Long Course on Deontology & Teleology

Long Course on Deontology and Teleology

Supplement to Would You Lie to Save a Life

A. Short Course on Deontology & Teleology

1. Short Course on Deontology & Teleology

2. Origin & Use of Deontology

3. Origin, Use, and Harboring Wayward Teleology

chart 6. Teleological Arguments for God

4. Teleology & Blackaby’s Experiencing God Phenomenon

5. Basic Definitions of Deontology & Teleology

chart 7. Teleology a Decisive Issue for Biblical Ethics

chart 8. Summary Definitions of Deontology & Teleology

B. Long Course on Deontology & Teleology—Overlapping

chart 3. The Great Shuffle of Responsibility (Revisited)

chart 7. Teleology a Decisive Issue for Love & Ethics (Revisited)

chart 8. Summary Definitions of Deontology & Teleology (Revisited)

A. Short Course on Deontology & Teleology

1. Short Course on Deontology & Teleology

This section is about two heavy hitting terms that we need in our arsenal to attack and deconstruct the Guns of Navarone, aka, Responsibility to Love; the two terms teleology and deontology are complicated and crucial to the ethical battlefield. Like many philosophical words, these pull together several concepts actually having no clear perimeters. Though there is a rather simple and essential meaning, we need to touch the depth of these two words.

Notice that deontology and teleology are more descriptive terms and not so much systems of thought in ethics. The terms have had dissimilar origins. For the purpose of this study, the two terms will be placed in a harbor of clearer perimeters. Let us start with H. Richard Niebuhr’s distinction between teleology, deontology, and responsibility. Niebuhr indicates some of the complication we are trying to clarify and do untangle some rabbits from the briar patch. Do not be surprised if you have to read these words twice. Niebuhr says,

Purposeness [teleology] seeks to answer the question: “What shall I do?” by raising as prior the question: “What is my goal, ideal, or telos?” Deontology tries to answer the moral query by asking, first of all: “What is the law and what is the first law of my life?” Responsibility, however, proceeds in every moment of decision and choice to inquire: “What is going on?” If we use value terms then the differences among the three approaches may be indicated by the terms, the good, the right, and the fitting; for teleology is concerned always with the highest good to which it subordinates the right, no matter what may happen to our goods; but for the ethics of Responsibility the fitting action, the one that fits into a total interaction as response and as anticipation of further response, is alone conducive to the good and alone is right….

At the critical junctures in the history of Israel and of the early Christian community the decisive question men raised was not “What is the goal?” nor yet “What is the law?” but “What is happening?” and then “What is the fitting response to what is happening?”[1] (Bold emphasis mine.)

This indicates some of the breadth, even if Niebuhr’s words are hard to chew on in the battlefield foxhole. Moreover, how on earth does one find what is a perfectly fitting response? Niebuhr’s words raise the bar, but not necessarily the bar of clarity. Herein, Christ’s competence as the criterion makes sense, certainly, even though Niebuhr confuses the simplicity of the Great Commands and the Golden Rule. If a principle cannot work in the foxhole at some point, then it is just shrapnel wounding people or structures, or simply littering the environment with twisted iron.

2. Origin & Use of Deontology

Deontology comes from the Greek deon, “duty,” and logos, “science.” Deontology arose in the “duty” that was considered inherent in the teleological and utilitarian ethic of Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) who thought that the search for the “greatest good” was the highest duty, like Aristotle (384-322 B.C.). Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) helped push deontology toward its present meaning denoting a choice that has certain virtue in itself apart from any consequences that might arise, and Kant is among the deepest and hardest of the moral philosophers to read, outside of what we would consider a purely biblical framework. The Encyclopædia Britannica says this:

Deontology consequently focuses on logic and ethics….

In deontological ethics an action is considered morally good because of some characteristic of the action itself, not because the product of the action is good. Deontological ethics holds that at least some acts are morally obligatory regardless of their consequences for human welfare. Descriptive of such ethics are such expressions as “Duty for duty’s sake,” “Virtue is its own reward,” and “Let justice be done though the heavens fall.”[2]

And so,

By contrast, teleological ethics holds that the basic standard of morality is precisely the value of what an action brings into being. Deontological theories have been termed formalistic because their central principle lies in the conformity of an action to some rule or law.[3]

Stephen Darwall brought us an excellent modern anthology on deontology, and opens it with,

Deontological theories can be defined by their opposition to consequentialism on a fundamental point. Consequentialists hold that what is morally right and wrong to do depends upon what would bring about the best consequences, where the latter are evaluated simply as states of the world, as good or bad things to happen…. Deontology holds that moral values and standards cannot be determined at any level of analysis by what would promote the best outcomes or states…. And they unite in the belief that at least some fundamental moral principles or ideas are agent-relative ‘all the way down.’[4]

In many respects, we shall be unpacking the difference between what is and is not relative “all the way down.”

