Introduction to Biblical Virtue Ethics

The Call to Virtue: Intentional Character Formation in the Life of a Christian

Purpose:
To assist the younger generation and those involved in remedial education with integrating their genuine
education with the Bible, particularly in regard to developing a vision for virtue
In light of:
• Hebrew 10:24 And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works.
• Proverbs 29:18 Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.

Objectives:
• To examine the fact that Christians are called to virtue, commanded to give all diligence to adding
virtue, and commanded to think on virtue
• To define virtue in the sense of areté and show its five uses in the Bible
• To assist those who are involved in classical (genuine) education with connecting the educational
framework which is aimed at virtue with the Biblical virtue ethics

Preface:
Over ten years I discovered that different brands of Bibles were substantially different. I discovered that
verses were missing, verses in one Bible was contradicting the same verse in other Bibles, and often they were
just different. The Bible I owned at that time was an NIV. Depending on the year the NIV was written, the
person who killed Goliath was a different person than in previous versions. This was concerning to me. What
was even worse was that I did not know how to demonstrate to myself what a verse actually said. I would often
purchase multiple books on a given verse that would have different takes on what a verse said: yet, I was still
left uncertain of which position was true. This was discouraging to me, so I prayerfully set out to find someone
who could tell me which Bible was the right one (or if any actually existed without error) and how to
demonstrate to myself what it actually said.
My research and answer to prayer led me to Pastor Conrad Jarrell in Las Vegas, Nevada. My wife and I
met with him and he answered all my questions over 3 long days together. He gave me resources proving which
Bible is without error along with the answer to my long-held question of how do I actually know what the Bible
says? I was expecting something seemly more profound than what he told me. He said the answer is Grammar
– the art of Grammar. Along with Grammar, he explained the need for the science and art of Logic and showed
me the first logic book I had ever seen in my life. Finally, he showed me an excellent writing composition book
from the 1960s that I now recognize as essentially the art of Rhetoric integrated with grammar and logic.
After having all my questions answered and at the end of our initial time together with Pastor Jarrell, my
wife and I were baptized and became nonresident members of The Meadows Church (which is English for Las
Vegas). Not only did my Church membership begin then - my remedial education did as well.
Over time, I discovered that the remedial education I needed fell under an umbrella term called "Classical
Education." I have spent over 10 years now researching classical education and understanding why I was not
given an education in the classical tradition. Classical Education is the education tradition of Western civilization
for the last two millennia. Classical Education is the same education tradition of the King James Translators,
those who wrote the songs in our Hymnals, the Founding Fathers of our country, the Church down through the
centuries, and of course Pastor Conrad Jarrell himself.
Eventually, The Lakeland Church was constituted, and I transferred my membership to The Lakeland
Church. Shortly after, James (Jim) Henderson was called to be our Pastor. I asked him what we could do to grow
and mature more quickly as Christians. It was at this time he referred me to 2 Peter 1:5-11, the verse that
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commands Christians to add virtue to their faith and how to go about it. After being set on course with remedial
education by my first Pastor, Conrad Jarrell, my second pastor put me on course to study biblical virtue and how
to grow in it. I have found this formula to be a blessing to my family and I wished to document some of the
things that I have learned along the way over the ten years.
I now realize that I have created a trilogy of study outlines that have proven useful to those involved in
Classical Christian Education. The first was Towards a Biblical Paideia, which outlined what an ideal biblical
education would look like from a baby onward. The second was How to Flourish and Never Fall, which was the
result of the studies Pastor Henderson recommended I do on 2 Peter 1:5-11. Finally, this outline I present today
is the third and final study outline which covers the big picture of everything I have been learning about biblical
virtue and its place in classical education.
It is my understanding that all children of members of our church are currently involved in classical education
to some degree. I also know that many of the parents, as well as many other members, are also currently
involved in improving their own education during their leisure time. It is my hope that these research outlines
save my fellow members time spent researching and may edify each of us towards the aim we all have in
common – answering the call to virtue!

