Comments on: The Dark Side Of Divine Command Theory?: A Response To Erik Wielenberg – Part Two

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 30 May 2008 17:48:22 +0000

David
You make an excellent point when you say that St. Paul's prohibitions are needed to help us to emulate Christ. You have made a few references to the “law” (ceremonial, natural, moral, etc. ) and the connection to God's revelation. Have you considered the law to be the way that God raises his family? Divine pedagogy, if you will. Ted Tripp makes the point in Shepherding the Heart of a Child, that the authority/influence continuum changes as a child grows older. For example, when a child is a toddler, it is important for them to know not to play with the light socket simply because “daddy said so”…authority. However, when a child reaches the teen years, it is more difficult for a parent to impose their authority on a child. It is during these years that a parent has influence over the decisions a child makes. After all, we are raising our children to make responsible decisions on their own.
How does this relate to DCT? Well Adam and Eve were given a simple command…because Daddy said so. The other end of the continuum would be the law of God written on our hearts as Jeremiah 31 states. Somewhere in between we find the ceremonial laws. What part did they play? Well we can look at the animal sacrifice as the means by which God reminded Israel that they were no longer in Egypt. They sacrificed and ate the animals that were worshipped in Egypt (bulls, goats, etc.) and they had to abstain from the animals that they ate in Egypt (pigs). Circumcision was a reminder that Ismael was an Egyptian and not the child of the promise as Isaac was. Ismael was circumcised at 13 which was when the Egyptians performed the rite. God instituing circumcision was His way of reminding Abraham's offspring that they have to rely on God's covenant and not on things of the flesh.
Now enter Christ who transforms circumcision to baptism and the sacrificial offering into the Eucharist. These two sacraments give us the grace to emulate Christ the way were supposed to in the beginning.
Any doubt about this can be cleared up when the Pharisees ask Jesus about divorce. What does Jesus tell them? He refers to the “beginning” when divorce was not so. Why would he refer to the beginning if he didn't intend for us to live as God originally intended?
Therefore, if we look at the whole of salvation history we see the divine command theory being taught to us. The DCT can be seen in the natural law but some of us are pretty stubborn and need to be led a little at a time. Thanks be to God that he is a very patient teacher.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 30 May 2008 00:50:19 +0000

This makes a lot of sense on a variety of levels – thanks for explaining it to me!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 30 May 2008 00:10:27 +0000

That sounds about right.
I think the bit about God's commands comes in for two reasons. One, it's difficult to have an ethical system without principles or laws. Merely saying “God is love”, at least in our post-fall state, isn't enough to get us to “love your enemy.” But ultimately the principles flow out of character, specifically a virtuous character. This is why, in many respects, the gospels are more important for morality than any set of prohibitions laid down by Paul. The gopspels give us Christ, who is a moral exemplar, the supreme moral exemplar. He is the picture of a perfect and virtuous character and we should attempt to emulate Him. But the truth still remains, post-fall, that we need Paul's prohibitions as well, because we can't emulate Christ perfectly in this life.
Two, there are certain commands God can give that aren't necessarily universal moral truths, such as Old Testament ceremonial laws. Was it morally right to build the tabernacle just exactly the way they did, and not to deviate from the established forms of worship? Yes, not simply because God's character is perfect, but specifically because He said so. And if He doesn't say so anymore, then it is no longer morally obligatory, even though His character hasn't changed.
You're right to point out that the commands themselves act like a middle-man, which would explain the confusion of so many over the nature of DCT. But in some cases I think they are a necessary middle-man (especially in the case of the OT laws). After all, we can only get at God's character through His revelation of Himself, which comes in the form of His Word (His commands) and Christ. We also have the internal work of the Holy Spirit, which enables to better emulate Christ every day. Perhaps you could say we're being weaned off commands and onto virtuous character, in which case, in Heaven, perhaps we will be discussing Divine Character Theory!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 29 May 2008 13:55:03 +0000

One thing I've always struggled to understand about Divine Command Theory is this: why not just step it back to Divine Character Theory? You say yourself that “God

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 21 May 2008 01:39:48 +0000

Yes, I think we agree. I was simply pointing out that pointing out this Augustinian understanding of good and evil alone would, at first, just seem to play into Wielenberg's hands. But like you said, an omnipotent being could not have an inferior character.
So when Wielenberg suggests that an omnipotent being could change the nature of moral perfection, he would agree with us that you can't actually change the nature of moral perfection, making the whole scenario ridiculous. But he wants us to conclude from this that the idea of an omnipotent being upon which morality is based is also ridiculous. This is where he simply misunderstands the nature of omnipotence. He's basically just given a longer and more sophisticated version of the old question “Can God make a rock so big even He can't move it?”