Everyone values deontology in Christian ethics, because everyone values that God is the source and object of biblical ethics. What God has declared “right” has rightness inherent in itself and rightness apart from any consequences that might arise. What God has declared “right” is a duty for all persons regardless of consequences—pure deontology.

In sum, Love and Truth are absolutely right, inherently right. Is that all?

3. Origin, Use, and Harboring Wayward Teleology

Teleology is from the Greek telos, “end,” and logos, “science,” and it has had a rather stable definition. In ethics, teleology implies that “ends” determine some of the rightness of a choice, and at times even the rightness of a choice. Sometimes teleology has come to mean that ends are more important than “means” in the determination of the rightness of a choice. Sounds simple enough. The Encyclopædia Britannica says teleology is a

theory of morality that derives duty or moral obligation from what is good or desirable as an end to be achieved. It is opposed to deontological ethics…, which holds that the basic standards for an action’s being morally right are independent of the good or evil generated….

Teleological theories differ on the nature of the end that actions ought to promote. Eudaemonist theories (Greek eudaimonia, “happiness”), which hold that ethics consists in some function or activity appropriate to man as a human being, tend to emphasize the cultivation of virtue or excellence in the agent as the end of all action. These could be the classical virtues—courage, temperance, justice, and wisdom—that promoted the Greek ideal of man as the “rational animal”; or the theological virtues—faith, hope, and love—that distinguished the Christian ideal of man as a being created in the image of God.[5]

The ways in which teleological ethics have been applied vary from the biblical to the secular to the fully atheistic.

Utilitarian-type theories hold that the end consists in an experience or feeling produced by the action. Hedonism, for example, teaches that this feeling is pleasure—either one’s own, as in egoism (the 17th-century English philosopher Thomas Hobbes), or everyone’s, as in universalistic hedonism, or utilitarianism (the 19th-century English philosophers Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, and Henry Sidgwick), with its formula the “greatest pleasure of the greatest number.” Other utilitarian-type views include the claims that the end of action is survival and growth, as in evolutionary ethics (the 19th-century English philosopher Herbert Spencer); the experience of power, as in despotism (the 16th-century Italian political philosopher Niccolò Machiavelli and the 19th-century German Friedrich Nietzsche); satisfaction and adjustment, as in pragmatism (20th-century American philosophers Ralph Barton Perry and John Dewey); and freedom, as in existentialism (the 20th-century French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre).[6]

In those connections, it is easy to see how teleology has not always had favor in evangelical and biblical ethics. How can they answer the charge that ends or goals do not always justify the means? What about the seeming and nearly universal perception of the inherent goodness of many actions? Is it true or false that intentions themselves are a part of the choice.[7]

In the following, we shall be unpacking some of the difficulty on how an intention of a choice, the choice itself, and the consequence of a choice are all part of the complexity in determining the absolutely “right” choice in perfect Love. Furthermore, we indicate how the deontological and teleological are both parts of an absolutely “right” choice in perfect Love.

In Love, a right choice has both teleological and deontological elements.

Furthermore, with respect many Christian fundamentalists, whenever “ends” are talked about, they grimace and think that one is just a short step away from using any evil “means” to accomplish a good “end.” They twist biblical concepts in convoluted ways and mulch the Golden Rule. That is the fear, and sometimes the fear is reasonable. That is the preponderant fear of the radical fundamentalist side by side with a fear to itemize Responsibility.

Also, since “ends” are not as clear as a deontological “right,” that lack of clarity is an arena into which few actually want to go. Conformity is such a comfortable place, especially for the radical fundamentalist, not to mention anything about political correctness and vocational security. Some battles are just not worth the risk or effort. And Barney Fife leads the way.

Most important, though right in itself, Love also demands that ends are crucial to the determination of “right” choices in a way that Truth does not.

Interjecting some philosophy of another school and subject altogether, we need not be afraid of teleology, for it has served well to argue for the existence of God for a few millennia. Some examples are:

(1) Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover[8]

(2) Thomas Aquinas’ five arguments:

(a) Since motion exists, a First Mover is assumed

(b) Since things are caused, a First Cause is assumed

(d) Since varying degree of perfection exist, a Perfect Being is assumed

(e) Since design is evident, a Designing Intelligence is assumed

(3) Ontological argument: being implies a First Being, with the very word God implying God

(4) Cosmological argument: first cause implies a First Causer

(5) Teleological argument: design in nature implies a Grand Designer[9]

chart 6. Teleological Arguments for God

In addition to arguing for the existence of God, these arguments have in various forms served to philosophically argue for immortality and creationism.[10]

