Goodness
GOODNESS
The fitness of a thing to produce any particular end. Perfection, kindness, benevolence.
Fuente: Theological Dictionary
goodness
As a divine attribute, the perfection of God by the complete possession of all that is best in Himself, and as the source bf all that is good in His creatures.
Fuente: New Catholic Dictionary
Goodness
in man is not a mere passive quality, but the deliberate preference of right to wrong, the firm and persistent resistance of all moral evil, and the choosing and following of all moral good.
Fuente: Easton’s Bible Dictionary
GOODNESS
People have always had difficult defining goodness. But whereas philosophers may struggle to define the abstract, the Bible talks about the concrete. It helps people understand goodness not by discussing the concept of goodness, but by pointing to people or things that are good.
When a young man questioned Jesus about moral goodness, Jesus replied by referring him not to a concept, but to a person God. The way to understand goodness is through the person who is good and whose works are good (Mat 19:17). Gods character reveals his goodness. It is a character that combines love, mercy, patience, faithfulness, justice, holiness and wrath in perfect balance (Exo 33:19; Exo 34:5-7; Psa 86:5; Rom 11:22).
The biblical words translated good contained a range of meanings, such as pleasant, beneficial, fitting, beautiful and honourable (Gen 1:4; Deu 6:18; Job 2:10; Eph 5:9). The added meaning that the words acquire in the Bible is largely because of their association with God. The goodness that the Bible teaches is the goodness that exists perfectly in God (Psa 100:5). This goodness was demonstrated in the life and ministry of Jesus (Act 10:38), and the Holy Spirit wants to reproduce it in the lives of Christians (Gal 5:22).
All that God does is good (Psa 119:68; Psa 136:1; Act 14:17; 1Ti 4:4). His people should recognize this, even when they meet hardships and difficulties (Job 2:10; Mat 7:11; Rom 8:28; Heb 12:10; Jam 1:17; see also CHASTISEMENT).
God desires the welfare of all, and therefore he wants people to do good (Isa 1:17; Isa 5:20; Gal 6:10). Though good works will not earn them salvation (for salvation is the gift of God and is received by faith), once they have received salvation they have an obligation to produce good works (Eph 2:8-10; Tit 2:14; see GOOD WORKS).
Likewise, although the law of God is good (Psa 119:39; Rom 7:12; Rom 7:16), obedience to the law will never produce a satisfactory standard of goodness (Rom 7:18-19). The reason for this is the sin that still infects human nature (Rom 7:13-14; see FLESH). But the believer can produce goodness through the power of the indwelling Spirit (Gal 5:22).
Fuente: Bridgeway Bible Dictionary
Goodness
GOODNESS.As resignation is the ideal of the Buddhist, and valour of the Mohammedan, so the essence of Christianity is goodness. Its Founder was the absolute personification of this characteristic quality. Nothing short of this could have so inspired the Apostles and Evangelists. Veiled within the few imperishable pages of the Gospels, and perhaps seen only by the meditating mind, is the figure of a perfect goodness once realized upon earth. It is not the novelty of His teaching that has attracted men, nor His deep sympathy with humanity, nor any spiritual utterances to the Father (which are all too rarely recorded). Behind the words and deeds of the four biographies stands a shining personality, a living type of goodnessOne of whom they could speak as being without sin. The Evangelists knew nothing of the dogmatic spirit, and could probably have given no clear definition and explanation of the sinlessness of Christ. To them He was the human expression of the Divine Goodness, and it mattered little whether a man should say that the Goodness was from eternity, so that by its nature sin had never been a moments possibility, or that at birth Christ had been uniquely endowed with a passion for goodness that turned naturally from everything selfish, injurious to others, or sinful either to God or man; or that at His baptism He had been set aside to that brief ministry (which is nearly all men know of His earthly life), when the voice from heaven was heard saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased (Mat 3:17). However its genesis might be spoken of, the sinlessness of Christ is the utterance of the measure of His goodness as it affected the disciples. Throughout the Sermon on the Mount they would hear that note of human tenderness blended with unhesitating virtue which constitutes goodness. This alone could be the source of that merciful utterance which is perhaps His only new doctrineLove your enemies.
