There is no easy answer to this question, as there is so much diversity within Christianity. Some Christians will base their ethics solely on the Bible and its teachings, others will base their ethics on the biblical teachings but also on Church tradition and natural law, others will follow a situation ethics approach and others will look to their conscience as a guide. As a result of this diversity, Christians have different responses to ethical issues, whether it is euthanasia, abortion, genetic engineering, foetal research, sex and relationships, war, peace or justice. It is important to understand not only what Christians think on different ethical issues but also why they think as they do and the basis of their ideas.
In many ways Christian ethics does not look at right and wrong actions, but at the sort of person we are called to become. The Bible teaches that humans are created by God in his image and called to live free and responsible lives, but sin and ignorance have led us to misuse this freedom. In many ways, therefore, Christian ethics has more in common with virtue ethics than any other ethical theory.
The theory that an eternal, absolute, moral law can be discovered by reason.
The early Church brought into Christianity much that belonged to Judaism, and many today would still claim that we can obtain absolute moral rules from the Bible: the Ten Commandments are rules that must be followed without exception, and in the Bible we can find many acts such as homosexuality and divorce that are utterly condemned. However, it is clear that Christianity left behind the Jewish ethic of law as a divine command made known in a comprehensive legal code and interpreted by lawyers into many ritual requirements and practices. Christians attempted to drop the legalism and keep the law, especially the Ten Commandments, which were seen as an important part of God’s revelation and good guidelines for human existence and human flourishing, in accordance with the human nature which God gave us. Jewish ethical teaching, at its core, is based on relationships: our relationship with God and all our many and varied relationships with other people.
Many Christians rely on the Bible as their source of ethics as they believe that it is a revelation from God. ‘All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work’ (2 Timothy 3:16–17). This approach is called theonomous Christian ethics.
Although Christian ethics carries with it the Ten Commandments, it is of a totally different mindset from a law-based ethic. It was, from the beginning, attempting to reply to the philosophical questions of happiness and salvation. Therefore the most concentrated body of ethical teaching in the Gospels, the Sermon on the Mount, begins with the Beatitudes: ‘Blessed are the poor …’
The Sermon on the Mount may seem to be a set of impossible commands, but although its teaching is challenging, underlying it all is the commandment of love. However, it is not always easy to see what is meant by ‘love’: for Jesus in the Synoptics it is love of God and love of neighbour; for Paul it is mostly love of neighbour, especially Christians; John’s Gospel seems to speak of love in an even narrower sense. It may be summed up as follows:
Or ‘In everything do to others as you would have them do to you’ (Matthew 7:12a). The ultimate Christian ethical teaching seems to centre on love: ‘Love is the fulfilling of the law’ (Romans 13:10b). This New Testament ethical teaching is part of the relationship with God – what makes Christian ethics different is the ‘faith’ element; Christian ethics comes from a need to interpret, understand and respond to ethical issues from the point of their particular relationship with God.
Jesus answered, ‘The first is, “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” The second is this, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” There is no other commandment greater than these.’
(Mark 12:29–31)
Jesus answered him, ‘Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words; and the word that you hear is not mine, but is from the Father who sent me.’
(John 14:23–24)
Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.
(1 John 4:7–12)
Read Chapters 14–16 of John’s Gospel. Make notes on what it says about love.
Thought point
This idea of the special relationship with God is carried on in the idea of the Kingdom of God. What the Kingdom of God actually means has been debated endley, but it seems to be a state which has arrived, but not yet – a little like a visitor who has arrived at a friend’s house and rung the doorbell, but the door has not yet been opened. The problem is how this paradox is to be maintained as far as ethics is concerned. Jesus’ ethics can be connected with the idea of the Kingdom of God only by seeing entry into the Kingdom as a result of responding to the appeal to the desire to be children of God; a joyful acceptance of forgiveness and a desire to do God’s will. This is no blind obedience, nor is it a morality of law, command, duty and obligation; nor is it motivated by the promise of reward in heaven or punishment in hell, but by a desire to follow God’s will – the love commandment.
The ethics of Paul
The other source of biblical Christian ethics is found in the Epistles of Paul. He wrote at a time when the early Christians were attempting to interpret the teachings of Jesus and apply them to a variety of new situations. Paul stresses the importance of Christian freedom, but to be free from the law means to be united with Christ and with one another in love and service. It is life lived in the Spirit: ‘Live by the Spirit, I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh… . But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law… . If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit’ (Galatians 5:16, 18, 25).
