What is Natural Law?

Natural Law is a set of rules inherent to the universe, much like the Law of Gravity, which govern the effects resulting from the free will choices of creatures with the capacity to reason.

Natural Law is known by many other names, such as Moral Law, Karmic Law, God’s Law, etc. Its basic premise is that there is an objective difference between right and wrong, and that while all beings are free to do as they please, they are not free to escape the consequences of their choices.

WHAT IS RIGHT & WRONG?

A wrong is an action that causes harm to another sentient creature. Therefore, a right is any action which does not harm another being. Fundamentally it comes down to consent. If your actions are likely to affect another being or its property then you had better be sure that being would likely consent to your actions.

WHAT IS HARM?

Harm is generally classified into the categories of murder, assault, rape, theft, trespass and coercion, but these all can consolidated into theft. Murder is the theft of another’s life, assault is the theft of the health of another’s body, rape is the theft of another’s choice of whom to have sex with, trespass is the theft of another’s sense of safety in their home, and coercion is the theft of another’s free will. These things all belong to the other person, not to you, and deciding to steal these things will bring to you the consequences of that action.

WHAT ARE THE CONSEQUENCES OF HARM?

The consequences of choosing to harm another creature manifest on different levels and thus have several different ways of appearing in your life.

One level would be through the effect on your psychology: knowing that you are a person who would choose to harm someone else. Unless you’re a psychopath, it will be moderately important to you that you aren’t cruel to others, so exhibiting cruelty will reduce your sense of self-worth and contentment.

Another level through which Natural Law acts is the effect of your actions on how your community feels about you. Much of our satisfaction in life comes through our relationships, as does most of our physical safety, and choosing to harm someone causes you to now exist in an environment filled with people who know you willingly cause harm, thus sabotaging your access to both love and security.

A third level produces its effects through other fundamental principles of existence which effectively bring to you what you demonstrate to the universe you want through your actions. If you choose to steal from people then from the universe’s perspective you are saying you consent to being stolen from, and that you wish there to be more theft occurring in the world in general. Ask and ye shall receive.

HOW DO WE KNOW NATURAL LAW EXISTS?

Some believe we only know about Natural Law because the creator of the universe told us about it in various holy texts, but in truth the knowledge of right and wrong is inherent in all of us. It is inherent because we all have things we want and do not want to experience, and therefore it is safe to assume that this is the same for others.

The Natural Law consequences of intentional harm on the individual’s psychology and the society’s perception and treatment of them are evident even to the most ardent skeptic. The remaining levels through which Natural Law manifests are less obvious in today’s world because fundamental principles of nature are occulted (i.e. hidden) from the general population, but they can be scientifically tested and verified to be occurring by every individual willing to explore it for themselves.

Natural Law is no more a belief than it is a belief that if you drop your coffee mug it will fall downwards. Gravity is something we know to be in effect because it has been proven to each of us an uncountable number of times. Natural Law is proven to us in the same way.

IS HARM EVER ALLOWED?

Harm is only allowed in the prevention of harm from another. In other words, we all have the right to use force in order to stop someone from causing harm to us or our loved ones.

This is of course a tricky topic, as prevention of harm is how most of the wars in the world are justified. So how do we know when force is acceptable? We must first know that the individual we intend to stop has an intention to harm us and also likely has the ability to cause that harm. It is at that point that defensive action aimed at incapacitating the individual can be initiated, and not before.

CAN NATURAL LAW BE BYPASSED?

As you probably realize, there are many people in this world who would prefer that Natural Law were not in place. While in the lower levels of society most people are brainwashed to believe it doesn’t even exist, the people behind that brainwashing know very well it exists and do everything they can to mitigate its effects on them.

The primary strategy used to reduce and delay the effects of Natural Law relies on getting someone else to do your dirty work. In other words, you need order followers, or people who will do what you say no matter what it is because you provide them with something they believe they need. Order followers take the brunt of the Natural Law consequences for any harm caused, which is the opposite of the common belief that the order giver is the one responsible. The owner of the finger that pulled the trigger is the initiator of aggression from the universe’s perspective.

The effects of Natural Law can also be reduced by dispersing them across a population of people by getting their consent for the harm to occur. For example, smoking marijuana does not inherently cause harm to others, therefore it is a right. When you vote to forcibly take that right away from someone, or even consent to the existence of a system which allows any rights to be taken away at all, you accept the Natural Law consequences of all the harm that system causes. However, those consequences are dispersed across all the others like you who consent to that system, and so from your individual perspective the impact might seem acceptable.

IS NATURAL LAW A GOOD THING?

Many see Natural Law as something which prevents them from living the way they want to, and therefor consider it something which enslaves them. Seeing as the effects of Natural Law can never be fully escaped, it’s understandable that one would feel restricted. However, gravity is also restricting us in unavoidable ways, and at the same time the world would be nothing like it is now were it not in effect.

In the same way, Natural Law allows for a universe containing sentient creatures with the capacity for both suffering and joy to exist without ever going fully into a state of maximized misery for the most amount of people. In other words, Natural Law balances conscious experiences in this universe towards positivity.

It’s not necessary to think of Natural Law as only governing the results of choices we make which cause harm, because the law works in the same way for positive actions as well. If you do good for others then good will come to you and the world in which you live. This seems to me like a sensible rule for someone creating a universe to put into effect, and I consider it one of the best pieces of evidence that there is an intelligent and loving creator.

Cahlen Lee