A guy by the name of Ben Tegland sought to critique some questions I asked and comments I made in the closing paragraphs of my review of Bart Ehrman’s Forged. Ben is an atheist, and from reading a little bit of his blog, he doesn’t seem to be one for good reason (he was raised a fundy and then when he discovered that there was something wrong with fundamentalism he decided there was no God). Anyway… Here’s what I asked/said:
I’m also curious about how/why a self-professed agnostic would write so much about honesty and deception as if those concepts actually have concrete meaning to a non-theist. In other words, Ehrman can talk about truth and lies all he wants, but I’m left wondering why he cares or how he grounds any kind of belief in such concepts without grounding them in God. It seems that he has to borrow from a worldview that is not his own in order for the issues he raises to even begin to be considered problematic. Ironic? Perhaps. Inconsistent? Definitely.
Now it seems that a few people have had a hard time understanding how or why I’d ask such questions and some have seemingly missed my point (which I sought to clarify in the comments to that review). The point is not that non-theists of varying stripes cannot have morals or ethical standards—on the contrary—they do have them and they have them in spades. The point is that in having them, they have to borrow from a worldview (i.e., the Christian worldview) in which such concepts make sense. They cannot be consistent in their atheistic worldviews and be ethical or moral. But people are inconsistent all the time.
Tegland makes my point repeatedly in his post by referring to things in the Bible such as “Bashing babies’ heads on rocks, divinely commanded genocide, and human sacrifice” as being “morally repugnant.” He appeals to “Sam Harris’ idea of basing morality in an attempt to do the greatest good” as being “much more satisfying” than grounding morality in God.
I’ll first point out that these are seemingly inconsistent claims since it is conceivable that each thing Tegland lists as being morally repugnant could in fact be conceived of as an attempt to do the greatest good. It is conceivable that in some possible universe smashing 500 babies’ heads on rocks could save 5 million babies’ lives. But this shows another inconsistency, namely that Tegland expects his readers (and presumably everyone who has ever lived anywhere and at any time) to agree that such acts are morally repugnant. He seems to have set up some kind of objective standard. I’m all for objective standards, but without God I can’t see how one is even conceivable let alone possible.
And if Tegland doesn’t expect all people in all places at all times to agree with his assessment of these actions then he has no objective moral standard. And if it’s subjective then what good is it for critiquing anyone’s morality? It just becomes opinion and we all know what they say about opinions (they’re like… and everybody’s got one). Moving along… Tegland’s appeal to Harris assumes that “good” is a concept that has some kind of concrete meaning that we all should recognize. What exactly is good and how do we know it when we see it? What standard are we using to determine good? And once good is determined then how to we arrive at “greatest good?” Is this a majority opinion? Is it quantifiable in some way? You get the point.
You see, the problem with Tegland’s criticisms is that he has to use concepts that only make sense in the Christian’s worldview. Good is good because God says it’s good. Same with bad, right, wrong, and everything else tied to morality and ethics. Tegland might not like it, and he can certainly disagree with it, but he can’t effectively argue against it. No one can. Sorry.
B”H
Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth 
Good post. I agree with you completely Nick!
Get a lot of rest, I can see you having to make about 100 responses to the backlash this post will most likely create. I hope I’m wrong, unless you want to confront Tegland and others. If that’s the case, have fun and good luck!
EDH: Thanks. I doubt that this is going to stir up much controversy since most folks recognize that it’s true. We’ll see though. I do know that I have no plans on getting drawn into lengthy back and forth debates over the issue.
Well, let’s see if I can stir up at least a little: :-)
http://exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com/2011/04/christians-bible-and-objective-morality.html
James: You can try, but I can assure you that this isn’t controversial.
That’s your subjective view of things, but objectively speaking, it is controversial.
James: Oh, and you’ve fundamentally misunderstood what I was saying. That kind of ruins your whole post. I’m saying that there is an objective moral standard: GOD!
