morality is whatever God tells us to do ..."

Morality is not grounded in God's prescriptive will (i.e., what he tells us to do). The person's question is driving toward one of the two horns of the Euthyphro dilemma, which is set up thus: "Is a thing moral because God commands it, or does God command it because it is moral?" It is a dilemma in the sense that it forces upon someone a choice between two options, two horns that both produce an incoherence. On one horn of the dilemma, that God commands a thing because it is moral, we are faced with the problem that moral order is grounded outside God, which means that God himself is subject to a higher law and is therefore not an answer to questions about morality. And on the other horn, that a thing is moral because God commands it, we are faced with the problem that moral order is grounded in God's arbitrary fiat, commonly referred to as divine command theory, which falls prey to Bertrand Russell's penetrating criticism: "If it is due to God's fiat, then for God himself there is no difference between right and wrong" (Why I Am Not a Christian, p. 12). Morality is reduced to a notion of might makes right, that nothing is good unless and until God commands it. Moreover, the statement "God is good" is rendered not insignificant as Russell put it but altogether meaningless.

But the dilemma invalidates itself by committing the bifurcation fallacy of False Dilemma, such that only two alternatives are considered when in fact there are more. On the Christian view, morality is not grounded either outside of God or in his fiat; rather, morality is grounded in the very nature and character of God (from which proceeds his prescriptive will). As such, morality is no more mutable than God is, whom Scripture reveals as necessary being (cf. actus purus). Morality is as eternal and immutable as God is, in whom it is grounded.

(A careful distinction should be kept in mind, too: ethics regards "what is moral" while meta-ethics regards "what morality is." Too often in my experience the unbeliever conflates ethics and meta-ethics, ignoring the categorical difference between them.)

Incidentally, the old covenant laws certainly did have to do with morality. To disobey God is a sin, which is a moral pronouncement.

"Even if you solve the problem of absolute morals, there are so many different interpretations within Christianity, so isn't it useless and doesn't solve any problems?"

First, the person is committing a categorical error, trying to undercut a metaphysical point with an epistemological objection. Metaphysics and epistemology are entirely different categories; even if no one knows what moral absolutes are, that does not render them non-existent. Second, although there are many different interpretations, we are not left without the means to find out which one is correct (viz. exegesis).

 

[jwright82]

Well first off a thing is right or wrong simply because God's says it. Do we christians locate the source of that rightness or wrongness in God's unchanging charector? Yes but what we know of that charector is revealational in nature and always anthropomorphic. We cannot use reason to probe the depths of God. We can faithfuly start with hi srevealation to us and move from there. Also we must say yes God can declare murder to be right, but he has covenantly bounded himself in the covenat of works (or creation). Remember that God can do whatever he wants because he wants to. Does he bound himself in covenants to mankind? Yes, so he will no more "change" his mind on murder being wrong than he will flood the earth again.

I do not object to appealing to his immutible charector, only that appeals alone tend to abritraraly bound God for some logical or metaphysical reason. God is no more bound by logic than he is bound by creation. Now murder is one crime that he gives his reasons for in the Nohaic covenant but he is under no obligation to give any reason whatsoever for his descissions regarding anything. That I think is the best response to the Euthryphro argument, and Ryft gave an excellant response to it as well.

 

[Afterthought]

Thanks guys!

Pardon my ignorance because I'm still having trouble wrapping my head around voluntarism, especially in the context of these sorts of questions/problems, but is this...

He is the only constraint on his own freedom; but it is his WILL to act precisely as he has. There isn't some "higher standard" by which he is held. The absurdity is in the puny creature, who tries to render God impotent or irrelevant by language-games.

...consistent with this?

On the Christian view, morality is not grounded either outside of God or in his fiat; rather, morality is grounded in the very nature and character of God (from which proceeds his prescriptive will). As such, morality is no more mutable than God is, whom Scripture reveals as necessary being (cf. actus purus). Morality is as eternal and immutable as God is, in whom it is grounded.

Or to put it another way, are we binding God by saying morality is grounded in His character and nature? Is it better to say, God's character is immutably good because He chooses it to be so, and morality is then grounded in that and so ulitmately grounded in His will? Or does that bind God to some other standard still (the "good" God chooses to be)?


Edit: (Also, related to the quote above, how does positive law work if we say morality is as "eternal and immutable as God is"? I know you said the morality of the action in such a case consists in obedience to God, but how did such an action become commanded in the first place if morality is immutable? Or is it that the morality is obeying God and that takes expression in the form of positive law in such cases? Although such laws as the ceremonial laws wouldn't have anything to do with morality in that case, I would think, except in so far as a person obeyed or disobeyed God's command; that way of thinking does deal well with Abraham nearly sacrificing Isaac though, and it seems to deal fine with such cases where God does something--like take human life--which would be immoral for mere humans to do.

Edit 2: On further thought, it seems you are saying the same thing, namely, that the morality of positive law consists in obedience to it.)

