The Euthyphro Dilemma

In Plato’s Euthyphro, we read about how Socrates is asking Euthyphro of piety and about the situation he is in. Euthyphro must judge a murder, and to the surprise of the audience, the murder was his father. As the scene goes on, Socrates keeps asking what Euthyphro means by piety. In the end, Euthyphro finally answers that piety is what the God’s love or demand. In The Ethical Life, they modify the question asked by Socrates to “Is an action morally right because God commands it, or does God command an action because it is right?”. This question brings up many other questions.

Someone who would believe a statement such as this one would most likely be in agreement with the Divine Command Theory---the reason being that the main claim in this theory is, all that is morally right, is right because God commands it so. Therefore in order to believe in the Divine Command Theory, one would need to be a strong believer in God---and would truly believe that if there were no God, morality would be absent. With this in mind, if God is the creator of all that is morally right, and there turns out to be no god at all, then nothing is morally wrong or can be capable of being morally wrong---would be a statement that non-believers of the Divine Command Theory would believe, and believe that morality can exist on its own, with or without a God. In this paper I will focus on the Divine Command Theory in relation to the statement above, and those who would oppose this statement. In doing so, I will attempt to show why I believe that those opposing this statement have a more plausible view.

In Plato 's Euthyphro, Socrates and Euthyphro discuss the nature of piety. Euthyphro first proposed that piety is that which the gods love. His proposal was quickly objected by Socrates though, since the gods often disputed amongst themselves and therefore what one loves can be what another hates. Euthyphro then revised his hypothesis to say that piety is that which the gods love unanimously and for the moment this was their conclusion. This definition however, that piety is what the gods love unanimously, further proposed the question of whether the gods love the pious because it is pious or whether the pious is pious solely because the gods love it. If it is true that the gods love the pious because it is pious then the definition of

What Benedict is saying here is that an individual can never discover the depths of himself or herself without the scrutiny of a culture as a guideline. For if he has no culture, he has no way of measurement! Likewise, culture cannot exist if it does not reap from the actions and behavior of human beings. In other words, individual personality and culture cannot exist solely without another.

I believe that God commands it because it is already right or wrong. This could possibly mean that whether or not God exist, those right or wrong actions were already right or wrong instinctively. The only difference is that, some people believe that they need a creator or God to tell them what is morally correct or wrong to believe it is.

The consequences of accepting that the goodness of actions consists simply in the fact that God favours them are obviously disagreeable. However, the consequences of accepting the alternative also appear unfortunate. If it is maintained that God favours certain actions because they are objectively good, it seems that their goodness is independent of His will. But such a view appears to be inconsistent with the conception of God as the omnipotent creator and sustainer of all that is. It means that there is a realm of moral values which exist quite apart from God's creative will and to which His will must conform. Such a view must inevitably appear blasphemous to all those who believe in God, for it makes God out to be less than He is.

Benedict focused principally on isolated tribes in her essay Anthropology and the Abnormal, stating “Only among these simpler peoples has there been sufficient isolation to give opportunity for the development of localized social forms.”(CR 134). She drew upon these studies to propose several key arguments to her stance of moral relativism. The first of these is the observation of actions deemed as normal—action which falls within the expected behavior of a society. These normal behaviors come about necessarily as a group polarizes in the presence of natural human behaviors, as Benedict states “…it [the behavior] confronts us with a choice of two possible attitudes. One is to brand it as abnormal and reprehensible…The other is to make it an essential attribute of ideal man.”