God is not an objective moral standard, especially if you believe that God can both command genocide and command that we love our enemies, both command war and command that we refrain from taking up the sword. But even if God commanded one thing consistently, if one is thinking of God in personal terms, then that is a subjective morality. It may be objectively true that God views certain things as moral, and objectively true that God will punish those who do not follow his moral dictates, but that isn’t the same thing as something being “objectively moral.”
James: By what standard do you determine what is moral, ethical, or good?
By putting myself in the other person’s shoes. By what standard do you determine what is moral, ethical or good?
James: By God speaking in Scripture.
On that basis, is it moral to slaughter all the inhabitants of a city that one has conquered?
Which God? Which scripture?
James: Your question is loaded and needs some unpacking. I’m not willing to devote much time to unpacking it so the short answer is that it depends — If said slaughter is in obedience to a divine command (as a means of executing God’s judgment) then of course it’s moral. I can’t imagine morality coexisting alongside disobedience to God. If such slaughter is nothing more than the human desire to kill then of course it’s not moral (God clearly commands us not to murder). I see nowhere in Scripture that God universally commands slaughtering the inhabitants of a city that one has conquered. There are specific instances and in those instances there’s plenty to take into consideration (such as the offenses that warranted the judgment; the time given for the offending nations to repent; the opportunity for innocents to escape the judgment; etc.).
Jay: The triune God and Christian Scripture.
Then morality is not objective. It is whatever God says it is at a given moment, and that can change. I don’t think that that is what most people mean by “objective morality.”
I think what you mean is that God is the ultimate authority regarding moral matters. That is a different concept in many important respects.
James: No, I mean both actually. Morality is objective precisely because it’s grounded in God who is the ultimate and unchanging standard. I’m using “objective” in the sense of something having reality independent of the mind as opposed to “subjective” which is dependent on the mind and merely perceived. It’s according to God’s unchanging justness (or justice – I didn’t know which to use here) that we know it’s moral to exact his judgment in such a manner and not ours.
But this is deviating from the point — the point is that objections to things like slaughtering entire cities (or even individual persons) rely on presuppositions that non-theists cannot hold consistently with their worldview (again, I’ll concede that they hold them nonetheless). They can’t explain how or why human dignity (which undergirds the idea that taking human life is wrong) exists in any meaningful way. Why, according to a non-theistic worldview is the slaughter of humans wrong, or bad, or immoral when the slaughter of animals (such as cows or pigs) is not?
It sounds like you view God as an object rather than a subject, but that is perhaps beside the point. Your final statement seems to me to be the opposite of the truth. It is a theist with a view like yours who cannot state categorically that slaughtering an entire city is wrong. They would have to know what God had commanded in that particular instance in order to state that. A non-theist, but also a theist with a different view of morality than yours, can on the other hand define human rights in such a way as to state that it is categorically wrong to slaughter the inhabitants of an entire city, including non-combatants, even if the army doing so believes that God has told them to do it.
James: Hence my earlier response: God speaking in Scripture. And the subjectivity of your explanation continues to make the point — the non-theist defines morality and human rights. That then differs from person to person. There is no standard that all people in all places at all times should adhere to. And on that note, I’m done.
Are you saying that Joshua and his armies had Scripture to guide them in deciding when it was moral to wipe out a city leaving no survivors and when it wasn’t? What is your evidence for that?
If you want to end it there, that’s fine. But you’ll leave this discussion giving the impression that you hold a baffling view which you nonetheless believe to be self-evidently true. I think the heart of the matter is that you believe, and want to believe, that your beliefs and values are objectively true – making it hard to discuss these things “objectively.” :-)
Nick
If objective morality can only be found through God speaking in scripture, how do you respond to all of the moral issues which God fails to address in scripture? The vast majority of humanity today agrees that slavery is a moral evil, but the pro-slavery preachers of the civil war had more scripture to cite in their favor than the abolitionist preachers could find in theirs. The morality that most agree can be found in scripture, can also be found outside of scripture (Confucius gave us the golden rule in the 6th century BC).
