Theologians have an allergy to the science of economics. They will quote philosophers and sociologists all day long. But they refuse to read any economics, the best developed and most useful of the social sciences. Even when they think they have given the science a chance, it's easy to see they haven't. For example, when Craig L. Blomberg, Professor of New Testament at Denver Seminary, wrote "Neither Capitalism nor Socialism: A Biblical Theology of Economics," he argued that he had studied and his views were based on sound economics. They were not.
If theologians are not Marxists, most will insist like Blomberg that the Bible is neutral on the question of capitalism verses socialism. That doesn't explain why theologians from the 16th century until the late 19th century proclaimed laissez-faire capitalism as Christian economics.
As I have shown, the best economic historians prove that the principles of capitalism came from the theologians at the University of Salamanca during the Reformation. They distilled the principles from natural law, but natural law cannot contradict Scripture and their main principles found support in the Bible. For example, the right to life is just the positive version of "Thou shalt not murder." The right to property is the positive of "Thou shalt not steal."
The fear of economics may happen because of a dread of math. Most theologians since Newton have been math challenged and mainstream economics is a subdiscipline of math. If their reluctance is a fear of math, they should check out the economics textbook written by the theologian, pastor, president of Brown University and economist, Francis Wayland. Brown uses very little math, and only math that pastors and theologians can follow, to explain the Christian origins of capitalism. Wayland's text was the most popular from its first edition in 1837 until the rise of socialism in the late 19th century.
Here is a PDF version of the textbook. Amazon offers a print version here.
Economists didn't give up Wayland's economics textbook because the science advanced beyond it. There is very little in it that the science has improved on since 1837. They abandoned his text because Richard T. Ely, a founder of the American Economic Association, returned from his studies in Germany with socialist propaganda to promote. He simply ignored Wayland and proceeded to advocate socialism as if no one had written on economics before him.
Wayland quotes the Bible where appropriate, but since the Bible isn't an economics textbook, he relies on natural law to discover important economic principles, as did the theologians at Salamanca. He assumes that God created mankind and endowed him with the necessary traits to flourish. And he assumes that "Thou shalt not steal" applies to today and includes the government. So, he begins his book with this:
"In order to arrive at the truth with the greater certainty, it will be proper to consider the circumstances under which man is placed, with reference to the universe around him, so far as this subject is considered.
"1. God has created man with physical and intellectual faculties, adapted to labor. He has given us a mind, adapted to investigate the laws of the universe, and a body adapted to perform all those operations, by which, in obedience to those laws, the objects of desire may be produced.
"2. Labor has been made necessary to our happiness. No valuable object of desire can be procured without it. Intellectual power cannot be attained without intellectual discipline; nor knowledge of the laws of nature, without study. Neither physical comforts, nor even physical necessaries, can be obtained, unless labor be first expended to procure them. The universal law of our existence, is, 'In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat thy bread, until thou return to the ground.'
"3. Labor is necessary to the healthful condition of our powers, both physical and intellectual. Without intellectual labor, the mind becomes enfeebled; and, were this labor wholly intermitted, it would sink into idiocy or madness. Without physical labor, the body, feeble and enervated, becomes a prey to pain and disease.
"4. That labor, per se, is pleasant, it is not necessary to assert. It is sufficient to our purpose, that it is less painful than idleness and the results of idleness. The laborer complains of his toil, but, deprive him of his opportunity for toil , and he becomes miserable. When men are, in our penitentiaries, condemned to solitary confinement, and labor or idleness are left purely to their own choice, they have never been known to continue longer than a few days, without beseeching, importunately, for work."
"5. On the contrary, the Creator has affixed several penalties, which those, who disobey this law of their being, can never expect to escape. He who refuses to labor with his mind, suffers the penalty of ignorance. The amount of this penalty may be estimated, by considering the blessings, both physical and intellectual, of which ignorance deprives us; and by contrasting the comforts of savage, with those of civilized nations, where the physical effort, made by both, is the same. He who refuses to labor with his hands, suffers, besides the pains of disease, all the evils of poverty, cold, hunger and nakedness. The results which our Creator has attached to idleness, are all to be considered as punishments, which he inflicts for the neglect of this established law of our being.
"6. And, on the other hand, God has assigned to industry, rich and abundant rewards. 'The hand of the diligent maketh rich.' 'Seest thou a man diligent in his business, he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men.' The pleasure, the independence, and the power arising from knowledge, are the rewards of intellectual industry. 'A wise man is strong, yea, a man of understanding increaseth strength.' And, it is only by physical labor, that the riches of the earth are appropriated, and the laws of nature made available to the happiness of man. At the first, there existed nothing in our world but the earth, with its spontaneous productions, and capabilities, and helpless and defenceless man. All that now exists of capital, of convenience, of comfort, and of intelligence, is the work of industry, and is the reward which God has bestowed upon us, for obedience to the law of our being.
"7. If such be the facts; if God have given to all men faculties for labor; if he have made labor necessary to our happiness; if he have attached the severest penalties to idleness, and have proffered the richest rewards to industry; it would seem reasonable to conclude, that all that was required of us, was, so to construct the arrangements of society, as to give free scope to the laws of Divine Providence. If he have excited us to labor by sufficient rewards, and deterred us from indolence by sufficient penalties, it would seem that our business must be, to give to these rewards and penalties their free and their intended operation. These, at any rate, should be the means first tried, in order to facilitate production; nor should any others be resorted to, until these have been tried and found ineffectual."
This is natural law at its best! And he founds it on the providence of God. In spite of its modern enslavement to math, economics is natural law applied to money, work and the market. More wisdom from the great Francis Wayland will come in future posts if readers appear interested.
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