A fantastic chapter in G.K. Chesterton’s ‘Orthodoxy’, titled ‘The Maniac’, would be worth reading for those who think they are sufficient, good enough, and altogether. It seems to me, as it did Chesterton over a century ago, that only those who are a bit insane or oblivious to reality think we humans are good. Anyone with a pinch of self-awareness realizes we are a mess.
Only those who are oblivious to reality, like a man who thinks he is a poached egg, is absolutely sure of his own goodness. Everyone else around him knows he is crazy but he is fully convinced of his eggness. It is the sane person who realizes that he is not good because he can see himself as everyone else around him does–as a finite, fallen human.
I think this question can go the other way around “are you good with god?”
of course if you have access to a computer and enough free time, chances are you aren’t in a war stricken poverty country where they believe in god, and yet they’re life is still in shambles
This would demand that we determine what it is meant by being “good”. For many today, including many Christians, being “good” equates to living up to some standard of behavior. While it is not less than this it surely is more than this.
For the early Christians we see some think that change what it means to be “good”. It begins with faithfulness to Jesus as Messiah and a loyal life of worship to the one true God. Equally, for the church, the presence of the Holy Spirit dwelling in us makes us “new creation” which no “good” Buddhist, Atheist, or Muslim can claim. While it may be difficult at times to visualize how a sometimes jerk-of-a-Christian can be “good” in a way that the kindest of atheist never could be this is something that Christianity claims, and I believe it does so rightly.
Brian,
I’m lost in parts of your second paragraph. I’m not really sure what the final point of it was?
I don’t get what you mean, “i believe it does so rightly”. So are you saying that no atheist could be as “good” as a christian? OR, are you saying that christianity just makes the claim of being good, and not necessarily so? OR are you saying that no atheists life can be as “good” as a christians (ie they won’t be as happy, nice, etc…whatever you see as “good” in your eyes)
I don’t think it’s hard to visualize how a jerk-of-a-christian can be good at all. I say this, not to offend either, it’s just been in the news lately. I’m sure many of those priests in catholic church (i consider this a denomination of christianity), we’re out doing good everyday. Just in their spare time, some of them, went and molested boys. I think there’s a good/evil in everyone though. (I think this is straying off from the original question of are you good without god?).
Even if we eliminate all the bad things churches have done there is no evidence that a life based on the teachings in the bible would be a moral one.
The god of the bible is one of the most evil characters in all of fiction. If one was to add up the total number of humans killed by the Christian god in the old testament he is the clear leader. Second place would go to people killing others after he told them too. A distant third would be Satan.
At no point does Jesus ever say his father/self was wrong to kill so many innocent people.
To ask if you can be good without god presupposes that their is a god and that he is some sort of role model. The first is almost certainly false as is the second.
Brian,
“For many today, including many Christians, being “good” equates to living up to some standard of behavior. While it is not less than this it surely is more than this.”
No, being a good person is pretty much only about social behavior.
Since it just happened, you may be thinking of the day called “Good Friday”. There was certainly nothing good about it; the etymology actually dates back to Old English where “good” meant roughly the equivalent of what “holy” means today. However, while there are a couple proper nouns whose etymology follows this antiquated definition, that is not what the word means today. You’re still hanging onto it, trying to tell us that “belief in my god” is part of being a good, moral person. If you weren’t, you would not have placed every instance of the word inside quotation marks.
If you don’t see a problem with that, well, there’s not much I can say to you. There *really* are people out there that think feeling love or displaying empathy and kindness to someone is impossible if you don’t believe in a god. It would be easier trying to convince some guy that believes he’s a poached egg that he really isn’t an egg at all.
What I am not saying is that behavior does not matter at all. I do not want to come across as being amoral. Behavior does matter.
Nevertheless, we must begin with the fact that we all do some terrible things. It is easy to point our fingers at a priest who has molested a child while calling that person a monster. In some sense this may be true. If there is a ranking on immoral behaviors this would appear to be one of the great ones.
But at that we must ask why we feel there is a ranking. Why do we feel such behavior is worse than say a white lie? If there is such a ladder of sins this would seem to indicate that we believe, at least subconsciously, in a standard. If there is a standard what is that standard?
For Christians that standard is God and God alone. If God is the standard there may be degrees of failure and sin but there is no one who can claim to be “good”. As the Apostle Paul says, “We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God”. So while you and I can look down at a priest who has failed morally for self-justification what we cannot do is look up if we want to continue feeling smug.
The Christian gospel claims that the answer to our problem is not trying to do more good things than bad things since we can never accomplish such a task. In fact, once we have done wrong even once we have put ourselves outside of the standard of morality into the category Christians call a “sinner”. The prescription to our illness in the Christian gospel is throwing ourselves in the mercies of God.
When we do this it is a necessary part of the process that we acknowledge that God’s Son has paid the price for us and that God has found a way to make sure that all our sins are justly punished without actually having to punish us. So for a Christian the truth of the matter is that we know we are no better than the next person; we do know who we can run to for forgiveness.