In His message of the Divine Fatherhood they would behold that goodness sending rain upon the just and the unjust (Mat 5:45), forgiving the penitent as the father forgives the prodigal son (Luk 15:11 ff.), and even forgiving those whose repentance is yet to come (Luk 23:34). Such conceptions would be born of the goodness within Himself, that breathed out in the intense sympathy of the story of the woman taken in sin (Joh 7:53 to Joh 8:11), or the defence of Mary Magdalene in the house of Simon the Pharisee (Luk 7:36 ff.), or in the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luk 10:25 ff.). The same spirit marks the greater number of the miracles. None could be considered as entirely separated from human interest and influence, and the great majority (thirty-one out of thirty-seven recorded) were wrought openly and intentionally for the good of others. The blind, the deaf, the palsied, the lame, the lepers, the lunatic, the hungry crowd, the timid fishermen, the mourners for the dead,all shared in the effective power of the innate goodness of our Lord. It was as though, in His purity and sinlessness, the very forces of nature became obedient to His transparent will,the one will that sin has never overcome, the one luminous purity in which sin has found no vitalizing atmosphere. He had been tried at the beginning of His mission, but the temptations of the desert had ended in triumph. The goodness that was the breath of His being rose instinctively above the low promptings of a selfish wonder-working, or the presumption of pride, or the vanity of power, even though over all the kingdoms of the earth (Mat 4:1 || Luk 4:1, Mar 1:12). He spoke harshly to the Tempter, for goodness does not always win by mild passivity against evil. He who knows that God is the beginning and the end of all goodness will waste little time in diplomatic parley with the powers of darkness. Victory will often lie in swift attack. So the goodness of Christ is not lessened by His fierce handling of the money-changers and traders within the Temple (Mat 21:12 ff., Joh 2:13 ff.), for He knows that lower ideas of God and goodness will unconsciously prevail if the house of God becomes a place for barter and bargain. It is part of the same zeal that had kept Him about His Fathers business in the days of His boyhood (Luk 2:49), though it takes the more vigorous form we might expect in manhood. The inward knowledge of the simplicity and holiness of His motives makes fear not only impossible, but non-existent; and this is the spirit that inspires every true missionary. He also, as his Master, would show the winning charm of the visibly goodthe goodness embodied in a life rather than in doctrines onlythat which in Christ could say to the world, I am the bread of life (Joh 6:35; Joh 6:48), I am the way, the truth, and the life (Joh 14:6), and I am the light of the world (Joh 8:12, Joh 9:5), the witness of which is described by St. Paul, when he says that the fruit of the light is in all goodness and righteousness and truth (Eph 5:9).
The goodness of Christ brought a new force into Jewish religion, one that changed the nature of it. Judaism was formal, ceremonial, mainly an external worship. Its prophets had striven to kindle it into a moral and spiritual faith. But prophet and priest had stood apart. In Christ the middle wall was broken down, and into the old religion was poured the new spirit. Henceforth religion could not be separate from the moral life. A man could not be unrighteous, an evil-doer, and yet be religious. Goodness became a synonym for true and undefiled religion. For man, having once seen the perfect manhood of the Christ, and felt His power to overcome sin and death, had gained a vision of religion that might perpetuate such a type, and the vision would not lightly fade. Through failures from within and tyrannies from without the Christian would bear witness to his Lord and to his faith, by a life of goodness modelled on that of his Master. This was the highest evidence he could offer of the Divine Incarnation.
Edgar Daplyn.