With regard to the cosmological argument, William Lane Craig has argued for creation and the existence of God. The Kalam cosmological argument for God is based upon the impossibility of an actual infinite and therefore the impossibility of a temporally infinite regress of events. With such an impossibility, there is good philosophical evidence of a creation and not much evidence of an evolution. The basic arguments are supported with a sophistication that at times requires an understanding of advanced physics.[11]

For our purposes, not just one, but all of the arguments have a teleological thrust, for the arguments for God are argued from the “end” product (be that motion, causes, being, design, etc.). From the “ends” of grand design that are clearly evident in our experience of a tree or fellow human being, we argue that a Great Designer exists—namely, YHWH God of the Old Testament and Father in the New.[12]

Difficulties have been pointed out in these arguments: the First Causer and Designer are hypothetical in a philosophical sense. Even so, they are cogent arguments, even poignant in their philosophical directness, simplicity, and sweeping range. For apologists defending the faith, the five arguments come together to form a one-page textbook without equal. With the shining light of centuries and volumes of extraordinary work, God has displayed His glory in the universe. For those who believe in God and experience God—for the Christian—these arguments have a substance in the God of the Bible, and they are indicative of what we already believe to be true (same for all religions). For the Christian, they are not merely arguments. With the presupposition of the reality of the biblical and personal God, the arguments are philosophical observations and not mere arguments anymore.

A First Causer and a Designer do in a helpful way—philosophically—argue for teleology in a Christian ethic that not just assumes but actually indicates a philosophical faith in the preexistence of the YHWH God of the Bible. A First Causer and Designer had “ends” in view: respectively, a cause of causing and a design in designing. Therefore, we contend, Christians have a definite Responsibility in fulfilling that purpose and reaching that end toward which they have been called, resurrected, empowered, and are being drawn toward—even heaven to come.

The “end” in view is not the perfect and completed end that some Classical Theists would argue that God fully sees today, as though God has perfectly settled all things today about 100% of the future. Such a view makes mush out of the New Testament view that God is still working in the world today: that is, we are working with God in many ways. Though some of the future is settled, like the return of Christ and our future heavenly rest, some of the future is not settled. What is so very important in this context is that the future is not settled above God’s ability to save today and not settled above God’s ability to prevent a victim’s tragedy tomorrow. Every man or woman has hope today—Love demands that.[13]

4. Teleology & Blackaby’s Experiencing God Phenomenon

Henry Blackaby’s Experiencing God study showed one way to find God’s will: essentially, look where God is working and go and join Him there.[14] In that free-will responsiveness and ability, Blackaby has articulated in a rough and unsophisticated fashion how teleology is an integral part of the New Testament. How does one distinguish between what God is doing and the Devil’s work dressed up as an angel of light? Blackaby’s book Experiencing God has fostered a veritable cottage industry for Southern Baptists. Because of the popularity, not very many have dared a real analysis of the workbooks themselves.

The Experiencing God phenomenon has an existential title, with a few novel Bible studies, but lacks any real cohesion. The singular insight of “look for where God is working and go and join Him there” is so clearly existential, and the few studies in the Experiencing God workbook substantiating and surrounding the insight have made this insight a great revelation. I suspect the insight’s novelty played a role. The study groups help the disciples apply this. Nevertheless, look closely at the chapter titles in the table of contents, and one can see that Blackaby has to strain to make the whole work cohesive; worse, Blackaby’s charts do a poor job at clarifying the continuity.

“Existential” refers for the most part to experience or existence and the derivation of insights into life and philosophy from experience and how we perceive the world. Existentialism is a broad, encompassing a complex set of philosophies that are usually not considered biblical by fundamentalists, and some of the philosophies are not biblical. Sometimes existentialism is abysmally negative—as in Nietzsche’s God is dead, and becomes essentially anti-Christ. But all is not negative, and few fundamentalists make a distinction between Nietzsche’s negative insights against the in-depth perceptions of others. In spite of some hard reading and some unevangelical-like moments, masters like Paul Tillich and Søren Kierkegaard in an existential vein have helped articulate many clearly biblical and golden Truths about life and Love.

In spite of the troublesome parts of Blackaby’s work and because of its popularity, here is a nice thought: the theology of the Experiencing God movement as well as the ready acceptance of the movement’s premier insight depend upon a blazingly clear teleological thrust: find what God is doing and go an join Him there. That is, in a roundabout way, the total Experiencing God phenomenon points out the already widely accepted teleological focus of New Testament ethics without mention of the term teleology.

Whatever happened to the ancient roots of teleological principles and the principles’ assimilation into Blackaby’s existentialist focus, we shall never know. Certainly, we do not want to argue for teleology and the teleological thrust of the New Testament based upon Blackaby’s popularity alone, nor do we want to argue for Blackaby from the widely esteemed though existential, teleological, and singular insight of “look for where God is working and go and join Him there.” The only places on earth that his insight may be considered a good method for finding and doing God’s will is in the Garden of Eden, a true utopia where absolute “rightness” was universally practiced, and maybe in a Mayberry RFD closet.

