DIVINE COMMAND THEORY

Divine Command Theory



Divine Command Theory

Introduction

Defenders of Divine Command Theory, one of the major types of religious ethical theories, maintain that such an understanding does imply at least some minimal knowledge of God because we know things to be wrong only when we know they are against God's will. Something is good only because God wills it, and wrong only because He prohibits it. That is the central claim of the Divine Command Theory. To begin with the understanding and comprehension of the Divine Command Theory, it is actually a derivative of the 'Categorical Imperative', placed and brought forward by Immanuel Kant. Kant was of the concept that an individual paves way for choosing a righteous and dutiful life, which aligns his actions and thoughts in the light of the Divine and the Law of God (Hertz, 1973).

Discussion and Analysis

There is a philosophical problem about how we know these things to be wrong, but that is as much a problem for the believer as for the atheist. For if any person, believer and non-believer alike, has an understanding of the concept of morality, has an understanding of what it is to take the moral point of view, than that person will have an understanding that it is wrong to harm others, that promises are to be kept and truth is to be told. This does not mean that such a person will be committed to the belief that a lie can never be told, that a promise can never be broken, or that a human being in no circumstance whatsoever can rightly be harmed. But if there is no understanding that such acts always require special justification and that the presumption of morality is always against them, then there is no understanding of the concept of morality.

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