WEBVTT NOTE The Tension Between Economics and Religion (video) 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.000 The Theory of Money and Credit 2 00:00:30.000 --> 00:00:38.000 The Theory of Money and Credit 3 00:00:40.000 --> 00:00:43.000 Lew Church was an exemplar of the entrepreneur. 4 00:00:43.000 --> 00:00:48.000 He prospered in the free enterprise system through hard work, risk taking, innovation, 5 00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:53.000 and making use of his talents for the benefit of others and himself. 6 00:00:53.000 --> 00:00:57.000 Mr. Church remained true to the values of freedom, a market economy, 7 00:00:57.000 --> 00:01:00.000 Limited Government, and the Private Property Order. 8 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:08.000 Through the Lew Church Educational Foundation, he hoped to preserve and perpetuate this system in which those who followed after him 9 00:01:08.000 --> 00:01:13.000 would have the same opportunity to prosper and enjoy liberty that he had. 10 00:01:13.000 --> 00:01:19.000 We are honored to have Robert Murphy deliver this year's Lew Church Memorial Lecture. 11 00:01:19.000 --> 00:01:24.000 Dr. Murphy is visiting Assistant Professor of Economics at Hillsdale College. 12 00:01:24.000 --> 00:01:33.000 He earned his BA magna cum laude in economics from Hillsdale College and an MA and PhD in economics from New York University. 13 00:01:33.000 --> 00:01:42.000 Dr. Murphy has published numerous articles in popular and scholarly venues, including the Journal of the History of Economic Thought, 14 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:50.000 the Journal of Economics and Sociology, the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics, and the Journal of Libertarian Studies. 15 00:01:50.000 --> 00:01:58.000 He is the author of two book manuscripts, Chaos Theory and Minerva, and a home study course in Austrian Economics. 16 00:01:58.000 --> 00:02:03.000 Dr. Murphy will speak on the topic, the tension between economics and religion. 17 00:02:11.000 --> 00:02:12.000 Thank you, Jeff, for that introduction. 18 00:02:12.000 --> 00:02:16.000 First, I would like to thank Lew Rockwell for inviting me to give this talk. 19 00:02:16.000 --> 00:02:35.000 I'm very honored and humbled to be able to give this talk. Let me clarify the title. I don't mean anything more profound than what it suggests that there is in the popular culture this idea that free market economics in particular and Christianity in particular are somehow at odds with each other. 20 00:02:35.000 --> 00:02:43.000 I think many people would say, for those of you who espouse and endorse free market economics, how can you call yourself a true Christian? 21 00:02:43.000 --> 00:03:00.000 So that's what I want to discuss today, and as we'll see, I don't think that that criticism is entirely warranted, but on the other hand, I think those of us who are Christians can't just dismiss it as out of hand and think that, oh, there's nothing to that complaint. 22 00:03:00.000 --> 00:03:30.000 So, there's one sense that's quite obvious in which if you're a free market economist that could conflict with your Christianity, and that would be if you place that above your faith, if you think that your occupation is more important in your life than your faith is, and of course you wouldn't say that in the abstract, but if by your behavior that's what you show you really care about, then of course that's a problem if you're a Christian. But there's nothing peculiar to economics in that regard, whether you're a botanist or a chemist or a philosopher, 23 00:03:30.000 --> 00:03:42.200 To let you know though that this isn't just a remark I make just because it's obvious 24 00:03:42.200 --> 00:03:48.760 and we move on that I noticed myself, I violated that very precept myself a few weeks ago. 25 00:03:48.760 --> 00:03:54.600 I had to sign up for a new email account and I was, as you can imagine, there's more than 26 00:03:54.600 --> 00:03:59.440 And then one Bob Murphy walking around and so I was trying different permutations of 27 00:03:59.440 --> 00:04:03.880 things and I even think I tried Bob Murphy and put my bank pin number on, which is probably 28 00:04:03.880 --> 00:04:07.240 the stupidest thing you could possibly do in retrospect. 29 00:04:07.240 --> 00:04:11.760 So fortunately someone else is using my pin and Bob Murphy. 30 00:04:11.760 --> 00:04:16.800 But finally I settled on one that was Bob Murphy and CAP, okay, and so that went through 31 00:04:16.800 --> 00:04:21.400 and I was really pleased, okay, that's anarcho-capitalist for those of you who don't know. 32 00:04:21.400 --> 00:04:25.240 And then it occurred to me a few minutes later, why was it that I was trying to come up with 33 00:04:25.240 --> 00:04:26.800 some way to describe myself? 34 00:04:26.800 --> 00:04:30.340 Why did I pick my political views? 35 00:04:30.340 --> 00:04:34.480 Why didn't I say Bob Murphy Christian or Bob Murphy, my boss is a Jewish carpenter, to 36 00:04:34.480 --> 00:04:38.900 make people pause and think and then, you know, oh, that's clever. 37 00:04:38.900 --> 00:04:42.800 So why did I go the route of the political aspect? 38 00:04:42.800 --> 00:04:44.660 Why did I choose that to describe myself? 39 00:04:44.660 --> 00:04:45.660 And it disturbed me. 40 00:04:45.660 --> 00:04:49.320 And I think that that is a problem. 41 00:04:49.320 --> 00:04:54.000 And just not to justify why I did that, but just thinking about psychologically what was 42 00:04:54.000 --> 00:04:58.640 it that led me to act that way, I was thinking about it and I realized, well, one thing is, 43 00:04:58.640 --> 00:05:02.920 if you call yourself a Christian in America, that's not giving people too much information. 44 00:05:02.920 --> 00:05:06.160 In other words, there's plenty of Christians and that doesn't, you know, it's sort of 45 00:05:06.160 --> 00:05:09.080 like saying I have a heartbeat, right? 