Goodness is an inherent characteristic of humankind, bestowed upon us through our creation in the image of God. Holy Scripture attests that the whole world was created by God ‘very good’ (Genesis 1:31), that is, suited to its purpose, consistent with itself, and in an eschatological tension oriented towards permanence in goodness. Man, as priest of the whole of creation, has the vocation to spiritualise the world, so that through this he himself may grow into ever fuller communion with God: ‘For the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and share in the glorious freedom of the children of God’ (Romans 8:21). Turning away from God through disobedience meant turning away from goodness, God being the sole source of goodness: ‘Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights’ (James 1:17). Clement of Alexandria clearly shows that God alone is good: ‘Nothing is better than God’1), in accordance with the words of Christ the Saviour: ‘Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone’ (Matthew 19:17). Saint John Cassian, explaining these words, writes that God alone is unchanging and good; He, possessing goodness not through the gift of effort but by nature, cannot be anything other than good 2.
Saint Dionysius the Areopagite considers that the most fitting designation for the divine being is that of goodness, or super-goodness: ‘which theologians (the authors of Scripture) attribute par excellence to divinity above divinity itself and distinguish it from all else, as they consider, calling divine existence itself “goodness”’3
Thus, all patristic theology associates the work of goodness as being, par excellence, proper to the divine nature, and man partakes of goodness to the extent of his closeness to God. Clement of Alexandria writes of goodness as a divine attribute, stating that ‘God is good just as it is in the nature of fire to give off heat’4, whilst Saint Gregory of Nyssa, in The Life of Moses, supplements this definition, stating that: ‘The first and true Good, whose nature is goodness, is and is called divinity, whether this is understood or not’5; whilst Saint Maximus the Confessor concludes that ‘God is, as it is written, “the Sun of Righteousness” (Malachi 4:2), showering the rays of goodness upon all’6. Boethius, in The Consolation of Philosophy, shows how ‘the common conception of human souls holds that God, the beginning of all things, is good; indeed, since nothing better than God can be conceived, who would doubt that He is good, He of whom there is nothing better? Thus, reason demonstrates that God is good, thereby convincing us that the supreme good also lies in Him. If this were not so, He could not be the principle of all things; there would indeed be something superior to Him, possessing perfect goodness and appearing to be prior and older than Him; for it is clearly evident that all perfect things exist prior to those that are less perfect. Therefore, so as not to take the argument to infinity, we must acknowledge that the supreme God possesses within Himself alone the supreme and perfect good…”7
Saint Basil the Great, in enumerating the attributes of God, presents Him as perfect goodness: ‘God, blessed nature, abundant goodness, the One desired by all who are endowed with speech and reason, the much-desired beauty, the beginning of all existence, the source of life, the spiritual light, the incomparable wisdom’8
All things in the world, including visible and invisible beings, were created by God through the free exercise of His will and goodness: ‘When He created, “in the beginning”, all that He deemed good to create, and, as for rational beings, He had no other reason for bringing them into existence than Himself, that is to say, His goodness’9. God, who is good and transcendentally good, was not content merely to contemplate Himself, but, out of an abundance of goodness, deemed it fitting that there should be things which might share in His goodness and participate in it 10.
The Holy Trinity, as Love without beginning and without end, is therefore not only a model of perfect goodness, but the source of all goodness in the world: ‘The primary source of goodness is undoubtedly the Father: from Him was born the Son, Who is in every respect “the image of His goodness”. Indeed, there is no goodness in the Son other than that which is in the Father. This is why the Saviour rightly says in the Gospel: ‘No one is good except God alone, the Father’. By this we must understand that the Son has no goodness other than that which is in the Father. And the Son is also rightly called His image, for He comes from no other source than this goodness, which is also the beginning, so that no goodness other than that which is in the Father may be seen in the Son, and not some foreign or different goodness. Therefore, the words ‘no one is good except God the Father alone’ must not be taken as a curse, as though we were seeing here a denial of the goodness of Christ or of the Holy Spirit; rather — as has been said before — we must place in the Father the primordial goodness: The Son, Who is born of Him, and the Spirit, Who proceeds from Him, undoubtedly reflect within Themselves the (true) nature of this goodness, which is the source from which the Son was born and from which the Holy Spirit proceeded. ‘If the attribute “good” has been ascribed by Scripture to other beings, whether angels, humans, servants, or even treasures, in all these cases the term was used in a broad sense, referring only to an incidental goodness, not to a substantial one’11 Man possesses true and qualitative goodness only to the extent that he shares in God’s infinite love, according to the words of the psalmist: ‘God will not withhold his goodness from those who walk in integrity’ (Psalm LXXXIII, 12).
