Divine authority over us

Imagine a custody battle between Alice and Bob over their child Carl. Suppose the court finds that Alice loves Carl much more than Bob does, that Alice is much wiser than Bob, and that Alice knows Carl and his needs much better than Bob does. Moreover, it is discovered that Bob has knowingly unjustifiedly harmed Carl, while Alice has never done that. In the light of these, it is obvious that Alice is a more fitting candidate to have authority over Carl than Bob is.

But now, suppose x is some individual. Then God loves x much more than I love x, God is much wiser than I, God knows x and his needs much better than I do. Moreover, suppose that I have knowingly unjustifiedly harmed x, while God has never done that. In light of these, it should be plausible that God is a more fitting candidate to have authority over x than I am.

Suppose, however, that I am x. The above is still true. God loves me much more than I love myself; God is much wiser than I; God knows me and my needs much better than I do. And I have on a number of occasions knowingly unjustifiedly harmed myself—indeed, in typical cases when I sin, that’s what has happened—while God has never knowingly unjustifiedly harmed me. So, it seems that God is a more fitting candidate to have authority over me than I am.

I am not endorsing a general principle that if someone loves me more than I love myself, etc., then they are more fit to have authority over me. For the someone might be someone that has little intuitive standing to have authority over me—a complete stranger who inexplicably enormously cares about me might not have much authority over me. But it is prima facie plausible that God has significant authority over me, for the same sorts of reasons that my parents had authority over me when I was a child. And the above considerations suggest that God’s authority over me is likely to be greater than my own authority over myself.

If it is correct that God, if he existed, would have greater authority over me than I have over myself, then that would have significant repercussions for the problem of evil. For a part of the problem involves the question of whether it is permissible for God to allow a person to suffer horrendously even for the sake of greater (or incommensurable but proportionate) goods to them or (especially) another. But it would be permissible for me to allow myself to suffer horrendously for the sake of greater (or incommensurable but proportionate) goods for me or another. If God has greater authority over me than I have over myself, then it would likewise be permissible for God.

This does not of course solve the problem of evil. There is still the question whether allowing the sufferings people undergo has the right connection with greater (or incommensurable but proportionate) goods, and much of the literature on the problem of evil has focused on that. But it does help significantly with the deontic component of the question. (Though even with respect to the deontic aspects, there is still the question of divine intentions—it would I think be wrong even for God to intend an evil for the sake of a good. So care is still needed in theodicy to ensure that the theodicy doesn’t make God out to be intending evils for the sake of goods.)

A hypothesis about authority and duties of care

Parents have the authority to command their children and parents have a special duty to care for children. Officers have special duties of care for those under their command. The state likewise has special duties of care for those under its jurisdiction. Special duties of care do not imply authority: adult siblings have special duties of care to one another but do not have jurisdiction over one another. But we can hypothesize that authority implies special duties of care.

Why would that be so? One possibility is that authority always arises out of special duties of care: in some cases, in order to properly care for y one must have authority over y. That fits neatly with the parent-child case, but doesn't fit with the military case, where the authority seems explanatory of the duties of care, or at least not posterior to it. But in the military case we might say this: in paradigmatic cases (putting to one side the case of mercenaries), the officer's authority derives from the state's authority. And the state's authority may well arise out of special duties of care for its citizens, whom the state can thus induct, voluntarily or not, into the military.

This more general pattern can fit cases which don't fit the simple version of the authority-care hypothesis. For instance, perhaps, a judge has commanding authority over a convicted prisoner but does not have special duties of care for the prisoner. But the judge's authority derives from the state's authority, which is explained by the state's special duties towards its citizens. So the more refined hypothesis is something like this: The authority to command is connected with special duties of care, but the special duties of care need not be had by the one who has the authority to command--the authority to command may have been deputized from another who had both the authority and the special duties.