The gospel proclaims that we are not alone in this freedom. Anyone can come to God through Christ. The gospel is all inclusive.
What separates a Christian from a non-Christian is, at the beginning, that one has recognized their need to appeal to God for mercy while others have not. Once a Christian proclaims faith in Christ we are promised that the Holy Spirit of God will dwell in us, changing us, making us new.
The imagery of writers such as John and Paul is that of someone who has internally been “born again” or “died and raised again”. While on the outside we continue to wrestle with the same things non-Christians wrestle with we are different in one important way–the Holy Spirit has begun to redeem our inner person (may we say “the soul”). We are in the process of a redemption that will be finalized when our whole person–body, soul, and spirit–has become what God intends.
For an unbeliever such a change has not happened which means that all good actions may be good but this does not solve the important problem of actually being a changed person. Once we are actually changed we are categorically different than someone who has not placed their faith in Christ. While we may anticipate the “fruit of the Spirit”–which is good behavior empowered by the Spirit–we may also fail.
So what I am saying is this: a Christian who fails morally is still someone who has fallen on the mercy of God in Christ and in whom the Holy Spirit dwells and if progressively changing from the inside-out. Those who have not come this way may do good but the sickness of sin has not been healed, there has not been reconciliation with God, and the Holy Spirit does not yet dwell in them.
While there have been many answers given for this problem (and it is a problem) the first note of importance is God is God and we are not. While it may be hard to understand such commandments by God what is even harder to understand is why God would give us humans the gift of existence in the first place. We don’t even deserve our first breath. If God chooses to take our last breath it was His to begin with.
My first question is how you measure “goodness”. By what standard is one good or bad? If we measure ourselves by Hitler or Bernie Madoff we are in good shape. If we have to behave as Mother Theresa everything changes!
While I am sure there are people who love and display empathy without belief in God I deny that these people do it without God. God is the source and standard of goodness. If we behave rightly it is because he “rains on the just and the unjust”. It is because His love shines even on those who deny Him and His grace touches us all. It is because even the most avid atheist still retains a hint of the imago dei in which we were created.
What I am talking about here is not bad news. For those of us that realize our “goodness” can only go so far; for those of us whose introspection has led us to the realization that we have deep, dark secrets; for those of us who secretly hate, scam, lie, and cheat and who know our hearts this is very, very good news. We do not have to prove ourselves to anyone. We do not have to tip the balance of good behavior so that it outweighs bas behavior. We do not have to come up with excuses for self-justification. We can admit we make mistakes, we are human, we are fallen.
The gospel is the freedom to acknowledge who I am and still find love from God through Christ. Why would anyone want to turn this aside in order to prove how self-sufficient you are? The gospel is a much easier burden to carry.
Why would anyone want to turn this aside in order to prove how self-sufficient you are?
@Brian Even if you did you wouldn’t be atheist.
Anyway.
Good is different for different people. Why do you think we get in wars half the time? Seriously.
@Brian about your reply to Michael.
This is what I always notice people do. Brian, you a think, understand and logic person. You are probably not crazy, I’m probably not crazy.
So here goes.
>>>He gave it to us so it’s his to take away.
So? That doesn’t make what he does just, automatically.
>>>We don’t know why he does it.
So? This is an argument over finite knowledge bowing to infinite knowledge since that will never know why without asking and getting a truthful answer.
Do you say we cannot trust our own knowledge and logical abilities? Then what use are we?
>>>We don’t deserve the first breath.
Because you did nothing to get it doesn’t mean you don’t deserve it. You treat it bad doesn’t mean someone should just swoop in take it away/back.
You can say he is perfect and always just, but if action falters and you see it with your own eyes and process it and know it for what it is with your own mind and you trick yourself with, “we don’t know it all like him and he made this all anyway”. Is he truly what you say he is or are you making him something he’s not?
Here is my opinion as a non scholar, and I quote from the bible on this one:
“But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.”
As a human being and a female raised here on earth between various backgrounds and experiences I say, if the above is God, in his wisdom, then everything else is out of the human experience, which we are free to taste. Living our lives wisely ( as wisdom is biblically defined ) would address so many injustices.
God, in his wisdom is first of all considerate, submissive, full and mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.”
People who live otherwise, should be careful of associating God with themselves, and I know a lot of so called christians in my own family who fit into this category. I myself have a long way to go, but in my experience, I have not found God to be anything to me if not gentle. The consequences of the chain reaction of all human decisions and the reality that creates on this earth with others is part of the human experience. But really, if we were ALL considerate, submissive, full of mercy, good works and totally impartial and sincere with one another, wouldn’t that change the world? Wouldn’t that be a wise kingdom under a wise ruler? I’d pick God over humans any day.
It is true that good appears to be good in different ways for different people. Does this make it necessarily so? If so, how do we avoid pure nihilism. We can never know if we are really doing anything good. We can only ask how we feel about it.
If God is the source of life it would seem that we can also presuppose he is the source of justice. I am not sure how we can critique God for taking our life it is His in the first place. The false assumption here is that we have some right to what He gave us.
