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I've just finished reading an intellectually stimulating book: Moral Clarity: A Guide for Grown-Up Idealists by Susan Neiman. The author is an American philosopher who has taught at Yale and Tel-Aviv University, and is currently director of the Einstein Forum in Berlin.
A fascinating part of this book for me is Neiman's discussion of Abraham. She talks about the 'two Abrahams' -- the Abraham of Genesis 18, and the Abraham of Genesis 22.
In Genesis 18 Abraham bargains with God for mercy on the people of Sodom. Abraham thinks it is not fair to destroy everyone in the city just because some of them are unrighteous. That would not be justice, says Abraham. In other words, Abraham has an idea of Justice that trumps the intention of God. Instead of simply going along with God's plan, this Abraham uses his reasoning powers and his idea of justice to argue with God. This is the Enlightenment Abraham.
In Genesis 22 Abraham obeys God without any question, even though God's command is very unreasonable. Because God is telling Abraham to kill his son Isaac. This is the religious (fundamentalist?) Abraham. Unquestioning. Not raising rational arguments.
Neiman suggests that these two passages from the Bible give us two different moral paradigms. One is about submissive to the irrational; the other is about questioning authority and trying to make sense out of the world.
Christian theology (as in Aquinas) tries to keep the two together: divine revelation and reason, not one or the other. However, as I read the Bible I find it necessary in some places to reject the so-called divine commands as unreasonable. There does seem to be a higher Common Sense (or what theology calls Natural Law) that sometimes clashes with parts of Scripture. We all know this. That's why we read the Bible selectively. We select the parts we agree with and ignore the rest. All of us do this.
Neiman goes so far as to say, "Any ethics that needs religion is bad ethics." Well. I think what she is doing in her philosophy is building a moral ethic on 'good religion,' not religion in general. Even though some of her statements will seem sacrilegious to Christian readers, I'm in sympathy with her agenda. Especially with so much fundamentalism around these days, we need to lift up the Abraham of Genesis 18. Neiman also uses the Book of Job as an example of the 'good religion' that risks questioning God.
Moral Clarity has sections on the values of Happiness, Reason, Reverence, and Hope. There is a section on Heroes that exemplify authentic moral life. I especially found useful the section on the relationship between realism and idealism.
As an American I am drawn to the morality behind the words, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal..." Some things do seem to be 'self-evident.' Abraham took the self-evident notion of Justice and argued with God. And God gave in. Which must mean that Abraham was right.
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