Capitalism, Socialism, and Biblical Ethics

Capitalism versus socialism has raised its head again in biblical ethics. Debate has re-ignited among Christians on whether capitalism is compatible with Christianity. In the US, a majority view is that held by conservative evangelicals who are ready to maintain capitalism as it is. Conversely, a minority position is put by the Radical Orthodoxy School, more inclined to socialism. Other positions also exist, for example, that neither capitalism nor socialism is compatible with Christianity. This paper tries to pick its way through these contentions, emphasizing the arguments of contemporary Christian supporters of capitalism. It focuses on three Christian qualities the capitalist advocates stress. Capitalism and socialism are briefly defined. Ways by which reform might be undertaken inside capitalism are explored, taking the US as example. Some of the reforms proposed in this paper are sometimes labelled “socialist,” but the definitions of socialism and capitalism suggest that the reforms can be accommodated inside a transformed capitalism

Using the Bible in Christian Ethics

Various Christian ethicists commented on a disconnection of Christian ethics from the Bible in the 1960s and 70s. Although this tendency is thought to have been remedied, this paper argues otherwise. The distance and detachment of Christian ethics from the Bible continues. The contention is demonstrated from examining Christian ethics’ books published from 2001-2011, plus two influential works from the 90s — Hays, and Peschke. Their separation from the Bible is indicated by their selective analysis of the biblical text, by their ‘plain reading’ interpretation, by their placing more weight on Christian tradition than the Bible, by not relying on the biblical text for developing ethics, and by not showing how biblical ethical guidelines relate to modern life. Exceptions to these generalizations are noted. Suggestions based on the Pontifical Biblical Commission are offered for how these limitations might be addressed

A Postmodernist Theologian\u27s Critique of Capitalism

Radically Orthodox theologians believe they are developing an operative Christian economics qualitatively different from the economics with which Christian economists are familiar. Some use postmodernist concepts, relating to desire and power. This paper evaluates a leading exponent of this thesis, Daniel Bell Jr., in his 2012 Economy of Desire, a book so far overlooked in Christian economics discussion. This paper contends that Bell does not take the case for an alternative Christian economics further than where earlier Christian economists had reached, that postmodernist concepts do not illuminate the issues, and that his critique of capitalism does not lead to clear-cut alternatives. The case here is that capitalism is in process of being reformed incrementally on the road to the alternative or divine economy — the mustard seed notion. In the last section, instances are given of how this is being achieved

Is the Bible Value-Neutral Toward Competition?

Competition is pervasive in modern society, affecting work, education, and recreation. The question arises whether competition is consistent with scriptural teaching. The context for this enquiry is that Christians today disagree among themselves about whether Scripture has any normative content relating to competition. Some view competition as incompatible with Scripture, while for others it is compatible. On the basis of a given definition of competition, Christian contributions to the debate in the last decade are reviewed. Only six inputs were discovered (involving seven authors), with five arguing that Scripture takes no normative position toward competition. Most of this article is taken up with evaluating their cases that are found to be unpersuasive. A sixth paper claims that Scripture is incompatible with competition, examined in the penultimate section. From reviewing the six contributions to the debate, the conclusion is that that Scripture does not have a favorable attitude toward competition

Distributional implications of contemporary Judeo-Christian economics

Distributional issues have re-emerged as an important issue in economics, social science, and philosophy in the last few decades. In the same period, the relevance of derivative Judeo-Christian socio-economic principles to the contemporary world has been (re)asserted, developing an incipient Judeo-Christian economics. Methodologically, this undertaking is comparable to that underlying the evolution of Islamic and other forms of religious economics. The methodology employed in the Judeo-Christian undertaking is described via a worked example. The example shows how normative principles can be derived from Judeo-Christian thought allegedly relevant to shaping the contemporary distribution of wealth and income. The principles are deduced from a particular sub-set of Judeo-Christian source material, and have the effect of generating greater equity in economic distribution. The deductions are compared with selected ideas canvassed in recent economics' discussion about inequitable distribution concerning appropriate criteria for guiding redistributional policy, ideas of “equal opportunity” vs “equal outcomes”, and the relation between distribution and economic growth.Christianity, Distribution of wealth, Economics, Equality, Judaism

God, prosperity and poverty

An influential strain in recent Christian thought (Schneider 2002a) has stressed that material prosperity is a quality for human life sought by God for all people. Clearly, this objective has not been achieved. One of the reasons why the all-enveloping prosperity objective has not been reached is that its pursuit has been undertaken by down-playing God’s equally-important objective of mitigating material poverty. Incompatible with God’s aims, poverty persists. Via Biblical exegetes’ interpretation of Jesus’ sayings, this paper shows that Jesus usually speaks of the necessity to share possessions with the poor when He teaches on wealth. If assistance to the materially poor is as important as achieving prosperity in the Christian framework, implications arise for today. Final sections consider how the poor in First World countries might be identified (using the United States as the example), and how they might be helped to greater prosperity

Is the Bible Value-Neutral Toward Competition?

Competition is pervasive in modern society, affecting work, education, and recreation. The question arises whether competition is consistent with scriptural teaching. The context for this enquiry is that Christians today disagree among themselves about whether Scripture has any normative content relating to competition. Some view competition as incompatible with Scripture, while for others it is compatible. On the basis of a given definition of competition, Christian contributions to the debate in the last decade are reviewed. Only six inputs were discovered (involving seven authors), with five arguing that Scripture takes no normative position toward competition. Most of this article is taken up with evaluating their cases that are found to be unpersuasive. A sixth paper claims that Scripture is incompatible with competition, examined in the penultimate section. From reviewing the six contributions to the debate, the conclusion is that that Scripture does not have a favorable attitude toward competition