What is the conscience?
Everyone has felt it — the inward pull that says this is wrong, sometimes long after the act, and often against what we want. Commentators treat conscience as one of the most solid proofs that we are not merely clever animals, but also as one of the least reliable guides we own.
What Conscience Is
It is not the will, and it is not reasoning. One writer separates it from both before defining it:
The Bible TreasuryClearly it is not the will, since conscience often pushes its way against the will. Neither is it reason, for while a man's reason will prove to him that a certain course of action will harm him, his conscience will still drive him to do the right thing, even at his own cost. It is not a conclusion reached in the mind after weighing the right and wrong of a question. Conscience is the moral sense of right and wrong that is born in man. It is as much a part of his present being as his reason or his will. We may describe conscience as the eye of man's moral being, or compare it to a voice inside him commanding him about right and wrong.
That inner court has a striking feature: it judges me, not just the deed. Darby draws the line sharply between conscience and law:
J. N. DarbyConscience may be defined as my own mind judging good and evil as God does. That is why it is so completely false to turn it into a law. A law is something imposed on a person, while the essence of conscience is that I discern between good and evil in myself, and that becomes a law to me.
Where It Came From
Conscience arrived with the fall. The first man knew he was responsible to God, but he did not yet know evil:
W. W. FeredayConscience may be defined in two ways: as a sense of responsibility, and as a knowledge of good and evil. The first man was created with a sense of responsibility... but it could not be said that in his unfallen state he had the knowledge of good and evil. It was impossible for him to have such knowledge, since he was surrounded by good, and nothing but good... Then he gained in the fullest sense what we commonly call conscience; so that from that day he not only had a sense of responsibility, but also the ability to discern good and evil. "Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil" (Gen. 3:22).
A Witness, Not a Guide
Conscience reports; it does not supply the standard. Hamilton Smith uses a picture from sailing:
Hamilton SmithConscience is not the light, and therefore is no guide. The compass will not guide the ship; only the rudder will guide, under the control of the helmsman. But the compass will tell the helmsman the moment he is off course; so conscience will bear witness the moment we stop walking according to the light we have.
This is why "follow your conscience" is not a safe rule on its own. Commentators differ on how to describe conscience — some call it an inward voice, while Frederick Grant denies it is God's voice and calls it self-conviction. All agree it must be taught:
The Bible TreasuryConscience needs instructing; it does not instruct. As the conscience is faithfully instructed, so its verdicts will be more or less just... Conscience is very like a window, which lets in much or little light depending on whether it is clean or dirty.
Conscience Cannot Save
It can convict, but it cannot supply power — and left alone, it drives a person away from God rather than towards Him.
The Bible TreasuryIf it is a light within, showing man the right path, it is a light shining on feet that are paralysed — "How to perform I find not." Conscience makes men cowards, and miserable.
Mackintosh reads Adam's fig-leaf apron as the first attempt to quiet a guilty conscience by religion:
C. H. MackintoshIt is plain that that covering did not even satisfy his own conscience. Had his conscience been divinely satisfied, he would not have been afraid... This is what conscience will do at all times. It will cause man to hide himself from God; and all that his own religiousness offers him is a hiding-place from God.
The Purged Conscience and the Good Conscience
Scripture speaks of two different things, and confusing them causes needless distress:
Hamilton SmithThe purged conscience is one that, having been "once purged", has no more conscience of sins (Hebrews 10:2). It assumes a conscience that has been exercised about its sins, but has had that exercise met by learning that the believer is cleansed from all sins by the precious blood of Christ and will never come under judgment. A good conscience is a conscience free from offence in practical ways and walk.
The first is a gift received once; the second is kept by daily care.
W. T. P. WolstonHow do you get and keep a conscience free from offence toward God? It is got first of all by being washed in the blood of the Lamb, and it is kept by walking in dependence on God and obedience to Him... But you say, How can I keep a good conscience? By being exercised. You are exercised in your soul, and always have God in view.
Summary
- Given — conscience is the inborn moral sense of right and wrong, the eye of the inner man, distinct from will and reason.
- Gained — it came in at the fall, when responsibility to God was joined to the knowledge of good and evil.
- Grieving — a guilty conscience does not drive a person to God; like Adam behind his apron, it drives him to hide.
- Given rest — the blood of Christ purges the conscience once, so the believer has no more conscience of sins.
- Guarded — a purged conscience is received; a good conscience is kept, by walking in the light with God always in view.