Well that didn’t take long. I have received several emails’ raising a couple of questions to my previous post. Please keep in mind that this is not a book, rather it is a lack of a better analogy a series of letters to myself. Nevertheless, I appreciate the correspondence, and it has made me a ware of the fact as I have stated that all clear thinking is based on the two points mentioned in my prior post , I need to assure myself that before I move forward that the foundation that those two point’s build is in fact solid. Therefore, I must address a couple questions that were raised. The objections came in two basic areas, which I have summarized as follows. ‘Isn’t what I call the Law of Human Nature (Moral Law) simple a herd instinct that has developed just like our other instincts over the years? ‘ And ‘Isn’t what I call the Law of Human Nature (Moral Law) something that is taught to us by our parents, family, society, etc.?’ Let’s take a look at those ‘Buts’
I will begin by responding to the first inquiry ‘Isn’t what I call the Law of Human Nature (Moral Law) simple a herd instinct that has developed just like our other instincts over the years?’ I would be a complete fool to deny that we as humans have a herd instinct, but that is not what I meant by the Moral Law. I as well as you know what it is feels like to feel prompted by instinct for food, shade, sexual instinct, motherly love, and on occasions sometimes we even feel a desire to help another. There is no doubt that all of those desires are due to herd instinct. However, feeling a desire to help is quite different then feeling that you should help, weather you want to or not.
It is actually fairly simple to visualize.
If you do not know, I live in Hawaii. Oahu is a small island surround by a massive ocean. Needless to say, if you live here, you spend a fair amount of time at the beach. Imagine that I am at the beach and I hear someone caught in a riptide crying for help. At that moment I will feel two desires, the first the desire to help (due to the herd instinct) the second a very strong desire to keep out of danger (self-preservation). Interestingly, I will also discover inside myself a third ‘thing’, which tells me that I should follow my impulse to attempt a rescue, and to ignore or suppress my self-preservation desire. It does not take much thought to realize that that third ‘thing’ that decides which of the two desires should be encouraged, cannot be either of the two desires, as they are opposing desires.
Another way to look at the fact that Moral law is not just one of our instincts is that if two instincts are in conflict, and there is nothing else in the creatures mind except for those two impulses, then obviously the stronger of the two must always win. Nevertheless, at preciously those moments when we are most aware of ‘Moral Law’ it always instructs us to chose the weaker of the two instincts. In the above example, if you are like me, you probably want to be safe, much more than you want to go swimming into a riptide to save a drowning man. However, the Moral Law tells you to do it anyway. It is that third ‘thing’ that drives us to chose to act to make the weaker of the two instincts stronger than it really is.
Now on to the second general objection ‘Isn’t what I call the Law of Human Nature (Moral Law) something that is taught to us by our parents, family, society, etc.?’ We of course learn a great many things as we are growing up, language, math, writing and even the rule of decent behavior. But while most of these are merely conventions (what language do I speak, do I drive on the right or left hand side of the road, do I shake your hand or bow, what type of clothes do I wear) some like mathematics are real truths. The question then becomes which class does the ‘Law of Human’ nature belong?
The are two obvious reasons why it belongs to the same class as mathematics (Real Truths). The first I addressed in my previous post, that though there are differences between the moral ideas of one time and another, or from one country to another; the differences are not nearly as significant as most people want to imagine. In fact, when you look closely at them you will see the same law running through all of them. However, those mere conventions can and do vary greatly from one time and one country to another.
The other reason is this. When you consider the morality of one people (country, time, culture) to another, do you believe that the morality of one is better or worst than the other? Now stop and think about that for a second; because if no set of moral ideas were more real, or better than the other, there would be no reason to compare say the civilized morality to a savage morality or Christian morality to a terrorist morality. If decent behavior simply meant that every nation, every person could do what he or she approves of, there would be no sense in saying that any nation or any one person had ever been more correct in their approval than any other person. But we do not hold that to be true, in fact, all of us do believe that some moralities are better than others are. Now here’s the rub, the moment you say that one set of moral ideas is better than another; you are, in fact, measuring them both against a standard. Saying that one of them conforms to that standard better than the other. However, the standard that measures the two is something different from either of them.
Like it or not, you are comparing them both with some ‘Real Morality’.
Max Lucado's examination of the Beatitudes may just be the inspiration you need The Applause of Heaven
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