Lost Boys and the Road to Carnage

I will be examining an excerpt named 'the death of god' from Simon Blackburn's book, Being Good. The aim of this excerpt is to question the acquisition of ethics from religion, particularly Christianity. The piece highlights problems with using religion to obtain moral standards and suggests that religion is not the foundation of ethics but rather a 'symbolic showcase' of a more natural and human moral code which we can decide upon ourselves.

Blackburn begins by describing how the reach of religious influence is very wide and thus many people's sense of ethics is based on principles inferred to them through the Bible and religious teachings. He then references a letter written to a fundamentalist agony aunt which displays many pitfalls in the Christian way of thinking. The scenarios given make the old teachings seem absurd, for example sacrificing a bull and owning slaves. If such large flaws are overlooked in religious teachings it would seem to follow that the guiding principles which allow for this are also flawed and hence the ethics of many people under religious influence are wayward to say the least. However it can be argued that religion is adjusted with time and these pitfalls are only apparent under rather radical approaches such as fundamentalism and literalism.

His next point is a criticism of Jesus' character and other teachings included in the Bible. He references things that Jesus had said which showed a sense of sectarianism and racism. He goes on to reference passages in the Bible which seem to uphold harsh attitudes to children and the mentally handicapped among others. He then references a passage from Nietzsche which attacks Christianity and goes into detail about how Christianity is against joy and intellectualism. This upholds his argument because these attributes of the faith seem to be inherently bad and against what seems like our more natural moral code. This is similar to the previous example, if such large issues are able to slip through the Bible undetected it should follow that the reasoning behind them is flawed.

His next point is more of an inquisition rather than a criticism, and addresses our 'more natural moral code'. He asks that if we are able to criticise the moral values of religion we must be using our own set of beliefs, so where do these come from? He uses Plato's Euthyphro as an argument for ethics not having a religious foundation but rather a basis in reason as it poses that God is a being which is non-arbitrary and hence piety must be sought out through a process of reason rather than on a whim. It follows from this argument that ethics is not founded in religion but rather deduced through reason and hence comes from within. This supports his two previous points as it allows us to criticise religious ethics and to deduce our own ethical code just as we have