I. Introduction
a. This is outline is advanced – it assumes the essentials of basic bible doctrine are understood.
The best sermon series I know of that covers the essential bible doctrine is done by Pastor
Henderson and found on youtube.com under the series name Essential Bible Doctrine (outlines
are available as well).
b. The end of genuine education is virtue. This is especially true for Christians because they are all
called to virtue and commanded to give all diligence to add it, lest they fall.
c. The true arts and sciences are the means to develop virtue in education and an educated
person knows how the arts and sciences are ordered in relation to each other.
d. However, the Bible warns Christians to beware of and avoid:
i. Science falsely so called (1 Timothy 6:20) {aka Scientism & Propaganda}
ii. Philosophy and vain deceit (Col 2:8) {aka Sophistry}
iii. Theology that is false and damnable (2 Peter 2:1, Eph 4:14)
{Sophistry in the form of Pseudo, Quasi, and Semi-Christianity}
e. The best way to beware and avoid these falsities as obedient children of God who are Christians
is to learn:
i. Science rightly so called
ii. Philosophy without vain deceit, but instead with substance and truth
iii. Theology that true and redemptive
f. Since Christians will be using these true arts and sciences in education, I will briefly explain the
ones which cover virtue and how the Biblical use of the term virtue perfects the concept of virtue.
I will also show that the Bible has specifically laid out a Biblical Virtue Ethics.
g. Finally, Virtue as a term and idea has multiple senses both in the dictionary as well as in the Bible.
Pastor Henderson has done a great general overview of the multiple senses in the Bible in a
sermon entitled "What is Virtue?" This sermon is found on youtube.com. I am going to zero in on
the second sense of the word virtue which is translated from the Greek term "areté" and its use
in the Bible.

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 II. The need to understand Areté (Virtue) and finding its use in the Holy Bible
a. Education rightly understood aims at the development of Virtue
b. The science where the understanding of virtue is taught is called Aretology or Virtue Ethics. Areté
is a Greek term that is now expressed in English as virtue or in its transliterated form of areté.
c. Areté or virtue is an idea that is important to understand because personal lives, and well as
family lives and even entire countries are destroyed when they fail to develop and maintain
enough virtue. Therefore, it is not enough to simply associate words found in the definition – one
must understand the idea!
d. The study of virtue is the central idea in classical (genuine) education and by the end of high
school, this idea of areté or virtue is understood. Christians that have received this kind of
education since youth are set up to more easily do what the Bible calls "good works" and
understand what it means when the Bible commands to add virtue to their faith as well as to
think on virtue.
e. Rather than give long boring lexical definitions, I think it is more profitable to show areté as
commonly expressed and understood in classical education in hopes that you may be provoked
into studying the idea yourself.
"There is no equivalent for the word Areté in English …It is 'virtue' not in the modern but in the old sense of the
word: 'excellence' with no moral sense necessarily attaching to it. Everything, the Greeks said, has a use, a
function, a virtue of which it is capable. Take things as different as a knife, an eye, a doctor. Each of them has a
use and is capable of a virtue. A knife's use is to cut, an eye's is to see, a doctor's is to keep or make us well; and
each of their virtues is achieved when they fulfill their use and function. If they do this, we call them good. If
they fail, they are considered to be bad knives, eyes, or doctors. Hence the task and problem of each of them is
to fulfill its functions and so achieve its virtue.
But what is true of knives and eyes, is true, the Greeks thought, of men also. They too must have a function, a
use, a virtue of which they are capable and which it is their business to achieve; and in so far as they achieve it,
we shall call them good. It is easier to see the functions and virtue of an eye or a knife than of a man: and in
fact, he has many functions, and therefore many virtues to strive after. A human being is a member of a family
–as son or daughter, husband or wife, father or mother; he is a citizen, a member of a state; he has a profession
or occupation; in each of these roles he has a different function, and in each function is capable of attaining a
virtue, an excellence, which consists in doing the particular job well, in being a good son or daughter, a good
citizen, good in his occupation – whether it is that of Prime Minister or a shop assistant. He, no less than the
knife or the eye, is judged by the way in which, in each particular capacity, he does the job in question well. But
that is not enough. Man is more than a citizen, a parent or child, a person with an occupation, he is also a human
being and, in that capacity, too, is capable of a virtue. As a human being, he has a body, an intellect, and a
character, and his business is to make the most of each of these, and see that all three are developed to the
excellence of which they are capable, used rightly, and used to the full. He must aim at Areté, at virtue, in all."
- From Education for a World Adrift by Sir Richard Livingstone, page 99 (1943)
f. Paraphrasing the concept of Areté:
1. Areté is when a thing performs its function well
2. Areté is when the purpose of a thing is fulfilled
3. Areté is when a thing works well
4. Areté is when a thing does what it is capable of doing
5. Areté is when a thing does what it is called upon to do
6. Areté is when a thing's potentiality is actualized