While I am not saying we cannot trust our logic I am saying it is limited. If we assume anything called “God” we assume by default that His/Her/Its logic supersedes our own. If we could reason to this God would He/She/It be a God at all?
Brian, they are good because they go out of their way to make sure others have quality, dignified lives. If they did not have money to give, they would surely give their time.
I may have been a bit vague. I am asking by what do we measure goodness? What makes you say that one action is good and another is not good? Is it intuition? Is it our feeling on the matter? Why is one action good and another is not?
Brian, Sam Harris answers this quite elegantly in his latest TED talk. You should check it out. http://www.ted.com/talks/sam_harris_science_can_show_what_s_right.html The short of it is this: We can measure benefit and detriment in many scientific ways. The answer of “what is right?” does not need to be some vacuum of masturbatory philosophy.
My own answer is this: We all know what is right and what is not right when we think for ourselves. Why must this question even be asked? If you answer that the bible provides the answer, then you’re not thinking for yourself.
In order to determine what is “good” we must establish a reference point. It is common that we only compare ourselves and our view of goodness to other people. We award Olympic runners with medals because of their amazing speed. “That guy runs so fast!” Yet, we know of comets, asteroids, and celestial bodies that travel many times faster than the fastest human. Whether it be a bullet or a rocket ship a human falls far behind in our potential for speed.
If there is no God, who or what sets the standard? It seems that we would all set our own standard of what is right and wrong.
Is this a positive thing? Or does it leave us to the mercy of those who have the most power?
But what if the God of the bible existed? Would that that give us a reference point to how we should live our lives?
I watched the Sam Harris video and I appreciated most of the conclusions that he reached regarding moral absolutes, moral progress, and what is best for humanity. Nevertheless, I was struck with the reality that it seemed inevitably pragmatic. We should behave this way as a society because it is has better, more pleasant results. It was sort of a scientific approach to the Golden Rule.
While Ted Bundy’s behavior is obviously less desirable in this paradigm it is not ultimately worse. In other words, if Bundy does not care about what we all think is best for society we may rightly call him wrong, but we do not really have any absolute standard by which to judge him.
Likewise, I see this as slipping into subjectivity at some point. In Hitler’s Germany it was very obvious to many Germans that the Jews were a threat and that the most obvious step was to eliminate the Jews. Scientifically (for them) the Jews were a lesser being anyways. So the Holocaust, in that society, was somewhat justifiable.
While we may say that is ridiculous, and rightly so, I am not sure how Harris’ claim for scientific objectivity actually plays into this debate. Maybe you can give me your thoughts on this matter?
@brian
I find this very hard to believe. “So for a Christian the truth of the matter is that we know we are no better than the next person; we do know who we can run to for forgiveness.”
and then you state “a Christian who fails morally is still someone who has fallen on the mercy of God in Christ and in whom the Holy Spirit dwells and if progressively changing from the inside-out. Those who have not come this way may do good but the sickness of sin has not been healed, there has not been reconciliation with God, and the Holy Spirit does not yet dwell in them.”
Now is it just me, or do the two statements seem to contradict each other? I mean, how are you able to say someone is “sick” if they do not have the holy spirit with in them? When you put a label on them, it seems like you’re trying to make it sound like you’re better of then them (or maybe it just sounds like that to me?)
Also in Germany, i think it’s safe to say that people weren’t thinking for themselves (some people might get where i’m coming from with this), and thus you have the result. Which then leads me to say, how does god actually teach you to think for yourself? I mean, the fact that Jesus was a “Shepherd” leading his “sheep” is a bit funny to me. It seems to point out that all humans are sheep who need leading, and therefor do not think for themselves.
@eric
I don’t see why you have to compare yourself to others to see what’s good. I actually read an article in a christian magazine (i wish i could remember the name of the magazine), that was stating how people “fail to study the real jesus”. The article stated how this professor gives tests out in his class. In it he asks two sets of questions, the first set all pertain to jesus “do you think jesus would worry, do you think jesus is like this etc…”. In the second set, he asked the same exact questions in a different manner “are you a worrier, etc…”. The results? they were the same…He realized that people were making jesus more like them, and not them like jesus. So is it possible that the “standard” set by god, is just a standard set by people?
first and foremost, i think these discussions are awesome. the insights and comments that are on this blog are helpful, thank you. so please forgive me for taking this in a direction that is more personal and simpler in nature. i mean no disrespect to all of the well thought out comments.
personally, i think people can be good without God. I know i was. i spent about 23 years of my life doing whatever the hell i wanted and i had a blast. job, money, chicks, friends, material crap… it was all good. so, i would have to agree that some of us can be good without Him.
however where does it end? I came upon a phase in my life where i asked myself, “is this as good as it gets?” to be honest this question, haunted me for several years. but when it came down to it, i realized that there was a void in my life. a void that my friends, family, money and work couldn’t fill. and although i still believe that you can be good without God, i feel that everyone would probably be better with Him. i know i am…
Brian: Nazi Fascism was intrinsically dogmatic and coercive. There is absolutely no reason to believe it would pass the test of Sam Harris’ conceptual ideal. Likewise, look at the world of Islam, where a woman is forced to wear a burka. The women who are being repressed by our standards actually view the burka as a rite of passage into womanhood and are proud to wear it. So where is this cognitive dissonance coming from? It comes from the dogma of Islam, from the fact that they have no choice but to love their shackles or else they will be destroyed by their own family. Dogmatic policies of religion and nationalism would not pass the test.