‘…Although the attribute “good” has been ascribed by Scripture to other beings—be they angels, humans, servants, or even treasures—in all these cases the term has been used in a broad sense, referring merely to an incidental goodness, not a substantial one’.
The existence of creatures bears witness not only to the existence of God, ‘His invisible attributes have been clearly seen since the creation of the world, being understood from His works, namely His eternal power and divinity’ (Romans 1:20), but also His infinite goodness: ‘Being good, He created beings that did not exist. First, He willed to reveal His goodness (for it is proper to a most good nature to bring into being that which has never existed), and then He manifested it through the promise of higher blessings, which He offered to those whom He created. He gave them not only existence, but also the joy of greater blessings, thereby revealing the goodness that is within Him. He proves Himself to be good precisely because there are beings who need Him. If God had not created the world, God would have remained unknown, for there would have been no beings to know Him. Therefore, wishing to make Himself known and desiring to show that He exists, He created the world. As for the rest of the universe, I say that it was created for humankind, to provide them with what they needed (and humankind for God Himself, to glorify their Lord and to spread amongst the other creatures the goodness received from God). I believe that before God created this world, He took delight in contemplating the things He was to make, for He was never idle, but worked with His mind, visualising the beauty of His works). The knowledge that God possessed was never useless to Him, but He put it into practice from the very beginning. Furthermore, He did not wish for goodness to remain confined solely to Himself, in a state of resolve, but for this resolve to be translated into action12).
God’s goodness extends to the whole of creation and to all people, for it tends to be ‘overflowing’, that is to say, it is reflected and imprinted upon created nature through uncreated energies: ‘Out of His goodness, He bestows in abundance all the multitude of His gifts upon both the worthy and the unworthy. He cannot be overcome by insults, nor can He be shaken from His steadfastness by the injustices of men, His goodness and His unchanging nature always remaining intact’13
‘God’s goodness extends to the whole of creation and to all people, for it tends to be “overwhelming”, that is to say, it is reflected and imprinted upon created nature through uncreated energies.’
It is God’s infinite goodness that ontologically sustains the world and the beings within it. Saint Dionysius the Areopagite states that: ‘And if you were to abolish goodness entirely, there would be neither being, nor life, nor desire, nor movement, nor anything else at all’14).
For humankind, goodness is communion with God and a sharing in His gifts, which, in turn, they share with their fellow human beings: ‘Man, with his weak and frail nature as it is, will be like God only if he always extends the love of his heart to the good and the bad, to the righteous and the unrighteous. Only in this way will he imitate God’s goodness and, acting out of a sense of the good for the sake of the good itself, will he attain that true adoption among the sons of God’15’.
The creation of the world and of humankind is a realisation of God’s goodness and a tangible expression of the reasoning of the Logos: ‘God is good and therefore desires that man, the lord of all creation (Genesis 1:28–30), should be saved; and God has directed everything towards this end. The first blessing bestowed upon man is existence, which He gave him from the very beginning; for it must be acknowledged that existence is better than non-existence. Then God permitted every human being to have his own nature; and he did have it; and God permitted him to improve his nature for his own good’16
Man’s path towards holiness, towards likeness to God, is an ever-fuller ascent towards sharing in His goodness. With every virtue acquired, man draws ever closer to God’s goodness, partaking of it ever more deeply, and becoming ever better: ‘If you love Him, you will be an imitator of His goodness. Do not be surprised that a man can be an imitator of God! He can, if he so desires’17’. The spiritual man is called a ‘perfected man’ because he becomes ever better, because he partakes ever more fully of God’s grace. Thus, since God is the fullness of goodness, man shares in this fullness: ‘By His very nature, God is for us the greatest good that the mind can conceive. He surpasses every other good that the human mind can conceive, and if He creates human life, He does so for no other reason than that He is good. This being so, and since it is precisely for this reason that He chose to bring us into being, God does not show His goodness only in part, bestowing upon man only a part of His goodness whilst jealously keeping the other part for Himself; rather, He reveals His supreme goodness precisely by bringing man from non-existence into being and showering him with all manner of gifts. The multitude of all these blessings is so great that we do not know whether they could easily be counted. Therefore, summarising them, Scripture has described them as follows: ‘In His own image God created man’ (Genesis 1:27), which is the same as saying that human nature was made a partaker of all these blessings. And if God is the fullness of all these goods, and if man is made in His image, will not his likeness to the Archetype or his model consist in this very fullness?’18
Very often, the goodness that a Christian must demonstrate is confused with charity. Yet to be good means to repair the damage that sin has wrought in the world, to people and to nature, not as a correction of evil, but as a transformation of evil into good. Underpinning this work is the virtue, or the practical exercise, of potential goodness, constantly infused by divine grace, as the Holy Apostle Paul testifies: ‘I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me’ (Galatians 2:20).
