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Honoring Muhammad — A Bridge Between the Crescent and the Oktcrux

Abu Qasim Muhammad ibn Abdullah ibn Abdul Muttalib ibn Hashim was born in Mecca in the year 570 AD. He was raised by his uncle Abu Talib ibn Abdul Muttalib after being orphaned at an early age. At the time of his birth, the Arabian Peninsula had fallen into idolatry and disbelief, pagan traditions rampant and hedonism the norm.

Muhammad felt disgusted by all that. Revolted, he would retreat into the depths of Gar Hira for meditation. He could not believe that the true purpose of humanity was to bow down to stone and wooden statues of strange creatures in submission. He believed there was more. Turns out he was right.

At the age of forty, during one meditative sessions, Muhammad experienced something profound. A Light of Truth shone upon him in the form of the Archangel Gabriel who manifested before him with the command to read.

Initially, Muhammad was confounded by this. He did not know what he was being asked to read from. The angel embraced him, tighter and tighter, repeating the demand. Fear grasped Muhammad and he fled the scene, returning home to his wife, Hazrat Sayyidina Khadija bint Khuwaylid asking her to comfort him, lay her arms around him, soothe his nerves. As she did, Muhammad told her what happened and she assured him he was the Lord's Chosen.

The experience was profound and it was three years until the next revelation came, declaring Muhammad as a Prophet chosen to preach the doctrine of the One God to the pagan polytheists of Mecca. Daunted by the task, Muhammad was hesitant at first but steeled himself later on to begin his duty. He was persecuted, hurt, exiled and cast out. He lost his family and everyone he knew, those closest to him, dearest to him, were tortured along with him. Eventually, he and his followers took flight to Medina wherein the newest chapter of his ministry began.

In Medina, Muhammad turned his faith into a political system, forging the tribes there together into one state, with a law and an army. With his newfound power and influence, Muhammad launched a campaign to nationwide propagate the Faith of the One God of Abraham. Twenty-three years after the mission began, he succeeded.

The Arabian Peninsula came together as a singular entity of united tribes, a religious polity. The leaders who followed Muhammad after his death spread the faith even further. During the reign of Caliph Omar ibn al-Khattab, the faith found its way to Palestine, Egypt and Persia. The faith was known as Islam.

From an outsider perspective, Muhammad is considered to be the founder of Islam. However, from the viewpoint of a practitioner, God is the founder of Islam and Adam was the first among humans to be Muslim. He propagated the faith and passed down its knowledge through Seth to Enoch to Noah all the way through to Abraham, Isaac, Ishmael, Jacob, Joseph, Moses and David. The central creed of this faith: the doctrine of the One God, also known as Tawhid.

La ilaha il-Allah — this is the summary of the creed. There is no god but God. And Muhammad is His Messenger, merely a Prophet on the Path of Prophets. Patriarch Mar Timothy I of Baghdad states it succinctly as the following:

Muhammad is worthy of all praise by all reasonable people...
He walked in the Path of the Prophets and trod in the Trail of the Lovers of God. 

All the Prophets taught the doctrine of the One God, and since Muhammad taught the doctrine of the Unity of God, he walked, therefore, in the Path of the Prophets. 

Further, all the Prophets drove men away from misdeeds, and brought them nearer to good works, and since Muhammad drove his people away from impious acts and brought them nearer to righteousness, he walked, therefore, in the Path of the Prophets. 

Again, all the Prophets separated men from idolatry and polytheism, and attached them to God and worshiping Him. Since Muhammad separated his people from idolatry and polytheism and attached them to the worship and knowledge of One God, beside whom there is no other God, he walked, therefore, in the Path of the Prophets. 

Finally, Muhammad taught about God, His Word and His Spirit, and since all the Prophets had prophesied about God, His Word and His Spirit, verily indeed , Muhammad walked, therefore, in the Path of the Prophets... 

Who, then, shall not praise, honor and exalt the great one who not only fought for God through words, but showed zeal for Him by the sword?

Patriarch Timothy I is a patriarch of the Church of the East often called, inaccurately since they accept and follow the Chalcedonian Creed, the Nestorian Church of the East or, simply, the Nestorian Church. It is to be distinguished from the Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox Churches. A prime difference between the Oriental Orthodox Church and the Nestorian Church of the East is that the former is Nasrani while the latter Hanif.

"Hanif" is a Syro-Aramaic word meaning "one rejecting and turning back" because the Nestorian Church observed the Sabbath and refrained from eating pork along with keeping other Laws of the Torah meticulously. The Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge states in the article concerning the Nestorians:

The Nestorians eat no pork and keep the Sabbath.
They believe in neither auricular confession nor purgatory.

Therefore, the greater majority of Christians considered that the Nestorians were turning back or inclining towards Judaism. Hence, the other Christians used to call the Nestorian Church "Hanif" because they were Hebraizers. Eventually the categorization stuck on.

What is interesting to note here is that the word "Hanif" also appears in the Quran and it did not previously exist within the Arabic language before the Revelation of the Book unto Muhammad. The root of the word is Syriac, basically the same as above. It is used in the Quran to refer to those who maintained the pure monotheistic beliefs of Patriarch Abraham, having rejected idolatry and retained some or all of the tenets and laws of the religion of Abraham which was "Submission to God" in its purest form.

 

Say unto them,
"Nay, we follow only Hanif, the religion of Abraham, and he was not of the polytheists."
[Quran 2:135] 

Abraham was neither a Jew nor a Christian, but he was a Hanif and he was not of the polytheists.
[Quran 3:67] 

Therefore, set you your face towards Hanif, inclining towards Haqq and Fitrah. No change let there be in the Creation of God: that is the straight religion, but most of men know not.
[Quran 30:30]

In the final Quranic verse listed above, "Haqq" means "Truth" and "Fitrah" means "Natural Law" referring to the preset moral compass instilled within all humans and jinn, as believed by Muslims, from the moment of their creation. These, in total, encompass the notion that Abraham's doctrine of monotheism, Hanif, in faith and practice was the true lawful nature of human beings expressed physically and spiritually.

Meanwhile, the categorization of the Oriental Orthodox as Nasri came from their acceptance of the Coptic belief regarding the Month of el-Nasi.  This is a thirteenth month lasting just a week or so in length. Nestorians do not accept this because of the prohibition of Nasi laid down in the Quran, the Revelation bestowed unto Muhammad, which the Church of the East term as Abu Qasim's Ahadith Qudsi, the Holy Narrations, making clear there are only twelve months, totally rejecting the Nasi,

The number of months with God is only twelve by God's Ordinance since the day He divinely fashioned the Heavens and the Earth.
[Quran 9:36]

Muhammad also mentions the Nasi in the Farewell Sermon,

Certainly the Nasi' is an impious addition, which has led the infidels into error. One year they authorize the Nasi', another year they forbid it. They observe the divine precept with respect to the number of the sacred months, but in fact they profane that which God has declared to be inviolable, and sanctify that which God has declared to be profane. 

