What is Good?

A friend recently asked me to define "good" for him, he seems to be under the impression that it is not possible; an apparent paradox of this life. My initial response was that God was good and that the question itself pressupposed not only the possibility of definition but one actually. My supposition was that in regards to language, that content precedes communication and thus an actual, historically valid concept of good exists.

Yet, the more that I thought about it, the more I thought about how we know anything in regards to what is good. Now, this is a work in progress and thus might at times lack cogency, but I think that the general problem I have is that I think that the question itself is invalid, that rather one must ask who is good rather than what is good and in doing so we come to Paul rather than Athens, remembering that he said that no one was good - referring to created persons - and that all had fallen short of the glory of God. This being so we must assume that God alone is good and that that is displayed to us in both his speech and his actions; that our knowledge of good and thus evil find reference in what God does and says and what those who are not God do and say. So our knowledge is participatory and revelational rather than rationalistic; in this sense I mean attained by contemplation and speculation.

Some might say that answering the question, "What is good", would be a rather easy one. That one might say that good is ultimate perfection, allowing for no moral or ethical failure. Yet it seems to me that an answer like that would simply beg the question. Rather I follow a principle of epistemology that I believe is found in the early chapters of the book of Genesis, that creation- or in this conversation, content- precedes communication and identification. And in doing so I think that it follows that we must ask who is good, because behind that I believe lies the answer as to how we can formulate such a question.

So in this first post I am attempting to reformulate the question into a legitimate query. For the question. "What is good"; seems arrogant and autonomously oriented.

A Question of Foundations

I have often wondered if the debate going on between the confessionally reformed and the federal vision camps- I do make a distinction, though it is not meant as a slight, but rather one of denotation- is in fact a secondary or consequent- though valid and necessary- argument and that the real battle is over a theology containing a works/merit and faith/grace paradigm and one that rejects a works/merit paradigm wholly in favor of a single covenant model of faith/grace. Thus it often seems that the subliminal war over the epistemological foundations for the theological enterprise at large is largely between the camps of Kline and Shepherd. And that being so, though we are often told that the debate is about what the gospel is it seems rather that it is actually about what lense we acquire to read the text in order to actually define the gospel.
Any thoughts or insight is not only welcomed but sought, though perhaps no one will ever read this anyway.

Ruminations on conduct

What is it that causes those in theological debates, those who consider themselves educated, layman or not, to descend to pejorative, incendiary language in response to those with whom they disagree? I know that I myself have been guilty of this and I have noticed that it occurs in contexts where the discourse is one of thoughts and not voices, gestures devoid of the face that goes with them. In short, it seems to occur within the anonymous context of the internet; the great equalizer between the learned and the laymen and alas, it has also become the spark which has kindled flames of arrogance, condescension, and outright slander.
I, for one, feel ashamed at how, in the pursuit of truth we have forgotten that we dwell in the covenant community, yes that includes those outside our denominations and even our confessions, and instead functioned more adversarially than fraternally. Though I believe that conflict both does and must arise- due to the fact that confessional unity would require both more humility and exegetical depth than we shall ever be possessed of- it does not mean that we should deride, demean, and impugn our opponents. I have often read blog posts to which I wholehearted concurred substantively but was grieved by the manner in which it was conveyed.
Well, this being my first foray into the land of the blog, I felt that I had to get that out of the way.