Monday, July 30, 2007

The Bible and Economics


Palmetto Sunrise
Originally uploaded by paynehollow
I've been looking through the Bible ( here, here and here) to see what it has to say about issues of economics, wealth and poverty. Thus far, I've offered up a few of the multitude of quotes that hold wealth at a distance, seemingly disdaining it or at least warning of its traps.

These sorts of passages run rampant through the Bible, like clover in an untended field.

But what of the flip side of the coin? Does the Bible have anything positive to say about wealth?

Clearly, yes. A little bit.

For one thing, we have some biblical heroes who had great wealth, whose many accumulations were accredited as a blessing from God. In this category, we have Abraham, David and Solomon, for instance.

But we must remember that while they are heroes to us for many reasons, they were flawed humans. They had many traits that we don't think of as godly (polygamy, murder, cowardice, sometimes horrifyingly bad parenting skills etc). So, merely that they are recorded as having much is not in and of itself an endorsement of wealth.

Beyond those examples (mostly OT, although we could probably think of a few NT examples of positive wealthy individuals, Nicodemus, perhaps...), we have a scattered verse here and there that at least seem to speak of wealth positively. Most of these verses are found in Proverbs and Ecclesiastes.

Here are some I could locate...


But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth.

~Deuteronomy 8:18

With me are riches and honor, enduring wealth and prosperity. My fruit is better than fine gold; what I yield surpasses choice silver. I walk in the way of righteousness, along the paths of justice, bestowing wealth on those who love me and making their treasuries full.

~Proverbs 8:18-21

The wealth of the rich is their fortified city, but poverty is the ruin of the poor. The wages of the righteous bring them life, but the income of the wicked brings them punishment.

~Proverbs 10:15-16

The blessing of the LORD brings wealth, and he adds no trouble to it.

~Proverbs 10:22

Dishonest money dwindles away, but he who gathers money little by little makes it grow.

~Proverbs 13:11

Through wisdom is an house builded; and by understanding it is established: And by knowledge shall the chambers be filled with all precious and pleasant riches.

~Proverbs 24:3-4

To the man who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

~Ecclesiastes 2:26

God gives a man wealth, possessions and honor, so that he lacks nothing his heart desires, but God does not enable him to enjoy them, and a stranger enjoys them instead. This is meaningless, a grievous evil.

~Ecclesiastes 6:2

A feast is made for laughter, and wine makes life merry, but money is the answer for everything.

~Ecclesiastes 10:19

Less than ten.

It gets much more difficult to find wealth spoken of positively in the NT. Many would say that the parable of the talents would be an example...

Matthew 25:14-30

I'm not as convinced.

Am I missing other positive references to wealth?

10 comments:

brd said...

Perhaps if you expanded your search to conceptions of bounty, it would grow a bit. Genesis 1:11,12 "Let the earth put forth vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit inwhich is their seed, each according to its kind, upon the earth." And it was so, . . .And God saw that it was good.

And in Genesis 3, the interruption of the bounteous production of the earth is part of the curse of God, not the good of God.

Dan Trabue said...

Yes, that might help. I may look for a chance to take that angle some.

Theologian/economist Ched Myers talks about the concept of Sabbath Economics in a book and various articles. In these, he talks about God's new economy of Grace. Myers suggests that the world is a world of plenty, or abundance, but also a finite world.

Myers says, in talking about Sabbath:

Richard Lowery points out that "in a delightful twist, ‘rest' is signified as a verb in this passage and ‘work' as a noun." Sabbath, he contends, captures the double theme of this creation story: abundance and limits...

The two main assumptions of classical economics are: 1) scarcity; and 2) unlimited need. These, he writes, "breed resignation to systems of distribution so unequal as to guarantee homelessness and starvation. On the other hand, they create an imperative toward unlimited economic growth." Sabbath economics, however, based on "the principles of abundance and self-restraint, turn this classical economic approach on its head.


The source for that is Sojourners, but you may need to register for free to read it.

T Michael W Halcomb said...

