scholarly journals Aquinas and Scotus on the Metaphysical Foundations of Morality

Religions ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 107
Author(s):  
J. Clanton ◽  
Kraig Martin
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Divine Command ◽  
Divine Command Theory ◽  
Source Theory ◽  
Divine Will ◽  
Natural Law Theory ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Divine Law

This paper retraces some of the contrast between Aquinas and Scotus with respect to the metaphysical foundations of morality in order to highlight how subtle differences pertaining to the relationship between the divine will and the divine intellect can tip a thinker toward either an unalloyed natural law theory (NLT) or something that at least starts to move in the direction of divine command theory (DCT). The paper opens with a brief consideration of three distinct elements in Aquinas’s work that might tempt one to view him in a DCT light, namely: his discussion of the divine law in addition to the natural law; his position on the so-called immoralities of the patriarchs; and some of his assertions about the divine will in relation to justice. We then respond to each of those considerations. In the second and third of these cases, following Craig Boyd, we illustrate how Aquinas’s conviction that the divine will follows the ordering of the divine intellect can help inform the interpretive disputes in question. We then turn our attention to Scotus’s concern about the freedom of the divine will, before turning to his discussion of the natural law in relation to the Decalogue as a way of stressing how his two-source theory of the metaphysical foundations of morality represents a clear departure from Aquinas in the direction of DCT.

On Moral-Natural and Moral-Positive Duties: A Combination Metaethical Theory in the Restoration Tradition

2016 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 429-448
Author(s):  
Kraig Martin ◽  
J. Caleb Clanton
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Christian Ethics ◽  
Divine Command ◽  
Scholarly Work ◽  
Divine Command Theory ◽  
Restoration Movement ◽  
Contemporary Christian ◽  
Euthyphro Dilemma ◽  
Positive Duties ◽  
Natural Law Theory

This article elucidates a unique metaethical theory implicit in the work of several thinkers associated with the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement. After positioning that theory within a broader landscape of metaethical positions endorsed by several prominent contemporary Christian philosophers and theologians, we address the concern that, when attending to the Euthyphro dilemma, the Restoration-inspired combination metaethical theory inevitably collapses into either an unalloyed divine command theory or an unalloyed natural law theory. In explaining how this sort of worry can be mitigated, we offer reason to think that the nonreductive, combination metaethical theory in question constitutes potentially fertile territory for further scholarly work in Christian ethics.

2. Natural law and morality

2020 ◽  
pp. 20-73
Author(s):  
Raymond Wacks
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
Moral Realism ◽  
Moral Dilemmas ◽  
Thomas Aquinas ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Natural Law Theory ◽  
Law And Morality ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter discusses the relationship between the ancient classical theory of natural law and its application to contemporary moral questions. It considers the role of natural law in political philosophy, the decline of the theory of natural law, and its revival in the twentieth century. The principal focus is on John Finnis’s natural law theory based largely on the works of St Thomas Aquinas. The chapter posits a distinction between ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ natural law, examines the notion of moral realism, and examines the tension between law and morality; and the subject of the moral dilemmas facing judges in unjust societies.

Biblical Discourses of Law

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine Hayes
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Positive Law ◽  
Divine Wisdom ◽  
Divine Will ◽  
The Law ◽  
Biblical Texts ◽  
Divine Law

This chapter describes biblical discourses of divine law. It begins by examining those biblical texts that emphasize the emergence of divine law from the divine will. These texts stand as resources for later readers who seek to construe biblical divine law as positive law. It then turns to texts that emphasize elements of divine wisdom in the Law. These texts stand as resources for later readers who seek to construe biblical divine law in terms of natural law. Finally, it examines texts that narrate the historical circumstances under which this multifaceted law came into being and its role in the divine plan for Israel and humankind.

Zeno’s Republic, Plato’s Laws, and the Early Development of Stoic Natural Law Theory

2015 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 166-190
Author(s):  
Jed W. Atkins
Keyword(s):  
Early Development ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Recent Scholarship ◽  
Philosophical Framework ◽  
Natural Law Theory ◽  
The Relationship

Recent scholarship on Stoic political thought has sought to explain the relationship between Zeno’s Republic and the concept of a natural law regulating a cosmic city of gods and human beings that is attributed to later Stoics. This paper provides a reassessment of this relationship by exploring the underappreciated influence of Plato’s Laws on Zeno’s Republic and, through Zeno, on the subsequent Stoic tradition. Zeno’s attempt to remove perceived inconsistencies in Plato’s treatment of ‘law’ and ‘nature’ established a philosophical framework that overturned the republicanism of Plato and Aristotle; this same framework established the preconditions for the cosmic city of gods and human beings regulated by natural law. Thus, the early Stoic tradition on the topic of natural law is characterized by continuity rather than by discontinuity.

scholarly journals Concept and Position of Peremptory Norms (Jus Cogens) in International Law: A Preliminary Study

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 235
Author(s):  
Irawati Handayani
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
Order Theory ◽  
Theoretical Background ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
The Public ◽  
Natural Law Theory ◽  
Jus Cogens ◽  
Peremptory Norms ◽  
The Relationship

