There are a variety of subjects that theologians use to show the existence of God and defend their position. In this article, look at one I believe to be among the strongest and easiest to follow: Morality.
If you read my previous Hard Questions article on Am I Saved, you will be familiar with the 5 questions each religion and philosophy addresses and attempts to answer.
This article on the existence of God will address, in part, the question of "How should I live".
Morality
Greek philosopher, Heraclitus (540BC to 480BC) held a belief in a unity of opposites which states that opposites have an underlying connection that define each other. We can see this experientially ourselves. For example the opposites of health and disease, truth and lie, hot and cold, light and darkness, etc. each had correlation with its opposite.
The same applies to good and evil.
Author and Christian apologist, C. S. Lewis picks up on this in his book 'Mere Christianity':
My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust?- C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
But what defines what good and evil are?
Are they defined by personal perception? (Opinion of individual)
Are they defined by ethnicity or location? (Opinion of culture)
Are they defined by popular opinion? (Opinion of popularity)
Are they defined by majority opinion? (Opinion of the more numerous)
Are they defined by dominant opinion? (Opinion of the most powerful)
At this point, let's set a couple of definitions as provided from the Miriam-Webster dictionary:
subjective
1. of, relating to, or being a subject2. of, relating to, or arising within one's self or mind : personal a subjective point of view.
objective
1. expressing or dealing with facts or conditions as perceived without distortion by personal feelings, prejudices, or interpretation
2. of, relating to, or being an object, phenomenon, or condition in the realm of sensible experience independent of individual thought and perceptible by all observers : having reality independent of the mind
Right and wrong, good and evil, are aspects of morality and immorality. That sense of morality is inherent to us. If you don't believe that, consider your reaction to someone keeping the change of your monetary transaction without your authorization, or to someone cutting you off in traffic, or to someone breaking in ahead of you in the line at the theater, or how they would feel if you did those things to them.
If good and evil are subjective, meaning they are simply based on individual opinions or group-think, then they are fluid, inconsistent, and meaningless. There would be no legitimate validation of judging historical, contemporary, or future events, whether personal or global, as particularly good or unquestionably evil. Good and evil would be simply be a mutually agreed on acceptance for a way of life in that period of time.
If that were the case, things judged evil would not be eternally evil despite whenever, where ever, and to whomever they took place. Throughout history there have been very evil laws established and practices observed in various cultures.
- Was it evil to burning children alive for sacrifices as done by the Amalekites 3,000 years ago? Would it have been be evil 1,000 years before or after?
- Was cannibalism practiced throughout the world and throughout time evil, or should it be considered good for them because that was their culture?
- Would the racism such as what caused the Jewish holocaust always be evil even if the majority of the world had supported it?
- Would laws establishing and encouraging chattel slavery and sex-trafficking ever be good?
- Would the US laws segregating whites and blacks of the south from sharing restrooms, water fountains, or public transportation still be evil even if the north had agreed and followed suit without objection?
- Was the Rwandan genocide that saw nearly 1 million people killed in 100 days an evil event even though the entire world turned an unconcerned blind-eye to it while it happened?
- Is the human trafficking taking place around the world today an evil thing? Could it have been good 2,000 years ago? Could it be a good thing 500 years from now?
If what defines good and evil is objective, meaning that good and evil - and all things that flow from them, such as truth and lies or justice and injustice - are based in a constant reality outside of opinions, regulations, and even laws.
Various people who believe in a subjective morality argue that good and evil are congruent with the "flourishing of humanity". Those who believe in objective morality agree. However, the logical problem is that proponents of subjective morality are taking an objective position that the flourishing of humanity is good in the past, is good now, and will be good in the future. In a worldview where subjective morality exists, it would reason that the flourishing of humanity could at some time or through some circumstances be evil.
Relative truth is another problem. Truth flows from a position of good. "You have your truth and I have my truth" may work in matters of opinions and tastes, but in matters of morality it is contradictory. If you believe it true that murder is evil, and I believe it true that murder is good, how can we both have truth? One of us could have the truth, but not both of us.
There are things that are obviously good and others that are obviously evil. Murder, sexual-assault, larceny, and torture are indisputably evil. Sacrifice, love, compassion, and integrity are clearly good.
Morality is therefore based on the unyielding differences between good and evil. Morality is not based on the sliding scale of acceptance or popularity. Good and evil are an unchanging objective standard uniformly and impartially applied regardless of any outside or malleable influence.
The differentiation between good and evil is what we refer to as justice. With good and evil being objective realities in our world, the judgement between them needs to be something unbound by space and time and opinion. That would make justice timeless and spaceless which only is fulfilled by the being we call God.
Justice is then an attribute of God. We saw 8 more attributes of God discernable from the creation in the previous article of this series, Cosmology and Fine Tuning: timeless, spaceless, immaterial, personal, intelligent, wise, powerful, and creative.
So what of the individual opinion, or the majority opinion, or the strongest group's opinion? Humans are not perfectly moral.
There are a couple of common colloquial sayings that everyone is familiar with, that are often used that illustrates this. Stop me if you've heard these before: "Nobody's perfect." and "I'm only human."
These quips are always offered as an excuse for not being perfect whether the error is physical, emotional, intellectual, or morally. They are offered because of the innately accepted universal knowledge that there are no perfect people.
Christians and non-Christians alike agree 100% on this point. In fact, the bible says:
As it is written: None is righteous, no, not one.- Romans 3:10
And it warns against it:
There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death.- Psalm 14:12 and Psalm 16:25
For truth, goodness, justice - morality - to exist regardless of opinion, time, or location, it must have its source external to all of humanity. It points to an inexhaustible, unchanging, and unbiased source which is best explained by the existence of God.
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