On a closer look, Blackaby’s insight is slim on substance for practical utility in the foxhole—or anyplace else—having more air than something practical. It sounds nice in a church parlor. But it is useless in the dark hour, and very easily leads one away from the more Responsible and practical methods of biblical principles. Blackaby’s singular insight becomes lacks the nourishment of baby food in comparison to the Golden Rule. On the other hand, the Great Commands, the Golden Rule, and the Great Commission are practical to the uttermost, something everyone can use.

Do not mistake. There are some good little Bible studies surrounding Blackaby’s singular insight in his book. Nice stuff in general, and the book has sold millions making a mint for Blackaby and the SBC under the guise of experiencing God, and that single insight is the key to the whole book.

Yet Blackaby’s “look for where God is” is near WWJD in substance and deceptive simplicity, except that the insight is buttressed by several Bible studies that Blackaby saddles next to his insight, but they do not remain in the same corral of reason. Blackaby’s insight “look for where God is working” is a wild horse made to look like a tame gilding. Blackaby places his wild horse in a corral with other good horses, and he becomes slightly deceptive when the wild horse is placed on the cover of his book—Experiencing God. It’s like his book is designed to help a person experience God. Blackaby’s lead principle is a wild horse with no true bridle, just an existential world to look at and see where God is working so that the disciple can go and join God there—a purebred existential wild horse placed in a corral of a few detached Bible studies.

Surrounding Blackaby’s insight “look where God is,” he places Bible studies that talk about the experience of other biblical characters. Blackaby does this as though his insight “look for where God is” has no perilous conjunctions. If taken truly and seriously, that directive becomes powerfully detracting from the more concrete and clear N.T. principles that are far less ghostly.

Because of Commander Bucher and his murdering hijackers, we press this and ask another hard question. What is the experience of God outside of the existential group dynamics and the existential thrust of the singular insight? Blackaby does not even appear to be aware of group dynamics, much less attempt to articulate the experience advertised—a wild horse indeed. His singular insight has been blown out of proportion from its own substance, so it seems, and far more than it deserves. Blackaby’s use of “experiencing God” borders on piracy and gets close to false advertisement. That is, the insight is hardly an extraordinary insight. On actually finding Love and God’s will, it is sorely lacking energy in the battlefield foxhole and in most other places of stress—except perhaps in a Mayberry RFD church parlor.

Most significantly, Jesus’ directives to Love, “seek first the kingdom of God,” and the Golden Rule are so much more substantive and require much more personal Responsibility for initiative. These ask for unique choices in Love and are radically non-existential; they are packed to the gills with free-will Responsibility and real-world-in-the-foxhole practicality. But Jesus’ words do not get priority in Blackaby, who at the time was a leading Southern Baptist bolstered by the SBC’s mighty publishing arm. In practice, Blackaby’s singular insight removes Responsibility and detracts from Jesus’ words, very much like WWJD distracts. Whatever Blackaby truly means by “look where God is,” why is that clearly teleological and existential focus not given a droplet of credit to any existentialist? Jesus’ directives are much clearer, practical, and far less dependent upon the observation of the existential wind of circumstance, or whatever may be the “where” of God’s working.

What is the where of Blackaby? But who knows? Blackaby’s book and follow-up works do not give a single clue on how to distinguish between the existential wind, the actual work of God, and the work of Satan beyond the mere observation of simple religious activity. Just trust in whatever your eyes see, I guess, and exempt yourself from Responsible initiative based upon biblical principles.

Regardless, thanks to Blackaby’s hugely popular book, teleology and the use of “ends” have become a common denominator in the determination of rightness to a degree, at least to a kind of determination of the will of God. That is a good thing as we shall prove, beyond Blackaby, in that the New Testament has an overall teleological thrust in Love.

5. Basic Definitions of Deontology & Teleology

These two words might burden the reader, even to sleep, if their basic meaning is not easily and permanently grasped. We use them throughout, and there is a simplicity to them. In keeping with their etymology, the easiest definitions are:

Deontology

“Dutiful” because of inherent “Rightness” = Means over Ends

Teleology

“Rightness” chosen in view of “Consequences” = Ends over Means

In their connotations, deontology has carried with it some aspect of “rightness,” and teleology has carried with it some aspect of “method.” The New Testament brought us to a teleological and even an eschatological look at the world.

The watcher in the night tower is Responsible for the city within the walls of his or her watch. The watcher’s Responsibility looks forward and ever forward into the future of the night watch with a vigilance to the threatening horizon and a readiness to sound the alarm. We Love, evangelize, and disciple on the concourse of time as well as with a constant vigilance down the concourse of time into the future, and this is our Responsibility to Love.

