What matters more? Beliefs vs Behavior

In the last week or two I saw multiple posts on Facebook of the same saying.  It was a picture of a chalkboard with this written on it: Beliefs don't make you a better person behavior does. 

It does matter how we behave and how we treat others, I think that is pretty obvious to most of us.  However, the implication in the statement is that beliefs don't matter or that beliefs and behavior don't have anything to do with one another.  Is that really true?  Beliefs lead to behavior.  We may act contradictory to our beliefs (I recently wrote a post about that) but you can't just separate beliefs from behavior.  For example, the belief that certain people groups are subhuman led to Hitler murdering over 6 million Jews and 15 million others.  Yes, that's a counter example to the saying because that behavior clearly was not better than not murdering people but it shows that beliefs do matter.

We see things all the time where behavior was apparently good but the belief behind it wasn't.  Someone might do something nice for another person but the only reason they do it is because it will benefit them personally.  Suppose Bob wants something that Martha has.  Martha is a window and her husband had a really nice collection of tools.  Bob covets the tools but knows that Martha won't sell the tools to just anyone.  Bob doesn't particularly like Martha and in fact he can't stand her but he mows her yard and fixes a few things around her house with those tools.  Martha is very grateful and eventual asks Bob if he'd like to have her husbands tools at a price that's 1/2 of their value.  Bob of course buys the tools. 

Now let's take another look at this same situation and the reason Bob helps Martha.  Bob sees that Martha has lost her husband and needs help.  He's aware that her husband was quite handy around the house and had an extensive tool collection.  Bob sees that Martha's yard isn't getting mowed and her house needs some repairs.  Out of compassion he offers to mow the yard with her mower and fix things with her tools.  Martha wants to show her appreciation and offers to sell Bob the tools at 1/2 price and he buys them.

The outcome is exactly the same in both instances, the behavior doesn't change.  Someone on the outside looking in might say "Martha got benefit and so did Bob. It was fair."  But the question here isn't about fairness it's about whether Bob's behavior made him a better person or not.  In which scenario is Bob a better person?  The second one of course because we recognize that Bob's motivation (his beliefs) are good.  In the first scenario he is taking advantage of Martha and in the second one he is helping out of compassion.  Same behavior but different beliefs.

We've all seen this type of situation and if we're honest we've all done it.  It makes none of us a better person.  Behavior does matter and is extremely important but the beliefs behind our behavior are just as important and motivate our behavior.