Timothy Elledge

This dissertation considers the claim that we can find in ancient and Biblical literature certain values that are of the lineage shared by much of Western culture today. Because of their persistence, they comprise part of what Hilary Putnam calls the 'moral image' we have of ourselves. Knowing that these values have endured enables us to claim more justification in employing them in discussions of moral dilemmas today. Mere persistence, however, does not ensure that a value should continue to be honored. Some long-honored values have persistently led to human suffering. Still, the continuity of values over time suggests that they may offer insight into norms of human nature that should be taken seriously. ;Using stories to gain moral information provides a kind of understanding not available by way of usual philosophical discourse. Something about our response to stories allows us to see in a way that reading a Kantian text, for example, does not. The form of stories, with their rich descriptions and their insights into human experience, gives us access to more than merely another of the currents of a moral claim; it provides a wholly different kind of moral message. Tragic drama in particular, because it is focused on human life as we experience it in the world, is less abstract and thus is concerned with real losses and reversals, and with the emotional responses to these as they play out in the complexities of our familial, communal, and erotic attachments. ;Further, among the claims of those opposed to the development and use of some new medical technologies is that tools such as cloning and genetic therapies are arrogant infringements on god's work, or in some way violate appropriate limits. Boundaries referred to as "god's work" or "appropriate limits" on human action are an essential element of ancient and Biblical literature. As such, ancient and Biblical literature contains the development of the boundary claims employed in current debates. Because Western culture developed from the Greek and Judaic cultures, it is helpful to see where some of these persistent beliefs originated. I argue that our stories---mythological, Biblical, and secular---can be employed to develop more understanding about what we value in human life, and thus about the good of human life