Peremptory norms or jus cogens hold a unique position in international law. Unlike customary international law and treaty law, they abide no derivation and bind all states regardless of their willingness to be bound. Some scholars had elaborated fundamental theories to answer the theoretical background of jus cogens. However, they have never reached a satisfactory result. This study aims to elaborate the theoretical background of jus cogens and to observe the relationship between jus cogens, obligation erga omnes, and customary international law. The positivists recognize that jus cogens is an imperative norm within state practice and opinio juris. The positivist theory is not in line with the concept that jus cogens bound to states without their consent since every state has their sovereignty and cannot be bound by any kind of provision without consent. The proponents of the natural law theory stated that peremptory norms are inherited from the tradition of natural law so that it is the highest norm in international law that directly binds countries. On the other hand, the public order theory states that international law recognizes important (imperative) norms, which are hierarchically higher than ordinary norms and customary international law to advance the interests of the international community and to preserve the main values of international law. The three theories are considered insufficient to answer the philosophical basis of jus cogens. In its development, therefore, some new theories have been developed to challenge the basis of jus cogens.

scholarly journals Divine Command and Socratic Piety in the Euthyphro

2018 ◽  
pp. 13-24
Author(s):  
Glen Koehn
Keyword(s):  
Moral Theory ◽  
Divine Command ◽  
Divine Command Theory ◽  
Divine Will ◽  
Moral Decisions ◽  
Moral Praise ◽  
Good For

While Socrates was in his own way a deeply religious man, the Euthyphro is often thought to provide a refutation of the divine command theory of morality: the theory that what is morally good is good because it is divinely approved. Socrates seems to suggest that what is holy or pious (ὅσιος) is pleasing to the gods because it is holy, and not holy because it pleases them. Thus the dialogue is sometimes presented as showing that what is morally good and bad must be independent of the divine will. I argue that matters are not so simple, since there are several ways in which the gods could help determine which acts are good, for instance, by disposing certain human affairs which are relevant to moral decisions. Moreover, Socrates suggests that he has obligations to the gods themselves, and these obligations would have to depend in part on what pleases them. It follows that the dilemma which Socrates poses to Euthyphro (pious because loved by the gods, or loved by the gods because pious) does not offer two mutually exclusive alternatives. There are various ways for the preferences of such gods to help determine which acts are adequate for moral praise or blame. It could therefore hardly be the case that religious doctrines, if true, are irrelevant to the content of morality. Knowledge of the gods’ preferences, if such knowledge were available, would be of importance to moral theory. Socrates himself does not deny this, nor should we.

Divine Command Theory in the Passage of History

2009 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 307-328
Author(s):  
Simin Rahimi
Keyword(s):  
Divine Command ◽  
Divine Command Theory ◽  
The Will ◽  
Divine Commands ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
In Virtue Of ◽  
Moral Facts

Are actions that are morally good, morally goosd because God makes them so (e.g., by commanding them)? Or does God urge humans to do them because they are morally good anyway? What is, in general, the relationship between divine commands and ethical duties? It is not an uncommon belief among theists that morality depends entirely on the will or commands of God: all moral facts consist exclusively in facts about his will or commands. Thus, not only is an action right because it is commanded by God, but its conformity to his commands is what alone makes it right. An action is right (wrong) solely because he commands (forbids) it, and solely in virtue of his doing so. This view has come to be known as the „divine command theory of morality". This paper is devoted to a brief reconstruction of claims and controversies surrounding the theory, beginning with Plato's Euthyphro, which is the historical initiator of the debate and to a reconstruction of the various lines of argument that have been set forth to defend the theory.

From “Epicurean” Physics to Ethics

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
David S. Sytsma
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
Thomas Hobbes ◽  
Divine Wisdom ◽  
Divine Will ◽  
De Legibus ◽  
Natural Law Theory

This chapter discusses Baxter’s theory of natural law and his polemics against Thomas Hobbes and Benedict de Spinoza on ethical matters. Baxter’s natural law theory drew on Francisco Suárez’s De legibus, which grounded the obligation of the natural law in the divine will and the content of the natural law in the divine wisdom. Baxter responded to the necessitarianism and natural law theories of both Hobbes and Spinoza, but engaged with Spinoza’s arguments more fully. His response is noteworthy for drawing lines of continuity between their physical and ethical views. Unlike most contemporary responses to Spinoza’s Tractatus theologico-politicus, which focused on his denial of miracles and the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch, Baxter addressed Spinoza’s natural law and political theory, which was central to the argument of the Tractatus.

Normativity as Natural Law

2019 ◽  
pp. 161-201
Author(s):  
Robert Stern
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Moral Obligation ◽  
Divine Command ◽  
Natural Law Theory ◽  
Ethical Demand

This chapter argues that Løgstrup’s position on the question of moral obligation is closest to a natural law outlook, not only in The Ethical Demand but also in later works when he speaks of his ‘ontological ethics’ and ‘the sovereign expressions of life’ (§7.1). Alasdair MacIntyre’s claim that Løgstrup is not a natural law theorist (§7.2), and also Stephen Darwall’s claim that in this earlier work Løgstrup was a divine command theorist (§7.3), are both considered and rejected. The next section argues that the natural law theory Løgstrup adopted is non-theistic rather than theistic (§7.4). Finally, this account of Løgstrup as a natural law theorist is connected to subsequent chapters, where it will be suggested that this approach underpins his critique of Kant and Kierkegaard, as well as setting him at odds with Levinas and Darwall (§7.5).

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