Lecture Outline Notes on Divine Command Theory

• Question: Are morally wrong things wrong because God commands us not to do them, or does God tell us not to do them because they're already morally wrong for some reason?

Moral Truths	God's Commands
Lying is wrong	God commands us not to lie
Murder is wrong	God commands us not to commit murder
Adultery is wrong	God commands us not to commit adultery
Etc.	Etc.

Which direction does the explanatory arrow go in?

Two possibilities:

(1) The Right Column Explains the Left ( = Divine Command Theory, or DCT)

(2) The Left Column Explains the Right

• Deep Philosophical Question: What is it that ultimately makes morally wrong acts wrong (or obligatory acts obligatory, etc.)?

DCT proposes one answer to this question. (You should be able to explain what exactly that answer is.)

• Problems for Mortimer's simple version of DCT

• Mortimer: "God made us and all the world. Because of that He has an absolute claim on our obedience. . .[Because we are His creatures,] we ought therefore to do and be what he desires." Can this be right?
• The evil demon thought experiment

• Where, then, does the general obligation to obey God's commands come from in the first place?

• Modifying the Theory: God's goodness to us as the basis for a duty of gratitude and a general obligation to obey his commands

• Further Problems: If some obligations (such as the above) can have a non-command basis, why can't others? Why can't we short circuit the appeal to particular divine commands altogether, and ground moral obligations in other ways? Examples:

Obligations of respect and gratitude toward one's parents

Obligations to one another through promises

Moral wrongness of cruelty: the burning cat

Can't the above moral obligations, or facts about moral wrongness, all be explained simply on natural, secular grounds, quite independently of any appeal to divine commands?

• DILEMMA for DCT: Either God's commands are arbitrary and given for no good reason, or he has good reasons for giving those commands. But the first possibility is unacceptable: it is not rational to give commands without good reasons for giving those commands, and God must be rational. And the second possibility is equally problematic for DCT: If God does have good reasons for commanding us as he does, then it would seem that those very reasons are themselves the reasons why the acts in question are right or wrong (rather than God's commands being what makes the acts right or wrong).

• Example: the command not to lie. Suppose God has reason R for telling us not to lie. Then isn't R also more directly just the reason why lying is wrong--the thing that makes lying wrong? Compare: my commands to my son regarding not touching the stove. What work is the command really doing, in terms of what makes something right or wrong to do?

• Theistic Alternatives to DCT: #2 from earlier (the left column explains the right). How might this be understood? Analogy with space and geometry, and created natures with intrinsic principles.

• Some Epistemic Considerations: How do we know divine commands, given all the competing claims made by various texts and traditions? And how could we make the necessary judgments about the goodness of an alleged creator and commander (see above response to the evil demon problem) unless we already have a sophisticated grasp of morality? Won't we therefore have to rely on a non-religiously based grasp of morality to guide religious belief, even as we may also use religious belief to help guide our moral thinking?

NOTE: In connection with the last bullet point, I realize that many of us have likely been raised to believe that the Bible must be accepted as the literal word of God from cover to cover, and so can serve as a simple and authoritative guide to divine commands--just as millions of people from many other cultures have been told about the various competing texts and traditions that have been handed down to them. It is important, however, for anyone who wishes to take a serious approach to the Bible today to understand that these texts (and the histories surrounding them) have now been subjected to rigorous, scholarly examination for over a century, and scholars have in fact learned a great deal about their origins, authorship, uses, history of selection and exclusion, changes over the centuries, inconsistencies, and so on, by employing the same techniques scholars have long used in studying other texts and traditions of all kinds from around the world (such as texts associated with Shakespeare or Plato). For those who are interested in understanding Biblical texts more deeply than is possible simply through reading English translations taken at face value, and in grasping the enormous complexities involved with understanding the origins, authorship, and significance of Biblical texts, I would recommend starting with Professor Bart Ehrman's recent book, _Jesus Interrupted_ (Harper Collins: 2009), which gives a good introductory summary of mainstream scholarship on these issues. Ehrman, a former Evangelical Christian, is Distinguished Professor and Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at UNC Chapel Hill (http://religion.unc.edu/faculty/BartDEhrman/BartCV.htm). Note that this is not to suggest that believers cannot make use of what they take to be divine revelation (whether the Bible or any of the many other texts competing for that status among believers) in trying to discern the divine will. The point is just that this will necessarily be a very complicated endeavor, filled with uncertainties, and will certainly benefit from being informed by the best current scholarship.