A unique aspect of
the Christian worldview is the teaching that rather than mankind searching for
and discovering God on our own, men and women can only know God because He has
first revealed Himself to us. If it had not been for God initiating contact with
humanity, He would have remained “hidden in incomprehensible majesty,”[1]
as the human race collectively crawled in the darkness, hoping “that they might
feel their way toward him and find him” (Acts 17:27).[2]
There are four primary avenues through which God has revealed Himself to
mankind: in His creation of the physical universe; in the Incarnation of His
Son, Jesus Christ; through the Canon of Scripture; and in the witness of human
conscience. While both the Incarnation and the Bible are examples of God’s special revelation, the creation and the
conscience fall under the category of general
revelation, as they are “available to all rationally and morally
responsible persons.”[3] This post
will focus on the later of these divine revelations, the human
conscience and its expression of natural law.
What is Natural Law?
There is some difficulty in accurately defining the term natural
law, as it carries a significant amount of baggage. When some hear the
term, they immediately think of the scientific laws of nature, such as gravity
and the speed of light, laws that define and predict the interaction of
physical objects.[4] This is not the natural law we are considering.
Instead of describing the actions of physical matter, natural law has to do
with the universal and binding rules of proper human behavior.
In the context of
this post, natural law can be defined as the “general, objective, and widely
shared moral values that are not specifically tied to the special revelation of
Scripture.”[5]
It is not a theory developed by human philosophers, but rather an objective
foundation of reality put in place by God Himself. Natural law “is built into
the design of human nature and woven into the fabric of the normal human mind.”[6]
And as such, it holds a certain continuity among the human species. C. S. Lewis
described this universal aspect of the natural law:
 |
| C. S. Lewis |
"This
law was called the Law of Nature because people thought that every one knew it
by nature and did not need to be taught it. They did not mean, of course, that
you might not find an odd individual here and there who did not know it, just
as you find a few people who are colour-blind or have no ear for a tune. But
taking the race as a whole, they thought that the human idea of decent behaviour
was obvious to every one."[7]
The precepts and moral absolutes of natural law are based on the holy and changeless
character of its Creator. And God, the author of natural law, has not hidden it
from us. “It is not a secret rule, for He has so arranged His creation that
every rational being knows about it.”[8]
In his epistle to the Christians at Rome, the apostle Paul explained that since
the special revelation of Scripture was not available to all people, God
implanted the moral law within the hearts of human beings. For when people “who do not have the law, by nature do what
the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have
the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while
their conscience also bears witness . . .” (Romans 2:14-15a).
Each individual’s
conscience, his innate knowledge of right and wrong, gives testimony that God
has inscribed His moral law upon our very hearts. Not only is the natural law
known by all rational human beings, it is also recognized as being right. J. Budziszewski’s
brief summary helps to clarify our understanding of the natural law: “Certain
moral principles are not only right for all, but at some level known to all.
They are the universal common sense of the human race.”[9]
Evidence
for Natural Law
The witness of
Scripture has been noted above, seen in Paul’s statement in Romans 2:14-15,
that God’s moral law has been written on the hearts of humanity. But is there
evidence for the natural law apart from the Word of God? There is indeed
abundant evidence that testifies to the objective reality of the natural law,
the universally known standard of moral values.
When one compares
the moral teachings of various religions and civilizations throughout history,
the “striking resemblance of their basic ethical principles”[10]
quickly emerges. C. S. Lewis points to this reality in The Abolition of Man: “But what is common to them all is something
we cannot neglect. It is the doctrine of objective value, the belief that
certain attitudes are really true, and others really false . . .”[11]
In the appendix of this same book, Lewis presents an impressive (though not
exhaustive) list of common moral teachings expressed by over a dozen different
civilizations throughout history, from Greeks, Romans, and Babylonians, to
Egyptians, Norsemen and Native American Indians.[12]
Lewis’ inventory of shared moral beliefs include beneficence, duties to
parents, elders and ancestors, justice,
honesty, mercy, and magnanimity.[13]
This recognition of the common threads of morality winding throughout mankind’s
history points to the existence of the natural law.
When we turn our focus to individual persons, it does not take long
before the natural law can be seen at work. While it is one thing to observe how a person acts, or even to ask
someone how they think others should act,
the unvarnished revelation of their deepest moral belief arises in how they react when someone threatens
their own rights or property.[14]
In other words, rather than arguing with a self-proclaimed moral relativist and
trying to convince her of the existence of the natural law, it is much more
effective to simply steal her smart-phone. The widely shared morality of the natural
law quickly emerges when someone’s prized possessions or personal rights are
violated.
