فهرست نشریات علمی دسترسی آزاد ایران

The re-reading of divine command theory in the last century has led to more defensible interpretations of this theory. Philip L. Quinn is one of the leading philosophers who tries to prove the ontological dependence of morality on God in Christianity. He claims that by separating the sphere of duties and values in morality, moral duties depend on divine command and moral values depend on the good nature of God. He uses a cumulative argument to substantiate this claim and by presenting four testimonies from the Christian tradition, he shows that Christianity supports the ontological dependence of morality on God. Devotional practice, gospel ethics, scriptural hermeneutics, and a theological theory are evidence that, according to Quinn, their aggregation has the potential to prove this claim. In this article, after a detailed explanation of Quinn's theory and his reasoning, it is analytically shown that Quinn's reason includes his claim. The central point in the critique is that the author accepts the validity of the cumulative argument and he does not seek to show the imperfection of each evidence alone; rather, by acknowledging that this evidence together can only prove the result, it will be shown that the result obtained in this cumulative argument is not in line with Quinn's claim. Quinn claims that morality is ontologically dependent on God, while his cumulative argument proves the principle of dependence, not the ontological form in particular.