On Oughtness

Introduction

One of the most interesting questions of history is ‘how ought man behave?’ Probably the most interesting part of that question, at least in this author’s opinion, is the word ought. If the word had been ‘does’ then we would have a whole different issue on our hands. We would begin to describe all the social habits of the curious creature known as man. If, on the other hand, the question had been ‘why does man behave as he does?’ then we would have yet another completely different discussion ensue. That discussion would probably take the form of evaluating the psychology of man and what things he does because of nature versus what things he does because of nurture and so on.

But our discussion for the purpose of this paper is oughtness. I propose to take a tour through some of the foundational works of social science and divide them between pre-modern and modern to see where there is agreement and disagreement. It is my supposition that what will be found is a distinct shift in thinking on oughtness (which is synonymous with objective moral truth) when the transition happens from pre-modern to modern. I will try to draw out, through the course of this paper, what it is that I believe has driven this shift in thinking.

For our pre-modern works I will consider Solomon’s Proverbs, Plato’s The Republic, and Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. For the works of modernity I will be considering Machiavelli’s The Prince, selections from Karl Marx’s Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, and finally Friedrich Nietzsche’s On the Genealogy of Morals. Certainly a great deal of other works could be considered but these works may be representative of a general way of thinking in the pre-modern versus modern of world. Exceptions are, of course, always available to the norm.

Solomon’s Proverbs

First I want consider the oughtness presented to us by Solomon. Of what kind is it and where does it originate? Let us consider the introduction of Solomon’s work:

The proverbs of Solomon, son of David, king of Israel: To know wisdom and instruction,  to understand words of insight, to receive instruction in wise dealing,  in righteousness, justice, and equity; to give prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion to the youth— Let the wise hear and increase in learning,  and the one who understands obtain guidance, to understand a proverb and a saying, the words of the wise and their riddles. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.

Here we Solomon’s purpose in writing. He is writing to instruct about the gaining of knowledge, wisdom, insight, wise dealings, righteousness, justice, equity, prudence and discretion. All of these words imply a sense of oughtness. Had we gone on to the next verse we would have found that Solomon is addressing his work to his son. These are things he wishes his son to know and apply to his life because Solomon believes he ought to.  But why ought he to?

The answer comes, I think, at the end of the section I quoted. “The fear of the Lords is the beginning of knowledge.” All of the oughtness of Solomon’s work has this as its reference point, the Lord. A closely related term for moral is justice and likewise for immorality is injustice. Though they carry a more legal connotation we may argue successfully that all legislation hails back to a moral standard. If it is unjust to steal or to murder, and if there is legislation against such deeds, then the reason those things are ruled against is because they are recognized to be immoral deeds, deeds that should not be done at all. So there will be some going back and forth between words like good and bad (or good and evil), just and unjust, moral and immoral as we move forward. While there are some reasonable distinctions to be made between some of these words there is, at the core, a common sense of appeal to oughtness.

Solomon gives us several example of justice and injustice in his Proverbs which may help us clearly see his connection of the origin of moral objectivity to God. He writes,

“For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding; he stores up sound wisdom for the upright; he is a shield to those who walk in integrity, guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints. Then you will understand righteousness and justice  and equity, every good path; for wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul; discretion will watch over you, understanding will guard you, delivering you from the way of evil, from men of perverted speech, who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways of darkness, who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil, men whose paths are crooked, and who are devious in their ways.”

Solomon connects justice with walking on the right path and with exercising wisdom which is received from the LORD (this is YHWH in Hebrew, the personal name of God for Jews and Christians). Furthermore, he puts these in juxtaposition with the ways of evil and darkness, perverse speech and being devious in action. Elsewhere Solomon connects injustice to accepting bribes (Proverbs 17:23) and showing partiality for the wicked and depriving the righteous of their due (Proverbs 18:5). Solomon does not blush at connecting Justice directly to God as the origin and source, “Many seek the face of a ruler, but it is from the Lord that a man gets justice.”

