Natural Law: A Short Companion by David VanDrunen. B&H Academic, 2023. Paperback. 160 pp. $19.99.
The contemporary revival of natural law among Protestants has made astonishing headway in just the span of a generation, but thus far its impact has been largely confined to the intelligentsia. Among ordinary rank-and-file Protestants filling pulpits and pews (or gym bleachers, as the case may be), the concept remains foreign at best, anathema at worst. Do we really need any guide beyond Scripture alone to live our lives wisely and faithfully? Many evangelicals would still instinctively balk at such a notion, dismissing the revival of natural law as just the sort of thing you might expect from over-educated social climbers trying to be academically respectable or politically influential.
And indeed, among those keen to revive natural-law discourse, there has been a disproportionate focus on the political arena. Natural law is supposed to be a tool for persuading our thoroughly-secularized fellow citizens that Christian stances on abortion, same-sex marriage, and other hot-button cultural issues aren’t so scary or sectarian after all—they are just plain rational. Needless to say, such appeals have not been particularly persuasive to date. Protestant proponents of natural law have thus often found themselves in the unenviable position of having burnt their bridges with the evangelical rank-and-file (who seem them as namby-pamby sellouts who are just afraid of quoting Scripture in public), without having successfully built any bridges with morally relativist unbelievers. The only bridges they have built, it seems, are with conservative Roman Catholics, who have been banging on about natural law for centuries—but this is only liable to heighten the suspicion of your average Protestant evangelical.
How, then, to quell these fears, and persuade the ordinary evangelical Christian that natural law is not about rationalism, not about political influence, but simply a matter of being faithful to Scripture? David VanDrunen has at last met this challenge, penning a short, elegant little volume that persuasively argues through clear, simple prose that natural law, far from presenting a challenge to sola Scriptura, is in fact an essential element of biblical teaching. The volume is quite modest in its aspirations, to be sure—a point I shall come back to later on—but in this basic task it sets for itself it is a success. I expect it will make frequent appearances in the footnotes of the next generation of Protestant writings on natural law (indeed, I myself have already found occasion to footnote it!).
VanDrunen begins with a crisp and helpful definition of natural law: “the law of God made known through the created order, which all human beings know through their physical senses, intellect, and conscience, although they sinfully resist this knowledge to various degrees” (1). He goes on to insist that natural law is thus an “essential part of Christian theology and ethics” without which “Christianity would not make sense” (1). Without natural law, it would not make sense to say that fallen men everywhere are “without excuse” (Rom. 1:20) and thus under judgment. “Natural law thus explains how God holds the world accountable to him” (2). Moreover, without natural law, we could have no basis for calling upon our unbelieving neighbors to be faithful to their wives or not to cheat their employers. If such demands are mere matters of special revelation for Christians, we should expect society outside of the church to be entirely lawless, and have nothing to say about our neighbors’ moral choices until they repented and believed the Gospel.
For these reasons and more, VanDrunen points out, “early Protestant theologians did not seem to regard natural law as especially controversial” (13). It is simply a recent misunderstanding to try and pit natural law against the Reformational doctrine of sola scriptura. In fact, writes VanDrunen, “Traditionally, sola scriptura means that Scripture is the sufficient source of special revelation…. Sola scriptura does not mean, however, that natural revelation is unnecessary. To claim such would be absurd. Scripture itself presumes that we know all sorts of things about the world in which we live” (14).
Having established these starting-points, VanDrunen sets out to argue first in chapter 2 for the metaphysical reality of natural law—the truth that “the created order overflows with meaning and purpose that reflects God’s infinite understanding” (22)—and then to establish in chapter 3 the epistemological fact that fallen human beings still have some meaningful grasp of this objective moral order. He makes this argument strictly through Scripture itself, drawing on numerous Old Testament narratives, legal codes, and New Testament epistles to demonstrate that the Bible constantly assumes and attests that those outside the community of faith still possess much true moral knowledge. Chapter 4 then builds upon this biblical testimony by zeroing in on the prophetic literature to show how routine it is for the biblical authors to hold Gentile nations morally accountable on the basis of their violation of God’s law inscribed on their hearts, even though they had never received the written law.
Only at this point, more than halfway through the book, does VanDrunen finally invoke the locus classicus of natural law, Rom. 2:14-15. A great deal of ink has been spilled on whether the “Gentiles” in this passage refers to unbelievers (the more common traditional interpretation) or to already-converted Gentile Christians (an increasingly popular interpretation). It is often implied by advocates of the latter interpretation that if in fact Paul is saying that it is Gentile Christians who have “the law written on their hearts,” this destroys the whole exegetical case for natural law. Given that Thomas Aquinas himself actually adopted this interpretation, that is hardly likely! In any case, VanDrunen provides a very persuasive exegetical case for the more common traditional interpretation, but also shows that it is largely irrelevant to the larger question. Scripture provides overwhelming and pervasive testimony to the reality and relevance of natural law—with or without Rom. 2:14-15.
