This is a verse I’ve come across many times in my path as a believer.

Romans 3:10-12
“As it is written:
‘None is righteous, no, not one;
¹¹ no one understands;
no one seeks for God.
¹² All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
no one does good,
not even one.’”

I’ve had some discomfort around this notion for quite some time. I’ve heard people use it to define them, saying there is no righteousness in them, or anybody, ever. I don’t think that is the case.

The verse in Psalms that it was referring to is either Psalm 14:1–3 or Psalm 53:1–3:

“The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’
They are corrupt, doing abominable iniquity;
there is none who does good.

² God looks down from heaven
on the children of man
to see if there are any who understand,
who seek after God.

³ They have all fallen away;
together they have become corrupt;
there is none who does good,
not even one.”

Again we find in Psalms 143:

“Hear my prayer, O Lord;
give ear to my pleas for mercy!
In your faithfulness answer me, in your righteousness!
² Enter not into judgment with your servant,
for no one living is righteous before you.”

At first it seems as if David is talking about a specific group of people, as he often lamented about evil people who were after him, but then in verse 2 of Psalm 53 he says that “God looks down” … “to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God.” Is this saying that God has never found anyone throughout history who seeks Him? I think not. From what I know, many people have and do seek after God, and there are also many who have done and still do good in the world.

Then in Psalm 143, the psalmist laments, “no one living is righteous before you.” Was this a statement to the heart of men at the time, or a broader truth about humanity in general? Perhaps “before you” simply means that God’s righteousness is the root of all righteousness, because there are many instances of the same psalmist describing people as righteous as we will see later in the article.

Some seem to have taken these verses to mean that no one in existence is ever righteous. Is that true? No. The bible tells us to put on a breastplate of righteousness, and other verses speak about how God loves righteous people.

First, here it is written plainly in the New Testament by John:

1 John 3:7 ESV
“Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous.”

Let us now go to the same psalmist who proclaimed what Paul has quoted that “none are righteous, no, not one”:

Psalm 1:6 ESV
“for the Lord knows the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked will perish.”

Psalm 5:12 ESV
“For you bless the righteous, O Lord;
you cover him with favor as with a shield.”

Psalm 7:8-9 ESV
“The Lord judges the peoples;
judge me, O Lord, according to my righteousness
and according to the integrity that is in me.
9 Oh, let the evil of the wicked come to an end,
and may you establish the righteous—
you who test the minds and hearts,”

Psalm 11:5 ESV
“The Lord tests the righteous,
but his soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence.”

Psalm 33:1 ESV
“Shout for joy in the Lord, O you righteous!
Praise befits the upright.”

Psalm 34:15-17 ESV
“The eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous
and his ears toward their cry.
16 The face of the Lord is against those who do evil,
to cut off the memory of them from the earth.
17 When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears
and delivers them out of all their troubles.
18 The Lord is near to the brokenhearted
and saves the crushed in spirit.
19 Many are the afflictions of the righteous,
but the Lord delivers him out of them all.
20 He keeps all his bones;
not one of them is broken.
21 Affliction will slay the wicked,
and those who hate the righteous will be condemned.”

Psalm 35:27 ESV
“Let those who delight in my righteousness
shout for joy and be glad
and say evermore,
‘Great is the Lord,
who delights in the welfare of his servant!’”

Psalm 37:5-6 ESV
“Commit your way to the Lord;
trust in him, and he will act.
6 He will bring forth your righteousness as the light,
and your justice as the noonday.”

Psalm 37:12-13 ESV
“The wicked plots against the righteous
and gnashes his teeth at him,
13 but the Lord laughs at the wicked,
for he sees that his day is coming.”

Psalm 37:16-17 ESV
“Better is the little that the righteous has
than the abundance of many wicked.
17 For the arms of the wicked shall be broken,
but the Lord upholds the righteous.”

Psalm 37:21 ESV
“The wicked borrows but does not pay back,
but the righteous is generous and gives;”

Psalm 37:25 ESV
I have been young, and now am old,
yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken
or his children begging for bread.

Psalm 37:29-32 ESV
The righteous shall inherit the land
and dwell upon it forever.
30 The mouth of the righteous utters wisdom,
and his tongue speaks justice.
31 The law of his God is in his heart;
his steps do not slip.
32 The wicked watches for the righteous
and seeks to put him to death.”

Psalm 37:39 ESV
“The salvation of the righteous is from the Lord;
he is their stronghold in the time of trouble.”

