物語における自然法 : 非歴史的な法の歴史的な働き

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There is an order in nature. Though the term "nature" is polyvalent and ambiguous, many people have accepted this proposition and found a way of living based on it. There is also an order in human society. Human beings are social and in fact live in relationship to others. In order to maintain the order of society one enacts a law and complies with it. If one can say that human beings are part of nature, there might be an order in him/her and a law to maintain it. The thought of the natural law derives from such a background. Lex indita non scripta : the natural law is not a law written down but one inscribed in the human heart. Thomas Aquinas classified law into three categories : eternal law, natural law, and positive law. According to him, "a law is nothing else but a dictate of practical reason emanating from the ruler who governs a perfect community" (S. T., I-II, 91, 1). The eternal law is also called the divine law, divine reason, and divine wisdom. At any rate, the eternal law is understood as what governs the whole world by leading all human acts. Though one cannot comprehend the eternal law as such, as St. Paul says, he/she is led to the understanding of it through creatures : "Ever since the creation of the world, his [God's] invisible attributes of eternal power and divinity have been able to be understood and perceived in what he has made" (Rom 1: 20). The natural law is understood in relation to the eternal law. In other words, the natural law is the participation of the eternal law in the rational creature (S. T., I-II, 91, 2). In order to understand the natural law more deeply one can and should do it in a theological context, that is, one should see the natural law in the personal relationship between God and human beings. The natural law is also called right reason (recta ratio) and demands of us the ethical imperative : to do good and to avoid evil. This imperative is, however, abstract and universal as such. Therefore, one has to make good discernment appropriately when one applies this imperative to each concrete case. Here one can see the two aspects of the natural law: universality and historicity. In order to understand this more accurately and concretely, one should put the natural law in the context of narrative. By so doing, we can see it in a new horizon. In this essay, I would like to consider whether the natural law is always abstract and invariable or not, in other words, whether it has the aspect of historicity. For a fuller examination I take three parts. First, I survey the traditional understanding of the natural law. Secondly, I examine the critiques of the natural law from the sides of both Catholics and Protestants. Finally, I investigate the possibility of a new understanding of the natural law by adopting the theory of narrative by Stanley Hauerwas.
上智大学の論文

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竹内修一
上智大学神学部

物語における自然法 : 非歴史的な法の歴史的な働き

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