Lesson 2 – Philosophy and Ethics: Says who?
There is a formal and vital connection between:
- Our ideas about the nature of the world (Philosophy) and
- Our understanding of right and wrong behavior (Ethics)
What has our culture been taken captive by? [2 Timothy 2:24-26]
Warning – Believers can be taken captive also! [Colossians 2:8]
- Human Traditions
- Basic Principles of This World
Assumptive Language – Carl Sagan in the Cosmos – fundamentally there is no God!
Cosmic Cube – “The Cosmos is all that is, or ever was, or ever will be.”
- A philosophy that tries to define everything
- Nothing exists outside the box and everything comes from the box
What is Philosophy?
Biblical Worldview – fundamental presuppositions:
- God is!
- God has revealed Himself to us! How?
- In the creation itself
- Through His Word (special revelation)
Do we live as if God is not? If we believe that God is, do we live like it?
R. C. Sproul stated that philosophy means simply the love of wisdom. It was a scientific quest to discover ultimate reality.
S. S. Smith stated that true religion and true philosophy must arrive at the same point – reality.
The Universals – the BIG Philosophical questions:
- What is existence?
- What is reality?
- What does it mean to exist?
- What is the meaning and purpose of life?
The great quest of philosophy is to find the answer to the big questions – the universals. We must understand the universal to understand the particulars of life.
The philosophical dilemma: the battle over where you find the answer to the big questions of life. There is a huge gap between the universals and the particulars.
The world’s approach – to find the universals from the particulars
God’s approach – He gave us the universals so that we might understand the particulars
Postmodernism – there is no truth, there is no absolute truth.
Ethics – How do you answer: What is right and what is wrong? Who makes the rules?
The world’s answers come from the box. Typically, the majority or the mighty make right.
Things are wrong because they contradict the nature of God.
A summary of the implications of modern evolutionary biology [Dr. William Provine]
- No gods or purposive forces
- No life after death
- No ultimate foundation for ethics
- No ultimate meaning in life
- No free will
Dr. Provine said that to be a Christian you must suspend your rational mind. From atheism you can have robust ethics and proximate meaning to life.
R. C. Sproul said we are victim today of a crisis of ethics. There has been a linguistic shift away from a distinction between morality and ethics.
- Once morality referred to how you behave. “That which is.”
- Once ethics referred to transcendent standards or norms of behavior. “That which ought to be.”
Now, ethics and morality are synonyms.
Now, ethics determined by statistical morality.
- Majority sets what is normal.
- Majority sets what is good.
- Good is determined by what IS instead of what OUGHT to be.
- This explains our focus on statistics and polls today.
What is your worldview?
Your personal worldview is the cumulative set of truth claims that you accept and that drive what you believe and how you act.
The solution to our problem is found in Romans 12:2
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Transformed – Metamorphoo – a metamorphosis
God is calling us to a real metamorphosis of our mind.
What is next?
Lesson 3 – Anthropology: Who is man?