Reading: MacIntyre, Which God Ought we to Obey?, pp. 612-618
Reading Guide: The editors provide a summary of MacIntyre’s position, but not much detail. Most of you have probably encountered this question at some point: Are actions right because God commands them or does God command them because they are right? The Divine Command theorist argues that actions are right because God commands them. MacIntyre rejects the Divine Command theory, but tries to preserve some notion of the independence of God the lawgiver.
In the first section (The Nature of God’s Commands), MacIntyre begins with Freud’s “psychologically primitive version of the relation between beliefs about” morality and “beliefs about divine commands”, where the father’s commands are interpreted by the child as having divine authority. He contrasts “the God of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures” with the child’s vision of her father as god and with Jupiter. MacIntyre then considers whether it could be “right for someone to obey (the Jewish or Christian God -RS) and yet also to have justified regrets for so doing”, to be “divided in feelings and will” (613, 614). He contrasts R.M. Adams’ modified divine command theory with Occam’s unmodified divine command theory. Although MacIntyre is not a divine command theorist, he sides with Occam here: “it is logically impossible that it should be true of any action both that it is commanded by God and that it would not be wrong not to do it” (614). MacIntyre believes that both Occam and Adams have impoverished “moral theories”, theories that “are unlikely to be able to distinguish adequately between the claims to human allegiance made in the name of a variety of gods who allegedly issue commands to us” (614). After discussing what’s wrong with Adams’ view, he turns to the question of what assumption(s) we would need to add in order to “derive the conclusion ‘We ought to do what God commands’” (614). In the second section (Why Only Just Commands are Worthy of Obedience), he identifies the “crucial concept that is characteristically missing from divine command theories” (614). In the final section (How We Acquired our Understanding of a Just God), he discusses 3 historical stages of the concept of the divine; he may mean this historical story to apply only to Western civilization, for the 1st stage is recognizably that of ancient Greece. Each of the 3 stages represents “ideal types”, which I take to be his way of saying that he is not presenting his analysis of these stages or the transitions between stages as an accurate, complete historical account. I think it’s pretty clear what the difference is between a stage 1 (or “episode” 1) conception of the divine and a stage 2 conception of the divine. The stage 3 conception of the divine is of the Jewish or Christian God OR a god like the J-C God in important respects. The first paragraph of MacIntyre’s discussion of Stage 3 is quite important; this paragraph gives a good description of MacIntyre’s own position on the relationship between morality and divine commands. The last sentence of the paragraph is especially important. On p. 617, MacIntyre makes a claim that will probably seem surprising, especially if you raced through the previous paragraphs on Stage 3: “From the fact that we can at one stage in our progress towards God evaluate the divine claims, using a standard of justice acquired and elaborated independently of the knowledge of God, it does not follow that in so doing we are judging the Word of God by something external to it.” If you read Section 3 carefully (including the remaining few paragraphs), I think you’ll see why he says this.
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I got the most out of this reading at the very end when MacIntyre writes "the standard by which we judged God is itself a work of God" and "God, it turns out, cannot be truly judged of by something external to his Word." This makes sense and falls in line with my view.
For this reading, I read through it, got confused, read the editor's rundown and it all made sense... sort of. I'm not entirely sure what I should think about this reading... I guess the one part that really stood out to me was that if it's God's command, you shouldn't feel like you need to question it. But there are those commands that you question, that you feel could be wrong- you ask, "Why me?" or "Why did I/we/they deserve this?" For many these questions pop up and the insecurities can't be solved with "if it's God's command or God's way, it must be just," especially if it goes against our sense of justice (the unfairness of a world where there is evil, for example). Thoughts?
I really like MacIntyre's discussion relating to divine commands being worthy of obedience on page 614. I'm curious, however, to know what law he is referring to when stating that the ends of justice are only served when power is exercised in accordance with promulgated law. I understand that power and benficence without justice can influence us to obey commands for various reasons but is it the law of man which gives these actions justice? Or is he referring to some sort of laws delegated by a higher deity?