If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others.
(Philippians 2:1–5)
Look up some of the following texts to see how Jesus’ ethics is based on, yet seems to reinterpret, the Jewish law:
- Matthew 5–7
- Mark 2:23 to 3:6
- Mark 7:1–23
For Paul, the whole law may be summed up in love of neighbour and this love is limitless, as is shown in the great hymn to love in the Letter to the Corinthians. Paul also calls the Christians to imitate the virtues of Jesus in their daily lives: meekness, gentleness, humility, generosity, mercy and self-giving love. However, the words and life of Jesus could not be made into a blueprint for Christian ethics in the early Church without becoming legalistic, and so it was recognised that following Christ depended on the gift and guidance of the Holy Spirit, which was given to the community of believers. Paul’s list of virtues is called ‘the fruit of the Spirit’ (Galatians 5:22–23) and love is the greatest sign of the presence and activity of the Holy Spirit (I Corinthians 13).
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
(1 Corinthians 13:1–7)
Christian ethics in this developing Church could be called a community ethic: the ethic of a community guided by the Holy Spirit, rather than by law or tradition.
If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others.
(Philippians 2:1–4)
However, there is no explicit concern with changing society as a whole. The main attitude towards rulers was that of obedience, as their authority was given by God, but if the commands of the state and those of God conflict, then the Christian should obey God. According to Paul the barriers between slaves and free men and women have been broken, both marriage and celibacy are seen as gifts, and wealth is to be shared with those in need. However, there is no evidence of struggling for justice, as it was believed that God would soon intervene in history and establish his kingdom, apart from which Christians were few in number with no political clout. The teaching of love for one’s neighbour, however, did eventually lead Christians to exercise greater social responsibility.
Love
This distinctive moral teaching based on love continued to dominate the work of Christian thinkers:
Love, and do what you will. If you keep silence, keep silence in love; if you speak, speak in love; if you correct, correct in love; if you forbear, forbear in love. Let love’s root be within you, for from that root nothing but good can spring.
(Augustine, Epistola Joannis 7.8)
Love, according to Thomas Aquinas, is the reason why we were made; it unites us with God, and to love is to share his life. Without love no virtue is possible, and love alone leads to happiness and fulfilment.
Authority and tradition in
Christian ethics
Although Aquinas followed the early Christian idea of morality as love and grace, not law, it is true that legalism has justifiably been associated with Christian ethics, both in theory and in practice. Peter Singer criticises this legalism and accuses Christianity of obscuring the true nature of morality: human fulfilment – happiness. He thinks that the end of the Christian influence on our moral standpoints will open up a ‘better way of life for us’ and the Judaeo-Christian ethic is ‘an empty shell, founded on a set of beliefs that most people have laid aside’. Christian ethics have been seen as deontological and authoritarian, with an emphasis on certain acts as being either right or wrong.
Many Christians believe that ethics should be a combination of Biblical teaching, human reason and teaching from the authority of the Church. This is called heteronomous Christian ethics.
Heteronomous Christian ethics
This is a system of normative ethics based not on the individual’s own moral principles but also on beliefs and teachings taken from other sources.
There are problems with Christian heteronomous ethics. Apart from the Bible, what other sources should be consulted while others should be ignored? Also, do these sources have a hierarchy of importance or are they all equal?
The issue of authority and tradition is treated differently by the different Christian churches. Some Protestants see the Bible as the sole authority in every matter and view this as more important than the role given to tradition in Catholicism.
While, particularly in the past, there have been Protestant theologians who taught natural law, today most Protestants would accept the Bible as the primary source. Others would argue that the Bible evolved over time and the development of Christian ethics should also be based on reason, conscience and particular Church traditions.
An exception to this perhaps is the American theologian Stanley Hauerwas (1940–). Hauerwas is strongly influenced by Karl Barth and maintains that Christian ethics evolve within the worshipping community of the Church. He says that that Christian Church is ongoing and developing.