Without the
existence of natural law, it would often prove impossible to pass judgment on
the most heinous of moral violations when those crimes are given legal cover
within a particular society. This was the challenge of the Nuremberg trials,
when Nazi leaders stood in the dock charged with the attempted extermination of
an ethnic and religious people within their country’s borders. One of the arguments
of the defense was that what began with the systematic exclusion of the Jewish
people from normal life in Germany was actually justifiable under the Nazi
legal system. A series of laws had been established within Nazi Germany, laws
which progressively degraded the legal standing of Jews.[15]
These included the declaration that they were non-persons, effectively
forfeiting for the Jewish people the normal legal protections now only afforded
to those considered “fully human.” Another contention of the defense was that
since no law existed specifically prohibiting their actions, no crime had
actually taken place! In answer to this rationalization, the Nuremberg tribunal
utilized the existence of natural law as the foundation of the legal
proceedings. During the final verdict, the American Judge Francis Biddle
pointed to the universality of justice and the innate moral conscience shared
by all of humanity:
 |
| Nuremberg Trial |
"It
is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that
it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole. To assert that it
is unjust to punish those who in defiance of treaties and assurances have
attacked neighboring states without warning is obviously untrue, for in such
circumstances the attacker must know that he is doing wrong, and so far from it
being unjust to punish him, it would be unjust if his wrongs were allowed to go
unpunished."[16]
Timothy Keller sums
up this connection between the Nazi atrocities and the objective veracity of
natural law. “The Nazis who exterminated the Jews may have claimed that they
didn’t feel it was immoral at all. We don’t care. We don’t care if they
sincerely felt they were doing a service to humanity. They ought not to have
done it.”[17]
The Nuremburg trials provide powerful testimony from human history to the
transcendent reality of the natural law.
God is the Source of Natural Law
The widespread agreement of societies
throughout human history to certain common yet undeniable moral values
illuminates the truth that an objective moral law exists. And for an objective
moral law to exist, there must be a moral lawgiver. In other words, the
existence of the natural law is one more piece of evidence for the existence of
God. Natural law, “the notion that there are true, universally binding moral
principles knowable to all people and rooted in creation and the way things are
made,”[18] finds its foundation in the very character of God Himself,
who has provided a standard upon which He can justly hold accountable those who
have not been given the special revelation of Scripture. “I didn't know” will
not be a valid excuse before the judgment seat of God. The existence of moral
values apart from special revelation underlines a reality that is shared by
all people. God has engraved His natural law on every human heart.
[1]Michael Horton, The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology
for Pilgrims On the Way (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011), 113.
[3]Norman L. Geisler, Christian Ethics: Contemporary Issues and
Options (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2010), 125.
[4]Mortimer J. Adler, How To Think About The Great Ideas, ed.
Max Weismann (Peru, IL: Open Court
Publishing, 2009), 352.
[5]Scott B. Rae, Moral Choices: An Introduction to Ethics
(Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2009), 53.
[6]J. Budziszewski, What We Can’t Not Know (Dallas, TX:
Spence Publishing, 2003), 14.
[7]C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (New York:
HarperCollins Publishers, 2001), 5.
[8]J. Budziszewski, What We Can’t Not Know, 14.
[9]Ibid., 15.
[10]Norman L. Geisler, Christian Ethics: Contemporary Issues and
Options, 123.
[11]C. S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man: Reflections on
Education with Special Reference to the Teaching of English in the Upper Forms
of Schools (New York:
MacMillan Company, 1947), 12.
[12]Louis Markos, Apologetics For The 21st Century (Wheaton,
IL: Crossway Books, 2010), 29.
[13]C. S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man: Reflections on
Education with Special Reference to the Teaching of English in the Upper Forms
of Schools, 51-61.
[14]Norman L. Geisler, Christian Ethics: Contemporary Issues and
Options, 124.
[15]Ian Kershaw, Hitler 1889-1936: Hubris (New York: W.
W. Norton & Company, 1998), 568-573.
[16]Robert E. Conot, Justice at Nuremberg (New York: Harper
and Row, 1983), 493.
[17]Timothy Keller, The Reason For God: Belief in an Age of
Skepticism (New York: Penguin Group, 2008), 147.
[18]William Lane Craig and J. P.
Moreland, Philosophical Foundations for a
Christian Worldview (Downers Grove, IL: Inter Varsity Press, 2003), 410.