 

[Ryft]

James (jwright82):

You said, "We cannot use reason to probe the depths of God," and to an extent you are right. But considering your sentence that followed this, about God's self-revelation in Scripture, I think you would agree that it might be better to say that we cannot use unaided (autonomous) reason to probe the depths of God—for surely we can, and do, use reason when thinking God's thoughts after him. Reason is involved in exegeting Scripture rightly, but it is "aided reason" in subjection to the authority of God and his word. A minor but important point, I think. It bothers me to see reason disparaged without qualification, for godly reason is to be extolled and encouraged. I echo the sentiment of Galileo who wrote to Christina of Tuscany, "I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use."

Another potentially minor point is the issue I took with your statement that "God can declare murder to be right." The wording is a bit sticky given that murder is defined as premeditated unlawful killing with malice. Insofar as God is the ultimate law-giver, we should understand murder biblically as any killing that is contrary to God's command. So in this sense it is logically incoherent for God to "declare murder to be right," for such killing would be lawfully unlawful. Rather I would say that God can declare killing to be right—and at times he has. When God commands to kill, such killing is not murder because it is lawful or in obedience to God. Moreover, in such an instance to not kill is a sin (e.g. 1 Sam 15). God indeed will not "change his mind on murder being wrong," but killing is not always murder or unlawful.

My biggest concern, however, is with your statement that appealing to God's immutable character tends to "arbitrarily bound God for some logical or metaphysical reason." I am not sure who you have in mind with such a statement, but I otherwise fail to see how such theological arguments are arbitrary or why limiting God for logical or metaphysical reasons is somehow out of bounds for the serious Christian. Are not logic and metaphysics grounded in the nature and character of God, just as ethics is? Thus when we say that God is limited for some logical or metaphysical reason, we are drawing conclusions about God's nature by appealing to what he has revealed about his nature, which is neither out of bounds nor arbitrary. To speak about God's nature, informed by his self-revelation, is to speak logically and metaphysically, for surely God is the ground of both (indeed the ground of all reality). God is identical and limited to his nature, which we reason from Scripture to be self-existent necessary being (eternally of himself and unchanging); that is, we conclude logically and metaphysically that God cannot be not-God. We impose nothing on God, but simply recognize that God in his aseity is eternally and immutably who he is. God is not bound by logic; he is bound by himself. It is from his nature and self-revelation that we his image-bearers grasp by analogy such systems as logic and metaphysics (e.g. we do not reason from logic to God, but rather from God to logic).

~ * ~​

Raymond (Afterthought):

You asked if we are perhaps binding God by saying that morality is grounded in his nature and character, but if you look at your question more closely you should see that it is not God but morality that we are binding. So in effect we are saying that something is moral to the degree that it conforms to the nature and will of God; that he is the ground of moral order is the reason why we can speak of God in terms of moral perfection (viz. the nature and will of God cannot fail to conform to the nature and will of God). Morality is bound by God, and God is bound by himself.

"Is it better to say that God's character is immutably good because He chooses it to be so?" I would say no, for this implies a moral standard apart from God, which he chooses to conform his character to. If morality is grounded in something apart from God, as I pointed out previously, then he is not an answer to questions about morality.

 

[jwright82]

You said, "We cannot use reason to probe the depths of God," and to an extent you are right. But considering your sentence that followed this, about God's self-revelation in Scripture, I think you would agree that it might be better to say that we cannot use unaided (autonomous) reason to probe the depths of God—for surely we can, and do, use reason when thinking God's thoughts after him. Reason is involved in exegeting Scripture rightly, but it is "aided reason" in subjection to the authority of God and his word. A minor but important point, I think. It bothers me to see reason disparaged without qualification, for godly reason is to be extolled and encouraged. I echo the sentiment of Galileo who wrote to Christina of Tuscany, "I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use."

I would agree with you here, nicley put by the way.

Another potentially minor point is the issue I took with your statement that "God can declare murder to be right." The wording is a bit sticky given that murder is defined as premeditated unlawful killing with malice. Insofar as God is the ultimate law-giver, we should understand murder biblically as any killing that is contrary to God's command. So in this sense it is logically incoherent for God to "declare murder to be right," for such killing would be lawfully unlawful. Rather I would say that God can declare killing to be right—and at times he has. When God commands to kill, such killing is not murder because it is lawful or in obedience to God. Moreover, in such an instance to not kill is a sin (e.g. 1 Sam 15). God indeed will not "change his mind on murder being wrong," but killing is not always murder or unlawful.

When God kills is he right or wrong? Well obviously he has revealed to us that for us it is wrong. Is this moral idea grounded in God's nature or self-revealation, which I would prefer to say, obviously yes.

My biggest concern, however, is with your statement that appealing to God's immutable character tends to "arbitrarily bound God for some logical or metaphysical reason." I am not sure who you have in mind with such a statement, but I otherwise fail to see how such theological arguments are arbitrary or why limiting God for logical or metaphysical reasons is somehow out of bounds for the serious Christian. Are not logic and metaphysics grounded in the nature and character of God, just as ethics is? Thus when we say that God is limited for some logical or metaphysical reason, we are drawing conclusions about God's nature by appealing to what he has revealed about his nature, which is neither out of bounds nor arbitrary. To speak about God's nature, informed by his self-revelation, is to speak logically and metaphysically, for surely God is the ground of both (indeed the ground of all reality). God is identical and limited to his nature, which we reason from Scripture to be self-existent necessary being (eternally of himself and unchanging); that is, we conclude logically and metaphysically that God cannot be not-God. We impose nothing on God, but simply recognize that God in his aseity is eternally and immutably who he is. God is not bound by logic; he is bound by himself. It is from his nature and self-revelation that we his image-bearers grasp by analogy such systems as logic and metaphysics (e.g. we do not reason from logic to God, but rather from God to logic).

