Euthyphro Dilemma & Christian apologetics
The Euthyphro dilemma is the following:
Socrates asks Euthyphro "Do the Gods will something because it is good or is something good because gods will it?"
Stated differently "Is something moral because God say so or did God say something because it is moral?" If God says something is moral only because it is moral by a standard independent of God then God has not say in what is moral. If something is moral only because God said so, then it is a case of "might makes right" and independent of any standards (if God says murder or hatred or rape is OK, then is it?).
Bertrand Russell formulated the problem this way in his polemic Why I Am Not a Christian:
If you are quite sure there is a difference between right and wrong, you are then in this situation: Is that difference due to God's fiat or is it not? If it is due to God's fiat, then for God Himself there is no difference between right and wrong, and it is no longer a significant statement to say that God is good. If you are going to say, as theologians do, that God is good, you must then say that right and wrong have some meaning which is independent of God's fiat, because God's fiats are good and not good independently of the mere fact that he made them. If you are going to say that, you will then have to say that it is not only through God that right and wrong came into being, but that they are in their essence logically anterior to God.
Both these arguments are against those who believe that goodness and moral values are grounded by God. Abrahamic faiths are explicit in this regard:
Judeo-Christian belief is that morality has to be grounded by God (via his command). Otherwise, morality goes into infinite regress and ends up in nihilism. While it is possible to have some morals objectively without reliance on God, in the end, one cannot provide an ontological basis for morality without God.
Euthyphro's dilemma stands in opposition to this Judeo-Christian belief that morality has to be necessarily grounded by God's command. Is something good because God wills it to be good or God wills good because it is already good i.e., God recognize good whose goodness is knowable by independent criteria and by recognizing the good God is merely reaffirming the good?
- Man has to obey God's laws
The LORD your God commands you this day to follow these decrees and laws; carefully observe them with all your heart and with all your soul. You have declared this day that the LORD is your God and that you will walk in obedience to him, that you will keep his decrees, commands and laws—that you will listen to him. Deuteronomy 26:16-17
- Violating God's laws is a sin.
- Sin is nothing but violating God's law.
- In fact, if there is no law, there is no sin.
- Breaking a law brings God's wrath.
Anyone who sins breaks God’s law. Yes, sinning is the same as living against God’s law. 1 John 3:4
because the law can only bring God’s anger on those who disobey it. But if there is no law, then there is nothing to disobey. . Romans 4:15
You might think I am saying that sin and the law are the same. That is not true. But the law was the only way I could learn what sin means. I would never have known it is wrong to want something that is not mine. But the law said, “You must not want what belongs to someone else.” And sin found a way to use that command and make me want all kinds of things that weren’t mine. So sin came to me because of the command. But without the law, sin has no power. Romans 7:7-8
In my mind I am happy with God’s law. But I see another law working in my body. That law makes war against the law that my mind accepts. That other law working in my body is the law of sin, and that law makes me its prisoner. Romans 7:22-23
Judeo-Christian belief is that morality has to be grounded by God (via his command). Otherwise, morality goes into infinite regress and ends up in nihilism. While it is possible to have some morals objectively without reliance on God, in the end, one cannot provide an ontological basis for morality without God.
Euthyphro's dilemma stands in opposition to this Judeo-Christian belief that morality has to be necessarily grounded by God's command. Is something good because God wills it to be good or God wills good because it is already good i.e., God recognize good whose goodness is knowable by independent criteria and by recognizing the good God is merely reaffirming the good?
Now, any other stopping point based in some finite creature like humanity or rational consciousness or something like that seems arbitrary and one wonders why that is the stopping point. To overcome this arbitrariness problem, one could offer a platonic abstract object called "the Good" that exists independently as the standard. Plato proposed that transcendent concept as a solution to Euthyphro dilemma. Plato had the right idea - that the "Good" has to be independent of the human conception of personal God (Greeks had such Gods during Plato's time) to avoid the dilemma. However, there is still the ontological problem. Can abstract objects be the source of moral value? Is morality objective in the sense of being beyond humans and universal?
