Per my post
Objective Morality—Atheism vs. Pantheism vs. Theism, I firmly hold the Moral Argument for God’s existence to be true. However, any answer about the nature of objective goodness should be followed by the question of what evil is. Defining goodness should shed light on evil …
If God Is the Essence of Goodness, What Is the Essence of Evil?As I described in my prior post, evil is merely an inferior, parasitic attack on goodness, just as falsehood is an unnecessary contradiction of truth. Good can exist without evil, but evil cannot exist without goodness. But still … what exactly is evil?!
It is interesting to note that just as falsehood is nothing more than bogus truth (it claims to be factually correct, but is not), evil itself claims to be justified—but is not. Even the most ruthless human beings in history, such as Zedong, Stalin and Hitler, thought they were doing the right thing and attempted to justify their actions. And what about people who openly admit they are evil and morally wrong? The hard-core Satanist who proudly claims to be wicked really means: “I am
good—liberated to do whatever I want! And it’s those uptight religious people who are the problem.” In other words, the irony of evil is that it claims to be objectively good! Evil is nothing more than false moral goodness.
But if God’s nature is ultimate goodness, what is the implication about evil? In essence, evil is corrupt self-justification raised in rivalry against God’s true righteousness—it tries to stand independent of God on its own. In terms of our world,
human self-righteousness and evil are one and the same.
This is precisely the point of the often-mocked story of Adam and Eve in Genesis 2 and 3. Every created free moral agent must make the decision between submitting to God’s eternal goodness (entering into a healthy relationship with God) and attempting to be independently self-justified (rejecting relationship with God). Adam and Eve tried to challenge God’s righteousness and become “like God” … “knowing good and evil” for themselves. That is the moment humanity became corrupted and fell into darkness.
Ever since the Fall, we humans have been trying to be right. There is nothing that feels quite as good as being correct all the time, whether we are debating religion, politics, economics, science or everyday relational conflicts. Humanity’s deepest desire is to be
right—and since God
is truth and goodness, it is not a stretch to say that humanity’s deepest desire is to be God—to be omnibenevolent—to be all good and all justified. But since only God is the definition of goodness, we are out of luck.
As WLC has demonstrated, God is the paradigm of goodness, and the paradigm is always superior to imitations—even perfect imitations. Inescapably, the imitation defines its perfection based upon the paradigm. A perfect imitation of the Mona Lisa would still be measured against the Mona Lisa. So even if a human were to somehow perfectly imitate God’s benevolent characteristics in every single way, that person’s goodness would still be subordinate and inferior to God’s ultimate goodness.
Can We Be Good without God?In many philosophical discussions, the question is raised as to whether it is possible to be morally good without believing in God. As a former atheist, I had an extremely strong conscience prior to believing in God, adhering to many of the same morals as Christians. And many of the atheists I know, including friends of mine, are very honorable! So shouldn’t an atheist who does all the right things be able to justifiably proclaim moral independence from God? In short, the answer is
no. Apart from God (the paradigm of goodness), human moral goodness has no definition, which instantaneously undermines any attempt to be independently righteous. And if our goal in being “good” is to proudly throw our supposed holiness back in God’s face, it only proves we have been warped by self-righteousness.
A few years ago, I saw a billboard along an interstate from an atheist organization. It depicted a beautiful blue sky with white, puffy clouds and read: “Are you good without God? Millions are.” But the billboard could have been more accurately written: “Are you self-righteous? Millions are.” In turn, that could be even more succinctly stated: “Are you
evil? Millions are.”
Unfortunately for those who are attempting to be morally justified apart from God, it is that very self-holiness that has corrupted them and severed their relationship with God. And lest you think I am merely criticizing atheists, I am directing the same accusation at myself. In one form or another, every human on this planet (yours-truly included!) has demanded the right to be the Almighty’s moral equal, which blatantly demonstrates our lack of respect for God and our overestimation of ourselves. So it really should not come as a surprise to us that our relationship with God has suffered as a result of our “personal goodness”.
This is why Jesus uniquely invites us to surrender our self-righteousness to Him through faith (John 3:16), rather than endlessly trying to earn our way to a righteous status through our own moral accomplishments (Romans 3:20, Galatians 2:16). Believing in Jesus is far more than mere intellectual acknowledgement of Christian religious doctrine (Genesis 15:6, Habakkuk 2:4, Ephesians 2: 8–10)—it is an act of total surrender to God as the paradigm of goodness (1 John 1:5). In place of our fallen self-righteousness (Philippians 3:8–9), Jesus promises to infuse His true righteousness into us through His presence (2 Corinthians 5:17)—and to transform us from the inside out (Philippians 1:6). Whereas other religions offer solutions for human evil based upon our self-effort (whether through good works or meditations), the Biblical Jesus alone offers us redemption based upon divine righteousness.
And because Jesus uniquely offers to redeem and transform us through His divine goodness rather than our own inferior self-righteousness, this leads directly into
The Moral Argument for the Christian God Alone.
