we must postulate

In a couple of posts below I argued that Pope Benedict XVI attributes to Kant the foundations of modern moral relativism. I intend in this post to go back to this issue and discuss Kant's views on morality and religion. Kant himself summarized his views in the Preface to the first edition of his work On Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone (1792):

"So far as morality is based upon the conception of man as a free agent who, just because he is free, binds himself through his reason to unconditioned laws, it stands in need neither of the idea of another Being over him, for him to apprehend his duty, nor of an incentive other than the law itself, for him to do his duty. At least it is man's own fault if he is subject to such a need; and if he is, this need can be relieved through nothing outside himself: for whatever does not originate in himself and his own freedom in no way compensates for the deficiency of his morality. Hence for its own sake morality does not need religion at all (whether objectively, as regards willing, or subjectively, as regards ability [to act]); by virtue of pure practical reason it is self-sufficient." (bold mine)

Thus, according to Kant morality is a matter of reason; and morality is independent of religion and God. Although reason alone is sufficient to illuminate man in his decisions about what is moral and what is not, a question can be asked: But what would lead men to act morally? People need a goal or an end to act, and what is the goal or end that lead people to act morally? In his typical convoluted language Kant provides the answer (1). In short, his answer is: we must postulate God.

.

In the Kantian system, God arises out of morality and it is a rational by-product of morality. God has no place in defining the system of morals. He is quite convenient, though, as a guardian of it. For Kant, God is an option - a good option at that. If you have the right reasons you can lay down your own system of morals (as Kant himself did); if you then bring in religion and God it will be perfect.

.

This seems to me, in the absence of an universal human reason, the ideal intellectual framework for moral relativism. I lay down my own system of morals; you lay down yours; we both invoke God as a guardian of the two different systems of morals. And He is expected to guard both, without distinction, because this is a guardian who has no word on what He is guarding.

.

(1) "But although for its own sake morality needs no representation of an end which must precede the determining of the will, it is quite possible that it is necessarily related to such an end, taken not as the ground but as the [sum of] inevitable consequences of maxims adopted as conformable to that end. For in the absence of all reference to an end no determination of the will can take place in man, since such determination cannot be followed by no effect whatever; and the representation of the effect must be capable of being accepted, not, indeed, as the basis for the determination of the will and as an end antecedently aimed at, but yet as an end conceived of as the result ensuing from the will's determination through the law (finis in consequentiam veniens). Without an end of this sort a will, envisaging to itself no definite goal for a contemplated act, either objective or subjective (which it has, or ought to have, in view), is indeed informed as to how it ought to act, but not whither, and so can achieve no satisfaction. It is true, therefore, that morality requires no end for right conduct; the law, which contains the formal condition of the use of freedom in general, suffices. Yet an end does arise out of morality; for how the question, What is to result from this right conduct of ours? is to be answered, and towards what, as an end--even granted it may not be wholly subject to our control--we might direct our actions and abstentions so as at least to be in harmony with that end: these cannot possibly be matters of indifference to reason. Hence the end is no more than an idea of an object which takes the formal condition of all such ends as we ought to have (duty) and combines it with whatever is conditioned, and in harmony with duty, in all the ends which we do have (happiness proportioned to obedience to duty)--that is to say, the idea of a highest good in the world for whose possibility we must postulate a higher, moral, most holy, and omnipotent Being which alone can unite the two elements of this highest good. Yet (viewed practically) this idea is not an empty one, for it does meet our natural need to conceive of some sort of final end for all our actions and abstentions, taken as a whole, an end which can be justified by reason and the absence of which would be a hindrance to moral decision. Most important of all, however, this idea arises out of morality and is not its basis; it is an end the adoption of which as one's own presupposes basic ethical principles. Therefore it cannot be a matter of unconcern to morality as to whether or not it forms for itself the concept of a final end of all things (harmony with which, while not multiplying men's duties, yet provides them with a special point of focus for the unification of all ends); for only thereby can objective, practical reality be given to the union of the purposiveness arising from freedom with the purposiveness of nature, a union with which we cannot possibly dispense" (op. cit., bold mine).