Assuredly time, in its revolution, has returned to such as it was at the creation of the heavens and the earth. In the eyes of God the number of the months is twelve. Among these twelve months four are sacred, namely, Rajab, which stands alone, and three others which are consecutive.

The Nestorians accepts Muhammad as a transcendentally appointed Messenger of God inspired by the Holy Spirit. They call him Abu Qasim, Abbot Cosimas, and his Quranic traditions collected and codified during the time and reign of Caliph Osman they honor and consecrate as the Ahadith Qudsi.

The Nestorian Church of the East consists of many orders within its ranks, one of them being the small, almost extinct, military order known as the Order of the Caraimean. The Caraimean believe Muhammad was an orphaned ecclesiastical poet, not illiterate as propounded by mainstream Sunni scholarship, but one prolific with words and letters, his narrations, beautiful poetry, some of which were written down upon tablets of rocks and rags of parchment, leaves and leather, surviving him while others were lost.

They believe that when Caliph Osman put together the official Quran, some narrations were left out because he only included the ones which were written and could be recited but some could be recited yet no written copy was found and some were written yet no reciter was found. These became the remnants of the Ahadith Qudsi

However, over time, more and more Ahadith Qudsi were being spread around, some authentic while others fabricate. Therefore, Imam Abu Hanifah laid down the criteria to identify which ones were the former and the latter using Kalam, that is, philosophical discourse, and Ijtihad, independent reasoning. He taught this to Anan ben David who was, as believed by the Caraimean, the only student dedicated enough to be imprisoned with Imam Abu Hanifah.

Regarding the Theology and Christology of the Caraimean Order, they believe in High God the Holy Father Almighty. He is ha-Eloh, the God, al-Ilah or Allah, the Divine One. His Essence, dhat, is the Divinity, Haloh or Allah, which He has given His creations the chance of becoming one with through theosis, known in Islamic Sufi terminology as fana'. Theosis, in contrast to fana', though, is believed to provide one the chance to become elohim or alihatun, that is, lesser gods in His family. The equivalent to these "gods" or elohim in Islamic theology would probably be Sifatullah because these are the Names and Attributes of the One God reflected unto the mirrored hearts of His creations.

The Caraimean Creed believes in the statement of "La ilaha il-Allah" where they interpret it as:

The God is One, and His Essence is One, but His Names are many.

Therefore, the Holy Spirit, Ruh al-Quds, is considered to be a reflection of an eloh or sifat but not the God Himself, although emanating from the same Essence, Allah. The Holy Spirit carries the Logos which is also considered to be an eloh or sifat but not the God although emanating from the same Essence, Allah.

Meanwhile Christ is called Son of Mary — who is known by the Caraimean Order as the Christotokos, meaning Mother of Christ, and not the Theotokos, meaning Mother of God — not the Son of God. This is to emphasize his humanity. The role of the Messiah, according to the Caraimean, is to take the Logos from the Holy Spirit and be united with it forever. The Logos is from Allah but the Christ is not Allah. Together they are one in Jesus.

This is why it is said:

The Word is god from God, light from Light, truth from Truth, generated not created, but one divine essence with the Father. It was sent out by the Power of the Holy Spirit and through the flesh of the Virgin Mary to become one with man in Christ.

The Caraimean believe that Christ suffered death by crucifixion, he permitted it, under Pontius Pilate, who did not crucify him but only Allah allowed it to happen, and was buried, descended unto Sheol, the Realm of the Dead, at the End of Time to liberate the souls deserving Mercy, then rose again on the third day and ascended unto Heaven.

They believe we will see him again at the End of Days when he liberated the dead. Since time is relative, for him it has already happened but for us it is yet to happen. This is why the Caraimean say that Christ came and yet is coming. In Truth, it has all been accomplished already.

They believe that the Holy Spirit is Grace, termed Ahmed, poured out into the Saints, called Mahamadim. Each Saint is therefore named Muhammad. It is impossible to say Muhammad has gone, if he dies or is slain and the believer should not turn on their heels because, they believe, he will return in the next saint.

The Caraimean Order understands that when Abu Qasim was a child, the Archangel Gabriel came and opened his chest, took out his heart and put Ahmed inside of him. Hence, from that day onward he became Muhammad, and the same happens to every saint, at some point in their life.

This story and the foundation of this belief is not alien to Islam. The narration regarding the renewal of Muhammad's heart is found in a hadith concerning Muhammad's childhood related by Anas ibn Malik in the Sahih of Imam Muslim which states the following:

"Gabriel came to the Apostle of Allah while he was playing with his mates. He took hold of him and made him to lay on his back, ripping open his chest and taking out the heart from it.
He then proceeded to open the heart and extracted something that clung in it stating that was the part leading Man to sin. Then, his heart was washed in a gold basin with the Water of Zamzam, closed, and restored to its place. The boys came running to his foster mother and said,

Verily, Muhammad has been murdered!

They all rushed towards him and found him changed in complexion.
Anas said,

I myself saw the mark of stitching on his chest."

Muslims believe Gabriel is the Holy Spirit, Ruh al-Quds, who is tasked as the Archangel of Revelation to carry the Word of God to the Saints and Prophets. This is referenced multiple times in the Quran,

"And verily We gave unto Moses the Scripture and We caused a train of messengers to follow after him, and We gave unto Jesus, son of Mary, evident signs, and we supported him with the Holy Spirit."
[Quran 2:87]

"That Day God shall say: 'O Jesus, the son of Mary, recount My Favor unto thee and to thy mother. Behold! I strengthened thee with the Holy Spirit!"
[Quran 5:110]

"Say: the Holy Spirit has brought the Revelation from thy Lord in Truth, in order to strengthen those who believe, and as Guidance and Glad Tidings to Muslims."
[Quran 16:102]

Therefore, Gabriel, the Holy Spirit, cleansing the heart of Muhammad and implanting it unto him anew brimming with the Inspiration from the Grace of God is not entirely a bizarre idea from an Islamic viewpoint, though the resultant events and the interpretation of the event itself is different.

In the end, the gist of the matter is this, that our Caraimean brothers among the echelons of the Nestorian Church, have the utmost respect for our Liege Lord and Sultan al-Qulub Muhammad salallahu alayhisalam.

