The post that started this train of thought is here.
Summary of that post: there once was a Catholic clergyman of the 1400′s who was remarkably ahead of his times in terms of the capitalisticness of his thoughts. Despite all this, he was entirely against the charging of interest. Murray Rothbard, writing as an economist, immediately dismisses San Bernadino of Vienna’s anti-usury stance as irrational. And from an economic perspective, he’s right. Loans and interest play an important role in our economic system, and I think people ought to be allowed to legally charge interest on loans. But I’m not going to talk economically in this post. If you want that, go read the post I linked to.
I want to think about this from a religious/historical perspective, and try to unfold some of the complexities that this San Bernadino might have had to grapple with. In trying to understand the thoughts of a 15th-century economist/priest, we need to think not only of the economist side of his life, but also of the priest side.
Israel and the Church both have had a complicated history with interest, also called, in a more negative sense, usury. I’d like to trace a little bit of that history, because understanding our history as a Church is a vital part of understanding both our present and our future relationship with society. And a question we must ask is, what attitude should the People of God take towards interest?
If we want to have a comprehensive understanding of the history of Christian responses toward usury, we have no choice but to go back beyond the Jesus, all the way to Moses, because Christian teaching, for all its unique attributes, grows out of Judaism.
The Torah on Lending
So to begin, let us look at the statements concerning usury in the Law of Moses:
Exodus 22:25 — If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor with thee, thou shalt not be to him as a usurer, nor shalt thou lay upon him usury.
Leviticus 25:35-37 — And if thy brother become poor, and impoverished with thee, then thou shalt relieve him; yes, even if he be a stranger, or a sojourner; that he may live with thee. Thou shalt not give him thy money with usury, nor lend him thy food for increase.
Deuteronomy 23:19-20 — Thou shalt not lend with usury to thy brother; usury of money, usury of food, usury of anything that is lent with usury. To a stranger thou mayest lend with usury; but to thy brother thou shalt not lend with usury; that Jehovah thy God may bless thee in all that thou settest thine hand to in the land which thou goest in to possess.
Note that in each of these passages, it is a singular “thee” who is addressed, and a person-to-person loan is assumed. The reason for this is that the Law of Moses was given to a society which, despite its achievements in literature, government, and trade, was a clannish society where the agricultural economic system was far more labor-intensive than capital-intensive, meaning that institutional borrowing (banking) was not in mind when these scriptures were written. What we see here is a limit on the use of personal interest, person-to-person to the poor and to ‘brethren.’
Personal loaning, in a society where capital is generally irrelevent, is done when someone is short on funds and needs help. Taking interest on a personal loan to a friend is not only in extremely bad taste, but in the case of genuine material poverty in an agricultural society, it can produce strong tensions, especially when there is trouble paying back a loan by a poor person who sees their own personal debt growing. It has even be used by the wealthy against the poor to produce a kind of slavery (there’s a lot of countries where this has and still does happen frequently). As it says in Proverbs (22:7),
The rich person rules over the poor, and the borrower becomes the slave of the lender.
So although the Law of Moses regulates personal lending, but is silent on modern banking and other modern capitalistic capital-borrowing practices. If the cultural context and intention of the Law of Moses are ignored, it is therefore easy to quote these passages as a condemnation of all sorts of interest. But I believe that an honest look at these passages will reveal that Moses is silent on the topic of interest in general.
This belief of mine is supported by the fact that Judaism, throughout Europe in the Middle Ages, allowed for loans, to the extent that Jews received from the lending practice their undeserved stereotype as money-lending parasites.
Nevertheless, regardless of my opinions on what intent Moses’ law had around 1400 B.C., the fact that the Law had nothing but negative words for interest is highly significant for the development of Jewish and Christian attitudes toward lending at interest.
Later Hebrew References
Although the Law of Moses is generally regarded as the highest basis of Jewish Law, the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures are certainly allowed a significant voice in legal issues. And because the material on interest in Moses is inconclusive on a great many issues, let’s take a look at debt and lending in the rest of the Old Testament.
