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I just finished reading the most recent defense of Natural Theology and Natural Law. It was written by Stephen Grabill, Rediscovering the Natural Law in Reformed Theological Ethics (Eerdmans, 2006). My first question was who is Stephen Grabill? On page ix he acknowledges that he wrote the book for the Acton Institute for the Study of Religion in Liberty located in Grand Rapids, Michigan. This foundation is sponsoring seminars on Natural Theology and Natural Law at such places as Calvin College. This book is recommended by J. P. Moreland and Budziszewski.
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Who recommends Morey's books? The theologically and philosophically perfect?
What's the above supposed to prove? That he excels in circumstantial ad hominems. Granted...long ago.
I've also heard that his latest book on Eastern Orthodoxy suffers from "numerous grammatical and spelling mistakes." Does that prove anything?
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I went on the Internet and found the Acton Institute was established in honor of Lord Acton, a fanatical Roman Catholic scholar, who fought against the evangelical gospel in England. Budziszewski is a Protestant who converted to Roman Catholicism and has connection to the Acton Institute. I found that the head of the Institute is headed by a Jesuit priest.
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Perhaps the simple minded who are taught to recoil from any mention of a, gasp!, Catholic, will be bullied or persuaded into viewing the book's *content* as false.
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What this book attempts to demonstrate is that all of the Reformers, including Calvin, still retained much of Medieval-Roman Catholic thought. This is no surprise to us as both Luther and Calvin retained such ridiculous doctrines as the perpetual virginity of Mary.
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So the book succeeds in what it sets out to do...
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The Roman Catholic Church proclaimed that ethics and morality were not based upon Scripture alone, but also upon the findings of human reason. They used the little clichés that Natural truths and Laws are “self-evident,” “intuitive,” and “universal.” These clichés are actually psychological terms, not philosophical in nature. Something “Feels” right or wrong to me. Intuition is a psychological term.
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Of course this is a complete straw man of natural law theorists. This of course sets up a straw man, painting the picture that natural law theorists simply try to prove their position based on "feelings." I have read more than my fair share of these books, and I can conclude that Morey is either playing dumb, or is dumb.
And, what does he mean that morality is "based on Scripture alone?" This is vague and subject to a whole host of interpretations. Should we stone people? Or is Morey going to build in qualifications? And, when he does, will he bravado wear off?
Intuition is not a psychological term, and Morey's definition (i.e., "feels right) is the first one debunked in almost every philosophical work that deals with intuition that I've read. Intuition is actually a powerful philosophical argument, used in many areas of the discipline.
Indeed, "based on Scripture" has become a cliché in itself!
Furthermore, as many erudite scholars have pointed out, the OT laws represent a sort of moral basement. They were not intended to be the best expressions of the highest laws. They weren't meant to be moral ceilings. That's why divorce was allowed for many reasons as long as you got a certificate.
Does he mean that the *principles* are in the Bible? Okay, but we still *apply* these principles to situations. We must use our reasoning here. We must look at the world, not the Bible. If our reasoning is completely untrustworthy, Morey shoots himself in the foot, or has a completely impractical ethic. We can dismiss him out of hand when trying to deal with tough questions.
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The book is an attempt to move Calvinists from sola scriptura to sola ratione. That the Reformers believed in General Revelation I fully grant. But Grabill makes the astounding assertion that General Revelation is Natural Theology.
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No it wasn't. And to violate the 9th commandment in a discussion on ethics is nothing short of ironic. Moreover, Morey himself told us what the book *attempts* to do:
QUOTE MOREY: "What this book
attempts to demonstrate is that all of the Reformers, including Calvin, still retained much of Medieval-Roman Catholic thought." END QUOTE MOREY.
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General Revelation is God’s activity whereas Natural Theology is man’s activity. General Revelation is happening 24 hours a day, 7 days a week throughout the entire universe. Natural Theology is the failed attempt of a few Western professors of religion from such universities as Oxford and Harvard. For most of human history, Natural Theology and Natural Law were never believed in or taught by the majority of mankind.
