P
polytropos
Guest
Well, Thomas Aquinas (who was a negative theologian) held that God’s goodness could be demonstrated, and negative theology is the process to do it. His view would be that goodness is analogically predicated (ie. to be a good human is different than to be a good tree, which is different than to be a good God). Since we do not directly know the nature of God, we do not know exactly what it means for God to be good, but we can know that He is good (following from his perfection/lack of flaws, which is the conclusion of any of the major classical demonstrations of God’s existence).
Brian Davies is a contemporary Thomist who addresses the issue fairly well. His main topic is evil (he has one book on Aquinas’s view of evil, and has also translated his De Malo, though I haven’t read either of them), but that of course involves inspecting goodness as well. You might find his book The Reality of God and the Problem of Evil interesting. He discusses what we might mean by calling good and analyzes various approaches to the problem of evil (favoring, ultimately, Aquinas’s approach). It’s rather expensive, but you might be able to find a copy at a library or something, if you are interested.