The Incarnation of the Son of God means for humankind a sharing in Incarnate Goodness, as Saint Paul the Apostle shows us in his Epistle to Titus: ‘But when the kindness and love for humankind of our Saviour God were revealed, He saved us, not because of righteous deeds that we had done, but according to His mercy, through the washing of rebirth and the renewal by the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:4–5). Whoever partakes of the Person of Christ the Saviour partakes of all goodness: ‘All hope of goodness is believed to lie in Christ, in Whom we have been raised and in Whom are all the treasures of goodness’19).
The whole of Holy Scripture is nothing other than a testimony to God’s goodness, a Gospel, a proclamation of the Good News that the Son of God became Man, so that man might share in God’s goodness: ‘If to evangelise means to proclaim a goodness, and if all the events that prepare for the coming of Christ in the flesh proclaim Christ Himself, in Whom all these blessings are fulfilled (...), then the words of all the prophets are, in a certain sense, part of the Gospel. And since what we call the Gospel or the good news has been proclaimed throughout the world, we must understand that it has been proclaimed not only in this geographical region, but, so to speak, across the entire expanse of heaven and earth, of the heavens and the earth’20
The full manifestation of goodness was revealed in the Person of Christ the Saviour, true God and true Man, who also became the High Priest of the good things to come (Hebrews 9:11): ‘(…) Jesus’ goodness towards mankind extended not only throughout the duration of His earthly life, during the days when He walked amongst us in the flesh, but has continued right up to the present day, so that even today those who believe in Him are transformed, leading a better life. And the clear proof that this is due to His power, as He Himself says, and as daily life demonstrates, is the fact that, despite the lack of labourers to toil in the harvest of souls, the harvest is nevertheless so abundant that God’s fields and churches have been filled everywhere”21
The spiritual person entrusts himself entirely to God, placing his life in His hands and experiencing His goodness in a tangible way: ‘Taste and see that the Lord is good’ (Psalm XXXIII, 8). ‘The Fountain of goodness always draws to Himself those who thirst, as the Fountain says in the Gospel: “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink” (John 7:37). For in this He has set no limit upon thirst, nor upon the inclination towards Him, nor upon the pleasure of drinking; but through the eternal scope of His commandment, He unites within it the urge to thirst, to drink, and to be drawn towards Him. And for those who have had a taste and found that the Lord is good, that taste becomes an incentive to partake of even more. Therefore, the one who ascends never lacks the incentive that is given to him, which ceaselessly draws him towards what is greater’22
The same divine Father, Saint Gregory of Nyssa, shows how human perfection is linked to one’s spiritual growth in the Holy Spirit through partaking of His blessings, for the fruit of the Spirit is “love, joy, […] goodness, and doing good” (Galatians 5:22). Every step a person takes in the spiritual life becomes a new beginning on the soul’s journey towards God; the more a Christian ascends towards God, the more they long for Him: ‘Having partaken of goodness as much as they could, they are drawn once more by a new beginning, as though they had not yet partaken of goodness, towards partaking of the beauty that lies higher, so that, as she advances towards what lies before her, her desire also grows; and because of the overwhelming greatness of the blessings, which are always higher still, it seems as though she is beginning the ascent for the very first time. For even he who has risen will not be spared the need to rise ever anew, nor will the distance to be traversed towards God be diminished for him who runs towards the Lord. For people must always rise up and must never cease to draw nearer by running’23 Saint Gregory of Nyssa also shows that participation in divine goodness grants man a greater openness to the fulfilment of goodness, for it increases his strength and stature, so that the one nourished by divine goodness grows continually and never ceases to grow. As the spring of goodness flows ceaselessly, the nature of the recipient becomes more capable of receiving and embracing it, in an insatiable, ecstatic expansion, for nothing that is received is superfluous or useless, for everything that flows into the recipient’s soul reveals their own greatness. For both grow together: the nourishing power increases the abundance of blessings even further, whilst the spring of nourishment flows ever more abundantly through the widening of the soul, which grows ever greater. Therefore, the soul must rise to such an extent that no one can any longer hinder its growth 24.