Yes but remeber that it is important that we do not make the imutability of God some abstract foundation for logic or morality outside of God's covenantly revealation to us. You are right in your concerns but remeber that the covenant is how we Reformed folk understand all of God's revealation. So I think that we should aproech these issues from that perspective and not from some Platonic reason.

 

[Ryft]

I would agree with you here. Nicely put, by the way.

Very kind of you to say, brother. Thank you.

When God kills, is he right or wrong?

Given the Christian metaethics I have been describing, he is necessarily right. If morality is grounded in the nature and character of God (from which proceeds his prescriptive will), then it is at once both logically and metaphysically impossible for God to be morally wrong, for that would involve the nature and character of God failing to conform to the nature and character of God (i.e., X is not-X at the same time and in the same respect).

Well obviously he has revealed to us that for us [murder] is wrong. Is this moral idea grounded in God's nature or self-revelation ...

Both. It is grounded in God's nature and self-revelation. If you will recall, I said that morality is (1) grounded in the nature and character of God (2) from which proceeds his prescriptive will. Having said that, there has been a series of thoughts coalescing in my mind which I would like to commit to paper, so to speak, and on which I would like to hear yourself and others comment, a sort of peer-review thing, if you will.

First, murder is always wrong. Second, killing is not always murder. Third, God is incapable of murder; for there is no law, of any form, above God for him to contravene, neither is God capable of malice. Fourth, God's acts of killing are necessarily right, as are God's commands for others to kill (whether human or angelic), for his nature and character is the very ground of morality in the first place. Fifth, since God by the power of his word creates and sustains all of creation, all life is fully in his hands; that is, no life would even exist but for the sovereign purpose of God; to effect the end of any life, God need only remove his sustaining hand. In other words, God never kills an independent life, for there is no such thing. Sixth, all mankind is fallen in sin and moral ruin, undeserving of life; it is but for the sovereign mercy of God that anyone lives, so that any killing God does is always and only just. Seventh, in his sinful rebellion against God, man violently opposes his sovereign authority in morality, for the very father of sin has always presumed to accuse God, as if moral censure is intelligible apart from God. Thus it should not be a surprise when the unregenerate balk at a biblical theory of morality, in as much as they balk at God's authority in anything unless touched by the saving grace of God.

Yes but remember that it is important that we do not make the immutability of God some abstract foundation for logic or morality outside of God's covenant revelation to us. ... I think that we should approach these issues from that perspective, and not from some Platonic reason.

When God is the final reference point of predication vis-a-vis logic and metaphysics, as I argued previously, our reasoning is anything but Platonic.

 

[py3ak]

These discussions often make me a little uncomfortable. I think part of the reason is that we do have a tendency to search into what is not revealed - and when we do that, we can hardly help but go astray. The second is that it seems we sometimes forget that the divine willing is itself the divine nature; God is absolutely simple. As Calvin has well said (in Institutes, III.23.2, and echoed elsewhere):

If at any time thoughts of this kind come into the minds of the pious, they will be sufficiently armed to repress them, by considering how sinful it is to insist on knowing the causes of the divine will, since it is itself, and justly ought to be, the cause of all that exists. For if his will has any cause, there must be something antecedent to it, and to which it is annexed; this it were impious to imagine. The will of God is the supreme rule of righteousness, so that everything which he wills must be held to be righteous by the mere fact of his willing it. Therefore, when it is asked why the Lord did so, we must answer, Because he pleased. But if you proceed farther to ask why he pleased, you ask for something greater and more sublime than the will of God, and nothing such can be found. Let human temerity then be quiet, and cease to inquire after what exists not, lest perhaps it fails to find what does exist.

 

[jwright82]

Given the Christian metaethics I have been describing, he is necessarily right. If morality is grounded in the nature and character of God (from which proceeds his prescriptive will), then it is at once both logically and metaphysically impossible for God to be morally wrong, for that would involve the nature and character of God failing to conform to the nature and character of God (i.e., X is not-X at the same time and in the same respect).

Yeah I don't see anything wrong with claiming that God is neccessaraly "good", but I would want to qualify that. Which I guess has been my point all along, that I have aparently not been so good at explaining. I would say that primaraly good and bad have meaning only to human beings, in so far that they mean either obedience or rebbellion to God's commandments. Now in a qualified sense or anthropomorphic sense we can ascribe good to God because in a way he does this in his revealation but I would say that it means something somewhat different when applied to him than it does when applied to us. Does that make sense?

