Theological Ramblings

Calvinists must be careful of something. We may be completely unaware of it. I was until I met my friend Jamey. I’m talking about the Euthyphro Dilemma. It’s best to introduce it by posing the dilemma as Socrates put it to Euthyphro in the so named work by Plato.

Is the pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it is loved by the gods?

A more monotheistic way of putting this would be “Is what is moral commanded by God because it is moral, or is it moral because it is commanded by God?”1.

Now you’re probably wondering what this has to do with anything. First I’ll have to explain the implications of this dilemma. On the one side you have a God who loves something for what it is (loving the pious because it is pious). This is a reaction. God is loving the lovely, and therefore is subject to the object loved. I don’t know if that makes sense. It is as though it were possible for something to command God on the basis of it’s loveliness. Or take the morality way of looking at things: You have a God doling out commands because that’s what is moral. He’s not defining morality in that sense, he’s merely passing it along.

We can immediately see the issue with this, because it would appear that if this were the case, then God is not the supreme being of the universe. He must not be, as we aver, the ultimate reality. There must be something outside of himself that is the standard for what is pious, lovely, moral and good. This is simply not how the Bible portrays God, so we balk at something like this.

The second half seems a little easier for us to swallow. The second half implies that God is active and in charge. He defines what is lovely by loving it. He is the trend setter. He is the definer of morality, for in issuing a command, he creates a rule.

This is far more pleasant on our theological palate. It puts God in charge. He’s the creator after all. Job question God and God’s response was to name all of the incomprehensible things that He had done which Job was nowhere near enough to witness. God is so much more powerful and unimaginable, and we do not dare put any limits on his power, sovereignty and authority.

This is where many of my “Reformed” (if I can use that term) brethren tend to fall. If you were to pose this question, they would state that it was obviously the latter. But we must be very careful with this one. For, though the first seems obviously wrong to us, the second may not be any more correct. We have to be careful to understand a few things and set some parameters before we say this. And you understand that by setting parameters we are interfering with the thing itself. We are qualifying and unqualified statement.

Let me explain. As I have understood (likely incorrectly) the Islamic faith, Allah is a fickle god. His will can change from one day to another, and his whims are absolute. So much is this the case, that (as I understand it) a persons right to enter heaven is never truly secured (except by Jihad Martyrdom). A person can keep the five pillars their entire lives and upon crossing death’s threshold they come face to face with Allah, their entrance into heaven is determined by his final say. Which means that if Allah is having a “bad day” he can banish the most righteous person, while he can allow the filthiest wretch on a “good day”. It’s all up to his mood, apparently.

DISCLAIMER: I acknowledge that my experience and understanding of Islam is very low. I have not studied it much for myself. I’ve only synthesized what I’ve heard others say. Therefore I am aware that I may be thoroughly misrepresenting the Islamic faith. If that is the case, then I apologize, especially if you are a follower of Allah yourself. If you have constructive insight to share, please feel free to comment. I do not with to continue in ignorance. I would love to learn more about your faith in an open dialogue. But that is neither here nor there. It is thoroughly beside my point. My intention here is not to accurately portray Allah or the Islamic faith. My intention was simply to draw a scenario in which we would not want the second half of the dilemma to be true. For if God’s will - his loves; his affections - are changing from day to day, then the second half is deadly! For he may love faithfulness today, and adore treachery tomorrow! He may love love today and adore hatred tomorrow! He may love giving today and adore thievery tomorrow! A God who’s will changes would be a tyrant if the second half is true.

So I think we’re at an impasse. It can’t be the first, for God cannot be subject to anything outside himself. And it can’t be the second, for an unqualified second half would open the door to an equally unbiblical God. So what’s the answer?

Now you can stop jumping up and down. I be I’m thinking of the same $10 word you are. Immutability. Don’t we Christians believe in this doctrine that states that God does not change? He is the same, yesterday, today and forever? Don’t we believe that? Of course. It’s Biblical. Check out Hebrews 13:8. So that should be our answer, right? Since God is immutable, then we’re free to release the power of the second half of Euthyphro to him. Right?

You’re on the right track, but you haven’t quite reached the station. This is what I meant earlier about qualifying an unqualified statement. The second half of the Euthyphro dilemma implies that God can love whatever he desires to love and thereby make it pious. I like to restate the Euthyphro dilemma like this: “Does God do what is good because it is good, or is what God does good because it is God who does it?” So if the second half is true, then God can do whatever he wants and make it good. He can love today and hate tomorrow and they’re both good. But the problem is he can’t contradict himself. And also we have his immutability. The law of non-contradiction is a standard. Also, the fact that he is immutable is a standard. Therefore, there is some sort of standard to which God adheres when he loves piety, commands morality and does goodness. He’s not just making it up as he goes. So this implies a bit of the first. God is bound by some definition of piety, morality and goodness.

So the answer appears to be both/and. And this is the point where it either blows your mind, or sounds completely ridiculous, because being the supreme being of the universe. Being ultimate reality, God is the definition of all these things. He’s the definition of consistency, immutability and non-contradiction. These are not things that are outside of him, they are within him. So God by his own character, defines goodness by what he does, because he does what is according to his own nature.

It’s really confusing when we speak in such grand terms like morality and goodness on such a universal philosophical scale. Let’s get a smaller example. I’m a person. I have likes and dislikes. Let’s take food for example. There are certain foods that I like. Do I like them because I consider them good, or do I consider them good because I like them. See how on this scale both sides appear to be saying the same thing. Isn’t liking them the same as considering them good? Take into account that I don’t just generally change on a whim what I like or dislike. Of course I’m an imperfect example. We humans are fickle. I may like cheeseburgers today, and pizza tomorrow, and that’s ok, because I’m not defining global morality

I think we think of goodness in the wrong way. We tend to see God’s laws, commands and moral code as an imposition. Which is why we even ask the first half. We wonder why God is sending down this seemingly arbitrary list of dos and don’ts for us to follow, even though they don’t make much sense to us in and of themselves, and I think that’s because we have the wrong view of the purpose of morality.