The very beginning of the Saviour’s preaching of the Gospel highlights God’s goodness, as He came to proclaim repentance: ‘From that time Jesus began to preach and say, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand’ (Matthew 4:17). The beginning of the Lord’s preaching, which in essence coincides with that of His Forerunner, becomes a model for proclaiming God’s goodness to every Christian: ‘But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people acquired by God, so that you may proclaim to the world the goodness of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvellous light” (1 Peter 2:9). Man’s return to God through repentance means, according to Saint Gregory of Nyssa, partaking of His infinite goodness: ‘Goodness, wisdom, justice, incorruptibility—all are revealed in the plan of salvation for humanity. Goodness is seen in the Saviour’s intention to go and seek the lost (Luke 19:10) 25’
The psalmist David urges us to praise God ceaselessly for His goodness and mercy: ‘Declare to the Lord that He is good, for His mercy endures for ever’ (Psalm 56:1). Saint Gregory of Nyssa, commenting on this verse, points out that the word ‘confess’ is used here in the sense of thanksgiving, not of atonement. The commandment is to glorify God for His goodness alone, showing that all that has come to people from God is good and salvific, and has been brought about by grace and goodness 26.
All the gifts received from God’s infinite goodness cause man to ascend ever more perfectly towards God, to improve himself ever more, that is, to become a ever fuller participant in the love of the Holy Trinity: ‘All the radiant splendour that proceeds from the Father and comes to us as a gracious gift fills us once more with a unifying power, directs us upwards and turns us towards unity (cf. John 17:21; 1 Corinthians 1:10) and the deifying simplicity of the Father who gathers us into Himself. For from Him and to Him are all things, as the Holy Word has said (Romans 11:36)’27
By sharing in God’s gifts, the improved person leads others to follow in his footsteps: ‘It is therefore fitting that, through the qualities you possess, you should draw others to yourself and allow all those who wish to receive from the goodness of your nature a kind of fragrant aroma to come into your presence’28. Man must strive to receive and share God’s goodness ever more fully with others: ‘Let man endeavour to accustom his soul to goodness, making it his duty’29).
The acquisition of virtues requires a long and arduous effort on man’s part, which is crowned by the vision of God as a gift of His goodness: ‘He prays to God, and God shows him His goodness and allows him to see His face’ (Job 33:26). The perfected human being is one who strives ever more to become like God, partaking ever more fully of His goodness: ‘He who has enlightened his mind with divine insights and has trained his reason topraise the Maker unceasingly through divine hymns, and who has sanctified his sensibility through pure images, such a person adds to the natural goodness of the ‘image’ the willful goodness of ‘resemblance’ to God’30 The gift received from God becomes active in the life of the improved human being, placing him in the service of his fellow human beings: ‘Let each person take the gift with which he has been endowed by God and multiply it for the sake of doing good, bringing benefit to many. For no one is excluded from God’s goodness’31
- 1
Clement of Alexandria, The Pedagogue, I, VIII, 63.2., in PSB, vol. 4, translation, notes and indices by Fr. Dumitru Fecioru, published by IBMBOR, Bucharest, 1979, p. 203.
- 2
St John Cassian, Spiritual Conversations, I, XVI, 3, in PSB, vol. 57, translated by Prof. Vasile Cojocaru and Prof. David Popescu, with a preface, introductory study and notes by Prof. Nicolae Chițescu, IBMBOR Publishers, Bucharest, 1990, p. 411.
- 3
Saint Dionysius the Areopagite, On the Divine Names, IV, I, in Complete Works, translated, with an introduction and notes by Fr. Prof. Dr Dumitru Stăniloae, edited by Constanța Costea, Paideia Publishers, Bucharest, 1996, p. 145.
