How do we determine what is right and wrong, good and evil?

Right and wrong are determined by the "Standard of Original Value," which centers on God's purpose of creation. Actions aligning with God's purpose, fostering truth, beauty, and goodness, are right. Selfish motivations that deviate from this purpose are wrong. This standard requires directing human desire toward righteousness, guided by conscience and the Three Great Blessings, thereby fulfilling our portion of responsibility in God's ideal.

Understanding how to discern right from wrong is a fundamental human quest, shaping individual character and societal structures. Without a clear compass, societies risk moral relativism and spiritual decay, which can lead to conflict, sadness, and pain.

The Standard of Original Value

The standard for determining right and wrong is the "Standard of Original Value," which is centered on God's purpose of creation. This standard measures whether an action, person, or object is good or bad, right or wrong, important or unimportant. In a world often confused by self-centered values, where individuals determine value based on their feelings or personal biases, there is a great need for an objective, universal standard. Our intellect, emotion, and conscience are meant to reflect the original values of truth, beauty, and goodness that arise from God.

The value of anything is determined in relationship to a subject partner's needs, specifically whether the object partner satisfies those needs, including motivation and purpose. For example, a knife’s value changes dramatically depending on whether it is used for medical surgery or for a robbery. When God is the ultimate Subject Partner, the values of truth, beauty, and goodness are measured in relation to His motivation and purpose. An act is "right" when it aligns with God's purpose, bringing forth these original values.

Divine Principle's Clarification

The Divine Principle clarifies that the original value of creation is realized when it stands as an absolute object partner to human beings in the subject partner position, centered on God. God is the center of the Four Position Foundation, and thus, the standard of value is God Himself. This means that an action is good when it helps establish God's purpose of creation, which is to realize His ideal of love and joy through the Three Great Blessings: individual perfection, true family, and dominion over creation. Conversely, an act is evil when it contradicts God's purpose and aligns with Satan's purpose, leading to disunity and suffering.

Good and evil originate from human desire, but their difference lies in motivation, purpose, and direction. When desire is directed towards establishing God's purpose of goodness, righteousness is the result. When desire is selfish—centered on oneself, one's family, race, or nation—it leads to unrighteousness. To manifest our original value, our desires must be directed towards the good according to our conscience and the God-centered Four Position Foundation, based on loyalty, fidelity, and filial piety. This framework guides us to achieve human happiness and aligns with God’s absolute will, though its fulfillment is conditional upon our 5% portion of responsibility. As the Scripture reminds us in Proverbs 3:5-6, "Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths."

Understanding the Deeper Meaning

Morality is not merely a set of rules, but a dynamic expression of God's Heart and His original purpose for creation. The "right" action always nurtures true love, contributes to ideal relationships, and restores humanity's position as children of God. This forms a heart-centered ethics, moving beyond legalism. For instance, Jesus’ actions often prioritized love and saving life over strict adherence to external rules, such as healing on the Sabbath, because they aligned with God's higher purpose. We are called to embody God's love, reflecting His character in our actions. "Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God," as written in 1 John 4:7.

Why There Must Be an Objective Standard

The reason right and wrong cannot be settled by preference is that both are defined by purpose. Anything with a purpose has a standard built into it: a knife is good if it cuts, a lung is healthy if it breathes. Human beings were created for a purpose too — to grow to maturity, to build true families, and to exercise loving stewardship — and so what serves that purpose is right and what obstructs it is wrong. This is why moral rules are not arbitrary commands imposed from outside. They describe the way a being made for love actually functions, in the same way that nutritional advice describes how a body actually functions.

It follows that a purely private standard cannot work. If each person decides for themselves, the word "wrong" loses meaning precisely when it is most needed, since anyone harming another can appeal to their own judgement. Scripture records exactly that collapse: "every man did that which was right in his own eyes" (Judges 21:25), and warns of those who "call evil good, and good evil" (Isaiah 5:20). Conscience remains a real guide — Paul says the law is written in the heart, the conscience bearing witness (Romans 2:15) — but conscience can be trained well or badly, so it needs a standard outside itself to be calibrated against, which is the role of revealed truth.

How the Standard Is Applied

The practical test is the direction of love. An act that gives for the sake of a larger whole — the family beyond the individual, the community beyond the family — accords with the purpose of creation; an act that consumes a larger whole for the sake of the smaller opposes it. This is why the whole law can be summarised as loving God and loving one's neighbour as oneself (Matthew 22:37-39), and why Jesus offered a usable rule of thumb: "whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them" (Matthew 7:12). It also explains the two familiar failures of moral reasoning. Legalism keeps the letter while destroying the purpose, which is why Jesus healed on the Sabbath and told the objectors that the Sabbath was made for man (Mark 2:27). Relativism abandons the letter and loses the purpose as well. The test that avoids both is to ask what genuine love, aimed at the whole and willing to bear cost, requires in this concrete case — and then to check that answer against Scripture, conscience, and the counsel of people whose lives show that they know how to give.

How We Know What Is Good and What Is Evil

Good and evil are not two independent substances. Evil is the misdirection of something that was made good, which is why every evil act can be traced to a genuine desire turned the wrong way: hunger into greed, love into lust, the wish to be recognised into the wish to dominate.

That gives a usable test. Since anything with a purpose has a standard built into it, the question about any act is which direction it sends the love in it. An act is good when it gives for the sake of a larger whole — the person for the family, the family for the community, the community for the world, and all of them for God. It is evil when it consumes a larger whole for the sake of a smaller one, which is what every form of exploitation is at bottom.

Both motive and result have to be weighed, because either alone can deceive. A good intention that predictably damages people is not innocent, and a beneficial result achieved by treating someone as a means does not become good because the figures improved. "By their fruits ye shall know them" (Matthew 7:20) supplies the second half of the test that conscience alone cannot.

Conscience is real but needs calibration. It can be dulled by habit and reshaped by the company we keep, which is why it must be trained against revealed truth rather than trusted as an instinct.

Living the Principle

Applying this understanding daily demands introspection and commitment to true love. 1. Center on God's Purpose: Always align your motivations and actions with God's purpose of creation for truth, beauty, and goodness. 2. Fulfill the Three Great Blessings: Strive for individual perfection, establish a true family, and exercise loving dominion over creation. "But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you," Matthew 6:33 advises us. 3. Direct Desire Toward Goodness: Cultivate desires that contribute to righteousness, guided by your conscience, loyalty, fidelity, and filial piety. 4. Embrace Responsibility: Understand and fulfill your 5% portion of responsibility, knowing that God's absolute will depends on your conditional effort.

These answers explain the Bible in the light of the Divine Principle, the teachings of Reverend Sun Myung Moon. .

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