Does morality stem from God? Or does it exist independently of his presence, not subject to arbitrary decisions? The first discussion over these questions appeared in Plato's Euthyphro, in which Plato chronicles the proceedings of a highly repetitive argument between Socrates and Euthyphro, a prophet and holy man, over the nature of piety and holiness. The questions produced in this dialogue have been expanded to remain relevant even in a modern religious context. It has achieved so much fame that the core question presented in this dialogue is now known as the Euthyphro Dilemma. In the dialogue, Socrates presents Euthyphro with a choice, "Is what is holy loved by the gods because it is holy, or is it holy because it is

In this paper, I’m going to discuss the argument that the famous American anthropologist, Ruth Benedict, has put forth regarding ‘ethical relativism’. Ethical relativism is the theory that holds that morality is relative to the norms and values of one's culture or society. That is, whether an action is classified as right or wrong depends on the moral norms of the society in which it is practiced. The same action may be morally right in one society but be morally wrong in another. For the ethical relativist, there are no universal moral standards -- standards that can be universally applied to

Now that’s all well and good, except for the fact that the logical problem of evil spends so much time focused on the omnipotent and the omnibenevolent aspects of God that is all together neglects the fact that God is also omniscient. He knows everything, past, present, and future. Therefore, it is only logical to assume that God also knows the best way to achieve the greatest good, which as established is the singular goal of an omnibenevolent being. If such knowledge is true, as it must be according to the laws of Omni-three, then it is possible that God has determined that the greatest good can only come by human-choice, also known as freewill, not by His force. In a bit, I will attempt to explain just

The conflict between the Divine Command Theory and the Euthyphro objection come with questions about who sets the rules of morality, and how it can be assumed that these rules are justifiable. On one hand, the Divine Command Theory defends the idea that an act is morally right because God commands it and wrong because He commands against it. This sets God’s will as the foundation of ethics, making morally good actions those that comply with His commandments. This religion-based concept becomes problematic when it runs into the Euthyphro dilemma, founded from Plato’s Euthyphro dating back to 395 BC. The argument centralizes on why it is that God commands rightful actions, bringing in the question of, “Are moral acts commanded by God because they are morally good, or does God command things to be right because He has good reasons for them?” The Euthyphro argument creates its foundation on the idea that either God has reasons for His commands, or that He lacks reasons for them. This divides up the Divine Command Theory in two ways, either making the theory wrong or portraying God as an imperfect being. If God does have reasons for His commands, then these reasons are what would make the actions right or wrong. God’s reasons would stand as the basis of morality, instead of God’s commandment itself. God having reasons would insinuate that goodness existed before any direction from God because otherwise, there wouldn’t be any commandment. Morality would have to stand independent

The Euthyphro Dilemma The Euthyphro dilemma is a dilemma for those who believe in divine command moral theory, that there is a supreme omni God. If you do not believe in a supreme omni God than this is not a dilemma. The question that must be asked is, does God says things because they are good, or are things good because God says they are good? There are a total of five possible solutions but most of them have one major problem.

How exactly can we know God’s will? In divine command theory, God’s will is the only thing that determines morality. Theists will first point to the religious scriptures...but which one? A Christian might think it is obviously the Bible, but an objective viewer will have to choose between the Bible, Quran, Vedas etc. You can not say look at which one has the better moral arguments, since you’re trying to derive morality from the book! Another common source for morality is through people who have spoke to God. But many people claim this, so how do we know who is right? Someone might say that God told him to destroy a village; does this mean he is right? The final option is that God gave us reason and knowledge, and so morality is instilled in our very nature. But then, what is the point of believing in certain religions if people are going to act the same anyway? And people don’t act the same, so does that mean God is responsible for

However, Plato’s dilemma is more applicable for the Christian, since we believe that God must be the ultimate source of the good, so a standard that is higher than God is problematic; and we are forced to deal with the apparent arbitrariness of a God who makes things good by commanding them. What if God commanded that we torture babies? That would imply that torturing babies was good, which is strongly counter-intuitive.3 A possible answer to this objection is that what is good is grounded in God’s character, and his commands flow from his character. While this is true, it does not really solve the dilemma – it only pushes the criticism back another step. What if God liked torturing babies? That would still imply that torturing babies was good, and it would still be strongly counter-intuitive.

Good will comes from doing actions out of duty. The definition of duty here is similar to the sense of pledge. This is very specific in that the action must be done because of duty, not simply in accordance with duty (Kant 10). Performing actions in this way gives the action itself moral worth. Both duty and moral worth