Coding religion as rule-like law crushes moral freedom and spontaneity.

Evidence

By contrast moral rules or principles cannot be brought into being or changed or eliminated in this way. To assert that this ‘cannot’ be is not, however, to deny that some conceivable state of affairs is actually the case, as the assertion that human beings ‘cannot’ alter the climate would be. Instead this assertion points to the following facts. It is perfectly good sense to say such things as ‘As from 1 January 1960 it will be a criminal offence to do so-and-so’ or ‘As from 1 January 1960 it will be no longer illegal to do so-and-so’ and to support such statements by reference to laws which have been enacted or repealed. By contrast such statements as ‘As from tomorrow it will no longer be immoral to do so-and-so’ or ‘On 1 January last it became immoral to do so-and-so’ and attempts to support these by reference to deliberate enactment would be astonishing paradoxes, if not senseless. — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 443 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

A customary practice of those whose role it is to apply primary rules, a rule of recognition provides criteria of legal validity by determining which acts create law. So the fundamental constitution of a legal system does not rest on moral justifications or logical presuppositions, but on this customary social rule created by ‘a complex … practice of the courts, officials, and private persons’ (107). — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 56 (#complicates, via linked claim)

To reduce the two types of rule in this way to a single type would, however, obscure their character and subordinate what is of central importance in the game to what is merely ancillary. It is worth considering how far the reductionist legal theories, criticized in this chapter, similarly obscure the diverse functions which different types of legal rules have in the system of social activity of which they form part. — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 649 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Religion should consist of principles rather than fixed rules to preserve moral responsibility.; Religion-as-law freezes iniquitous rules into eternally fixed commands.; Legal systems rest on customary social rules rather than moral foundations — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 56 (+8 more)

Related

• Religion-as-law freezes iniquitous rules into eternally fixed commands. (similarity 0.85)
• Moral rules cannot be created or altered by deliberate human enactment (similarity 0.85)
• Religion should consist of principles rather than fixed rules to preserve moral responsibility. (similarity 0.80)
• Legal systems rest on customary social rules rather than moral foundations (similarity 0.80)
• Nothing in society is eternal, so moral standards must be revised (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Moral rules cannot be created or altered by deliberate human enactment #corroborates (0.60) — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 443
• Legal systems rest on customary social rules rather than moral foundations #complicates (0.50) — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 56
• Reductionist legal theories obscure the diverse functions of rules within a social system #corroborates (0.50) — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 649
• Islamic morality stems from performed faith rather than reasoned ethical judgment #exemplifies (0.45)
• Attributing every social characteristic to religious texts erases contextual factors #expands (0.45) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 123