The Law of Nature
Does God exist? If the answer is yes, then how can it be proved? These are the questions that one might expect to find at the beginning of a book about Christianity. But C.S. Lewis doesn't even start there. He takes a step back and asks: Is there right and wrong? The answer to this question is important to his argument, and was a foundation in Lewis's own conversion from atheism to Christianity. Once the question of morality is answered, the question about whether God exists and if it can be proved or not naturally follows.
The first two chapters of Mere Christianity can be summarized in two points:
1. There is a common moral law that is universal to all people. We know it, no matter what time or place we come from.
2. No one perfectly keeps this moral law.
These are the main points. The rest of the pages that make up chapters one and two are dedicated to explaining and supporting these points.
Let's briefly dive into each one.
Lewis's first claim is that we all refer to some kind of universal moral law. It might be when we make an argument, justify our actions, or express injustice when we feel wronged. He is not saying "what's right for me might not be right for you". He is saying, "This is always wrong, across time, location, and culture". There is an argument that right and wrong is determined by society, or how we were raised, or even by biology. If this were true, that environment and upbringing determined morality, then that would be a relative morality, and not a universal one. There are certainly some rules that are relative, like what is considered modest clothing. What about something like kidnapping? Is that considered the right thing to do in some cultures, or is it universally wrong?
Lewis points out that even people who claim to not believe in universal morality, prove otherwise with their words. Have you ever heard someone say, "That’s not fair"? The only way something can be fair or unfair, take the example of sports, is that there are established rules. If there were no agreed upon rules, then no one could claim another person was cheating or playing unfair. It would just be anything goes, and there would be no point to the game. The same goes in life. To say that something is unfair means that we are referring to a set of rules.
This kind of thinking is the default in the human mind. People only become relativists after a lot of cerebral activity: creating convoluted arguments and justifications. Every child instinctively knows that there is right and wrong.
Lewis writes:
"People say things like that every day (i.e. "that's not fair"), educated people as well as uneducated, and children as well as grown-ups. Now what interests me about all these remarks is that the man who makes them is not merely saying that the other man’s behavior does not happen to please him. He is appealing to some kind of standard of behavior which he expects the other man to know about. And the other man very seldom replies: ‘To hell with your standard.’ Nearly always he tries to make out that what he has been doing does not really go against the standard, or that if it does there is some special excuse" (pg. 5).
He is saying that we often hold an unspoken agreement on what is right and wrong. He is clear in distinguishing between cultural agreements, like what side of the road to drive on, and universal ones that go beyond culture and environment. In Romans 2:12-16, the apostle Paul talks about the law being "written on their hearts". C.S. Lewis and Paul are both saying that deep down in our hearts, we know what is right and wrong.
The second point is that we fail to keep this universal moral standard. Lewis does not spend much time trying to convince the reader of this second point. I think the reason is obvious: if we are honest with ourselves, we know that we do not always live up to standards, even ones we set for ourselves. When we are dishonest with ourselves, we will make excuses about why we are not living up to our standard. But Lewis uses this fact to drive home his first point. He writes:
"The truth is, we believe in decency so much — we feel the Rule of Law pressing on us so — that we cannot bear to face the fact that we are breaking it, and consequently we try to shift the responsibility. For you notice that it is only for our bad behavior that we find all these explanations."
The thinking is, if we don't believe in a moral standard, then why are we so desperate to make excuses for our behavior. And if we felt like we never broke our standard, then why were we making up an excuse in the first place?
Of course, there are counter arguments to all of these points (social conditioning, herd mentality, etc.). Lewis address some of them and some he does not. My goal is not to prove C.S. Lewis right. It would be pointless even if I tried. Nevertheless, I think that every person should come to some decision about where morality comes from, and what that means. I ask myself, "is there a universal moral law, that is, a world-wide right and wrong?", and "if there is a moral law, do I break it?" My answer is "yes" on both accounts. We will see that the answer to these simple questions is pivotal for answering other questions about Christianity.