In Psalm 15 paints a picture of a righteous person, a person who “shall dwell in the sanctuary” of Jehovah and “never be shaken.” This faithful man, among other things, “does not put out his money at interest or take a bribe against the innocent.” So we see that the Psalmist still regards the Mosaic prohibition as in full force. In Proverbs we find a similar sentiment: “He who increases possessions by means of usury and unjust gain, gathers it for one who has compassion on the poor.” The use of interest as a means of exploitation (as mentioned in Proverbs 22:7 discussed earlier) continues to be referred to. In Nehemiah 5, we also see an example of God’s servant Nehemiah cracking down on usurious practices. But not only does usury appear condemned by rulers and wisdom writers. It also appears in the prophetic books. Jeremiah recognizes the tension produced by usury (15:10): “Woe is me, my mother, that you have born me, a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have neither lent with usury, nor have others lent to me with usury, [yet] every one of them curses me.” Although the central focus of the verse is not on usury, it is an indirect testament to usury’s destabilizing effect on social relations. Ezekiel 18 and 22:12 also repeat the same concepts of exploitation and unrest associated with usury.
So the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures do not further develop a viewpoint toward banking. Personal exploitation continues to be condemned, but banking is not spoken of. We will have to go to the New Testament to see that, and even there it is in indirect form
Jesus on Banking
As far as I know, the New Testament mentions banking one way, and it is in parable form–the parable of the talents, and the parable of the minas, in Matthew 25 and Luke 19. In each passage, a wealthy man, who is compared to God, entrusts managers to handle his money in his absence. At the end of both stories, there is one manager who has not done anything with the money, and earns no profit. In each case, the wealthy man says something along the lines of “Come on. You should have at least put the money in the bank so that I could have some interest when I returned.” Although Jesus does not directly address interest, it is interesting that he, speaking to a Jewish audience, makes no apologies for comparing God to someone who sees the existence of banking as a matter of course.
I admit it would be a stretch to draw any conclusions from this parable. But it seems to me that the role of interest in business is assumed as legitimate by Jesus, while the use of interest as a means of personal exploitation is always condemned in the Bible. So my conclusion is that interest is legitimate.
But looking at these Scriptures has shown that nothing directly good is said about interest, and that on the contrary many bad things are said about interest. And it is these Scriptures that led the Catholic Church, throughout its history, to have such a negative view towards usury. And that’s why the remarkably progressive 15th-century economist would rail against usury, which he quite possibly personally saw being used as a tool of exploitation.
some thoughts on usury
The post that started this train of thought is here.
Summary of that post: there once was a Catholic clergyman of the 1400′s who was remarkably ahead of his times in terms of the capitalisticness of his thoughts. Despite all this, he was entirely against the charging of interest. Murray Rothbard, writing as an economist, immediately dismisses San Bernadino of Vienna’s anti-usury stance as irrational. And from an economic perspective, he’s right. Loans and interest play an important role in our economic system, and I think people ought to be allowed to legally charge interest on loans. But I’m not going to talk economically in this post. If you want that, go read the post I linked to.
I want to think about this from a religious/historical perspective, and try to unfold some of the complexities that this San Bernadino might have had to grapple with. In trying to understand the thoughts of a 15th-century economist/priest, we need to think not only of the economist side of his life, but also of the priest side.
Israel and the Church both have had a complicated history with interest, also called, in a more negative sense, usury. I’d like to trace a little bit of that history, because understanding our history as a Church is a vital part of understanding both our present and our future relationship with society. And a question we must ask is, what attitude should the People of God take towards interest?
If we want to have a comprehensive understanding of the history of Christian responses toward usury, we have no choice but to go back beyond the Jesus, all the way to Moses, because Christian teaching, for all its unique attributes, grows out of Judaism.
The Torah on Lending
So to begin, let us look at the statements concerning usury in the Law of Moses:
Note that in each of these passages, it is a singular “thee” who is addressed, and a person-to-person loan is assumed. The reason for this is that the Law of Moses was given to a society which, despite its achievements in literature, government, and trade, was a clannish society where the agricultural economic system was far more labor-intensive than capital-intensive, meaning that institutional borrowing (banking) was not in mind when these scriptures were written. What we see here is a limit on the use of personal interest, person-to-person to the poor and to ‘brethren.’
