THE MORAL ARGUMENT

for the existence of God

************************

Immanuel Kant

-----------------

Kant did NOT put forward a moral argument and anyone who said he does is wrong!!!! Kant rejected all attempts to argue from the world to God, he regarded such an exercise as impossible. However he thought that God was a POSTULATE of practical reason. If you share Kant's assumptions, then it becomes necessary to assume that there is a God. Kant's reasoning....

. All human beings desire and seek happiness

2. All human beings ought to be moral and do their duty

3. The universe is fair

4. The Summum Bonum (highest good) represents virtue and happiness

5. Everyone seeks the summum bonum (from (1) and (2))

6. What is sought must be achievable because the universe is fair (see (3))

7. The Summum Bonum is not achievable in this life

8. So it is necessary to POSTULATE a life after death in which the Summum Bonum can be achieved

9. AND it is necessary to POSTULATE a God to guarantee fairness.

Note the emphasis on life after death and God as POSTULATES. Kant did not think that either of these could be proved. What he is claiming is that IF you hold the universe is fair and IF the Summum Bonum can be achieved then life after death and God are necessary postulates.

Of course, it may well be that the Universe is not fair - Kant had a deep sense of trust in the fairness of the Universe and if this is rejected then the postulates are not needed.

Argument from absolute moral values

A different approach to that of Kant comes from those who argue from the existence of some absolute moral values. Rashdall put forward this argument but it was developed by Sorley. Sorley claims:

. There is an absolute moral law. Sorley supports this claim with the following reasons:

2. People are conscious of an absolute moral law

3. People acknowledge the demands that this law makes on them even if they break it

4. No finite mind grasps the whole of what this represents

5. Ideas exist only in minds

6. Therefore there must be a supreme mind, beyond all finite minds, in which this absolute moral law exists.

Sorley claims that unlike Natural Law which is descriptive of human nature, the Moral Law is prescriptive. It describes not what IS but what SHOULD BE. The Natural Law approach to Ethics stems from Aristotle and was developed by St. Thomas Aquinas. It is based not on the claim that there is an absolute moral law but rather on the claim that all human beings share a common human nature. What is morally right is what causes human beings to fulfil this nature and actions are morally wrong if they lead us away from what it is to be fully human.
Join now!


C.S. Lewis also argued to the existence of God from the claim that there exists absolute moral laws. His approach is similar to that of Sorley but he develops the argument in rather more detail.

* THERE MUST BE AN ABSOLUTE MORAL LAW (otherwise disagreements would not be possible; promise and treaty keeping would be unnecessary; we would not make excuses for breaking the moral law)

* THIS MORAL LAW CANNOT BE HERD INSTINCT (otherwise the strongest would always win [and it does not]; we would act from instinct and we don't [sometimes our instinct is ...

This is a preview of the whole essay