46 00:05:09.080 --> 00:05:12.640 But whereas to say I'm an anarcho-capitalist, it's not like everyone's saying, yeah, tell 47 00:05:12.640 --> 00:05:16.440 us something we don't know. 48 00:05:16.440 --> 00:05:18.360 So there's that aspect to it. 49 00:05:18.360 --> 00:05:23.800 But then also, and that's in a sense defensible, but then the aspect that's not defensible 50 00:05:23.800 --> 00:05:28.920 and that I did regret was that there was also the element that, oh, you know, it's cool 51 00:05:28.920 --> 00:05:32.560 to be an anarcho-capitalist, and it shows I'm a rebel, and that really gives an insight 52 00:05:32.560 --> 00:05:35.520 in my personality, whereas, you know, a Christian. 53 00:05:35.520 --> 00:05:40.240 But if you think about it, that's exactly wrong, that to be a Christian, if you are 54 00:05:40.240 --> 00:05:45.720 a real Bible-believing Christian, that's far more radical than to be an anarcho-capitalist. 55 00:05:45.720 --> 00:06:15.720 Sure, anarcho-capitalists, oh, you think the government is flawed and that you critique the government and that institution of power, but a true Christian believes that the world itself has fallen and that all forms of power, in a sense, are the realm of Satan and that that's his arena, and so I think that for the very reasons that we think, those of us who are anarcho-capitalists, that it's in a sense kind of cool and rebellious to be that, that by the same token all the more so, it's cool and rebellious in a sense to 56 00:06:15.720 --> 00:06:19.720 against the institutions of this world, to be a Christian. 57 00:06:19.720 --> 00:06:24.720 And just to, if I can go on a little bit on this point and come back to the main topic in a moment, 58 00:06:24.720 --> 00:06:31.720 it's funny because I think a lot of libertarians, radical libertarians, whenever there's something wrong with humanity, 59 00:06:31.720 --> 00:06:35.720 some sort of social problem that we can all identify as, yes, that's a problem, 60 00:06:35.720 --> 00:06:41.720 the standard libertarian solution or approach is to first say, okay, how is government causing that problem? 61 00:06:41.720 --> 00:06:46.880 and that's and I there's usually the government certainly has a hand in it but 62 00:06:46.880 --> 00:06:51.260 I think from a Christian viewpoint that that's that's missing the the big 63 00:06:51.260 --> 00:06:55.540 picture that ultimately it's not merely that all government is messing things up 64 00:06:55.540 --> 00:06:58.880 but the human beings themselves are flawed and there are plenty of things 65 00:06:58.880 --> 00:07:03.360 that it's true government exacerbates it and of course you have fallen men in the 66 00:07:03.360 --> 00:07:08.040 government doing it but it's even if even if there were a libertarian so 67 00:07:08.040 --> 00:07:11.520 called utopia that really wouldn't be the Garden of Eden that even if everyone 68 00:07:11.520 --> 00:07:18.520 The Alleged, or perhaps real, tension between free market economics and free market economics 69 00:07:41.520 --> 00:07:55.520 and Economics and Christianity, I have this quote from C.S. Lewis, who most of us in this room, I think, respect, and we certainly can't just dismiss anything that he says as being foolish, and this is from mere Christianity, I believe, and he says, 70 00:07:55.520 --> 00:08:05.520 There is one bit of advice given to us by the ancient Greeks and by the Jews in the Old Testament and by the great Christian teachers of the Middle Ages, which the modern economic system has completely disobeyed. 71 00:08:05.520 --> 00:08:13.520 All these people told us not to lend money at interest, and lending money at interest, what we call investment, is the basis of our whole system. 72 00:08:13.520 --> 00:08:22.520 Now, it may not absolutely follow that we are wrong, but I should not have been honest if I had not told you that three great civilizations had agreed, or so it seems at first sight, 73 00:08:22.520 --> 00:08:26.520 and Condemning the very thing in which we have based our whole life. 74 00:08:26.520 --> 00:08:31.520 So when I read that, it disturbed me. 75 00:08:31.520 --> 00:08:36.520 And not in the sense that how could C.S. Lewis have been so crazy, but rather in the sense that, yeah, he's right. 76 00:08:36.520 --> 00:08:42.520 And of course, coming from the Austrian tradition, we know about the law of time preference and that. 77 00:08:42.520 --> 00:08:46.520 And that's the explanation and justification, if you will, for interest. 78 00:08:46.520 --> 00:09:00.520 It did seem hard. How do you square it with that? How could it be that all these great traditions that we endorse in terms of our faith lives, how could they have been so completely wrong? Or rather, is it that they're wrong or is it more nuanced? 79 00:09:00.520 --> 00:09:13.520 So that's an issue for me. And just to make it a little bit more personal to understand why I'm particularly interested in this one, my dissertation topic involved capital and interest theory. 80 00:09:13.520 --> 00:09:43.520 and portions of it I was in a sense saying this is the proper way or this is a better way to defend the capitalist earning of interest in a market economy as opposed to some of the other defenses that have been given and so if C.S. Lewis, if his point is a valid one then that led me to worry a bit and just to tell you two incidents that happened I was, when I was a graduate student I was wrapping up my dissertation and so you'd work on it at home and then you'd go into the office and work on it there 81 00:09:43.520 --> 00:09:55.520 And so I was at home working on my laptop and then I had to go into the office. I didn't want to be carrying around a floppy, so of course you email it to yourself so that when you get into the school you can get it off your email there. 82 00:09:55.520 --> 00:10:04.520 And it must have been nearing the ends of the process because I converted it to an Adobe file that was really big and attached that so you can go and... 83 00:10:04.520 --> 00:10:11.520 I don't know if they give it to all their graduates who are just PhD students or how it works, but I was filling out the formula. 