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THE OBJECTIVITY OF OBLIGATIONS IN DIVINE MOTIVATION THEORY: On Imitation and Submission
Author(s) -
Johnson Daniel M.
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
journal of religious ethics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.306
H-Index - 20
eISSN - 1467-9795
pISSN - 0384-9694
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9795.2012.00533.x
Subject(s) - obligation , morality , objectivity (philosophy) , epistemology , criticism , imitation , moral obligation , philosophy , attractiveness , social psychology , psychology , sociology , law , political science , aesthetics
To support her divine motivation theory of the good, which seeks to ground ethics in motives and emphasize the attractiveness of morality over against the compulsion of morality, Linda Zagzebski has proposed an original account of obligations which grounds them in motives. I argue that her account renders obligations objectionably person‐relative and that the most promising way to avoid my criticism is to embrace something quite close to a divine command theory of obligation. This requires her to combine her desired emphasis on the imitation of God with a contrasting emphasis on submission to God. I conclude that her divine motivation theory of the good, if it is to have an adequate account of obligation, is dependent on a divine will or divine command theory of obligation.