So it is not hard to discover that, for Solomon, there is absolutely a sense of objective moral truth that all should seek to know and live out. Furthermore he directly links this objective morality to the LORD, the Creator of the universe. Upon the ultimate being Solomon places the weight of justice, goodness and truth and he is confident that its weight can be held by him.

Plato’s The Republic

Plato’s great work, The Republic, is entirely about the subject of justice which we have already said is closely related to morality and is without a doubt about oughtness.

In this work many ideas are proposed such as the one given early on by Cephalus when he argues that justice is “speaking the truth and giving back what one takes.” It does not take Socrates long, however, to poke some holes in this offered definition when he gives a counterexample that clearly shows it would be unjust.  At least in some specific situations it would actually be unjust to give back what one has taken from another. The  specific example Socrates uses is that of giving back a weapon to someone who is not in their right state of mind when they ask for it back. What follows from this discussion is perhaps one of the greatest treatises on the matter of justice that has ever been written. That being said, the definition of Justice remains elusive in The Republic. It is easier to recognize justice and injustice in practice and to point to examples of just behavior than it is to define the concept itself.

This difficulty of giving a proper definition of justice might lead some to conclude that there is not one and that perhaps justice itself, and not just the definition, is what is elusive. But this would be a mistake because Plato does not have a hard time showing us examples of injustice and if we recognize what is unjust we must admit that their is such a thing as justice no matter how difficult it may be to define.

While the proper or perfect definition of justice may remain just outside of our graps, according to Plato, its origin and basis is not. It would appear that he sees justice as being in accord with virtue and imitating the gods. To this point he writes, “For, surely, gods at least will never neglect the man who is eagerly willing to become just and, practicing virtue, likens himself, so far as is possible for a human being, to a god.” So then, injustice is to be unvirtuous and out of step with the gods. Furthermore, Plato has already said earlier in The Republic that the laws they create must be in accordance with what is good and patterned after the god who is good. In fact, it is outlawed to suggest that any god did any unjust thing but, rather, “the god’s works were just and good.” So then what is lawful in The Republic is that which is virtuous and mimics the gods who only do that which is good and virtuous.

This means, although Solomon and Plato would make significant departures from one another’s understanding of the divine realm, they both agree that morality, our objective oughtness, squarely rest upon the shoulders of the divine. There is no doubt between them that there is a right way to behave and a wrong way and that God (or the gods) are the reason why these things are so. They cannot think of another place upon which to safely rest the weight of morality.

Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics

Aristotle continues down a line of similar thinking as Solomon and Plato when he gives us the example of the law abider and the law breaker and connects justice to that which is lawful when he writes:

he who is a lawbreaker is unjust and he who is lawful just, it is clear that all lawful things are somehow just…. The laws pronounce on all things, in their aiming at the common advantage, either for all persons or for the best or for those who have authority either in accord with virtue or some other such way. As a result, we say that those things apt to produce and preserve happiness and its parts for the political community are in a manner just.

Further, in Book 7 and Chapter 1 of Nichomachean Ethics Aristotle draws from Homer’s work where Priam spoke of Hector being “exceedingly good” and that “He did not seem to be a child of any mortal man but a god.” For Aristotle then (and Homer, although he is not currently under consideration, but certainly another pre-modern case) you have the connection of goodness or morality with the divine. Here we rest, once again, morality upon divine shoulders. This, then, places Aristotle in a camp agreeing with Plato (and essentially Solomon) that goodness and virtue lie ultimately with the gods.

As I said earlier, these are but a small sample of great thinkers from the pre-modern era but they are a good representation of the majority of thinking from that time on the present issue. But let us now turn our attention to some modern era thinkers and their view of oughtness and moral truth. I think what we will find is a definite and fundamental shift in the conception of oughtness and its origin.

Machiavelli’s The Prince

Machiavelli’s The Prince is an interesting work full of tongue in cheek statements but his aim is ultimately a serious one. He seeks to instruct towards what the ideal governmental system is and how to maintain control as a leader. One of the pivotal statements in his work is the following: “The principal foundations which all states have, whether new, old, or mixed, are good laws and good arms. And because there cannot be good laws where there are not good arms, and where there are good arms there needs must be good laws, I shall omit the reasoning on laws and speak of arms.”

