RSSKirk: For and Against the Natural Law
W.H. Chellis
So far I have been accused of holding to high a view of the natural law and to low a view of it. I want to do justice to a proper view so will allow the venerable ghost of Kirk to speak. I appreciate Kirk’s view as it seems to me very close to that of the old southern Presbyterians.
brentski76
March 29th, 2007 at 11:04 pm
Perhaps it’s been suggested already, but David VanDrunen has written a monograph called A BIBLICAL CASE FOR NATURAL LAW (Acton institute; Series called Studies in Christian Social Ethics and Economics). I’m reading it concurrently with Hart’s book.
W.H. Chellis
March 30th, 2007 at 8:21 am
David’s little book is helpful and very intersting. I take issues with a couple of areas but think it is very worth while. He has a chapter for a forthcoming book that will explore the relationship between natural law and the covenant of works. He is doing good work.
W.H. Chellis
March 30th, 2007 at 8:28 am
That said, Kirk’s view of natural law should be taken into very careful consideration. The claim of “higher law” has often been abused by radicals. Who interprets its meaning and application. What happens when some disagree? Dabney was very interested in the issue as well. Seward and other “higher law” advocates saw their peculiar views of what constituted the “higher law” as more authoritative than the Constitution. How should politicians handle such a problem. What is the role of individual conscience in relationship to our consitutional order.
Speaking in generalitites about the natural law is one thing, applying it within the context of real life politics is harder. This is why I have a deeply love for the old unwritten common law system. There the natural law was found emanating from sundry and ancient usages, traditions, prescriptions, prejudices, and cases.
I am not in favor of a neo-Thomist rationalist approach to the natural law, nor an immediate “self-evident truth” approach that seems to be advocated by R. Scott Clark (at least I think that is what he has been saying), but a non-deconstructionst approach rooted in tradition and immemorial usage.
R. Scott Clark
March 30th, 2007 at 3:36 pm
Hi Bill,
I don’t think that the human conscience is the *only* source of knowledge of the natural law but it’s one place where the substance of “love God and love neighbor” can be found. It is found in Scripture but it it is also reflected in other places such as custom and culture. It might be helpful to distinguish between the civil and theological uses of natural law (since, I think we do that already), and between natural law considered broadly and narrowly. In this discussion, I should have made these distinctions.
W.H. Chellis
March 30th, 2007 at 4:48 pm
Scott, You see. We are not that far apart.