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The Divine Command Theory (DCT) posits that a thing is good because God orders it to be done or wicked because God prohibits it from being done. Thus, to declare that loving our neighbors is good is linguistically equal to arguing that God compels us to love our neighbors. Similarly, it is wrong to kill because God forbids it. Someone may oppose DCT right away on the basis that good and evil become subjective to God’s discretion. Morality is essentially a will to dominance if good and evil are completely determined by God’s will.
The counterpoint to DCT is the claim that the foundation of morality exists outside of God and is not subject to His whim. Plato employs this method in his conversation with Euthyphro. “Is an activity morally good because God demands it [DCT], or does God command it because it is morally good?” asks the Euthyphro Dilemma (Moreland & Craig, 2017). One can be tempted to reject DCT and instead base morality on anything other than God. However, claiming that God demands something since it is morally right undermines God’s sovereignty and autonomy. If an external principle, in this case, the objective foundation of morality, exists apart from God, God is compelled to follow it, and so He is not sovereign. Furthermore, God’s morality is contingent on His obedience to this external norm; hence, His independence is jeopardized.
As a result, we’re trapped on the horns of a dilemma. Neither option is acceptable to the Christian worldview. God is neither arbitrary in His moral deeds, nor is He bound by some external moral norm that guides His decisions (Moreland & Craig, 2017). In the first situation, we may claim that God is not good, and in the second, God is not God. At this point, it’s clear why some reject Christianity and choose moral relativism as their “standard,” except that the Bible paints a different image of morality and illustrates that the Euthyphro Problem is a false dilemma. The traditional Christian approach to the Euthyphro Dilemma is to find goodness in the character of God. This resolves the first horn of the issue since God does not decide what is good and what is bad at random. Rather, it is in God’s nature to do good, and God never goes against His essence.
Reference
Moreland, J., & Craig, W. (2017). Philosophical foundations for a Christian worldview (p. 672). InterVarsity Press.
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