Furthermore, if God had said the opposite to what He did say then the things that would have been good is now bad. This makes the moral codes seem subjective. For some philosophers, morality cannot depend on authority alone. However, there are also clear problems. If humans obey God’s moral commands simply because they fear punishment, they are acting in a moral fashion purely to serve God rather than morally.
Augustine defends the god of theism by rejecting the existence of evil as a force or power opposed to god as it would reject the premise that god is omnipotent. Below are the ways in which he justifies moral and natural evil, which respectively mean evil caused by human acts, and evil events caused by the processes of nature. To justify evil, he solves the problem by defining evil as a ‘privation’ – which means when something is ‘evil’, it is not defined to contain bad qualities but is seen to be falling short of perfection, or what it is expected to be. Take a rapist as an example. Adopting Augustine’s idea of ‘evil’, we are to say that he is not living up to standards expected of human beings.
Did god determine that it is good to help the poor, give gifts, and preserve life? Or on the other hand did morality come about because of something independent of God. Meaning that the determination of that which is good or that which is bad came from something other than God and the reason that God agrees with certain actions is because the action is already morally right. The former of these two is known as the Divine Command Theory and the latter is the Autonomy Thesis. The clash of these two options is the Euthyphro Dilemma.
A major movement was the enlightenment. The enlightenment was in direct contrast to these views as it brought about a caviller dismissal of the prejudices that Burke sought to protect. Furthermore contrary to the conservative view the enlightened individuals promoted reason over reasonableness, as they believed this would liberate man from the oppression as the result of old laws. It would be foolish not to write this essay and not address Burke’s views on the French revolution. Burke opposed the instability and the reasoning of the revolution, as well as it’s potential to increase in violence and decline into anarchy, as it later did.
If evil did not taint the world, the world would lack good and freewill, too. God chose freewill for his people rather than a deficit of evil. To have the freedom to do anything outweighs the sum of the evil in the world. Evil can also be viewed as an alternative to a lack of goodness in the world. Without evil to counter good, good would not
Hume concluded that the three points are inconsistent. If God is omnipotent, He is aware of existing evil and suffering, and knows how to put a stop to it. If God is omnibenevolent He will want to put a stop to it. If God is both of these attributes, then evil cannot exist. Since we know evil and suffering is a necessary bi-product of human life, we must acknowledge that evil does exist.
Does morality depend on God? The aim of this essay is to discuss the ethical issue of whether God commands what is good or if something if good because God commands it. First, I will clarify the difference between these two statements and then go on further to explore whether one or neither statement is true. The first statement, what God commands is good, implies that there is a source of goodness independent of God and that he simply abides by what is good and is the greatest example of good but not the ultimate source of moral goodness. If we are talking about a Christian view of God as omnibenevolant then He always does what is good but this does not detract from the fact that the source of good is independent of Him.
It is necessary for it to be elastic. While the clause may allow, perhaps, small, technical violations of the principles of the Revolution, it is for the greater good of the Union. The clause essentially establishes that the pursuit of harmony between order and liberty is not unconstitutional. Staying completely true to Republican ideals is impossible, and will only cause greater problems, like complete anarchy. The means justify virtuous ends.
They believe we as human beings are prone to sin. We have a proclivity to do terrible things or to be tempted to so (p.30, 2008). They believe our freedom or success of government is dependent on virtue. They further added that only moral people would remain free. On those premise it is asserted that religion play an important part in nurturing the virtue needed for a free society.
When the State removes Alex’s power to choose his own moral course of action, Alex becomes nothing more than a thing. A human being’s legitimacy as a moral agent is predicated on the notion that good and evil exist as separate, equally valid choices. Without evil as a valid option, the choice to be good becomes nothing more than an empty, meaningless gesture. The novel’s treatment of this theme includes, but is not limited to, the presentation of a Christian conception of morality. The chaplain, the novel’s clearest advocate for Christian morals, addresses the dangers of Alex’s “Reclamation Treatment” when he tells Alex that “goodness is something chosen.