It is a shame today that so many of our brethren among them are being slaughtered inhumanely by those who claim to be from us such as the likes of ISIS and al-Qaeda. The violence perpetrated unto them by these terrorist so-called Muslims who are, in reality, munafiqun, are driving the Nestorians to believe that perhaps Patriarch Mar Timothy I was wrong about Muhammad and his people, leading them to leave the Church of the East for other denominations.

What is even more saddening is that the Church is already dwindling in regards to numbers. We cannot be the ones under whose name they are driven to extinction, specially when they behold our Prophet in such eminent light. We have to extend our hands to them, embrace them as one with us, hand in hand, together as humanity against the subhuman ilk of terrorism and extremist fundamentalism that is corrupting our world today.

I end this article with the Achtiname of our beloved Prophet Muhammad to the Christian Monks of Mount Sinai penned by his esteemed cousin and son-in-law Mawla Imam al-Murtaza Ali ibn Abu Talib:

This is a letter issued by Muhammed, son of Abdullah, the Messenger, the Prophet, the Faithful, who is sent to all the people as a trust on behalf of God to all His creatures and creation, that they may have no plea against God hereafter. Verily God is Mighty and Wise. 

This letter is directed to the ones embracing submission to God in peace, as a covenant unto the followers of the Holy Nazarene in the East and West, the far and the near, the Arabs and foreigners, the known and the unknown. 

This letter contains the oath given unto them, and he who disobeys that which is therein will be considered a renegade and transgressor to that whereunto he is commanded. He will be regarded as one who has corrupted the Oath of God, disbelieved His Testament, rejected His Authority, despised His Religion, and made himself deserving of His Curse, whether he is a Sultan or any other Muslim. 

Whenever monks, devotees and pilgrims gather together, whether in a mountain or valley, or den, or frequented place, or plain, or church, or in houses of worship, verily we are behind them and shall protect them, and their properties and their morals, by myself, by my friends and my allies, for they are of my subjects and under my protection. 

I shall exempt them from that which may disturb them; of the burdens which are paid by others as an oath of allegiance. They must not give anything of their income but only that which pleases them — they must not be offended, or disturbed, or coerced or compelled. 

Their judges should not be changed or prevented from accomplishing their offices, nor the monks disturbed in exercising their religion, or the people of seclusion be stopped from dwelling in their cells. 

No one is allowed to plunder the pilgrims, or destroy or spoil any of their churches, or houses of worship, or take any of the things contained within these houses and bring it to the houses of Islam. And he who takes away anything therefrom, will be one who has corrupted the Oath of God, and, indeed, disobeyed His Messenger. 

Poll-taxes should not be put upon their judges, monks, and those whose occupation is the worship of God; nor is any other thing to be taken from them, whether it be a fine, a tax or any unjust right. 

Verily I shall keep their compact, wherever they may be, in the sea or on the land, in the East or West, in the North or South, for they are under my protection and the testament of my safety, against all things which they abhor. 

No taxes or tithes should be received from those who devote themselves to the worship of God in the mountains, or from those who cultivate the Holy Lands. No one has the right to interfere with their affairs, or bring any action against them. 

Verily this is for aught else and not for them; rather, in the seasons of crops, they should be given a Kadah for each Ardab of wheat as provisions for them, and no one has the right to say to them this is too much, or ask them to pay any tax. 

As to those who possess properties, the wealthy and merchants, the poll-tax to be taken from them must not exceed twelve drachmas a head per year. 

They shall not be imposed upon by anyone to undertake a journey, or to be forced to go to wars or to carry arms; for the Muslims have to fight for them. Do no dispute or argue with them, but deal according to the verse recorded in the Quran,

Do not dispute or argue with the People of the Book but in that which is best [29:46] 

Thus they will live favored and protected from everything which may offend them by the Muslims, wherever they may be and in any place they may dwell. 

Should any Christian woman be married to a Muslim, such marriage must not take place except after her consent, and she must not be prevented from going to her church for prayer. 

Their churches must be honored duly as their right and they must not be obstructed or withheld from building churches or repairing their convents. 

They must not be forced to carry arms or stones; but the Muslims must protect them and defend them against others. 

It is positively incumbent upon every one of the Islam nation not to contradict or disobey this oath until the Day of Resurrection and the End of Time.

— Fahim Ferdous Kibria

A Brief Summary of the Bangladeshi Sociopolitical Environment in Regards to Islam

After the fall of the British Empire, India and Pakistan were split up somewhat based on religion. Pakistan was for Muslims, India for Hindus. Bangladesh was part of Pakistan with a Muslim-majority population but had its own culture and language, etc. Pakistan wanted to strip that away from us. Thus began a war.

Islamist movements in Bangladesh supported the Pakistani regime, they wanted to keep the two countries merged together as a single Islamist entity. Most of the folks in these movements where people possessing religious authority such as mullahs and imams.

Eventually Bangladesh did manage to break away from Pakistan forming into its own country in 1971. Not the best in the world but I'd say a lot better than Pakistan with its blasphemy laws and other figures of Islamism in power, plagued by the Taliban, etc.

The Pakistani sympathizers, the people of the Islamist "right" planned to usurp power and failed but nonetheless survived trial and weren't punished for their war crimes until now. The problem? These Islamist figures indoctrinated the youth to believe that there is a conspiracy against Islam in our country and they are being punished not because of their war crimes but they're framed for being Muslim.

Think of the evangelical complains of war against Christianity here in the US and multiply times hundred with guns and thugs involved. On one hand you have a growing population of youths who think there is a conspiracy against Islam, some kind of religious oppression. They want to wage war, jihad, against the so-called kuffar powers who are fueling this conspiracy against Islam from the West and from India.

These guys are relentless. They support everything that has to do with violent jihad, the misguided kind: ISIS, Taliban, all that stuff. They want a caliphate, the only way, they believe, they can stop this conspiracy and oppression of Muslims in their own land.

On the other hand, you have the hedonists, the anti-theists, using this opportunity to vilify Islam as a violent, misogynistic, homophobic, anti-freedom, anti-democratic, tyrannical ideology against all notions of culture and civilization that must be eradicated in order to restore peace.

— Fahim Ferdous Kibria

Intuition vs. Rationalization and the Reflective Equilibrium of Ethics

The following is an essay I penned for my Introduction to Ethics class offered by Rutgers University, conducted by Professor Beth Henzel.

The question of whether ethics and moral judgment be based upon reason or intuition is a subject of debate as indicated in the dialogue between Joakim Sandberg, Niklas Juth and Peter Singer. The text in consideration is a response to one of Peter Singer’s papers where he argues that some interesting new findings in the field of experimental moral psychology confirms his thesis of contention that intuition should play a negligible role in adequate justifications of normative ethical positions.

