In a conversation between myself and the legendary Joel Watts, we were discussing socialism versus free market economics. And brother Joel said the following:
And what exactly are ’socialist motives’? You mean live feeding the hungry, healing the sick, and having all things common in a community so that everyone is equal?
Now, Joel did not say this directly, but what he is implying in this statement is that socialism or communism is the practice of the early Church as described in the Bible–that the feeding of the hungry, the healing of the sick, and the sharing described in the book of Acts are all socialist practices, opposed to the workings of the free market and private property rights.
Now, you may know if you’ve read much here that I am very much an advocate of free markets. But I want to, at the outset, make clear the fact that I am pro-feeding the hungry, pro-healing the sick, and pro-sharing of resources. But all this does not make me a socialist. Socialism as the word is used today refers to the use of governmental powers to force people to share resources. And it is this that I object to.
So let’s skip straight to Acts and see if the passage Joel is referring to actually has any relation to socialism.
And all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and distributed them to all men, as every man had need. And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, ate their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God, and having favour with all the people. (Acts 2:44-47.)
At first glance, this description might look like socialism. But a knowledge of early Church history will reveal at least one crucial difference: no governmental enforcement. Indeed, the sharing of resources voluntarily is entirely consistent with free-market economics. The Church, in the book of Acts, was an institution of those who chose to join it, regulated according to voluntary decisions and completely separate from the actions of the state.
Nor was cooperation with the sharing of the early Church in any way coerced. The story of Ananias and Sapphira makes this utterly clear. Rather than retell the whole story, here’s just six verses (Acts 5:1-6):
But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possesion, and kept back part of the price (his wife also was in on this) and brought part of the proceeds and laid it at the apostles’ feet. But Peter said, Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back part of the proceeds from the land? While it remained, it was yours, wasn’t it? And after the sale, was it not still under your control? Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have lied not to men, but to God. And as Ananias heard these words, he fell down and breathed his last. And great fear came upon all who heard these things. And the young men got up, wrapped him in cloth, carried him out, and buried him.
Notice that Peter was upset over the fact that Ananias lied. You have lied not to men, but to God, says Peter. And it’s not as though you had to do this to protect your stuff. It was your land, for Pete’s sake. And even after you sold it, you were free to do whatever you wanted with it. So why lie about it? Why pretend you’re giving more than you are? You’re lying about your personal choice is unnacceptable. And for this Ananias died.
And so despite the widespread sharing going on in the Church, even such a leader of distribution as Peter himself implicitly recognized the validity of personal property. Even though people were being given what they needed, Joel is wrong about the reason. His comment asserts that this distribution is being done “so that everyone is equal.” The distribution was being done to relieve genuine need, not to make everyone equal.
Indeed, Paul later spells out in more detail policy on distribution to widows, revealing that he has a strict notion of who should and who should not receive from the common purse. His policies outline the fact that as Paul saw it, the norm was to produce one’s own sustenance, with only exceptional cases granted monies outside of what they produced (1 Timothy 5):
Don’t let a widow be enrolled if she is under sixty years old, having been the wife of one man, with a good reputation for good words; if she has brought up children, if she has taken in stranger, if she has washed the saints’ feet, if she has given relief to the affliction, if she has diligently followed every good work. But refuse the younger widows . . .
Monetary redistribution for Paul is something exceptional; not a means to creating a world of forced equality as some would imagine. And remember how the early Church in Jerusalem was conducting a utopian common-purse system? To see how that turned we can find a hint in Romans 15:25-26
But now I’m going to Jerusalem to minister to the saints. For it has pleased those from Mecedonia and Achaia to make a certain contribution for the poor saints who are at Jerusalem.
For some reason or another, the total sharing movement of Jerusalem failed to provide any sort of long-term relief for the poor believers. This is to be expected, however, because any system that relies on the continued selling off of property cannot provide stability.
And so in conclusion, the record of the New Testament is this: there did exist, for a while, an incredible level of sharing of resources in Jerusalem about 30 A.D. This project, for reasons we are not given, failed in the end, leaving the Jerusalem church impoverished and in need of outside assistance by sometime between 50 and 60 A.D. Even amidst the massive sharing experiment of the early Jerusalem Church, Peter still recognized the validity of personal control of property. And after the collapse of the sharing experiment, Paul’s letters leave for us a set of instructions confirming that his intent was for the mass of believers to be personally responsible for their own expenses, with only a very small minority being the recipients of the Church’s common property.
And so it looks to me like the New Testament record is fully compatible with a free market system, and there exists no demand anywhere in the New Testament for the abolition of the free market or personal property rights. On the contrary, property is repeatedly upheld in the Bible.
