Transcript Being Good - Cloudfront.net

CHAPTER FIVE
Conscience Formation
Prayer:
Jesus said: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures
on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where
thieves break in and steal. But store up for
yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth
nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in
or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart
will be also. The eye is the lamp of the body; so
then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full
of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will
be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is
darkness, how great is the darkness!”
Matthew 6:19–24
A. The Value of Ethics
1. What is Ethics?
Ethics & Right Action
Human Nature
Sin
Natural vs. Unnatural
A. The Value of Ethics
2. Is Ethics Christian?
-Is Jesus an Alternative to Ethics?
B. Rightness & The Human Being
1. Rightness & Acts of the Body
-Where is the Locus of Sin?
Matthew 5:27-28
27 “You have heard that it was
said, ‘You shall not commit
adultery’; 28 but I say to you
that everyone who looks at a
woman with lust for her has
already committed adultery
with her in his heart.
Feeling
‫לֵ ב‬
Heart
Ecclesiastes 1:13: “I gave my heart to seek and
search out by wisdom concerning all things that are
done under heaven.”
‫לֵ ב‬
Heart
1 Corinthians 4:20
20 For the kingdom of God
does not consist in words but
in power.
1 John 4:13
13 By this we know that we
abide in Him and He in us,
because He has given us of
His Spirit.
1. WHY BE GOOD?
What is our reason for being good?
‫לֵ ב‬
Heart
WHAT MANNER OF GOOD?
What are good actions? How should we
act?
‫לֵ ב‬
Heart
RULE
Mean/Right Amount
|________________|______________|
Excess
Defect
Giving to the poor
WHAT MANNER OF GOOD?
“For many people, ethics is not only tied up with religion, but is
completely settled by it. Such people do not need to think too
much about ethics, because there is an authoritative Code of
instructions, a handbook of how to live. It is the word of
Heaven,…. We have ... a text ... sufficiently in touch with the
divine will to be able to communicate it to us. Then we know
what to do.”
Simon Blackburn, Being Good: A Short Introduction to Ethics
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 10
WHAT MANNER OF GOOD?
What we are calling ‘rules’ tell us what to do
generally, but what specifically we should do still
has to be determined. – Why would we think it
was more Christian or more religious to think
that God tells us everything? To think that we
determine nothing?
3. WHAT STANDARD OF GOOD?
If the good action is not fully spelled out, to
what can we turn to discover what specifically to
do?
In the case of unspecificity, or ambiguity, what
tells us what is good and bad?
Genesis 38:6-10
6 Now Judah took a wife for Er his firstborn, and
her name was Tamar. 7 But Er, Judah’s firstborn, was
evil in the sight of the Lord, so the Lord took his
life. 8 Then Judah said to Onan, “Go in to your
brother’s wife, and perform your duty as a brotherin-law to her, and raise up offspring for your
brother.” 9 Onan knew that the offspring would not
be his; so when he went in to his brother’s wife, he
wasted his seed on the ground in order not to give
offspring to his brother. 10 But what he did was
displeasing in the sight of the Lord; so He took his
life also.
(4) GOOD BY WHAT MEANS?
And what is it that will enable me to act in
that way?
What MEANS will move me to do what I
ought to do, against my will.
Romans 12:1-2
12 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of
God, to present your bodies a living and holy
sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual
service of worship. 2 And do not be conformed to
this world, but be transformed by the renewing of
your mind, so that you may prove what the will of
God is, that which is good and acceptable and
perfect.
Four Divisions of Ethics
(1) Why be good: what is our REASON? (In a way, this is the
final cause of being good: the for-what of our goodness.)
(2) What is the MANNER or way in which we should act,
specifically?
(3) How do we “discern what is the will of God” (Rom. 12:2)?
What is my STANDARD or procedure of discernment, in the
event of uncertainty?
(4) And what is it that will enable me to act in that way? What
MEANS will move me to do what I ought to do, against my will.
“The form of [Christ’s] ethical teaching was very different from that of other ethical
teachers. They adopted one of two methods. Either they argued – like the Greeks –
from the purely human level and elaborated a system of ethics; or else – like the
Jewish rabbis – they Codified revealed ethical laws.”
[Lindsay Dewar, An Outline of New Testament Ethics (1949), 13–14]
“[Jesus] is by a wide margin the most admired and influential moral teacher of all
time. But what is distinctive, what is different, what is new about His answer to the
moral question? His morality was not new. There is no such thing as a new morality,
only new immoralities. Everyone always knew what was good and what was evil. No
sane individual and no sane society ever believed that justice, charity, honesty, selfcontrol, mercy, loyalty, and wisdom were wicked or immoral, or that injustice, hatred,
lying, addiction, cruelty, betrayal, and folly were moral goods or obligations. Jesus’
morality was only the fullest flower of the plant that God had already planted in the
nature of man, in all human hearts and consciences by creating us in His image….
Jesus’ moral appeals, therefore, were appeals to a moral conscience that was already
there.... If you look at Jesus’ Jewish tradition you will find that there is hardly any
moral saying of Jesus in the Gospels whose equivalent cannot be found somewhere in
the scriptures or in the sayings of the rabbis.”
[Peter Kreeft, The Philosophy of Jesus (2007), 93–95]
426. Not to build an altar of hewn stone (Ex. 20:22)
515. That sacrifices of cattle can take place only when they are at
least eight days old (Lev. 22:27)
588. That a Nazarite [like Samson] shall not eat fresh grapes
(Num. 6:3)
590. That he shall not eat the kernels of the grapes (Num. 6:4)
591. That he shall not eat of the skins of the grapes (Num. 6:4)
592. That the Nazarite shall permit his hair to grow (Num. 6:5)
Four Divisions of Ethics
(1) Why be good: what is our REASON? (In a way, this is the
final cause of being good: the for-what of our goodness.)
(2) What is the MANNER or way in which we should act,
specifically?
(3) How do we “discern what is the will of God” (Rom. 12:2)?
What is my STANDARD or procedure of discernment, in the
event of uncertainty?
(4) And what is it that will enable me to act in that way? What
MEANS will move me to do what I ought to do, against my will.
Exit Journal
Please define the following terms
Metanoia
Justification
Grace
Sanctifying grace
Actual grace
Sacramental grace
Contemplative orders
Apostolic orders