Sandberg and Juth argue that even though basing ethics solely on certain kinds of intuition can be problematic, basing ethics off the standpoint of pure reason can be similarly troublesome. Instead, Sandberg and Juth suggest a more nuanced and sensible methodology to derive moral positions. They coin this methodology “reflective equilibrium” which, as the name suggests, travels the middlep path between reason and intuition taking into account both sides of the coin before settling on a decision. This is the most fair and equitable position.

In this essay I will attempt to argue on the side of Joakim Sandberg and Niklas Juth by first presenting a summary of Peter Singer’s paper and the summary of arguments against Singer raised by Sandberg and Niklas on their response to him, then providing my own argument by drawing a comparison between moral decision-making and cognitive psychological findings on how best to deal with situations that induce an emotional and a rational response.

Singer begins his paper by stating the views of moral philosopher Jim Rachel who argues that ethicists in general should not base their comments on tragic events and their moral ramifications on pure intuition subject to the orthodox view of what is right and what is wrong. Singer then goes on to say that this is a view he shares with Rachel and proceeds to explain his own standpoint by starting off with a history of moral philosophy recalling popular myths of mankind being bestowed moral guidance from a divine origin and then moving on to names of other philosophers such as David Hume and Niccolo Machiavelli. He then goes on to explanations of post-Darwinian understanding of ethics in relation to genes and reciprocity.

Following this, Singer explains the difference between “personal” and “impersonal” moral reasoning, that is, he uses the example of the “trolley problem” to show how people are quick to make personal moral decisions over impersonal ones, namely, that if a group of people are asked, assuming an empty train trolley is rolling towards a group of five and flipping a switch will save four of them but kill the fifth by diverting the path of the trolley, whether they want to flip the switch or not, majority would answer in the affirmative. However, if the group is then asked whether they want to push a large heavy man into the pathway of the trolley thus stopping the trolley at the cost of that man most would answer in the negative. Singer explains how neuroscientists have discovered that this is the case because in the latter scenario pushing the large man causes the agent to be personally involved in killing him thus stimulating more areas of the brain making the intuition against it stronger than if the agent is not personally responsible for killing one man by flipping the switch. Afterwards, Singer goes on to talk about Rawls and his analogy of normative moral theories being similar to scientific theories where he says that like scientific theories that may be best explained by plausible scenarios even if those scenarios do not comply with all the data, in which case we assume the data to be flawed and seek a balance between it and the result, moral theories have our base intuitions as raw data and we are to regulate our intuitions and our judgments until there is reconciliation between the two. Singer finds this analogy erroneous.

Singer explains the difference between a scientific theory and a theory of normative morality by expounding on their definitions. He states that a scientific theory attempts to explain why certain things happen the way they happen while normative morality does not explain why do we react the way we react to things such as abortion and voluntary euthanasia but rather what we are ought to do and how we are to react in such circumstances. This difference between the two should account for the error in Rawls’ analogy by contrasting the two.

In conclusion, Singer states that human beings may always be subject to intuition and, just like the tampering or dismissal of data to fit a plausible scientific theory, we rationalize our arguments to fit the intuition for morality. Nonetheless, Singers says there is a difference between this intuition and the base intuition that cannot be rationalized where a person says they do not know why something is wrong but they just know it is, as they did in Haidt’s experiment that Singer uses to support his paper. Singer calls the former rational intuition and concludes that this should be our methodology to arrive at moral judgments.

Sandberg and Juth start their paper off by outlining Singer’s arguments along with the experiments mentioned in his paper. They move on to explaining the two types of intuitions in Singer’s paper, namely practical and theoretical, and mentioning how Singer concludes we should derive moral codes off the latter instead of the former. Sandberg and Juth argues that Singer’s notion that practical intuitions are products of our evolutionary lineage whereas theoretical intuitions are more rationally grounded is false since the latter can be just as evolution-based as the former, also adding in the fact that for most people theoretical intuitions could be just as spontaneous as their practical ones. The gist of Sandberg Juth’s paper is basically this that both methodologies are prone to the same cons as each other.

Personally, I agree with Sandberg and Juth’s view and do believe that the reflective equilibrium approach is the best approach to arrive at moral conclusions. In the field of cognitive behavioral psychology the human mind is divided into three separated dimensions: the emotional mind, rational mind, and wise mind. The emotional mind is the loci of decisions based on emotions, intuitions, and feelings, while the rational mind is the loci of decisions derived off pure logical reasoning. The wise mind is the balance in between and, psychologists confirm, is the correct source to base our decisions off in real-life. The wise mind is the balance between validating our emotions and judging a situation properly off sound logical reasoning. Cognitive behavioral therapy attempts to teach patients to base their decisions and tackle everyday problems using the wise mind. This largely mimics the methodology of reflective equilibrium for moral reasoning.

A good example to demonstrate the contrast between the thought processes of the emotional mind, the rational mind and the wise mind is to think of a girl who walks into her room which is extremely untidy and disorganized. Looking at the room makes her feel like that there is no way she can clean up the room given how messy it is. This is the emotional mind talking. The rational mind says that just because she feels like it cannot be done does not mean it cannot realistically be done. The job is not impossible. Rationally speaking, it is, in fact, possible. The wise mind strikes a balance between the two and says that yes it is possible but it is going to be difficult which is why the first emotional instinct of the girl was to feel like it could not be done. This validates her initial emotions as well as present the reality of the situation that cleaning up the room is something that is not impossible to achieve but it is going to be a tiresome task, preparing the girl to tackle with the problem as required.

The aforementioned example can then be applied for a moral decision. Let us assume that the woman somewhere in the world is undergoing labor and her husband is frantically pleading for help. He calls the emergency unit of the closest hospital and they inform him that all their ambulances are currently engaged. Distraught, the man decides to drive his wife to the hospital himself. Rationally, at this point, the moral thing to do would probably be to follow all the driving laws for the safety of everyone on the road. However, the first intuition of the man would be to rather ignore all the laws and speed limits, and make sure that his wife is in the hospital under immediate medical attention. Nonetheless, it is morally wrong to push away the safety of everyone else on the road for the well-being of just one person, namely this man’s wife, if one were to weigh the situation logically. The best thing to do at this point would be to strike a balance and drive ignoring a few traffic rules without being too reckless while upholding a minimal level of road safety and not harm anyone else. Balance is the key.

Now, it is important to note here that just because some answers are neither black nor white, it does not mean that no answers are black or white. In other words, there can be a situation where acting upon one’s intuition is “wrong” and the rational answer is “right” or vice versa. Once again, reflective equilibrium maintains the balance by reconciling one and the other.

