John 1:4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.
Jesus Himself said;
“I am the light of the world.” (John 9:5)
The Apostle John said that Jesus;
was the true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world.
Of course we know that there was no fault in He who was “the light of the world.” So, the fact that men did not and do not comprehend the light is found in the fact, as John’s Gospel reveals in chapter 3;
19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed.
The practitioners of evil know the darkness and they know the light. They cannot hate the light and refuse to come to the light unless they know yet suppress what they know about the light. The lovers of darkness remain in the dark because they prefer the dark over the light and as they remain in the dark they chant, “there is no light, there is no light.” This is because such men remain dead in their sins and trespasses. Their intellect, will, and affections each and all experience the total effects of the fall. It is because they are sons of darkness that they hate the light.
These Scriptural truths by themselves ought to give the Natural Law fanboys pause before pushing their Aristotelian non-Scriptural position that teaches that fallen man’s intellect is not completely fallen and so can read “Nature” (however that might be defined) aright. But there is more. The Holy Spirit can say in I Corinthians 2:14
14 But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
Yet, despite this testimony of Scripture the Natural Law advocates now blanketing the church in the chemtrail “theology” of both the R2K Escondido crowd and the Dr. Stephen Wolfe Christian Nationalism crowd are poisoning the Church.
Over and over again the Scripture teaches that man, starting from himself and his own resources, runs from capital T truth. Scripture teaches also in Romans 8;
“… the carnal mind is enmity (warfare) against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be.”
Fallen man, as Paul says earlier in Romans as the wrath of God upon Him;
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, 19 because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. 20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, 21 because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
When non-Christians consider anything that can be found in what people call “natural law” they invariably use what they find to further their sinful ends. So, for example, fallen man finds gender realities in Natural law and for a season fallen man may well conform to gender realities when living in a predominantly Christian shaped nation. But even in the times of “conforming” one does not find the non-Christian living out their gender to the glory of God. Instead, fallen men prioritize themselves and their needs above their spouses. Then, over the course of time, as we are seeing now in the West, natural man, using natural law and right reason insist that there are no gender realities to conform to. They insist that the idea that one man goes with one woman for life is antiquated and mistaken. They suppress even more overtly than their heathen fathers the idea of gender realities. They suppress the truth in unrighteousness. They prefer the darkness to light. They are at enmity with God. The idea that natural law is going to somehow be the means whereby men are going to give up their suppression, warfare, and preference for the dark is a Aristotelian fairytale – a fairytale that more and more of the Christian church is taking up.
At one time natural law theory taught that “Nature” was the objective, external, corporeal universe that was objectively out there and could be known by all men. There was no consensus on where these laws of nature came from. They just were … and these eternally existing natural laws which existed autonomously governed both the gods and men.
When the philosophical world was ruled by the empiricists the laws of nature along with the external, material, objective universe were just out there in the cosmos. But as the worldview of men shifted from empiricism to different forms of idealism this “out there-ness” view of natural law was eclipsed and in its place the idea of natural law shifted to being located to the internal, subjective, non-corporeal “mind” of man. Human reason itself became the locus of Natural Law. Autonomous man, starting with and from himself could name what the laws of nature were. In this evolution of natural law man even more clearly became his own god determining good from evil.
This has always been and remains the achilles heel of natural law theory. There is no stable definition of natural law. It varies from man to man depending on what philosophical matrix he is living in. It may be the case that the Romanticists/Transcendentalist, the logical positivist, the Deist, and the Utilitarians (to cite random examples) may all agree that Natural Law exists but given their differing philosophical pre-commitments they will never agree on just exactly what Natural Law is as it is concretely defined, and indeed will offer up contradictory definitions.
In the end there is no objective reality in the subjective construct that is Natural Law theory. To be sure God’s creation declares God’s truths. No one disagrees with that. The disagreement arises when the idea is advanced that men’s will and intellect is not so fallen that residual ability remains so that man can, starting with himself (as fallen), as his own beginning point, identify true truth. The objection arises that fallen man starting autonomously with himself will always identify as true truth a fallen “true truth.”
