What Is Righteousness? Five Scriptures on Righteous Living

“What is righteousness?” Each Tradition represented on this site answers in its scripture, and many of the answers turn to how we treat one another. Here are five of them, quoted as they are written, with a link to each verse in its original language. As in our posts on the oneness of God and the afterlife, we add no commentary of our own: the verses speak for themselves.

Hinduism: the Rig Veda

From a hymn in praise of generosity in the tenth book of the Rig Veda:

“The riches of the liberal never waste away, while he who will not give finds none to comfort him. … Bounteous is he who gives unto the beggar who comes to him in want of food and feeble.”

— Rig Veda 10.117.1–3 (read the verses)

Judaism: the Hebrew Bible

The prophet Isaiah describes the fast that God desires:

“Is not this the fast that I have chosen? To loose the fetters of wickedness, To undo the bands of the yoke, And to let the oppressed go free, And that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, And that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? When thou seest the naked, that thou cover him, And that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?”

— Isaiah 58:6–7 (read the verses)

Christianity: the New Testament

From the Letter of James:

“Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.”

— James 1:27 (read the verse)

Islam: the Qur’an

From Surah Al-Baqarah, the second and longest chapter of the Qur’an:

“Righteousness is not turning your faces towards the east or the west. Rather, the righteous are those who believe in God, the Last Day, the angels, the scripture, and the prophets; and they give the money they cherish to the relatives, the orphans, the needy, the traveling immigrants, the beggars, and to free the slaves. And they observe the prayer and give the charity. And they fulfill their covenants when they make them, and they remain steadfast in the face of persecution and hardship, and during war. And these are the truthful and these are the righteous.”

— Qur’an 2:177 (read the verse)

Sikhism: the Guru Granth Sahib

The closing line of a verse in one of Guru Nanak’s hymns in Sri Raag:

“Everything is inferior to truth; the practice of truth is superior to all else.”

— Guru Granth Sahib, Ang 62 (read the verse)

Side by side

Placing these verses together does not mean the Traditions teach the same things in every respect, and we do not rank one above another. Each is presented under its own name and in its own words.

To read them side by side in their original languages (Sanskrit, Hebrew, Greek, Arabic and Gurmukhi), see the Comparison on Righteous Living. For verses that speak of the one God, the Hereafter and a righteous life together, see The Message.

Translations: Ralph T. H. Griffith (1896), the JPS Tanakh (1917), the World English Bible, One God One Message’s own translation of the Qur’an, and Max Arthur Macauliffe (1909). Sources and licenses are listed on each verse’s page.