Let me try to clarify because I see where I may have sounded contradictory. At an intrinsic level there is no difference between a Christian and a non-Christian. There is nothing that makes a Christian superior to a Buddhist, a Muslim, or an atheist. But it would be hard to say, as a Christian, that having the Holy Spirit in our lives doesn’t make things better. I may put it this way: we are not better in and of ourselves. Likewise, it is better to be in relationship with the God revealed through Jesus Christ than not.
I agree that in Germany people were not thinking for themselves. It is a good example of a mob mentality. But given the paradigm presented by Sam Harris how do we know that the chemicals in our brain aren’t simply misleading us? How do we know deep down that they are wrong? It seems to me to be a battle of whose view is pragmatically better for our species than what is absolutely right or wrong.
Is not Sam Harris being dogmatic and coersive? He may not be using the same means, but I am not sure if the result is any different. So dogmatic policies of religion and politics are off limits but dogmatic policies of Harris are not?
@brian
Is it possible for life to lead itself? If anything, the chemicals in our brains could be incorrect. I’ve tried many different drugs which plays with the chemical makeup in our brains, and I’ve come to the realization that our reality can be altered. In fact there’s a chemical in our body, called Dimethyltryptamine, which does exactly just that.
I don’t know how we would know what’s right and wrong, as I think each situation in life is made up of too many variables that it’d be impossible to say “this is the way it should be done, and this is the way it shouldn’t be done”.
If life was a math problem with one solution, I think it’d be easy to lay a ground set of rules down saying “this is the right way, and this is the wrong way”. I don’t think life is that simple though, do you?
If we agree that there’s more then one solution to a problem, then it seems that life can be just as good without god (of course this is based on agreeing that there is more then one solution)
@chase
I reached a point in my life where I had that happen to me as well. I found a deep void inside of me, and I realized that all of the things that I had, did not make me happy. My solution? I didn’t turn towards god or religion, instead I got rid of everything. My apartment, tv, everything. I camped out and lived in a tent for 10 months. I still held a regular job (I had a corporate job too, so I had to wear a tie+jacket everyday), and also had a car (if i didn’t need a car to maintain a job, I would have gotten rid of it too). I searched for answers to my own questions as what would fulfill my life, and came up with my own answers. I sought for answers within me, not external ones
I appreciate your story. wow! you really went through a lot of junk there. i can somewhat relate to a lot of your experiences. Thanks for sharing.
I too had a moment during my past life wherein i “shed” a lot of things in my life both material and things having to do with my personal habits. the void that i felt was too big to fill with anything. the “several years” that i mentioned early was a bad time for me. a lot of changes happened for good and bad. but ultimately, i am where i am and am better for it. I’m better because of the choice i made to follow Jesus. even though, i had to trip, fall and get beat (a lot) before i made the choice.
I cant keep up with all of you scholars but can just say at this point my experience with HIM is what keeps me going. I know what its like to live my “own” life without involving HIM. Of course its okay for a while. I was fine until 1 day…For me HE got me, I’m hooked and I can’t even convey what its like feeling the peace I have inside. Like I said, I’m a hooked individual.” I got rid of the junk in my trunk and the clutter in my mind and now I’m hooked. alright signing off.
I do think that so many try too hard and make it more difficult than what it is though…..
March 30th, 2010 at 10:23 pm
A fantastic chapter in G.K. Chesterton’s ‘Orthodoxy’, titled ‘The Maniac’, would be worth reading for those who think they are sufficient, good enough, and altogether. It seems to me, as it did Chesterton over a century ago, that only those who are a bit insane or oblivious to reality think we humans are good. Anyone with a pinch of self-awareness realizes we are a mess.
Only those who are oblivious to reality, like a man who thinks he is a poached egg, is absolutely sure of his own goodness. Everyone else around him knows he is crazy but he is fully convinced of his eggness. It is the sane person who realizes that he is not good because he can see himself as everyone else around him does–as a finite, fallen human.
Anyways, for this to make sense you ought to read Chesterton: http://books.google.com/books?id=p7UEAQAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=chesterton+orthodoxy&source=bl&ots=XA1HrenfTf&sig=3JHegp19zYTZQPoqZuIxpunIxVo&hl=en&ei=xr6yS92xH53yswPJvZTdBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CAkQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=&f=false
April 1st, 2010 at 1:35 am
I think this question can go the other way around “are you good with god?”
of course if you have access to a computer and enough free time, chances are you aren’t in a war stricken poverty country where they believe in god, and yet they’re life is still in shambles
April 1st, 2010 at 9:18 pm
Greengodzilla,
This would demand that we determine what it is meant by being “good”. For many today, including many Christians, being “good” equates to living up to some standard of behavior. While it is not less than this it surely is more than this.
