WJEC/Eduqas RS for A2/Yr2: Religion and Ethics (DRAFT)

WJEC / Eduqas Religious Studies for A Level Year 2 and A2 Religion and Ethics

morally good or bad is commanded by God. For example, in Christianity God’s moral commands can be found in the Bible. One set of moral commands is the Decalogue, which can be found in Exodus 20. One of these ten commandments is ‘You shall not murder’. Therefore, human beings know that murder is morally wrong because God has commanded this. However, it could be conceded that the use of human free-willed reason is reduced by this particular normative ethic. This is because human beings do not need to use their own reason to rationalise morality; it is just provided for them; such as ‘murder is morally wrong’. On the other hand, the human being still needs to freely reason whether Divine Command Theory is, or is not, the rational understanding of God’s eternal moral law. Therefore, whether it is the right normative ethic for them to follow to achieve their freely chosen goal of following God’s moral law. It is also a big assumption to make to say a human being has free will to use a normative ethic. If a human being does not have free will then the effectiveness of normative ethics can be questioned. As we have seen, the aim of all normative ethics is to act as a moral guide, helping a human being guide an insight into morality and then follow it. However, if a human being is absolutely determined by one or more determining factors then normative ethics become redundant. For example, Divine Command Theory pre-supposes that human beings have a free will choice to follow God commands or not. This is illustrated when some Christians wear a band around their wrists with the initials ‘WWJD’, meaning ‘What would Jesus do?’, to remind them to always follow God’s commands, as Jesus did, in any moral dilemma. However, if human beings have no free will, as Augustine puts it, ‘our will can merely do evil and desire evil’, then normative ethics, like Divine Command Theory, becomes utterly pointless. The degree to which free will makes the use of prayer irrelevant This issue is asking candidates to consider whether a human being, with free will, should use prayer to interact with a deity. Candidates could approach the above issue from several lines of argument. One line of argument that free will makes the use of prayer relevant is that one of the attributes of God that human free will suggests is omnibenevolence. An omnibenevolent God would wish to have a relationship through prayer and/or help all human beings as an answer to prayer. Therefore, human free will may suggest prayer is relevant because it would be to an omnibenevolent God. This point could be illustrated through Pelagius’ theory. Pelagius argued that when Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, to create the ‘original sin’, God would not punish all human beings for the sin of Adam and Eve. Pelagius argued this was a very important point because an omnipotent God would not punish all human beings through no direct fault of their own. As he stated: ‘we (human beings) may not seem to be forced to do evil through a fault in our nature’. Therefore, Pelagius argued that ‘the fall’ remained Adam and Eve’s sin alone. Therefore, according to Pelagius, an omnibenevolent God, was allowing human beings not to be predestined by inherited sin and thus all human beings had the ability, within themselves, to achieve salvation. This point was supported by Arminius’ supporters, called Remonstrants, at the ‘Synod of Dort’ in 1619. One of their ‘Five Articles of Remonstrance’ was that salvation (or condemnation) on the day of judgment is freely conditioned by the faith (or unbelief) of the individual human being. Therefore, because God’s omnibenevolent nature is evidence, through human free will, then the use of prayer is relevant because an omnibenevolent God, by definition, would wish to have a relationship and help all human beings. The best way human beings can interact with God is through prayer. However, a counter-argument could be that a human being, with free will, should use prayer because human free will illustrates that God is not omnipotent. If God is not omnipotent then He does not have the power to answer human prayer. This point can

DRAFT

Specification content The degree to which free will makes the use of prayer irrelevant. t t

AO2 Activity Now you’ve read through this line of argument can you do the following: 1. For each line of argument try to evaluate whether or not you think this is strong or weak. 2. Think of any questions you may wish to raise in response to the arguments. 3. Can you evaluate here by drawing a mini conclusion about whether it is possible for human beings to have free will to follow a normative ethic. This activity will help you to start thinking critically about what you read and help you to evaluate the effectiveness of different arguments and from this develop your own observations, opinions and points of view that will help with any conclusions that you make in your answers to the AO2 questions that arise.

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