In collaboration with William Willimon, Hauerwas wrote Resident Aliens: Life in the Christian Colony (1989). The book considers the nature of the church and how it relates to the culture around it. It argues that churches should focus on developing Christian life and community rather than trying to reform secular culture. The authors do not accept that any country is a Christian nation. They say that Christians should regard themselves as ‘resident aliens’ in a foreign land. Instead of trying to make the world confirm to the gospel or the gospel to the world, they say that Christians should focus on conforming to the gospel themselves. The role of Christians is therefore to live lives which model the love of Christ. So instead of trying to convince other people to change or redefine their ethics they should present a new set of ethics which are derived from the life, death and resurrection of Christ.
The Catholic Church
Catholics would argue that scripture does not give guidance on many important matters and so Church tradition is important, as interpreted by the Magisterium (the pope and the bishops). This teaching does not claim to be absolutely accurate or infallible, but is teaching on behalf of the community of the people of God. It can become authoritarian, especially when the issues are new or there is no consensus of views among the episcopacy or the Catholic community – for example the teaching of Humanae Vitae (1968), which banned artificial contraception and has been totally ignored by many Catholics.
The Church, the ‘pillar and bulwark of the truth,’ ‘has received this solemn command of Christ from the apostles to announce the saving truth.’ ‘To the Church belongs the right always and everywhere to announce moral principles, including those pertaining to the social order, and to make judgments on any human affairs to the extent that they are required by the fundamental rights of the human person or the salvation of souls.’
The Magisterium of the Pastors of the Church in moral matters is ordinarily exercised in catechesis and preaching, with the help of the works of theologians and spiritual authors. Thus from generation to generation, under the aegis and vigilance of the pastors, the ‘deposit’ of Christian moral teaching has been handed on, a deposit composed of a characteristic body of rules, commandments, and virtues proceeding from faith in Christ and animated by charity. Alongside the Creed and the Our Father, the basis for this catechesis has traditionally been the Decalogue which sets out the principles of moral life valid for all men.
The Roman Pontiff and the bishops are ‘authentic teachers, that is, teachers endowed with the authority of Christ, who preach the faith to the people entrusted to them, the faith to be believed and put into practice.’ The ordinary and universal Magisterium of the Pope and the bishops in communion with him teach the faithful the truth to believe, the charity to practice, the beatitude to hope for.
(Catechism of the Catholic Church §2032–2034)
In addition, the Church stresses the role of the conscience and the importance of natural law.
The authority of the Magisterium extends also to the specific precepts of the natural law, because their observance, demanded by the Creator, is necessary for salvation. In recalling the prescriptions of the natural law, the Magisterium of the Church exercises an essential part of its prophetic office of proclaiming to men what they truly are and reminding them of what they should be before God.
(Catechism of the Catholic Church §2036)
Magisterium
The Magisterium of the Catholic Church is the church’s authority to establish its own teachings. That authority is rests in the pope and the bishops because it is believed that they are in communion with the correct teachings of the faith. Sacred scripture and sacred tradition ‘make up a single sacred deposit of the Word of God, which is entrusted to the Church’ (Dei Verbum 2:10).
Liberation theology
Another development of Catholic ethical heteronomy is liberation theology, which developed in South America in the 1950s and 1960s. In 1955 the Latin American Episcopal Conference (CELAM) was founded in Brazil.
Liberation theology is based firmly on the Bible as the central source of ethics. Liberation theology aims to fight poverty by addressing its source, which is believed to be sin. It looks at the relationship between Christian theology (particularly Catholic) and political activism in relation to social justice, poverty and human rights. It focuses on seeing theology from the perspective of the poor and the oppressed.
CELAM attempted to push the Second Vatican Council (1962–65) towards a socially oriented stance. Liberation theology was opposed by the Vatican, and Pope Paul VI tried to slow the movement after the Council. The Church saw liberation theology as being related to Marxism.
In 1979 at a conference in Puebla, Pope John Paul II criticised radical liberation theology, saying, ‘this idea of Christ as a political figure, a revolutionary, as the subversive of Nazareth, does not tally with the Church’s catechesis.’ He did, however, continue by speaking about ‘the ever increasing wealth of the rich at the expense of the ever increasing poverty of the poor’.
In 1983, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI), said that he objected that the spiritual concept of the Church as ‘People of God’ is transformed into a ‘Marxist myth’.