It can be argued that an area so gray does not provide us with a concrete understanding of what is right and what is wrong. The answers derived off such a methodology is too subjective and it does not allow us to lay down a consolidated set of ethical laws and codes of conduct for all to follow since intuition will differ from person to person and thus what may seem right to one person may be branded as ethically wrong by another. Rationally arrived codes of ethics may be more compact and therefore give us something corporeal to follow. This argument can be broken down into premises surrounding the idea that ethical codes of conduct are nomic necessary truths which can be arrived at using pure logical reasoning alone. However, this is not the case in a practical scenario, as, by pure logical reasoning alone, a person may arrive at an entirely different conclusion than another regarding the question of what is right and what is wrong. Therefore, reasoning can be just as subjective as intuition.

Also, let us assume for the sake of argument that ethical codes of conduct are nomic necessary truths that can be reached at through solely using reason. This leaves us with another problem, namely that the capability of the mental faculties of the one doing the reasoning is subject to differ from one person to another thus two people may arrive at two completely different conclusions on the matter of what is right and what is wrong due to the varying levels of their intelligence and other mental abilities.

Hence, taking all of the presented viewpoints into account it would be safest to conclude that Sandberg and Juth’s argument that rationalization is prone to similar flaws as intuition in the topic of ethics and morality, and thus, a balance between the two utilizing the methodology of reflective equilibrium is the most sound approach for an ethicist.



— Fahim Ferdous Kibria

Unity of Existence

Only God is Existent, and all of Creation is but a grandiose mirror reflecting His Divine Essence and Attributes.

Shaykh al-Akbar Imam ibn Arabi al-Hatimi at-Tai termed this concept "the Unity of Existence" — al-Wahdat al-Wujud.

In Sufi terminology, Wahdatul-Wujud means to believe that all the Mawjudat, that is, everything that exists and is present around us and beyond us, is an indication of God’s Presence, and everything besides God is Subjective, that is, a thing that exists, merely exists because God has subjected it to exist and therefore it has no existentiality of its own. Therefore, everything that exists is a representation of Takwin, the Creative Act of God.

A common argument against the concept of al-Wahdat al-Wajud, often brought up by the Wahhabi Muslims such as the likes of Dr. Zakir Naik and Dr. Bilal Philips, is that it is Shirk in the form of Pantheism: untrue.

Pantheism is the belief that God is present in creation in the physical sense which is, thus, worshiped. This leads to paganism and idolatry as the objects in creation are directly worshiped as God, reducing Them to being bound in three-dimensional entities existing within spacetime.

In sharp contrast, Wahdatul-Wujud enhances God beyond any space, time or dimensional boundaries by stating that if everything in being was extended to infinity, nothing would remain but God. That is, a two-dimensional picture of
a house can be rendered into three-dimensional form, converting the image into an actual house with height, weight, width and length. However, if everything in existence was, similarly, rendered into infinite dimensions, then it would all cease to exist except for God. Therefore, in the greater scheme of things, we conclude, nothing exists but God.

Think of it this way: You paint a picture. The picture is not real. It is a two-dimensional rendering of whatever was going through your head as you illustrated it on a canvas. It doesn't really exist – you gave it form. Now, think this: you and everything around you is a picture, a three-dimensional rendering of the Will and Creative Attribute of God.

This is the Ultimate Truth. This is the Unity of Creation and All of Existence. This is Wahdat al-Wujud.

— Fahim Ferdous Kibria

Moral Philosophy and the Metaphysics of Ethics

Moral Philosophy

Aim: to establish the supreme principle of morality

Preface

Kant begins by systematizing knowledge (Kant is very fond of systematizing).

He makes the observation that Ancient Greek thinkers divided philosophy into three sciences:

1. Physics
2. Ethics
3. Logic

Kant agrees with this division but seeks to explain the reasoning behind this division by introducing new division.

•  Formal: concerned solely with the form of the understanding and form of reason itself;
  universal rules of thinking as such: this is logic
• Universal and necessary laws of thinking
• Can have no empirical (based on experience) component
•  So is “pure philosophy” – based on a priori principles
•  Material: concerned with specific objects and their laws (as opposed to the forms of the understanding and reason); consists of two parts
• Laws of nature: physics/natural philosophy
• Laws according to which everything happens
• Laws of freedom/moral philosophy
• Laws according to which everything ought to happen
• Does his description of ethics strike anyone as odd (laws of freedom)?
• The point: we see the importance of freedom and laws in ethics.
• Ethics differs from physics in that its laws, laws of freedom, are not descriptive but instead prescriptive.
• Both have an empirical component
• Empirical component of ethics is practical anthropology
• “Moral philosophy has to define the laws of the human will, to the extent that the will is affected by nature.”
• However, ethics can also be pure (based on a priori principles).
• When pure philosophy is limited to specific objects, it is called metaphysics. (Thus the name metaphysics of morals)
• Metaphysics of morals, and only the metaphysics, is moral philosophy.
• This part is also called the rational part.

The empirical and rational parts should not mix.
Metaphysics must precede the empirical part and must “be scrupulously cleansed of everything empirical” to know “how much pure reason can accomplish”

• He later states that anything which mixes pure and empirical principles “does not even deserve to be called philosophy…still less…moral philosophy”
• Practical judgment, sharpened by experience, is needed to discern the cases to which the moral law applies. However, the laws themselves do not draw upon experience. 

Why? Moral law, to be law, must carry absolute necessity to be morally valid – “valid, that is, as a basis of obligation.” It must also not hold only for humans but for any rational being. So, the law cannot be grounded in human nature or facts about us or our world, for these things which are contingent. Nothing empirical but pure reason only can be used in determining moral law

This “pure” moral philosophy is concerned with a “pure will” and not human volition generally.
The pure is not concerned with humans tend to do or what we often do but instead with what a rational will, free from inclinations (likes, dislikes, wants, desires, aversions, etc) can do. This will is motivated only by a priori principles.
It acts out of duty in accordance with the Moral Law; its actions are done for the sake of the moral law instead of merely conforming to it.

• There is a difference between done for sake of and conforming. If the actions is not done out of duty, then the coincidence of the action with the moral merely happens chance; it is a coincidence.
• Actions for the sake of duty are the only actions that are morally good. 

Ch. 1: Passage from the Common Rational Knowledge of Morality to the Philosophical

Good Will

Will: the ability to determine action according to principles.

• We have a will. My cat does not. 

Good will: the only thing good without qualification

• Constitutes an indispensable condition of our worthiness to be happy.
• It is the only thing with “intrinsic moral worth.”
• It is the only thing with intrinsic worth because a good will is the only thing that always has morally good ends.
• Though helpful, gifts of nature and of fortune do not; Villains can have wit, intelligence, and bravery.
• This is why it is the only thing good without qualification
• It has “intrinsic moral worth” because it “has full worth in itself” regardless of consequences.
• A good will is good even if it achieves nothing; utility adds nothing to its worth.

