NO ETHICS WITHOUT RESURRECTION
This title is what I got from John Milbank’s paper “Can Morality be Christian?” His answer, perhaps surprisingly, was an emphatic No. He notes that although there can be a specifically Christian morality, morality itself cannot be Christian. His reasons, as I understand them (I assume all errors), boil down to this:
Morality (understood generally) is an attempt to stave off death, to put it off as long as possible. It involves a contract with death, for without death, there is no need for morality. The failure to be moral comes with the penalty of death, death is then a tool of morality, and morality a means of survival; and ultimately, in the same way Paul saw in reference to “the Law”, it then becomes a slave master.
The reason this is a problem is that, as per the Christian understanding of the fall, or even our collective experience, the human as seen now always ends in death, man always “falls” to death. Morality as a means of survival is then a sort of futile attempt to escape the void, to escape the uncertain, which, if we understand the uncertain christianly, is the essence of sin: a failure of faith. We don’t have faith, so we run in fear away from the unknown, of which death seems to be the ultimate manifestation.
Another way this manifests is in the logic of sacrifice, of which the most notable manifestation is self-sacrifice. In self-sacrifice for the other, we see this other as an extension of ourselves, and because of this, we would give ourselves over to death, for this other, who, to us, is us. Self-sacrifice is the destruction of self to save self. It sounds good and noble, but brings up a question: Is this form of sacrifice “good”?
In fear of loss, we willingly lose. Is loss “good”? I don’t think so. The “gain” of this “self-loss” is a relative gain, a calculated gain, which is perceived to be greater than the loss. But no “gain” in this calculated sense can make ultimately make up for the loss of self. A loss is still a loss, and any “gain” here is a relative, not an absolute, good.
In this light, all self-sacrifice, and in turn all sacrifice that take this form, fail to participate in the absolute Good of God. This failure of self-sacrifice to be “virtuous” plunges it into nihilism, carrying with it all the antique sacrificial logic and many modern attempts at self-sacrificial patriotism. The failure to think “the absolute” to the point of renunciation of this form of sacrifice is a way to understand Paul’s (and the Christian) proclamation that the resurrection of Christ has spoiled the powers and revealed their Laws as impotent to save.
The life, death and resurrection of Christ Himself shows the true form of “self-sacrifice”. It would be a mistake to read Christ’s word on “laying our lives down for our friends” without understanding that that life is given back as a gift. The original gift of Life from God is “given back” in our Love to the death, and given back to us again in the resurrection. Rather than a contract with death, a Christian understanding of “ethics” is simply “Love manifest in Faith”. He who loves, loves to the death, as Christ did; but it is not a surrender unto an ultimately meaningless void, or a transaction with death; it is rather a “gift” of Love, to the God we trust to give back, who in fact is the original giver and the original “gift”. We are therefore not slaves to death, nor do we bargain with death or the Law for a longer (yet ultimately pointless) life for us or our loved ones and city. Virtue does not fail here. Virtue here is truly eternal, a manifestation of the eternal gift and giving of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. There is no loss, but an eternal gain. Our failure in death, our loss, is redeemed in our surrender, our “owning up”, our “repentance”, which is only possible in light of Christ’s incarnation. Death is hastened that death might be conquered. The Law killed us, but Christ resurrected us.
Happy Sunday :)