Short answer
Yes. Many atheists are honest, kind and brave, and Islam says why: God (﷾) showed every soul its wrong and its right (91:7-8). So the real question is not about anyone's character. It is about what makes good truly good. Without God (﷾), right and wrong are feelings shaped by evolution, rules people agree on, facts about what helps or harms, or facts that simply are. None of these says why good binds us when it costs us, or why it matters in the end. Islam's answer is that goodness comes from God (﷾) Himself. He is the Beneficent and the Wise, so His commands are never arbitrary. And no standard stands above Him. The Prophet (ﷺ) said good done without faith is repaid in this world (Muslim 2808). The lasting reward is for good joined to faith (16:97).
Full explanation
The question is not whether atheists do good
Many atheists are honest, generous and brave. Anyone who knows them can see it, and this page does not deny it. Greg Epstein, the Humanist chaplain at Harvard, argues that people can live good lives guided by reason and compassion. As a report of how many atheists live, that is true. But it answers a different question from the one asked here. This page asks what makes good truly good, and why it binds a person when it costs him. That is a question about the ground of goodness. It is not a question about anyone's character.
The Humanist chaplain at Harvard University argues that people can live good and meaningful lives without belief in God, guided by reason and compassion, and that morality does not need religion.
The main accounts of good without God (﷾)
Without God (﷾), there are four main accounts of right and wrong. The first says our moral feelings evolved because cooperation helped our ancestors survive. The second says right and wrong are rules that people agree on. The third says moral facts are natural facts about what helps or harms living things that can feel. The fourth says moral truths are basic facts. The American philosopher Erik Wielenberg calls this godless normative realism. On his view, moral truths are necessary and depend on nothing else. Some atheists go further. The philosopher J. L. Mackie argued that there are no objective values at all. The page on where morality comes from deals with the second account. The others are taken in turn below.
Argues that our moral judgements are saturated with evolutionary influence. Natural selection favoured attitudes that helped our ancestors survive and reproduce, not attitudes that track independent moral truths. So if such truths exist, any match between them and our beliefs would be a coincidence.
Defines moral naturalism as the view that moral facts are natural facts. Sets out the normativity objection: moral facts concern what we have reasons or obligations to do, while natural facts, the kind scientists study, are not by themselves a source of reasons for everyone.
Defends "godless normative realism": moral truths are basic and necessary, not derived from natural facts or from God. He grants that the evolutionary debunking argument is a serious problem for his view, and answers that the laws which produced our moral beliefs may themselves be necessary.
Argues that there are no objective values. Objective moral qualities would be strange entities, unlike anything else found in the world, so ordinary moral judgements carry an error.
Evolution explains feelings, not duties
Evolution may well explain why people feel that cruelty is wrong. It does not show that cruelty is wrong. Nor does it show that a person must avoid it when cruelty pays. The Scottish philosopher David Hume saw this gap in 1740. He noticed writers moving from what is to what ought to be. He asked for a reason how an ought could be drawn from facts entirely different from it. Hume himself grounded morals in human feeling. But his point stands against any account that offers only an origin story. A feeling may explain why we act. It does not show that we are bound to act. The same gap faces those who say good is simply what helps living things that can feel. Facts about health and suffering show what helps people. They do not show why I must help a stranger when it costs me.
“a reason should be given, for what seems altogether inconceivable, how this new relation can be a deduction from others, which are entirely different from it.”
Argues that our moral judgements are saturated with evolutionary influence. Natural selection favoured attitudes that helped our ancestors survive and reproduce, not attitudes that track independent moral truths. So if such truths exist, any match between them and our beliefs would be a coincidence.
Defines moral naturalism as the view that moral facts are natural facts. Sets out the normativity objection: moral facts concern what we have reasons or obligations to do, while natural facts, the kind scientists study, are not by themselves a source of reasons for everyone.
Bare moral facts leave two things unexplained
On Wielenberg's view, moral facts are simply there, with nothing behind them. That leaves the first question open: why should a bare fact bind anyone? It also raises a second: why should our minds know these facts at all? The American philosopher Sharon Street argues from evolution, not from religion. Natural selection shaped our moral attitudes for survival and reproduction, not for tracking independent moral truths. So if such truths exist, any match between them and our beliefs would be a coincidence. Wielenberg grants that this is a serious problem for his view. His answer is that the laws which produced our moral beliefs may themselves be necessary.
