Christian moral principle essay

Question 1

bible as authority AO1?

Answer 1

• Biblicists such as Clavin see bible as direct messages from God, ‘as a whole is in perfect harmony’ as this is the only authority needed
• Bibles teaches through God’s people not just stories, christians learn how to keep commandments at face value as well as in their heart eg sermon on the mount
• literalists, don’t obey every word at face value but all they do need is in the bible (fundamentals of faith found in the bible)

Question 2

bibles as authority AO2?
scholars against

Answer 2

• Karl marx warns a possible error of this view,there is danger that a high view of the bible leads to bibliolatry (worship of the bible) which can cause issues ad the bible is a witness to the truth rather than being the truth itself
• For catholic theology the bible is central but it is not the one and only comprehensive guide, arguing that the tradition of the catholic church should also be used as a form of authority

Question 3

bible as authority AO2?

Answer 3

✅
- Logical that God would want people to know how to live, which the bible offers
- The bible has to be viewed from a contextual perspective, with it being written hundreds of years ago it will have outdated views
❌
- God is ineffable, he couldn’t be completely known just through human words
- For some christians this is too irrational to agree with eg liberal christians who believe the bible just takes inspiration of God’s world due to the range of messages and contradictions
- It can’t solve modern issues?
- Gospels have clearly used each other as sources and edited each others, making it unlikely that God could have written then

Question 4

love as the main principle ? AO1

Answer 4

• Jesus’ demonstration of unconditional love (healing bleeding women)
• John 4;7 love comes from God: so christian love must reflect that
• Agape love is better way to describes love as it differs from other types of love mentioned in the new testament such as Philia (friendship)
• Agape is at the heart of Jesus’ teachings (prominent theme of NT) with him summarising the law as people should love God and their neighbour as much as they love themselves
• God gave us reasoning ability to do right over wrong, in any situation there are no specific guidelines we have to choose ourselves, Circumstances of themselves cannot change the moral quality of acts themselves; they can make neither good nor right an action that is in itself evil

Question 5

scholars as love as the main principle?

Answer 5

• Tillich, the Protestant theologian, suggested that Christians should use three ethical principles: justice, love and wisdom, of which love is the most important. He criticised ‘moral Puritanism’ for being too closely tied to fixed rules, and argued instead for love guided by wisdom as a person-centred approach to ethics (influenced Fletcher)
• Joseph Fletcher ethical theory of situation ethics is driven purely by love proving that love is sufficient and complex enough to base an entire theory around

Question 6

principle of love being sufficient ? AO2

Answer 6

✅
- As Jesus is God on earth surely we should be following his exact teachings and try to ensure our lives are lived as close to his as possible
- Situation ethics puts people first which mirrors how Jesus always put people above the law, ‘the sabbath was made for the man not the man for the sabbath’
- Kung highlights how Jesus challenged rule-based ethics
❌
- Is it overly simplistic and subjective, love is always changing?
- Pope francis believed that love is central to christian life but not a moral guidance, rather it is a character that we must have in order to understand and follow the church’s rules