Fuente: A Dictionary Of Christ And The Gospels
Goodness
goodnes: This word in the Old Testament is the translation of tobh (Exo 18:9; Psa 16:2, the Revised Version (British and American) good; Psa 23:6), etc.; of tubh (Exo 33:19; Psa 31:19; Jer 31:14; Hos 3:5), etc.; of hesedh (Exo 34:6), abundant in goodness, the English Revised Version plenteous in mercy, the American Standard Revised Version abundant in loving kindness; The goodness of God endureth continually, the Revised Version (British and American) mercy, the American Standard Revised Version loving kindness (Psa 52:1), etc.
In the New Testament it is the translation of chrestotes (usefulness, benignity); the riches of his goodness (Rom 2:4; Rom 11:22, thrice); of chrestos (useful, benign, kind, in Luk 6:35); The goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance (Rom 2:4); of agathosune (found only in the New Testament and Septuagint and writings based thereon), full of goodness. (Rom 15:14); gentleness, goodness, faith (Gal 5:22); in all goodness and righteousness and truth (Eph 5:9); all the good pleasure of his goodness, the Revised Version (British and American) every desire of goodness. (2Th 1:11).
The thought of God as good and the prominence given to good and goodness are distinctive features of the Bible. In the passage quoted above from Gal 5:22, goodness is one of the fruits of the indwelling Spirit of God, and in that from Eph 5:9 it is described as being, along with righteousness and truth, the fruit of the light which Christians had been made in Christ. Here, as elsewhere, we are reminded that the Christian life in its truth is likeness to God, the source and perfection of all good. 2Th 1:11 regards God Himself as expressing His goodness in and through us. See GOOD; GOOD, CHIEF.
Fuente: International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
Goodness
(AS. god) The extrinsic elections of things. The positive object of desire. For Plato, coextensive with being. For the Romans, duty. For Kant, that which has value. For Peirce, the adaptation of a subject to its end. In psychologythe characteristic actions which follow moral norms. Opposite of evil. See Ethics. — J.K.F.
Fuente: The Dictionary of Philosophy
Goodness
agathosyne (G19) Goodness
chrestotes (G5544) Kindnress
Agathosyne is one of many words where revealed religion has enriched the later language of Greece. Agathosyne occurs only in the Greek translations of the Old Testament (2Ch 24:16; Neh 9:25; Ecc 9:18), in the New Testament, and in writings directly dependent on these. The grammarians never acknowledged or gave it their stamp of approval and insisted that chrestotes should always be used in its place. In the New Testament, agathosyne occurs four times, always in the writings of Paul, where it is consistently translated “goodness” in the Authorized Version. Sometimes the lack of a more special and definite word is felt, as in Gal 5:22, where agathosyne is one of a long list of Christian virtues or “fruits of the Spirit.” Although in that passage it must refer to a single, separate virtue, the translation “goodness” seems to embrace them all. Favorinus explained agathosyne as “the completed virtue,” but this is less than satisfactory, though it is difficult to suggest any other translation and even more difficult to determine the central force of agathosyne than of chrestotes. The difficulty in precisely defining agathosyne occurs primarily because there are no helpful passages in classical Greek literature where the word is used. Although classical usage can never be the absolute standard by which we define the meaning of words in Scripture, we feel a loss when there are no classical instances to use for comparison.
It is prudent first to consider chrestotes. After determining its range of meaning, it will be easier to ascertain what agathosyne means.
Like agathosyne, chrestotes occurs in the New Testament only in Paul’s writings, where it is used with philanthropia, makrothymia (G3115), and anoche and contrasted with apotomia.The Authorized Version translates it by “good” (Rom 3:12), “kindness” (2Co 6:6; Eph 2:7; Col 3:12; Tit 3:4), and “gentleness” (Gal 5:22). The Rheims Version translates it by “benignity” (a great improvement over “gentleness” in Gal 5:22) and “sweetness” (2Co 6:6), which better captures the central meaning of this word. Plato defined chrestotes as “sincerity of character with prudence,” and Favorinus explained it as “good-heartedness, being sympathetic toward a neighbor and regarding his possessions as one’s own.” Clement of Rome used chrestotes with eleos, Plutarch used it with eumeneia and with haplotes (G572) and megalophrosyne. Lucian used it with oiktos, and Plutarch used chrestos (G5543) with philanthropos. When speaking of the chrestotes of Isaac, Josephus displayed insight into the ethical character of the patriarch.
