Jan. 15, 2026 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
30:34
Religion Solves Morality?
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All right, two thoughts.
Maybe we'll get to two.
I'll certainly get to one.
So there's somebody who emails me at least once a week making the case that UPB does not prove ethics.
Ethics can only be grounded in God's commandments.
That only God can remove subjectivity and relativism from ethics.
Well, that is a very interesting observation, and one which I've touched on here and there, but I want to take the brain cannon directly at the broadsides of this idea that with God, with God, with God, you get objective ethics.
I strenuously disagree.
Now, with science and with physics, you get objective answers.
If they're validated, they're true all over the world.
Indian mathematicians and Sri Lankan mathematicians and Chinese mathematicians and European and American all say two and two make four.
Scientists all over the world say that gravity is a property of mass, gases expand when heated and things fall to the earth at 9.8 meters per second per second.
Oliver, that's objective.
There are 10,000 gods, at least in the minds of man.
And I would argue, there are as many gods as there are people because everybody has their relatively subjective interpretation of what is meant by God's commandments.
So when you say God brings objectivity to morals, you have a problem in that God, God, most manifestly does not bring objectivity to morality, even within the same religion, even within the same denominations, even within the same church.
There are wild disagreements about the meaning of religious texts.
People in Islam disagree with people in Judaism, disagree with people in Christianity.
The various subsects of Christianity disagree with each other.
Even within those subsects, there are further divisions.
And it is almost impossible, in fact, I would say functionally and practically, it is impossible to get any two religious people, even if they're in the same family, to get any two religious people to agree on what constitutes ideals in religious virtues.
Is it thou shalt not kill, or is it just war?
Is it turn the other cheek or is it an eye for an eye?
Is there hell?
Is hell eternal?
Is there redemption?
Can people be redeemed on their deathbeds?
Is it good faith or good works?
Did Socrates go to heaven?
I mean, I won't go into all of the religious debates and arguments, but everyone can look at even the Bible, Old and New Testament.
Everyone can look at the Bible and they can all decide on different things and place their emphasis on different things.
Is Jesus soft and forgiving?
Or is Jesus hard and demanding?
We can't even agree on what forgiveness means in Christianity.
Is forgiveness, does it have to be earned, or is it granted outside of being earned?
There is no particular agreement on this at all.
Just look at the recent Erica Kirk situation of a couple of months back where she, within a couple of days of her husband being shot through the neck by a deranged gunman, forgave him.
And Trump and JD Vance and other people, mostly men, said, well, I guess they're better than us because we don't forgive.
Is forgiveness or punishment the ideal?
I have talked about Christian ideals for many, many years.
Those Christian ideals being: if you have a problem with someone, sit down and talk with him or her.
This is what I've counseled people to do if they have neglectful, abusive, or destructive, or toxic parents, according to what they say.
Obviously, I can't verify what people say, but that's what they say.
And I say, well, you should sit down with them.
And you should have repeat conversations with them until you solve the problem or you don't solve the problem and don't want to continue the conversation.
And then you don't have to see them.
That is straight up Christianity.
People think I invent stuff.
Yeah, I invented some stuff, but not that one.
Ask Christianity very explicitly says: if you have a problem with someone, sit down with him, try to work it out.
If he doesn't, if he doesn't listen, if he doesn't accept or repent, then bring a few friends, bring a few trusted friends, talk to him again.
If he still won't repent or admit faults, and everyone agrees he's at fault, then bring him before the whole congregation or bring the whole congregation before him and go over it again.
And if he still does not admit fault or repent, cast him from the congregation, cast him from your life.
Un du toi, einsweitrei.
One, two, three.
Three chats, and you're gone, baby, gone.
Now, why am I passionate about this?
Well, because you see, I grew up in a Christian culture, in a Christian country.
I was on the choir.
I went to church two or three times a week at times, in boarding school in particular.
And this is what I was taught.
And then when I became a podcaster, I said this to people straight out of the Bible.
And in the absence of having allies within the family, if you're not part of a congregation, what did I say to people?
I said, well, if you're going to confront your parents over misdeeds or any family member in particular, but most essentially your parents, if you're going to confront your parents regarding their misdeeds, then you really should have a therapist if nobody else is on your side.
