The Transcendent Character of the Good: Philosophical and Theological Perspectives. Edited by PetruschkaSchaafsma. New York & London: Routledge, 2023. Pp. x, 232. £120.00, and Open Access at www.taylorfrancis.com.

This volume arises from the Moral Compass Project conducted by the Protestant Theological University in the Netherlands. The introduction by the editor identifies the focus of the project and the shared horizon of the contributors, as the ‘urgency of finding new ways of ethical reflection in the current moral climate’. The need is to find a moral compass and a map for orientation amidst the confusion of multiple moral standpoints, relativism, and absolutism, as characterises the contemporary situation. The project is expected to continue with a further step, to find common moral ground. The hope is to engage not only academics but a wider public in the Netherlands to develop more satisfactory ways of engaging with one another in public debate. There are three parts to the book, each with four chapters. The three parts are very different, and provoke the question of the common thread or continuity. This is provided, presumably, by the notion of transcendence, and specifically the transcendent character of the good. But the reader is left to struggle with the question of what exactly this transcendence entails. The editor's introduction suggests that a moral compass could help people orient themselves in relation to the goods they encounter. These goods can be experienced as open-ended, pointing beyond themselves, and here the theologian remarks on the transcendent appearing in daily life. Conscience has been identified as the capacity to acknowledge the call of this Other, a greater good, that can stand as ‘a pole that attracts, a call that sounds and cannot be ignored, which breaks open our being closed in on ourselves. The good is transcendent in that it is not exhausted by such experiences but always beyond it and therefore also a critical opposite to judge such experiences’ (p. 7). Fiona Ellis opens the first part with an argument that an acceptance of naturalism does not entail a denial of God. She defends a form of naturalism that can accommodate God (p. 24). Transcendence then identifies an openness that does not exclude the divine. This lays the ground for a secular or naturalist position that is open to the possibility of engagement with a theological perspective. The second chapter presents Iris Murdoch's moral vision and, as is well known, she stresses the sovereignty of the good in a style evocative of Plato, such that many Christians have imagined she identifies the Good with the divine. Rob Compaijen, the author of this chapter, takes no such shortcut, presenting Murdoch's moral vision as requiring attention to what is, looking again in challenging situations, so that we can respond with more love, justice, patience, and humility. Perhaps here the transcendence in question is the achievement of looking again, moving beyond the first, narrow, and possibly mistaken apprehension of what is at stake. Nigel Biggar writes on ‘Goods, Rights, and Universality: A Christian View’, included in the collection as chapter 3. His principal focus is on the question of whether human rights are universal, or whether they are confined to a Western culture and inextricably linked to an anthropology that is excessively individualistic. Biggar takes issue with theologians from both Western and Asiatic contexts who assert the culture-bound nature of legal rights, including human rights. He draws a conclusion that the ‘human goods that rights seek to protect are universal: they are elements of the universal nature of human flourishing’ (p. 65). That rights protect human goods is assumed in the mention of several examples (life, freedom of speech), but the argument is not made in detail that there is a set of human goods that is universal, that can be listed as transcending particular cultures in which their articulation may be located. In what sense is it a contribution to a discussion of the transcendence of the good? Transcendence of the culture of origin may make these human moral and legal constructs universal, but is it also a transcendence of their mundane origins pointing to another reality? Maarten Wisse's chapter 4 is both a critique of Biggar's argument and an attempt to provide a theologically grounded alternative. He turns to Augustine to relate the goods that humans pursue with the Good that is the source of all goods, and in doing so he is consistent with the orientation of the volume. Drawing on Augustine on ‘love’, he maintains that ‘no one holds a patent on access to the good’ (p. 78), since the Holy Spirit is always at play in nourishing love in persons’ love for one another and for themselves. Love between people expresses the presence of God (p. 81). The common ground available for people who may find themselves espousing different moral standards is not some person-independent set of principles. It is the fact that ‘all people have access to the Good itself as their basic way of being’ (p. 81). Moral pluralism is compatible with this shared reality, which also grounds the possibility of encounter and conversation between adherents of different worldviews. Pluralism can also arise from the propensity for sin, but is not itself always a sign of sin. In conclusion Wisse asserts the theological conviction that this book attempts to elucidate: ‘God is the common ground who inspires people every day to do good, to know it and to find happiness in it’ (p. 82). The second part has four chapters more explicitly theological, but with a definite focus. They deal with the history of Dutch Reformed theologians’ engagement with the tradition of natural law thinking. One of the authors, David Van Drunen, is a recognised authority in this field and his works have previously been reviewed in this journal. The significance of these discussions in this context is to demonstrate the possibility of genuine encounter of theological arguments and those of secular naturalism. The theological ethics of Dutch Protestantism is not to be confined to divine command theory, and major figures in the tradition have combined divine law with elements of obligation and virtue and goods drawn from natural law thinking. Transcendence in this tradition seems to be both the capacity of the theologians to move out from their theological standpoint, and at the same time to integrate philosophical ideas in an orientation to the divine. The third part is devoted to discussions of two very controverted issues, euthanasia, and family. For the former, the context is the experience of the operation of the very liberal law on euthanasia in both Belgium and the Netherlands. Decriminalisation of euthanasia has freed medical practitioners from fear of punishment, but has landed them in another set of tensions, owing to social pressures and the demands of conscience. Public debate or discussion of these pressures and moral issues is not easily accommodated. For the topic of family, the editor of the volume explains how the term ‘family’ is ideologically and politically fraught, so that it is difficult to have a conversation about family and duties of care within the secularist Dutch culture. Ethical appeals to divine law or natural law are vehemently opposed in the name of relativism and pluralism. Can participants transcend their own preferences to enter into an open discussion? The two chapters on the family name the transcendence made possible by the experience of precarity, vulnerability, as ‘a call out of oneself, to care for and love the other’ (p. 211). The Moral Compass Project must be of interest to any citizen who is concerned about the quality of public discourse on controversial issues. As a first step in the project, this volume raises a genuine hope that engagement in the discourse will generate a practice that would satisfy Murdoch's injunction to all parties to ‘look again’. The cost of the printed volume should not deter any reader from entering the conversation, since a PDF version of the book is available for free in Open Access at www.taylorfrancis.com.