Let me suggest something else, if I may. The question, "Why are you calling me good?" can be understood as a probing question, rather than as merely a request for information.commonsense wrote: ↑Wed Sep 02, 2020 11:09 pmAnother point I don’t understand—if Jesus was contingently good...
In fact, the context invites that reading. Remember that the rich young ruler had just called Him "Good teacher." So Christ turns to him and asks, essentially, "I see; you are calling me good (and I am). But what motive in your heart made you choose to describe me this way?" And this makes sense of his follow-up comment as well: "There is none good save God alone." In other words, he's asking the rich young ruler, "Are you implying that you agree that I am God?" And this also makes sense of Christ's answer to him: "One thing you lack (in order to make your declaration of faith in me real); go, sell all that you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven. And follow me."
So the whole incident coheres if we understand Christ's question not as calling into doubt his own goodness, but as asking the rich young ruler why he, in particular, was choosing to call Christ that, especially when up to this point he hadn't been interested in Christ at all.
So it was the rich young ruler's sincerity, not Christ's goodness, which was really the subject of doubt here.