The power of ownership

The Bible is a collection of ancient writings, written in ancient cultures. This collection has more printed copies in more languages than any other collection of writings. The collection tells the history of a peculiar people, the children of Israel. The story reports the story of a people, who experienced the life of landless nomads, of slaves and of powerful rulers. They were victors in war and were crushed by more powerful neighbors. They survived as a particular and peculiar people.

The most distinctive mark of their lives was their devotion to their God, Jehovah. Their God was a God of law. Their history is littered with interpreters of their laws. Jesus was a devout Israelite, who was determined to plumb the depths of his tribe’s laws and to live them faithfully. He was from a small town in northern Palestine called Nazareth. Nazareth was entirely unimportant. Life had passed it by. People of Nazareth were poor, powerless, uneducated, and ignored. Jesus was a gifted story teller, who interpreted the clan’s beliefs and commitments to people of an impoverished existence. When he took his teachings to Jerusalem, a city of power and prestige, he was brutally murdered, as an insurrectionist by Roman rulers. There was no reason for history to take further note except that some of his followers believed their God raised Jesus from the dead. Two thousand years later, Jesus has over two billion followers spread out on every continent in the world.

We, who call ourselves followers of “The Way,” are still trying to figure out the everyday meaning of the laws of the children of Israel and the interpretations given to them by the martyr from nowhere.

This is a perilous task. The records have gone through long periods of oral tradition, have endured translations from and to many languages, and have been challenged by cultural interpretations. Can there be any legitimate and helpful message from this ancient religious and cultural tradition that is relevant to the early 21^st century population?

There is a long list of ideas and practices that are accepted and advocated in the collected writings that we call the “Bible;” however, few thinking people accept them in a modern world. In the Bible women are treated as property. Men owned women in three categories…wives, concubines and slaves. An owner man fathered children by all. A man was allowed to own as many women as he could support. A first born son was given privilege over other children. Dietary laws of the Bible make no sense in a modern world. Slavery was approved and practiced. Men were free to sell their own children as slaves. We dismiss these laws as ancient and purely cultural.

Is there anything in Israelite cultural practices that make sense today? In the Luke gospel, Jesus is reported making a speech at the beginning of his public ministry. He called for the celebration of a year of jubilee. It was straight from the teachings of Israelite law. The law required a dramatic reordering of the Israelite population. Every fiftieth year there was to be a complete reordering of the life of this special people of God. Two requirements were most notable. All slaves were to be set free. A complete redistribution of land was to be made. Among these special people of God, there was to be no private ownership of land. Land belonged to their God. People were not owners of land; they were stewards who worked and managed the land on behalf of God. Some stewards would inevitably prosper in their stewardship more than others. The year of jubilee leveled the playing field. This particular law was on the books, but was never practiced. Jesus saw the ancient law of Israel as an answer to the desperate poverty of the people of Nazareth and the surrounding area.

It may have sounded good to many of his listeners, but it was insurrection to Roman rulers and owners and their Jewish enforcers. Jesus’ proposal of jubilee was probably the key to his death sentence. He challenged the ignoring of the ancient laws of Israel. For Jesus it was time to practice what was written in their law about ownership and stewardship.

The corrupting influence of wealth is one of the lessons that the ancient Bible writings delivers to a modern world. In Jesus day, the rich never had enough. They always wanted more. Nothing seems to have changed from then until now. Many people today who embrace the Bible as their instruction book for life, conveniently ignore the issues of ownership and stewardship.

The ancient world was very different from the modern world. The ancient world was cruel and knew nothing of equality for all. Kings, emperors, and dictators ruled the world. Israel struggled to a different kind of people, but also to survive. They knew better than they lived. Human rights were unheard of. The divine rights of kings and emperors were unquestioned.

Seldom are the economic teachings of Jesus mentioned in our churches. Seldom is the ownership of all things by God ever discussed among even the most devout believers. The stewardship of everything is not taken seriously.

Some teachings of the Bible ought to be challenged, even ignored. However, the ancient Bible teaching of the ownership of God and human stewardship needs a lot more attention.

The Rev. Howard Bess is a retired American Baptist minister, who lives in Palmer, Alaska. His email address is hdbss@mtaonline.net.