That said, although making a compelling case for the role of natural law as a moral bridle on unbelievers, VanDrunen’s exposition offers another refreshing surprise by first highlighting the role of natural law in the Christian life (chapter 5) before finally turning to its role in engaging secular society (chapter 6). In chapter 5, using the paradigm of the “three uses of the law,” he emphasizes that the natural law, every bit as much as the law revealed by special revelation, “serves as a guide for Christians, to show them how to pursue gratefully obedient lives in Christ” (80). He skillfully shows how even the Mosaic law itself—the only part of Scripture that even approximates a complete code of revealed divine law—constantly presupposes and relies upon natural law. Why? Because it is case law, “providing a relatively small number of concrete examples, which Israelites were then to apply to similar cases that were not addressed” (82). As he notes, this would be useless if the Israelites did not have the rational faculties enabling them to draw analogies from cases that were addressed to cases that weren’t. The Book of Proverbs even more obviously appeals to natural revelation to guide the moral lives of believers.
But that’s not all. VanDrunen makes the oft-neglected point that natural law also serves to add additional depth and force to issues that Scripture does explicitly address. Whereas we might know from special revelation that God prohibits something, natural revelation can help us understand why he does so, “startl[ing] us into realizing that our sins are stupid and destructive” (85). Finally, he points out that the ethics of the New Testament should not be misunderstood as some kind of radical Gospel summons to turn the world upside down, but are remarkably conservative: “much of what the New Testament commands and prohibits is not new at all. It reaffirms what we already know, things that were morally obligatory long before Christ came” (91).
Only in chapter 6 does VanDrunen finally address natural law in the context where it seems to be discussed most often—making morally-persuasive arguments in the public square. Here, he seeks to demystify natural law a bit, asserting that it is less a matter of “high-level philosophical arguments” (100) and more an appeal to the ordinary wisdom derived from practical experience. In either case, however, it is crucial to note that just because something is rationally knowable (as natural law by definition is) does not mean that it is widely or easily known, much less mastered. Many critics of natural law never tire of pointing to the moral obtuseness of most individuals and societies, suggesting that this demonstrates the uselessness or non-existence of natural law. One might just as well deny the existence of golf by pointing to the incompetence of most novice golfers, VanDrunen retorts! One only understands natural law by learning to read the world well, a skill that requires time, practice, and discipline, just like learning any other skill. Accordingly, the appeal to natural law in a secular public square drunk on hedonism and materialism is unlikely to take the form of knock-down arguments that suddenly turn the political tide. However, it can make real progress around the margins, especially if wielded with humility. Whereas many Christians like to tout the superior courage of their willingness to boldly quote Bible verses at their political opponents, this is more often a mark of pride or laziness, VanDrunen suggests.
In short, this book is a wonderful entry point into the topic of natural law for evangelical Christians, and I hope it gains a wide readership. Some might reasonably ask whether VanDrunen’s claims in this book might not undermine controversial claims in some of his other works. For instance, since man’s duties to God are obviously part of natural law as presented in Scripture, one might expect to see these duties foregrounded in any just political order, something VanDrunen has resisted in his earlier writings. One might also point out that if, as VanDrunen here admits, natural law plays a crucial role in decision-making within the institutional church (96-98), this might challenge VanDrunen’s commitment to jure divino polity and the regulative principle of worship articulated in his Natural Law and the Two Kingdoms. Still, perhaps this volume shows that there is more room for common ground between VanDrunen and his critics than might have been supposed.
One might also complain that VanDrunen tries so hard to meet the average evangelical reader where he is that he leaves out much of what ought to be discussed in a book of this sort. Certainly there is no effort whatsoever to touch on the philosophical dimensions of natural law—what it implies about the metaphysical order of the world, or what different epistemological theories have to say about how we might acquire knowledge of it. For an accessible introduction to such topics, readers will still have to consult other resources, such as Davenant’s own Natural Law: A Brief Introduction and Biblical Defense. Nor does VanDrunen take note of rival theories of natural law, or how it relates to other important theological categories like “common grace.” However, there is much to say for doing one job well, rather than trying to do multiple jobs in cursory fashion. Every pastor and Christian educator should be grateful to Dr. VanDrunen for the fine job this volume does in showing how natural law is rooted in Scripture and can help equip the believer for more faithful living and effective witness in many spheres of life.
Brad Littlejohn is a Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. He founded and served for ten years as the President of The Davenant Institute. His most recent publication is The Word Made Flesh for Us: A Treatise on Sacramentology from Book V of Hooker’s Laws (Davenant Press, 2024), and he is the author of Called to Freedom: Retrieving Christian Liberty in an Age of Licence (B&H, forthcoming 2025).
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