Do You Believe that God is the Basis of Morality?

Question

Many Christians believe that God is the basis of morality. In fact it is one of their arguments for the existence of god. Christians claim that without God, man will not know what is evil moral and not. Without God, then genocide like what Hitler did cannot be classified as evil as we do not have any standard to refer to. What is your take on this issue?

Answer 1

Good, evil, moral...these things are all human conceits. These abstract ideas were defined for society, by individuals who claimed that the "laws" were handed down by a higher power. Some of the laws were to protect people from themselves (times to abstain from certain foods, or not allowing certain foods to be eaten at all), and some of the laws were to maintain a hierarchy (wouldn't those who heard god be more important than those who didn't). Your example of Hitler falters in one MAJOR aspect. With or without religious based morality, people can determine what's right and wrong based off of logic.

Answer 2

Well, God being the basis of Christianity, the true question becomes is morality the base of Christianity, and the answer of that is surprisingly no. To be a Christian all you have to do is believe in Jesus, you don't have to be moral. And furthermore, God cannot be the basis of morality because there are plenty of athiest people that are not influenced by God in any way that are still moral. You do not have to be a Christian to have morals, so long story short, the answer is no.

Answer 3

All you have to do is read a little history and you will discover that morality is not based solely in a belief in a god. Greek philosophers, Pagan cultures, all had moral standards. However, some people cannot understand morality except through some religion.

Answer 4

Major world religions such as Christianity and Islam are inherently amoral - They do not judge behaviour according to whether it is moral, but according to whether it is 'sinful', i.e. whether or not it is consistent with the orders of the religion's deity. Atheism, by contrast, allows for true morality, since the atheist worldview allows actions to be judged good or bad according to conscience, which is the true definition of morality.

In the theistic worldview, anything goes as long as it is imagined to be the wishes of the deity... and virtually any atrocity can and has been justified in this way. This is how all oppressive regimes succeed, whether it be Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia or Iraq under Saddam - The most hideous crimes can be justified on the basis of "just following orders".

Furthermore, anyone imagining that they can make moral pronouncements from a religious basis is faced with an insurmountable problem: In tying their pronouncements to religious claims, their pronouncements are invalid until they can provide logically satisfactory evidence that the claims are true, and this they will never be able to do, so therefore any moral viewpoints based on religion should be dismissed as irrelevant.

Moral viewpoints are subjective value judgments, so whether or not something constitutes 'evil' in a person's mind is defined by their response to it. There are no objective values of 'good' or 'evil'. This was shown long ago by David Hume and is summarised in his proof that "you cannot get an 'ought' from an 'is' - i.e. that moral values are not properties of events or ideas or people themselves, but are our responses to those things.

Morality is of course a product of evolution. It's unarguably true that society as we know it could not exist if we didn't have self-imposed codes of behaviour - i.e. we make value judgments about what is 'good' and 'bad' behaviour in any particular situation. This is just one of the things which has made us such an enormously successful species, but many other species have the same traits; They care for their young, they alert others to danger, they co-exist without conflict, they co-operate to hunt prey and so on.

It's hard to say exactly what goes on in the minds of other species but we know from experiments that they experience empathy - this can even be shown in mice - and empathy is one of the key aspects of morality. When you can recognise what another individual is experiencing then that is the basis of moral values which, broadly speaking, cause people to voluntarily limit harm to others and thereby enable us to live in closely-packed co-operative societies. Morality evolved as a very successful survival strategy.

Answer 5

It is quite clear to me that the basis of morality stems from the concept of humanity. Historically, Christianity has had a relatively small global influence: consider tribes living in isolation which developed their own sense of morlity, which may be surprisingly similar to Western ethics. The most incredible evidence to me of god having no influence on morality is the percentage of Atheists in prison: In the U.S.A. , for example, 10% of the general population are non-believers, yet only 0.3% of prisoners are Atheists, implying that they are massively under-represented. Sweden, which has a 85% Atheist population has a murder rate that is half of that of the USA. These stats seem to indicate that free-thinking, rational individuals are progressing humanity, whilst religious sects are slowing it.

Answer 6

I tried my best to figure it out; It seems that God has impressed "naturally" upon mankind a sort of Natural Law or law of goodness. (Rom, xi. 22.) paraphrased :) This law of God's goodness and justice is also called Natural Law -- Law of Nature, because it is naturally impressed on the mind and heart of every rational being, and makes him know the difference between good and evil. Then there is Natural Light....As all men have this light of nature as a rule of right and wrong, no man can plead utter ignorance of right and wrong. Hence it is that we find, even in the heathen nations, the obligations of the natural law respected. This eternal, natural law of right and wrong is called moral law, because natural law, or sound reason, is the rule and standard of good morals; it is the rule to guide men in all their actions; it tells them what is good and bad, what they must do or avoid. ^ ^ I'm atheist and I think the dude below me has hit it spot on.

Answer 7

It depends how he is used. I know christians who claim to be all holy and perfect, but they are constantly judging others and acting like they are superior to everyone else. These two "christians" at my school refused to reply to me when I talked to them, because apparantly I wasn't good enough for them, although I am a christian too. Like Jesus, I hang out with the sinners too, because we are supposed to follow his example, and not condem others. I mean it does say Ïf your standing in a glass house do not cast stones in the bible somewhere right?

I think Christianity can be a beautiful thing to live by if you do if probably, but if it is abused and twisted to suit the person, it won't work.

Answer 8

you do not need god for morality the none beleavers have morality a lot more than the christians for one thing thay are not bigated against the gays

Answer 9

You either got morals or you got nothing and no religion can change that.
Take care!

Answer 10

Some Muslims murder for God.

Many Christians killed many other Christians for God.


Muslims and Christians killed many, many Jews for God.

Is this enough proof?