Apr

4

Rights

Filed Under Philosophy, Random Thoughts 

Unfortunately, I am bound by an Internet filter that prevents me from getting to all of my friends’ blogs, so I won’t be able to see what others have said about this — at least not for a while.

Mel R. over at Chosen By Grace has posted some questions about rights. I hear about rights all the time when I am judging debate, and the level of analysis is often quite low. Sadly, even “educated” people don’t always make a lot of sense either.

What rights do we have?

This question begs another question: Where did we get our rights? Let me first take it from a non-Christian point of view. I hear debaters assert that we have a “right to _______.” I write on the ballot, “where did we get this right?” It appears that we have given ourselves our rights. We talk of the Social Contract (whatever that is) and how it is supposed to protect our rights, but we never establish where our rights come from. As I see it, we call “rights” things that we want (or expect): liberty, justice, equality, property, housing, health care, free BMWs, whatever. As long as our rights stem from our desires, there is no stopping what rights we might invent. People don’t always want the same things.

From a Christian point of view, I think we can make a better case for some rights. Mel actually asks two different questions and the Christian perspective informs both answers. First, rights are built into who we are, as bearers of God’s image. Further, God’s law implies several rights, including the right to life (6th commandment) and a right to property (8th commandment)1. Even though Scripture does affirm several rights2, it doesn’t affirm some that we would like.

For example, to answer the second question, I do not think that the Bible affirms the right to freedom from government restrictions. Quite the opposite. And really, unless you are a strong libertarian, you don’t deny the value of governmental restrictions. Face it; everyone needs some kind of government. Sure, it would be great if we were all self-governing. But we’re not. And even if we were, we would need a law by which to govern ourselves. I’ve thought a lot recently about the Kingdom of God. During eternity, we will presumably have the capacity for perfect self-government. And we will still have a King, ruling with a rod of iron. Chew on that for a while.

I am typically sympathetic with libertarian principles, within certain boundaries. But I think that I am more conservative than libertarian. Conservativism is skeptical about the ability of men to govern themselves. It therefore affirms the value of government. To extend the argument, conservatives are also often skeptical about the ability of the general populus to govern themselves (i.e., to create a good government), and I certainly fit into that category. I could go on, but perhaps I will save it for a later post.

I should also note here that I am speaking of “natural” rights. Rights within a government are a totally different thing. But I think the question at hand is whether there are any rights that transcend governments — human or “inalienable” rights.


  1. “Property” is a technical term and doesn’t mean that you have a right to have anything you want; rather, it implies that you have a right to keep what you have if you want to — though I am still over-simplifying. back↩
  2. Scripture also affirms our desires, so the fact that we want certain things doesn’t necessarily make them bad. It is not evil to desire justice or freedom — we are probably designed to want it, especially the former (see the review of Simply Christian) — but we cannot assume that, because we want something, that makes it legitimate, even if everyone else wants it too. back↩

Comments

7 Responses to “Rights”

  1. Jon on April 6th, 2007 10:54 am

    Very interesting… As I was reading, I realized that often times I “assume” or “expect” certain rights without knowing where exactly those rights originated. Good thoughts.

  2. Anthony on April 8th, 2007 8:31 pm

    I read an interesting commentary on rights the other day, I don’t remember were it was from. But it commentent on how the idea of rights have changed since the American revolution. In the american revolution, rights are God given. However in the Universal Decleration of Human Rights are goverenment given.

    “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness…”

    vs.

    “The General Assembly,Proclaims this Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations…”

    Kind of scary when you think about it. Now that people veiw rights as governement given, what prevents the governement from suddenly redefining what your rights are. As people depart from an absolute standard in other areas of life, rights have also become subjective.

  3. Andrew on April 9th, 2007 10:46 am

    Now that people veiw rights as governement given, what prevents the governement from suddenly redefining what your rights are. As people depart from an absolute standard in other areas of life, rights have also become subjective.

    I would argue that most of the rights that show up in the Constitution and other similar documents of the time are government-given, and only government-given. In fact, many of the rights that we hold near and dear (and fight for) come from government. I think Jefferson (following Locke) overstepped the bounds of what rights are truly God-given.

    Of course, when you get wording like the Universal Declaration uses, it comes across as patently absurd pretty quickly. That people even think that way can be scary.

  4. Anthony on April 10th, 2007 11:26 pm

    Ok, I can agree to that. But, the idea of accountability to a higher authority figure than government is the justification that Jefferson is hinting at. He seems to say that rights check the power of government, and when a consistent history of rights violation has happened then we have a obligation to secure our God given rights. Basically, God has given us certain rights, and it is the government’s obligation to protect them.

    On the other had the UDHR makes no justification as to why these rights are rights other than the fact that the General Assembly said they were.

  5. Andrew on April 11th, 2007 3:06 pm

    Ah yes, the two quotes are quite different on their face, but it is not clear that they draw from different assumptions about man, God, and government.

    Accountability is very important. But that doesn’t necessarily mean governments are accountable to their citizens. We can invent rights for ourselves and claim that the government must protect them, but that doesn’t mean that the rights are God’s way of providing accountability to the government. It may be that, in their own silly way, the United Nations was being more honest than Jefferson was. It’s nice when governments protect God-given rights, but it is not obvious that those rights Jefferson claim actually came from God.

  6. Anthony on April 25th, 2007 10:29 pm

    Governmental rights are for the most part meant to limit the power of the government. The Bible seems to limit the power of government. “Eye for an eye.”
    The problem is that the governments that God set up aren’t the governments that we have now. Plus, the governments that God set up, assume that the people will submit to God. That is why, when they didn’t submit to God they ran into all sorts of problems. So it is kind of hard to say what exactly our rights are from a Biblical Perspective.

  7. Andrew on April 27th, 2007 1:38 pm

    Governmental rights are for the most part meant to limit the power of the government. The Bible seems to limit the power of government. “Eye for an eye.”

    This is not the same thing. The idea of rights is almost exclusively an Enlightenment idea. The lex talionis represents an idea of justice, not a statement of governmental obligation.

    There’s also a very important sense in which all governments are set up by God, good and bad. (See Daniel 2:21, 4:17ff).
    It seems that the whole reason for earthly governments is that people do not submit to God’s will. It’s as if they need someone visible to be in charge.

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