If we’re reduced to an attempt to interpret scripture for every moral question scripture doesn’t answer, we’ve simply returned to a state of subjective morality.
But what you call subjective morality can still be guided by agreed-upon principles, such as the Golden Rule. It is a rule against which we can judge our actions. Certainly we can imperfectly interpret the Golden Rule, but Christians have been imperfectly interpreting the Bible (at times to horrific effect) for 2000 years.
As a side note, I can’t help but smile at the irony of what I’m watching as I type. I’m not sure what company hosts your blog, but I’m watching four mini-video screens of brutal, bloody ultimate fighting action embedded at the bottom of your web page.
Beau: You’ve answered your own question. Imperfect interpretations are just that; the objectivity of God as the absolute standard of morality and the only grounds by which morality exists isn’t done away with because people get things wrong. Also, if morality is determined by what the vast majority of people agree upon then you have to admit that there was a time when slavery was moral, right? As you said, “the vast majority of humanity today agrees that slavery is a moral evil…” What about the days when the majority didn’t agree upon slavery’s immorality? I’m sure you can see the inherent problems with such standards. Even the Golden Rule, for all its alleged virtue, isn’t as great as it might seem since people have very different ideas of what they’d want done to them (e.g., I recently learned that a couple I went to high school with died in a murder-suicide; the husband killed the wife and then himself; it’s quite possible that his wanting to die had a great deal to do with his wanting her to die as well).
I’m not sure I see the irony you’re talking about. I’ve embedded the MMA, btw, but to my knowledge there’s nothing immoral about competitive fighting.
Ah, now I see why we disagree so much. I think Jesus’ teaching is as great as it seems… ;-)
James: I don’t equate Jesus’ teaching with the Golden Rule. Jesus commanded us (in agreement with the OT) to love God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength (this type of loving obedience is precisely the grounds for obeying divine commands to destroy inhabitants of a land as to carry out God’s judgment) and to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Love is the key component. Our love for self and neighbor is rooted in our love for God (who comes first) but love is the key. The Golden Rule simply has us doing as we’d like done. That can mean very different things to different people.
Care to venture a guess as to why Jesus taught us this principle that varies from person to person and situation to situation, if morality is something objective?
James: Are you being intentionally obtuse? I just got done saying that I don’t equate Jesus’ teaching to love with the Golden Rule. Kindly address what I have said or move along. Thanks.
My point is that he taught it (you are free to disagree with me about this if you are so inclined), and it is a principle which seems to view moral decisions as involving subjectivity and sympathy, not simply the application of rules or Scripture.
You still have not answered my question about Joshua. Are you saying that they were guided by Scripture to decide whether to kill or spare the inhabitants of a city? If so, which Scripture?
James: I do disagree, which you already knew, and then proceeded to question me as if I didn’t. I find that slightly annoying. I’ll forgive it though.
I have no intention on answering your question about Joshua (not that it can’t be answered — go back and re-read our exchange and you should be able to spot the problem with the question itself). I do believe I said that I was done in a previous comment. I meant it. I only responded to the comment you left this morning because I thought it was going in a different direction. And now I’m done with this as well.
Well, I don’t see the problem with my question, and for what it’s worth, I’m not intensionally obtuse. I really think you are saying things you think you are supposed to about God and morality, but they are not things that either the Bible says or that make sense. But you’re free not to talk about it if you don’t want to. Whether it is moral of you to do so is another matter. :-)
Mr. Norelli, it seems to me that you’ve just been side-stepping the issues raised by your commenters. It’s fine to insist that ultimate moral authority belongs to God, but if our only access to God is Scripture (or prayer?), then we’re left with a lot of ambiguously answered moral questions. It’s nonsense to say that someone like Ehrman has no ground for moral judgement, when your only alternative is God through scripture. Yes, humans imperfectly interpret scripture with great diversity. What’s the alternative, unless you grant someone the gift of direct revelation today?