Psalm 52:6 ESV
“The righteous shall see and fear,
and shall laugh at him, saying,”

Psalm 55:22 ESV
“Cast your burden on the Lord,
and he will sustain you;
he will never permit
the righteous to be moved.”

Psalm 64:10 ESV
“Let the righteous one rejoice in the Lord
and take refuge in him!
Let all the upright in heart exult!”

Psalm 68:3 ESV
“But the righteous shall be glad;
they shall exult before God;
they shall be jubilant with joy!”

Psalm 72:7 ESV
“In his days may the righteous flourish,
and peace abound, till the moon be no more!”

Psalm 75:10 ESV
“All the horns of the wicked I will cut off,
but the horns of the righteous shall be lifted up.”

Psalm 92:12 ESV
“The righteous flourish like the palm tree
and grow like a cedar in Lebanon.”

Psalm 94:15 ESV
“for justice will return to the righteous,
and all the upright in heart will follow it.”

Psalm 94:21 ESV
“They band together against the life of the righteous
and condemn the innocent to death.”

Psalm 97:11-12 ESV
“Light is sown for the righteous,
and joy for the upright in heart.
12 Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous,
and give thanks to his holy name!”

Psalm 112:6 ESV
“For the righteous will never be moved;
he will be remembered forever.”

Psalm 118:15-20 ESV
“Glad songs of salvation
are in the tents of the righteous:
‘The right hand of the Lord does valiantly,
16 the right hand of the Lord exalts,
the right hand of the Lord does valiantly!’
…
19 Open to me the gates of righteousness,
that I may enter through them
and give thanks to the Lord.
20 This is the gate of the Lord;
the righteous shall enter through it.”

Psalm 125:3 ESV
“For the scepter of wickedness shall not rest
on the land allotted to the righteous,
lest the righteous stretch out
their hands to do wrong.”

Psalm 140:13 ESV
“Surely the righteous shall give thanks to your name;
the upright shall dwell in your presence.”

Psalm 141:5 ESV
“Let a righteous man strike me—it is a kindness;
let him rebuke me—it is oil for my head;
let my head not refuse it.
Yet my prayer is continually against their evil deeds.”

Psalm 142:7 ESV
“Bring me out of prison,
that I may give thanks to your name!
The righteous will surround me,
for you will deal bountifully with me.”

Psalm 146:8 ESV
“the Lord opens the eyes of the blind.
The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down;
the Lord loves the righteous.”

Here are many more verses that describe people as being righteous:

Genesis 6:9 ESV
“These are the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation. Noah walked with God.”

Deuteronomy 16:19 ESV
“You shall not pervert justice. You shall not show partiality, and you shall not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and subverts the cause of the righteous.”

2 Samuel 22:21-25 ESV
“The Lord dealt with me according to my righteousness;
according to the cleanness of my hands he rewarded me.
22 For I have kept the ways of the Lord
and have not wickedly departed from my God.
23 For all his rules were before me,
and from his statutes I did not turn aside.
24 I was blameless before him,
and I kept myself from guilt.
25 And the Lord has rewarded me according to my righteousness,
according to my cleanness in his sight.”

1 Kings 8:31-32 ESV
“If a man sins against his neighbor and is made to take an oath and comes and swears his oath before your altar in this house, 32 then hear in heaven and act and judge your servants, condemning the guilty by bringing his conduct on his own head, and vindicating the righteous by rewarding him according to his righteousness.”

Job 17:9 ESV
“Yet the righteous holds to his way,
and he who has clean hands grows stronger and stronger.”

Job 33:26 ESV
“then man prays to God, and he accepts him;
he sees his face with a shout of joy,
and he restores to man his righteousness.”

Revelation 22: 10-11 ESV
“And he said to me, ‘Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is near. 11 Let the evildoer still do evil, and the filthy still be filthy, and the righteous still do right, and the holy still be holy.’”

Paul in Romans continues with a warning against acting in self-righteousness instead of God’s righteousness:

Romans 10:3-4 ESV
“For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness. 4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.”

Through this I firmly believe that it is God’s righteousness that is what is important. Why, then, was Paul quoting that verse about none being righteous? He seems to have been stressing the universality of sin in humankind, as he goes on to say the following:

Romans 10:23 ESV
“…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

It seems that the distinction is that no one is righteous of only themselves, but if we do look to God and follow His ways and live out His righteousness as He wants us to, then we do in fact become righteous people. I believe we should strive to be the righteous people that God calls us to be, and to lead others to do the same, and an important part of doing so is acknowledging the sin inherent in us that we are all easily susceptible to. To believe that to be righteous is not possible with anyone, however, is a grave mistake. Amen.