After talking about duties toward oneself, Crusius turns his interest to duties toward God. In some sense, he notes, we have been talking about them all the time, because all duties are based on God’s will and therefore duties toward God. Still, there are some duties that are specifically duties about God, which is their immediate object.
Now, one might wonder how God can be an object of a duty, since God is supposedly immutable and no one can actually do anything to him. Crusius clarifies that it is more a question of, firstly, our notion of God, and secondly, of our relationship to God. In other words, it is our immediate duty toward God to act in accordance with his perfection and our relationship to him.
It is thus our duty to obey God, Crusius says. In fact, he says, all duty is in a sense obeying God since God wants us to obey all duties. Crusius considers the question whether the duty to obey God would make God an awful tyrant. Crusius notes that this duty is not just arbitrary whimsy of a dictator, but flows from the very nature of divinity.
Two sides exist in human mind, Crusius continues, cognitive understanding and volitive will, and both have their own duties toward God. If we start from the side of the understanding, Crusius notes that we are obligated to know God, since it is noblest thing to know the ultimate source of everything. This does not mean that we should know God perfectly, since as we are imperfect entities, our knowledge is always limited. Still, we should try to know what God actually is and what kind of properties he has, what he wills and what he has achieved in the world (creating and sustaining the world, to start from the obvious). Furthermore, Crusius remarks, we should try to know other things as parts of a hierarchy, the pinnacle of which is God.
Yet, knowing God is not the only cognitive duty toward God that Crusius recognises. Indeed, he notes that in addition to knowledge we might have beliefs, not just in the broad sense of convictions, but in the sense of weaker convictions that might still be doubted. Now, Crusius says, we might have rational reasons to believe in this strict sense something, even if we couldn’t demonstrate its certainty. Particularly, he says, if disbelief would break an obligation toward God, we should choose belief, even if the truth of this belief could not be perfectly demonstrated. For instance, accepting general skepticism would imply that God has made us incapable of knowing anything, which Crusius considers a blasphemy. Even seemingly absurd statements about God (e.g. his trinitarian nature) should be believed, Crusius concludes, if there just is external evidence making it probable.
When it comes to will, Crusius suggests, we have a duty to love God, since God loves us also. This love of God implies that we try to live as virtuously as possible, since God wants us to be good. Other things implied by love of God, Crusius goes on, are that we should respect God, be thankful to him and humble ourselves before him.
All the duties mentioned thus far have been internal duties, that is, they concern our mental actions. We do have external duties toward God, Crusius insists. Firstly, all the so-called internal actions have some external signs, and we might say that showing the external signs of appropriate internal actions is an external duty. Then again, Crusius continues, we also have an external duty to e.g. pray to God, if we have difficulties in upholding our internal duties. Still, he concludes, there is no external duty toward God that would have no relation to internal duties.
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