Jehovahs Witnesses: Is Jesus Christ good?

Greetings,

Actually it is Trinitarians who cannot explain this verse without bending the rules of logic and exegesis.

Witnesses know that Jesus is “good” just as many others are called “good” in the Bible. Even Jesus stated that other humans were “good” (Mt. 5:45; 12:35; 13:38; 22:10; 25:21,23).

The fact that others are properly called "good" in the Scriptures proves that Christ was obviously applying "Good" in an *absolute* sense here. If he wasn't using it in an absolute sense, then his statement that "No one is good except God alone" would be a lie.

Normally, calling Jesus "good" was appropriate. Yet, in this context the man was placing Jesus as ultimate/supreme judge of what is required for eternal life. The man seemed to be assuming Christ was so "good" that he could decide the requirements for salvation on his own.

Colin Brown Theological Dictionary:

"What stands out is... that God himself is the One who is really and exclusively good. In the language of the LXX, he is the highest good....However, this does not prevent a natural application of the predicate "good" to the moral differences between men, who do good as well as evil (Mt. 12:35; 25:21; and par. Lk. 6:45; 19:17)."

While Non-Trinitarians interpret this as an example of Jesus denying that he was equal to God some Trinitarians interpret Mk 10:18 to say that Christ wanted the man to realize that Jesus was God since only God is good.

What is clear is that the Trinitarian interpretation must arbitrarily import ideas into the text. That is, nowhere in the context is there anything that leads to the conclusion that Christ’s intention was to cause the man to believe that he was equal to God. This conclusion has to be read into the text according to a presupposed theological bias. Further, the grammar and context argues against it. This is noted even by many Trinitarian scholars:

Interpreter's Bible:

"Why do you call me good? ...later theologians interpreted it otherwise: 'If you call me good, you imply that I am God'--but this is wholly impossible, both in the original setting and for Mark." (Interpreter's Bible 7:801, 1951).

The Catholic NAB:

"Why do you call me good?: Jesus repudiates the term "good" for himself and directs it to God, the source of all goodness who alone can grant the gift of eternal life; cf. Mt 19:16-17"--(NAB ftn. on Mk. 10:18).

John A.T. Robinson:

"None of the disciples in the Gospels acknowledges Jesus because he claimed to be God... [footnote:] Indeed, by implication he DENIED being God: "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone' (Mark 10:18)--(Honest To God, John A.T. Robinson, pp. 72-73).

The literal rendering of Luke 18:19 is: "There is none good, but the one God" (EI MH EIS hO QEOS). Use of the article (hO QEOS) here is significant. In Mark only the Father is hO QEOS, never Jesus (cf. 15:34). Christ's words then specifically identify God the Father as the only one who is good and explicitly excludes himself (and all others). Jesus could not have used this syntax to give the meaning that Trinitarians claim. This fact is placed beyond debate when we notice the same exact Greek expression in other passages that have no theological baggage.

For instance: Mk. 2:7: "Why is this man talking in this manner? ...Who can forgive sins except one, God?"

This question and answer is almost an exact parallel making it very clear that the grammatical structure is designed to exclude the subject from the identification in the response. The Pharisees certainly wanted to explicitly exclude Jesus from being God. Their argument was explicit: "This man is NOT God since ONLY God can forgive sins."

The words "except God" (EI MH) except the Father alone (EIS O QEOV) were chosen because they clearly excluded Jesus. Conversely, if Jesus meant to imply that he be considered "good" in the sense the man used why would Jesus use syntax which could only be understood as excluding himself?

The ultimate and final authority on what Jesus meant lies in how the man understood the correction. We get a definite answer when the man in his very next words dropped the "Good" and addressed Jesus simply as "Teacher." It was obviously very clear to the man that Jesus was excluding himself from being called good since he was not God. Jesus obviously thought the man got the correct point since he did not correct the man this time. Rather, Jesus "loved him" and invited him to be his follower! Would Jesus have done this if the man was so obtuse as to miss or reject Jesus' point?

In conclusion, it is first clear that the context and the grammar shows that Jesus gave no indication that the man must recognize he was Almighty God. To the contrary Jesus' response was a clear correction of what was said, rejecting the application of the term "good" to himself in this circumstance.

Yours,

BAR-ANERGES

Of course, Jesus is not just good but very good!

For correct Bible understanding one must not make the common error of thinking that everything called “perfect” is so in an absolute sense, that is, to an infinite degree, without limitation. Perfection in this absolute sense distinguishes only the Creator, Jehovah God. Because of this Jesus could say of his Father: “Nobody is good, except one, God.” (Mr 10:18) Jehovah is incomparable in his excellence, worthy of all praise, supreme in his superb qualities and powers, so that “his name alone is unreachably high.” (Ps 148:1-13; Job 36:3, 4, 26; 37:16, 23, 24; Ps 145:2-10, 21)

So, in other words, Jesus was saying: Jehovah is the PERFECTION OF GOODNESS or THE GOOD ONE in the highest sense.

