BIBLICAL ETHICS
Review
We have looked at several systems of moral decision-making so far. One focused on groups of
people (society, or culture) as the source of moral values. Another claimed that ethics goes no
deeper than the strong emotions one feels.
Two of the systems focused on consequences as the prime source of moral values. “Will this
action give me what I want?” asks the egoist. “Will this action accomplish the goal I have
chosen?” wonders the utilitarian.
We have found that each system has serious deficiencies. One reason that recurs is that each
system could yield the verdict that a particular act was moral, yet that same act, if performed,
will thoroughly violate one or more of the objective moral standards we have considered in Unit
1.
For example, the relativist will conclude that the Sudanese practice of female circumcision is
moral (if Sudanese culture approves and advocates the practice), yet this barbarity often results
in disease and sterility, and always results in the female losing God’s endowment of marital
satisfaction.
For another example, consider the forced resettlement of Native Americans in the 1800’s to the
worst tracts of land (“reservations”) in territories (often far from their ancestral homelands). The
emotivist cannot conclude that there was anything morally objectionable about that practice if
nobody feels any strong negative emotions about it, and the emotivist cannot provide any lasting
reason that anyone should feel strong negative emotions about it.
The short stories “The Way Up to Heaven” and “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” each
vividly illustrate how egoism and utilitarianism, respectively, could easily lead people to moral
decisions that trample crucial objective moral standards, like the right to life.
We have also found that relativists, egoists and utilitarians smuggle in absolutes that their own
respective systems cannot produce. For example, relativists assume that tolerance is always
good, so you should be reluctant to reject their diversity and dependence theses, for fear of being
intolerant or ethnocentric. However, in doing so, they violate their own belief that all moral
norms are non-absolute. Egoists teach that one can decide which of one’s wants one ought to
pursue, but cannot tell you how to do this, without using some external absolute criteria to assess
one’s many competing desires. Utilitarians assume that happiness must be the supreme goal, but
cannot provide the means of measuring happiness qualitatively without relying upon absolute
values that utilitarianism as a system is incapable of providing.
Each of these systems is an approach to making moral decisions, and each one of these claims to
have no need for Scriptural support. This means that they are secular systems, and that the
worldview that forms the foundation for these approaches to ethics is secular. One more secular
approach needs to be explored before we move into religious systems.
Professor Christopher Ullman – Christian Life College
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BIBLICAL ETHICS
Deontology: The Study of Duty
What about the ideas that right and wrong are simply matters of duty?
 Is it moral to tell the truth even when one cannot determine the outcome of doing so?
 Is it ethical to help someone when there is no possibility of payback to you, and when there is
no assurance that helping will produce a beneficial consequence even for the person
being helped?
 Are there times when the only clear direction in a situation is simply to do your duty?
In one way or another, three deontological ethicists Immanuel Kant, W.D. Ross and John Rawls
ask and seek to answer questions like these.
Please use the three short descriptions of each philosopher’s system to making ethical decisions
to help you to prepare for our in-class discussions.
Be sure to read the short ethics problem at the end of this document entitled “Lifeboat.”
Professor Christopher Ullman – Christian Life College
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BIBLICAL ETHICS
ETHICS as ABSOLUTES
Immanuel Kant felt that the consequences were not the important thing.
Principles ought to win out.
His system has been called a deontological system, because it
emphasizes duty, not goals.
MEMORY IMAGE: A LIGHTHOUSE
Five basic things to know about Kant:
1. Immanuel Kant (German, 1724-1804) – lived all his life in the university town of
Konigsberg, Prussia. Began as a rationalist, was awakened from his “dogmatic
slumbers” by the radical empiricist David Hume, and then brought about a remarkable
fusion of the two.
2. The Categorical Imperative: “Act only on that maxim which you can
will to be a universal law.”
 Universalizability
3. The Humanitarian Principle: Always treat persons as ends in
themselves, not merely as a means to some other end.
 Inherent worth vs. Lifeboat Game values
4. What is absolutely good? A good will
 Altruism
5. What drives our ideas of right and wrong? Duty, not goals.
Four points from Kant on ethics:
1. It’s always wrong to lie
2. You must always treat each person as an end in him/herself. Never treat a person merely as a
means to get something else.
3. An action is right when it satisfies the Categorical Imperative
4. Some duties are unavoidable (“perfect duties”). Some duties are optional (“imperfect
duties”). Rights are rooted in perfect duties, freedom is rooted in the concept of
imperfect duties.
Objections and responses
1. Conflicting duties arise. How do you resolve the conflicts, if every duty is based on the
Categorical Imperative?
2. There is no logical limit to the number of maxims to be formulated.
3. The Humanitarian Principle depends upon the definition of a person: personhood from
conception? From birth? Only upon demonstrating you can function as a person?
4. The Good Will may be wishful thinking. Does anybody have an autonomous self-regulating
will?
