One thing I’ve been struggling with lately is the following question: is it morally relativistic to say that killing innocent children is bad unless God commands you to do it like he did for the Israelites slaughtering all of the Canaanites
It's an interesting question. But within deontological ethics, there is a hierarchy of moral decisions, such as lying to prevent murder, such as what German citizens did when they were hiding Jews. Within the Christian Ethics system is the Divine Nature theory, which says that moral absolutism comes straight from God's nature, and his commands come from his nature. That is to say God did not create morality, instead it flows from who he is as God.
So the commands of God are higher in the hierarchy of moral decisions. If God commands the slaughter of the (seemingly) innocent, then it's a command from his character and supersedes the other options as the most moral choice to make.
Relativism has to do with the ethical system as a whole, not the decisions within a system.
One thing I’ve been struggling with lately is the following question: is it morally relativistic to say that killing innocent children is bad unless God commands you to do it like he did for the Israelites slaughtering all of the Canaanites
It's an interesting question. But within deontological ethics, there is a hierarchy of moral decisions, such as lying to prevent murder, such as what German citizens did when they were hiding Jews. Within the Christian Ethics system is the Divine Nature theory, which says that moral absolutism comes straight from God's nature, and his commands come from his nature. That is to say God did not create morality, instead it flows from who he is as God.
So the commands of God are higher in the hierarchy of moral decisions. If God commands the slaughter of the (seemingly) innocent, then it's a command from his character and supersedes the other options as the most moral choice to make.
Relativism has to do with the ethical system as a whole, not the decisions within a system.