Some Ethical Questions

I've been thinking about Dietrich Bonhoefer lately, the German theologian who was hanged by the Nazis as the Third Reich itself was dying in April 1945. Bonhoefer was involved, to what extent is unknown, in the plot to kill Hitler in July 1944.

Bonhoefer started out as a traditional religious thinker, but came to America in the early 1930's. He came to enjoy jazz. His American experience seems to have started him on his ethical odyssey. Bonhoefer returned to Germany prior to the beginning of the war to work as a pastor.

He became interested in the matter of honesty. While agreeing that honesty is the best policy, he wondered if it was always best. The scenario that changed his thinking was: a little boy is called to the front of his classroom by his busybody teacher and asked, "Was your father drunk again last night?" Now as it happens, the father was drunk last night, but the boy doesn't have the presence of mind to tell the teacher to mind his own business. Instead, he's faced with a conflict between honesty and loyalty. If he answers truthfully his father will be humiliated and might lose his job.

So, Bonhoefer claimed the boy not only has a moral right to lie, he has a duty to do so.

There are many other instances where a lie is the best policy. You're at the hospital to visit a very sick friend. Before you go into his room you hear a doctor say, "It's hopeless. He has 24 hours to live." You go into the room and your friend gasps, "I'm not going to die am I? I couldn't stand it if I thought I was about to die." What do you say?

Of course, lying isn't as great a matter as some other dilemmas. If lying can be justified, even required, what about theft, violence of different sorts, destruction, or murder?

Bonhoefer had to face the question whether he had a moral obligation to murder a few men to save millions of lives. Math would make the answer easy, but of course the puzzle has to do with what actions an individual would take, not just allow to happen.

The commandment says, "Thou shalt not kill." Some people claim it actually says, "Thou shalt commit no murder," allowing killing in the greater good for example. Most of us would agree. We support sending drone planes to kill suspected al-Qaida supporters in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and brush off civilian deaths as just unavoidable, or even blame them for being in the way. What should someone who is horrified by this carnage do?

A hundred thousand Iraqis have died as a consequence of "Operation Iraqi Freedom." Is that worse than the toll Saddam Hussein would have taken on his own people? What gave us either the right or the responsibility to overthrow him? President Bush claimed Saddam was behind the attacks on the United States though in retrospect the evidence for his involvement is lacking. Even in 2003 many Americans suspected the rationale for war was bogus.

Ethical questions have a way of becoming complicated. People who claim there are simple answers . . . well, I'll leave it at that.