What if God willed rape or murder to be Good? Would it be Good? The idea that God's nature is goodness says not so. William of Occam offers a voluntarist view which states that good is simply determined by God's fiat. This aligns with the idea that goodness or morality is arbitrary as it is simply what is willed by God. This is problematic to many because it gives the sense of "might is right". William of Occam overcomes this by saying that God's judgment of good and bad is not arbitrary and it aligns with our own sense of good and bad. We think along those lines simply because God has built that thinking in us. Thus, we think of rape and murder as bad simply because God has willed them to be bad. The problem with this argument for the theist is that it makes their scriptures and religion non-essential for ethical living. Current theistic position moved away from this argument. It says that the essential nature of goodness of God is that it makes it impossible for rape, murder, or hate to become good.
Modern day Christian apologists (such as William Lane Craig) propose that goodness is nothing but God's nature. Hence there is no possibility of conflict between God's decree and whether that decree is good. God's very nature is the good. In other words, God's nature defines or determines what goodness is. By God's nature, we mean his essential properties. Without God's nature as the standard of Goodness, one goes into an infinite regress. The way to end the regress is to provide a stopping point or a standard of good whether it is theists or atheists. Unless one is a moral nihilist, one cannot escape the need for such a standard. If one is not a moral nihilist, then they believe that an objective standard of goodness exists and we have to ask where this standard originates from. That is where the infinite regress arrives from.
Modern day Christian apologists (such as William Lane Craig) propose that goodness is nothing but God's nature. Hence there is no possibility of conflict between God's decree and whether that decree is good. God's very nature is the good. In other words, God's nature defines or determines what goodness is. By God's nature, we mean his essential properties. Without God's nature as the standard of Goodness, one goes into an infinite regress. The way to end the regress is to provide a stopping point or a standard of good whether it is theists or atheists. Unless one is a moral nihilist, one cannot escape the need for such a standard. If one is not a moral nihilist, then they believe that an objective standard of goodness exists and we have to ask where this standard originates from. That is where the infinite regress arrives from.
Does the God of Judeo-Christian theism fit the bill where the finite Greek Gods failed?
In the Judeo-Christian faith, Theonomy teaches what that rule is: God’s revealed laws in the Old Testament, which are absolute, immutable, objective, and universal. This means that every one of the 613 laws given to Moses and recorded in the Pentateuch remains binding on every human being and must be enacted into law.
If these commandments come from the Bible and Bible is the source of knowledge of God, surely the Biblical commandments have to the closest knowledge we have of the good nature of Judeau-Christian God. Which of these 613 commandments are part of the definition of God's nature as goodness? Why not all of them? On what basis do Christians pick and choose from the 613? Clearly, Christians are using an independent standard to pick and choose some and reject others. There is an additional problem: Humans accept morals not explicitly mentioned in the Bible. Where do these morals come from? Are they arbitrary compared to morals explicitly specified in the Bible?
Thus, Bible as the sole source of morals faces two problems: (a) All morals in the Bible are not accepted by modern society; Thus, there seems to be an independent standard that ultimately judges morals, whether those morals come from the Bible or not; (b) There are morals missing in the Bible. Should one consider them arbitrary?
Thus, Bible as the sole source of morals faces two problems: (a) All morals in the Bible are not accepted by modern society; Thus, there seems to be an independent standard that ultimately judges morals, whether those morals come from the Bible or not; (b) There are morals missing in the Bible. Should one consider them arbitrary?
In the final analysis, it is not sufficient even to have a standard for moral behavior. We also need a basis for moral obligation or moral duty. An abstract Good does not lay any moral obligation or duty upon me. Why should I align my life with this abstract object of Good? Standing in contrast o this objective Good are moral vices or abstract Bad? What is to keep me from aligning with these vices? Thus Plato's idealism doesn't provide a basis for moral duty or obligation. Bible seems to offer a reason for the obligation of moral duty - Surely, Biblical God's commands are a force with a threat of sin and punishment. They are an obligation with a threat of punishment for non-compliance. But can a threat be an independent standard for moral behavior? How many Christians really accept and follow that?
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