You sound exactly like one of the killers of Jesus. Don't you see the similarity in your question? "Is it so that you are the Son of God?" You are trying to trap people, because that is what you are good at. Careful!...you are showing what is in your heart when you start questioning both Jesus and Jehovah,

Jesus was making the point that all worship should be directed at his father in heaven...Jehovah...

Back then the meaning of the word...good...meant much more than now...

The people were trying to make Jesus the No 1. and so Jesus denied it...but directed it to where it was deserved/../

.

All goodness if relative to the goodness of Jehovah.

In that sense, none can claim true goodness.

We of course use the word in a less restricted way, and would most all agree that in that less restricted sense, Jesus is indeed very good!

.

Salutations!

God alone is the standard for goodness.

There are others that are "good" in a limited sense. Jesus is one of those. Faithful angels who have never sinned are also good.

But none of these "good" ones are good in the sense that they are the standard for goodness. Only God is the standard. Only God has goodness as a part of his nature. He is the archetype of good, and is truly good in a way that the archetype's copies cannot be good.

Yours,

Abernathy the Dull

of path, yet greater importantly than CALLING him our Lord (communicate is far less high priced, isn't it?) we are taught that, if Christ is relatively our Lord, then we would desire to OBEY what he tells us, as our Lord, in the Bible. maximum individuals only supply lip service to Jesus' command to "love your enemies," particularly in time of conflict, however the witnesses seem at that as a command that needs to be obeyed each and all of the time. and how a lot of human beings view Jesus as their Lord while it is composed of his command to "pass, for this reason, and make disciples of people of each and every of the countries...coaching them to visual demonstrate unit each and all of the failings I relatively have commanded you"? maximum each and every physique is taught that God's advantages for the righteous will in basic terms be heaven, yet did no longer our Lord it seems that say, "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth", too? (Matthew 5:5, the Sermon on the Mount) maximum individuals don't understand that Jesus became quoting from Psalm 37 while he stated that (perchance 36 or 38 in case you have a Catholic Bible), and that later on in that comparable Psalm it says, "The righteous shall very own the land and stay therein continuously." (Psalm 37:11, 29) considering Jesus is our Lord, the witnesses take heavily what he prayed to his Father at John 17:17: "Sanctify them by potential of potential of the fact. Your observe is reality." so as that they have got 5 conferences a week just to earnings God's observe of reality, the Bible, so as that they are able to know it for themselves and attempt to do what it says. can't do it completely, of path, yet, as Benjamin Franklin stated, the greater you attempt, the closer you will get, besides. Jesus is my Lord and the Lord of all Jehovah's witnesses, and, greater important than in straightforward terms announcing so, we prepare it by potential of our strikes (different than that no-one's proper, of path.) perfect regards, Mike

Jesus is good - BUT his goodness is because he COPIES the goodness of his Father.

Any goodness we have is because we attempt to the best of our ability to follow the example of Christ who followed the example of his Father.

Without a God-given conscience, we would have no way to decide good or bad. It is ONLY because we have God's standard to guide us that we can CHOOSE good.

Adam and Eve were perfect, but they chose to IGNORE what was good.

Satan, at one time, before he chose a path of evil, was good. But he made his choice to ignore that.

And of course, some angels made their personal choice to go from good to bad.

So perfection, for Adam and Eve, Satan, the wicked angels, - all chose to ignore Jehovah God's right to set the standard of good for us.

But Jesus, the righteous heavenly angels, and those of honest heart here on earth, are choosing to accept God's goodness.

Yes, Jesus Christ is Good and if you take out one 'o' from good that makes him God !

Here is a beautiful verse that no JW can ever understand but if you have trusted Jesus for your salvation (Rom 10:9-10 ) -- you will know what it means.

(2Cor 5:21)

For he hath made him to be SIN for US, who knew NO sin; that we might be the RIGHTEOUSNESS of God in HIM.

Isn't it amazing ! God made his only begotten Son to be sin for us rotten sinners even though he knew NO sin. And not only that, but us christians have been made righteous by God through trusting Christ for our salvation (Rom 3:21 and 1Cor 1:30)

The poor deluded JWs have been misled by their organization into believing they can establish their OWN righteousness before God (Rom 10:3 ) by doing good works to EARN there way to heaven.

Gods word tells us in (Tit 3:5 ) NOT by works of righteouness which WE have done, but according to his mercy he saved us.

(Rom 4:5) But to him that worketh NOT, but believeth on him that justified the ungodly, his faith is counted for RIGHTEOUSNESS.

When was the last time you read of a JW quoting these verses ? -- probably never.

All JWs (and every other lost sinner) must believe the gospel of their salvation in their hearts by trusting Christs WORK on the cross and making him their Saviour ( 1Cor 15:1-4 and Acts 16:31) Eternal life in heaven is a FREE GIFT from God by his GRACE through faith in Jesus ( Rom 6:23, 11:6, and Eph 2:8-9 )

I agree with @angelmusic1914, plus thank you for giving us another scripture that disproves the Trinity to add to the list of others!