Both. It is grounded in God's nature and self-revelation. If you will recall, I said that morality is (1) grounded in the nature and character of God (2) from which proceeds his prescriptive will. Having said that, there has been a series of thoughts coalescing in my mind which I would like to commit to paper, so to speak, and on which I would like to hear yourself and others comment, a sort of peer-review thing, if you will.

Anytime, you are both wise and I think capable to deal with these matters so I look forward to reading it! I can agree your first comments but again in a qualified sense. God has "voluntaraly condesecended" to us in the covenants to reveal things about himself in human language and concepts. That is why Van Til is absolutly correct in saying that we have analogical knowledge of God, and I would argue analogical knowledge of everything as well (but that is a discussion for the philosophy section). And what suprises me about analogical knowledge is that every single human being has an understanding of this term whenever they talk with people.

Think about it, I am divoriced but when I was married I had to deal with my ex saying to me "you don't take me out enough". Now if language is univocal in nature that she was saying one thing and one thing only, that is to say that there would be no misunderstandings between us if words meant one thing and one thing only. This was Gordon Clarks problem.

If all language was equivocal than we would all mean completley different things in how we used language so we would always have misunderstanding when spoke to another. Both those alternitives don't match the reality of conversation, back to my ex (who is a wonderful Reformed christian who is getting married to a wonderful Reformed guy, I am very happy for her and I am praying for their relationship, he is very good to my daughter as well). When she uses the phrase that I mentioned there is both similarety and dissimilarety in what she means. On the one hand I understand factualy what she is saying on the other hand I wasn't always so wise enough to understand that she was using those words to convey her feelings not neccessaraly facts, thus the dissimilarety in meaning.

So we encounter analogical language all the time, in fact all language In my humble opinion is analogical. So when God uses our language to reveal things about himself it is always analogical, he is a different kind of being than we are hence disimilarety in meaning (read Horton on this, he is great). Does this make sense?

First, murder is always wrong. Second, killing is not always murder. Third, God is incapable of murder; for there is no law, of any form, above God for him to contravene, neither is God capable of malice. Fourth, God's acts of killing are necessarily right, as are God's commands for others to kill (whether human or angelic), for his nature and character is the very ground of morality in the first place. Fifth, since God by the power of his word creates and sustains all of creation, all life is fully in his hands; that is, no life would even exist but for the sovereign purpose of God; to effect the end of any life, God need only remove his sustaining hand. In other words, God never kills an independent life, for there is no such thing. Sixth, all mankind is fallen in sin and moral ruin, undeserving of life; it is but for the sovereign mercy of God that anyone lives, so that any killing God does is always and only just. Seventh, in his sinful rebellion against God, man violently opposes his sovereign authority in morality, for the very father of sin has always presumed to accuse God, as if moral censure is intelligible apart from God. Thus it should not be a surprise when the unregenerate balk at a biblical theory of morality, in as much as they balk at God's authority in anything unless touched by the saving grace of God.

Yeah but can murder as a moral term even be applied to God? I would on one level say no because I think it means one human killing another human. But we could also in a qualified sense say that he commits no murder. I think my point is that we start talking about him, and I am not accusing you of this, like he is like us and than run into problems theologicaly that way ( a slippery slope argument). And so I am trying to caution us to be careful in how we talk about God, hence the emphasis on analogical knowledge. What I am not saying is that God can act in way contrary to his covenantly revealed nature, which is always analogical knowledge.

When God is the final reference point of predication vis-a-vis logic and metaphysics, as I argued previously, our reasoning is anything but Platonic.

I was not accusing you of being Platonic, my apologeze for not making that clear, only pointing out a slippery slope argument that has come up in christian history over and over again.

---------- Post added at 08:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:36 AM ----------

These discussions often make me a little uncomfortable. I think part of the reason is that we do have a tendency to search into what is not revealed - and when we do that, we can hardly help but go astray. The second is that it seems we sometimes forget that the divine willing is itself the divine nature; God is absolutely simple. As Calvin has well said (in Institutes, III.23.2, and echoed elsewhere):

If at any time thoughts of this kind come into the minds of the pious, they will be sufficiently armed to repress them, by considering how sinful it is to insist on knowing the causes of the divine will, since it is itself, and justly ought to be, the cause of all that exists. For if his will has any cause, there must be something antecedent to it, and to which it is annexed; this it were impious to imagine. The will of God is the supreme rule of righteousness, so that everything which he wills must be held to be righteous by the mere fact of his willing it. Therefore, when it is asked why the Lord did so, we must answer, Because he pleased. But if you proceed farther to ask why he pleased, you ask for something greater and more sublime than the will of God, and nothing such can be found. Let human temerity then be quiet, and cease to inquire after what exists not, lest perhaps it fails to find what does exist.

My point exactly!!!!!!!!

