Most Christians tend to think of Christian ethics in terms of following a list of rules. God has given us His laws, and we have to obey them. If we do, then God will be happy with us. If we don’t, then we have sinned and God will be angry with us.
Now, it is certainly the case that obedience to God’s commands is an important theological theme in Scripture. However, God’s commands are often more complex than simply a set of rules. If we think of Christian ethics merely in terms of following a list of rules, we will have a shallow, impoverished understanding of what Christian ethics is all about. Going beyond just “following the rules,” Christian ethics is about developing virtues that express a Christlike character.
Virtue Ethics in Scripture
In the Old Testament, the five books of Moses form the basis for Israel’s theological understanding of itself and the ethical demands that God has for them. We typically refer to these books as the Law, since ancient Greek translations used the Greek word Nomos (meaning “law”) to refer to them. However, the original Hebrew uses the term Torah, which has a meaning much closer to “teaching” or “instruction” than to “law.”
There are certainly parts of the Torah that could be considered “law.” However, it is important to understand that Ancient Near Eastern law was not what we typically think of when we talk about “law”; it was not legislation that was enforced. Rather, it was more a kind of wisdom literature that, through a multitude of examples, provided guidance in understanding what justice looks like. Judgment in particular cases was decided not by rigidly enforcing legislation, but by attempting to make a wise decision about what would be most just in this particular case.
God certainly expected His people to be obedient to the commands He gave them in His Torah, but these commands did not provide them with an exhaustive ethical system of rules that was an end in itself. Rather, the purpose of the Torah was to provide guidance for Israel to be the kind of people God had called them to be in all aspects of their lives, even in those cases where He had not explicitly given them a specific rule to follow. The Torah provided God’s people guidance in understanding what it meant for God to tell them, “You will be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy” (Lev 19:2).
When we turn to the New Testament, God’s call on His people to live out their identity as God’s holy people remains central. However, there are two important new developments. First, God’s holy presence now dwells within His people instead of externally in a temple building, which heightens the ethical stakes. Second, there is a Christological element added. As members of the body of Christ, Christians are called to be conformed to the image of Christ, God’s ultimate revelation both of who He is and of what human beings are supposed to be like.
The New Testament does contain many specific commands and rules. For example, it forbids Christians from engaging in violence, theft, fornication, adultery, homosexual behavior, or slander. There are certain absolute rules and boundaries regarding what can be considered ethical Christian behavior. Yet not all of God’s commands in the New Testament can be reduced to a set of rules. Jesus commands His followers to love God, to love their neighbors as themselves (Matt 22: 36-40), and to love their enemies (Matt 5:44). The command to love is not simply a rule that can be followed; rather, it is a demand for a certain attitude or orientation towards another person, which is lived out in a variety of complex ways.
Ultimately, New Testament ethics is not fundamentally about following a list of rules. It is about developing a certain kind of character. Scripture commands Christians to be loving, patient, kind (1 Cor 13:4), joyful, peaceful, good, faithful, gentle, self-controlled (Gal 5:22-23), merciful, humble (Col 3:12), courageous (1 Cor 16;13), and hopeful (1 Cor 13:7). These are not rules to be followed, but character traits, or virtues, that God calls us to develop. Ultimately, New Testament ethics is about being conformed to the image of Christ (Rom 8:29; 2 Cor 3:18), the One who shows us what it really means to live in a genuinely human way.
Virtue in the Christian Tradition
There are many different virtues, each having to do with different aspects of human personality and life. However, in the Christian tradition, there are seven virtues that are considered to be primary and most important: wisdom (or prudence), justice, courage (or fortitude), self-control (or temperance), faith, hope, and love. These virtues are divided into two kinds. Faith, hope, and love are “theological virtues,” which only Christians can possess, while wisdom, justice, courage, and self-control are “natural virtues,” which even non-Christians can possess.
I reject the idea of natural law, that there are universal moral principles which all human beings can and should know, regardless of their historical or cultural context. Therefore, I do not affirm that there are natural virtues in the sense of character traits that can and should be universally recognized as virtuous according to universal, neutral reasoning. However, I do acknowledge the existence of natural virtues in a more nuanced, modified sense. I acknowledge that most people in most cultures regard wisdom, justice, courage, and self-control as positive character traits, with the important caveat that there is a significant variety of ways in which these concepts are understood across various cultures, societies, and communities.
Of course, this means that the Christian understanding of these natural virtues will often be significantly different than non-Christian understandings of them, having its own distinctive character. This is one of the things I will be highlighting over the next four posts in this series, as I examine the place of each of the four natural virtues within Christian ethics. Following that, I will move on to examining the three theological virtues, which only Christians can possess.
To some, it may seem arrogant or self-righteous for Christians to claim that there are virtues which only they and no one else has. However, the recognition that there are uniquely Christian theological virtues is not a matter of arrogance, but of humbly acknowledging that we cannot be truly virtuous without having a relationship with God and being transformed by Him. According to St. Thomas Aquinas, faith, hope, and love “are called theological virtues,: first, because their object is God, because they direct us to God; secondly, because they are infused in us by God alone; thirdly, because these virtues are not made known to us except by Divine revelation, contained in Holy Writ.”[1]St. Thomas Aquinas. The Summa Theologica, Volume II. Translated by Father Laurence Shapcote. Great Books of the Western World, Volume 18. (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1990), 60 An immature Christian may be inferior to many non-Christians with regard to the natural virtues. However, because of their relationship with God, they have the potential to become far more truly virtuous than anyone who does not know God ever could.
The Importance of Virtue for Christians
In my last philosophy post, I made the case for why virtue ethics is vitally important: we are often incapable of doing the right thing if we lack certain virtues, most of our actions are not the result of conscious deliberate choice, and other ethical theories have serious shortcomings. All of this, of course, applies to Christians as they try to live out their understanding of what it means to be ethical. “Make every effort,” the apostle Peter writes, “to add to your faith virtue” (2 Pet 1:5). God does not want Christians to have the demonic utilitarian attitude that “the ends justifies the means.” Nor does He want Christians to just look for rules in Scripture and think that they are being good Christians as long as they do not break those rules. God wants Christians to grow more and more in maturity, godliness, and holiness. He wants them to become more and more like Jesus Christ. In other words, He wants us to become virtuous.
Notes
| ↑1 | St. Thomas Aquinas. The Summa Theologica, Volume II. Translated by Father Laurence Shapcote. Great Books of the Western World, Volume 18. (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1990), 60 |
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