A review of "Christian Ethics"

I have been reading "Christian Ethics", by Norman Geisler, to try and understand the varied Christian viewpoints to various ethical topics. The first point is essentially an outline of various ethical systems. For example, some systems say there are no rules, except the rule that there are no rules. Another system, a Christian system, says that there is one absolute rule that we must follow always, that of "love". This then translates into a Christian ethic that says never to do something which would harm another, because that certainly is not loving. I'm not going to go into the whole detail here, because that's not the point of this post. If you want to read the book, I'll let you borrow it.



The point here is to list at least one way I think this could be improved. Let me first off say that I appreciate this book. It provides various viewpoints, Christian and non-Christian, on essential ethical topics. Those include abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality, war, etc. The explanations of the various arguments for each position are clear and concise, well-referenced, and generally making a fair representation of the point. My critique of Geisler's arguments is that though in the first part of the book he has laid out a clear explanation of graded absolutism, that there are hierarchies of God's commands that we should follow and that not following a lower command does not incur wrath, he then essentially drops this kind of logic when discussing the various issues.


What I had hoped to see was an explanation of the graded absolutism, actually applied to the subject in question. For example, in reading about war, there are essentially 3 different views - 2 extreme views and 1 middle view. One extreme would be that we obey the government always - even into wars that are unjust - thus obeying God's commands to obey the governments that are in authority over us. The other extreme would be that we do not participate in wars, because wars involve the killing, and God has commanded not to kill. So which one wins? I would expect something like the following:

"Graded absolutism would say that there are hierarchies of obeying God's laws. Obeying the higher law is what is required. Obeying the lower law is not ignored, simply not punished. However, not following the higher law would be punished, for God has set that hierarchy in place."

Unfortunately, this clear distinction has not been made. I think he may get to a similar answer, but the clarity of explaining it within the position of graded absolutism doesn't appear. I will still finish this book, and use the arguments within it, but may have to make some additional notes for myself so that when I discuss these things with others I can pull out a little notebook or stack of 3x5 cards and have my information at the ready.