 Why might one think that the masterful use of ‘morally obligatory’ requires recognition that the morally obligatory is what is commanded by God? If Adams is right, it is part of the meaning of obligation that obligations are social in character (Adams 1999, p. 233) and involve actually made demands by one party in the social relationship on another (Adams 1999, pp. 245–246). It is the fact that a demand is actually made that gives sense to the notion that one has to perform an action, rather than merely that it would be good, even the best, to do it (Adams 1999, p. 246). But if it is part of the meaning of ‘morally obligatory’ that one is part of a certain social relationship in which demands are actually made, then it is no longer just an interesting further fact that the property that best answers to the concept ‘morally obligatory’ is the property being commanded by God. Rather, one who denies that there is a God or that God actually makes demands on human beings must fail to use the term ‘morally obligatory’ masterfully. For think of the other marks of the moral, especially those of impartiality and overridingness. For one to think of an act as obligatory is for one to think of it as being actually imposed on one as a demand; for every obligation, on Adams’ view, there is someone who imposes that obligation by commanding. It is clear a priori that the only being that could impose the sort of obligation that could plausibly be classified as moral would be God. How, then, could one be a masterful user of ‘moral obligation’ without grasping that moral obligations are demands imposed by God?