Natural Law Theory
- Deontological normative ethical code asserting moral behaviour to be accessible
through God-given reason
- Synderesis – the principle inscribed within man by good to do good and avoid evil
- Phronesis – the practical wisdom God endows man with which facilitates a
translation of the descriptive Primary Precepts into the prescriptive secondary
- Five primary precepts (the Golden Five)
o P – preserve live
o O – order society
o W – worship God
o E – educate
o R – reproduce
- Doctrine of Double Effect
o An act which foreseeably will result in a negative but unintended
consequence is permissible
o Proportionalism (Bernard Hoose) is a modern variation whereby a moral
agent must prioritise the lesser of two evils
o E.g., eptopic pregnancy
- Augustine’s influence
o The idea that human nature is fallen and thus in need of strict guidance
o Man’s telos as achieving a perfect union with God – ‘our souls are restless
until they rest with thee’
- Aristotle’s influence
o Teleological worldview – Aristotle saw this world as one of inexhaustible
fascination and saw that all things have an end goal
Eudaimonia is directly lifted from Aristotle’s works and regards that
the human telos is a perfect flourishing that results from union with
God
Eudaimonia as bound up with a pursuit of arete (excellence) which is
‘always desirable in itself’
o Humans as having a rational soul that facilitates moral discernment
- Real vs apparent goods
o Real goods such as justice, love, friendship are always to be pursued
o Sometimes one can err and mistake apparent goods such as wealth, power,
pleasure for real goods which signifies a mistake in the process of
deliberating morally
- ‘every sin consists in the pursuit of an apparent good’
- ‘the fornicator seeks a pleasure that involves them in moral guilt’
- Strengths
o Attempts to bound morality into an approachable and credible framework
o Provides a universally applicable moral ethic, as exemplified by its use in the
Nuremberg trials
o Appeals to reason and logic which are universal attributes
- Weaknesses
,o Overly legalistic and absolutist meaning that moral action becomes simplified
and unattainable
o Unable to commit moral action to subjective nature of morality
o Teleological bases arguably become nullified after Darwin’s evolution which
suggests a constant flux rather than any specific design
o ‘nonsense on stilts’ (Bentham)
o ‘the semi official doctrine of the Catholic Church’ (Singer)
o ‘Natural Law assumes all humans are similar, assumption runs contrary to
modern studies of human nature’ (Nielson)
o Theological objection through Calvin’s doctrine of ‘Total Depravity’ which
suggests human nature to be so fallen that it is unable to discern moral acts
, Situation Ethics
- 1966 book ‘Situation Ethics: the New Morality’ coined ‘explosive’ and having a
‘pragmatic and empirical temper’ by critics
- Single law of Agape, that any moral action should be that which exemplifies the most
loving outcome
- Law of love rather than love of law
- Hermeneutically takes the example of Agape from the Gospels
o ‘love thy neighbour as thyself’
o ‘friend of sinners’ view of Christ
Mary Magdalene
- Argues that the New Testament overrules the stringent legalism of the Old
o ‘the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath’ (Mark) after
healing a man on the Sabbath
o Allowance to pick crops on the Sabbath
- But – there are some examples where Christ makes Jewish law even more
pronounced: ‘you have heard it said […]’ in Matthew 5
- C.S. Lewis defines Agape as a ‘wholly disinterested […] love to the loveless and
unlovable’ (‘The Four Loves’) as opposed to eros, philia, and storge
- Appealing to the 1960s liberating spirit
- Four Working Principles
1. Pragmatism
2. Personalism
3. Relativism – ‘relativises the absolute does not absolutize the relative’
4. Positivism – moral acts to be ‘vindicated not validated’
- Six Propositions
1. Only love is intrinsically good
o ‘regulative principle’ of Christian ethics
o ‘love thy neighbour’
o ‘do everything in love’ (Corinthians)
o ‘in order to know whether a man is good, ask not what he believes […] but
how he loves’ (St. Augustine)
2. Love is the only ruling norm of Christianity
3. Love and justice are the same since justice is love distributed
4. Love wills the neighbour’s good
o ‘greater love has no man that this ; he that lays down his life for his friend’
(Galatians)
5. Finis sanctificat media – only the ends justify the means
6. Love’s decisions are made situationally
- Examples
o Jewish-Romanian doctor conducted 3000 abortions in the concentration
camp to save the women’s lives
o 1942 ship captain threw off 7 sailors and 32 passengers to save the rest
o A Ukrainian POW realised that pregnant women were sent home as they
constituted liabilities, so got herself pregnant by a prison guard and was able