Defends "godless normative realism": moral truths are basic and necessary, not derived from natural facts or from God. He grants that the evolutionary debunking argument is a serious problem for his view, and answers that the laws which produced our moral beliefs may themselves be necessary.
Argues that our moral judgements are saturated with evolutionary influence. Natural selection favoured attitudes that helped our ancestors survive and reproduce, not attitudes that track independent moral truths. So if such truths exist, any match between them and our beliefs would be a coincidence.
Sets out the modern form of the Euthyphro dilemma: if God commands what is right because it is right, rightness seems independent of Him; if not, His commands seem arbitrary. Notes that grounding God's commands in His essential goodness meets the charge of arbitrariness, and that critics press further objections, among them that the answer is empty.
If right and wrong are made by us
Street's own answer is that values depend on each person's starting attitudes. She grants what follows. A fully consistent person who aims only at the suffering of others would have reasons to torture. She discusses him as an "ideally coherent Caligula", after the cruel Roman emperor. Mackie says there are no objective values at all. On either view, nothing makes the consistent torturer objectively wrong. Most people, with faith or without it, cannot accept that, and they are right not to.
Defends a Humean constructivism: what a person has reason to do depends on his own evaluative starting points, not on norms binding every rational agent. She grants that an ideally coherent Caligula, who aims only to maximise the suffering of others, would have reasons to torture.
Argues that there are no objective values. Objective moral qualities would be strange entities, unlike anything else found in the world, so ordinary moral judgements carry an error.
Good because God (﷾) commands it? The Qur'an's answer: goodness comes from God (﷾) Himself
In a dialogue by Plato, Socrates asks whether the holy is holy because the gods love it, or loved because it is holy. Philosophers now ask the same of God (﷾). Is something good because God (﷾) commands it, or does He command it because it is good? If the first, goodness looks arbitrary. If the second, goodness seems to stand above God (﷾). The Qur'an's answer is neither. Goodness comes from God's (﷾) own nature and names. In the Qur'an He is al-Barr, the Beneficent (52:28), and the Wise (59:24). The Qur'an says Allah (﷾) never commands what is shameful (7:28). He commands justice and the doing of good (16:90). So His commands come from who He is, and they are never arbitrary. Nor does any standard stand above Him, because the standard is His own perfection. His perfection is not chosen, and it cannot change. To Him belong the most beautiful names (7:180).
In Plato's dialogue, Socrates asks Euthyphro whether the holy is holy because the gods love it, or whether the gods love it because it is holy. Philosophers call the question, applied to God's commands, the Euthyphro dilemma.
Sets out the modern form of the Euthyphro dilemma: if God commands what is right because it is right, rightness seems independent of Him; if not, His commands seem arbitrary. Notes that grounding God's commands in His essential goodness meets the charge of arbitrariness, and that critics press further objections, among them that the answer is empty.
“"Truly, we did call unto Him from of old: truly it is He, the Beneficent, the Merciful!"”
“Allah is He, than Whom there is no other god;- Who knows (all things) both secret and open; He, Most Gracious, Most Merciful. Allah is He, than Whom there is no other god;- the Sovereign, the Holy One, the Source of Peace (and Perfection), the Guardian of Faith, the Preserver of Safety, the Exalted in Might, the Irresistible, the Supreme: Glory to Allah! (High is He) above the partners they attribute to Him. He is Allah, the Creator, the Evolver, the Bestower of Forms (or Colours). To Him belong the Most Beautiful Names: whatever is in the heavens and on earth, doth declare His Praises and Glory: and He is the Exalted in Might, the Wise.”
“When they do aught that is shameful, they say: "We found our fathers doing so"; and "Allah commanded us thus": Say: "Nay, Allah never commands what is shameful: do ye say of Allah what ye know not?"”
“Allah commands justice, the doing of good, and liberality to kith and kin, and He forbids all shameful deeds, and injustice and rebellion: He instructs you, that ye may receive admonition.”
“The most beautiful names belong to Allah: so call on him by them; but shun such men as use profanity in his names: for what they do, they will soon be requited.”
Every view stops somewhere: which explains more?
A critic may say the believer stops at God (﷾), just as the realist stops at moral facts. Every view must stop somewhere. The question is which stopping point explains more. Bare moral facts do not explain why good binds us, how our minds can know it, or why it matters in the end. A living, wise Creator explains all three. His own goodness is the standard, and He made the moral sense to recognise it, so the match is expected. Good binds because it is the will of the One who is goodness itself, and who gave us everything we have. It is not a bare fact or a feeling. And He will judge, which is why good matters in the end. Islam teaches that God (﷾) showed every soul its wrong and its right (91:7-8).