 

[Afterthought]

These discussions often make me a little uncomfortable. I think part of the reason is that we do have a tendency to search into what is not revealed - and when we do that, we can hardly help but go astray. The second is that it seems we sometimes forget that the divine willing is itself the divine nature; God is absolutely simple. As Calvin has well said (in Institutes, III.23.2, and echoed elsewhere)

Then what do we do with such questions? Do we say morality is grounded in God's nature and since God's will is His nature, it is actually and ultimately grounded in God's will? And we can be certain that God's will doesn't change (because God voluntarily is consistent or God voluntarily binds Himself in covenant with us in a consistent manner [I'm trying to paraphrase Rev. Buchanan, but it might be best to stick with precisely the way he phrased it]) and so morality doesn't change? If we can only say that this is a matter of speculation that we dare not go to, then what do we say to the unbeliever on these kinds of issues on which we must not speculate?

 

[DMcFadden]

This discussion reminds me of Gordon Clark's brief discussions of determinism and responsibility in his Essays on Ethics and Politics.

Clark delineates three forms of determinism: physical, logical, and theological.

Physical determinism is mechanistic and associated with names such as Democritus, Spinoza, Kant, LaPlace, modern behaviorism, and the like. It is “strictly mathematical” and surd with respect to purpose (35).

Logical determinism permits purpose and might be dubbed “rational or teleological determinism” (36). “Whatever happens, must happen, and, more consistently than in Spinoza, what does not happen is logically impossible” (36). This bears some affinities to the Stoics.

Theological determinism means that God “foreordains whatsoever comes to pass” (36). Romanism holds firmly to free will and this was the essence of the charge made against Luther by Erasmus. Reformed Christianity (e.g., Calvin, Knox, Westminster Confession, etc.) are “thoroughly deterministic” against the free will of Arminius which represents, to Clark, a step “backward towards Romanism” (36).

With recourse to Calvin, Clark argues that because God is truly Sovereign, “whatever he does is just, for this very reason, because he does it” (46). So, if God punishes someone, it must be just and therefore the man is responsible. This in no way compromises our free agency, for that merely means that we have the power to make a decision (47).

Simpleton that I am, Calvin and Clark make sense to me in this very difficult and controversial area.

 

[py3ak]

These discussions often make me a little uncomfortable. I think part of the reason is that we do have a tendency to search into what is not revealed - and when we do that, we can hardly help but go astray. The second is that it seems we sometimes forget that the divine willing is itself the divine nature; God is absolutely simple. As Calvin has well said (in Institutes, III.23.2, and echoed elsewhere)

Then what do we do with such questions? Do we say morality is grounded in God's nature and since God's will is His nature, it is actually and ultimately grounded in God's will? And we can be certain that God's will doesn't change (because God voluntarily is consistent or God voluntarily binds Himself in covenant with us in a consistent manner [I'm trying to paraphrase Rev. Buchanan, but it might be best to stick with precisely the way he phrased it]) and so morality doesn't change? If we can only say that this is a matter of speculation that we dare not go to, then what do we say to the unbeliever on these kinds of issues on which we must not speculate?

A lot of how you engage will depend on where the questioner is coming from; but the ultimate point is humility before God's majesty - for us to remember that God is in heaven and we are on earth and that therefore our words should be few. We need to bear in mind that we do not have the ontological or ethical stature to reply against God. God is goodness; if that is not assurance enough for us, the problem is not with the doctrine of God or with the basis of morality, but with our own hearts.
However it is not wrong to say that the nature of God is the rule of righteousness, the determiner of what is good and bad ("be ye holy, for I am holy") - but it must not be presented in such a way that God's will is made subsequent to his nature, because the divine willing is the divine nature. We must not look for something higher than God's will that binds it, in other words. And you have to qualify that though in some aspects, such as holiness, God is set forth as the standard, not everything that God is or does is properly imitable by humans. We cannot imitate God's infinity, for instance, nor his sovereign dominion.

 

[Afterthought]

A lot of how you engage will depend on where the questioner is coming from; but the ultimate point is humility before God's majesty - for us to remember that God is in heaven and we are on earth and that therefore our words should be few. We need to bear in mind that we do not have the ontological or ethical stature to reply against God. God is goodness; if that is not assurance enough for us, the problem is not with the doctrine of God or with the basis of morality, but with our own hearts.
However it is not wrong to say that the nature of God is the rule of righteousness, the determiner of what is good and bad ("be ye holy, for I am holy") - but it must not be presented in such a way that God's will is made subsequent to his nature, because the divine willing is the divine nature. We must not look for something higher than God's will that binds it, in other words. And you have to qualify that though in some aspects, such as holiness, God is set forth as the standard, not everything that God is or does is properly imitable by humans. We cannot imitate God's infinity, for instance, nor his sovereign dominion.

So we can make the argument that morality isn't arbitrary because God's character is consistent and doesn't change, provided we do so in a way that keeps God's will higher than His nature, which seems to be what Rev. Buchanan did (and we could do it the way David did provided we make clear that God's will is His nature). Correct?

And secondly, how exactly do we explain to unbelievers that we need to stop explaining when we get to mysterious issues like these? Most would reply that other religions could just do the exact same thing in justifying or explaining their position.

 

[py3ak]

So we can make the argument that morality isn't arbitrary because God's character is consistent and doesn't change, provided we do so in a way that keeps God's will higher than His nature, which seems to be what Rev. Buchanan did (and we could do it the way David did provided we make clear that God's will is His nature). Correct?

