This question was posed to my bible class yesterday. Do you believe that people are generally good?

Question

This was a roundtable discussion in my bible class. Do you think that people are generally good or evil? And why?

Answer 1

Yes. The majority of humans are born with the instincts of empathy and altruism. However, a minority are missing the instinct for one or the other, and a VERY rare few lack both.

No one, of course, is perfect, and even people with both instincts intact can be lead to violate them.

Answer 2

The question should have been phrased what makes people think that they are good, most people have the opinion that they are good people even tho not religious, this is the number one thing to ask someone when you are witnessing, do you think you are going to heaven when you die, and if so why? And most will tell you that they think they will because basically they are a good person...........so what people think and what is actually true are two different things, you can almost prove them wrong by reading Revelation 21:8 to them...........According to scriptures none of us are good,, so that would have been my answer, none of us are good people but some of us are saved which is a gift from God..., a good thoughtful question for your class though.
Most people are living under what they consider to be good, but Proverbs 14:12 will give you the answer to what the conditions is of most usaved people .

Answer 3

I think people generally are good if they are given the chance. I was watching a program on drug addicts once and they did horrible things to get money to buy their meth and other drugs. They mostly sold their bodies and lied a lot. They helped out anyone who needed help, though. They looked out for each other and when they'd finally get money for a hit, they'd say, "Thank God we got this". They talked about how they loved their mother and family but didn't want to go around them while they were like addicted. I just thought it was so strange how they talked so much about God and prayer and family and yet live such a horrible lifestyle.

That is addiction though, and it is so hard for them to break that addiction.

I've seen the most hateful persons in the world do something kind and it just makes me think goodness does win out overall.

Answer 4

No we are all born with an evil sinful nature and it is only by His saving grace can any bit of goodness be accounted to us:

Gen 6:5 And Jehovah saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
Gen 8:21b because the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth.
Ecc 9:3 This is an evil among all things that are done under the sun, that there is one event to all. Yea, also the heart of the sons of men is full of evil, and madness is in their heart while they live, and after that they go to the dead.
Jer 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?
1Pe 1:23 having been born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, through the living Word of God, and abiding forever.


and so on and so on....

Answer 5

According to my Psych Prof:
Man tends toward the selfish and when there are short term incentives to benefit from evil, (with only a small or delayed negative consequence disincentive), man will tend toward the evil.

According to David Suzuki, in "the origins of violence", children must begin to be socialized at a very early age.

According to the Bible,
Pr 22:6 - Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.

Pr 22:15 - Folly is bound up in the heart of a child...

And it all goes back to this...
Genesis 2:8 Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. 9 And the Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground--trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
...
16 And the Lord God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."
...
Genesis 3:4 "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. 5 "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
...
Genesis 3:22 And the Lord God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever."

Answer 6

I believe that most people are good. But being good will not get you into heaven. We must all accept the sacrifice that Jesus paid for our sins on the cross.

The Bible says that there are none righteous but by being born again we have the righteousness of Christ!

Answer 7

People are generally good except that most of us are misguided, some by parents, some by the norm of society of what is good & what is bad. When we were born, we were pure without evil. While growing up, we were educated either positively or negatively by the
people around us, the society we live in & it moulds
our character to be either good or evil or both.

Answer 8

Here was God's answer to that question after the Deluge - “Never again shall I call down evil upon the ground on man’s account, because THE INCLINATION OF THE HEART OF MAN IS BAD FROM HIS YOUTH UP; and never again shall I deal every living thing a blow just as I have done. (Genesis 8:21)

Answer 9

Yes I believe Generally people are genally good. We started out that way but we sinned. It's just a matter of how much we let the sin control our lives.

Answer 10

I believe that people are generally kind. I believe that people are generally greedy. I believe that people are generally loving. I believe that people are generally vain.