84 00:10:11.520 --> 00:10:15.520 How did you enjoy your time here? How did this compare with other institutions and so on? 85 00:10:15.520 --> 00:10:22.520 And one of the things was a bubble sheet with all the different graduate school of the arts and sciences and what department were you in? 86 00:10:22.520 --> 00:10:27.520 And what do you think the three-digit code for the economics department was? It was 666. 87 00:10:27.520 --> 00:10:32.520 And I'm not making this up. You'd think someone would have caught that, but maybe they thought it was funny. I don't know. 88 00:10:32.520 --> 00:10:40.520 This is what I'm saying. It's not merely an academic thing. There was a time when I was really concerned about these things. 89 00:10:40.520 --> 00:10:49.520 Now, for Austro-libertarian economists who aren't particularly prone to excessive self-doubt, people like Walter Block, for example, 90 00:10:49.520 --> 00:10:54.520 I don't know him that well, but I don't picture Walter Block laying awake at night saying, 91 00:10:54.520 --> 00:10:56.720 And I'd say, am I doing the right thing with my life? 92 00:10:56.720 --> 00:11:02.080 That's, he could explain these events, of course. 93 00:11:02.080 --> 00:11:04.320 He could say, well, NYU, it's a bunch of commies. 94 00:11:04.320 --> 00:11:07.160 And yes, of course, their program is from the devil. 95 00:11:07.160 --> 00:11:10.720 They're teaching you to contrast the free market 96 00:11:10.720 --> 00:11:13.760 decentralized outcome with the central planner solution. 97 00:11:13.760 --> 00:11:15.680 And I'm not making that up. 98 00:11:15.680 --> 00:11:17.960 I mean, you guys are familiar with Pareto optimality. 99 00:11:17.960 --> 00:11:20.200 And that's the way mainstream economists say, 100 00:11:20.200 --> 00:11:21.360 this is what ought to happen. 101 00:11:21.360 --> 00:11:23.480 And then what does the market do in equilibrium? 102 00:11:23.480 --> 00:11:25.320 But they didn't call it the Pareto optimal outcome. 103 00:11:25.320 --> 00:11:27.700 They actually referred to it in class, on the board, 104 00:11:27.700 --> 00:11:29.560 as the central planner solution. 105 00:11:29.560 --> 00:11:31.720 And that was the benchmark against which. 106 00:11:31.720 --> 00:11:35.480 So there, it's no surprise that that came up 107 00:11:35.480 --> 00:11:36.920 as 666 in its description. 108 00:11:36.920 --> 00:11:39.640 As far as my dissertation, well, I criticized Mises and Rothbard. 109 00:11:39.640 --> 00:11:40.640 So what do you expect? 110 00:11:40.640 --> 00:11:42.480 That would happen. 111 00:11:42.480 --> 00:11:47.880 Now, but to be a bit more serious about this, 112 00:11:47.880 --> 00:11:50.940 I think there is an element of truth in there, or at least 113 00:11:50.940 --> 00:11:59.900 And even those of us who, in terms of academics, endorse the Austrian theories concerning interest, 114 00:11:59.900 --> 00:12:05.620 in our personal lives, there are certain situations where we can at least understand the popular 115 00:12:05.620 --> 00:12:08.340 rejection of interest as somehow being exploitation. 116 00:12:08.340 --> 00:12:13.340 So for example, when we were newly married, my wife and I, on a few occasions, either from 117 00:12:13.340 --> 00:12:18.180 my parents or her parents, we would get a moderate-sized loan for a few months. 118 00:12:18.180 --> 00:12:23.980 We hit trouble and rather than having to go to get a cash advance and a credit card, of course, one of the set of our parents would say, 119 00:12:23.980 --> 00:12:27.980 well, here, we'll lend you the money and just pay us back in a few months when you can. 120 00:12:27.980 --> 00:12:31.480 And of course, they didn't let us pay them interest on it. They would have been insulted. 121 00:12:31.480 --> 00:12:36.780 They wanted us to pay them back. It wasn't that they was giving us the money, but they would have never, you know, 122 00:12:36.780 --> 00:12:44.180 it would have been inconceivable to them that they would have charged us prime rate plus 10 points or something because, you know, that's what the market will bear. 123 00:12:44.180 --> 00:12:50.180 So, if you just think about it, why is that then? It seems there's some validity to someone who might say, 124 00:12:50.180 --> 00:12:56.180 see, you economists, you free market economists, you have these theories that you think apply to the anonymous market, 125 00:12:56.180 --> 00:13:00.180 but as a Christian, don't you realize that everyone's your brother and that we're all, 126 00:13:00.180 --> 00:13:03.180 everything is really, in a sense, a face-to-face transaction. 127 00:13:03.180 --> 00:13:10.180 How can you endorse one set of ethics or norms for the so-called marketplace, but a different one in your personal life? 128 00:13:10.180 --> 00:13:17.180 But the more I was thinking about that, it's not so cut and dry, and it really doesn't have anything to do particularly with interest. 129 00:13:17.180 --> 00:13:22.180 For example, if our lawnmower broke down and my dad heard the story, I'm sure he would say, 130 00:13:22.180 --> 00:13:27.180 well, you can come borrow my lawnmower, and he wouldn't charge me $20 to do that. 131 00:13:27.180 --> 00:13:32.180 It would have been fine, even though in a sense I'm giving him back the lawnmower that was slightly more depreciated than when he lent it to me. 132 00:13:32.180 --> 00:13:36.180 And so, you see, it's not so much having anything to do with money in particular. 133 00:13:36.180 --> 00:13:41.180 I think it's just more that they had certain goods that we needed for a temporary period. 134 00:13:41.180 --> 00:13:45.180 And also there's the issue that they knew I was good for the loan, 135 00:13:45.180 --> 00:13:49.180 whereas a credit card company just going off my credit history wouldn't have as much information 136 00:13:49.180 --> 00:13:52.180 and be as sure that I wasn't going to skip town and not pay them back. 137 00:13:52.180 --> 00:13:57.180 And so the more you think about it, these examples aren't, it's not so crystal clear that 138 00:13:57.180 --> 00:14:02.180 we're advocating one set of norms for your personal family life and a completely different one in the marketplace. 