4 Comments
Mitchell, we can find a basis for generally any believe depending on how we read the bible.
No, the New Testament texts do not mention government enforcement, unless, you know, you count God among that. Considering that sharing resources is a church imitative, and that one day, we will rule with Christ, then pretty soon, you will have to sign a red card
In reality, a socialistic government is not about private property – which is not a biblical concept – neither is socialism about redistribution of wealth; but about sharing common resources through a democratically elected government. Nor was the passage in Acts about validating property rights, far from it. It is about lying to God, first of all, and second, about honoring your devotion to the community.
No, there is no government enforcement, but neither is their government enforcement with a lot of biblical (NT) commands. The passage does detect a communal understanding of resources and the sharing of resources, which is followed with the agape meals in later works and later times in the life of the primitive Church. Remember, a Christian is free to see after he or she comes to Christ, but does that mean that we are validating that sin? Hardly.
If capitalism is about profits – and it really is – then socialism is about the providing the basic needs of the community, especially those who cannot fend for themselves. Granted, if humanity was without sin, then no government or economic system on earth would be imperfect.
And legendary? Yeah, I can see that.
When we rule with Christ one day He can do whatever he wants with property and I won’t protest a bit.
I’d have to disagree with you as to whether private property is a biblical concept, because both the Old and New Testaments contain repeated support for the concept that people have the right to decide what to do with what is theirs. And if that’s not private property, I don’t know what is. And socialism, for all its talk of sharing common resources, inevitably includes redistribution of wealth and governmental control of factors of production, even when those were previously privately owned.
The passage in Acts was not about validating property rights, but property rights are implicitly assumed by Peter as valid in the discussion, as Peter makes it clear that Ananias was, before and after the sale, free to do what he wanted with his own land and money, but that it was his fraudulent speech that was unnacceptable.
There is no doubt that pooling of resources communally, and sharing, are part of the New Testament mindset. And it is my firm belief it should be part of our mindset today. But throughout the NT, as made clear by both Paul’s letters and Peter’s words to Ananias, it was always the sharing of whatever resources were voluntarily given from the possessions of private individuals. The agape meals are a continuation of that principle.
I disagree with your statement that capitalism is about profits. Both capitalism, socialism, and communism are systems which are all about money. I don’t see capitalism as a uniquely wealth-motivated system any more than the other two; it’s just a more efficient producer of material prosperity.
If humanity was without sin, any system would work. But in the meantime, one which recognizes the rights of the individual and contains strong incentives for effective work (capitalism) is still going to be the best at preventing poverty and allowing for the rule of law and order.
That all being said, I want to stress that I am absolutely in favor of the Church sharing resources.
Mitchell, everything is the Lord’s. We are commanded to do certain things with our private property, which means we hold it in reserve, not that it is permanently ours.
Again, the NT teaches against sin, but does allow that Christians will sin. Does that implicitly validate the sin?
I would after to disagree about capitalism. It is about individual profits, where as socialism is about creating a way for others to make profits. For me, capitalism is evil. For that matter, so is any economic system, as it wasn’t in God’s original plan.
It is His indeed. The question is what means are legitimate to use in handling it, and I’d argue that he has, to quote the Psalmist, “given the earth to the sons of men for their use”, through the vehicle of personal property.
I think of private property partially through this analogy (though I realize it is incomplete): If you have forty dollars, you could buy yourself a fancy dinner. Or you could buy me fancy dinner. Or you could get McDonald’s eight times. Or you could buy dinner for some kid for a month in the third word, for a month, along with a month worth of education and basic medical, through a charity like my personal favorite, Compassion International.
Now, you’d be doing a much better deed if you gave it to the third-world kid. And since the money is really the Lord’s we could argue that you must give it to the kid. Perhaps you would be selfish and choose McD’s instead. Suppose I, believing that you were misusing God’s property, decided to forcibly take it from you and give it to the kid. I would be wrong, because whether you are making a good or bad choice, it’s your money.
One problem that occurs when people discuss “capitalism” is that they may mean any of several different things. Some people mean a system which is designed to concentrate as much wealth as possible by legalizing the forceful exploitation of others, as happened in the early years of the U.S. and the Americas when they were first colonized. This I reject as immoral.
Some people mean an attitude of trying to make as much money as possible no matter what, and hoarding wealth at the expense of other people. This attitude I also reject as evil.
But when I use the word capitalism, I am referring to a system which allows people to spend their money as they see fit and work wherever they and an employer can reach mutual agreement on wages. That’s all. And I fail to see any clear reason that this capitalism is evil. Certainly, the fact that it did not exist in the garden of Eden does not make it evil, or else clothing, Old Testament law, Jesus Christ, and children would all be considered evil.
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