Editorial February 21, 1931 Issue

The Golden Rule

Duncan Sinclair

"And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise." These, the words of Christ Jesus, are recorded by Luke in the sixth chapter of his Gospel. They constitute the Golden Rule, which provides a standard of conduct for all Christians in their relations one with another. And in conforming to the Golden Rule are not we fulfilling the commandment which the Master emphasized—to love our neighbor as ourself; the commandment which fulfills the law, as Paul told the Galatians when he wrote, "For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself"?

To live in accordance with the Golden Rule needs a spiritually enlightened consciousness; a consciousness which knows that God is infinite Love, and that man in His image reflects that Love; a consciousness which understands that since God is infinite good, evil is unreal. And the greater the spiritual enlightenment, the better is one able to practice the Golden Rule. We can readily see how difficult it may be for one who does not know through Christian Science that evil is unreal to love as himself a neighbor who also believes evil to be real. The possibility is that their attitude to each other will not be one of love, but of selfishness, which may manifest itself in some form of evildoing. The Golden Rule can best be practiced by those who know the truth of Love's allness and evil's nothingness.

In obeying the Golden Rule, in loving our neighbor as ourself, we do not close our eyes to any claim of evil; nor do we mentally bind our neighbor to any evil belief. We strive to see our neighbor's real selfhood, his real spiritual selfhood, as we know our own real selfhood to be—the perfect image of God. We endeavor to separate our neighbor from all evil, seeing evil as unreal and having no power over man. What do we expect to result from this perception? The freeing of our neighbor, at least in some degree, from the sin that may have beset him; and even if he be not responsive to the impersonal truth, our own protection from his belief in evil.

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