You should engage with the therapist to make sure that you're doing the right thing and being reasonable.
So all of this was straight up Christianity.
As I learned, as I was taught, as it is written.
And what did everyone say?
Not everyone, obviously, but what did the media say?
What did people say?
Oh, he's running a cult.
Okay.
So if in a Christian culture you give people advice from the Bible and people say you're an evil manipulative cult leader, that's a little fucking confusing, isn't it?
This is our holiest book.
This is Commandments from Lord God Almighty.
This is infallible ethical advice.
Oh, here's the ethical advice you should take that's right out of that.
Oh, that's evil.
Oh, monstrous.
Monstrous.
It's like going to medical school and being taught that this is the most perfect way to take out an appendix.
You cut here, you separate here, you cut here, you remove here, you stitch up, and you are taught this year after year in medical school.
And then, what do you do?
Well, you go out, you practice like crazy, and you repeat it.
You go out into the world and you do exactly what was taught to you in medical school by the most perfect, world-renowned, excellent, magical, infallible doctors known to man, God or the devil.
Say, this is the absolute best way.
There's no better way to take out an appendix than to do it this way.
And you go out and you do it exactly that way.
You do it exactly the way that you were taught.
You're told exactly as the absolute best gold standard of healthcare and medicine.
The most perfect and brilliant doctors all approve.
Your teachers approve.
Everybody approves that this is exactly how you take out an appendix.
And you go out and you take out an appendix and people throw you in jail for trying to kill people.
And then they say, well, I mean, come on.
Medical school is the only way you can learn how to be a good doctor.
It's like, no, no, I went to medical school.
They taught me exactly how to do this, exactly the best way to do this.
I would have failed if I didn't do it that way.
I go out and do it.
And then I get sued and thrown in jail for malpractice and trying to kill someone.
What are you doing?
Well, I'm doing what I was taught.
No, that's evil.
So, if I apply Christian principles in a Christian country, and I, of course, have not come to set mother against child, father, parents against children.
I mean, Jesus said I have come to send set sons against their parents and parents against children, and so that's not my goal.
My goal is just virtue and truth.
So if, in a Christian society raised in a Christian context, I am told what is the good, right?
And then I publicly state what is the good, and everyone tells me I am an evil cult leader, then don't try to tell me that Christianity solves the problem of subjective ethics.
Don't try.
I mean, I'm sorry, I've experienced, I don't mean to laugh, but you know, it's a long time ago now.
But I have experienced quite the exact fucking opposite of any kind of consistency.
Forgiveness is central to Christianity, and after 2,000 years, nobody can really agree on whether forgiveness has to be earned.
I went through this on X a couple of months ago when I pointed out that nowhere in the Bible does it say you should forgive someone if they do not repent.
That's right there in the Bible.
And this is not a very subjective thing.
This is an objective thing because it's not contradictory.
Nowhere in the Bible does it command you to be virtuous by forgiving people who have done evil and not repented.
It's right there.
And then I mention this on X, and all the Christians come pouring down my throat, telling me I'm absolutely wrong, that people must be forgiven, and that's virtuous and I'm bad and wrong.
And I cite them Bible verse after Bible verse.
Commandments from God, from Jesus, from the saints, from church fathers, you name it.
No contradiction.
Does it change their mind?
It does not.
There was not one instance where somebody said, forgiveness must be provided without being earned.
And I point out all the verses where it says forgiveness must be earned.
Not one person out of the thousands I interacted with, and that's not a small sample group.
A lot in America, but all over the world.
People say, this is my holy book.
I believe God commands me to forgive without the evildoer repenting.
And I point out that nowhere in the Bible does it say that, and in fact, it says the exact opposite.
Does it change anyone's mind?
It does.
So that's subjective ethics.
I like forgiving people.
I feel good for giving people.
I don't like to withhold my forgiveness until people have earned it for whatever reason.
That's what I like.
That's what I want.
And Almighty God cannot convince that level of vanity otherwise.
The relationship between Christianity and other religions, particularly religions like Islam, where there has been historical aggression, really largely on the part of Islam, what is the relationship between Christians and Muslims?