Without encountering consequences (and heaven) as crucial to the determination of the “rightness” of a choice, there is no real Love or Responsibility at all. The issue is whether Love is deontological with no teleological duty or whether Love is deontological with teleological duty. See chart 6 below.

Decisive Issue about Love and Ethics is:

1. Deontology With No Teleological Duty—one without other

~ OR ~

2. Deontology With Teleological Duty—both/and

Either Love is “#1” or is “#2”—

~ No Middle Ground ~

chart 7. Teleology a Decisive Issue for Biblical Ethics

Either Love is wholly deontological or it is not. Either teleology with deontology is a crucial part of Love or they are not. There is no middle ground.

Look closer, for upon this hinge many biblical Truths. Only #1 or #2 describe Love, not both. If #1, then consequences are not crucial (pro Rakestraw): every decision is a matter of simple conformity to the law minus any Responsibility to the future or to others.

If #2, then the consideration of consequences is crucial and intrinsic to “rightness”—especially to absolute “rightness.” With #2, every decision is more than a matter of conformity with the law because of the New Testament necessity to Love others, where Love of necessity incorporates a passion that is never fully filled and is ever looking beyond the present moment to how to better Love down the concourse of time. With #2, the boundless qualities of Love are all the harder to fully determine. Can we say impossible to completely determine because of the boundless qualities of Love, especially if Love is eternal? We think so this side of heaven, save for our God who knows no bounds to His scrutiny and who is the very author and source of Love.

We exercise Love and abide in Love, and the golden treasure of Love has a heart that envelopes the present moment and at the same time looks ahead to better Love down the concourse of time, even with the expectation of the perfect experience of Love in heaven. Love never ends, and someday we shall be made like Him with the ability to Love perfectly.

The above ended the short course on deontology and teleology.

Part of long course, below, will discuss the overlapping of the terms. A teleological libertine is faulted for being short of respect for the inherent “rightness” of some choices—a lack of deontological virtue and sometimes a lack of appreciation for absolutes, or even a lack of appreciation for the absoluteness of absolutes. Similarly, the deontological fundamentalist is faulted for being short of respect for the clearly bad consequences of some seemingly “right” choices—a lack of teleological realism and sometimes a lack of appreciation for the demands of Love itself. The fundamentalist in deontological comfort is tempted to skew obvious teleological compassion, and the libertine in teleological individualism is tempted to skew some clear deontological duty.

In trying to clarify the overlapping of deontology and teleology—which is a bear hunt in itself—we identify several elements that like molecules spin around and in between the etymology of Deontology and Teleology. The elements are not clear until we split them in a particle accelerator, slamming them into each other to reveal as many quarks about Love as possible, forcing the ethical energy to come out of them in useful and predictable ways. Without some kind of control over the fission and fusion of these elements, we just might blow ourselves up by accident (kind of like Geisler did, where the absoluteness of absolutes is blown up, up, and away into an absolute gradation).

In Love’s particle accelerator, a few of these elements that immediately split apart are “rightness,” “time” (in which ends are considered), and “method.” These three elements are like quarks at first, very hard to see clearly, very hard to control, and they are only seen after Love’s particles collide with Truth. The three elements of “rightness,” “time,” and “method” are integral to the ethical structures (and etymologies) of deontology and teleology at the atomic level. After time in Love’s particle accelerator, the energized quarks of “rightness,” “time,” and “method” come into focus only when the three elements are seen as more influenced by the individual ethical systems and less as unwavering elements in the primal definitions of deontology and teleology.

The fuller discussion of the quirkiness of the three elements is in the Long Course on Deontology and Teleology.

After all and while keeping a crucial element of their etymology, the following definitions will better fulfill the two terms’ function in showing where a particular system places emphasis in the determination of right or wrong. Said in another way, “tight and wrong” and “good and bad” are determined by the ethical system, and only then—after the fact—can that system be rated as more deontological or teleological. The general definitions will be exemplified in the following.

Love’s Deontological Choice:
so chosen on the inherent qualities of choice;

A Deontologically Good Choice:

a choice a system determines is inherently “right” in itself.

Deontology = inherent over consequences

Love’s Teleological Choice:
so chosen on the consequential qualities of choice;

A Teleologically Good Choice:

a choice a system determines is “right” more from consequences.

Teleology = consequences over inherent

Both apply to all choices, not one without the other.

chart 8. Summary Definitions of Deontology & Teleology

We ask you to think about “inherent” to help describe deontology, and we ask you to think about “consequential” to help describe teleology. In short, it is important to remember that an absolutely “right” choice in perfect Love has both deontological and teleological elements. So deontology (with its focus upon the inherent rightness of an action) and teleology (with its focus upon how consequences help determine the rightness of action) are descriptive terms from this point onward. Observations made in Love’s particle accelerator. Therefore, every good choice made in Love is unique and embraces both the deontological and the teleological. That is, after NCA, GA, P, and DA have determined a choice—only afterward—then can one say that the choice was more deontological or more teleological, more one or the other. In Bucher’s dilemma, the choice of Truth would be more deontological and the choice of lying to save a life in Love would be more teleological, and that becomes clear only after the choice is made. These clarifications will help us understand Love and Truth the more they collide.

