Thank you for your last post, Sue. Actually you did a lot of explaining in the following paragraph:
Without God setting a standard, how could there be any absolutes for man to determine whether an action is inherently 'good' or 'bad' (i.e. by whose standard??) – it would be just a matter of whether it is expedient to adhere to the prevailing laws of a particular society.
I, myself, believe in objective morality, rather than subjective. But I disbelieve that this morality has its origin in a set of commands. I believe moralilty is as objective as the colour blue. I think that as a result of Adam and Eve's eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, all people have a "moral sense" if I may put it that way. This fact is verified in that all people of all cultures believe in the same set of basic moral principles, even though most people don't practise them (at least not consistently). For example, throughout virtually every culture, it is right to help your neighbour, and wrong to harm him. It is wrong to kill people for one's own convenience.
I know that it can be pointed out that in one culture, people who deceive and trick others are admired. But the very fact that such made the headlines in many newspapers, indicates that it was a deviancy from the norm.
I've heard of one culture in which people routinely killed their parents at age 60. We would consider that to be morally wrong. But the practice was based on a false belief. It was believed that in the after life, you will be the same age you are when you die. So these people believed they were saving their parents from being old and decrepit, and have to suffer all eternity with the painful and crippling effects of old age. So actually they were trying to fulfill the moral principle that one ought to help their parents.
There is no doubt that many of the immoral practices in North American culture also stems from false belief. Some justify abortion on such grounds. In the middle ages, Catholics and Protestants put to death many "heretics" on the grounds that if they lived, they would lead many others astray, and thus far more people would end up in "everlasting torment" than otherwise would. It is somewhat the same justification for administering capital punishment for murder, that justification being that the killer won't kill other people also.
Although I believe in objective morality, that is, it in no way depends upon what we believe or think, I do not believe in the absolutist theory of morality ---- that is that a moral imperative such as "Do not lie" is always the morally right thing to do. I believe in the hierarchal theory of morality, that is, that moral imperatives can be arranged in a hierarchy so that some principles take precedent over others, and that this recognition makes it possible to resolve moral conflicts. For example, it is morally right to lie in order to save a life. The reason is that the moral principle that we should save a life takes precedence over the moral principle to refrain from lying.
Erwin Lutzer, pastor of Moody Church in Chicago wrote a book on morality. Erwin was an absolutist with regards to morality. His book indicates that he believed that if you were faced with a moral conflict, you might choose to do "the lesser of two evils" but would still have sinned. So if you lied to save a life, you still sinned by lying, and would have to ask forgiveness.
In prison for his faith in communist Romania, Richard Wurmbrand was frequently tortured and deprived of food. He was often asked where certain Christians lived. At first he refused to tell. For he wanted no responsibility for bringing fellow disiciples to that place of torment. But when the torture got beyond his endurance, he gave then names. But they were all names of Christians who had either escaped the country, or had died. Wurmband once stated that it was
right to lie to the Communists. He was once challenged on his disobedience to the Communit authorities on the grounds that Paul instructed us to obey the authorities since they were ordained by God. Wurbrand responded that Paul had said that the authorities that God had placed were put there to "punish the evildoers and reward the righteous". He said that the Communists do the exact opposite! So the Communists are not true authorities. They are not ordained by God.
In the OT, Rahab lied to those who asked her about the Hebrew spies. She said that they had been there but had gone on, when, in fact, they were hidden under her roof. Yes, she was placed among the men and women of faith in Hebrews 11 because she had welcomed the spies. One of he second century writers put it another way: "because she did not disclose the spies", in other words, because she lied.
I do not claim that it is an easy task to always know what is right to do in cases of moral conflict, or even in case where there is none. I believe that as disciples we are obligated to follow the law of Christ as given in Matthew 5, 6, and 7 (and elsewhere). But even there we are sadly lacking. How many Christians do you know who refuse to take an oath in court or elsewhere? And that in spite of the fact that Christ instructed us to "swear not all but let your answer be [a simple] "yes" or "no". I'm sure these Christians do not think they are acting imorally by swearing an oath.