For the early Christians we see some think that change what it means to be “good”. It begins with faithfulness to Jesus as Messiah and a loyal life of worship to the one true God. Equally, for the church, the presence of the Holy Spirit dwelling in us makes us “new creation” which no “good” Buddhist, Atheist, or Muslim can claim. While it may be difficult at times to visualize how a sometimes jerk-of-a-Christian can be “good” in a way that the kindest of atheist never could be this is something that Christianity claims, and I believe it does so rightly.
April 3rd, 2010 at 5:22 am
Brian,
I’m lost in parts of your second paragraph. I’m not really sure what the final point of it was?
I don’t get what you mean, “i believe it does so rightly”. So are you saying that no atheist could be as “good” as a christian? OR, are you saying that christianity just makes the claim of being good, and not necessarily so? OR are you saying that no atheists life can be as “good” as a christians (ie they won’t be as happy, nice, etc…whatever you see as “good” in your eyes)
I don’t think it’s hard to visualize how a jerk-of-a-christian can be good at all. I say this, not to offend either, it’s just been in the news lately. I’m sure many of those priests in catholic church (i consider this a denomination of christianity), we’re out doing good everyday. Just in their spare time, some of them, went and molested boys. I think there’s a good/evil in everyone though. (I think this is straying off from the original question of are you good without god?).
April 5th, 2010 at 8:07 pm
Even if we eliminate all the bad things churches have done there is no evidence that a life based on the teachings in the bible would be a moral one.
The god of the bible is one of the most evil characters in all of fiction. If one was to add up the total number of humans killed by the Christian god in the old testament he is the clear leader. Second place would go to people killing others after he told them too. A distant third would be Satan.
At no point does Jesus ever say his father/self was wrong to kill so many innocent people.
To ask if you can be good without god presupposes that their is a god and that he is some sort of role model. The first is almost certainly false as is the second.
Good luck.
April 5th, 2010 at 8:10 pm
Brian,
“For many today, including many Christians, being “good” equates to living up to some standard of behavior. While it is not less than this it surely is more than this.”
No, being a good person is pretty much only about social behavior.
Since it just happened, you may be thinking of the day called “Good Friday”. There was certainly nothing good about it; the etymology actually dates back to Old English where “good” meant roughly the equivalent of what “holy” means today. However, while there are a couple proper nouns whose etymology follows this antiquated definition, that is not what the word means today. You’re still hanging onto it, trying to tell us that “belief in my god” is part of being a good, moral person. If you weren’t, you would not have placed every instance of the word inside quotation marks.
If you don’t see a problem with that, well, there’s not much I can say to you. There *really* are people out there that think feeling love or displaying empathy and kindness to someone is impossible if you don’t believe in a god. It would be easier trying to convince some guy that believes he’s a poached egg that he really isn’t an egg at all.
April 5th, 2010 at 8:35 pm
Greengodzilla,
What I am not saying is that behavior does not matter at all. I do not want to come across as being amoral. Behavior does matter.
Nevertheless, we must begin with the fact that we all do some terrible things. It is easy to point our fingers at a priest who has molested a child while calling that person a monster. In some sense this may be true. If there is a ranking on immoral behaviors this would appear to be one of the great ones.
But at that we must ask why we feel there is a ranking. Why do we feel such behavior is worse than say a white lie? If there is such a ladder of sins this would seem to indicate that we believe, at least subconsciously, in a standard. If there is a standard what is that standard?
For Christians that standard is God and God alone. If God is the standard there may be degrees of failure and sin but there is no one who can claim to be “good”. As the Apostle Paul says, “We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God”. So while you and I can look down at a priest who has failed morally for self-justification what we cannot do is look up if we want to continue feeling smug.
The Christian gospel claims that the answer to our problem is not trying to do more good things than bad things since we can never accomplish such a task. In fact, once we have done wrong even once we have put ourselves outside of the standard of morality into the category Christians call a “sinner”. The prescription to our illness in the Christian gospel is throwing ourselves in the mercies of God.
When we do this it is a necessary part of the process that we acknowledge that God’s Son has paid the price for us and that God has found a way to make sure that all our sins are justly punished without actually having to punish us. So for a Christian the truth of the matter is that we know we are no better than the next person; we do know who we can run to for forgiveness.
The gospel proclaims that we are not alone in this freedom. Anyone can come to God through Christ. The gospel is all inclusive.
What separates a Christian from a non-Christian is, at the beginning, that one has recognized their need to appeal to God for mercy while others have not. Once a Christian proclaims faith in Christ we are promised that the Holy Spirit of God will dwell in us, changing us, making us new.
The imagery of writers such as John and Paul is that of someone who has internally been “born again” or “died and raised again”. While on the outside we continue to wrestle with the same things non-Christians wrestle with we are different in one important way–the Holy Spirit has begun to redeem our inner person (may we say “the soul”). We are in the process of a redemption that will be finalized when our whole person–body, soul, and spirit–has become what God intends.