139 00:14:02.180 --> 00:14:32.180 and of course if we wanted to go buy a house our parents wouldn't have given us $30,000 and said just pay us back whenever you can and let's not even bother writing a contract and you know they of course would have said okay and what interest rate are you going to pay us if the numbers got bigger and bigger so as I say it's not so obvious that there really is this double standard that one would be advocating even if you do agree that yes in certain situations if you're lending money to your kid or you're borrowing money from your parents that it would 140 00:14:32.180 --> 00:14:35.420 be a bit unseemly if they were charging an interest rate. 141 00:14:35.420 --> 00:14:40.660 And this is similar, I think, to some arguments 142 00:14:40.660 --> 00:14:44.460 I had with people over Katrina that I wrote a few articles 143 00:14:44.460 --> 00:14:48.500 on the complaints against the price gouging. 144 00:14:48.500 --> 00:14:50.580 And I was saying things, well, that's 145 00:14:50.580 --> 00:14:52.220 exactly the exact opposite of what 146 00:14:52.220 --> 00:14:56.540 we need that the rise in prices of bottled water and batteries 147 00:14:56.540 --> 00:14:58.620 and so on, that's the signals that the market 148 00:14:58.620 --> 00:15:03.700 uses to ship the goods to the people who need them most and some people were 149 00:15:03.700 --> 00:15:06.540 emailing me and say oh come on you say that I can't believe you people really 150 00:15:06.540 --> 00:15:10.020 believe that stuff are you telling me that you know someone walking through 151 00:15:10.020 --> 00:15:13.380 New Orleans and it's flooded and there's all these people dying of thirst and he 152 00:15:13.380 --> 00:15:17.540 has bottled water and you really think that he ought to be going 30 30 30 I 153 00:15:17.540 --> 00:15:22.620 hear 30 or 25 and the auctioning off the wall while these people are all dying of 154 00:15:22.620 --> 00:15:26.340 thirst and how can you say that with a straight face and it's true in that 155 00:15:26.340 --> 00:15:56.340 That particular situation, no, I do think that if that person is a Christian and there are people literally dying in front of them and he has the water there, that it would be incorrect, without knowing more information about the situation, to not give them the water and to insist that they pay them and if they can't pay them, they die, or to give all the water to somebody who offers a $100 bill and let 90 other people who don't have any money on them at that moment die of thirst. I do agree that that wouldn't be a Christian thing to do, but as I was 156 00:15:56.340 --> 00:16:06.340 I was arguing with this person and trying to push it back. What exactly does the person think ought to be done instead besides just telling people if you're in situations like that, do what you think is right? 157 00:16:06.340 --> 00:16:14.340 Because I think where this person was coming from, if you pushed it far enough, basically the entire United States would have had to stop using money altogether. 158 00:16:14.340 --> 00:16:22.340 Because you could say, well, the bottled water company, how could they continue to ship water to these people and just hand it out for free? They would have gone out of business. 159 00:16:22.340 --> 00:16:39.340 The answer could be, oh, well, that's only because those people are being green. If we lived in a just society, then the workers would realize, well, we can't insist on wages right now. We have to drive the trucks down and hand out the water, do our part to help these poor people. 160 00:16:39.340 --> 00:16:43.340 And you could say, okay, but then if they didn't get wages, well, how would they feed their family? 161 00:16:43.340 --> 00:16:51.340 And you could just keep pushing it back and saying, well, the supermarkets ought to give food for free to the people who are volunteering to help the people in Katrina by giving them water. 162 00:16:51.340 --> 00:16:56.340 And it would just keep moving in larger and larger circles. And it's not, eventually, it wouldn't just be a matter of incentives. 163 00:16:56.340 --> 00:17:03.340 It wouldn't be unrealistic because at some point you'd run up against people who were hypocrites and acting in an unchristian manner. 164 00:17:03.340 --> 00:17:33.340 Manor, but eventually you would have to be planning the entire economy without money prices that people would need to know okay these bottles of water should go down to New Orleans and it's not just which goods need to go down there because there'd be the problem that you know what if a thousand flashlights went down but only 200 batteries went down and then you know would be pointless and so little things like that that don't just automatically follow from the Sermon on the Mount quantitative issues that really it's not a matter of pure justice that it's there's there's quantities involved 165 00:17:33.340 --> 00:17:38.940 And so there's numbers involved, and that's where economic calculation assists us greatly. 166 00:17:38.940 --> 00:17:43.820 And so that's, and again, it's not just the consumption good, it's also, okay, let's suppose 167 00:17:43.820 --> 00:17:48.140 we can agree that this bottled water ought to go down to the people in New Orleans and 168 00:17:48.140 --> 00:17:52.700 we can decide on that in the waters, you know, up in Washington, D.C., well, how do we get 169 00:17:52.700 --> 00:17:53.700 it down there? 170 00:17:53.700 --> 00:17:57.980 Do we charter a private jet and fly down there and get it there in a few hours, or do we 171 00:17:57.980 --> 00:18:00.620 put it on a bus and get it there in a few days? 172 00:18:00.620 --> 00:18:04.740 These are the sorts of trade-offs that even if we can agree on the ultimate moral ends, 173 00:18:04.740 --> 00:18:08.820 it's not entirely obvious the way to achieve them. 174 00:18:08.820 --> 00:18:12.060 And that's again where economic calculation comes into play. 175 00:18:12.060 --> 00:18:15.780 So it's not that I had a definitive answer for the person. 