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Grabill doesn't confuse the two.
And, notice the question begging epithets: "failed attempt."
Let's wait until Sudduth's book comes out and compare the work of a top-notch scholar against Morey's. Oh, perhaps we can dismiss Sudduth since he comes from Oxford!
And, what did they "fail" at? Morey doesn't tell us. My guess is that when he specifies, he'll be shown to not understand what they *attempted* to do. Of course they probably "failed at" what Morey wants them to achieve. But, really, is that a "critique?"
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The fatal flaw in Grabill’s book is found on the last page (191). He admits that while the Reformers believed that General Revelation was taking place all the time, man’s depravity blocked the light of General Revelation. Man could be saved only by special revelation.
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I don't get why this is a "fatal flaw?" Natural Theology and Natural Law aren't trying to *save* people.
On this page Grabill says,
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"Calvin, Vermigli, and the Reformed Scholastics all share the conviction that Scripture is the cognitive foundation (principium cognoscendi) of theology and that moral arguments can be based on axioms derived from that principium. Consequently, they recognized the existence of a natural knowledge of God that is present in the natural order and discernable either in conjunction with or apart from Scripture. This knowledge, however, has no saving efficacy and merely serves to render all people to be "without excuse" for their moral infractions, as Romans 1:20 attests. ... This study has endeavored to rediscover the contribution of select representatives of reformed Orthodoxy....We have seen, contrary to current scholarly opinion, that some of the most formative voices in the Reformed tradition thought the diminished natural faculties still functioned sufficiently to reveal the general precepts of the natural moral law." --Grabill, RNLRTE, 191
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Fans of Morey have just seen his dishonesty. Morey gives an impression of Grabill that is contradictory to what Grabill is asserting. There is no fatal flaw here. By my lights, there's not much wrong here at all.
Nothing excuses such blatant dishonesty. Morey does not seemed concerned to properly represent others so much as to "sound the alarm" to the sheeple who won't bother to read Grabill for themselves. I doubt Morey even read the book. 191 is the last page. He probably found out who Grabill was, and that was enough for him to dismiss him, and then he flipped around, found the last page, and thought he had something to offer a "reason" why he could be so dismissive of Grabill. But I've come to expect this kind of anti-intellectual, circle the wagons, emotion driven responses by Morey. For someone so opposed to appeals to emotion, he sure does it quite a bit. (Btw, Grabill also published a paper in the WTJ on NL and the noetic effects of sin. Morey is simply attacking based on, well, er, intuition!...the bad kind, that is...)
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It is interesting to note that on pages 6-7 Grabill lists the Natural Theologians who support Natural Law. Among others, he lists David Van Drunen, who has recently joined the faculty at Westminster Seminary (Escondido, CA). This is interesting because in a series of email exchanges I had with Dr. Van Drunen, he denied that he was a Natural Theologian. Under my questioning he did admit that his book Law & Custom: The Thought of Thomas Aquinas, the Future of the Common Law (Peter Lange), was financially underwritten by the Jesuits. It was dedicated to a Jesuit priest. His education was by the Jesuits.
When I had other people contact Westminster concerning whether Van Drunen was a Natural Theologian trained by the Jesuits, they were told that none of these things were true. Grabill’s book is the final straw that breaks the camel’s back. The Jesuits finally have someone on the faculty of
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Well, a lot of this probably depends on how NL is being defined by all the parties. And, DVD could accept NL *without* being a "Natural Theologian."
Grabill did write the forward for DVD's book (mentioned in my post above), and DVD's book is also put out by the Acton Institute.
I also don't see the relevance in his circumstantial ad hominem remarks.
It also looks like it is Morey who confuses NL with NT.
Anyway, I view Morey like I view Gordon Clark devotés.
And, Van Til was actually quite sensible and level headed. He wouldn't have called DVD's book "heretical." Exclamation marks aside! If he would have thrown that term around for something like this, would he called Morey a heretic for being a credo baptist? He can't "deduce" that from the Bible, so why request this of everyone else?