For an unbeliever such a change has not happened which means that all good actions may be good but this does not solve the important problem of actually being a changed person. Once we are actually changed we are categorically different than someone who has not placed their faith in Christ. While we may anticipate the “fruit of the Spirit”–which is good behavior empowered by the Spirit–we may also fail.
So what I am saying is this: a Christian who fails morally is still someone who has fallen on the mercy of God in Christ and in whom the Holy Spirit dwells and if progressively changing from the inside-out. Those who have not come this way may do good but the sickness of sin has not been healed, there has not been reconciliation with God, and the Holy Spirit does not yet dwell in them.
April 5th, 2010 at 8:37 pm
Michael,
While there have been many answers given for this problem (and it is a problem) the first note of importance is God is God and we are not. While it may be hard to understand such commandments by God what is even harder to understand is why God would give us humans the gift of existence in the first place. We don’t even deserve our first breath. If God chooses to take our last breath it was His to begin with.
April 5th, 2010 at 9:11 pm
Jonathan,
My first question is how you measure “goodness”. By what standard is one good or bad? If we measure ourselves by Hitler or Bernie Madoff we are in good shape. If we have to behave as Mother Theresa everything changes!
While I am sure there are people who love and display empathy without belief in God I deny that these people do it without God. God is the source and standard of goodness. If we behave rightly it is because he “rains on the just and the unjust”. It is because His love shines even on those who deny Him and His grace touches us all. It is because even the most avid atheist still retains a hint of the imago dei in which we were created.
April 5th, 2010 at 9:16 pm
Everyone,
What I am talking about here is not bad news. For those of us that realize our “goodness” can only go so far; for those of us whose introspection has led us to the realization that we have deep, dark secrets; for those of us who secretly hate, scam, lie, and cheat and who know our hearts this is very, very good news. We do not have to prove ourselves to anyone. We do not have to tip the balance of good behavior so that it outweighs bas behavior. We do not have to come up with excuses for self-justification. We can admit we make mistakes, we are human, we are fallen.
The gospel is the freedom to acknowledge who I am and still find love from God through Christ. Why would anyone want to turn this aside in order to prove how self-sufficient you are? The gospel is a much easier burden to carry.
April 5th, 2010 at 9:19 pm
Here is a post that lays out 10 atheist/agnostic philanthropists: http://www.dontfeedtheanimals.net/2010/03/good-without-god-secular.html
There is no question that we have the capacity to be good without god.
April 6th, 2010 at 12:41 am
Why would anyone want to turn this aside in order to prove how self-sufficient you are?
@Brian Even if you did you wouldn’t be atheist.
Anyway.
Good is different for different people. Why do you think we get in wars half the time? Seriously.
@Brian about your reply to Michael.
This is what I always notice people do. Brian, you a think, understand and logic person. You are probably not crazy, I’m probably not crazy.
So here goes.
>>>He gave it to us so it’s his to take away.
So? That doesn’t make what he does just, automatically.
>>>We don’t know why he does it.
So? This is an argument over finite knowledge bowing to infinite knowledge since that will never know why without asking and getting a truthful answer.
Do you say we cannot trust our own knowledge and logical abilities? Then what use are we?
>>>We don’t deserve the first breath.
Because you did nothing to get it doesn’t mean you don’t deserve it. You treat it bad doesn’t mean someone should just swoop in take it away/back.
You can say he is perfect and always just, but if action falters and you see it with your own eyes and process it and know it for what it is with your own mind and you trick yourself with, “we don’t know it all like him and he made this all anyway”. Is he truly what you say he is or are you making him something he’s not?
April 6th, 2010 at 2:07 am
Here is my opinion as a non scholar, and I quote from the bible on this one:
“But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.”
As a human being and a female raised here on earth between various backgrounds and experiences I say, if the above is God, in his wisdom, then everything else is out of the human experience, which we are free to taste. Living our lives wisely ( as wisdom is biblically defined ) would address so many injustices.
God, in his wisdom is first of all considerate, submissive, full and mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.”
People who live otherwise, should be careful of associating God with themselves, and I know a lot of so called christians in my own family who fit into this category. I myself have a long way to go, but in my experience, I have not found God to be anything to me if not gentle. The consequences of the chain reaction of all human decisions and the reality that creates on this earth with others is part of the human experience. But really, if we were ALL considerate, submissive, full of mercy, good works and totally impartial and sincere with one another, wouldn’t that change the world? Wouldn’t that be a wise kingdom under a wise ruler? I’d pick God over humans any day.
April 6th, 2010 at 9:32 am
Andrew,
Why are these people good? If they did not give their money would they be bad? If so, why?
April 6th, 2010 at 9:37 am
Meh,
It is true that good appears to be good in different ways for different people. Does this make it necessarily so? If so, how do we avoid pure nihilism. We can never know if we are really doing anything good. We can only ask how we feel about it.