The idea of the ‘agreement of the faithful’ has been further developed by many free churches, which have built their forms of church government on congregational lines – this is going back to Paul’s idea of attempting to discern the will of God by the Holy Spirit working in the Christian community. However, many Christian legalists would argue that Christians should keep rules because God has revealed them – is this why Christian ethics has become so irrelevant to many people?
Ethical autonomy
The Catholic Church views ethical autonomy as a development of liberal Catholicism. It teaches that people should have much greater autonomy in making their own ethical decisions. The Swiss Catholic theologian Hans Küng (1928–) argued that the essence of Christian ethics could be discovered by any ‘person of good will’. He created the idea of a ‘global ethic’ to save the environment and to prevent humanity from destroying itself.
Küng’s teachings angered the Magisterium and he had his official license to teach withdrawn in 1979.
My permission to teach was withdrawn by the church, but nevertheless I retained my chair and my institute. For two further decades I remained unswervingly faithful to my church in critical loyalty, and to the present day I have remained professor of ecumenical theology and a Catholic priest in good standing. I affirm the papacy for the Catholic Church, but at the same time indefatigably call for a radical reform of it in accordance with the criterion of the gospel.
(Küng, 2002, The Catholic Church: A Short History)
This type of ethical autonomy was condemned by Pope John Paul II (1920–2005) and Pope Benedict XVI (1927–).
The Protestant Church
Radical Protestant theologians, such as Joseph Fletcher (1905–1991) (see Chapter 9), argued that goodness is just a condition of being human and does not have to be revealed or derived from natural law. While agreeing that Christianity stressed the idea of agape, he argued that ethics are autonomous and teleological – striving to create the most loving situation. Opponents of this idea have said that ‘love’ is not sufficient in itself but that ethics must be developed internally to develop a relationship with God. ‘Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil’ (Matthew 5:17).
Divine command theory
If God’s will is taken as arbitrary, then this does not give any satisfactory explanation for why anyone is morally bound to follow it. If God commands something for good reasons, then it is these reasons that are the source of moral obligations, regardless of God or any religious law.
Does religion give people a reason to be moral? Is there any meaning to life that would make it even possible to talk about morality? In Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, Ivan says that ‘without God everything is permitted’ – so does God give a reason to be moral? In Albert Camus’ The Stranger, the issue of meaning is a central theme – Mersault does not condemn any action as wrong, and when he ends up shooting a complete stranger, he is sorry only that he got caught – killing someone has no more meaning than any other action. However, we do make judgements about what is right and wrong, and many people do so without seeing any involvement from God.
Euthyphro dilemma
The dilemma first identified by Plato – is something good because God commands it or does God command it because it is good?
The whole problem of doing something because God commands it was examined by Plato in what has become known as the Euthyphro dilemma. Plato asks, ‘Is X good because God wills it or does God will it because it is good?’
The first option says that certain actions are good because God commands them – it is the command of God that makes something good or bad. This means that if God commanded, ‘Make a fat profit,’ then it would be right – this makes God’s commands arbitrary. Leibniz in his Discourse on Metaphysics sums this up:
So in saying that things are not good by any rule of goodness, but sheerly by the will of God, it seems to me that one destroys, without realising it, all the love of God and all his glory. For why praise him for what he has done if he would be equally praiseworthy in doing the contrary?
The idea that moral rules are true because God commands them is called the divine command theory. In many ways the laws of the Old Testament may be seen as a good example of this theory (e.g. ‘Thou shalt not commit murder’). This view of Christian ethics goes completely against the morality of love and grace, but it was held by many Christian thinkers, such as Duns Scotus, William of Ockham and Descartes, as well as many conservative Protestants today. If we do good acts simply out of obedience to God, are we being good for the right reasons?
The second option says that God commands things because they are right or wrong in themselves. Murder is wrong in itself and that is why God forbids it. God can see that it destroys life and makes people unhappy, and so it is unlikely that he would ever command it. However, this option seems to be arguing that there is a standard of right and wrong which is independent of God and which influences his commands. James Rachels argued that it is unacceptable for religious belief to involve unqualified obedience to God’s commands as it means abandoning personal autonomy – the rightness of an action must come from the fact that the action is right in itself.