176 00:18:15.780 --> 00:18:18.860 I could identify in every single situation, oh yes, this would be the Christian thing 177 00:18:18.860 --> 00:18:20.420 to do or this wouldn't. 178 00:18:20.420 --> 00:18:25.300 But it doesn't immediately follow that this person's pointing to what he called price 179 00:18:25.300 --> 00:18:30.260 gouging was an evil thing, that in certain aspects I think it would be entirely appropriate 180 00:18:30.260 --> 00:19:00.260 for someone to raise prices, in a sense, taking advantage of the situation, the temporary emergency situation of those people, because if you don't allow that person to do that, and you apply that principle to more and more people, well then we just lose the ability to help the people as effectively as possible, and it's not, just to clarify, I'm not merely saying that, oh it's a violation of property rights and you can't use coercion, and so that's why it would be unacceptable, even put that aside, I'm saying if we can agree that just our sole aim were to help 181 00:19:30.260 --> 00:20:00.260 The Federal Reserve, fiat money, fractional reserve banking, 182 00:20:00.260 --> 00:20:05.900 by or have their volunteers go and hand the things out for free and the way they pay the 183 00:20:05.900 --> 00:20:09.540 suppliers of bottled water is through those voluntary donations that other people have 184 00:20:09.540 --> 00:20:10.540 given. 185 00:20:10.540 --> 00:20:17.840 So it's not that, let me put it this way, respecting property rights is consistent with 186 00:20:17.840 --> 00:20:21.200 all sorts of responses to Katrine that if everyone had been completely indifferent and 187 00:20:21.200 --> 00:20:24.420 said, yeah, those people should have known better than to live down there and done absolutely 188 00:20:24.420 --> 00:20:29.700 nothing, then I think that would have been sinful perhaps for many people to ignore the 189 00:20:29.700 --> 00:20:45.700 and the plight that was right before their eyes, or on the other hand, people responding and going and donating a lot of money and responding generously would also have been consistent with voluntarily obeying property rights and not abandoning the market order. 190 00:20:45.700 --> 00:20:54.700 Now, I want to move on to some passages in the Bible to elaborate on these themes. 191 00:20:54.700 --> 00:21:01.700 When it comes to property in the Old Testament, I think it's clear that it's certainly not an unjust institution, 192 00:21:01.700 --> 00:21:08.700 that it seems that God has no problem with property per se, and that might seem like a strange thing for me to talk about, 193 00:21:08.700 --> 00:21:16.300 out, but again, the relevance for me was in arguing with certain leftist anarchists who 194 00:21:16.300 --> 00:21:21.500 believe that not only the government but private property itself is an unjust institution that 195 00:21:21.500 --> 00:21:25.260 relies on force. 196 00:21:25.260 --> 00:21:29.540 We went back and forth with our intellectual arguments, but the thing that really reassured 197 00:21:29.540 --> 00:21:33.500 me that I think I'm on the right side of this debate is the Ten Commandments say, do not 198 00:21:33.500 --> 00:21:35.500 The Theory of Money and Credit 199 00:22:03.500 --> 00:22:08.220 They listen to this form, they repent, and then God doesn't carry out the destruction 200 00:22:08.220 --> 00:22:11.260 that he would threaten them with. 201 00:22:11.260 --> 00:22:16.260 And what's ironic is the thing that's bad about being a prophet is not only are you 202 00:22:16.260 --> 00:22:20.340 saying things that are unpopular, but most of the time people just ignore you and you're 203 00:22:20.340 --> 00:22:24.900 powerless and you see the warnings you had issued come fulfilled, whereas with Jonah 204 00:22:24.900 --> 00:22:28.580 you'd think he would be ecstatic that here he goes to the city, he tells them to change 205 00:22:28.580 --> 00:22:32.260 their ways and they listen to him, but no, of course, Jonah, he's miserable, he actually 206 00:22:32.260 --> 00:22:34.260 The Theory of Money and Credit 207 00:23:02.260 --> 00:23:06.860 So he wanted me to kill 120,000 people who, for all practical purposes, didn't really 208 00:23:06.860 --> 00:23:11.280 know how bad what they were doing, what it was, so we needed you to go tell them. 209 00:23:11.280 --> 00:23:13.780 And then he adds, and you wanted me to destroy all that livestock too. 210 00:23:13.780 --> 00:23:17.800 Now of course it could just be that Jonah was very materialistic, we're not sure from 211 00:23:17.800 --> 00:23:21.800 the book itself, and maybe the Lord was just trying to wake him up and get him to see, 212 00:23:21.800 --> 00:23:23.520 look at what you were asking me to do. 213 00:23:23.520 --> 00:23:26.740 But nonetheless, that always struck me as a strange thing for him to say, that you were 214 00:23:26.740 --> 00:23:29.140 asking me to destroy all this property. 215 00:23:29.140 --> 00:23:38.060 So now if we move on to the New Testament, I think the modern critic who says that there's 216 00:23:38.060 --> 00:23:44.140 all sorts of things in Christianity that are inconsistent with free market economics or 217 00:23:44.140 --> 00:23:48.160 the endorsement of free market economics, there are plenty of passages in the Gospels 218 00:23:48.160 --> 00:23:53.320 that at least superficially lend some credibility to that claim. 219 00:23:53.320 --> 00:23:59.080 But I think, let me just read a somewhat lengthy excerpt to sort of put them in perspective. 