We speak of good people and bad people. In a Gospel message you’ll probably hear something about the difference between them and what happens to each group ultimately (you should if the message is worth its salt). But you don’t just hear this in a Biblical context. Most people would agree that a child molester is a bad person. Most would agree that Osama Bin Ladin, Adolf Hitler and many others to be bad people, while we look at some as good people. We ask questions like “Why do bad things happen to good people?” Even people who do not acknowledge the Bible’s standard of morality, or even any standard of morality outside of themselves still speak in such terms, and would probably agree with my assessment of the aforementioned individuals.

Let’s take an amoral example. Let’s say I plant a tree, and I think I am planting an apple tree. I do everything right in the process. I plant it at exactly the right time of year. I put it in exactly the right place in my yard so as to have the most possible room to grow, the easiest access to sunlight and water, and cast the best shade possible. What will determine whether my tree is good or bad? Would we not say it is a bad tree if it does not grow very tall, cast much shade and yield much fruit? We’d say it’s a good tree if it grows very large, casts a huge shadow and produces many apples, of course! So in other words, if I plant a tree, it’s a good tree if it fulfills its purpose and it’s a bad tree if it does not fulfill its purpose. Right?

I think this is an interesting way to think about morality. Be careful, I’m not advocating Machiavellianism (at least not for us). I’m not saying the ends justify the means. If you’re not reading me carefully you might misread that from what I said, but it’s not what I said. It’s not the trees intentions that are important. The important purpose is that of the tree planter. Who is the planter of our tree? Read Genesis 1:26 with me “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.’” For a long time I thought that this was just merely descriptive. I thought God was just saying that his likeness would be the blueprint for how he designed us and that’s it.

But I think that’s wrong. I think there’s something deeper. I think he’s speaking of creative purpose. He’s not just saying that he’s the cast from into which we will be molded. That word image conjures up the idea of a picture. If I take a picture of myself, am I just trying to create something that looks like me for no reason whatsoever? Of course not! I’m trying to communicate with it. I’m trying to show people what I look like. We send pictures with applications when we’ve never met face to face. We often discover new friends for the first time on that wonderful place called Facebook! (Or we find out the names of ‘friends’ we’ve been hanging out with, but thought it was passed the socially acceptable point to ask what their name is). At any rate, a picture communicates something about the person it in it. It’s imperfect, of course. The picture is not the person. But the picture is a representation of the person. It’s a representative. A proxy. An agent. An ambassador. A liaison. Need I go on?

I fully believe that is the deeper meaning behind Genesis 1:26. God created this wonderful, beautiful world, which he created out of his own Triune love of and for himself (think about that in the context of marriage…. two becoming one……. way beside the point….). He sat back and looked at this wonderful creation and said, “sweet, but I need a representative.” He wanted to send a picture to the world; to the angels - so that they would have some way of better grasping what he is like. Is it very difficult to grasp then what the essential point of morality is, then? It’s not just some imposing list of arbitrary dos and don’ts. It’s God saying, “Look, I’ve created you to be my ambassador to this world. You’re supposed to be like me. This is what I’m like, be like this!” God’s law is our greatest revelation (aside from Immanuel himself) of who God is. This is why Christ’s presence was so powerful. It’s why he was called the second Adam! I’m getting ahead of myself. Is it any wonder that there was only one rule in the Garden of Eden? Adam and Eve had perfect fellowship with God. They knew intimately what he was like, how to emulate it, and had no reason to do otherwise. Once they broke that rule, their ability to know how to fulfill their creative purpose became damaged, so God had to send the law. Not because he wanted to be oppressive, but because he wanted to help them do what they were supposed to do!

We relate to this, don’t we? Has your mother or father ever said to you “When you go out there you’re not just you. You represent our family?” Or maybe a teacher said it before a field trip? Or maybe a youth leader before a church outing? We understand the idea of representation. When a child behaves a certain way, people immediately associate that behavior with the parent. Either the child learned it from the parent, or the parent failed to supress it. It’s the same with us. We reflect our maker. And when we reflect him poorly, we’re not doing our job. We’re bad trees. That’s why it’s sin. That’s why God uses the imagery of trees that don’t bear fruit being torn down and thrown into the fire! There’s a reason we were put here. If we’re not doing it, we’ll be torn down so another tree that will bear fruit can take our place.

I hope this makes sense and isn’t just inane babbling. The answer then to the Euthyphro dilemma is all four. A, B, Both and Neither. Because in the context of the true understanding of the True God and the true nature of morality, it doesn’t make a lot of sense. Of course God commands morality because it’s moral. Because morality is defined by that which accords to God’s nature, which is what he commands. It’s a big circle. So the question doesn’t make sense.

But why did I mention Calvinism? Sometimes we Calvinists have a tendency to harp on God’s right to do whatever he wants. He is Sovereign, after all. But we have to make sure that when we do that we also include the explanation of his immutability, for if we don’t, then is there really a difference between the God of Calvin and the god of Mohammad?

Questions? Comments? Snide Remarks? Concerns? Orders for Pizza? Yeah, it’s like 1AM. I’m going to bed folks! Have fun

References

1. Wording taken from Wikipedia’s article on the Euthyphro Dilemma.