Here Machiavelli cleverly tips his hat and reveals his priorities, namely, that of control by arms (force). Now Machiavelli is not suggesting that there be no laws, nor is he suggesting ruling purely by brute force alone, but he is talking priorities. He shows elsewhere in his book that his primary concern is that of maintaining power by whatever means are necessary and there is no objective moral ethic (merely a utilitarian one) to restrain what one should do while pursuing or maintaining power over a state. At one point he goes as far as saying, “Hence it is necessary for a prince, if he wishes to maintain himself, to learn to be able to be not good, and to use it according to the necessity.”

He must “learn to be able to be not good!” That is quite a statement indeed. For one it seems to recognize a notion of ‘good’ or perhaps ‘common decency’ but suggests that a prince ought (and there is that word again) to break with the good. It would seem in light of this and other comment made in The Prince that Machiavelli consider morality something like a social convention to be used when it is helpful and broken when it is more helpful. Of the references that Machiavelli makes to religion they are mostly utilitarian as well. Whether or not Machiavelli believed in God may be up for debate but what is very clear is that he did not fear him nor did he hold to an objective morality for all people (especially princes). Use religion when helpful, ignore when it hinders.

Karl Marx’s Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts

Where Machiavelli championed the cause of Princes, Marx believed himself to be championing the cause of the people. In this way they sat on opposite sides of one another. But there is definitely room for agreement because they are both utilitarian in their approach to problem solving. Marx responded to the suffering of the masses in his day with an attempt to cure the problem as he saw it. Marx felt that capitalism was a disease that kept the rich in power and oppressed the majority and he proposed a kind of communism as the answer. He wrote, “Communism is the riddle of history solved, and it knows itself to be this solution.” Furthermore he asserted that, “Communism begins from the outset with atheism.” Whereas Machiavelli taught princes to live like opportunist atheists who used religion to their own gain when useful, Marx says atheism is a presupposition and not a hidden one at that.

Because of this assumption of atheism the only guiding principle for Marx is the proletariat cause. So Marx would not see morality as relative but as defined by the cause. Actions and deeds are good when they support the communist agenda and bad when they hinder it. The utilitarian principle may never be clearer than in the Manifesto of the Communist Party when Marx describes the ideal Communist state. He states:

Nevertheless, in the most advanced countries the following will be pretty generally applicable: 1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes. 2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax. 3. Abolition of all right of inheritance. 4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels. 5. Centralization of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with the state capital and an exclusive monopoly. 6. Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the state….

And the list goes on.

What is evident in Marx’s thinking is that the Communist agenda trumps all sense of individual rights. Anyone moving into his ideal state automatically loses all of their personal belongings or are labeled as a rebel (and then lose all their personal belongings). He is convinced that this approach, mutual state ownership, is the key to ending suffering and the class problem but anything that gets in the way will be annihilated with extreme prejudice. He concludes his Manifesto by saying, “The communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions. Let the ruling classes tremble at a communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win.”

Friedrich Nietzsche’s On the Genealogy of Morals

Nietzsche sets out to give an explanation of the origin and evolution of morality in his book On the Genealogy of Morals. In his thinking the origin of the concept of good began with elite or noble class. What they did, what they were, was good and what stood in contrast to them (i.e. the lowly) was bad. He wrote, “The judgment “good” did not originate with those to whom “goodness” was shown! Rather it was “the good” themselves, that is to say, the noble, the powerful, high-stationed and high-minded, who felt and established themselves and their actions  as good…” He later argues that this concept becomes inverted by the religious, particularly the judeo-Christian tradition, to the point where what was once despised (e.g. weakness and low station) has become the ideal for moral goodness.