220 00:23:59.080 --> 00:24:04.220 I think most of these passages, it's not so much that Jesus is denouncing wealth and riches 221 00:24:04.220 --> 00:24:09.340 per se, but rather the attitude that you're getting your security from them. 222 00:24:09.340 --> 00:24:15.500 So it's not if you have wealth that that means you're automatically, you must not be a good 223 00:24:15.500 --> 00:24:20.140 person or you must not be following God's commands, but rather if you're really worried 224 00:24:20.140 --> 00:24:23.580 about the future and so what do you do, oh, I'm going to go diversify my portfolio and 225 00:24:23.580 --> 00:24:27.940 now I feel a lot better about myself and I can handle the uncertainties of tomorrow. 226 00:24:27.940 --> 00:24:31.940 If that's your attitude, rather than, well, I'm going to trust in the Lord, whatever happens 227 00:24:31.940 --> 00:24:36.060 tomorrow is consistent with His plan, and so even if I don't understand it at the time, 228 00:24:36.060 --> 00:24:40.940 I better just accept it and try to know that at some point it will make sense to me. 229 00:24:40.940 --> 00:24:45.020 If the first thing is your solution, then yes, I think that's what Jesus specifically 230 00:24:45.020 --> 00:24:46.060 is saying the problem is. 231 00:24:46.060 --> 00:24:53.260 So let me just, to back that particular interpretation up that I don't think is too, that many people 232 00:24:53.260 --> 00:25:12.260 Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is there, your heart will also be. 233 00:25:12.260 --> 00:25:15.780 and a little bit later he says no one can serve two masters 234 00:25:15.780 --> 00:25:18.540 rather he will hate the one and love the other else he will be loyal to the one 235 00:25:18.540 --> 00:25:20.820 despise the other you cannot serve God and mammon 236 00:25:20.820 --> 00:25:24.020 therefore I say to you do not worry about your life what you will eat or what 237 00:25:24.020 --> 00:25:24.740 you will drink 238 00:25:24.740 --> 00:25:28.400 nor about your body what you will put on is not life more than food in the body 239 00:25:28.400 --> 00:25:29.380 more than clothing 240 00:25:29.380 --> 00:25:32.740 okay then he says a little bit later 241 00:25:32.740 --> 00:25:36.180 therefore do not worry saying what shall we eat or what shall we drink or what 242 00:25:36.180 --> 00:25:37.060 shall we wear 243 00:25:37.060 --> 00:25:40.660 for after all these things the Gentiles seek for your heavenly Father knows that 244 00:25:40.660 --> 00:25:42.220 you need all these things but seek first the 245 00:25:42.220 --> 00:25:45.900 The Kingdom of God and His Righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 246 00:25:45.900 --> 00:25:50.820 Okay, so there, he wasn't saying you don't need material goods, no, he was saying the 247 00:25:50.820 --> 00:25:51.820 exact opposite. 248 00:25:51.820 --> 00:25:56.700 You do need them, but God knows you need them, and the point wasn't don't, when he says don't 249 00:25:56.700 --> 00:26:01.460 worry about them, I don't think he means forget about them and just don't even consider them. 250 00:26:01.460 --> 00:26:05.820 I think he means literally don't worry about them, that it'll take care of itself in a 251 00:26:05.820 --> 00:26:11.460 sense if you first put what's most important and set that as the priority in your life. 252 00:26:11.460 --> 00:26:22.460 Now there's a few other passages that I think the critic would point to and say these particularly show the flaw in your thesis, if you're a free market economist. 253 00:26:22.460 --> 00:26:26.460 So let me just deal with those. These will be shorter quotations. 254 00:26:26.460 --> 00:26:39.700 So, if we look at Matthew chapter 5, it's the famous passages about, you know, if someone 255 00:26:39.700 --> 00:26:44.220 wants to borrow, go ahead and lend to them, and if someone wants your cloak, give them 256 00:26:44.220 --> 00:26:54.700 your tunic as well, or your tunic, give them your cloak as well, and he says, if anyone 257 00:26:54.700 --> 00:27:01.700 If anyone wants to sue you and take away your tunic, let him have your cloak also, and a little bit later, give to him who asks you, and from him who wants to borrow from you, do not turn away. 258 00:27:01.700 --> 00:27:07.700 And in and of itself, it does look like that's saying, how could you be a capitalist who charges what the market will bear? 259 00:27:07.700 --> 00:27:16.700 But in context, you see the, right before those, it says, for example, you have heard that it was said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, but I tell you not to resist an evil person. 260 00:27:16.700 --> 00:27:18.700 Whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other one to him also. 261 00:27:18.700 --> 00:27:23.620 Also, and then immediately after that is, if anyone wants to sue you and take away your 262 00:27:23.620 --> 00:27:27.480 tunic, let them have your cloak, and then, there's another first, but then the next one, 263 00:27:27.480 --> 00:27:31.260 give to him who asks you and from him who wants to borrow from you, do not turn away. 264 00:27:31.260 --> 00:27:36.460 So in that context, it seems as if the person who is just coming up to you and asking to 265 00:27:36.460 --> 00:27:42.220 borrow money, it's possible that that person, in a sense, is aggrieving you the same way 266 00:27:42.220 --> 00:27:44.340 that someone comes up and slaps you on the cheek is. 267 00:27:44.340 --> 00:27:48.300 And so the fact that he's saying there, you can go ahead, you should lend to the person 268 00:27:48.300 --> 00:27:57.300 Anyway, I don't think he's saying, therefore, anytime you're lending money to someone, don't expect to ever be paid back and don't worry about repayment. 269 00:27:57.300 --> 00:28:08.300 I think it's more that he's just showing this is the way you deal with, in a sense, affronts to you or insults to yourself, that you just respond with generosity and kindness. 270 00:28:08.300 --> 00:28:15.160 Okay, what about the probably the most famous example in this tradition of the apparent 271 00:28:15.160 --> 00:28:19.340 tension between Christianity and free market economics? 