Kant’s responses generally included an appeal to the amazing rational abilities of humankind.
“Upon analysis and reflection, the answers to these can be found.” His answers are at
times enigmatic, and the objections are still being debated.
Professor Christopher Ullman – Christian Life College
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BIBLICAL ETHICS
ETHICS by INTUITION
THE ETHICS OF W. D. ROSS (English, 1877-1971)
Ross sought to find a middle ground of sorts between the relativism of
utilitarianism and the absolutism of Kantianism. His system has also
been called Prima Facie Ethics.
MEMORY IMAGE: A LIGHTBULB
Five facts about Ross’s system:
1. Rightness is a property that partly depends upon the non-moral specifics of a
situation.
2. Ross is an intuitionist. He believed that when a person “reached sufficient mental maturity,”
and gave “sufficient attention” to the moral question facing him, the prevailing duty will
be self-evident without any need of proof, like an axiom of geometry.
3. There are two categories of duties
Actual duty: In a situation, what you must do.
Prima facie duty: What you consider an obligation, when specifics are not considered (Prima
facie means “at first sight,” or “other things being equal.”)
4. There are 7 prima facie duties:
A. Fidelity: telling the truth, keeping your promises.
B. Reparation: righting the wrongs we have done to others.
C. Gratitude: recognizing the services others have done for us.
D. Justice: being sure pleasure and happiness is available to all on the basis of merit.
E. Beneficence: doing good for others, helping to better the virtue, intelligence or
pleasure of others.
F. Self-improvement: bettering ourselves with respect to virtue or intelligence.
G. Nonmaleficence: avoiding or preventing an injury to others.
5. When duties conflict,
 Do what is required by the most stringent prima facie duty.
 Do what tips the balance in favor of the highest degree of
prima facie rightness.
Objections and responses:
1. “Common sense” is not common. Intuition may yield many different
ideas of right/wrong.
2. Is the prima facie duty list complete? (What about stealing?)
3. Does the prima facie duty list obligate us to do them? (What if I make a rash promise? Am I
bound to keep it?)
4. Ross’s fondness for moral intuition makes debate nearly impossible.
Ross’s responses would include reference to a universal awareness of general moral principles
throughout history, coupled with a belief in the inherent sensibility of humans.
Professor Christopher Ullman – Christian Life College
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BIBLICAL ETHICS
ETHICS as FAIRNESS
RAWLS’ THEORY OF JUSTICE AS FAIRNESS
John Rawls (American, 1921- 2002) was a Harvard philosopher whose book A Theory of
Justice (1971) has generated a tremendous amount of interest in social and political philosophy,
and has molded attitudes toward entitlement, welfare and taxation.
MEMORY IMAGE: A BLINDFOLD
Three short facts about Rawlsian ethics:
1. Q. How do we decide what are principles of justice?
A. We go to the ‘original position’ with its ‘veil of
ignorance.’
2. All in this situation will choose two principles:
 Equal rights for everyone: in order to survive, each one of us should have access to
the goods of society
 Distribution of inequalities on the bases of merit and need: what to do with the
excess when each person’s minimum survival needs have been met
3. There are four natural duties
 The duty of justice
 The duty of helping others in need
 The duty not to harm
 The duty to keep our promises
Objections:
1. Is the veil of ignorance reasonable?
2. Isn’t this utilitarianism, with the goal of fair distribution of
societal goods?
Professor Christopher Ullman – Christian Life College
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BIBLICAL ETHICS
Lifeboat1
In 1842, a ship struck an iceberg and more than thirty survivors were crowded into a lifeboat
intended to hold seven. As a storm threatened, it became obvious that the lifeboat would have to
be lightened if anyone were to survive.
The captain reasoned that the right thing to do in this situation was to force some individuals to
go over the side and drown. Such an action, he reasoned, was not unjust to those thrown
overboard, for they would have drowned anyway. If he did nothing, however, he would be
responsible for the deaths of those whom he could have saved.
Some people opposed the
captain's decision. They claimed
that if nothing were done and
everyone died as a result, no one
would be responsible for these
deaths. On the other hand, if the
captain attempted to save some,
he could do so only by killing
others and their deaths would be
his responsibility; this would be
worse than doing nothing and
letting all die. The captain
rejected this reasoning.
Since the only possibility for
rescue required great efforts of
rowing, the captain decided that
the weakest would have to be sacrificed. In this situation it would be absurd, he thought, to
decide by drawing lots who should be thrown overboard.
As it turned out, after days of hard rowing, the survivors were rescued. When they got to dry
land, the captain was arrested and tried in a court for his action.
If Immanuel Kant had been on the jury, how would he have decided?
If John Rawls had been on the jury, how would he have decided?
1
Adapted from http://www.friesian.com/valley/dilemmas.htm
Professor Christopher Ullman – Christian Life College
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