Dan,

Just wondering what you think about Tabor's argument that Jesus was wealthy? I don't take this view (though I do believe that He owned a home). Just to throw it out there, what if He was wealthy? What kind of new angle would this give to Him and some of the passages concerning things He said?

Again, this is more of a musing than anything.

By the way, good point brd!

www.michaelhalcomb.blogspot.com

John Kaiser said...

"For one thing, we have some biblical heroes who had great wealth, whose many accumulations were accredited as a blessing from God. In this category, we have Abraham, David and Solomon, for instance."

Sadly, this has led to many preaching a gospel of prosperity. A gospel that says if you have enough faith, God will make you rich. And if you aren't rich, then you must not have enough faith.

These preachers either ignore or show zero concern for the millions who have great faith, yet little financial worth. Much less those who suffer and die for Christ in Africa and Asia that have great faith, but have been blessed with far greater blessings than earthly wealth.

Moreover, it seems like earthly wealth is more often a curse than a blessing. It takes our focus off God, leads us to think that we can go it alone (without God), and brings with it a slew of temptations and downright nefarious folks attracted to the allure of money.

Dan Trabue said...

Thanks for the comments, John. Fortunately, "prosperity gospel" adherents are a minority of the greater church population (or at least I hope so...)

Still, we want what we think's coming to us, at whatever cost that may be, don't we?

T Michael, I'm not familiar with Tabor's argument, but I see nothing biblically to support the notion that Jesus was rich and, as you know, I think when he said, "the Son of man has no place to lay his head," he was indicating that he was homeless.

Rather, it seems to me the Bible teaches that he and his gang were subsistence preachers, living off the land and off the kindness of community members.

Seems to me.

Chance said...

Job was a man who was very wealthy, and near the end of the book (Watch out! Spoilers!) he gets the wealth back. However, in chapter 31, Job speaks about how he has always helped the poor and needy.

It seems like yet another issue of balance in the Bible. It warns not to be in a hurry to get rich 1 Tim 6:9-10, but I don't think there is anything wrong with investing wisely (not that you are saying to the contrary) to take care of kid's college, retirement, etc...

Chance said...

"The two main assumptions of classical economics are: 1) scarcity; and 2) unlimited need. These, he writes, "breed resignation to systems of distribution so unequal as to guarantee homelessness and starvation. On the other hand, they create an imperative toward unlimited economic growth."

I would argue that classical economics does indeed take it into account because they view supply as a very important part of the equation. As supply lowers, price increases, reducing demand.

That being said, that doesn't automatically mean that a free market system is a more efficient way of distributing resources, as opposed to governmental means. I tend to think the former, but I would be curious to hear arguments for the latter. My point being, I don't think its an issue of classical economics being ignorant of limited supply, its a question of if classical economics knows about it enough.

Nevertheless, I don't know if I want to get too much into the political, I just thought I would bring up that point.

Dan Trabue said...

D'oh! How could I forget Job?!

Thanks, Chance.

drlobojo said...

I have always been fond of this one:

Ecc 10:19: "A feast is made for laughter, and wine maketh merry: but money answereth all things."

Miklós said...

I think you might like this one: Ecc 6: "7 All the labor of man is for his mouth, and yet the soul is not satisfied. 8 For what more has the wise man than the fool? What does the poor man have, Who knows how to walk before the living?"

I thought to bring you the new Hungarian translation which is different from all the English ones, but contextually seems to be quite right. verse 8 second part:
"What advantage has a poor above the one who knows how to walk before the living."

So basically: are you wise or fool, poor or rich you are never satisfied.

This suggests an interesting insight, which seems to be quite logical: poverty comes from deficiency in understanding how to walk before the living (I hope I use English correctly), or lack of willingness to walk as it is required by the business environment.

I see this as a real problem today in networking: 1Pet 4:3-4. If you keep away from certain conducts that is required in business, you may find yourself in a situation, losing business, getting into poverty (say relative). For which as Peter says later in the same section we should not be ashamed but endure, as Christ endured His sufferings.
What do you think?