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 20 May 2008 22:50:31 +0000

Derek
I would agree with you in regards to pain. Now I haven't read Wielenberg and am vaguely familiar with DCT and the arguments against it. However, it seems to me that the argument that evil being the privation of good is exactly how one could demonstrate that the DCT is true. An omnipotent God cannot have an inferior character. Take for instance the light and darkness argument. God cannot contain darkness because light is a greater characteristic than dark (ie. darkness only exists in the absence of light, therefore light would be a superior characteristic). God creates; evil destroys. There is nothing to destroy if there is nothing created. So, if God is a perfect being whose essence is perfect love, perfect unity, perfect beauty, perfect goodness, etc., then wouldn't it stand to reason that anything that tends towards those characteristics could thereby be considered good?
So back to Romans 2. God's wrath will be poured out on unbelievers, but isn't he saying that those who follow the natural law are believers? He says that they are a law unto themselves. Remember that Paul is writing to Jews who think that just because they are part of the covenant of circumcision, that they are saved. He is explaining to them that a Jew can be in sin just as a Gentile can.
Thanks for the discussion.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 20 May 2008 07:11:38 +0000

Hey David, thanks for the comment.
Yes, pain can have good effects (in fact, the whole purpose of pain, biologically speaking, is as a warning to prevent further damage to the body). But Wielenberg is talking about good and/or evil that is intrinsic. So, if you were to isolate the thing in question (pain) from everything else in the universe and simply consider it in and of itself, would you say it was good or bad? Wielenberg is relying on the intuition that, when considered by itself, without any consideration of extrinsic goods like the ones you've mentioned, pain is just bad. And I'm inclined to agree. All things considered, I'd rather not be in pain. And if I did willingly choose pain over comfort (say, to follow Christ in the midst of persecution), I would not be doing so because pain itself is good, but because of the end I hope to achieve through the pain.
This verse doesn't say anything about anyone keeping the law perfectly, and certainly not unto salvation, as the whole passage is about divine wrath poured out onto unbelievers.
Yes, evil is a privation of goodness, so Wielenberg's scenario of the evil contestant changing the nature of moral perfection is absurd. But this is exactly what he is relying on. Wielenberg wants you to see how ridiculous and inconceivable his scenario is, and from that he hopes to demonstrate that DCT is equally ridiculous and inconceivable. So merely pointing out that evil cannot become goodness or vice versa won't do anything to his argument. Fortunately Wielenberg has an inadequate conception of omnipotence and the classical theistic view of the nature of God, so his argument is easy to attack on those grounds.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 16 May 2008 21:13:53 +0000

David
How exactly are you defining pain? Couldn't it be argued that pain isn't evil at all. Isn't it through much “pain” that we enter the kingdom of heaven?(cf. Acts 14:22) Pain and suffering are the means by which Jesus redeemed the world. Pain could be God's mercy as it directs us to Him.
In reference to your reply to louddog's comment in part one, I don't know that I would say that the law is impossible to follow:
Romans 2:14,15: When Gentiles who have not the law do by nature what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law.
[15] They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts accuse or perhaps excuse them.
As for the DCT: Isn't evil simply the absence of good? Death occurs in the person because one or more systems disintegrate. Even the term “dis”integrate is defined negatively as the absence of integrity(which Aquinas defines as part of God's essence). So wouldn't it be impossible for evil to become goodness because it (evil) relies on the existence of goodness to even exist itself?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 16 May 2008 21:13:13 +0000

Nice interaction with Wielenberg here, David. It was good supplemental reading (like I need that with my load right now!) for my ethics class with Scott Smith.