Two things stood out for me in this reading that I felt really need further explanation. The first was his discussion about whether or not we should question divine commands or feel bad about doing them. Logically speaking, we are quite fallible so any feelings are completely justified in the sense that we don't have the intellect of an omnipotent being so naturally we'll err from time to time. Commands from God though, because his nature is justice itself, cannot be wrong. In that case, if God were to command me to murder my family, I may feel bad about it but I wouldn't be justified in questioning it. The problem for me is that how would I know I was being commanded by God? Once again, we are fallible creatures and can be deceived.
My second objection is where he goes through Stage 3. It's quite a paradox: God's word cannot be judged by anything external to it in order to be the ultimate justice. Well heck, which God do I believe in then since I can think of 3 right off the bat that all claim the same thing? I liken it to throwing a dart with a blindfold on and then emphatically and earnestly believing you've hit the bullseye.
MacIntyre's ideas are basically Kantian in nature. Rather than obey a divine entity simply because they issue a command, the individual should question the overall justice of the command and the just nature of the entity issuing the command (an idea akin to Kant's idea of absolute moral law). MacIntyre explains the three stage evolution of just concepts in the same manner as the evolution of one's concept of another person. In the first stage, the individual (or community of individuals) has a natural understanding of justice. This is akin to preconceived notions about any group of people prior to meeting a member of the classification. For example, one may be under the initial impression that men who wear yellow hats are smelly and have no fashion sense. In stage two of this evolution, MacIntyre claims that the individual is faced with divine interaction which reveals the true nature of justice. Returning to the aforementioned example, the individual would now meet another individual who happened to be wearing a yellow hat. Lastly, in the third stage, MacIntyre finds that the individual shapes their concept of justice around the new experience. The first individual in the example would find that the man wearing the yellow hat DOES lack fashion sense, yet does not smell. A portion of the original concept of "men with yellow hats" is thus retained, even in light of real interaction with the concept.
This reading was confusing to me. It seems like he wants to say that moral right is not just right because God says so but then he says that our sense of rightness and justice was itself created by God. So I feel like I am not sure what he is trying to say for real. Because to me it seems that you could says God gave us a sense of what is right based on his actions so that we sense justice in acts of God. Hmmm…
I was confused by this article as well. If god cannot be juged by anything external to his world, how are we supposed to know if we should obey him or not? We need to somewhat evaluate our actions and how they conincide with his will. This seperation between will and feelings is perfectly plausible if we cannot judge God accuratly.
I agree with MacIntyre's take on how we acquired our undestanding of a just God. Not to say that there is or isn't a just God, but his concept of growing and learning makes sense. A lot of theiologian's would look back on their youth and see some faults or misunderstandngs. Not to say that they are fully knowledgable now, but they are moving ever closer to what they define as truth. He takes it from a concept perspective and it somewhat made me think of a car example. When a new concept of a car comes about, it is simply an idea, then comes the drawings and sketches, then the parts, then the design, then the finished product. He sums this piece up when referring to looking back at an earlier stage of a concept saying "but that nonetheless that present formulation embodies a correction of some degree of misunderstanding or of some inadequacy at that earlier stag."
At the end of the chapter it says that MacIntyre claims it would be wrong for a theist to follow God's commands if such commands were incompatible with our basic concept of justice. I agree with this statement because I feel like if God is telling you to do something and it is outside what you this is just, then why would you do it? I feel like in Job it is kind of a cop out because God could tell you to do anything and justify it by saying you deserved it for such and such reason, like when he talks about Job in the first paragraph.
I am personally opposed to divine command theory. After reading this article, it seems that he could have strengthened his argument by taking an approach which attempts to establish some form of good or justice which must necessarily take place, independently of what is given to us in religious text. Just as an example...If God commands us not to take innocent life, then doing so is wrong. If God commands us to do the opposite, doing so is still wrong as a matter of logic. The operative principle here is the preservation of life, an instinct that must be innate in all humans.
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