The Euthyphro Dilemma is a famous philosophical question first posited by a character, called Euthyphro, in Plato’s ‘Socratic dialogue’ on goodness. Gottfried Leibniz rephrased it as whether the good and just “is good and just because God wills it, or whether God wills it because it is good and just”.  Although this dilemma seems impossible to answer, I believe that this is a false dichotomy, as there is a third option; that God is the moral law and his nature is benevolent, so he could never command that which is inherently wrong, as that goes against his nature. I believe this for the following reasons:

First, to provide an answer to the dilemma one must first fully understand the nature of the dilemma. The first horn of the dilemma is the proposition that good acts are good because God commands them. Those who accept this proposition are accepting that God’s command alone is enough to make something right and, by extension, are accepting that everything which a perfect God commands is good, as he would not command that which is evil.

However, God is believed to have commanded things which we now regard as wrong. For example, the book of Deuteronomy 22:11 [1], states that ‘Thou shalt not wear a garment of different sorts, as of woollen and linen together,’ but many clothes in the modern era are made from a mix of wool and linen and other materials. Nonetheless, if everything God commands is good, then are the people of today who wear a mix of wool and linen technically disobeying the Bible’s edicts? The few Christians who are aware of this edict might argue that it is a metaphor for being pure and untainted, and though I disagree, I must move on, as the argument is now regarding the interpretation of the scriptures and the reliability of the Book’s author. Thus, returning to the dilemma, many people object to this horn as they dislike the idea of morality being arbitrary and based on the whim of a deity.

The important flaw in this view is that it contradicts our very deeply-held belief that morality has an objective reality. Regardless of the rather cynical view that “morality is a branch of geography”, and reflects the historical experiences of a people rather than any external set of values, at the heart of most ethical debate is the concept that right and wrong are real. This means that we believe that right and wrong can be found in a rational and logical way by thinking through a situation. If right and wrong are ONLY determined by the views of an ineffable deity, humans can never be sure what right and wrong truly are – they can only guess at what their God might think.

The second horn of the dilemma is the belief that God commands it because it is right. This means that instead of creating and being the foundation of morality, God is simply noticing the goodness of a thing. The flaw with this proposition is that it means that God does not provide the standard of goodness, meaning that there is a standard which is outside of, and was not created by God. Since God is omnipotent, omniscient and the creator of everything [2], it is irrational to postulate a standard that exists.

The real bombshell is that if God defines goodness, then we can never be sure if goodness and evil are not arbitrary. If goodness exists outside of God, we naturally question his power and if we ‘need’ God if we could directly access the source of goodness. This is the famous dilemma.

Thankfully, the Bible provides a third option to which many Christians assent. God’s nature, his divine character, serves as the standard of goodness, which he follows. Seeing as he is pointing to his own nature as the standard, that standard does not exist above or outside himself. This option allows one to ‘escape’ the horns of the dilemma, as it states that God is the creator and measure of goodness.

In conclusion, I think in this case there is a third alternative which is to say that God wills something because he is good. That is to say, God himself is the paradigm of goodness, and his will reflects his character. God is by nature loving, kind, fair, impartial, generous, and so forth. Therefore, he could not have willed that, for example, hatred be good. That would be to contradict his very own nature.

Thus, God’s commands to us are not arbitrary, but neither are they based upon something independent of God. Rather, God himself is the paradigm of goodness.

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References:

[1] Deuteronomy 22:11 according to the King James Bible published in 1611.

[2] The use of ‘everything’ includes the universe and concepts such as morality.

Author(s):

Mark Somers