However, if this link between religion and morality is criticised, then there are sufficient grounds for secularist and atheistic ways of life. Why is religion needed when it is not the source of moral guidance? Two famous critiques of the link between religion and morality are the Euthyphro dilemma and the many critiques od Richard Dawkins against religion. Both essentially come to the same conclusion; that we do not need God to be good. The basic concept of religion and morality, especially divine command theory, is very simple: what God commands is good, therefore only do that.
A KoF can be the good guy or the bad guy, depending on how you view religion and the story of Abraham and Isaac for this purpose. A true KoF will be the individual or group of individuals who will defy the common worldly law of ethics in order to fulfill a religious duty. This duty may incorporate many different immoralities and negative actions. However, the immoral acts will be justified by the religion or religious figure that gives divine approval for it. This presents an issue with the moral and rational reasoning behind the deeds.
‘Assess the usefulness of Social Action Theory to our understanding of Society’ (33 marks) Social action theories are radical opposites of structural theories. Structural theories commonly view people as ‘puppet’s’ of the social system, passively and unthinkingly playing out their lives as determined by pre-existing social laws. The main disagreements between this social structure is that Functionalists emphasise the benefits for the entire society, whilst others believe that it is only beneficial to one type of group, via means of production; these are Marxists or Feminists. Social action theories have an issue with determinism, they alternatively believe that people within society are social actors and have free will, consciousness, meanings and motives. Social action theorists believe that illusion of a stable and constant society is slightly more than hundreds of individual interactions each carried out by choice and interpretation.
Morality does not come directly from God. This is the idea behind the Autonomy thesis. This option says that an act is either immoral or moral based on things apart from the commands of God. Actions are right or wrong in and of themselves regardless of God’s commands. The issues with this option mainly deal with the definition of a theistic God.
The Erosion of Faith in Society The strength of religious beliefs and faith in God are dependent upon individuals and the society they live in. The personal experiences or the actions of a society can negatively effect these religious beliefs and faith in god. Another aspect which affects faith and religion are the barriers individuals and society place in between themselves and their religious beliefs. The short story “The Young Goodman Brown” and the poem “God’s Grandeur” share one common theme, the erosion of faith throughout society. The destruction of an individuals or society’s faith can be caused by negative experiences.
This theory represents a conflict between good and evil in us which is determined by the capacity to keep "evil" impulses in check. Stevenson states "With every day, and from both sides of my intelligence, the moral and the intellectual, I thus drew steadily nearer to the truth, by whose partial discovery I have been doomed to such a dreadful shipwreck: that man is not truly one, but truly two." (Stevenson 104) The "evil" in ourselves is based off the high expectations and traditions presented to us. It’s in our human nature that suggests the different personalities of a person that’s affected which act independently and unknowingly of one another, whereas in the case of Dr. Jekyll, his second personality is a conscious creation brought into being willfully. In this situation, Dr. Jekyll inherits his family's reputation in high social status.
They have the ability to make their own decision through deliberate thinking. Yet, the presence of both social and authority pressure can sometimes lead a person’s mind astray. Human’s tendency to conform with their environment often gives submission to unreasonable idea; ridiculing their own conscience. In the article “The perils of obedience”, written by Stanley Milgram, it states that “obedience is a deeply ingrained behavior tendency.... [which is] overriding training in ethics, sympathy and moral conduct.” My experience above portrays a glimpse of social pressures in our everyday lives. If I were to succumb myself to the conformity of the group, I would probably be smoking now.
Basically this life is all you have so do what you want. Even those these religions have very different beliefs they do have some similarities. This paper will compare and contrast various aspects of both of these belief systems. “The gods are not to be feared; death cannot be felt; the good can be won; all that we dread can be conquered.” -- Epicurus. (webspace.ship.edu/) An Epicurean mindset is that this life will be over and there is nothing else.With Epicurus's one constant problem with God was evil.
However, humans start to learn about morals from their family unit, even before one starts to learn from the family church. The connection between morality and religion appears to show that people believe that moral truths require a religious foundation, or can best be explained by God's existence, or by an action assumed to be by God. Moral arguments for God's existence is argued constantly between believers and non-believers. Moral arguments are both important and interesting. They are interesting because evaluating whether they are legitimate requires one to be practical and attentive to each philosophical issue.
This is especially true of Christianity. In short it can be said that theology works on religion. Theology is in fact based on religion. It is a system of studying about God especially Christian religion. Religion does not deal with any sort of rational analysis.