Regardless of who or what ‘the good’ is, it is clear that for Nietzsche that the concept originates with man and not with God. Nietzsche too is an atheist but he is not as optimistic of hopeful as Marx is in his Atheism. Nietzsche realizes that atheism equals no truth, moral compass whatsoever and that any principle for guidance we have is merely subjective and man made. He seems to agree that man will endure on by sheer act of will but he does so apart from any real meaning to life.

Conclusion

So much more could be and needs to be said to do each of these authors justice in representing their thoughts and stances. Nonetheless what I have hoped to draw out, and what I think should be clear from what we have seen, is that the shift in thinking about morality or oughtness that took place with the turn of modernism was a shift towards nihilism and subjectivity. The pre-moderns, while certainly having major disagreements about things, held a common presupposition that there was objective truth to be sought and found and that there was a real good and evil (justice and injustice) and that one ought to seek the good and turn form the bad. The common strand for the pre-moderns was the existence of the divine. God (or the gods) allowed a place outside of and above mankind upon which an objective morality could rest, a sufficient origin of morals and also a way to make them objective and equally obligatory for all people.

But when we arrive at the moderns we see that the oughtness begins to be a fuzzy idea. Machiavelli pays some lip service to the good, at least as a social convention that is normally expected to be upheld, but he says the Prince ought to ignore it as needed for maintaining control of the state. He does not out himself as an atheist but he encourages a practical atheism for princes. Marx assumes atheism and he adopts a utilitarian ethic which says all that helps communism is good and all that opposes it is bad. But this is not an objective reality, it is something to be imposed by force. Finally, Nietzsche presents himself as the honest one who embraces atheism and its logical outcome, nihilism. There is no meaning, there is no truth and there is no moral imperative.

Some of the greatest minds of social science bring us to this point of realization. If there is moral truth that is objective, equally true for all people in all places and at all times, then there is a divine being (or beings). If there is no divine reality then there is no basis for objective morality and ultimately there is only force, there is only the will to power. We now live in a confused society that needs to be honest about the options before them. If there is oughtness there is God. If there is no God, there is no oughtness.

Why is Homosexuality a Sin?

A student recently asked me why homosexuality was sinful and I could tell that she wanted a more in depth answer than 'because the Bible says so.' It's understandable, to some degree, that in our culture she would be repulsed by the notion of calling homosexuality sinful. Everything she sees, hears and reads in the media and entertainment industries is geared towards telling her that homosexuality is perfectly normal. They tell kids, as early as they can get their attention, that homosexuals are people just like you and I who want to love and be with people they care about.* They would like to say that it is no different than our mother and father's love for and relationship with each other.** To deprive homosexuals of the 'right' to same sex marriage*** is an atrocity and to condemn their love as sin is simply archaic and back wooded nonsense.

You cannot watch a new television show which does not feature a homosexual or two or three. Everyone has a gay friend and/or family member. It's normal and they are everywhere you go. They are presented as happy, healthy, attractive, and well adjusted people who are committed to a long term and monogamous relationship with their partner. They just want to love and be loved and to be accepted like everyone else.

So why call such a perfectly normal thing, a natural thing, a good thing...sinful?

This question is best answered by asking another question. Why call anything sinful? The term 'sin' has, after all, been attached to a lot of other things besides homosexual behavior. Heterosexual sex outside of the context marriage is also called sin. Lying is called sin. Stealing is called sin. Coveting is called sin. The list of sins rolls on. But why are any of these things sinful?

To put it another way, to use a bit less 'religious' term, we might say that these things are morally wrong. It is wrong to lie and steal and cheat. It is wrong to murder and enslave other people. It is wrong for a man to beat on his girlfriend or to sexually fondle a young child. It is wrong... Isn't it?

I think all but sociopaths just answered yes.

But why is it wrong? How can you say that murder or rape or molestation is objectively wrong? You may think these things are wrong but the person committing those same acts might not agree with you. If it is simply you against him then who is right? Why is your opinion more valid than his? Surely no human being can dictate morality for all others! 'Who are you to judge me?' the rapist says!

