An interesting observation on capitalism from C S Lewis:
Now another point. There is one bit of advice given to us by the ancient heathen Greeks, and by the Jews in the Old Testament, and by the great Christian teachers of the Middle Ages, which the modern economic system has completely disobeyed. All these people told us not to lend money at interest: and lending money at interest—what we call investment—is the basis of our whole system. Now it may not absolutely follow that we are wrong. Some people say that when Moses and Aristotle and the Christians agreed in forbidding interest (or “usury” as they called it), they could not foresee the joint stock company, and were only thinking of the private moneylender, and that, therefore, we need not bother about what they said. That is a question I cannot decide on. I am not an economist and I simply do not know whether the investment system is responsible for the state we are in or not. This is where we want the Christian economist. But I should not have been honest if I had not told you that three great civilisations had agreed (or so it seems at first sight) in condemning the very thing on which we have based our whole life.
- Mere Christianity
Thoughts?
‘Money at interest’ is the mechanism by which the poor get poorer so the rich can get richer. Considering how touchy The LORD seemed to be over issues of social justice in the OT, I would suggest that this is why usury is forbidden; it’s simply a method of exploitation. I’ve got a feeling that Lewis knew very well which way was up.
It’s hard to believe that the question of usury even would need to be debated by a ‘Christian economist’… In fact, it’s kind of hard for me to even imagine a ‘Christian economist’ when a Christian economy is described in Luke 6:34,35 as one in which we lend to anyone who asks, even our enemies, without so much as expecting the repayment of the principal, lent alone charging our brethren forbidden interest!
An(other) example of how the Muslim world shows that it at least takes it’s formative sources seriously while Christians really just don’t.
I agree Pete… Christian economy is pretty simple! Maybe we’ve developped “christian” economists and financial advisers to trade away the internal confusion we feel for saying we follow Christ but actually following mammon.
As Jesus said, you can’t serve two masters! And, mammon is a particularly hard task master who always extracts his due.
I complete agree with the statement that as Christians we cannot serve two Lords. I hope we are strong and faithful enough to oppose to any system that brings injustice to God’s creation.