If God is the source of life it would seem that we can also presuppose he is the source of justice. I am not sure how we can critique God for taking our life it is His in the first place. The false assumption here is that we have some right to what He gave us.
While I am not saying we cannot trust our logic I am saying it is limited. If we assume anything called “God” we assume by default that His/Her/Its logic supersedes our own. If we could reason to this God would He/She/It be a God at all?
April 6th, 2010 at 10:49 am
Brian, they are good because they go out of their way to make sure others have quality, dignified lives. If they did not have money to give, they would surely give their time.
April 6th, 2010 at 3:38 pm
Andrew,
I may have been a bit vague. I am asking by what do we measure goodness? What makes you say that one action is good and another is not good? Is it intuition? Is it our feeling on the matter? Why is one action good and another is not?
April 6th, 2010 at 4:07 pm
Brian, Sam Harris answers this quite elegantly in his latest TED talk. You should check it out. http://www.ted.com/talks/sam_harris_science_can_show_what_s_right.html The short of it is this: We can measure benefit and detriment in many scientific ways. The answer of “what is right?” does not need to be some vacuum of masturbatory philosophy.
My own answer is this: We all know what is right and what is not right when we think for ourselves. Why must this question even be asked? If you answer that the bible provides the answer, then you’re not thinking for yourself.
April 6th, 2010 at 6:02 pm
In order to determine what is “good” we must establish a reference point. It is common that we only compare ourselves and our view of goodness to other people. We award Olympic runners with medals because of their amazing speed. “That guy runs so fast!” Yet, we know of comets, asteroids, and celestial bodies that travel many times faster than the fastest human. Whether it be a bullet or a rocket ship a human falls far behind in our potential for speed.
If there is no God, who or what sets the standard? It seems that we would all set our own standard of what is right and wrong.
Is this a positive thing? Or does it leave us to the mercy of those who have the most power?
But what if the God of the bible existed? Would that that give us a reference point to how we should live our lives?
April 6th, 2010 at 10:13 pm
Andrew,
I watched the Sam Harris video and I appreciated most of the conclusions that he reached regarding moral absolutes, moral progress, and what is best for humanity. Nevertheless, I was struck with the reality that it seemed inevitably pragmatic. We should behave this way as a society because it is has better, more pleasant results. It was sort of a scientific approach to the Golden Rule.
While Ted Bundy’s behavior is obviously less desirable in this paradigm it is not ultimately worse. In other words, if Bundy does not care about what we all think is best for society we may rightly call him wrong, but we do not really have any absolute standard by which to judge him.
Likewise, I see this as slipping into subjectivity at some point. In Hitler’s Germany it was very obvious to many Germans that the Jews were a threat and that the most obvious step was to eliminate the Jews. Scientifically (for them) the Jews were a lesser being anyways. So the Holocaust, in that society, was somewhat justifiable.
While we may say that is ridiculous, and rightly so, I am not sure how Harris’ claim for scientific objectivity actually plays into this debate. Maybe you can give me your thoughts on this matter?
April 7th, 2010 at 2:49 am
@brian
I find this very hard to believe. “So for a Christian the truth of the matter is that we know we are no better than the next person; we do know who we can run to for forgiveness.”
and then you state “a Christian who fails morally is still someone who has fallen on the mercy of God in Christ and in whom the Holy Spirit dwells and if progressively changing from the inside-out. Those who have not come this way may do good but the sickness of sin has not been healed, there has not been reconciliation with God, and the Holy Spirit does not yet dwell in them.”
Now is it just me, or do the two statements seem to contradict each other? I mean, how are you able to say someone is “sick” if they do not have the holy spirit with in them? When you put a label on them, it seems like you’re trying to make it sound like you’re better of then them (or maybe it just sounds like that to me?)
Also in Germany, i think it’s safe to say that people weren’t thinking for themselves (some people might get where i’m coming from with this), and thus you have the result. Which then leads me to say, how does god actually teach you to think for yourself? I mean, the fact that Jesus was a “Shepherd” leading his “sheep” is a bit funny to me. It seems to point out that all humans are sheep who need leading, and therefor do not think for themselves.
@eric
I don’t see why you have to compare yourself to others to see what’s good. I actually read an article in a christian magazine (i wish i could remember the name of the magazine), that was stating how people “fail to study the real jesus”. The article stated how this professor gives tests out in his class. In it he asks two sets of questions, the first set all pertain to jesus “do you think jesus would worry, do you think jesus is like this etc…”. In the second set, he asked the same exact questions in a different manner “are you a worrier, etc…”. The results? they were the same…He realized that people were making jesus more like them, and not them like jesus. So is it possible that the “standard” set by god, is just a standard set by people?
April 7th, 2010 at 7:11 pm
first and foremost, i think these discussions are awesome. the insights and comments that are on this blog are helpful, thank you. so please forgive me for taking this in a direction that is more personal and simpler in nature. i mean no disrespect to all of the well thought out comments.
personally, i think people can be good without God. I know i was. i spent about 23 years of my life doing whatever the hell i wanted and i had a blast. job, money, chicks, friends, material crap… it was all good. so, i would have to agree that some of us can be good without Him.
however where does it end? I came upon a phase in my life where i asked myself, “is this as good as it gets?” to be honest this question, haunted me for several years. but when it came down to it, i realized that there was a void in my life. a void that my friends, family, money and work couldn’t fill. and although i still believe that you can be good without God, i feel that everyone would probably be better with Him. i know i am…
peace out homies!!!
