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The word "character" is derived from the Ancient Greek word "charaktêr", referring to a mark impressed upon a coin. Later it came to mean a point by which one thing was told apart from others. [4] There are two approaches when dealing with moral character: Normative ethics involve moral standards that exhibit right and wrong conduct. It is a ...
Good moral character is an ideal state of a person's beliefs and values that is considered most beneficial to society. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] In United States law, good moral character can be assessed through the requirement of virtuous acts or by principally evaluating negative conduct.
In the New Testament, the word righteousness, a translation for the Greek word dikaiosunē, is used in the sense of 'being righteous before others' (e.g. Matthew 5:20) or 'being righteous before God' (e.g. Romans 1:17). William Lane Craig argues that we should think of God as the "paradigm, the locus, the source of all moral value and standards ...
The word "ethics" is "commonly used interchangeably with 'morality' ... and sometimes it is used more narrowly to mean the moral principles of a particular tradition, group, or individual." [ 8 ] Likewise, certain types of ethical theories, especially deontological ethics , sometimes distinguish between ethics and morality.
Sometimes, the word punya is used interchangeably with virtue. [32] The virtues that constitute a dharmic life – that is a moral, ethical, virtuous life – evolved in vedas and upanishads. Over time, new virtues were conceptualized and added by ancient Hindu scholars: some replaced, others merged.
Moral authority has thus also been defined as the "fundamental assumptions that guide our perceptions of the world". [3] An individual or a body of people who are seen as communicators of such principles but which does not have the physical power to enforce them on the unwilling are also spoken of as having or being a moral authority.
Holding the moral high ground can be used to legitimize political movements, notably nonviolent resistance, especially in the face of violent opposition, [2] and has been used by civil disobedience movements around the world to garner sympathy and support from society.
Christian ethics, also referred to as moral theology, was a branch of theology for most of its history. [3]: 15 Becoming a separate field of study, it was separated from theology during the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Enlightenment and, according to Christian ethicist Waldo Beach, for most 21st-century scholars it has become a "discipline of reflection and analysis that lies between ...