But what about this case: Sometimes a state will imprison those who are not under its care but who have harmed its citizens. One example is prisoners of war. Another is the case of seizing a criminal from another country, as in the case of Manuel Noriega. I could wimpily say that the hypothesis is just a general rule with exceptions. But perhaps what I should instead say is that the case of prisoners of war and criminals seized from abroad is not a case of authority to command and hence no exception to the hypothesis. While an imprisoned citizen does violate duties of obedience to the state in escaping, the prisoner of war or criminal seized from abroad do not violate any such duties of obedience in escaping. There may be a limited commanding authority, however, derived from duties of care. Thus, an officer in charge of a prisoner of war camp might have commanding authority in respect of keeping order at food lines. And in even other cases there may be moral reasons to obey not because of authority but in order to maintain order, which is good in itself.

So let's suppose the hypothesis is correct. We now come to two of the most interesting cases: God and self. If the hypothesis is true, then God's absolute commanding authority over us derives from God's duty to love us. That's surprising, but may be right. The case of self is even more interesting. While we may not, strictly speaking, have commanding authority over ourselves (though "promises to self" might be an example), the authority we have over ourselves goes beyond most cases of commanding authority. Does that authority, too, derive from duties to care for ourselves? I like that idea, but many will not like the idea of duties to care for ourselves.

Self-love and self-seeking

The following are excerpts from my book manuscript on love, which I am now revising. Comments (whether substantive or stylistic) are welcome. The setting for the puzzle below is Paul's observation in 1 Cor. 13 that love does not seek its own:

There is, however, a special puzzle in the case of love of oneself. The command in Leviticus (19:18) to love one’s neighbor as oneself is a seminal text, including for the Christian Scriptures which quote it frequently (Mt. 5:43, 19:19, 22:39, Mk. 12:31-33, Lk. 10:27, Rom. 13:9, Gal. 5:14, James 2:8). But how can love of oneself not be self-seeking? One answer could be that Paul is giving us a general quality of love: love focuses us on the beloved. In the special case where the beloved is oneself, this calls for a focus on self, but that is not the result of a general quality of love, but of the particularity of the beloved in this form of love. But there may be a deeper way to understand how a love of oneself can be non-self-seeking, and we will come to that in Section 2.9.

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2.9. Love of oneself and self-seeking

We saw that we need to distinguish the reasons for loving someone from the reasons for having a particular form of love for someone. The reasons for loving need not vary from beloved to beloved. My son, my wife, my sister, my father, my friend and my enemy is each a human being created in the image and likeness of God, and this calls out for a response of love. So I can love each of my neighbors for the very same reason. But the different forms that the love should take are each justified by different reasons. I love my son with a paternal love that includes a certain kind of authority because he is my son and because he is young. I love my friend with a friendly love perhaps because of our shared history of companionship.

This offers us a speculative way to see how Paul’s observation (1 Cor. 13:15) that agapê does not seek its own might apply to self-love. Aristotle in Nicomachean Ethics IX.4 observes that good people have the same kinds of reasons for loving themselves as they do for loving others: namely, they can love themselves for their character. At same time, Aristotle seems to think that thoroughly corrupt individuals have no reason to love themselves, and indeed do not. Aristotle was wrong in thinking that there was no reason to love the thoroughly corrupt—they, too, are people—but the idea that virtuous persons love themselves for the same reason that they love others is compelling.

This then offers a way in which well-ordered love of oneself is not self-seeking. When Francis virtuously loves himself, i.e., Francis, he does not love Francis because Francis is himself, but he loves Francis because Francis is a human being in the image and likeness of God. Or, at least, he does not primarily love Francis for being himself, but primarily loves him for the attributes that Francis shares with all other humans. Virtuous people love their neighbors as themselves. Conversely, they love themselves as they love their neighbors, namely for the same kind of reason. And in this sense the love is not self-seeking, since although the beloved is oneself, the beloved is loved primarily for reasons for which one loves one’s neighbor rather than for being oneself.

At the same time, love for oneself has a different form from love for another, just as love for one’s friend and love for one’s father have different forms. Perhaps the most important is that one’s relationship with oneself involves a kind of authority that one’s relationship with one’s friend or parent do not have: I can require sacrifices of myself that I have no right to require of a friend or parent. Another is that correlative with this authority over oneself there is a special responsibility for one’s moral development, going beyond that which one has for a friend or parent’s, and more akin to, though perhaps going further than, one’s responsibility for one’s children’s moral development.