272 00:28:19.340 --> 00:28:28.180 In the Gospel of Mark, we have the rich man comes up to Jesus and he says, good teacher, 273 00:28:28.180 --> 00:28:30.460 what do I need to do to inherit eternal life? 274 00:28:30.460 --> 00:28:33.620 And he says, follow the commandments and he lists some of them and he says, I've done 275 00:28:33.620 --> 00:28:34.620 that. 276 00:28:34.620 --> 00:28:35.620 And he says, okay, one more thing. 277 00:28:35.620 --> 00:28:41.620 go your way, sell whatever you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven and come, take up the cross and follow me. 278 00:28:41.620 --> 00:28:46.620 But the rich man was sad at this word because he had many possessions and he just walked away sorrowfully. 279 00:28:46.620 --> 00:28:51.620 And so then Jesus turns to his disciples and says, how hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God. 280 00:28:51.620 --> 00:28:55.620 And they were astonished at his words and he says again, and this one in particular, 281 00:28:55.620 --> 00:28:58.620 how hard it is for those who trust in riches to enter the kingdom of God. 282 00:28:58.620 --> 00:29:03.620 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. 283 00:29:03.620 --> 00:29:19.620 Alright, so there, certainly it seems as if that's evidence in favor of the thesis that there's a conflict, but again, at least in this translation, the second time he uttered it, he speds more specifically for those who trust in riches to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. 284 00:29:19.620 --> 00:29:34.620 And so in context of the other things I've mentioned to you, I think it's not so much that someone who has riches per se, but rather the type of person who has riches is probably also going to be the one who really seeks after them. 285 00:29:34.620 --> 00:29:43.620 And so that's, I think, his point. And also, of course, Jesus knew when that particular rich man came up to him that he was going to say that he wasn't going to listen to him. 286 00:29:43.620 --> 00:29:52.620 So it's possible that the reason he said to him, what I want you to do is to sell your riches and give to the poor and come follow me, was that he wanted to have a lesson for his disciples. 287 00:29:52.620 --> 00:30:02.620 So I don't think it necessarily follows just from that story that if you are rich right now, that means Jesus wants you to sell everything and go join a monastery or something. 288 00:30:02.620 --> 00:30:07.540 And, again, it's not that we're sure he doesn't mean that, but I don't think that passage 289 00:30:07.540 --> 00:30:12.580 alone you could conclude straightforwardly that that's what he does mean for all people 290 00:30:12.580 --> 00:30:14.240 who are rich to do. 291 00:30:14.240 --> 00:30:19.340 And also, one thing to consider is by their standards, just about everyone in America 292 00:30:19.340 --> 00:30:21.260 today is fabulously wealthy. 293 00:30:21.260 --> 00:30:25.060 So I think a lot of people, like blue-collar churchgoers, for example, probably think, 294 00:30:25.060 --> 00:30:28.380 yeah, when they read something like that, Bill Gates is going to hell for sure. 295 00:30:28.380 --> 00:30:30.780 But you know, I'm not, because look at how hard it is. 296 00:30:30.780 --> 00:30:37.920 I only have my cars beat up and we you know we don't even have cable and we have a you know a dial-up internet connection where 297 00:30:39.360 --> 00:30:46.240 Where of course compared to the you know there are probably many respects richer than Herod was okay, so it's again 298 00:30:46.240 --> 00:30:49.440 It's always a relative thing and so what do we mean by by rich? 299 00:30:49.440 --> 00:30:55.760 I I don't think Jesus had in mind a particular material standard of living. I think it was more an attitude that do you 300 00:30:55.760 --> 00:31:07.760 Do you derive your personal self-worth, or do you derive your security from your material possessions, or do you realize that they're really nothing, that that's not an important thing in the grand scheme? 301 00:31:07.760 --> 00:31:24.760 Okay, another famous story from the Gospels, I'm not going to read it, comes from the Gospel of Luke as it mentions it, where Jesus tells a story of the rich man who was dressed in fine robes and so on, and then there's the beggar Lazarus, 302 00:31:24.760 --> 00:31:30.960 and the Lazarus begs him for crumbs and then when they both die the rich man is being tormented 303 00:31:30.960 --> 00:31:39.960 by hellfire and Lazarus is in paradise and Abraham explains to the rich man that you 304 00:31:39.960 --> 00:31:44.780 had good things on earth and now Lazarus was a poor beggar and now the situations have 305 00:31:44.780 --> 00:31:51.200 been reversed and that I think epitomizes the anti-capitalist interpretation of Christianity 306 00:31:51.200 --> 00:31:53.200 The Theory of Money and Credit 307 00:32:21.200 --> 00:32:27.200 The Theory of Money and Credit 308 00:32:51.200 --> 00:33:21.200 I don't think so. If we consider what happened with Solomon, so of course he's placed on the throne after David, he's the son of David, he gets on the throne and then the Lord comes to him in a dream and asks him, ask me what you want and I'll give it to you and Solomon asks basically for wisdom and discerning justice so that he can effectively rule over the people in the way that God wants and God's very pleased with that answer. He says you didn't ask me for riches, you didn't ask me for long life, you didn't ask me to 309 00:33:21.200 --> 00:33:27.200 The Theory of Money and Credit 310 00:33:51.200 --> 00:33:56.880 to give him riches and of course there's other places too when God is telling them I told 311 00:33:56.880 --> 00:34:01.080 you to tithe and you're not tithing and he says things to the effect that just trust 312 00:34:01.080 --> 00:34:05.960 in me and tithe and then you will get more than paid back in essence. 