Not exactly. If people are arguing that morality can change then certainly the immutability of God is a pertinent point; but if people are objecting that God determines morality, if they are labeling it arbitrary because God determines what it is, then it isn't an intellectual problem: it's dislike and distrust of God.

And secondly, how exactly do we explain to unbelievers that we need to stop explaining when we get to mysterious issues like these? Most would reply that other religions could just do the exact same thing in justifying or explaining their position.

If explanations don't stop somewhere you have an infinite regress: and that's no good to us because we're not capable of infinity. God is always the end point of explanations, because God is ultimate.

 

[Afterthought]

Not exactly. If people are arguing that morality can change then certainly the immutability of God is a pertinent point; but if people are objecting that God determines morality, if they are labeling it arbitrary because God determines what it is, then it isn't an intellectual problem: it's dislike and distrust of God.

Good point. I hadn't thought of it in that way before, but they really aren't trusting God that He will do good and instead judge God by either their own standard of morality or by a standard of morality consisting of a misunderstanding of what God has revealed (like the guy in the OP asking whether God could decide murder was right)...or they'll flat out say they don't like God's morality. Of course, other religions could give the same answer for themselves, but that just means the lines of argument have to shift elsewhere when arguing in defense of reformed Christianity.

If explanations don't stop somewhere you have an infinite regress: and that's no good to us because we're not capable of infinity. God is always the end point of explanations, because God is ultimate.

Again, other religions could give this answer, but like the above, that means the lines of argument have to shift elsewhere. However, I wonder whether that would be convincing to those who just shrug their shoulders and say "Well, maybe we won't be able to explain everything, but we should do the best with what we have and so should try to explain this thing which you Christians claim is mysterious."

Thanks for the help!

 

[py3ak]

Yes, other religions could give a similar answer (and the fact that many religions would do so could point to the fact that ultimately it is the right answer; God is the proper answer to the question of why there is something instead of nothing); but if the interlocutor objects in principle to an appeal to a legitimate authority, then it is quite evident that his problem isn't that he's reasonable. In matters of faith of course we appeal to authority, and not in vain, since God has spoken. Thus those who prefer to lisp with the serpent, "Yea, hath God said" cannot be commended for their intellectual honesty. "If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself."

 

[Afterthought]

True, but they (obviously) wouldn't see it that way. They would see it as appealing to an authority they don't believe in, though in reality it is legitimate to appeal to such an authority. In dialogue with unbelievers, such keeps Christianity consistent, but it wouldn't convince unbelievers. Maybe I just miss the point of reformed apologetics?

Edit: Perhaps this has something to do with what someone posted in another thread of mine concerning Thomas, where Thomas mentioned that the articles of faith cannot be known by reason and so we cannot appeal to it when it comes to articles of faith?

 

[py3ak]

True, but they (obviously) wouldn't see it that way. They would see it as appealing to an authority they don't believe in, though in reality it is legitimate to appeal to such an authority. In dialogue with unbelievers, such keeps Christianity consistent, but it wouldn't convince unbelievers. Maybe I just miss the point of reformed apologetics?

There is no argument/evidence guaranteed to convince unbelievers. Though the Bible is self-authenticating and plainly manifests itself to be the word of God, yet for our full persuasion of that fact the inward witness of the Spirit is necessary. The works of nature declare plainly that there is a God - and yet you have people foolish and brazen enough to deny it. Shining light on the blind and reasoning with the unreasonable is always going to be a bit frustrating.

 

[Afterthought]

Well, thanks for the help then! "Frustrating" is definitely an apt way to put it. Actually, that last comment dovetails nicely into another thread that I had been planning on posting, but I'll probably wait until Monday to post it so that I don't appear to be posting so many threads at once!

 

[Ryft]

Can murder as a moral term even be applied to God?

Well, you have my answer to that already in the very post you were addressing, for I said that "God is incapable of murder" and explained how.

I think [murder] means one human killing another human.

I think for now I have to stick with the definition implicit in my arguments, where murder is any homicide contrary to the express will of God. Your tentative definition here is thwarted by Scripture in at least two ways. First, it refers to the devil as "a murderer from the beginning" (John 8:44), and the devil is clearly not human. Second, it refers to killing that was commanded by God (1 Sam 15:3), which therefore cannot be murder.

In dialogue with unbelievers, such keeps Christianity consistent but it wouldn't convince unbelievers. Maybe I just miss the point of Reformed apologetics?

We are called to preach and defend the gospel and make disciples. We are not called to convince or convert; that's God's job.

That's the point of Reformed apologetics, which also holds that one defends the truth by proclaiming the truth.

 

[jwright82]

Well, you have my answer to that already in the very post you were addressing, for I said that "God is incapable of murder" and explained how.

Can God as he is covet his neighbor's things or commit adultery? Yes Jesus could of but didn't, but could God as he is do these things? I mean that is my point, morality primaraly is one way, his revealed will to us.