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 7. Areté is when a thing is being excellent in its nature
g. Areté is used in the King James Bible 5 times:
i. As "virtue" 4 times:
1. 2 Peter 1:3 …called us to glory and virtue
2. 2 Peter 1:5 …add to your faith virtue
3. 2 Peter 1:5 …and to virtue knowledge
4. Philippians 4:8 … if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these
things
Virtue, in the sense of Areté, as defined in 1828 Webster’s Dictionary:
Moral goodness; the practice of moral duties and the abstaining from vice, or a conformity of life and
conversation to the moral law. In this sense, virtue may be, and in many instances must be, distinguished from
religion. The practice of moral duties merely from motives of convenience, or from compulsion, or from regard
to reputation, is virtue as distinct from religion. The practice of moral duties from sincere love to God and his
laws, is virtue and religion. In this sense it is true,
That virtue only makes our bliss below.
VIRTUE is nothing but voluntary obedience to truth.
ii. As "praises" in 1 time:
1. 1 Peter 2:9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a
peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called
you out of the darkness into his marvellous light:

Praise, in the sense of Areté as defined in 1828 Webster’s Dictionary:

Commendation bestowed on a person for his personal virtues or worthy actions, on meritorious actions
themselves, or on any thing valuable; approbation expressed in words or song.

III. Understanding the relationship of Virtue Ethics (Aretology) to Biblical Virtue Ethics
a. Aretology as defined in 1828 Webster’s Dictionary:
That part of moral philosophy which treats of virtue, its nature and the means of attaining to it.
b. There has always been two ways to learn about the created order and the God that created it –
one natural and the other supernatural:
i. The first was called General Revelation. It is what is revealed to all men through the
created order that God spoke into existence. It is limited knowledge that can be read in
nature about the nature of things.
1. Romans 1:20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are
clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal
power and godhead so that they are without excuse.
2. "The things that are made" - the study of nature (Physica)
3. "the invisible things of him from the creation of the world" – the study of Natural
Wisdom (Metaphysica) and natural wisdom has a division known as Natural
Theology (reason up to godhead)
4. Natural Wisdom became the foundation of Logic
5. Logic is then used to develop all the sciences
6. Logic is used to develop the science of human nature

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 7. From the science of human nature, logic was used to reason how humans ought
to conduct themselves, and this science is called Ethics or Prudence. This Ethics is
what we today call Virtue Ethics or Aretology.
8. These sciences along with Mathematics are called the Supreme Sciences (meaning
First Sciences) because all other sciences developed had to assume them. The
secondary sciences are called Empirical Sciences because they require the
scientific method to develop them. Think about it – "the scientific method" can't
create "the scientific method"!
ii. The second was called Special Revelation. It is what is revealed to only some men through
the Holy Scriptures that God brought into existence through men. We call this the Holy
Bible. The Bible is the means by which the Infinite Mind (God) tells his people who have
finite minds what they can't learn from the study of general revelation.
1. The Bible itself is Wisdom and to use logic to develop a science from scripture is
called Theology.
2. The study of human nature from scripture is called the Theological Anthropology.
3. The study of how humans should conduct themselves is called Practical Theology
or specifically Moral Theology.
4. Finally, Moral Theology is often called Christian Ethics or Christian Virtue Ethics.
All of these can be considered Biblical Aretology or Biblical Virtue Ethics.
iii. A few final points:
1. The sciences which fall under general revelation are what is used in apologetics.
2. The supreme sciences sourced from general revelation were and still are called
the "Handmaiden to the Queen of the Sciences" which is Theology. Upon request,
I can give a sermon series from our pastor or many of the pastors from Churches
where they use one or more of the supreme sciences in this way.
3. What often passes for Christian Ethics is just Pseudo-, Quasi-, or Semi-Christian
and you must clean up errors with the Bible and logic in your own studies.

