Sometimes claimed to be a uniquely Christian contribution to ethics, the “Golden Rule” has also been argued to be an eloquent expression of the universal principal underlying the concept of law. Compare the similar saying by Confucius.

In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets. (1)

New Revised Standard Version

(1) The Law and the Prophets are the first two parts of the Hebrew Bible. The third, the Writings, had not been fully consolidated at this time. This commandment would then be the essence of all Jewish teaching.

 

This is an excerpt from Reading About the World, Volume 1, edited by Paul Brians, Mary Gallwey, Douglas Hughes, Azfar Hussain, Richard Law, Michael Myers Michael Neville, Roger Schlesinger, Alice Spitzer, and Susan Swan and published by Harcourt Brace Custom Publishing.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

The reader was created for use in the World Civilization course at Washington State University, but material on this page may be used for educational purposes by permission of the editor-in-chief:

Paul Brians
Department of English
Washington State University
Pullman 99164-5020

Reading About the World is now out of print. You can search for used copies using the following information:Paul Brians, et al. Reading About the World, Vol. 1, 3rd edition, Harcourt Brace College Publishing: ISBN 0-15-567425-0 or Paul Brians, et al. Reading About the World, Vol. 2, 3rd edition, Harcourt Brace College Publishing: ISBN 0-15-512826-4.

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