Deontological ethics
Ethical systems which consider that the moral act itself has moral value (e.g. telling the truth is always right, even when it is difficult or causes problems.).
Absolutism
An objective moral rule or value that is always true in all situations and for everyone without exception.
Divine command theory
Actions are right or wrong depending on whether they follow God’s commands.
Conscience
Our sense of right and wrong.
Thought point
- 1 Do we need God to give meaning to life?
- 2 Do you agree that ‘without God everything is permitted’?
- 3 Explain the difference between ‘X is good because God wills it’ and ‘God wills X because it is good’.
- 4 Read the Euthyphro dilemma and work out the key criticisms of the argument.
- 5 Can morality ever be founded on authority?
- 6 How do you decide what is good or bad? Justify your view.
Natural law
A full treatment of natural law may be found in Chapter 10.
Natural law is often seen as centred on law, and so on obligation, and Aquinas himself speaks of natural law. However, by this he meant that our nature is objectively knowable and our reason will help us to understand what is meant by it. Ethics is a matter of our common humanity, not a set of principles from which we make moral decisions, and its purpose is to enable us to become complete and whole humans, and to achieve our desires. Morality is rooted in the desire for happiness, but for Aquinas natural law is not enough if we are to attain final happiness – for this God’s grace is needed.
Natural law has come to be seen as deontological and authoritarian with its application of the primary precepts, but Aquinas said that the primary precepts were always true, as they point us in the right direction; however, different situations require secondary precepts and if our reasoning is faulty these may be wrong – we need to discern what is good and what will help us to become complete and whole human beings. Intention is important, but in natural law it is not possible to say that the end justifies the means, although there is certainly flexibility in the natural law approach. Aquinas wrote, ‘The more you descend into the details the more it appears how the general rule admits of exceptions, so that you have to hedge it with cautions and qualifications.’
However, Aquinas is certain that there is an absolute natural law and this has led the Catholic Church, following Aquinas, to emphasise reason as a tool for showing that certain acts are intrinsically right or wrong, as they go against our true purpose; certain absolutes, such as the sanctity of life, cannot be changed by the circumstances.
Conscience
Catholics consider that conscience plays an important part in Christian ethical decision making. Here conscience is not seen as some inner voice or oracle that will point us in the right direction – conscience is not about feelings but about reason and judgement. Aquinas saw conscience as reason making moral decisions. But conscience as the ‘voice of God’ can easily become what we mean by ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ – so men persecute ‘heretics’, slaughter enemies and become suicide bombers in the name of God.
However, conscience does not make the law; it recognises law and uses it to assess conduct. So, for religious ethics, conscience is not so much the voice of God as a response to God’s voice. Conscience can be mistaken; doing a bad action when following the guidance of conscience does not make that action good. Conscience is just a way of using reason to come to a decision, but it needs to be informed, and in following conscience we need to be prepared to accept the costs, not just do what we want.
Summary
- The Jewish roots of Christian ethics
- The basis of Christian ethics in the Bible
- Theonomous Christian ethics
- The ethics of Jesus
- The ethics of Paul
- Authority and tradition in Christian ethics
- Heteronomous Christian ethics
- The Catholic Church
- Liberation theology.
- Ethical autonomy
- The Catholic Church
- The Protestant Church.
- Divine command theory
- Natural law
- Euthyphro dilemma
Review questions
Look back over the chapter and check that you can answer the following questions:
- 1 What is the principle of heteronomous Christian ethics?
- 2 What is the principle of theonomous Christian ethics?
- 3 Which of these principles do you think most convincing? Justify your answer.
- 4 What is the connection between conscience and Christian religious ethics?
Terminology
Do you know your terminology?
Try to explain the following ideas without looking at your books and notes:
- • Magisterium
- • Divine command theory
- • Natural law
- • Agape.
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Examination questions practice |
Exam mistakes to avoid: it is very important that you do not confuse autonomous, heteronomous and theonomous. May sure you can give clear examples of each.
To help you improve your answers look at the levels of response.
In evaluation the point could be made that without the Bible people would make the wrong choices and decisions. Can human reason be trusted as it often appears to reach different conclusions? The writers of the Bible of necessity were influenced by the social and geographical influences of where they lived and the time of writing. Therefore, it could be concluded that the teachings of the Church and reason are vital in understanding Christian ethics.
