The Golden Rule

September 2026

All passages below are my paraphrases from public domain translations, condensed for readability. Citations are there so you can check them. Specific numberings can vary across editions and translations.

"Do to others what you want done to you."

You know this one. Everybody knows this one. It's the moral rule you learned before you could spell "moral" and most of us were probably better at practicing it back then too. If you were like me, you credited this to Jesus and never thought twice about it. However, there is an earlier version of this popping up with a Chinese philosopher 500 years before Jesus. While it's unlikely that Jesus encountered Confucius's teachings, he almost certainly encountered the earlier Jewish versions of this teaching. In fact, the way this seemingly simple lesson has emerged and evolved over millennia indicates that history's wisest sages all understood its profound importance.

Teachings

Confucius, Analects 15:23 (or 24 depending on edition and translation)

There are a few threads that we will see continue through the other teachings. Firstly, this is the negative version of the golden rule. Do not do these things; a theme we will continue to see until Jesus. Another note to pay attention to, Confucius insists this is the rule to life, not a rule. This absolutist tone is something we will see come and go across the teachings.

Focusing more on this specific teaching, the Chinese word used is translated as "reciprocity," which carries a connotation of exchange in the English language. However, esteemed translators (Jennings) note that in Chinese the connotation is closer to like-heartedness, or putting yourself in another's place. I think that detail shows more of an overlap with the other teachings.

Interestingly, the disciple in this story is Zigong, and he appears in the golden rule twice. In Analects 5:11 he offers the rule himself: what I do not wish men to do to me, I also wish not to do to men. Confucius replies flatly that he has not attained to it. Then in 15:23 he comes back and asks for one word to live by, and is given reciprocity. The same student who has an intellectual understanding of the lesson but is lacking in practice.

Now we'll go to the Abrahamic stream and see how this teaching evolved.

Leviticus 19:18

Interestingly, at around the same time (or hundreds of years earlier depending on how you date Moses's teachings), we have this very similar teaching to Confucius crop up with no known contact between the groups. The teaching in Leviticus also approaches this rule from the negative: do not do these things. While this specific teaching implies it would only apply to other Israelites ("against your own people"), later in the same chapter it extends the authority of moral commands to strangers and sojourners among the Israelites as well (Leviticus 19:33-34). Therefore, it's not a leap to say that this teaching has a universal quality to it as well.

The next two teachers were certainly familiar with the Levitical teachings. Therefore, they are presented not as a convergence of the Golden Rule, but as an evolution of it. Also worth mentioning is that a version of this rule appears in Tobit 4:15 — "what you hate, do not do to anyone" — which will look very familiar next to Hillel the Elder's teaching from Shabbat 31a:

Hillel the Elder, Talmud, Shabbat 31a

I think the background behind this teaching is quite entertaining, so I wanted to mention it. A gentile went to another Jewish teacher and asked to be converted to Judaism on the condition that he be taught the entire Torah while he was standing on one foot. That teacher refused and chased him away, so the gentile approached Hillel with the same request. Hillel then delivered his clever, laconic line.

Here we have a clear continuation of the teachings in Leviticus and Tobit, with the same negative framing. However, Hillel also adds the absolutist quality that we see in Confucius. He is stating that this simple rule summarizes the entirety of the other teachings.

Fast forward another generation and it brings us to Jesus's teaching:

Matthew 7:12

While there isn't any firm evidence (at least that I could find, but maybe it's out there) for or against Jesus's direct familiarity with Hillel's teachings, it's certainly plausible. Hillel was a prominent teacher of the Pharisees who died around 10 CE, Jesus began his public ministry around 30 CE, and Jesus frequently engaged with the Pharisees' interpretations of the scriptures. However, we can say that Jesus probably knew the teachings from Leviticus and Tobit, which makes this teaching a continuation and evolution rather than a convergence.

Here, Jesus maintains the universal quality — this is the law and the prophets. However, the most interesting note is that he switches this to the positive form of the rule. He is saying it's not merely enough to refrain from doing bad things; one must take it a step further and positively do the good things as well. The only other place we will see this is about 600 years later in the hadith: "No one truly believes until he wants for his brother what he wants for himself." Obviously Islam recognizes Jesus as a prophet, so I'm not claiming it is original there, but I did want to point it out as the other place where we see a positive formulation of this rule.

This brings us to the final teaching, from Samyutta Nikaya 55:7:

Samyutta Nikaya 55:7, the Veludvareyya Sutta

Up front, the above teaching is heavily paraphrased for the sake of brevity. In the full teaching, the Buddha runs this line of thinking through seven kinds of misconduct: killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying, divisive speech, harsh speech, and gossip. I would encourage you to read the original if you want to more fully grasp the gravity of it. Nonetheless the parallel is stark. For a third time, in a separate part of the world, we have another sage teaching that we shouldn't do anything to anyone that we wouldn't want done to us.

Convergence

Convergent thinking is sometimes considered a sign that there is an underlying truth. While I wouldn't go as far as to say a moral lesson is "true," it does demonstrate that this is logically and morally derivable by some of history's wisest people. We have Confucianism, Buddhism, and Judaism all independently reaching the same conclusion within a few hundred years of each other. This suggests that it is likely tied far more to us as humans than to any one culture.

Additionally, the absolutist claim appears in two different traditions. Then the negative form of the rule appears in all three mentioned above. However, only Jesus, and the hadith downstream, iterate the rule into the positive form. Whether you are actively doing unto others or just not doing what is hateful, you'll probably land in a good spot. Whether it is the rule to life or a rule to life is up to you.

Personal Commentary

Of all the teachings here, what stuck out most to me was Hillel's final sentence: "Go and learn it." While researching it more, it's likely that he was telling his new student to go and learn the commentary. However, when I originally read it, I took it as "now go out into the world and learn this lesson through practice." I think this is something we need more of in the modern world. Almost everyone intellectually agrees with the Golden Rule. However, our behavior towards each other is far more leaden than golden.

As Zigong's story shows us, with philosophical teachings one must bridge the gap between intellectual understanding and actual behavior through honest, deliberate practice. How do we get people to stop saying mean things to each other? We stop saying mean things to each other. No excuses, no justifications. When someone says something mean to you, it's because they are an inconsiderate, rude idiot. When you do it, it's because they deserved it, or you'd given them enough of your patience, or any number of other reasons. However, most of us fail to acknowledge that the other person probably had their own excuses, the same as ours, running in their head. If we really want a golden world it starts by asking ourselves: how do I personally treat others the way I want to be treated more often than I do now? Then we need to go do it, even when it is inconvenient.