How An Atheist Helped Me Understand The Bible

Throughout the past couple years two certain verses have haunted me. They made me question God’s love and the definitions of right and wrong. I have always tried to ignore these verses, but they always stayed in the back of my head. Whenever I thought about them, I got frustrated and just tried to ignore them and pretend that they didn’t mean exactly what they said. Those verses were Isaiah 64:6 “But we are all as an unclean [thing], and all our righteousnesses [are] as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.” and Romans 8:8 “So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.”

These two verses tell us that anyone, who is without the Spirit, cannot please God and that all their supposed moral acts are worthless. All kind and loving acts, if done without the Spirit, are worthless in God’s eyes. But how can this be? If a non-believer holds the door open for someone, shouldn’t that make God smile? If a non-believer gives a million dollars to a charity or a church, shouldn’t that please God? If a non-believer jumps into the middle of a fight to save the small child from getting bullied, shouldn’t that make God happy? Why would these moral acts mean nothing to God? These are the questions I faced all the time and the answers implied by these verses made me mad. One human is honestly helping another human, who wouldn’t smile at the thought?

To see why these works do not please God and are actually compared to filthy rags we need to look into the nature of human beings. Everyone has heard of the doctrine of original sin. The fact is that everyone sins and comes short of the glory and perfection of God. We all have a sinful nature in us and that leads us to our sin and separates us from God. But non-believers still do nice things; they aren’t only capable of bad, are they? Well, they aren’t only capable of bad, but they are certainly are not capable of being moral, or in God’s case, righteous. I know what you are thinking: “What do you mean non-believers are not capable of being moral?” First off, we need to look at the definition of a moral person. This is where Aristotle comes into play. In order for a person to be moral they must meet four criteria: 1) they must know what they are doing. For instance, if you trip a criminal who is running away from the police by accident; and that leads to the police catching the criminal- you did not act morally because you did not even know what you were doing. 2) They must choose to act the way they do and they must choose it for its own sake. For instance: if you are required to get to work in the next 15 minutes but the car right ahead of you breaks down and you help the owner push it to the side, you are not acting morally. You did not push the car to the side because you wanted to help the owner; you just wanted it out of your way. 3) The act must spring from a firm and unchangeable character. 4) They must feel pleasure after completing the act. Number two and three are where everyone falls short.

Back in the early 1600s an atheist philosopher started writing books. His most famous book was called “Leviathan.” His name was Thomas Hobbes.  Although I don’t agree with everything he writes in this book he does bring up one very good point. He says that every action we do is made because it is in our own self-interest. In philosophy this is called “egoism”. And this statement could not be more true. Think about it, there is no action you perform that you do not believe to be in your own self-interest. That is why we lie, cheat, and steal. Just like these sins, all other sins and wrongdoings are easily traced back to self-interest. But what about acts that appear loving? Nope, still done in self-interest. For example: when someone gives money to a charity they are acting in their own self-interest. Either they are trying to get a tax write-off or trying to gain a positive reputation or they want the warm, fuzzy feeling that comes afterwards or they feel an obligation to give back or they would feel bad if they did not give money to charity. Most of the explanations I just listed can be also be applied to every other act that seems “self-less.”  When you help someone move into their new house you do it because either there is a reward or you want your neighbor to like you or you owe your friend a favor or you want your friend to owe you a favor or you want the warm, fuzzy feeling that comes afterwards or you want to show off your muscles or you want others to think you are a nice person or you would feel bad if you did not help. So, as you can see, every action we perform is based on our own self-interest! And thanks to Hobbes I was able to see this and to know that someone else out there realizes that we are all egoists!