Steven: We seem to have very different impressions of my interactions. I think I’ve addressed the commentators to this post head on, with the notable exception of not answering one of James’ questions, and I have a perfectly good reason for that (i.e., the question in and of itself proves irrelevant in light of what I’ve already said).
Scripture is certainly not our only access to God and I haven’t said as much. It’s one means of revelation and it’s a means of revelation that Christians accept as authoritative. I also believe in natural revelation (cf. Rom. 1:17-21). It’s fine to assert that my claim is nonsense, but just saying it doesn’t make it so. Explain to me, if you would, how a non-theistic worldview can provide any rational or coherent grounds for morality, i.e., an objective standard that all people in all places at all times should adhere to. I think I’ve already shown how things such as majority consensus and the Golden Rule don’t work; do you have an alternative?
I know a lot of nontheists. I couldn’t possibly ascribe to them all the same worldview.
But to say that a “nontheist” can have NO grounds for assessing morality (the golden rule being the most common example of such grounds) is not the same as asking that a “nontheist” provide an objective standard for all people in all places at all times. Just because humanity will disagree at times in our interpretation of those grounds, doesn’t invalidate the effort. We shouldn’t give up the practice of medicine just because doctors disagree on some treatments.
So yes. A nontheist’s grounds for morality are imperfect, subject to interpretation. No argument there. But so is a Christian’s. The amazing number of Christian denominations in the world is a clear indication of how much Christians disagree in assessing God’s will. That’s the point. One can insist that God’s morality is perfect, but how can that provide Christians with a better moral ground than nontheists, when Christian’s can’t agree on what God’s morality is?
Hi Nick, This will be a drive-by comment, as I don’t care for a protracted discussion either. :)
You said, “Good is good because God says it’s good.” I would say, “Good is good because God is good.” For example, we don’t “love our enemy” because God commands us to, but rather because that what God does, and we want to be like him.
I’m also curious about how/why a self-professed agnostic would write so much about honesty and deception as if those concepts actually have concrete meaning to a non-theist.
This is an example of a snarky comment I found in your original review. Do you, for example, believe that Aristotle or Voltaire or David Hume or Bertrand Russell or A. J. Ayer did not have a conception of “honesty” or “deception”? (What were these authors writing about then, when they were writing about logic?)
Do you, for example, believe that the truth value of the assertion “1+1=2” only has meaning in the context of a religious world view? (Actually many Christians I know believe 3=1.)
Is studying the catechism prerequisite to studying Euclid?
It seems not.
Hi Nick
Thanks for the reply. You are right to pick on the weakest part of my argument; for me to suggest that slavery is immoral is because the “majority agree” so, was bad logic on my part. Lots of arguments can be made for the evils of slavery. “Majority rules” is a bad argument for morality. Good catch.
I do think, though, that Steven gets at the problem I was posing. I understand the idea of God as an absolute moral authority. But isn’t that idea just as problematic as, say, a nontheistic use of the Golden Rule, if Christian’s can’t agree on God’s absolutes?
Wow. I’ve been following this conversation, and I thought the MMA footage was a web by-product, too. So you posted them?
You enjoy watching Henderson smash Babalu in rematch?
Steven: I am by no means saying that non-theists shouldn’t be moral or that they should give up on the pursuit of setting up moral standards. I’m saying that their morality is inconsistent with their worldview (all of ’em — pic your flavor). And this is exactly my point. It’s not a matter of better or worse moral standards — it’s a matter of consistency. A non-theist has to adopt Christian presuppositions in order to critique Christianity. A non-theist has to assume a standard of morality that makes no sense according to their worldview in order to complain about the alleged atrocities recorded in Christian Scripture. That’s the point.
Kevin: I’d say both/and, but I certainly didn’t mean to suggest that anything God says is inconsistent with who God is.
Theophrastus: Of course not! I keep saying this but I’ll say it again since I haven’t said it to you: It’s not that non-theists (of any stripe) don’t have conceptions of such things; it’s not that they don’t care about such things; it’s not that they don’t strive to live in accordance to such things; it’s that they’re non-theistic view of the world can’t make sense of such things so they borrow from a worldview that can.