In order for Thomistic Natural Law theory to work force must be used to re-create consensus as to what Natural Law “clearly teaches.” In our current situation this will have to be a force that moves Natural Law away from existing as within each individual to a Natural Law that is once again pretended to be objective. Existentialism and postmodernism, as well as variant forms of Idealism will have to be squashed in order for non-Christian Natural Law to work again. I have no opposition to those being squashed but I remain opposed to a Natural Law that pretends to be objective but really remains somebody’s subjective inflated to serve as a pretend societal objective.
Instead, what we as Christians should pray for is for the West to return to its Scriptural foundation for truth. We must once again embrace the idea that “in thy Light we see light.” We must understand that the axioms of Scripture and necessary consequences of those axioms form our epistemological foundation as a people. The God of the Bible once again must be our starting point when it comes to true truth. Only by having God has our starting point will we reason with a God honoring methodology that results in God honoring conclusions.
Away then with all Thomistic notions of Natural Law. It was bad when the Stoics owned it and it was bad when the Muslims Ibn Tufayl and Averroes embraced it and it remained bad when Aquinas pinched it from Averroes and “Christianized” it.
The historian Will Durant saw origins of “Natural Law” thus – the Stoics made the last and greatest attempt of pagan antiquity to find some kind of universal moral code that would not be (directly) dependent on theology:
https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.55010/page/n699/mode/2up?view=theater
“Since an increasing number of Epicurus’ followers interpreted him as counseling the pursuit of personal pleasure, the essential problem of ethics—what is the good life?—had reached not a solution but only a new formulation: how can the natural epicureanism of the individual be reconciled with the stoicism necessary to the group and the race?—how can the members of a society be inspired to, or frightened into, the self-control and self-sacrifice indispensable to collective survival? The old religion could no longer fulfill this function; the old city-state no longer lifted men up to self-forgetfulness. Educated Greeks turned from religion to philosophy for an answer; they called in philosophers to advise or console them in the crises of life; they asked from philosophy some world view that would give to human existence a permanent meaning and value in the scheme of things, and that would enable them to look without terror upon the certainty of death. Stoicism is the last effort of classical antiquity to find a natural ethic. Zeno tried once more to accomplish the task in which Plato had failed.”
Carl Schmitt was a “pro-Nazi” or “Fascist” thinker who yet had many genuine insights. What is more, Schmitt may not have been personally very devout, but traditional Christian worldview does seem to have influenced his thought, helping him to reject modernist Liberal worldview:
https://restorus.org/articles/politics/book-review-carl-schmitts-concept-political/
“The more benevolent you believe humans to be, the more radical your politics. Schmitt roots these views in theology. He argues that theology is only real theology when the theologian considers human beings to be sinful by nature.[13] Schmitt elaborates by saying, “The fundamental theological dogma of the evilness of the world and man leads, just as does the distinction of friend and enemy, to a categorization of men and makes impossible the undifferentiated optimism of a universal conception of man. In a good world among good people, only peace, security, and harmony prevail. Priests and theologians are here just as superfluous as politicians and statesmen.”[14]
…
We may only content ourselves by noting that Schmitt ends chapter seven by resting politics on the truth in Genesis 3.15. To affirm the scripture is to affirm Schmitt’s politics; to deny the friend/enemy distinction is to deny Genesis 3.15, which for Schmitt is a mere step away from denying the rest of the Word.”
