Rights, happiness and God: a response to Justice: Rights and Wrongs

This paper is a discussion of some themes from Justice: Rights and Wrongs, by Nicholas Wolterstorff. The paper beings with a discussion of Wolterstorff's distinction between justice as inherent rights and justice as inherent worth. It is suggested that what especially distinguishes Wolterstorff's position is his grounding of rights in divine love. An elucidation and defence of an Aristotelian eudaimonist grounding for rights is offered. The paper ends with a critique of the ideas that human well-being can be understood in terms of what God desires for us and that our worth depends on God's love