Beau: I don’ t think so. The law isn’t defective because lawbreakers break it. I’ll fully agree with anyone who wants to attribute all moral problems to sinful humans. The problem is with us; not the standard.
John: I actually wanted Babalu to win that one so I didn’t enjoy it so much. I think Henderson is overrated.
But how then to explain the Ancient Greeks, whose conception of ethics was quite deep (and of course, influenced Christian philosophy greatly) but who were themselves uninfluenced by monotheistic religion. How to explain Nicomachean Ethics? How to explain the Code of Hammurabi?
(said with a pipe in my mouth and an Irish brogue): Ah Nick, ye must have the patience of a Saint to keep repeatin’ yurself as ye are.
:D
Theophrastus: The same way as explaining the modern day non-theists’ conception of ethics: God. The Christian worldview exists because God exists and has revealed himself. I said in an earlier comment that God has revealed himself in nature. God preexisted Judaism and Christianity and revealed himself in nature before he revealed himself through his prophets and Scripture. Without God there is no basis for ethics or anything else. That people thought about ethics and whatever else before Christianity came along doesn’t suggest that they thought about these things consistently or that their worldviews could rationally explain such things apart from God.
Derek: I must! And it’s a good thing you put that pipe in your mouth after midnight. Otherwise you’d have been smoking it on 4/20 and I’d have to ask you what was in it. :-P
Let me put it another way. The question of the authorship of the New Testament canonical books (at least as posed by historical critics) is a factual question — not a religious question. And it is interesting in-and-of itself; just as the question of the authorship of Shakespearean canon is interesting.
In fact, in some ways, it is a question more easily asked by an atheist than by the devout; who may have faith commitments in certain dogmatic formulations of the origin of the Bible.
As to why Ehrman is motivated to raise it — it is not hard to fathom a simple reason — he simply wants to poke a finger in the eye of believers. One does not to be religious or even ethical to savor the victory of winning a debate (not that I am asserting that Ehrman has won at all.) The fact that Ehrman is earning big bucks with his books is also a plausible explanation.
Of course, you are right in the following sense: it is impossible to grow up in the West in the present time and not be influenced by Judeo-Christian concepts of morality. So in that sense, Ehrman can never be truly impartial — everyone’s world view is colored. (If Ehrman published a book on the origins of the Koran, would it sell as many copies? I doubt it.)
But I believe that Ehrman’s motivation in writing his books can be explained entirely by malice — or by greed — or by the fact that he lacks qualifications to do almost anything else.
Nick, to say that God reveals himself in nature skirts too close to pantheism for my tastes. In my world view, something happened in Sinai — there was a difference between what was “revealed” before and what was revealed there. If all was understood simply from nature, then what need was there for Sinai?
Remember however, it is still 11:08 here in my beloved Centennial State. ;)
Theophrastus: Let me put it another way. My argument is a transcendental argument. I’m arguing that apart from the theistic worldview one cannot make sense of facts, truth, honesty, or anything. In order for Ehrman to raise the questions at all he needs to presuppose things that don’t make sense in his worldview. The point of asking the questions I did in the review was to critique the inconsistency of his worldview.
As far as pantheism is concerned; I said that God reveals himself in nature, not as nature. This is Paul’s argument in Romans 1 and it’s also foundational for asserting that non-theists (and for the record, I only use this term so that agnostics don’t complain about being called atheists, in case anyone was wondering) presuppose all kinds of things that don’t fit with their non-theism. Deep down they know the truth because God has revealed it, but they suppress it in unrighteousness.
You’ll get no argument from me that something happened at Sinai; something very special happened there! And I’ll take it further by saying that something happened at the Incarnation, and then the Crucifixion, and then the Resurrection, and then on that Pentecost where believers were filled with the Holy Spirit. There is absolutely a difference between what happened in all these events and what was revealed before them. But enough of God had been revealed before them to hold all people accountable. Enough had been revealed for people to ask the right kinds of questions even if they couldn’t work out a consistent way to account for the answers.