Calvin had too superficial a view of chrestotes when he wrote:
Kindnessfor so it has been agreed to translate chrestoteta is what we render to loved ones. Meekness [prautes, G4240], which follows, extends wider than chrestotes, for meekness exists especially in facial expression and speech, while chrestotes is also an inward feeling.
Rather than being a virtue that refers only to a person’s words and countenance, chrestotes refers to a virtue that pervades and penetrates the whole nature, that mellows anything harsh and austere. Thus wine that has been mellowed with age (Luk 5:39) is chrestos, and Christ’s yoke is chrestos, because it has nothing harsh or galling about it (Mat 11:30). Cocceius distinguished chrestos and agathosyne this way:
From this example it is dear that this word [chrestotes] indicates a certain generosity and eagerness to do good. The other word [agathosyne] implies kindness, agreeableness of manners, eloquence, earnestness of character, and every amiability joined with propriety and dignity.
Even that statement, however, is not exactly correct. If the words are contrasted, kindness belongs more to the chrestotes than to the agathosyne. Jerome’s excellent statement is more germain to the matter:
Benignitas [friendliness! or suavitas [kindness]since among the Greeks chrestotes signifies eachis a gentle, charming, and calm virtue, suited to the company of all good people, attracting their friendship, delightful in encouragement and moderate in manners. Also the Stoics define it thus: chrestotes is a virtue willingly ready to do good. Agathosyne is not much different, for it also seems ready to do good. But it differs in that it can be more harsh and with a countenance wrinkled by strict standards for one to do well and to excel in what is demanded, without being pleasant to associates and attracting crowds by its sweetness. Also the followers of Zeno define it as follows: agathosyne is a virtue which is beneficial, or a virtue which promotes usefulness, or a virtue for its own sake, or a disposition which is the source of all benefits.
Jerome’s statement essentially agrees with the distinction drawn by Basil: “I think chrestotes is more extensive in doing good to those who in any way at any time have need of it; agathosyne is more narrow and uses words of justice in its well-doing.” Lightfoot found more activity in the agathosyne than in the chrestotes:”They are distinguished from one another as character from activity; chrestotes is potential agathosyne, while agathosyne is energizing chrestotes.”
A man may display his agathosyne, his zeal for goodness and truth, in rebuking, correcting, and chastising. Although Christ was still in the spirit of this virtue when he drove the buyers and sellers out of the temple (Mat 21:13) and when he uttered all those terrible words against the scribes and the Pharisees (Matthew 23), we could not say that his chrestotes was shown in these acts of righteous indignation. Rather, his chrestotes was displayed in his reception of the penitent woman (Luk 7:37-50; cf. Psa 25:6-7) and in all his other gracious dealings with the children of men. Thus we might speak of the chrestotes tes agathosynes of God, but scarcely of the converse. This chrestotes was so predominantly a part of the character of Christ’s ministry that it is not surprising to learn from Tertullian how “Christus” became “Chrestus” and “Christiani” became “Chrestiani” on the lips of the heathen, though with an undertone of contempt. The world expresses contempt for goodness that seems to have only the harmlessness of the dove and not the wisdom of the serpent. Such a contempt would be justified for a goodness that has no edge, no sharpness, no righteous indignation against sin or willingness to punish it. Sometimes chrestotes degenerated into this and ended up being not goodness at all, as evidenced in this striking fragment of Menander: “What now by some is called kindness [chrestotes] has set loose entire lives to vice, for no one is punished for his wrongs.”