Defends "godless normative realism": moral truths are basic and necessary, not derived from natural facts or from God. He grants that the evolutionary debunking argument is a serious problem for his view, and answers that the laws which produced our moral beliefs may themselves be necessary.
“By the Soul, and the proportion and order given to it; And its enlightenment as to its wrong and its right;-”
“Then shall anyone who has done an atom's weight of good, see it! And anyone who has done an atom's weight of evil, shall see it.”
Why good matters in the end
Without a Judge, many wrongs are never put right. A cruel man may die rich and honoured, and a brave woman may die poor and unknown. Without God (﷾), both lives simply end. Good still matters to the people it helps, and that is real. But nothing settles the account. Wanting justice does not prove a Judge. But the case for God (﷾) rests on its own reasons, and on that case the account is settled. Islam's answer is that no deed is lost. Anyone who has done an atom's weight of good will see it, and the same holds for evil (99:7-8). Allah (﷾) is never unjust in the least degree (4:40). The Qur'an asks whether people thought they were created in jest (23:115).
“Then shall anyone who has done an atom's weight of good, see it! And anyone who has done an atom's weight of evil, shall see it.”
“Allah is never unjust in the least degree: If there is any good (done), He doubleth it, and giveth from His own presence a great reward.”
“"Did ye then think that We had created you in jest, and that ye would not be brought back to Us (for account)?"”
What Islam says about the good that atheists do
Islam explains why people without faith do good: the moral sense is in every soul (91:7-8). The Prophet (ﷺ) said Allah (﷾) does not wrong a believer in any good deed. He is given for it in this world and rewarded for it in the Hereafter. He said that when a disbeliever does a good deed, he is given a taste of its reward in this world. So when the disbeliever reaches the Hereafter, he has no good deed left to be rewarded for (Muslim 2808). The Qur'an promises a good and pure life to whoever does good and has Faith (16:97). So in Islam goodness and faith belong together. Hakim ibn Hizam asked the Prophet (ﷺ) about the charity and kindness to kin he did before Islam. The Prophet (ﷺ) told him he had become Muslim together with all that good (Bukhari 1436). For Islam, faith, worship and good character make one way of life.
“By the Soul, and the proportion and order given to it; And its enlightenment as to its wrong and its right;-”
Anas reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said Allah does not wrong a believer in any good deed: he is given for it in this world and rewarded for it in the Hereafter. As for the disbeliever, he is given in this world for the good deeds he did for Allah, so that when he reaches the Hereafter he has no good deed left to be rewarded for.
Anas reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said that when a disbeliever does a good deed, he is given a taste of its reward in this world. As for the believer, Allah stores up his good deeds for him in the Hereafter, and gives him provision in this world for his obedience.
“Whoever works righteousness, man or woman, and has Faith, verily, to him will We give a new Life, a life that is good and pure and We will bestow on such their reward according to the best of their actions.”
Hakim ibn Hizam asked the Prophet (ﷺ) whether there was any reward for the good he had done before Islam, such as charity, freeing slaves and keeping ties with his kin. The Prophet (ﷺ) replied that he had become Muslim together with all the good he had done before.
Does religion make people worse?
Some atheists say religion does more harm than good. The writer Christopher Hitchens subtitled his 2007 book How Religion Poisons Everything. Every large group, with God (﷾) or without Him, has members who did wrong. The record of followers cannot settle which account of good is true. That is why this page compares foundations, not records. A faith is judged by its teaching, not by what some of its followers have done. Specific charges against Islam have their own pages on this site.
A popular polemic, subtitled How Religion Poisons Everything, which argues that religion is man-made and does great harm, and calls for a secular life based on science and reason.
The replies answered
Evans and Baggett, "Moral Arguments for the Existence of God" (2022)
Sets out the modern form of the Euthyphro dilemma: if God commands what is right because it is right, rightness seems independent of Him; if not, His commands seem arbitrary. Notes that grounding God's commands in His essential goodness meets the charge of arbitrariness, and that critics press further objections, among them that the answer is empty.
Cited for
Saying good comes from God's nature only moves the dilemma. Is His nature good because it meets a standard? If not, "God is good" says nothing.
