A continuing effort on my part to list what the Bible has to say about economic issues (see here and here).
Here's a shotgun batch of passages from Isaiah (not necessarily a complete listing from Isaiah on economics). As noted often, once you start watching for places within the Bible where ideas of economic justice, wealth and poverty are discussed, you find them everywhere...
Your new moons and festivals [religious rites and practices – dan] I detest; they weigh me down, I tire of the load. When you spread out your hands, I close my eyes to you; Though you pray the more, I will not listen. Your hands are full of blood! Wash yourselves clean! Put away your misdeeds from before my eyes; cease doing evil; learn to do good. Make justice your aim: redress the wronged, hear the orphan's plea, defend the widow.
Isaiah 1:14-17
The Lord enters into judgment with his people's elders and princes: It is you who have devoured the vineyard; the loot wrested from the poor is in your houses. What do you mean by crushing my people, and grinding down the poor when they look to you? says the Lord, the GOD of hosts.
Isaiah 3:14, 15
Woe to you who join house to house, who connect field with field, ‘Til no room remains, and you are left to dwell alone in the midst of the land!
Isaiah 5:8
Woe to those who enact evil statutes, and to those who continually record unjust decisions, so as to deprive the needy of justice, and rob the poor of My people of their rights... Now what will you do in the day of punishment, and in the devastation which will come from afar?
Isaiah 10:1-3
For You have been a defense for the helpless, a defense for the needy in his distress.
Isaiah 25:4
The afflicted and needy are seeking water, but there is none, and their tongue is parched with thirst. I, the LORD, will answer them Myself, as the God of Israel I will not forsake them.
Isaiah 41:17
And if you give yourself to the hungry, and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then your light will rise in darkness, and your gloom will become like midday. And the LORD will continually guide you, and satisfy your desire in scorched places, and give strength to your bones; and you will be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose waters do not fail.
Isaiah 58:10
Is this not the fast which I choose, to loosen the bonds of wickedness, to undo the bands of the yoke, and to let the oppressed go free, and break every yoke? Is it not to divide your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into the house; when you see the naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?
Isaiah 58:66
The spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me; He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the lowly, to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners, To announce a year of favor from the LORD and a day of vindication by our God, to comfort all who mourn… For I, the LORD, love what is right, I hate robbery and injustice; I will give them their recompense faithfully, a lasting covenant I will make with them.
Isaiah 61:1-2, 8
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You may have noticed that last passage as the one that Jesus quoted to begin his ministry.
I especially like the feel of the first passage, the one from Isaiah 1. If you read the whole passage, God goes on and on and on about how utterly wearying and disgusting the religious rites are of Israel (and I've set in on some of those services, believe me!)
And what is the reason given for why God is so disgusted by their rites? Because they have failed to do right by the poor and oppressed.
Thoughts?
6 comments:
i find that these passages both uplift and scare the hell out of me.
while in the culture of the United States our family certainly doesn't fit into the wealthy category i can only imagine that it is my own and family's way of life that Isaiah is taking to task.
it is difficult not to imagine that i do not have blood upon my hands.
I know what you mean, sister.
These passages are haunting and direct. My husband always says that we are enormously wealthy, and though like hipchickmamma, we are only middling here in 2007 America, we are topping the charts when you think either globally or historically.
Thanks for your reminder Dan.
I was reading the story about Lazarus the beggar and the rich man. Although I wouldn't consider myself rich by American standards, I'd probably be rich by the standards of those time, so it is very convicting to think I could be the rich man.
Yes, those are sobering and convicting. Anyone reading this or any blog is virtually certain to be in the richest 1-2% of people who have ever walked the planet.
Yet what is the average giving rate, even among church-goers?
That's a reasonable conclusion. Micah and Amos certainly directly die in God's rejection of festivals to injusice among the people.
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