IV. Biblical Virtue Ethics require a regenerate human nature

a. All men since the fall of Adam have been in the image (genotype) of fallen Adam
i. Genesis 5:3 And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own
likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth:
b. All those that Christ died for shall be made spiritually alive and be in his image
i. 1 Cor 15:22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive
ii. Eph 2:1-3 And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; Wherein in
times past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the
power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: among
whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lust of our flesh, fulling the
desires of the flesh and the mind: and were by nature the children of wrath, even as
others
iii. 2 Peter 1:3-4 According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto
life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:
Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might
be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world
through lust.
c. God strengthens his children as they strive for virtue

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 i. Philippians 2:12 Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence
only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and
trembling. For it is God which worketh in you to will and do of his good pleasure.
ii. Philippians 4:13 I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.
iii. Ephesians 3:16 That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be
strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;
iv. Colossians 1:10 That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in
every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; Strengthened with all might,
according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness;
Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the
inheritance of the saints in light:
d. For regenerate Christians, they will wrestle with their flesh until it falls off
i. Galatians 6:8 For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption: but he that
soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting
ii. Romans 7:19-20 For the good that would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I
do. Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
iii. Romans 8:13 For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do
mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live
iv. Colossians 3:9-10 Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his
deeds; And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of
him that created him
e. Eventually, the regenerated children get a glorified body
i. 1 Corinthians 15:20 But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of
them that slept
ii. 1 Corinthians 15:55 In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the
trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.
iii. Philippians 3:21 Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his
glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto
himself.
f. None of the points on Theological Human Nature listed above can be known from the Science of
Human Nature (Anthropology)

V. Biblical Virtue Ethics is dictated by the Bible and requires membership in a Church
a. The Bible dictates what is biblical virtue ethics
i. 2 Timothy 3:16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine,
for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be
perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works
b. Biblical Virtue Ethics require membership in a Biblical Church
i. Ephesians 4:11 And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists;
and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the
ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith,
and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the
stature of the fulness of Christ
ii. Romans 12:1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present
your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind

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 iii. Hebrews 10:23 And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works:
Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is; but
exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching

VI. Examination of the call to virtue

a. The call to virtue extends through your physical death because salvation is a process
b. Regenerate child of God in an Adamite body in an imperfect and fallen world
i. Already answered gospel call to repentance and baptism
ii. As members continue steadfastly in the faith adding virtue
c. Regenerate child of God in a glorified body in a new heavens and earth
i. Completion of the salvation process
ii. The Lord gives you a glorified body to live in the new heavens and earth free of any
corruption

VII. Keep the end in mind

a. 2 Peter 3:10-13 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night: in the which the heavens
shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also
and the works that are therein shall be burned up. Seeing then that all these things shall be
dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, Looking
for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be
dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to his
promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.
b. Finally, remember your glory and virtue is only a reflection of the Lord's glory and virtue
i. Peter 2:9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar
people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of the
darkness into his marvellous light:
ii. Psalms 9:1 I will praise thee, O LORD, with my whole heart; I will shew forth all thy
marvellous works.
iii. Isa 43:21 This people have I formed for myself; they shall shew forth my praises
iv. Titus 2:14 Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify
unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.
v. Mathew 5:16 Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and
glorify your Father which is in heaven.