And it seems that Schmitt, being an intelligent man with lost of historical knowledge, was able to see the roots of modernistic Enlightenment hubris, with its reliance on abstract “natural law,” which leads to utopian egalitarian theories, in the reason-worshipping Stoic philosophy, which did not know, or refused to know, the Christian notion of human reason being tainted by Original Sin – but because of his Roman Catholic bias, he apparently tried to differentiate between the Stoic “bad natural law tradition” and the Aristotelian-Thomistic “good natural law tradition”:
https://archive.org/details/chapoutot-johann-the-law-of-blood-thinking-and-acting-as-ns-2018/page/57/mode/2up?view=theater
“The French Revolution had designated the individual as the beginning and ending of the law. It made the law— something voted on and therefore decided by Parliament—into the only valid norm. In this, the French Revolutionaries were the heirs of a long tradition, one that Carl Schmitt traced back to the Stoics, and specifically to the scholar and Stoic philosopher Chrysippus, according to whom the law was “king, overseer, ruler, and master over morality and immorality, right and wrong.”142 This had been followed by the natural law of the Classical and Enlightenment ages, “the rational law of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, … which is part abstract normativism, part decisionism.” A good Catholic, Schmitt did not condemn “the Aristotelian-Thomistic natural law of the Middle Ages.” This law, which was a law of nature above all, and a theoretical consecration of the order willed by God, was, “from the point of view of legal science, the concrete order.”143”
Fallen man distorts and suppresses special revelation too, but still understands it well enough to aggravate his condemnation. The Jews heard Christ preach and understood Him well enough to make their condemnation worse than Sodom and Gomorrah.
So also with general revelation. Fallen man holds the truth (like the Athenians who knew there was only one God) but in unrighteousness (like the Athenians who built many altars). But holding the truth in unrighteousness does not mean fallen man has lost that truth. The Athenians worshipped many gods but still knew there was only one God.
Paul makes the same point in Romans 1:32, after listing all the abominable ways fallen man suppresses the truth: “Who, KNOWING the judgment of God, that they that do such things are worthy of death.” They suppress the truth, but they still know that there is one God, who will judge them for transgressing His commandments.
Paul lists violations of nearly all the 10 commandments in the previous verses, showing that everyone still has some knowledge of both tables of the moral law.
Natural law may be suppressed, but it is still there, and we can appeal to it when speaking to people who reject the Bible. They can’t obey it, and even if they could, it wouldn’t save them, because it doesn’t reveal an atonement for their sins in violating it. But it is still useful. The civil magistrate must punish sins against the light of nature (Westminster Confession of Faith).
The natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, i.e., the Scriptures which He inspired men to write. Paul is describing special revelation 1 Cor 2:14, not general revelation or natural law.
Exposing Natural Law For The Cheat It Is (II); A Conversation
Joshua writes;
Fallen man distorts and suppresses special revelation too, but still understands it well enough to aggravate his condemnation. The Jews heard Christ preach and understood Him well enough to make their condemnation worse than Sodom and Gomorrah.
Bret responds;
Nobody denies that fallen man suppresses all God’s revelation. However, with Special Revelation there is a specific text to which we can point and appeal. Natural Law has no such text. Nobody can tell you what Natural Law is. What library do I go to in order to check out a volume of Natural Law? Is it Wm. Paley’s Natural Law? Rousseau’s Natural Law or De Sade’s Natural Law? Is it Idealism’s Natural Law? Romanticism’s Natural Law? Is it Deism’s Natural Law? Anaximander’s? Heraclitus’? Zeno’s? Plato’s? Why should Aristotle via Aquinas be prioritized in terms of what Natural Law is?
“Natural” laws must be accessible and definable if we are going to apply them to society as civil law. Since everyone disagrees over what is or is not a “natural law,” how do we determine who is right? If we appeal to the Bible as the “higher law” by which we judge “natural laws,” then the basis of “natural law” is overturned.
Scripture itself teaches in the context of Israel looking for other sources of knowledge;
Isaiah 8:20 To the law and to the testimony! If they (the other false sources of knowledge) do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.
Here is what the author of the Heidelberg Catechism thought of Natural Law.
“Furthermore, although natural demonstrations teach nothing concerning God that is false, yet men, without the knowledge of God’s word, obtain nothing from them except false notions and conceptions of God; both because these demonstrations do not contain as much as is delivered in his word, and also because even those things which may be understood naturally, men, nevertheless, on account of innate corruption and blindness, receive and interpret falsely, and so corrupt it in various ways.”
Zacharias Ursinus
Commentary on Heidelberg Catechism
Joshua writes;
So also with general revelation. Fallen man holds the truth (like the Athenians who knew there was only one God) but in unrighteousness (like the Athenians who built many altars). But holding the truth in unrighteousness does not mean fallen man has lost that truth. The Athenians worshipped many gods but still knew there was only one God.