Derek: Ahh… I forgot about that! You must be high then! :-P
Nick, you still seem to me to be assuming rather than arguing that morality is not something that anyone but a theist can have. And the assumption seems very problematic. On the one hand, unless you deny that humans have some basis for moral reasoning (presumably from a theist’s perspective a God-given basis, but that is about the source of the ability, not whether people have to acknowledge the source to use it any more than to use other abilities), then it isn’t clear that theists can draw moral conclusions any more than non-theists. And on the other hand, you still seem to me to be doing little more than trying to short-circuit debate by assuming from the outset that no one has grounds for morality other than yourself and those who share your viewpoint.
And for what it’s worth, the morality you are talking about is still not “objective.” From your standpoint, it is not objectively wrong to sacrifice one’s child. It is right if God commands it, and wrong if God prohibits it. That is not “objective” morality. That is making God the absolute source of morality, but also in the process makes morality something that cannot be determined objectively.
It is a bit strange, Nick, that on the one hand you
(1) hold that pagans and atheists could have been inspired by God who “has revealed himself in nature”; and
(2) are “curious about how/why a self-professed agnostic would write so much about honesty and deception as if those concepts actually have concrete meaning to a non-theist.”
Certainly, major religious philosophers such as Aquinas and Maimonides and Averroes relied heavily on the Nicomachean Ethics, suggesting that Aristotle’s concern issues of “truth” were not merely frivolous but influential in the three major monotheistic traditions.
Regarding Ehrman’s arguments in Forged, the question of what persons authored New Testament books seems concrete enough, and does not seem to presuppose any religious world view. (I will grant you that more mystical claims, such as assertions that the Holy Ghost authored the New Testament lie beyond Ehrman’s ability to discern.)
However, even if it were the case that only theistic world view could animate the question “what person wrote this book?” why could Ehrman have not received some inspiration from the same natural forces that allowed Aristotle to be the greatest philosopher of his age — arguably of any age? (Note that even Ehrman’s opponents must concede that he has done useful work; for example his diglot editions and translations of the Apostolic Fathers, published in the Loeb Library, are the standard edition.)
It seems to me that you can’t have it both ways: that atheists and pagans receive divine inspiration from nature, and that atheists and pagans are also tone deaf to questions of truth because they receive no divine inspiration.
Theophrastus: I’m a bit confused over your assessment of what I’ve said since I haven’t said most of what you’ve attributed to me. I’m used to you being a much more careful reader of my comments.
I do not hold your first point. I haven’t said anything about “inspiration” (whatever you mean by that). I have said that God has revealed himself in nature, which he has, and thus all people are accountable. But this speaks to all people knowing the truth, and yet some suppress that truth in unrighteousness. This is why non-theists can inconsistently appeal to truth, morality, or whatever that has no meaning in a worldview that denies the very foundation of that truth, morality, or whatever. These things can only be accounted for because God exists and any worldview that denies God’s existence cannot rationally or consistently account for them.
The “both ways” you describe aren’t any way that I’ve described. A consistent non-theist would have no conception or concern for truth or falsehood, right or wrong, good or bad, because their worldview can’t support such things. But there is no such thing as a consistent non-theist. They aren’t “tone deaf to questions of truth” precisely because they know the truth (as it is revealed at least in nature but further through special revelation); they simply choose to suppress it in unrighteousness (as I’ve mentioned three times now, I think).
I’m not sure what relevance Aristotle’s greatness or Ehrman’s usefulness has here. I will say, for the record, that I have generally enjoyed Ehrman’s earlier works. At this point he bores me because he keeps repeating himself. And on the same note, I’m boring myself, since I keep repeating myself, so unless someone says something that will lead me to say something that I haven’t already said, I think I’ll be ending my interaction here.