The response
Every view has a final standard, and on Islam there is nothing behind God's (﷾) nature to measure it. Could His nature have been cruel? No. It was not chosen, and it could not have been otherwise, so it is not arbitrary. "God is good" is not empty. It says the source of all good is a living Being who is just, merciful and wise. We recognise what those words mean through the moral sense He gave every soul (91:7-8). But knowing what good is and what makes it good are two different questions. The moral sense answers the first. God's (﷾) own nature answers the second.
Where it lands — The final standard is God Himself, and calling Him good says something real about who He is.
Plato, Euthyphro 10a
In Plato's dialogue, Socrates asks Euthyphro whether the holy is holy because the gods love it, or whether the gods love it because it is holy. Philosophers call the question, applied to God's commands, the Euthyphro dilemma.
Cited for
Some Muslim scholars said good is simply whatever God commands. So Islam takes the first option after all.
The response
This page gives the Qur'an's own answer, not any one scholar's view. He is the Wise (59:24). He never commands what is shameful (7:28), and He commands justice and the doing of good (16:90). So His commands are never arbitrary, and no standard stands above Him.
Where it lands — The Qur'an ties God's (﷾) commands to His wisdom and goodness, so they are neither arbitrary nor under a higher standard.
Good Without God (2009)
The Humanist chaplain at Harvard University argues that people can live good and meaningful lives without belief in God, guided by reason and compassion, and that morality does not need religion.
Cited for
If you need God's command or the fear of Hell to be good, you are not really good. I do good because I care about people.
The response
Caring about people is good, and Islam says why you care: the moral sense is in every soul (91:7-8). The Qur'an praises those who feed the needy for God's (﷾) sake, wanting no reward or thanks from people (76:8-9). Fear of punishment is not the reason this page gives. Its question is not why a person acts. It is what makes an act truly right.
Where it lands — Why a person does good and what makes good truly good are different questions; the page answers the second.
David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, Book III, Part I, Section I (Book III first published 1740)
“a reason should be given, for what seems altogether inconceivable, how this new relation can be a deduction from others, which are entirely different from it.”
Cited for
Hume aimed his gap at every system of morality, including those that start from the being of a God. Religious ethics cannot cross it either.
The response
This page does not draw an ought from a neutral fact. On Islam the final standard is goodness itself, in God's (﷾) own nature. The page uses Hume for a narrower point. A story of how our feelings evolved does not show what we ought to do.
Where it lands — Hume's gap counts against an origin story offered as a ground, and the page uses it only there.
Street, "A Darwinian Dilemma for Realist Theories of Value" (2006)
Argues that our moral judgements are saturated with evolutionary influence. Natural selection favoured attitudes that helped our ancestors survive and reproduce, not attitudes that track independent moral truths. So if such truths exist, any match between them and our beliefs would be a coincidence.
Cited for
Street's argument cuts against belief in God too. Evolution shaped religious belief for survival as well.
The response
Street's challenge asks whether the process that shaped a belief tracked the truth. On a godless view, nothing made our moral beliefs track moral truths. Belief in God (﷾) is different in two ways. The case for God (﷾) rests on reasons any reader can test, not only on an evolved feeling. And if God (﷾) exists, He made both the moral sense and the mind that reasons, so the match is expected. The challenge works only if blind selection is the whole story, and that assumes there is no God.
Where it lands — The debunking argument troubles godless realism. The case for God (﷾) rests on reasons, and on it the match between mind and truth is expected.
Good Without God (2009)
The Humanist chaplain at Harvard University argues that people can live good and meaningful lives without belief in God, guided by reason and compassion, and that morality does not need religion.
Cited for
If atheists can be good, God is not needed for morality.
The response
God (﷾) is not needed for an atheist to do good, and Islam never said He was. Islam itself says why atheists do good: the moral sense is in every soul (91:7-8). What needs God (﷾) is the ground: why good binds and why it matters in the end.
Where it lands — The good conduct of atheists fits Islam's account and leaves the question of the ground where it was.
Sahih Muslim 2808a — Kitab Sifat al-Qiyama wa al-Janna wa al-Nar (The Resurrection, Paradise and Hell), hadith 2808a
Anas reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said Allah does not wrong a believer in any good deed: he is given for it in this world and rewarded for it in the Hereafter. As for the disbeliever, he is given in this world for the good deeds he did for Allah, so that when he reaches the Hereafter he has no good deed left to be rewarded for.
Cited for
So a kind atheist receives nothing in the Hereafter for a whole life of good. That is unfair.
