Two Voices of Conscience
Let’s review where we are in this series on conscience.
God made us in his image and likeness. Image refers to our nature; likeness refers to our nurture; or how we perfect the image of God in us. Perfecting our “imaging” God requires a mechanical knowledge of how to use things as well as the moral knowledge of why that thing was created by God in the first place.
This moral knowledge is called conscience, the Latin word meaning “with knowledge,” denoting the moral knowledge that comes with mechanical knowledge. That’s why, as I wrote last week, conscience involves both dialogue with oneself and dialogue with God, who is the Author of the moral law. Conscience is an internal voice of discernment that must be tuned to the eternal voice of the moral law.
Disney’s film Pinocchio gets these two voices right.
In the film, The Blue Fairy tells Pinocchio that he “must learn to choose between right and wrong.” How will the puppet know the difference? “Your conscience will tell you. Always let your conscience be your guide.”
But there’s a second guide.
The Blue Fairy has Jiminy Cricket kneel before her as she pronounces: “I dub you Pinocchio’s conscience, Lord High Keeper of the Knowledge of Right and Wrong, Counselor in moments of temptation and guide along the straight and narrow path.”
Which guide appears to have the greater weight? Jiminy Cricket’s, since he is Lord High Keeper of the Knowledge of Right and Wrong. Pinocchio hasn’t yet learned to choose between right and wrong. Pinocchio’s conscience had to speak in accord with Jiminy Cricket’s conscience for the puppet to become a fully alive boy.
To become a fully alive human, the interior voice of conscience must speak in accord with the exterior voice of conscience. Conscience is the interior voice of God that we pay attention to in our soul as well as the exterior voice of God that we pay attention to in the scriptures. The exterior voice of God has the greater weight.
In the Garden, Adam and Eve have yet to learn how to distinguish between good and evil. Like Pinocchio, they must rely more on the exterior voice of God than the interior voice in their soul. The interior voice is an initial authority (what we initially feel is right or wrong), while the exterior voice is the final authority (God is the final judge of right and wrong). The exterior voice has greater weight. We see this in the writings of the Apostle Paul.
Paul was circumspect about the judgments of his interior conscience. “My conscience does not reproach me, but that is not enough to justify me: it is the Lord who is my judge” (1 Cor. 4:4). In other words, he recognizes the interior voice of God is our initial authority. But the exterior voice of God is the final authority. It “will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart” (1 Cor. 4:5).
The interior voice of God is our initial authority but the exterior voice of God is the final authority
Paul recognized there are hidden purposes and desires in his heart and therefore hidden to himself. Only the exterior voice of God can pierce him to the point that it judges the thoughts and the intentions of interior conscience. As Blaise Pascal noted, “The heart has its reasons which reason knows not.”
Human rationality is why the exterior voice has the greater weight. The point of rationality is to prove the limits of rationality. Reason is a wonderful gift of God but there are areas in which human thinking and decision-making fall short of true rationality, reminding us of the inherent limitations of the human mind. We cannot reason our way to God’s ways.
Human reason is why the exterior voice of God is the final authority.
In my next post, I’ll describe how the interior voice of conscience in Adam acted in accordance with the exterior voice. It’s a glorious beginning in the Garden of Eden.