God’s Moral Dilemma

Have you ever heard of the Euthyphro dilemma? If you have never studied philosophy, the answer is probably no, but I assure you, it is not nearly as intimidating as it sounds. It comes from Plato’s book Euthyphro, and it speaks of a dilemma that reaches to the very heart of our understanding of God. In a nutshell, it asks whether good actions are good because God commands them, or whether God commands them because they are good.

The Dilemma Explained

And if you really think about it, that is a tough question to answer. On the one hand, if we say good actions are good because God commands them, then morality must be arbitrary since God could have commanded us to do the exact opposite. For example, He could have told us that things like murder, rape, and torture are actually good.

But that is clearly not right. We know those things are wrong in themselves, not just because God arbitrarily told us not to do them. In fact, any being who commanded us to act like that would be unworthy of the name “God,” so clearly, the first element of this dilemma must be wrong.

However, the second alternative isn’t much better. If God commands things because they are good, then He cannot really be God. Namely, if God is bound by external moral laws the same way we are, then those laws must be superior to Him, and He must be subservient to them. But, of course, if that is the case, then He is not the highest being or the supreme Lord of all existence.

So either way, it seems that our beliefs about God are wrong. Either He is an arbitrary despot who just happens to be nice, or He is not really God at all, and neither of those options is compatible with the Catholic faith.

“I Am”

So what are we to do? Does our faith just come crumbling down, or is there some way out of this dilemma? The key to solving this problem is to recognize who God really is.

Most of the time, we think of Him as just one being among many (albeit the highest and supreme being), but that is not really accurate. In the Catholic understanding, God isn’t just a being, a thing that exists. Rather, He simply is being. He is existence itself, and He grounds everything else that exists.

At this point, your head might be spinning, but don’t worry. Let’s try to make some sense of these abstract concepts. First, let’s look at a key verse in Scripture. In Exodus, when God first appeared to Moses, Moses asked Him His name. He wanted to know which deity was talking to him, and God responded:

“God said to Moses, ‘I am who I am.’ And he said, ‘Say this to the people of Israel, “I am has sent me to you.”’” (Exodus 3:14)

What kind of name is “I am who I am”? It is not really a name at all, but in a paradoxical sort of way, that is actually the point. God called Himself by this non-name to teach us that He is not just one being among many. He is not something we can name and wrap our heads around. Instead, as this non-name says, He is simply “I am.” His nature simply is existence itself, so He is the ground and basis of everything else that exists.

The Necessary God

That gives us the biblical foundation for this belief, but if there is any doubt about it, let’s bring in some philosophy to seal the deal for us. I don’t have room here to go over everything I would ideally want to say, so if you want to dig a bit deeper, take a look at the article I wrote a few years ago provocatively titled, “Why We Do Not Have Faith That God Exists”. In particular, start reading from the subheading “An Argument for God’s Existence.”

At that point in the article, I give a philosophical argument for God’s existence, and I show that the universe cannot explain its own existence. Instead, it must have been created by a necessary being, a being that must exist just like 1+1 must equal 2. For this post, I am going to assume that conclusion (if you want to know how we reach it, check out the article), and I am going to dig a bit deeper into what it means for a being to be necessary. Let’s get started.

When you think about me, for example, there is a difference between what I am and that I am (or that I exist). You could still think about me if I cease to exist or if you travel back in time to before I was conceived, so I do not have to exist. The mere fact that you are thinking about what I am does not imply that I am.

The same is true of every being in creation, but things are different with God. Since He is a necessary being (or, more accurately, the necessary being), that distinction can’t apply to Him. What He is and that He is must be one and the same because He absolutely has to exist.

And if that is the case, if there is no distinction between what He is and that He is, then His nature must be existence itself. By definition, then, He must be the ground of everything else that exists. In other words, as He told Moses, He must simply be “I am.”

The Dilemma’s Solution

And with that, we have a clear path out of the Euthyphro dilemma. Let’s think this through. What grounds moral laws like “Do not kill” and “Do not rape”? Admittedly, there is a lot we can say here, but at the end of the day, moral laws are just laws of existence, much like 1+1=2 is a law of mathematics. That is simply the way existence works, and if God truly is existence, then He Himself is the basis for those laws.

Now, to be clear, this doesn’t mean that they are based on His arbitrary will. To say that would just bring us back to square one. Rather, moral laws are grounded in His nature, so it is, in fact, true that God commands us to do good simply because it is good. However, when we say this, we do not mean that He is subservient to some higher standard. Rather, He is the standard of all that is good, so He is simply conforming to His own nature when He gives the moral law.

And once we understand that, the Euthyphro dilemma loses all its force. It is a false dichotomy, so it is basically just philosophical smoke and mirrors. There is in fact a third option here, and it is totally compatible with our Catholic faith.