Since the notion that utility doesn’t matter to value at all is a bit strange, Kant presents an argument against utilitarianism (or at least a version of it).

• P1: “no instrument for any purpose will be found in that being unless it is also the most appropriate and best adapted for that purpose.”
• P2: reason is an instrument nature gave to us
• P3: Assume nature’s purpose for beings with reason and wills are their own individual preservation, welfare, or happiness. 
• P4: Reason is not the most appropriate tool for preservation, welfare, or happiness.
• Support: Instinct would be a better way of meeting these ends.
• Support: Reason is a poorly suited to achieve these ends.
• Casts reason in rather negative light here
• Reason provides “feeble and defective guidance”
• “Nature would have prevented reason from…presuming, with its feeble insights, to think out for itself a plan for happiness and for the means of attaining it.”
• Furthermore, those who devote their cultivated reason to the enjoyment of life and happiness end up far away from content.

C: So…Reason is an instrument not for happiness but for some “worthier” end; and rejection of P3.
Points to push back on:

• P1
• P4 – specifically if the focus of utilitarianism is not just on one’s own happiness but maximizing happiness.
  {as a side note, Mill wasn’t born until 2 years after Kant died} 

Kant moves from the above conclusion to the broader conclusion that since nature gave us reason, and reason controls the will, the purpose of reason must be to produce a will which is good in itself.

• Not the sole good, but the highest good and the condition on all the rest (goods of fortune and of nature)
• The will has its own kind of satisfaction – not happiness but “satisfaction from fulfilling a purpose which reason alone determines”
• Acting out of duty in accordance with the Moral Law (Note: moral law, not laws).

The Three Propositions Regarding Moral Duty

Proposition 1: To have genuine moral merit an action must be done from, not just according to, duty.

• The action cannot be opposed to duty
• The action must have a direct inclination, meaning that the actions is not done because the agent is compelled by another inclination
• Ex: hypnosis; involuntary spasms; being nice to look good in front of your boss; Kant’s example of a shopkeeper giving correct change.
• This also means that the action cannot be done out of self-interest
• Difficulty arises when direct inclination and something else is at play.  For something to be done out of duty, Kant implies that it must be done solely out of duty, out a direct inclination. So some actions can be in conformity with duty but not out of duty [so, acting out of sympathy, happiness, self-interest or self-preservation generally doesn’t count]

Proposition 2: “The moral worth of an action done out of duty has its moral worth not in the objective to be reached…but in the maxim in accordance with which the action is decided upon.”

• This proposition eliminates at least one type of moral luck. Under a consequentialist view, one can try to do the right thing and be competent in doing the right thing but, through no fault of one’s own, one brings about a worse outcome. In this case, one has acted wrongly because of bad moral luck. Under Kant’s view, the focus is only on things fully within one’s control, assuming, of course, that we have free will.

Proposition 3: “Duty is the necessity of an act done out of respect for the law.”

• Respect is an activity of the will; “it is self-generated by a rational concept.” As such we can only respect what is “conjoined with [our] purely as a ground and never as a consequence”
• Kant claims we can never respect an inclination because an inclination – and so every object of volition – is an effect of the will.
• So we are left with the law itself. (law determined solely on basis of rationality and so free from and independent of inclinations)
• Worth, then, doesn’t have anything to do with results or possible results. 
• Kant also claims in footnote 2 that respect is the consciousness of my will’s submission to the law; the respect is thus the effect of the law on a person.
• Inclinations and their objections are excluded for another reason: their result could have been brought about by other causes.
• Recall that Kant is focused on the will, and the will has a “worthier end” than pleasure or self-preservation.

The will is important because Kant holds that only in rational beings is the highest and unconditional good to be found. In other words, only in rational creatures is morality to be had, and rationality requires a will. The idea of the law must determine the will for the will to act out of duty.

• Kant claims that to act with moral merit we need no insight into the ground for this respect. We must only have the appreciation of the moral law. 
• Since inclinations and the consequences of our actions are excluded, the duty gains a univerasalizability – a necessity. What is left is reason, and that is shared among and is the same in all rational beings.
• The moral law is universal and necessary. From these descriptions we can establish a form of the moral law: I ought to never act in such a way that I could not also will that my maxim should become a universal law.
• This doesn’t proscribe any specific action – it only establishes a template of sorts – a form – to which maxims must comply.

Metaphysics of Ethics

Acting from Duty

The chapter starts by addressing the claim that one cannot in fact point to an example of someone acting solely out of duty.

• Kant agrees. He claims that, even with the most searching and rigorous self-examination, we cannot know for sure that our motivation is based solely in duty, for there is always what Kant calls the dear self (hidden selfish-motivation). 
• As side note, it is interesting to juxtapose his stance here with a later comment made which states: “for the pure thought of duty and of the moral law generally…has an influence on the human heart much more powerful than all other motivations that may arise from the field of experience.” Apparently it is the fault of professors that the appeal of duty is lost. (I sincerely hope that Kant is wrong on this last point!)
• He claims that this observation is not a mark against the moral theory. Even if there were never any actions which sprang from pure motives, his theory would be fine because the question is “whether reason, by itself and independently of all appearances, commands what ought to be done.” Whether this or that actually occurs, Kant claims, is irrelevant.
• A phrase often repeated in moral discourse is “ought implies can.” Loosely, the phrase means that if we are morally required to X, we must be able to do X. Morality cannot require us to do the impossible. 
• If we assume that Kant is right that we can never know for certain that we are acting purely out of duty, can we know that it is possible for beings like us to act purely out of duty? 

Rant about How an Empirical Approach to Ethics is Bad

Long story short: 

• a priori and rational = good methodology is ethics
• empirical, “popular practical philosophy,” and reasoning from cases = bad methodology in ethics

According to Kant, moral reasoning from examples is the worst advice one could give in morality. Before drawing any conclusions from the example, we must first apply some moral standard or principle to it to see if it is fitting to be used as an example.

Introduction to the Will, Reason, and Laws

Kant claims that everything in nature “works in accordance with laws” but that only rational beings have the power to act in accordance with the idea of laws. Rational beings thus have wills. Reason works on the will to influence the principles of volition and to derive actions from laws.

• There are two types of relationships between reason and the will. 
• If reason is the only thing acting on the will, then objective principles will always be subjective. 
• However, other things can determine the will. If reason is not the sole determining factor of the will – if the will “is exposed to subjective conditions”, in other words, if the agent has inclinations – then the will is not in complete accord with reason, and objective principles will not necessarily be subjective ones. 
• Objective principles, when acting as constraints, are called commandments. The will can still be determined by such objective principles. However, the will, by its own nature, is not necessarily obedient to such principles. 
• The formulation of a commandment is called an imperative. 