Bret responds,
First, we must insist that general revelation does not equal Natural Law. You seem to be conflating these two distinct ideas.
Of General Revelation we can say that it is an activity of God which began at Creation and is Universal throughout the universe being continuous and unrelenting (Psalm 19). In God’s General Revelation what is witnessed are the attributes of God (Romans 1:19f) and the sinfulness of man. This non-verbal witness that is General Revelation renders all men without excuse and does not reveal the way of salvation.
Natural Law on the other hand is the activity of man warping General Revelation which began in Greece with Zeno of Citium. Natural Law, unlike General Revelation is not universal but can be found chiefly in Western Europe and America. As such, unlike General Revelation, Natural Law is not continuous and is only received by some men at some times in some places. Natural Law discusses two issue: the possible existence of god/gods and the problem of evil – anthropologically considered. The origin of Natural Law is man centered reason, subjective experience, feelings, or humanistic faith – all based on humanist philosophic discourse, yielding conflicting ways of salvation.
General Revelation is theological – God revealing to fallen man. Natural Law is philosophical – man starting from himself seeking to climb into “God’s” wisdom. Strictly speaking, man suppresses General Revelation while embracing Natural Law.
I never wrote that fallen man has “lost the truth of general revelation.” The heavens remain declaring the glory of God and the firmament remains showing forth His handiwork. God continues to reveal Himself via General Revelation, but man, using Natural Law blunts God’s General Revelation by means of suppressing the truth in unrighteousness.
After his analysis of whether Natural Law should be conflated with General Revelation theologian G. C. Berkouwer wrote;
“the identification of general revelation and natural theology is an untenable position.”
Joshua writes,
Paul makes the same point in Romans 1:32, after listing all the abominable ways fallen man suppresses the truth: “Who, KNOWING the judgment of God, that they that do such things are worthy of death.” They suppress the truth, but they still know that there is one God, who will judge them for transgressing His commandments.
Bret responds;
Perhaps I have been unclear. I do not negate the idea that God is sending General Revelation. I do not deny that men are responsible. What I deny is that fallen man can use General Revelation as a means to organize his social order existence, and that is because fallen man suppresses the truth in unrighteousness. So, fallen man knows but denies he knows and because he is at war with God (Romans 8:7, I Cor. 2:14) General Revelation and especially Natural Law is not a means of discerning for him.
Joshua writes,
Paul lists violations of nearly all the 10 commandments in the previous verses, showing that everyone still has some knowledge of both tables of the moral law.
Bret responds,
A knowledge that does them no good because they are suppressing that knowledge in unrighteousness. All this knowledge can do is leave them accountable for their suppression.
Joshua writes,
Natural law may be suppressed, but it is still there, and we can appeal to it when speaking to people who reject the Bible. They can’t obey it, and even if they could, it wouldn’t save them, because it doesn’t reveal an atonement for their sins in violating it. But it is still useful. The civil magistrate must punish sins against the light of nature (Westminster Confession of Faith).
Bret responds,
THIRD AND FOURTH HEADS OF DOCTRINE Of the Corruption of Man, His Conversion to God, and the Manner Thereof
Article 4 There remain, however, in man since the fall, the glimmerings of natural light, whereby he retains some knowledge of God, of natural things, and of the differences between good and evil, and discovers some regard for virtue, good order in society, and for maintaining an orderly external deportment. But so far is this light of nature from being sufficient to bring him to a saving knowledge of God and to true conversion, that he is incapable of using it aright even in things natural and civil. Nay, further, this light, such as it is, man in various ways renders wholly polluted and holds it in unrighteousness, by doing which he becomes inexcusable before God.
Joshua writes,
The natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, i.e., the Scriptures which He inspired men to write. Paul is describing special revelation 1 Cor 2:14, not general revelation or natural law.
Bret responds;
2:15 suggests that you’re reading of 2:14 is errant.
“But the spiritual man judges ALL things, yet he is judged by no one.”
Finally, a favorite explanation of mine on the meaning of Natural Law as coming from a heathen. Start at 2:00.