Well, historically, it's been one of combat, and Muslims have invaded and, you know, of course, taken over significant sections of Europe for hundreds of years.
The Holy Lands were taken over.
The Crusades were defensive in general, and that's the historical relationship.
However, the Pope is washing the feet of migrants and praising Islam.
So that's a little confusing.
Because people prayed to God who said, go fight Islam and eject them from Europe or the holy sites.
And now the Pope, who has a direct path to God, a direct communion with God, now says that that's not the case.
So the people who prayed to God and God said, go fight the Saracens, and then the people who now pray and God says, do not invite the Saracens, invite them in, that's a little confusing.
Why would there be opposite?
Because remember, without God, all morality is subjective.
Okay?
So a good scientist, if you show data to the contrary, a good scientist will change his mind.
A scientist may not believe that a bowling ball and an orange when dropped from the Tower of Pisa by Leonardo da Vinci fall at the same rate.
However, if you go and drop those things and he sees that they do, if you take out wind resistance, things fall at the same rate, he will change his mind because he has been presented with different data.
I cannot, in the history of my life, and I have done a lot, hundreds of thousands of public conversations, I have yet to come across a religious person who changes his mind based upon data in the Bible.
There should be zero debate or issue over whether forgiveness is commanded without atonement, without the admitting of fault and restitution.
It is immoral to forgive someone who has not asked for forgiveness, who has not admitted fault and admitted wrong, because it removes from them the requirement to admit fault in order to get back in good graces.
God does not forgive those who do not repent.
God nowhere commands people to forgive those who do not repent.
In fact, he commands quite the opposite: forgive them if they repent, 70 times seven.
So the reason why God does not solve the problem of subjective morality is not just the 10,000 gods.
It's not just the different view of religion held by males and females as a whole.
It's not the subjective interpretation that everyone has out of generally ambiguous texts.
It is that people cannot be commanded according to the all-powerful.
People do not believe in God.
People do not bend themselves to the will of that which they call the Almighty.
What they do is they do what they want and find justifications.
And if no justifications are to be found, they make them up.
Religion as a whole promotes narcissism because by all evidence, by all evidence, if people are praying to God and God has given the Ten Commandments not for the local time, not for Tuesdays at three o'clock, but for all time in all places, right?
Because when Christians go to the New World, then they don't say, Well, I mean, this is the new world.
Christianity wasn't meant for here.
Christianity was specific to the Middle East and Ireland.
No, so no, Christianity is everywhere.
Christianity applies everywhere and forever.
It's universal.
You don't get saved in a different way in Alaska or the equator.
Christianity is eternal and universal.
So if it's true that people pray to God and God gives answers and God has given us universal eternal ethics, then the answers that God gives to people should be the same in the same way that scientists who perform the same experiments should get the same results.
If you drop an orange and bowling ball from various places around the world, they'll fall at the same rate, always and forever.
It's eternal.
So if people pray to God and say, Should I forgive Charlie Kirk's murderer? The answer should be the same because the morals and virtues are the same.
So that would be an indication that morality comes from God and morality is objective.
People pray to God and God gives the same answers to everyone.
I mean, there used to be these video game helplines that you'd call up and for a couple of cents a minute, they would give you the answer to a particular puzzle you had in a video game.
Okay, good.
Well, you don't get a different answer every time you call up, right?
One guy says, oh, you jump on the flaming block and then swing from the meat hook in the sky, they have to say that to everyone.
They can't take the opposite or something completely different.
And that's just human beings.
That's just calling up a helpline.
It wouldn't be much of a helpline if you told every person something different.
Sort of pointless, right?
Yeah, ripoff.
So it does not solve the problem of moral objectivity to say God.
Go to Christians and ask them specific moral questions.
I will give you another example.
In 2003, America invaded Iraq, a sovereign nation committing the international war crime called aggression, which is just about the worst thing you can do, which is to attack and invade another country who poses no threat to you.
And they said, well, we know for sure that there are weapons of mass destruction there.
You had Donald Rumsfeld waving his hands around saying they're north, east, west, south of here.
They know for a fact you got Colin Powell giving his big presentation to the UN.
We know exactly where they are.
We know what they are.