So you take the next logical move you can make and you appeal higher. You say that 'no individual person can dictate morality but society as a whole can'. Really? 'Yes,' you say 'society agrees together what is best for human flourishing and this agreement is what morality is. Murdering people does not aid the flourishing of our civilization, nor does molesting children, therefore they are wrong.' But I have a few questions.

What if I can get away with it? What if I commit the act and am never caught and therefore there is no punishment? Furthermore what if I really enjoy doing this act and feel it benefits me personally? Why ought I not to do it then? And before you say 'I should care for the good of the rest of society' I ask you why should I care about other people or what is good for society? It does not seem to follow that simply because a lot of people are saying something is so that it in turn actually is so. If an action benefits me and I can accomplish it without any harm to me, you have hardly given me a reason why I ought to not do the thing.

Furthermore your notion 'society defines morality' has some real difficulties. For one, it justifies a lot of atrocities throughout history and into our present day. Our society once felt that human slavery was permissible and, indeed, the majority supported it. Under the reasoning of 'society decides morality' we would have to say that slavery was morally good while the majority supported it. That moral reformers were actually evil because they opposed the norm and said the majority were in the wrong. Moral reform is impossible when we are simply counting noses.

Even further we have the problem that societies do not always agree with other societies. Who were we to tell the NAZI's to stop killing all the Jews and handicapped people? If their society was in favor of it then who is our society to judge them? This just takes us back to the difficulty we had before when you and the rapist were in a disagreement. You kicked it up the chain a bit to the level of society to avoid the problem of individual morality but it did not work. The problem is the same but merely on a larger scale. We think we ought not to murder people because of their ethnicity, they think it is for the good of all mankind to do so. Who is to say?

Who is to say?

It would seem that you have a real choice to make. You can choose between option A) that there is actually no objective morality which is binding on the consciences of all people everywhere across all times and cultures or B) That God exists. You might think that I have just tried to pull a fast one on you but, I assure you, I have not. I have however backed you into a corner with only two options. It is time that you faced them.

The problem of objective morality, that some things are really right and others really wrong, is that if it exists it is not a product of man. Mankind cannot, in themselves, account for morality. If morality is man made then it is just 'you versus me' or 'us versus them' and, in neither case, do we have objective moral truth that is binding for all people. The only place such an objective moral standard could come from is a Creator-God.

If it is the case that we are made by God and that he designed us and placed us upon this earth then he alone can state what our purpose is and how we are to function in relationship with one another and with him. He provides the accountability, He is the ultimate will-answer-to, that we lack if morality is man made and subjective. I ought not to do something, even if I can get away with it and it benefits me immediately, because it is actually wrong and I will be held accountable for my actions before God.

If there is no God then there is no objective morality. If there is objective morality then there is a God. These are your options.

And so now we come full circle. 'Why is homosexuality a sin?' It is a sin because it is contrary to the design and purposes of God for human life and flourishing and he has made this plain both in natural revelation and in special revelation (Scripture). Or there is no God, homosexuality is not sin, and all is permissible.

What I have trouble tolerating is people who try to play around like there is a middle option. I assure you there is not. The problem is that mankind is in rebellion to its Creator. We think we know better than our designer how we ought to behave and function. We reject him, we normalize what he has forbidden and we destroy ourselves in the process. Homosexuality is sin, just as heterosexual sex outside of marriage is sin, just like lying is sin, just like murder is sin and stealing is sin, etc., because God has made us and knows what is best for us and has told us how to live and we are either in accordance with his will or in rebellion.

If we say that homosexuality is not sin then we simply are rejecting God either in his existence or his authority.




*And, of course, homosexuals are people just like you and I who want to love and be loved and we ought to love them as people. But they are also living in sin (just like you and I apart from Christ) and they need to turn away from sinful desires and submit to the will of God. All of us have sinful impulses whether they be homosexual or otherwise. All of us have to deny ourselves certain things we crave because they are wrong.

** There is an obvious difference, however, because the human form was designed in such a way that the opposite sexes were complimentary and that the sexual organs, male and female, actually complete one another and produce offspring.

