Christ taught giving. Giving means taking ones own property and passing it on to someone in need. Nowhere did he advocate taking from others by force and “redistributing” it. He certainly did not advocate taking from others, using what’s taken to fund a huge government bureaucracy, and pass out a pittance of the remainder to the poor (have to justify that bureaucracy somehow).
Nowhere in the Bible is there a passage similar to this:
And I say unto you, take up your sword and shew it to the rich man and say unto him “give to me your wealth that it might care for the poor, lest I smite you to the Earth.”
And when the wealthy man has given up his wealth, take it and pay for a multitude of scribes and pharisees and learned doctors of the law and say unto them, “use this wealth to provide for your hire, but only this, save a pittance thereof and give it unto the poor so that we may noise about this good work and stand in the marketplace speaking loudly of these alms we give.”
And when this is done, say unto the people “Behold, we have cared for the poor. Now give us more of your wealth that we may continue to do so and to do other things.”
And if any dare to resist you, lay your hands upon him and chain him and cast him into a dungeon.
And in all this way shall you show unto the people your mercy and kindness.
When people advocate socialism enforced by government, they are advocating using force to take from some to give to others. Nowhere in his teachings did Christ advocate that. Nowhere.
This is where some people say “but Christ said Render unto Caesar.” Yes. He did. In response to a question intended to trap him. Context matters. Christ had rising popularity among the masses which concerned the Jewish leadership greatly. So they planted the question of whether they should give tribute to Caesar. If Christ had simply said “yes” he would have lost his popular audience and his ministry would have died right there. If he had said “no”, he would likely have been arrested (“we caught him forbidding tribute to Caesar” was one of the charges the Sanhedrin laid against him when handing him over to the Romans for execution). And his ministry would have died right there. Instead, he asked for an example of the tribute money, asked whose picture was on it, and gave his famous answer. And if people followed him in that, the Roman reprisal, destruction of Jerusalem, and diaspora would have occurred before much of Christ’s mission was fairly begun. If you accept his divinity, you have to accept that he knew this and gave the answer that allowed him to complete his mission.
But did “render unto Caesar” mean an endorsement of everything that tax funds were used for? Did he endorse gladiatorial games? Wars of conquest? The capture and importation of slaves? The use of government troops to put down slave revolts? Let’s not be absurd. Just because the Roman government did something with tax monies, or modern governments do something with it, “Render unto Caesar” is not an endorsement of that use.
Government is force, pure and simple. That’s essentially a definition of government: the legitimizing of the use of force. Socialism imposed by government has nothing to do with Christian charity. It is, in fact, very nearly the exact opposite, wearing a mask to confuse the unwary.
David L. Burkhead, “The “Christian Left”, The Writer in Black, 2018-01-08.
March 27, 2020
QotD: “Jesus was a socialist”
Filed under: Government, Politics, Quotations, Religion — Tags: Christianity, Poverty, RomanEmpire, Socialism, Taxes — Nicholas @ 01:00
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