We know that there are weapons of mass destruction, 100% guaranteed.
It's a slam dunk.
Mr. President, thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not bear false witness.
So that's pretty obvious as a horrifying crime that killed well over half a million people.
It was lies to say that they knew where the weapons of mass destruction were because they weren't there.
That was a lie.
And therefore, it was not a defensive war, and it violated times 500,000 thou shalt not kill.
Now, the Christians, conservatives as a whole, tend to be quite favorable towards the death penalty for murderers.
And this would include people who hire murderers, right?
Even if they don't kill themselves, they hire hitmen and so on, right?
Okay.
So it's an eye for an eye.
When you take a life, your life is forfeit.
What if you take over 500,000 lives?
Does that matter?
Because that would be about as evil a thing as you can do.
I mean, a really prolific serial killer is going to kill 50 people.
You know, we're talking 10,000 times more than that.
10,000 serial killers, plus plus, plus.
Not to mention the genetic damage from the depleted uranium shells, the people who got sick from lack of health care, hundreds of thousands dead, hundreds of thousands maimed.
Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not bear false witness.
Does George W. Bush fit that category?
Yes, he does.
Did the people who lied America into a war, do they carry that moral burden?
Yes, they do.
And yet there came no particular cry from the Christians about this.
Some of the people who were the architects of this absolutely beyond mass murdery moral horror were still welcome at Christian conservative conferences.
How the fuck does that solve the problem of moral relativism?
To cause the death of half a million people, thus thou shalt not kill is explicitly violated in just about the worst conceivable way.
Thou shalt not bear false witness, lying a country into war Well, what has happened?
Nothing.
There has been no generic church cry for trials against those who architected this crime against humanity.
And many of them are still welcome in conservative circles and speak at conservative events and so on.
So do Christians, I'm sure that George W. Bush is still welcome in his church.
I'm sure that he's still welcome to give speeches at conservative events.
Fool me can't get fooled again.
What does this mean?
How is thou shalt not kill solved when a man, and it wasn't just him, but other men and other women, lied America into a brutal and unnecessary war that killed half a million people?
And there is no railing against him in particular from the church as a whole.
He's not shunned.
The churches aren't saying, well, we got to have these trials because thou shalt not bear false witness, thou shalt not kill.
Why not?
I mean, that's pretty clear.
It's a pretty clear one, right?
If George W. Bush had killed a guy, stabbed him in the head or whatever, and killed the guy, well, the Conservatives, if he was just a private citizen who killed a guy, the Conservatives would all be like, death penalty, jail, trial, prison, injection, eye for an eye.
But they don't hold those principles with the state as a whole.
So tell me how the problem of morals is solved through religion.
See, if there isn't a God, and we all have to accept that that's at least a possibility, then religion swells narcissism.
Why?
Because if there is no God, you are praying to something you consider eternal, omniscient, and all-powerful that doesn't exist, which means you're praying to the part of yourself that is deluded and psychotic, and you are placing it in authority over yourself.
Because if someone came in to a hospital and said, I am God, I am all-knowing, I am all-powerful, I am eternal, and I am all good, he would be viewed as psychotic and would be medicated.
Well, he would be, right?
Okay.
So if you pray to a God that you believe is all-knowing, all-powerful, all-perfect, cannot make an error, cannot ever counsel evil, then you are praying to the part of you that cannot admit fault.
Because generally, introspection is when, ooh, I'm not really sure, I got to weigh things in the balance, I don't know.
But if you are praying to the part of you that never admits any doubt or never admits any fault, then you are, in fact, placing in charge of your decisions the least healthy part of your consciousness.
Because if you're praying to God and what comes back from your unconscious is, ooh, I don't know, it's hard to tell.
I'm not sure.
It's complicated.
There's factors on both sides, arguments for both cases, blah, blah, blah.
And you say, well, that's not God, because God is all certain, all-knowing.
God doesn't weigh things.
He's not uncertain of things.
He knows.
So doubt, which is healthy, is replaced by absolute certainty without knowledge, which is very unhealthy.
Because the people who are on the right are complaining quite a bit about the people on the left and saying, oh, but they're so certain and they're so wrong.
