Lesson Three: "Some Objections"

from Book One, Chapter Two: "Some Objections"

Lewis continues his discussion of the concept of a Moral Law that he introduced in the previous chapter by dealing with the two most common objections to this concept. These are:

1) The claim that morality is a function of human instinct (internal sense)
2) The claim that morality is learned behavior derived from a society/cultures conventions of behavior (external sense)

Remember that Lewis's thesis is that morality is based on a real and definite moral law that exists outside the realm of human thought and cultural construct. It is, in other words, transcendent or supernatural. Let’s examine each of these discussions individually.

INSTINCT
Lewis differentiates the moral law from the human instinct by means of a most effective example. He imagines a man who hears other man in distress cry for help. Out of the man’s human instinct come two urges: first, the urge to go and help the man in distress; second, the urge to flee the danger himself as a means of self-preservation.

Lewis makes the convincing point that in many cases, the stronger urge is that of self-preservation. If we adhered solely to instinct, then it follows that we should obey the stronger of the two urges. But what is clear is that in all of us, there is a third notion: the voice of conscience that tells us to suppress the survival instinct and obey the urge to help the man in danger. This third urge is not a manifestation of the instinct within ourselves, but rather the function of the supernatural moral law that tells us what we ought to do, often in spite of what our instincts are urging us to do.

Furthermore, Lewis writes that if morality were an internal sense, we should be able to identify at least one of our natural instincts as “good” and follow that instinct in any and all moral situations. This is not, however, the case in reality, and it is easy for us to recognize that any human instinct, no matter how noble, cannot and should not be followed blindly in every situation. Lewis’s analogy is particularly apt: our instincts are like the keys on a piano—none of them can be called “right” or “wrong” in and of themselves; the moral law is like the sheet of music that tells us which notes are to be played to make the right sounds.

Therefore, agreeing with these premises, we must confess that the moral law does not originate in our own instincts and must come from outside ourselves. Now the question becomes, “From what source outside of myself do these ideas of morality come?”

CONVENTION
People who argue that morality is simply a matter of a society’s conventions point out that our notions of right and wrong are learned from a variety of sources—home, church, school, peers, etc. Lewis does not deny this, but he makes the important distinction between the way in which we obtain this knowledge and the nature of the knowledge itself.

The analogy is this: we learn our multiplication tables in grade school. Were we to never attend school, we would have no idea what “nine times seven” equals, but our ignorance of this equation would not change the essential truth that 9 x 7 = 63. In the same way, our ignorance or knowledge of the moral law has no effect on its existence or its truth. When we learn about the moral law, we are learning about the nature of truth in the same way that we learn about the nature of multiplication. In philosophical terms, this is known as a priori knowledge—knowledge that we obtain based on logic and reason, independent of experience.

Lewis gives us two reasons why we can view the moral law in this way. The first reason he gave in the previous chapter: We find that basic morality has never varied significantly throughout the history of human civilization. Every culture in every age has adhered to the same basic moral standards (a few that spring to mind…honor God/the gods; don’t murder; don’t steal; don’t lie; don’t have sex with another person’s spouse; don’t betray loyalties…can you think of any culture that did not adhere to one of these standards in any way?)

The second reason is a bit more complex. He says that whenever we judge the moral standards of two different cultures—in his case, the comparison is between his native England and Nazi Germany—we always say that the morality of one culture is “better” than the morality of the other. But in order for this to be a logically meaningful statement, do we not have to have a third notion of morality that stands as the measure by which we judge the other two? If this is not so, then all we are doing is expressing a preference, but we cannot condemn the lesser morality as “wrong” or “evil” unless there is a real moral law that exists independent of society and culture.

This third standard is the moral law, and because it exists independent of any single nation, culture or society, it may be rightly categorized as transcendent or supernatural. Therefore, Lewis has effectively shown that a moral law exists, and that it exists independent of any individual human instinct or particular society’s conventions. What follows next is trying to identify the true source of this moral law.

Discussion Question:
Are you convinced that the moral law is real and exists outside the realm of human instinct and social convention? Why or why not?

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