Written on the heart: on the grounds of moral obligation in natural law theory
The extent to which God grounds normativity within natural law theory is analyzed. I examine Hugo Grotius’s understanding of natural law and human nature and show that Grotius makes few explicit metaphysical commitments which makes his view open to development in at least two different ways. Then a...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic/Print Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
[2017]
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| In: |
International journal of philosophy and theology
Year: 2017, Volume: 78, Issue: 3, Pages: 200-214 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Grotius, Hugo 1583-1645
/ Law of nature
/ Human being
/ Nature
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| IxTheo Classification: | KAH Church history 1648-1913; modern history KDD Protestant Church NBE Anthropology NCA Ethics |
| Further subjects: | B
Hugo Grotius
B Thomism B Obligation B Natural Law B God B Normativity |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | The extent to which God grounds normativity within natural law theory is analyzed. I examine Hugo Grotius’s understanding of natural law and human nature and show that Grotius makes few explicit metaphysical commitments which makes his view open to development in at least two different ways. Then a Thomistic view of natural law and human nature is developed. It is shown that Grotius’s position could be developed as a proto-new natural law theory, but this leaves it open to powerful objections from Fulvio Di Blasi and other Thomistic philosophers. Finally, I argue that a view can be developed in such a way as to take on certain elements of the Thomistic view, particularly its metaphysics, but still maintain the famous Grotian claim that human nature can establish normativity without God. The key to this is the distinction between the order of knowing and the order of being. |
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| ISSN: | 2169-2327 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: International journal of philosophy and theology
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1080/21692327.2017.1306720 |