And it's like, but you're praying to a God that gives everyone different answers, which is impossible.
You understand?
It's impossible for God to give people different answers.
You say, ah, yes, well, but some are coming from God and some are coming from the devil and some people aren't even connecting with God, blah, blah, blah.
But that's not an answer.
Most people who pray pray with great sincerity.
And if you are contacting the all-knowing, then you should get the right answer.
So back in the day, if you didn't know someone's number, you call directory assistants.
You could say, what's the number of Bob at 30 ABC Court?
Oh, here's his number.
Now, if they just gave you a different number every time you called, then there would be no purpose to that.
It would either be malevolent in that they knew Bob's number but wouldn't give it to you or they just made up numbers to make a buck when you called in.
Be wrong, be bad.
That would be terrible.
So if God gives different answers to everyone who prays in, then you have not solved the problem of subjectivity.
You've made it kind of psychotic.
Because everyone who prays to God thinks that the prayer that he or she gets answered is God's will and therefore is not open to negotiation.
Like this Mormon woman, Hildebrand, who teamed up with a Mommy blogger from eight passengers and said, God has sent me with the perfect answer on how to solve your marriage.
Turned out she and the Maumee blogger were horrendous child abusers who tortured and starved children.
And they're now in prison for what, four to 60 years for multiple counts of second-degree felony, child neglect and abuse.
But they operated within the, I think, largely within the Mormon community.
And this woman, Hildebrand, said to her clients, I've been sent by God to solve your marriage and I have the perfect solution.
God has told me the solution to your marriage.
Okay.
How are you going to argue that?
How are you going to argue that?
If you believe in God and you believe that this woman, Hildebrand, was sent by God with perfect knowledge on how to fix your marriage, this is why she was able to destroy so many marriages.
Because if you pray to God and God says, no, no, she's not a good woman, she's using my name in vain, blah, blah, blah.
Well, how are you going to prove it?
So those with the most doubt end up with the least, the fewest answers.
Because if you prayed to God and you had good faith, you were faithful and you believed in God, God answered your prayers and you'd have absolute certainty.
Because you can't get any more certain than absolute certainty from an all-knowing, all-powerful, all-good entity.
There's no higher standard of truth or proof that could be conceived of.
I'm open to the answers.
But, you know, in my seventh decade, almost, I look for what accords with the evidence.
If there is a God who's all-knowing, all-powerful, and speaks to people and gives them rules, then those rules should be more certain than the rules of physics.
But they're not.
People who pray to God should get the same answers, but they don't.
If there is a God, then why are there 10,000 gods that people believe in?
Are there false gods?
Okay, well, say 9,999 are false gods, but that other one, man, totally not false.
What accords with the actual evidence?
Why is it that when people who believe in Christianity, when it is absolutely proven to them that forgiveness requires repentance, that it is wrong to forgive without repentance, without the person who's wronged you repenting, why do they continue to argue?
I have given them the text from all-knowing, all-good, all-honest God, and they argue, which means they don't believe.
And this is consistently true.
I cannot think of a single Christian or religious person I've ever confronted with a text and they said, oh, you know what?
I didn't, you're right.
Of course, right.
I mean, not you're right, but you illuminating God's truth is right.
God can't be wrong and you've given me what God said, so, right, doesn't happen.
And that's because by praying to yourself, you are inflaming your vanity.
You are praying to the part of you that thinks it's God, which is desperately unhealthy.
And because you're inflaming your vanity, you can't be contradicted.
Because you can't be contradicted, because you can always just go and say, well, I'm going to pray again.
Oh, look, God now agrees with me.
You don't have to submit yourself to anything objective, which is why they generally don't, because you can just pray and get the answers that you want.
So the idea that religion solves the problem of relativism and subjectivism, that religion makes morals as clear and as objective and as universal and as absolute as the laws of physics, which took mankind millions of years to discover, the idea that God solves the problem of morality is, I mean, I wouldn't say it's ridiculous because that's an insult to ridiculous.
Just look around the world.
Has religion solved the problem of subjectivity in morality?
No.
And if you disagree with me, just find someone online who's religious, who's making a mistake according to scripture, tell them that they're wrong, prove them that they're wrong, and then see what happens.