The response
Allah (﷾) is never unjust in the least degree (4:40). The hadith says the good a disbeliever does is rewarded in this world, so it is not lost. The lasting reward is not a wage earned by deeds alone. It is the grace of God (﷾), prepared for those who believe in God (﷾) and His messengers (57:21). So it is for good joined to faith (16:97). God (﷾) punishes no one until a messenger has come to warn them (17:15). No Muslim may declare any person's fate; that belongs to God (﷾). And the door stays open while a person lives: Hakim ibn Hizam became Muslim together with all the good he had done (Bukhari 1436).
Where it lands — No good deed goes unpaid, and each person's fate is God's (﷾) alone. The way to the lasting reward stays open while a person lives.
Hitchens, God Is Not Great (2007)
A popular polemic, subtitled How Religion Poisons Everything, which argues that religion is man-made and does great harm, and calls for a secular life based on science and reason.
Cited for
Religion poisons everything. Believers have done terrible things in God's name.
The response
Where that happened, it was wrong. Every large group, with God (﷾) or without Him, has members who did wrong. The record of followers cannot settle which account of good is true. This page compares foundations, not records. Specific charges against Islam are answered on their own pages.
Where it lands — Records of followers do not decide the question; the ground of goodness does.
Perspectives
Atheist: good needs no God
People can be good without God, guided by reason and compassion. Morality is explained by evolution and human life, or by moral truths that need no God. Some add that right and wrong are made by us, and that religion does more harm than good.
People can live good lives without belief in God, guided by reason and compassion.
Rebuttal
That is true of how many atheists live, and Islam says why: the moral sense is in every soul. The question is what grounds good and makes it bind, not who does it.
Our moral sense evolved because cooperation helped our ancestors survive, so morality needs no God.
Rebuttal
Evolution may explain why we feel that cruelty is wrong. Hume saw that what ought to be cannot simply be drawn from what is. An origin story for a feeling does not make it binding.
Good and bad are natural facts about what helps or harms beings who can feel, such as health and suffering. So morality needs no God.
Rebuttal
Facts about flourishing show what helps people. They do not show why I must help a stranger when it costs me. That is Hume's gap again.
Moral truths are basic and necessary, like truths of logic, so they need no God behind them.
Rebuttal
Then nothing explains them or why they bind. Street's argument adds that evolved minds would know them only by coincidence. Wielenberg grants that this is a serious problem for his view.
There are no objective values; human beings invent right and wrong.
Rebuttal
Then nothing makes cruelty objectively wrong, only disliked. Few people, with faith or without it, can live by that, and the moral sense in every soul says otherwise.
Values depend on each person's own starting attitudes, and there is nothing alarming in that.
Rebuttal
Street grants that a fully consistent person who aims at others' suffering would have reasons to torture. A view that cannot call him mistaken has given up what wrong means.
If good is whatever God commands, it is arbitrary. If He commands it because it is good, good does not need God.
Rebuttal
The Qur'an's answer is neither. Goodness comes from God's (﷾) own nature: He is the Beneficent and the Wise, and never commands what is shameful. So His commands are not arbitrary, and nothing stands above Him.
Religion does more harm than good, so it is no ground for goodness.
Rebuttal
Where wrongs were done in God's (﷾) name, they were wrong. Every large group, with God (﷾) or without Him, has members who did wrong. Records of followers cannot show which account of good is true. A faith is judged by its teaching.
The Islamic perspective
Atheists can do good, because God (﷾) showed every soul its wrong and its right. Goodness itself comes from God's (﷾) own nature and names, so His commands are never arbitrary and nothing stands above Him. Every deed is weighed, and the lasting reward is for good joined to faith.
The Qur'an says God (﷾) showed every soul its wrong and its right. That is why people without faith can do good.
Goodness comes from God's (﷾) own nature. He is the Beneficent and the Wise, He commands justice and doing good, and never commands what is shameful.
No deed is lost: an atom's weight of good or evil will be seen. And Allah (﷾) is never unjust in the least degree.
The Prophet (ﷺ) said a disbeliever is given a taste of his good deeds' reward in this world. In the Hereafter he has no good deed left to be rewarded for.
The Qur'an promises a good and pure life to whoever does good and has Faith. It also promises a reward by the best of their deeds.
Hakim ibn Hizam had done much good before Islam. The Prophet (ﷺ) told him he had become Muslim together with all that good.