Does God View All Acts of Nonbelievers as “Filthy Rags”?

Some Misapplication of Scripture in Evangelism

In the 2,000-year history of Christianity, there have been times of church renewal in which the faithful advocated reform against ritual observance and/or rote liturgy that results in insincere, non-genuine worship of God. The most prominent examples have been Protestantism, with its emphasis on justification by faith and dependence on Sola Scriptura (“Only Scripture”), and the more recent emergence of Evangelicalism. The name of the latter indicates its emphasis on personal evangelism.

All of this has been good except that Evangelicalism has been experiencing some over-application of scripture resulting in misapplication of scripture. The antidote to this is for Bible readers to be aware that the Bible ought always to be interpreted according to its context, its audience, and the time it was written. If not, application of certain Bible texts to life circumstances can be an overreach unintended by its authors and God.

Saying All Acts of Nonbelievers are “Filthy Rags”

For example, some Christians, in their exuberance to share or preach the good news about Jesus, sometimes apply biblical texts to nonbelievers that represent a both a misapplication as well as an unkind offense against them. A common evangelistic misapplication of scripture is to quote from Isaiah 64.6 in the King James Version, that “all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags” in God’s sight, and claim that it refers to all acts of nonbelievers (and some would even claim this of believers).

On the contrary, Isaiah refers generally to the apostasy of Israel, not every person in the world, as a nation that had become “unclean.” Although he says “we,” identifying himself with the nation, he surely did not think this of himself just as Jesus submitted to John’s baptism, but not that he needed it to symbolize repentance. For, in Isaiah’s text, “filthy” translates the Hebrew iddah, referring to fluid from a female menstrual cycle, and “rags” translates begged, meaning cloth. So, iddah begged refers to a soiled, repugnant, menstrual cloth which does not reflect the deeds of God’s holy prophet.

Isaiah 64 is an oracle directed against the nation of Israel at a certain time in history—when it was disobedient to God. So, Isaiah does not mean the acts of all individuals, including Gentiles, are filthy rags. For he earlier says to God in this oracle that he “works for those who wait for him. You meet those who gladly do right, those who remember you in your ways” (Isaiah 64.4-5 NRSV). So, Isaiah acknowledges that some people “do right,” thus produce good deeds. Yet for the nation as whole at that time, its “righteousnesses are as filthy rags.” And he says to God, “There is no one who calls on your name, or attempts to take hold of you” (v. 7). That was not always true of Israel.

Although Isaiah seems to refer to his own time, as in Daniel 9.4-19 it is both a prophesy of that time which also refers to the end times as a model prayer for the penitent Jewish remnant then. This also connects acts as “filthy rags” to a specific people and a time. Of that future end time, Isaiah here reiterates what he predicts elsewhere, that God literally will “tear open the heavens and come down,” and the “mountains would quake at your presence” (Isaiah 64.1; cf. 13.10-13; 24.1-6, 19-21).

Saying Nonbelievers Never Do “Right” or “Good”

Protestant reformer John Calvin and his followers created Reformed Theology. In its acronym TULIP, T stands for Total Depravity. That is, people cannot do anything that can reasonably be called “good deeds” since they are totally depraved. The New Testament characterizes godless people as “sinners” in need of God’s merciful forgiveness of their sins through faith in Jesus’ atoning, sacrificial death on a cross. Yet it never portrays all nonbelievers as being incapable of doing anything that can be reasonably called “right” or “good” that God might bless.

For example, the book of Acts relates that a Roman centurion named Cornelius “was a devout man who feared God with all his household; he gave alms generously to the people and prayed constantly to God” (Acts 10.1-2). It adds, “he had a vision” of “an angel of God” who said to him, “Your prayers and your alms have ascended as a memorial before God” (v. 4). When the apostle Peter, a Jew, later met Cornelius, Peter expressed his new, divine enlightenment about the spiritual condition of Gentiles, saying, “God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him” (v. 35). Peter then preached the good news of the risen Jesus to Cornelius and his household, and “the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word,” resulting in them “speaking in tongues and extolling God” (vv. 44, 46).

Psalm 14 and 53 Say Atheists Don’t Do “Good”

Along with “filthy rags” in Isaiah 64.6, Reformed Theology cites Psalm 14 and its twin 53 and applies them to all people (cf. Romans 3.10-18). These Reformers cite the text, “there is no one who does good” (Psalm 14.1; cf. 53.1), and they apply it to nonbelievers if not believers as well. But in doing so, they rip this text out of its context. The psalm begins, “Fools say in their hearts, ‘There is no God’” (v. 1). Thus, the psalmist refers throughout to practical atheists who do no good. To apply such a text, written about atheists, to all nonbelievers is a gross misapplication of scripture. The psalmist says only of such atheists, “They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds; there is no one who does good” among them. The psalmist further adds that they are “evildoers who eat up my people as they eat bread and do not call upon the LORD” (v. 4). So, he contrasts these atheists with “my people” who are “poor” (v. 6). He then says of the latter, “God is with the company of the righteous” (v. 5). The psalmist concludes saying, “the LORD” will deliver “Israel … his people” from such enemies and restore their fortunes (v. 7).

A few Protestants and Evangelicals further allege that being justified by faith renders subsequent good deeds unnecessary. That is Antinomianism, a heresy that the Catholic Church rightly condemned. It claims that God’s grace releases believers from all moral obligation. Not so! That makes grace a license to sin, and Paul condemns it by saying, “Should we continue in sin in order that grace may bound? By no means! How can we who died to sin go on living in it?” (Romans 6.1-2).

Genuine Faith Produces Good Deeds

Martin Luther, the founder of Protestantism, muddied the waters by translating in his German Bible (here in English), “a person is justified by faith alone” (3.28). He added the word “alone,” which is not in the Greek text. In doing so, Luther set up a seeming contradiction between Paul and Jesus’ brother James who wrote, “faith, by itself, if it has no works, is dead. … a person is justified by works and not by faith alone” (James 2.17). Martin Luther called the biblical book of James, “a right strawy epistle” because he thought it was close to contradicting his teaching on justification by faith alone.

The truth is that we are justified only by faith, but this faith subsequently produces a life of good works or else it is pseudo faith. Paul affirms this wholeheartedly in his letters. While he reckons no one is sinless, he enumerates sinners who will not enter the kingdom of God (e.g., 1 Corinthians 6.9-11; Galatians 5.19-21; Ephesians 5.5).

Jesus taught likewise. In his Sermon on the Mount he said, “unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5.20). And concerning the yet future day of judgment he said, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?’ Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers’” (7.21-23).

In sum, to evangelize by alleging that all nonbelievers can only do acts comparable to “filthy rags” neither justifies that scriptural application, honors the gospel, or represents lovingkindness.