Personal loaning, in a society where capital is generally irrelevent, is done when someone is short on funds and needs help. Taking interest on a personal loan to a friend is not only in extremely bad taste, but in the case of genuine material poverty in an agricultural society, it can produce strong tensions, especially when there is trouble paying back a loan by a poor person who sees their own personal debt growing. It has even be used by the wealthy against the poor to produce a kind of slavery (there’s a lot of countries where this has and still does happen frequently). As it says in Proverbs (22:7),
So although the Law of Moses regulates personal lending, but is silent on modern banking and other modern capitalistic capital-borrowing practices. If the cultural context and intention of the Law of Moses are ignored, it is therefore easy to quote these passages as a condemnation of all sorts of interest. But I believe that an honest look at these passages will reveal that Moses is silent on the topic of interest in general.
This belief of mine is supported by the fact that Judaism, throughout Europe in the Middle Ages, allowed for loans, to the extent that Jews received from the lending practice their undeserved stereotype as money-lending parasites.
Nevertheless, regardless of my opinions on what intent Moses’ law had around 1400 B.C., the fact that the Law had nothing but negative words for interest is highly significant for the development of Jewish and Christian attitudes toward lending at interest.
Later Hebrew References
Although the Law of Moses is generally regarded as the highest basis of Jewish Law, the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures are certainly allowed a significant voice in legal issues. And because the material on interest in Moses is inconclusive on a great many issues, let’s take a look at debt and lending in the rest of the Old Testament.
In Psalm 15 paints a picture of a righteous person, a person who “shall dwell in the sanctuary” of Jehovah and “never be shaken.” This faithful man, among other things, “does not put out his money at interest or take a bribe against the innocent.” So we see that the Psalmist still regards the Mosaic prohibition as in full force. In Proverbs we find a similar sentiment: “He who increases possessions by means of usury and unjust gain, gathers it for one who has compassion on the poor.” The use of interest as a means of exploitation (as mentioned in Proverbs 22:7 discussed earlier) continues to be referred to. In Nehemiah 5, we also see an example of God’s servant Nehemiah cracking down on usurious practices. But not only does usury appear condemned by rulers and wisdom writers. It also appears in the prophetic books. Jeremiah recognizes the tension produced by usury (15:10): “Woe is me, my mother, that you have born me, a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have neither lent with usury, nor have others lent to me with usury, [yet] every one of them curses me.” Although the central focus of the verse is not on usury, it is an indirect testament to usury’s destabilizing effect on social relations. Ezekiel 18 and 22:12 also repeat the same concepts of exploitation and unrest associated with usury.
So the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures do not further develop a viewpoint toward banking. Personal exploitation continues to be condemned, but banking is not spoken of. We will have to go to the New Testament to see that, and even there it is in indirect form
Jesus on Banking
As far as I know, the New Testament mentions banking one way, and it is in parable form–the parable of the talents, and the parable of the minas, in Matthew 25 and Luke 19. In each passage, a wealthy man, who is compared to God, entrusts managers to handle his money in his absence. At the end of both stories, there is one manager who has not done anything with the money, and earns no profit. In each case, the wealthy man says something along the lines of “Come on. You should have at least put the money in the bank so that I could have some interest when I returned.” Although Jesus does not directly address interest, it is interesting that he, speaking to a Jewish audience, makes no apologies for comparing God to someone who sees the existence of banking as a matter of course.
I admit it would be a stretch to draw any conclusions from this parable. But it seems to me that the role of interest in business is assumed as legitimate by Jesus, while the use of interest as a means of personal exploitation is always condemned in the Bible. So my conclusion is that interest is legitimate.
But looking at these Scriptures has shown that nothing directly good is said about interest, and that on the contrary many bad things are said about interest. And it is these Scriptures that led the Catholic Church, throughout its history, to have such a negative view towards usury. And that’s why the remarkably progressive 15th-century economist would rail against usury, which he quite possibly personally saw being used as a tool of exploitation.
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