The modern word “economy” comes from the Greek words oikos and nomia, meaning household management. The people of antiquity
were concerned with the provisioning and sustaining of family and household. First-century
Roman Palestine was an agrarian society – largely agricultural (rural areas) with
some artisans and tradesman (mostly in Mediterranean cities). The Gospels makes
numerous allusions to agriculture and crops (i.e. MT 13:24-30; MK 4:26-32, 11:13-14,
20-24; LK 12:18, 19:20; and JN 4:37). Other ancient sources also list numerous agrarian
references. For example, Deuteronomy 8:8 lists the major subsistence crops as wheat,
barley, grapes, olives, and figs, and the Mishnah lists “seven kinds” of subsistence
crops. Working the land was difficult and labor-intensive as farmers had only light
tools and some animals to assist them in planting and harvesting.
Production was primarily for consumption
and 90-95% of the population was subsistence level peasants with no surplus crops,
goods, or disposable income. Agrarian societies viewed all goods, tangible (i.e.
land, water, crops, material possessions) and intangible (i.e. honor, status, prestige,
love), as in limited supply (see LK 19:12-27). This type of life is a “zero-sum
game” -- an increase for one meant a decrease for another. Economic historian T.F.
Carney stated that in antiquity someone had to go without in order for someone else
to have more. The one who had to go without was deprived of the proper family life,
material sufficiency, basic human dignity, and life space in order to create the
“surplus.” When we refer to the poor in antiquity we are speaking of those who could
not maintain their inherited status in society and in most cases this left them
destitute – materially and otherwise.
Oakman stresses that “economic” activities
of the ancient peasant were within the household and village and that these activities
were embedded into the social structure. There was no separation of life into political,
economic, social, ore religious spheres of life. The household served as the basis
for social and religious life and this placed limits on the accumulation of wealth.
The economic ethic of the household or close community was general reciprocity where
sharing occurred without strict accounting (you received what was needed and gave
what you could).
The elites of first-century Roman
Palestine lived in urban centers and the lifestyles of those few dominated the political-economic
way of life for the rural peasantry. The Roman system operated on redistribution
where goods were collected and distributed by the elite ruling class. It was an
extractive economic system where the powerful elite extracted agricultural and craft
products from peasants and artisans so that the benefits of production and consumption
flowed to the elites. Peasants literally had no control over what they produced
nor did they see any benefits from their labor.
A means of control over peasant labor
and the productive process came through heavy taxation, rents, and debt payments.
Debt played an especially destructive role as “through debt, ownership of the patrimonial
land of the peasantry could be, and was, wrested from them.” All the Roman laws,
set by the elite, favored the elite creditors and forced the peasantry further into
debt. If debt could not be repaid, as was often the case, the debtor was sold into
slavery or imprisoned.
Jesus saw the problem of debt as
both an economic oppression as well as one that ruined the quality of relationships
between the owning class/elite and the peasants. Jesus understood that debt was
predominately exploitive and he was trying to transform the oppressive system into
one of general reciprocity. Oakman describes this as a change to “no strings attached,”
“pure gift” relationships.
In understanding Jesus’ economic
ethic we need to look no further than the most foundational of all Christian prayers
-- The Lord’s Prayer. Scholarship is suggesting that Jesus was making much more
than a spiritual statement. It seems most likely that The Lord’s Prayer was originally
more basic and was addressing the deep human need of release from oppressive debt
and providing for literal bread to survive another day. Oakman writes that the Lord’s
Prayer was a petition for forgiveness from debt (debt being the original language)
and a petition for daily bread (a basic food staple for survival) as debt threatens
the ability to have daily bread to eat. It is a petition for a social order that
will allow for the supply of basic needs as God is asked to participate in the removal
of the oppressive powers of debt in people’s lives.
The problem of debt that was oppressing
the poor of First-century Palestine was so vast (the Gospels clearly discuss the
problem – e.g. Lk 12:58-59) that in The Lord’s Prayer Jesus is responding to the
deep need that the poor be released from the earthly shackles of indebtedness. He
connects this to the radical forgiveness and release that is available in God’s
reign. Jesus advocates for release from oppressive economic conditions and also
perceives a moral obligation for a new social behavior of forgiveness and reconciliation
(Mt 18:12-25; Lk 7:42-43, 16:1-8).
Jesus’ message is that human beings
can provide for one another’s material needs if we only overcome certain social
injustices (Mk 12:1-2; Mt 6:25-34, 7:1-5; Lk 6:37-42, 12:25-26). Jesus taught that
oppressors should behave toward the oppressed with generosity (Lk 10:6-7, 14:23;
Mt 18:27, 20:29). But his message did not end there. The generosity must extend
to social change that transforms oppression into a new kinship with moral obligations
based on general reciprocity and proclamation of the Reign of God (Mt 5:38-42, 7:2;
Lk 6:27, 29-30, 38, 7:41-42, 10:35).
Jesus wants society to look beyond
self-sufficiency and concern for controlling land and focus on the quality of relationships.
He emphasizes a new kind of interdependence (see Mk 4:25, 10:29-30, 12:1-2; Lk 12:3-9,
13:3-9) based on kinship – an ethic of family. However, this interdependence could
not be realized until oppression ended and, thus, he sided with the poor and outcast.
Jesus believed that God would provide in God’s reign, but that the earthly struggle
now rests upon the shoulders of human relationships.
Jesus presented an economic ethic
of family where all are under God’s reign and must treat one another as brothers
and sisters. He clearly opposed the unjust political-economic structures of his
day and called for a new economic reality of interdependence and kinship based on
a system of general reciprocity. Jesus called on his followers to participate in
God’s mission to establish right relationships and a social/political/economic system
that gathered all into the household of God’s reign. This was of such central importance
to Jesus’ ministry that he began his public ministry by proclaiming that his was
especially a mission to the poor and oppressed:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim
release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed
go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Luke 4:18-19)
The one place where Jesus speaks
directly of how he will judge the world is based on response to the poor and oppressed.
In fact, he tells us that how we respond to the poor and oppressed is how we respond
to Christ himself:
For I was hungry and you gave
me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and
you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care
of me, I was in prison and you visited me […] Truly I tell you, just as you did
it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.”
- Matthew 25:35-36, 40b