Here is another proof that I came up with, and the basis is formed on the question “If there was no gain would you do the action?” Another way of putting it would be to say: “If a certain action did not fulfill any self-interest, or did not provide a benefit to you, would you still complete the action?” The answer is a universal “no.” It is a fact that all actions have a negative consequence. All actions, performed by you, take up your time. As you complete an action you use up seconds, minutes, or hours of your life that you can never get back. So, right here, we already see that all actions have a negative consequence. The effect this has on people varies, but no matter how much it differs from person to person there is always an existing amount of a negative consequence. Again, this effect can be very, very minimal; but, it does exist. If an act provides no personal gain in accordance with self-interest then the overall effect of the action is negative. With nothing to overtake the –0.000001 amount of dissatisfaction, the overall effect is one of dissatisfaction. And, since it is logical to say that no rational being will perform an act that leads to a negative effect or personal dissatisfaction; then we can therefore say that every action a human performs must involve self-interest.

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After showing that we are all egoists we can now go back to Aristotle's definition of a moral person. If you recall the second criterion was that the person must choose the moral action for its own sake. That means a person must do the right thing simply because it’s the right thing, not because they have some self-interest in the action. Since all actions are done with the thought of “This will not hurt me” or “It will hurt me more if I do not do this action” then these acts are not moral because these acts are done only under the condition that the chosen outcome will be less bad for you than the opposing action(s). So, by definition, no one is moral! No one can be moral because all of our actions spring from self-interest instead of morality. Now it is quite easy to apply this to theology. Because of the sinful nature inside of us we are egoists. Everything we do- we do it because it will benefit us. We do not do any action because it is the right thing to do; we do it because we want to do it. This is why we cannot please God and why all or good works are likened to dirty rags. Even when we do morally good actions or rightouesnessess we are only doing them for ourselves, not because of a moral or godly nature in us. God does not want us to do the right thing simply because He says so; he wants us to do the right thing because that’s what our heart tells us to do. He wants our earnest desire to be in line with morality or righteousness. And this is only possible if the Spirit lives in us.

Check this passage out, Jeremiah 31:31-34:

^“31Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah:

³²Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD:

³³But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.

³⁴And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”

Looking at verses 33 and 34 we see that God will write the law (morality) in their hearts! So man will be moral because they shall have a firm and unchangeable character and will do the right thing simply because it is the right thing. People won’t even have to teach others to fear God because that knowledge is already in their hearts.

So, it no longer bothers me when the bible says that all good works, while done in the flesh, are like dirty rags: in fact, it makes complete sense! We cannot please God because all our works are done for our own personal benefit instead being done for the sake of it being the right action. No wonder God calls them “filthy”: because we are trying to deceive ourselves and God when we do righteous acts and claim them to be moral. When in reality, we are just trying to benefit ourselves. Thank you Aristotle and Hobbes for helping me see the truth in God’s word!

Since I'm already talking about Hobbes I will take this time to explain another truth that has been shown to me through Hobbes’ Leviathan. In that book he says that we are always at war with one another and that in order to keep us from always fighting with one another for more power we must have an overarching legitimate government to keep us I line by fear of punishment. Hobbes’ writes “Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common power to keep them in awe, they are in a condition which is called war; and such a war, as is of every man, against every man” He also says “Where there is no common power, there is no law; where no law, no injustice.” This last sentence is saying that without a government, there is no law to keep or follow. And without a law, there can be no injustice because justice/injustice cannot be defined. Unless the law says “do not steal” how can I say I am being treated unjustly if someone steals from me and is not punished? These couple lines from Hobbes, and the rest of his book, show the truth in God’s word also. Look how closely the quote from Leviathan matches up with Romans 4:15 “Because the law worketh wrath: for where no law is, [there is] no transgression.” It’s pretty much the same thing! Where there is no law, there is no injustice/transgression!

But back to the first quote about the common power keeping people in awe: look at Romans 13:1 “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God.” So, what it looks like to me is that God did establish governments. He did this because otherwise we would be constantly fighting with each other, just as Hobbes said. Without the overarching power to keep us in awe or to punish us we would all run free and take whatever we wanted knowing that it would lead us to war with each other. This is why a government or a hierarchy of power is necessary.  

Man, I love it when reason, logic, and philosophy say exactly what God has already said. Even ungodly men have seen just how corrupt our bodies are! They mostly come to the same conclusions that God has already set, and prove the truth in His word as they do so.