April 7th, 2010 at 7:41 pm
Brian: Nazi Fascism was intrinsically dogmatic and coercive. There is absolutely no reason to believe it would pass the test of Sam Harris’ conceptual ideal. Likewise, look at the world of Islam, where a woman is forced to wear a burka. The women who are being repressed by our standards actually view the burka as a rite of passage into womanhood and are proud to wear it. So where is this cognitive dissonance coming from? It comes from the dogma of Islam, from the fact that they have no choice but to love their shackles or else they will be destroyed by their own family. Dogmatic policies of religion and nationalism would not pass the test.
April 8th, 2010 at 5:11 pm
@Greengodzilla,
Let me try to clarify because I see where I may have sounded contradictory. At an intrinsic level there is no difference between a Christian and a non-Christian. There is nothing that makes a Christian superior to a Buddhist, a Muslim, or an atheist. But it would be hard to say, as a Christian, that having the Holy Spirit in our lives doesn’t make things better. I may put it this way: we are not better in and of ourselves. Likewise, it is better to be in relationship with the God revealed through Jesus Christ than not.
I agree that in Germany people were not thinking for themselves. It is a good example of a mob mentality. But given the paradigm presented by Sam Harris how do we know that the chemicals in our brain aren’t simply misleading us? How do we know deep down that they are wrong? It seems to me to be a battle of whose view is pragmatically better for our species than what is absolutely right or wrong.
April 8th, 2010 at 5:12 pm
@Andrew,
Is not Sam Harris being dogmatic and coersive? He may not be using the same means, but I am not sure if the result is any different. So dogmatic policies of religion and politics are off limits but dogmatic policies of Harris are not?
April 8th, 2010 at 7:32 pm
@brian
Is it possible for life to lead itself? If anything, the chemicals in our brains could be incorrect. I’ve tried many different drugs which plays with the chemical makeup in our brains, and I’ve come to the realization that our reality can be altered. In fact there’s a chemical in our body, called Dimethyltryptamine, which does exactly just that.
I don’t know how we would know what’s right and wrong, as I think each situation in life is made up of too many variables that it’d be impossible to say “this is the way it should be done, and this is the way it shouldn’t be done”.
If life was a math problem with one solution, I think it’d be easy to lay a ground set of rules down saying “this is the right way, and this is the wrong way”. I don’t think life is that simple though, do you?
If we agree that there’s more then one solution to a problem, then it seems that life can be just as good without god (of course this is based on agreeing that there is more then one solution)
@chase
I reached a point in my life where I had that happen to me as well. I found a deep void inside of me, and I realized that all of the things that I had, did not make me happy. My solution? I didn’t turn towards god or religion, instead I got rid of everything. My apartment, tv, everything. I camped out and lived in a tent for 10 months. I still held a regular job (I had a corporate job too, so I had to wear a tie+jacket everyday), and also had a car (if i didn’t need a car to maintain a job, I would have gotten rid of it too). I searched for answers to my own questions as what would fulfill my life, and came up with my own answers. I sought for answers within me, not external ones
April 9th, 2010 at 5:14 pm
@Greengodzilla
I appreciate your story. wow! you really went through a lot of junk there. i can somewhat relate to a lot of your experiences. Thanks for sharing.
I too had a moment during my past life wherein i “shed” a lot of things in my life both material and things having to do with my personal habits. the void that i felt was too big to fill with anything. the “several years” that i mentioned early was a bad time for me. a lot of changes happened for good and bad. but ultimately, i am where i am and am better for it. I’m better because of the choice i made to follow Jesus. even though, i had to trip, fall and get beat (a lot) before i made the choice.
Thanks for your blog! I appreciate you!
Peace out…
April 10th, 2010 at 1:00 pm
Greengodzilla,
I agree that pragmatically one can be just as “good” without God, but I think there is more to “being” and goodness.
April 11th, 2010 at 11:18 pm
i wonder what more is out there
http://www.smart-kit.com/s225/powerful-words-by-carl-sagan/
April 13th, 2010 at 10:24 pm
I cant keep up with all of you scholars but can just say at this point my experience with HIM is what keeps me going. I know what its like to live my “own” life without involving HIM. Of course its okay for a while. I was fine until 1 day…For me HE got me, I’m hooked and I can’t even convey what its like feeling the peace I have inside. Like I said, I’m a hooked individual.” I got rid of the junk in my trunk and the clutter in my mind and now I’m hooked. alright signing off.
I do think that so many try too hard and make it more difficult than what it is though…..
April 15th, 2010 at 11:36 pm
@ stephenie
what is your experience with him? i’d be interested to learn about these
how did he “get” you?