Truly, Love makes the world go round, even at the atomic level.

B. Long Course on Deontology & Teleology—Overlapping

The above ended the short course on deontology and teleology. If you like, go toward the end of this chapter to chart 8: Summary Definitions of Deontology & Teleology. That should be enough for the rest of the book.

If, on the other hand, you are philosophically adventurous and enjoy taking the long way—truly do not mind circumnavigating the globe because of the scenery—then read on here. If you are interested in a mastery, wade into the waters of the long course below.

From the above, there is a subtle overlapping of the connotations of between deontology and teleology. The overlapping is hard at first to see, but apparent after a closer look. Subtle as the overlapping is, seeing the overlapping is easier than distinguishing where one term departs from the other, except in the mind of the radical fundamentalist who remains in denial of the crucial place of teleological concerns. To make this clear, we will need to dovetail a few previous arguments and charts.

Because of the overlapping, a teleological libertine is faulted for being short of respect for the inherent “rightness” of some choices—a lack of deontological virtue and sometimes a lack of appreciation for absolutes, or even a lack of appreciation for the absoluteness of absolutes. Similarly, the deontological fundamentalist is faulted for being short of respect for the clearly bad consequences of some seemingly “right” choices—a lack of teleological realism and sometimes a lack of appreciation for the demands of Love itself. The fundamentalist in deontological comfort is tempted to skew obvious teleological compassion, and the libertine in teleological individualism is tempted to skew some clear deontological duty. See below the recall of chart 3.

The Best & the Worst of the Great Responsibility Shuffle
Modus Operandi	Inquisitor Fundamentalist	Values
Right-Wing Judgments Often at the Expense of Loving Concern	< < - > >	Demand of Conformity High Degree of Restricted Freedom
~ Those in Between ~ Squeezed, Torn, or Gone is the Lukewarm—Even Despised
Modus Operandi	Nonchalant Liberal	Values
Left-Wing Tolerance Often at the Expense of Absolutes	< < - > >	Claim to Freedom Low Degree of Conformity
Bilateral Results: the worst dialogue is defensive/offensive; the best dialogue is neither offensive/defensive, but encountering clear concerns

chart 3. The Great Shuffle of Responsibility (Revisited)

The inquisitor-fundamentalist is very much deontological. Whatever is presently “right” has to be done regardless of consequences. The question of “right” does not often—if ever—take into consideration the consequences of actions and almost exclusively considers the Law as the final indicator of “rightness,” or some current or modern interpretation that has been politically canonized as a law. That is the Pharisee scanning the horizon with a tape measure looking for anyone who has gone a centimeter off of the prescribed code of the day.

The nonchalant liberal is very teleological. Whatever is “right” is not that clear all of the time, so judgment is suspended. Of course, the worst of the nonchalant liberal is: “whatever feels good is OK.” Hello, Hedonism. Period.

Outside of the pharisaic code and more close to the nonchalant liberal, Jesus’ words seem very appropriate: “let him who has no sin cast the first stone” followed very quickly by “go and sin no more” (John 8:1-11).

Clarifying the overlapping between deontology and teleology is necessary to a fuller understanding of the nature of the N.T. biblical ethic. This was touched upon earlier in chart 6: Teleology a Decisive Issue for Love and Ethics, which is recalled below.

Decisive Issue about Love and Ethics is:

1. Deontology With No Teleological Duty—one without other

~ OR ~

2. Deontology With Teleological Duty—both/and

Either the Biblical Ethic is “#1” or is “#2”—

~ No Middle Ground ~

chart 7. Teleology a Decisive Issue for Love & Ethics (Revisited)

There is no middle ground. We see that deontology and teleology go together in Love.

Since every good Love in the present moment is solidly linked to loving better tomorrow and even eternally, if it is not already clear, we shall be reinforcing more and more how Love cannot have a solely deontological focus. Such a solitary focus on the deontological circumvents the nature of Love. It should be enough that Love is linked to contemplating Love’s results, and that means Love is deontological and at least equally if not predominantly teleological. We shall indicate how both Love and the N.T. ethic are predominately teleological. In other words, there is no true Love that does not have one foot in the future tense of the loved one’s life.

In trying to clarify the overlapping of deontology and teleology—which is a bear hunt in itself—we identify several elements like molecules that spin between the two terms’ etymology. The elements are not clear until we split them in a particle accelerator, slamming them into each other to reveal as many quarks as possible, forcing the ethical energy to come out of them in useful and predictable ways. Without some kind of control over the fission and fusion of these elements, we just might blow ourselves up by accident (kind of like Geisler did, where the absoluteness of absolutes is blown up, up, and away into an absolute gradation).