Imperatives

• All imperatives are marked by a “must,” which emphasizes the constraining nature of imperatives. 
• All carry at least a type of necessary and state which actions will be good (in a sense) - either good period or good for something else. Necessary period or necessary for some further end. 
• All imperatives apply to wills, but no imperatives hold for a divine, or holy, will. 
• This is because imperatives are formulations of commandments, and commandments apply only when the objective principles are not subjective principles – i.e. when the will is not in complete accord with reason. 
• A good will would still be subject to objective principles but would simply not be constrained by them because reason would already be in harmony with the will. 
• Two types of Imperatives: 
• Hypothetical Imperative (HI): “declare a possible action to be practically necessary as a means to the attainment of something else that one wants” or may want 
• Ex: If you want to win the lottery you ought to buy a ticket. 
• Two sub-types: 
• Problematic practical principle: End is possible 
• Assertoric practical principle: End is actual 
• Names come from types of proposition in Aristotelian logic. Assertoric propositions state what is or is not the case; problematic propositions involve the possibility of something being true. 
• He mentions one type of hypothetical imperative in particular, imperatives of skill. In these imperatives there is not found a question as to whether the end is reasonable but good – only about what one would have to do to attain it.
• We thus need to be careful of how we read “good” in some passages of Kant
• Kant claims that there is one end that “we may presuppose as actual in all rational beings.” This end is perfect happiness
• We can suppose this purpose a priori; call prudence that which leads to it
• Note: Kant does not claim that this is the ultimate end of human conduct, like Mill does. He only states that it is one end that all humans share. 
• Categorical Imperative (CI): “represented an action as itself objectively necessary”
• An apodictic practical principle 
• Apodictic, like assertoric and problematic, refers to Aristotelian propositions. Apodicitic propositions are statements which assert things that are necessarily true or self-evidently true or false 
• The CI is not concerned with the material of the action or its result but instead with its form and with the principle from which the actions itself results. 
• **What is good in the action consists in the agent’s disposition.** 
• Kant slightly reconfigures the division and gives new names: 
• Rules of skill: HI 
• Also technical imperatives 
• Counsels of Prudence: HI – always assertoric practical principles 
• Involve necessity but only under a subjective and contingent condition 
• Also pragmatic imperatives 
• Commandments (laws) of morality – CI 
• Also moral imperatives 
• All recommend actions that are good either as a means to something else or good in itself. 
• How are these imperatives possible? How can we understand these imperatives to constrain our will? 
• Technical and pragmatic imperatives: whoever wills the ends also wills the means 
• He claims that the use of a mean is included in the concept of the end; when willing that an effect be the result of one’s actions, one already conceives of the causality involved. The causality involves the means. 
• Pragmatic imperatives are trickier because the concept of happiness is vague. Willing the means when one wills the end thus becomes more difficult because we don’t really know what perfect happiness requires. 
• Kant even says that determining what action will promote the perfect happiness of a rational being is “insoluble” 
• If he’s right, is this a problem for Mill? 
• Moral imperatives: 
• The response here is more difficult because objective necessity can’t rest on a presupposition like the HI can. 
• We also cannot settle the issue empirically, so…. Investigate a priori! 
• While we cannot know beforehand what a HI will contain, Kant claims that we know right away what the CI contains: a necessary conformity to it. 
• Our duties are derived from this one principle. This leads us to… 

The Categorical Imperative: 1 and 2

There are three main formulations of the CI, with a slight variation of the first one mentioned. It is important to keep in mind that Kant views each of the formulations as identical to the others. They are all formulations of the CI and not different categorical imperatives.

CI 1a: “Act only on that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law”
CI 1b: “Act as though the maxim of your action were to become by your will a universal law of nature”

• What it means: We should act only if we can will that..
• 1a: everyone acts on the same principle we do without contradiction.
• 1b: the principle we act on become a law of nature. 
• While these are generally similar, there is a slight difference between the two – almost more of a slight difference in focus – that is highlighted in Kant’s discussion of the four examples. 
• Explanation of Examples:
• Borrowing Money: If we borrow money, state we will pay the loaner back, but have no intention of ever doing so, we act on a maxim that we cannot will to become universal law. Our larger goal is procuring money. If everyone acted on our maxim, then no one would ever lend money. Our maxim then undermines the practice of borrowing (and promising), creating contradiction. 
• Here, the focus is on “universal law.”
• Not helping others: If we acted on the maxim that we never help others, Kant claims we are acting on a maxim we cannot will to be universal law. This is because we sometimes seek help from others. 
• Here, the focus is on the act of what we can will to be universal. 
• Suicide: “A nature whose law was that the very same feeling meant to promote life should actually destroy life would contradict itself, and hence not endure as nature.” Basically, it would make no sense, and in a way be self-defeating, for nature to have as one of its laws “kill yourself whenever you don’t feel like living.”
• The focus here is on “law of nature.” 
• Not developing talents: even though nature could survive if everyone let their talents languish, Kant claims we cannot will that everyone would have such a natural instinct to eschew all development of talent. 
• As with the not helping others case, here the focus is on what we can will. 
• Possible Objections: 
• How do we appropriately describe a maxim? (Anscombe)
• Every action and goal has numerous descriptions. How we determine which ones are most salient? 
• Mill: “[Kant fails] to show that there would be any contradiction, and logical impossibility, in the adoption by all rational beings of the most outrageously immoral rules of conduct. All he show is that the consequences of their universal adoption would be such as no one would choose to incur.”

Moving from CI 1 to CI 2

Kant returns to the question of how a CI is possible. Can we prove, a priori, that there is an imperative that commands (1) absolutely and (2) without further motivation?

• Absolutely: 
• If the law is necessary, then the law must be connected with the concept of the will of a rational being.
• Will is a power of determining oneself to act in conformity with the idea of certain laws.
• An end is what serves the will as the objective (as in object) ground of its self-determining. 
• Basically an end is the effect which the will wills
• A necessary end is given by reason and so must be equally valid for all rational beings (since there is no inclination involved, and form of rationality same in all).
• If it is equally valid for all, then it commands absolutely. 
• Without further motivation
• You can have either a subjective ground of desiring (called a driving-spring) or an objective ground of willing (called a motivating reason).
• Practical principles are formal if they abstract from all subjective ends and material if they are based on subjective ends, or driving-springs. 
• Subjective ends only have value in relation to a subject’s desiring.
• Since CI is formal and has objective grounds, it does not have value in relation to any further desiring, and so the CI commands without further motivation. 
• Since it is possible for an imperative to command in this way, something whose existence in itself had absolute worth (as opposed to subjective value) could be a ground of the CI. 
• Kant claims as rational beings are such things. We, or our rational natures, are ends in themselves.
• Kant asserts that this is the way in which a rational agent must conceive of her own existence. Since we all must hold this on the same grounds, the subjective principle is also objective. 