- 4
Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, VII, VII, 42.4., in PSB, vol. 5, p. 502.
- 5
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Moses, Book I, in PSB, vol. 29, translated by Fr. Dumitru Stăniloae and Ioan Buga, IBMBOR, Bucharest, 1982, p. 23.
- 6
Saint Maximus the Confessor, ‘Gnostic or Theological Chapters’, I, 12, in The Philokalia, or a collection of writings by the Holy Fathers showing how man may be purified, enlightened and perfected, vol. 2, translation, introduction and notes by Rev. Prof. Dr. Dumitru Stăniloae, IBMBOR Publishers, Bucharest, 2017, p. 159.
- 7
Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy, III, II, X, in PSB, vol. 72, translation, notes and commentary by Prof. David Popescu, published by IBMBOR, Bucharest, 1992, p. 117.
- 8
St Basil the Great, Homilies on the Hexaemeron, I, II, in PSB, vol. 17, translation, introduction, notes and indices by Fr Dumitru Fecioru, IBMBOR Publishers, Bucharest, 1986, p. 73.
- 9
Origen, On the Principles, II, VI, 9, in PSB, vol. 8, with an introductory study, translation and notes by Rev. Prof. T. Bodogae, published by IBMBOR, Bucharest, 1982, p. 165.
- 10
St John of Damascus, Dogmatics, II, 2, translated by Fr Dumitru Fecioru, Scripta, 1993, p. 46.
- 11
Origen, On the Principles, I, XIII, 2, in PSB, vol. 8, p. 62.
- 12
Methodius of Olympus, On Free Will, XXI, PSB, vol. 10, with an introductory study, translation, indices and notes by Rev. Prof. Constantin Cornițescu, published by IBMBOR, Bucharest, 1984, pp. 235–236.
- 13
Saint John Cassian, Spiritual Conversations, II, I, VI, 3, in PSB, vol. 57, p. 504.
- 14
Saint Dionysius the Areopagite, On the Divine Names, IV, 20, p. 153.
- 15
Saint John Cassian, Spiritual Conversations, II, I, IX, 4, in PSB, vol. 57, p. 507.
- 16
Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, VI, XVII, 152.3, in PSB, vol. 5, p. 468.
- 17
‘Epistle to Diognetus’, X, 3–4, in The Writings of the Apostolic Fathers, PSB, vol. 1, translation, notes and indices by Fr. Dumitru Fecioru, published by IBMBOR, Bucharest, 1979, p. 418.
- 18
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, On the Making of Man, 16, in PSB 30, translation and notes by Rev. Prof. Dr Teodor Bodogae, published by IBMBOR, Bucharest, 1998, p. 49.
- 19
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, On the Life of Moses, or On Perfection through Virtue, in PSB, vol. 29, p. 96.
- 20
Origen, From the Commentary on the Gospel according to John, I, C, XV, 86–87, in PSB, vol. 7, p. 163.
- 21
Origen, Against Celsus, I, XLIII, in PSB, vol. 9, p. 67.
- 22
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, A Detailed Exegesis of the Song of Songs, Homily VIII, in PSB, vol. 29, pp. 223–224.
- 23
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, A Detailed Exposition of the Song of Songs, Homily V, in PSB, vol. 29, p. 185.
- 24
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, Dialogue on the Soul and the Resurrection, in PSB, vol. 30, p. 385.
- 25
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, The Great Catechetical Discourse or On Religious Instruction, 24, in PSB, vol. 30, translation and notes by Rev. Prof. Dr Teodor Bodogae, published by IBMBOR, Bucharest, 1998, p. 321.
- 26
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, On the Titles of the Psalms, I, VIII, in PSB, vol. 30, p. 153.
- 27
Saint Dionysius the Areopagite, ‘On the Celestial Hierarchy’, I, 1, in The Complete Works, p. 15.
- 28
St Basil the Great, Epistles, LIX, II, in PSB, vol. 12, p. 228.
- 29
Saint Macarius the Egyptian, ‘A Discourse on Freedom of the Mind’, 19, in PSB, vol. 34, p. 344.
- 30
Saint Maximus the Confessor, ‘Gnostic or Theological Chapters’, I, 13, in The Philokalia, vol. 2, p. 160.
- 31
St Basil the Great, The Minor Rules, 253, in PSB, vol. 18, p. 425.