Though the term “Golden Rule” does not appear in Holy Scripture, it refers to the injunction of our Savior: “Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” (Matt. 7:12), or “And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise” (Luke 6:31).

Described by Isaac Watts as “that golden principle of morality which our blessed Lord has given us,” it has formed the backbone of Christian moral teaching since the day it was spoken. Indeed, no one seriously questions its fundamental place in Christianity.

Let us try to understand it and see how it applies to our conduct.

First, let us never use it as many modernists do, as the basis of their working creed: “But what do you suppose you are in the world for?” “Oh, I don’t know: I suppose to do one’s duty, and make the best use of one’s faculties, and avoid hurting other people.” “In short, to do unto others as you would they should do unto you?” “I suppose so.”

Neither let us licentiously pervert it into George Bernard Shaw’s notorious adage: “The golden rule is that there are no golden rules.”

What, then, does the injunction mean?

Augustine states that the Golden Rule means the same as “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” In short, it is part of the eternal law of God that Christ re-enforces under the gospel, thereby harmo­nizing Old Testament morality with New. In a per­ceptive addition to this understanding, Augustine claims that it is also designed to secure sincerity of motive in all our dealings with our neighbor. That is, there should be no “double dealing” with him, but we should do him good so as to expect “no temporal advantage from him.” What is this but to love him as we love ourselves?

John Chrysostom adds a further dimension to our understanding. Seeing the Golden Rule in the context of the preceding injunction to ask, seek, and knock, he puts great emphasis on the word “therefore.” Jesus “did not merely say, ‘All things whatsoever ye would,’ but ‘Therefore, all things whatsoever ye would.’” The purpose of the “therefore,” he insists, is this: “If ye desire ... to be heard (in prayer) ... do... ‘Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you.’” In other words, we need to behave righteously towards others if ever we expect to be heard by God.

Calvin reached a similar conclusion as did Augustine, but from Christ’s precept develops an all-inclu­sive Christian social ethic.

Comments Guenther Haas: “He understands the Golden Rule of Matthew 7:12 as a short and simple definition of equity. It is a rule of thumb which Jesus gives to His disciples to guide them in implementing the commandment to love their neighbors. Thus, it becomes Calvin’s guide for interpreting, expounding, and applying the commandments of the Second Table of the Law, and it permeates his writings and sermons on Christian social behavior.”

With Augustine, too, Calvin saw the Golden Rule as deliberately designed to cut across “all empty pre­tence” by which we cover up our selfish, unjust dealings, adding pointedly: “Every man demands its strict application for himself ... Where our own advantage is concerned” we can all go into great detail “on the extent of our right.” By applying the same rule to everyone else, we not only show our sincere love to them; we also “demonstrate thereby that we are true children of God.”

The Golden Rule is a recurring theme with Calvin. His remarks on it are always eminently practical. It requires, he says, “that we render to our neighbors what belongs to them,” and do whatever we can to ensure that they are not denied their natural rights. As Christ’s law of love, it expects us both to promote their welfare and to avoid anything that would harm them. When individuals are “too tenacious of their rights” we should even be humbly “ready to settle ... at our own loss, rather than pursue our rights with unyielding energy.” A characteristic application of Calvin’s relates to usury. We would never be guilty of gaining excessive interest on loans to others, he claims, if “we had engraven on our hearts the rule of equity which Christ provided in Matthew 7:12.”

Calvin is so concerned for the strict application of the Golden Rule that he states that no sooner should we reflect on our own well-being than we should instantly think of our neighbor’s. This means that we must guard against that sinful self-indulgence which expects everyone to treat us well while we treat them how we like! In short, “everything that is not regu­lated according to it (The Golden Rule) is wrong, however beautiful” it appears to us. Obedience to it is the only way to secure righteousness in society.

For Calvin, the only model for observing the Golden Rule is Christ Himself. He perfectly fulfilled the Moral Law, both in its spirituality and its extent. He therefore exemplifies it in all His dealings with others. By His example, as well as by His precept, “all the sons of God should frame their lives.” Consequently, we are “to embrace each other with that love with which Christ has embraced us.”

Luther points us to a very important practical distinction regarding the Golden Rule. The unbeliever endures injustice according to it mainly for the sake of peace and order. The believer, by contrast, moved by love for Christ, does so by faith. That is, he acts not on the basis of natural law, but on the law of Christ expressed by His death on the cross.

Henry Scougal views the Golden Rule as covering love to our enemies — that is,

those who hate us, who envy our happiness, who wish our misery and abhor our persons and society.” Our obligation to love them, he says, “may be deduced from another ... doing to others what we would have done to ourselves. Everyone of us,” he amplifies, “desires to be loved and cherished by others, to have our faults pardoned, our failings overlooked, and our necessities supplied ... How then can we think it unreasonable to allow that to others which we ourselves expect and desire? ... With what confidence can we say ‘Pardon our sins’ unless we are willing to ... pardon those who sin against us? ... Nothing but blind selfishness and extravagant partiality,” he concludes indignantly, “can teach us to make so unreasonable a difference between ourselves and others.

A very interesting chapter actually entitled “The Golden Rule” appears in the anonymous 3^rd-4^th cen­tury Clementine Homilies. Its fullness deserves quo­tation:

It is natural to all to love those who love them. But the righteous man tries also to love his enemies and to bless those who slander him, and even to pray for his enemies and to compassionate those who do him wrong. Wherefore also he refrains from doing wrong, and blesses those who curse him, pardons those who strike him, and submits to those who persecute him, and salutes those who do not salute him, shares such things as he has with those who have not, persuades him that is angry with him, conciliates his enemy, exhorts the disobedient, instructs the unbelieving, comforts the mourner; being distressed, he endures; being ungratefully treated, he is not angry. But having devoted himself to love his neighbor as himself, he is not afraid of poverty, but becomes poor by sharing his possessions with those who have none ... And as he wishes ... to have all his sins forgiven, thus he does to his neighbor, loving him as himself. In one word, what he wishes for him­self, he wishes also for his neighbor. For this is the law of God and of the prophets; this is the doctrine of truth.

This disarmingly simple chain of Scripture references says more about the Golden Rule than whole tomes of scholastic casuistry.

Let us wind up our brief consideration of this much-neglected precept by attending to the characteristically forthright comments of Bishop JC Ryle:

We are not to deal with others as others deal with us: that is mere selfishness and heathenism. We are to deal with others as we would like others to deal with us: that is real Christianity. This is a golden rule indeed! It does not merely forbid all petty malice and revenge, all cheating and overreaching: it does much more. It settles a hundred difficult points which in a world like this are continually arising between man and man; it prevents the necessity of laying down endless little rules for our conduct in specific cases; it sweeps the whole debatable ground with one mighty principle; it shows us a balance and measure by which everyone may see at once what is his duty: Is there a thing we would not like our neighbor to do to us? Then let us always remember that this is the thing we ought not to do to him. Is there a thing we would like him to do to us? Then this is the very thing we ought to do to him.

May He who made and kept the Golden Rule teach us how to live by it!