*** The issue of rights is similar to that of morality. Who can give individuals 'rights' beside their creator? Who defines marriage but the one who created the institution in the beginning?

Why You Cannot Be Good Without God

It is commonly objected when theists present The Moral Argument for God’s Existence that atheists are just as capable of being moral as theists. Of course this retort is a total misunderstanding of the Moral Argument altogether. Note the following argument:

If objective moral values exist then God exists.

Objective moral values exist.

Therefore God exists.

It seems very commonly, despite the fact that the argument says no such thing, that atheists think theists are saying “In order to behave morally one must believe in God.” But look again carefully at the above argument. Does it say that? No. I really have a hard time understanding why so many intelligent atheists seem to miss the point of the argument. I mean I understand if they want to try and reject the argument and attempt to defeat either premise one or two but I don’t understand why they constantly fail to understand the argument itself.

The point of the argument is to say that the only sufficient ground for the existence of objective moral values (that is to say, moral values that are true for all people, places and times) is the existence of God. If God does not exist then there is no sufficient ground for objective moral values and moral values become necessarily subjective (that is to say moral values are reduced to personal or societal opinions and there is no reason for them to be binding on the conscience of anyone).

What this argument is not saying is that you must believe in God for objective moral values to exist. Actually any theist worth his salt would tell you that your belief in God or your belief that there is no God has absolutely no affect whatsoever on the reality of whether or not objective moral values exist. If objective moral values exist the they simply do regardless of what you think or believe about anything. If they don’t exist then they simply don’t regardless of what you think or believe about anything. That objective moral values exist is either true or false just like the claim “God exists” is either true or false, no amount of belief in them or belief against them actually changes anything.

The point is only that if objective moral values do exist then God also exists. They are inseparably tied together. If you concede that objective moral values exist then you are in a corner and have to give in that God necessarily exists as well. The reverse is also true. If you concede that God does not exist then you necessarily concede that objective moral values do not exist either. Simply put, if God exists then rape, murder and theft are objectively morally wrong. If God does not exist then rape, murder and theft are not objectively morally wrong, they are at best distasteful to you and socially taboo.

I think this argument holds and is indeed very strong. But do you see how it is not the case that theists are not saying you have to believe in God to behave morally? You can be a perfectly moral person and an atheist. Your belief that God is not real does not make you immoral (aside from the fact that we as Christians would see your rejection of God as immoral itself). But you can be faithful to your spouse, help old ladies cross streets, give to charity, never lie to anyone, etc., etc., and be an atheist. You can behave morally as an atheist. Clear? I hope so.

We are also not saying that theists behave in a morally superior way. Indeed there have been many immoral theists throughout history and Christians believe all of us are morally impaired and thus need Jesus Christ as our savior. There are theists who have lied, cheated, stolen and killed in cold blood. So this argument is not about theism guaranteeing moral superiority to atheism.

The point is simple and I hope you apprehend it. If objective moral values exist then they do so because God exists as the sufficient ground for them. If God does not exist then there is no sufficient ground for objective moral values and therefore objective moral values do not exist.

But although we are not arguing that belief in God is necessary for moral behavior it is the case that no one is able to behave morally if God does not exist. See the difference? Belief is not necessary, but God himself is. If it is the case that there is no God then it is also the case that you are not capable of being good. This is true for theists and atheists alike because what we believe about God makes no difference. The brute fact is what matters and if God does not exist then calling someone or some act or behavior good or bad loses all objective meaning.

If there is no God then self sacrificing to help the poor or save someone from drowning is not good, it’s just an act that you have emotions about. Raping children is not evil or bad if there is no God, it’s just something you strongly emote against. You can’t be good without God. You can’t be bad without him either. All actions are morally neutral and individuals and societies can merely react to them emotionally but not objectively.

So the questions are simple:

Do objective moral values exist? If your answer is yes then you must confess that God exists.

Does God exist? If your answer is no then you must confess that there are no objective moral values.