In Love’s particle accelerator, a few of these elements that immediately split apart are “rightness,” “time” (in which ends are considered), and “method.” These three elements are like quarks at first, very hard to see clearly, very hard to control, and they are only seen after Love collides; but they are integral to the ethical structures (and etymologies) of deontology and teleology at the atomic level. After time in Love’s particle accelerator, the energized quarks of “rightness,” “time,” and “method” come into focus only when the three elements are seen as more influenced by the individual ethical systems and less as unwavering elements in the primal definitions of deontology and teleology.

So the function of the three elements need to be clarified as somewhat subservient and even quarky in the meanings of deontology and teleology. One reason for their quarky subservience is that

how the three atomic elements of
“rightness,” “time,” and “method”
function

in teleology and deontology are never learned until the system itself tells us how the particular system came to its conclusions. We can only apply the three elements after the system has showed us its own method of justification and especially how the system viewed absolutes. Only then do we understand how the three elements pertain to the definitions of deontology and teleology.

Bear in mind that this discussion is not simply between DA, P, GA, NCA, and how the four systems use of the terms teleology and deontology. This discussion is digging out the fundamental elements in all biblical ethical systems. Whether a person can articulate their ethic or not, recall from this book’s introduction that ethics per se are everywhere, and that everyone has an ethic. How we view the nature of deontology, teleology, and the quarky elements “rightness,” “time,” and “method” is not so much a matter of interpretation, but a matter of description. Whatever a person may claim, how a person makes choices and is acting is that person’s ethic—period. The mark of integrity is measured highest in the man or woman whose actual thoughts and deeds come closest to their claims. Whatever the ethic may be, that ethic will in turn be subjected to one ethical description mentioned above in chart 6, either #1 or #2.

In clarifying deontology and teleology as descriptive terms, as opposed to determinative or definitive terms of a system’s ethics, the “time” perspective in the terms becomes an ancillary and subservient aspect of their definition governed not by the terms themselves. It is the ethical system’s method of choosing and the system’s choice that govern the “time” perspective. For instance, Truth is as deontologically “right” as Love in Saving Lives: both have inherent “rightness” and “duty.” But since the “rightness” of Truth has little-to-no bearing in “time,” and the “rightness” of Love in Saving Lives does have a bearing in “time” (as it may be postponed to the crucial moment), Love in Saving Lives also has a teleological aspect that Truth does not.

Yet, from the very fact that Truth usually yields favorable ends in the long run, Truth likewise has a teleological aspect that is somewhat different from the teleology of Love in Saving Lives. The point is that all biblical actions have aspects that are both deontological and teleological: regardless of the place of “time” in the making of a decision.

What this concludes is that the two terms deontological and teleological will describe an ethical perspective of an event or a system: where emphasis was, is, or will be placed at any given time during the course of decision-making and evaluation. Deontology and teleology are descriptive. How “time” or “ends” relate to the “rightness” of an action is not the concern of deontology and teleology (so much). How “time” and “ends” relate to “rightness” is more the concern of the ethical system that evaluates the choice.

In other words, it is important to remember to divorce the concepts of “time” and “rightness” and “method”—as unchanging qualities—from the terms deontology and teleology. The import of “time,” “rightness,” and “method” within the terms of deontology and teleology are elements that vary according to how the particular ethical system makes or is making or made a decision in Love.

Only after Love collides with the problem can one determine how “time” and “ends” relate to “rightness.” Love finds a way to “rightness” or there is no Love or “rightness.”

The three elements vary even more according to how the system is looking at a decision in competition with other decisions (and other ethical systems). The particular ethical system lays out its own “method,” the degree of “rightness” in an action, and when, where, and how “time” fits in the determination of “rightness.” Until the system lays out how the three elements are viewed with respect to a specific decision, the three elements are innocuous and have little relevance to the general definitions of deontology and teleology.

The elements of “time” and “rightness” are only made clear by a system’s method. Once “rightness” and the place of “time” are determined by a system’s method of determining the rightness of a choice, the terms become useful in the description of where the system placed priority in analysis as well as in a description of the general perspective of the system itself and even in describing something of the decision itself (as viewed by the system).

To truly master deontology and teleology, divorce the concepts of “time,” “rightness,” and “method” from the terms—theoretically. Divorce “rightness” too, you ask? Yes, for the method of determining the “rightness” of a choice is the ethical system’s purview, with biblical systems placing a premium on God’s absolutes like Truth and Love. So remember, the terms deontology and teleology are descriptive, and they are not ethical systems themselves in biblical ethics.