---------- Post added at 09:31 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:28 AM ----------

I think for now I have to stick with the definition implicit in my arguments, where murder is any homicide contrary to the express will of God. Your tentative definition here is thwarted by Scripture in at least two ways. First, it refers to the devil as "a murderer from the beginning" (John 8:44), and the devil is clearly not human. Second, it refers to killing that was commanded by God (1 Sam 15:3), which therefore cannot be murder.

I agree that not all killing is murder but can murder rightly be applied to God? I would say primaraly no, beceause his revealed moral will is to his creatures, which would include the devil ( I should have expanded my view there but keep in mind there might also be an analogical distinction there as well, does the devil murder in the same way as we do?).

 

[Ryft]

Can God, as he is, covet his neighbor's things or commit adultery? Yes, Jesus could have but didn't; but could God, as he is, do these things? I mean, that is my point: morality primarily is one-way, his revealed will to us.

You and I are agreeing with one another, yet for some reason you wish to continue arguing the point. It is a very strange experience. As I have said (and your every response implicitly agrees), morality is grounded in the very nature and will of God; as such, a thing is moral to the degree that it conforms to the nature and will of God (and sin is thus understood in privative terms). There is no moral law apart from God according to which we can evaluate his moral standing; God is simply God, the self-existent and sovereign I Am, and we simply accept that he is the standard by which anything is measured and the final reference point in all predication.

I agree that not all killing is murder. But can murder rightly be applied to God?

No—as I have said several times now, and carefully explained why. Review the points I raised explaining why God is INCAPABLE of murder (Msg. 12, points 3–6). A very similar argument could be made regarding coveting; that is, it is impossible for God to covet his neighbor's things because God has no neighbor who has things (viz. nothing exists except God and what he creates). I appreciate your recognition that God's moral commands are given to angels and human kind, but I confess that I cannot see how that relates to the Christian moral theory I have been contending for (i.e., the question of what morality is—which is obviously different from the question of what is moral).

 

[jwright82]

You and I are agreeing with one another, yet for some reason you wish to continue arguing the point. It is a very strange experience. As I have said (and your every response implicitly agrees), morality is grounded in the very nature and will of God; as such, a thing is moral to the degree that it conforms to the nature and will of God (and sin is thus understood in privative terms). There is no moral law apart from God according to which we can evaluate his moral standing; God is simply God, the self-existent and sovereign I Am, and we simply accept that he is the standard by which anything is measured and the final reference point in all predication.

Than I apologize for not understanding you clearly. I just get a little uneasy with using abstract notions to describe God. I prefer more revealationaly concrete terms like covenantal. Think about like it is the qualifying ideas that prevent us from speaking about God in uneccessary abstract terms. I mean would God be immorral to flood the earth agian? He would only be unfaithful because he has made a covenant with us in which he promised not to do so. If he had never made his covenant with Adam could Adam have ever than sinned? Well I know that this might be undue speculation but my point is that Adam is a sinner because he violated his covenant with God. So it is as a covenant breaker that he is called a sinner.

No—as I have said several times now, and carefully explained why. Review the points I raised explaining why God is INCAPABLE of murder (Msg. 12, points 3–6). A very similar argument could be made regarding coveting; that is, it is impossible for God to covet his neighbor's things because God has no neighbor who has things (viz. nothing exists except God and what he creates). I appreciate your recognition that God's moral commands are given to angels and human kind, but I confess that I cannot see how that relates to the Christian moral theory I have been contending for (i.e., the question of what morality is—which is obviously different from the question of what is moral).

I'll aproech it from a differant angle. Is any killing on Gods part ever no matter what murder? If he had never made his covenant with Adam and he decided to annihilate Adam's existance after he created him would that be wrong? I would say no. Since God's first act of grace was not clothing Adam and Eve after they violated his covenant but creating them to begin with leads me to believe that no killing on God's part would ever or will ever be murder. Hence my thesis that we cannot apply that term to God in any way. If you are saying that his exspressed will for the way humans are to behave includes a commandment for humans not to murder than I say o.k., but if you mean that God is pleadging himself not to murder anyone than I am confused. Is any killing on God's part ever murder?

 

[Ryft]

I just get a little uneasy with using abstract notions to describe God. I prefer more revelationally concrete terms like covenantal.

I hear you, James, but there is something I do not get. Let us look once again at my statement: "Morality is grounded in the very nature and will of God." Now, first, which of the terms used in that statement are not revelationally concrete? I submit that these are not "unnecessary abstract terms," for they are no less revelational and no less concrete than describing the issue in covenantal terms as you prefer, as both divine will and covenant proceed from the same place and are revelational (in Scripture and the self; cf. Rom 2:14–15).

And second, I am willing to grant that "covenantal" has more soteriological depth and is thus important, but the point I am exploring is theological and lays the groundwork for the soteriological. How? In the first place because soteriology is a subset of theology, hence theology is antecedent, and secondly the good news does not make sense without the context of the bad news (as attested by Scripture, our confessional documents, and our gospel witness), which depends rather directly upon the nature of morality and moral culpability.

So there are two points for you to digest contemplatively.

I mean, would God be immoral to flood the earth again?

