Two Kingdoms: Natural Law

If you have been following the blog, you are aware that we are having a discussion on natural law. In this post I have two very meager, yet needed, aims. First, I want to set forth a good working definition of natural law and second, I want to look at a passage, from Scripture, that teaches natural law.

Natural law can be easily defined as a set of ethical rules or laws that are impressed in every person. Notice that this law is impressed "in" every person and not "on" every person. This distinction is important because it illustrates how people gain access to this law--it is in them. This definition will work for almost all forms of an ethical natural law theory. However, since God is the creator, this definition needs to be a bit more specific. It needs to include the origin or source of this ethical code. Thus, the definition we will be using for natural law is a set of ethical rules or laws that are impressed in every person by their Creator. So there is no ambiguity, by the term "their Creator" I mean the God of Abraham, Issac and Jacob. This is the only Creator that exists. However, natural law does not reveal specifics about God. Nature (creation) itself reveals that God exists, but this is not the same thing as natural law. Natural law has to do specifically with the ethical sphere of man, and it is not intended to prove or show that God exists. Though Paul goes to great lengths in Romans 1 to demonstrate that all people know God exists, he does not use natural law as his reasoning; rather he uses nature (the created world) to prove that all men know God exists.

With this working definition of natural law, it is important to set forth a biblical case for this view. It is one thing to define a view, it is quite another to demonstrate that a view is taught in the Scripture. The locus classicus for proving that man has a ethical law within him is Romans 2:14-15.

For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.

In commenting on verse 15 Calvin argues for natural law.

Who show the work of the law written, etc.; that is, they prove that there is imprinted on their hearts a discrimination and judgment by which they distinguish between what is just and unjust, between what is honest and dishonest. He means not that it was so engraven on their will, that they sought and diligently pursued it, but that they were so mastered by the power of truth, that they could not disapprove of it. For why did they institute religious rites, except that they were convinced that God ought to be worshipped? Why were they ashamed of adultery and theft, except that they deemed them evils?

Without reason then is the power of the will deduced from this passage, as though Paul had said, that the keeping of the law is within our power; for he speaks not of the power to fulfill the law, but of the knowledge of it. Nor is the word heart to be taken for the seat of the affections, but only for the understanding, as it is found in Deuteronomy 29:4, “The Lord hath not given thee a heart to understand;” and in Luke 24:25,“O foolish men, and slow in heart to believe.”

Nor can we conclude from this passage, that there is in men a full knowledge of the law, but that there are only some seeds of what is right implanted in their nature, evidenced by such acts as these — All the Gentiles alike instituted religious rites, they made laws to punish adultery, and theft, and murder, they commended good faith in bargains and contracts. They have thus indeed proved, that God ought to be worshipped, that adultery, and theft, and murder are evils, that honesty is commendable. It is not to our purpose to inquire what sort of God they imagined him to be, or how many gods they devised; it is enough to know, that they thought that there is a God, and that honor and worship are due to him. It matters not whether they permitted the coveting of another man’s wife, or of his possessions, or of any thing which was his, — whether they connived at wrath and hatred; inasmuch as it was not right for them to covet what they knew to be evil when done.

Further, as to leave no ambiguity as to what natural law does and does not do, Calvin remarks about natural law in the Institutes 2.8.1.

Now that inward law, which we have above described as written, even engraved, upon the hearts of all, in a sense asserts the very same things that are to be learned from the two Tablets. For our conscience does not allow us to sleep a perpetual insensible sleep without being an inner witness and monitor of what we owe God, without holding before us the difference between good and evil and thus accusing us when we fail in our duty. But man is so shrouded in the darkness of errors that he hardly begins to grasp through this natural law what worship is acceptable to God. Surely he is very far removed from a true estimate of it. Besides this, he is so puffed up with haughtiness and ambition and is blinded by self-love, that he is as yet unable to look upon himself and, as it were, to descend within himself, that he may humble and abase himself and confess his own miserable condition. Accordingly (because it is necessary both for our dullness and for our arrogance), the Lord has provided us with a written law to give us a clearer witness of what was too obscure in the natural law, shake off our listlessness, and strike more vigorously our mind and memory.

Calvin is here, as well as in his commentary, expounding what Paul stated in Romans 2, namely, that man does indeed have a moral/ethical law written on his heart. He also argues that men know this law and are held accountable to it. However, Calvin does find a weakness in natural law. He thinks it cannot give us a clear picture or way to worship God. But as Gregory Johnson points out in his article Natural Law and Positive Law in Calvin's Thought, "while the Fall has left man unable to clearly discern the natural law in all of its fullness, the Fall has not left man blinded with respect to horizontal, earthly matters...Thus, Calvin distinguished between inability in 'heavenly things' and substantial ability in 'earthly things.'"

Further, it needs to be pointed out that this moral law that is in every person is given by creation. In other words, it is created in them; they are made that way. This is in contrast to the idea that they gain a sense of right and wrong strictly from the Bible. Paul makes this point when he says, "For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires." This is not to say that we do not need the Bible. On the contrary, the Bible explains and expands on the law God gave us at our creation. It also informs us what duty we are to give God--how we are to worship him and glorify him.

Natural law, as defined as a set of ethical rules or laws that are impressed in every person by their Creator, is taught in Romans 2 and attested as a teaching within Reformed Orthodoxy. This view of natural law should not be seen as sub-Reformed or pseudo-Roman Catholic. On the contrary, since the Reformers held to Sola Scriptura they taught, along with Paul, that every human has a sense of right and wrong written on their heart and they can be held accountable to following this law because they know it.