Deontology and teleology describe the system’s method of determining “rightness” and not “rightness” itself. Each of the following ethical systems use the Bible to determine “rightness,” and in complex decisions the systems use their own method to biblically justify the “rightness” of a given choice. After the fact, the action can be described as either more deontological or more teleological. Furthermore, when one classifies an action as either more deontological or more teleological, the emphasis is not on the perspective of “time” or even “rightness” as much as the emphasis is on the particular system’s overall method of determining “rightness.”

In our atom splitting, we ask this: What did the system look at most? Did the ethical system look at raw inherent duty or at the results? What did the system look at most in determining the “rightness” of a choice? Did the system look at the “inherent rightness” of the action? Or did the system look at the “consequential rightness” of the action?

For example, in Bucher’s dilemma, several decisions are analyzed:

Truth over lying,
Love in Saving Lives over murder,
and the minutiae among these.

Each of these choices have an element of deontological and teleological significance that varies during the course of decision determination. That is, the deontological or teleological significance changes somewhat before, during, at, and after the time a specific choice is made. That significance is all relative and subject to the “method” of a system and not to the two terms themselves.

Yet once a decision is made as to which choice one needs to make (or after the choice is made), the three atomic elements of significance in each of the two terms cause the three elements to align themselves without further ado, and the quarky energy of “rightness,” “time,” and “method” becomes useful again for ethical description. Indeed, the quarkiness abates and settles after the ethical accelerator is turned off, after the choice is made. So that if one chose to tell the Truth rather than Love in saving a life (by lying), that person chose a clearly more deontological action. If one chose to Love with a lie to save life, that person chose a more teleological action. This is clear from the general connotations of deontology and teleology when the atomic particles of “time,” “rightness,” and “method” are split apart and separated by an individual ethical system.

Even though clear, an overlapping is seen in further analysis. A deontological choice of Truth also has some teleological virtue. And a teleological lie (made by Love in Saving Lives) has also some deontological virtue if it saves life. This will be seen clearer as we look in depth at Bucher’s choice.

Remember that deontology and teleology are descriptive terms. Remember that these are fluid terms that change during the course of a particular decision. Remember that when the two terms describe a particular action as either more deontological or more teleological, they are describing “how a system used” the three elements of “time,” “method,” and “rightness” at that particular juncture in decision-making.

Therefore, any Christian system (like any of the four we compare) can use the two terms deontology and teleology, and use of the terms helps the system further describe how it relates to absolutes and most especially to the atomic terms of “rightness,” “time,” and “method.” Yet a non-Christian system can also use the terms with or without respect to absolutes, because the terms do not have as much to do with “rightness” as much as they do with how an individual person’s ethical system determines “rightness.”

One reason the overlapping occurs is because few systems have defined their perspective on the places of “time,” “ends,” or “rightness” before the prospective choice. Few writers in ethics describe their theoretical methodology beyond an elementary claim to the valuing of absolutes, and fewer have shown how they use, compare, and select absolutes (like many radical fundamentalists who just know what is right). Likewise, there is a great need for many to show how their methodology relates to the methodology of other systems.

Yet even after the system’s method of determining “rightness” is defined, overlapping still remains between deontology and teleology. Though less ambiguous, ambiguity still remains. The reason—every “good” choice has both some deontological value and some teleological value. This is inescapable.

We have nearly finished our circuit around the globe.

The following definitions, while keeping a crucial element of their etymology, will better fulfill the two terms’ function in showing where a particular system places emphasis in the determination of right or wrong. “Right and wrong” and “good and bad” are determined by the system, which system is then rated as more deontological or teleological, eclipsing, but not erasing, a portion of “rightness” in the etymology of deontology. “Time” relations and “methods” are also determined by the system (eclipsing, not erasing, a portion of “time” or “method” in the etymology of teleology). The general definitions will be exemplified in the following.

Love’s Deontological Choice:
so chosen on the inherent qualities of choice;

A Deontologically Good Choice:

a choice a system determines is inherently “right” in itself.

Deontology = inherent over consequences

Love’s Teleological Choice:
so chosen on the consequential qualities of choice;

A Teleologically Good Choice:

a choice a system determines is “right” more from consequences.

Teleology = consequences over inherent

Both apply to all choices, not one without the other.

chart 8. Summary Definitions of Deontology & Teleology (Revisited)

We ask you to think about “inherent” to help describe deontology, and we ask you to think about “consequential” to help describe teleology. In the use, remember that deontology and teleology are descriptive terms, coming into force after the individual ethical system has determined the use of the three elements of “time,” “rightness,” and “method.” As such, remember that an absolutely “right” choice in perfect Love has both deontological and teleological elements.

Love finds a way, even through the atomic layers of rightness.

Supplement to
Would You Lie to Save a Life

Michael G. Maness

mgmaness@earthlink.net