Since the nature and will of God is the ground of morality, it does not even make sense to ask if God would be moral or immoral in some state of affairs. Rather, flooding the earth again implies God being not-God—which is unintelligible nonsense. For God to go back on his word is for God to be not-God, thus we are speaking nonsense before the moral question can even arise. Do you see now?

Adam was a sinner because he violated his covenant with God. So it is as a covenant-breaker that he is called a sinner.

Adam was at once both a sinner and a covenant-breaker. I do not know if the following point is novel, and I quite doubt it is, but it seems to me that the sin of Adam was predicated on his having second-guessed God and his word (autonomy); that is, he sinned before his lips ever touched the fruit, by presuming to judge God and what he said. Eating was not the sin but the product of the sin. And his sin was compounded by being a covenant-breaker through his disobedience. Theological contemplation on my part so take it or leave it, but it makes good sense of original sin if it is understood in light of what Van Til identifies as "the sin of autonomy." He created a breach in his communion with God by presuming to stand apart from God and judge for himself what God had said. That privative move by Adam is by definition immoral (sin), given that morality is grounded in the very nature and will of God. As I said previously, there is no moral law apart from God according to which we can evaluate him; God is simply God, the self-existent and sovereign I Am, and we simply accept that he is the standard by which anything is measured as the final reference point in all predication (e.g., Rom 14:23). Being a covenant-breaker compounded his sin, but that sin was manifest before his lips ever touched the fruit.

If you are saying that his expressed will for the way humans are to behave includes a commandment for humans not to murder, than I say okay. But if you mean that God is pledging himself not to murder anyone, then I am confused. Is any killing on God's part ever murder?

I do not mean that God pledges to not murder anyone—obviously, since he is by definition incapable of murder. Killing is one thing, murder is another. It would be nonsensical for God to pledge to never do that which he is incapable of in the first place. Does God pledge to never lie?

 

[jwright82]

Since the nature and will of God is the ground of morality, it does not even make sense to ask if God would be moral or immoral in some state of affairs. Rather, flooding the earth again implies God being not-God—which is unintelligible nonsense. For God to go back on his word is for God to be not-God, thus we are speaking nonsense before the moral question can even arise. Do you see now?

Sure I agree with that. I am just coming from a Dutch Reformed P.O.V. where you start with what cannot be said of God and move from there. You know "nature" and "will" are human concepts that will always remain human concepts. God has been pleased to "condescend" to us and take on human concepts to reveal himself to us so that we may know something about him as far as creatures can know, this is what is meant by all revealation is anthropomorphic. If we are not careful to ground our discussion in these truths and the covenantal perspective than our chances of sliding into undue speculation, I am not saying that anyone has, go up. Open Theism is just one example of this.

God is and will always remain incomprehensable. We can know things about and have discussions about him but it is always as creatures. This it seems to me was Clark's problem. It is alright to say that morality is grounded in the nature and will of God but I prefer to agree with, and I do, withen the context that I have laid out, does that make more sense?

Adam was at once both a sinner and a covenant-breaker. I do not know if the following point is novel, and I quite doubt it is, but it seems to me that the sin of Adam was predicated on his having second-guessed God and his word (autonomy); that is, he sinned before his lips ever touched the fruit, by presuming to judge God and what he said. Eating was not the sin but the product of the sin. And his sin was compounded by being a covenant-breaker through his disobedience. Theological contemplation on my part so take it or leave it, but it makes good sense of original sin if it is understood in light of what Van Til identifies as "the sin of autonomy." He created a breach in his communion with God by presuming to stand apart from God and judge for himself what God had said. That privative move by Adam is by definition immoral (sin), given that morality is grounded in the very nature and will of God. As I said previously, there is no moral law apart from God according to which we can evaluate him; God is simply God, the self-existent and sovereign I Am, and we simply accept that he is the standard by which anything is measured as the final reference point in all predication (e.g., Rom 14:23). Being a covenant-breaker compounded his sin, but that sin was manifest before his lips ever touched the fruit.

I agree with you and your point is true. It is very true that Adam sinned before eating the apple. My point was that if the covenant is the perspective through which we claim to be sinners, as covenant breakers, than there is none outside of a covenant. Either you are in Adam or in Christ, covenant-breaker or covenant-keeper. So morality comes to, even if grounded in the nature and will of God, through a covenant.

I do not mean that God pledges to not murder anyone—obviously, since he is by definition incapable of murder. Killing is one thing, murder is another. It would be nonsensical for God to pledge to never do that which he is incapable of in the first place. Does God pledge to never lie?

Again I completly agree. And maybe I am guilty of stiring a pot for nothing since at the end of the day we agree, if this is the case than I apologize. But I thought it important to lay out the right context to have the discussion in before agreeing to anything. I have been trying to learn something very important to Van Til, it seems to me at least, that he was very keenly aware of the philosophical consequences of our theology, especially of God. He was able to see how just talking about God in certian way could slide one down into a false philosophical speculation about God and hence to a false theology about God.

So I guess I picked up from him a hesitancy when talking about God. I noticed the same thing in Turretin and Bavink. The context that I have laid out is I'll admit hard to wrap your head around but that is why we confess first and foremost that God is incomprehensable.