- Deontological normative ethical code asserting moral behaviour to be accessible
through God-given reason
- Synderesis – the principle inscribed within man by good to do good and avoid evil
- Phronesis – the practical wisdom God endows man with which facilitates a
translation of the descriptive Primary Precepts into the prescriptive secondary
- Five primary precepts (the Golden Five)
o P – preserve live
o O – order society
o W – worship God
o E – educate
o R – reproduce
- Doctrine of Double Effect
o An act which foreseeably will result in a negative but unintended
consequence is permissible
o Proportionalism (Bernard Hoose) is a modern variation whereby a moral
agent must prioritise the lesser of two evils
o E.g., eptopic pregnancy
- Augustine’s influence
o The idea that human nature is fallen and thus in need of strict guidance
o Man’s telos as achieving a perfect union with God – ‘our souls are restless
until they rest with thee’
- Aristotle’s influence
o Teleological worldview – Aristotle saw this world as one of inexhaustible
fascination and saw that all things have an end goal
Eudaimonia is directly lifted from Aristotle’s works and regards that
the human telos is a perfect flourishing that results from union with
God
Eudaimonia as bound up with a pursuit of arete (excellence) which is
‘always desirable in itself’
o Humans as having a rational soul that facilitates moral discernment
- Real vs apparent goods
o Real goods such as justice, love, friendship are always to be pursued
o Sometimes one can err and mistake apparent goods such as wealth, power,
pleasure for real goods which signifies a mistake in the process of
deliberating morally
- ‘every sin consists in the pursuit of an apparent good’
- ‘the fornicator seeks a pleasure that involves them in moral guilt’
- Strengths
o Attempts to bound morality into an approachable and credible framework
o Provides a universally applicable moral ethic, as exemplified by its use in the
Nuremberg trials
o Appeals to reason and logic which are universal attributes
- Weaknesses
,o Overly legalistic and absolutist meaning that moral action becomes simplified
and unattainable
o Unable to commit moral action to subjective nature of morality
o Teleological bases arguably become nullified after Darwin’s evolution which
suggests a constant flux rather than any specific design
o ‘nonsense on stilts’ (Bentham)
o ‘the semi official doctrine of the Catholic Church’ (Singer)
o ‘Natural Law assumes all humans are similar, assumption runs contrary to
modern studies of human nature’ (Nielson)
o Theological objection through Calvin’s doctrine of ‘Total Depravity’ which
suggests human nature to be so fallen that it is unable to discern moral acts
, Situation Ethics
- 1966 book ‘Situation Ethics: the New Morality’ coined ‘explosive’ and having a
‘pragmatic and empirical temper’ by critics
- Single law of Agape, that any moral action should be that which exemplifies the most
loving outcome
- Law of love rather than love of law
- Hermeneutically takes the example of Agape from the Gospels
o ‘love thy neighbour as thyself’
o ‘friend of sinners’ view of Christ
Mary Magdalene
- Argues that the New Testament overrules the stringent legalism of the Old
o ‘the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath’ (Mark) after
healing a man on the Sabbath
o Allowance to pick crops on the Sabbath
- But – there are some examples where Christ makes Jewish law even more
pronounced: ‘you have heard it said […]’ in Matthew 5
- C.S. Lewis defines Agape as a ‘wholly disinterested […] love to the loveless and
unlovable’ (‘The Four Loves’) as opposed to eros, philia, and storge
- Appealing to the 1960s liberating spirit
- Four Working Principles
1. Pragmatism
2. Personalism
3. Relativism – ‘relativises the absolute does not absolutize the relative’
4. Positivism – moral acts to be ‘vindicated not validated’
- Six Propositions
1. Only love is intrinsically good
o ‘regulative principle’ of Christian ethics
o ‘love thy neighbour’
o ‘do everything in love’ (Corinthians)
o ‘in order to know whether a man is good, ask not what he believes […] but
how he loves’ (St. Augustine)
2. Love is the only ruling norm of Christianity
3. Love and justice are the same since justice is love distributed
4. Love wills the neighbour’s good
o ‘greater love has no man that this ; he that lays down his life for his friend’
(Galatians)
5. Finis sanctificat media – only the ends justify the means
6. Love’s decisions are made situationally
- Examples
o Jewish-Romanian doctor conducted 3000 abortions in the concentration
camp to save the women’s lives
o 1942 ship captain threw off 7 sailors and 32 passengers to save the rest
o A Ukrainian POW realised that pregnant women were sent home as they
constituted liabilities, so got herself pregnant by a prison guard and was able