CI 2: “Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in any other person, always at the same time as an end, never merely as a means.”

• What does CI 2 mean?
• We must always treat people as persons instead of things. While we can use others a means, we must never treat them merely as a means but instead must always treat them as beings with worth – a worth that they have independently of subjective desires. 
• In other words: how we treat a barista must differ from how we treat a coffee machine. One has dignity; the other has a price. 
• Explanation of Examples
• Borrowing money: we view the other person merely as means to our own end instead of as an agent desiring of respect. 
• Suicide: we are viewing our own selves as a means to maintaining a tolerable state of affairs.
• Cultivating talents: “It is not enough that an action that an action not conflict with humanity in our own person as an end in itself: it must also harmonize with this end.”
• Helping others: Not helping others will not conflict with humanity, but it will not harmonize with humanity either. 
• Roughly, we can avoid using ourselves or others as means, but we must be sure to also treat ourselves, others, and humanity in general as an end – as something with dignity or value – and we ought to promote things with intrinsic value. 

How do CI1 and CI2 fit together? Well, slightly different ways of looking at the CI.

• Objectively, ground lies in universality
• Subjectively, the ground of legislating lies in the end. So the ground lies in rational beings as end in themselves. 

The Categorical Imperative: 3

From the subjective ground of the CI follows that the supreme condition of the will’s harmony with universal practical reason is the Idea of the will of every rational being as a will that legislates universal law, or…

CI3: “every human will is a will that enacts universal laws in all its maxims”
[This problem is the hardest version of the CI to follow, so just hang in there.]
What it means:

• We should reject maxims that conflict with the law-giving nature of the will. 
• A will that is a supreme law-giver cannot depend on any interest. Why? 
• Such a will would require yet another law in order to restrict the interest of self-love

In this version Kant emphasizes the self-legislating aspect of a will. The will is subject to the law but also gives the law to itself.

• When we thought of beings as merely subject to laws (without legislating such laws to themselves), “the law had to carry some interest, as stimulus or compulsion to obedience”; their will had to be compelled by something else to act in a certain way. The result was then always a conditional imperative. Do X if you have interest Y. 
• The notion of self-legislation shows how the law can constrain us in the absence of an interest or inclination: it constrains us because we give it to ourselves.

This notion of all rational agents as equal lawmakers (and, he tosses in there, as judgers of their own actions from this standpoint) leads to the concept of a kingdom of ends.

• Kingdom: systematic union of different rational beings under common laws. 
• Abstracting from “personal differences” and “private ends”, we can conceive of all ends being so systematically united. 
• This kingdom’s laws would relate to CI2, to the relation of us to each other as ends and means
• We are all members as lawgivers, and we must conceive of ourselves as lawgivers if we conceive of ourselves as ends in themselves. 

In other words, because we have dignity we are a rational being and so a member of the kingdom of ends.

• Dignity versus Price 
• Price indicates that the thing can be replaced; it has only relative worth (worth because someone values it). These things have a market price or attachment price.
• Dignity is what those things which are “exalted above all price” and have no equivalents possess. Dignity is the inner worth of ends in themselves have.
• Since “morality is the only condition under which a rational being can be an end in itself,” morality and humanity are the only things with dignity, though morality can confer dignity to actions though intentions, or maxims of the will.
• The basis of dignity is autonomy. (Autonomy is the ability of a will to legislate as a member of the kingdom of ends.) 

Categorical Imperative: Recap

All maxims have…

• A form: universality
• A matter: an end (rational beings)
• A complete determination: see CI3b; basically refers to the totality or all-comprehensiveness of its system of ends.

Autonomy and Heteronomy of the Will (almost done with Chapter 2!!!)

This entire discussion was supposedly started by an investigation into a good will, so Kant returns to this idea and tries to tie everything together.

Good will: a will is absolutely good if it cannot be evil, which means its universalized maxims cannot be in conflict with each other.

• End of a good will is a rational nature/being. 
• Such end must be self-sufficient. If it had to be brought about, then the goodness of the will would depend on consequences, which is bad. 
• Since the good will cannot be submitted to anything lower, the end must be itself.
• This shows the move from CI 2 (humanity as end in itself) to CI 3 (humanity as self-legislating). 
• Autonomy is the ability of a will to self-legislate as a member of the kingdom of ends.
• Morality and autonomy are thus linked, and the moral law is the law of freedom.

Another way to look at the relation between morality and autonomy:

• “Whatever constitutes by itself the absolute worth of human beings is that by which they must be judged”
• Autonomy is what gives persons dignity and so constitutes the absolute worth of humans. 

Autonomy of the will – some other attributes:

• An autonomous will is free from inclinations and does not act upon them. 
• Kant claims that the will is necessarily bound to the principle of autonomy, but to prove this we would have to give a critique of practical reason. 
• He does think that we can show that the principle of autonomy is the sole principle of ethics. This, plus the claim regarding how we must conceive of ourselves as being ends in themselves, is enough to get at basically the same thing.

Heteronomy of the will

• A will governed by inclinations; a will which does something because it wants something else.
• In other words, heteronomy arises when objects have sway over the will. 
• Two types of principles of morality which are based on heteronomy as their foundation:
• Empirical: drawn from principles of perfect happiness; built on either moral (think moral intuitions) or physical feeling.
• Not fit for moral laws because they are based in human constitution and so cannot be universal 
• Rational: drawn from principle of perfection; built on either the rational concept of perfection as a possible effect of our will or on the concept of perfection (God’s will) as a determining cause of our will
• Concept of perfection better than theological conception as a basis for morality, but both are also flawed
• An account based on the concept of perfection is circular; you cannot offer a proof without assuming the consequent at some point.
• Kant isn’t fond of using God as a basis of morality because we cannot directly apprehend Gods’ perfection and can only derive it from our own concepts, and these concepts generally include things like vengefulness, lust for glory and dominion, etc. 
• So (surprise surprise) Kant thinks heteronomy is a flawed foundation of morality for the above reasons, but also because of a more general criticism: such a basis can never command categorically. It always wills for some end, which is in turn a means for some other end, the limit being given by nature, and so is contingent. 
• Morality thus cannot come from a heteronomous will but must instead be bound with an autonomous will. 

The End (of Kant, for now)

— Professor Beth Henzel, Rutgers University