Religiosity, Spirituality and the Moral

[robvalue]

If I may, I'd like to recommend a great book on this subject. It is entitled "What ever Happened to Good and Evil?" by Russ-Shafer Landau, who is a professor of Philosophy .

I concur with his thesis that the only viable moral code must be objective. There seems to be a problem however, on defining what constitutes "objective". I say that because in discussions I've had with others, they seem to want to identify their subjective moral codes as objective. That one of these (as an example) was the only source of the moral code is what made it subjective and I guess he couldn't see that. It is my opinion that an objective morality is not possible without God.

It is my further belief that all other moral codes in the world are necessarily subjective or relative and consequently are the source of conflict with others who disagree.

Russ-Shafer Landau explains that among moral skeptics are several categories. Moral nihilists claim that there are no moral laws. Moral subjectivists claim that there are moral laws, but that there is no verifiable basis for it (other than themselves and an immediate circle of associates). Moral relativists claim that moral codes are determined by the culture (or nation).

If God is deciding what the moral code is, then it's not objective, it's subjective to God. It's what God finds moral and immoral. If it were objective, it would not be created by God, but it would apply to God, and god could not decide it. You're appointing a random arbiter, and then claiming he "doesn't count" as being subjective when he makes decisions.

Also, if you have a prescribed moral code which you follow blindly, you are being amoral- without morals. You're making no consideration as to whether your actions actually benefit or harm those around you. You are merely a robot passing down judgements from someone else. If you do decide whether or not to apply any given part of the moral code in any situation, then you are filtering that code using your own morality. And of course, this is exactly what people do even when they claim to follow the "morality of the bible". Anyone who actually lives by what the bible told you to do would very quickly be dead or in jail.