313 00:34:05.960 --> 00:34:10.480 And so it's not so much that of course God wants the material goods that they're offering 314 00:34:10.480 --> 00:34:14.480 to him but rather he wants them to obey his word and to trust him that even though it 315 00:34:14.480 --> 00:34:19.240 seems in a sense silly why would I give up one tenth of my goods especially when God 316 00:34:19.240 --> 00:34:45.240 the Capitalist Way of Life and Christianity 317 00:34:45.240 --> 00:35:15.240 Okay, let me move on. I'm running out of time here. One thing I would say is whether or not we think that they can feel comfortable in the grand scheme of things, I think Austro-libertarian economists, at least if there is this tension, their actions are far more defensible than other possible economists, because what Austro-libertarians do, yes, they're scientists, they use economic science, and that's what they devote their occupation to, 318 00:35:15.240 --> 00:35:25.240 The point of it is not just to study economic science per se, but then they go and apply and try to diminish or eliminate what they perceive to be as injustice. 319 00:35:25.240 --> 00:35:40.240 So somebody who gets involved in the arguments over the drug war, for example, it's not simply an academic exercise, but the point is to stop people getting locked up and to stop drive-by shootings and things like that. 320 00:35:40.240 --> 00:35:47.200 And so if we go back to the C.S. Lewis quote, it's true. 321 00:35:47.200 --> 00:35:52.140 I'm not sure if, as an Austrian economist, you can say the world would be worse if more 322 00:35:52.140 --> 00:35:57.560 people lowered the rate of interest that they insisted on when they were giving loans to 323 00:35:57.560 --> 00:35:58.560 people. 324 00:35:58.560 --> 00:36:02.680 I'm not sure that the other way is true too, but it's not clear to me voluntarily if people, 325 00:36:02.680 --> 00:36:06.460 especially Christians, said, you know, maybe I should lend out to more people without asking 326 00:36:06.460 --> 00:36:07.820 for interest. 327 00:36:07.820 --> 00:36:10.040 Maybe there wouldn't be any ramifications from them. 328 00:36:10.040 --> 00:36:15.080 would be good, but what I am pretty sure about is if the government uses guns basically to 329 00:36:15.080 --> 00:36:20.720 punish people who are charging interest, that I think would clearly be worse than the alleged 330 00:36:20.720 --> 00:36:22.480 evil that we're trying to remedy. 331 00:36:22.480 --> 00:36:27.040 And so to the extent that what we're doing is not so much telling individuals how to 332 00:36:27.040 --> 00:36:32.480 live their lives, but rather just taking certain means off the table, namely intervention by 333 00:36:32.480 --> 00:36:37.120 the government, then I think there's a much stronger case where the Austrian libertarian 334 00:36:37.120 --> 00:36:43.120 and economists can clearly say, yes, what I'm doing is not inconsistent with the tenets of Christianity. 335 00:36:43.120 --> 00:36:52.120 Now having said that, I do think that there are aspects of Austro-libertarianism that we do need to be careful about. 336 00:36:52.120 --> 00:36:57.120 So I've mentioned one that I think it's incorrect or short-sighted perhaps to say, 337 00:36:57.120 --> 00:37:01.120 oh, the government's causing all these bad problems and not to realize, if you're a Christian at least, 338 00:37:01.120 --> 00:37:17.120 And another point I would want to make is that I think libertarians sometimes lose sight of the fact that there are plenty of things that are legal from a libertarian point of view that are far more sinful than other things that would be illegal from a libertarian point of view. 339 00:37:17.120 --> 00:37:47.120 and another point I would want to make is that I think libertarians sometimes lose sight of the fact there are plenty of things that are legal from a libertarian point of view that are far more sinful than other things that would be illegal from a libertarian point of view and for example suicide would be presumably legal in a Rothbardian world but of course that's if you're a Catholic that's you know one of the if not the worst thing you can do or just to blaspheme against the Holy Spirit for example is that's a very serious 340 00:38:17.120 --> 00:38:21.760 You can criticize something and not mean, and therefore I'm going to use force to try to stop it. 341 00:38:21.760 --> 00:38:27.280 You can just say, oh, that's a bad practice, and I don't think those people should do that, and they're wrong for doing it, and I'm not going to associate with them. 342 00:38:27.280 --> 00:38:33.760 And just to say, well, gee, they're not violating anyone's property rights, that isn't an adequate response necessarily. 343 00:38:33.760 --> 00:38:45.480 Okay, let me deal with two last biblical episodes that people would point to, specifically regarding anarcho-capitalism and Christianity. 344 00:38:45.480 --> 00:39:13.600 Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except 345 00:39:13.600 --> 00:39:17.760 from God and the authorities that exist are appointed by God. Therefore, whoever resists 346 00:39:17.760 --> 00:39:21.400 the authority resists the ordinance of God and those who resist will bring judgment on 347 00:39:21.400 --> 00:39:25.280 themselves. For rulers are not a terror to good works but to evil. Do you want to be 348 00:39:25.280 --> 00:39:29.280 unafraid of the authority? Then do what is good and you will have praise from the same. 349 00:39:29.280 --> 00:39:33.080 For he is God's minister to you for good but if you do evil be afraid for he does not bear 350 00:39:33.080 --> 00:39:37.920 the sword in vain for he is God's minister and avenger to execute wrath on him and who 351 00:39:37.920 --> 00:39:38.920 who practices evil. 352 00:39:38.920 --> 00:39:44.080 Okay, so as I say, he doesn't qualify this, and Christians email me and say, how can you 353 00:39:44.080 --> 00:39:49.920 possibly say you're against the government, and moreover, you try to argue that that's 354 00:39:49.920 --> 00:39:53.800 what a truly Christian viewpoint would be, when look at what Paul's saying, what do you 355 00:39:53.800 --> 00:39:54.800 do with that? 356 00:39:54.800 --> 00:39:57.080 And let me admit, it is difficult. 357 00:39:57.080 --> 00:40:03.280 It does seem as if Paul is saying that, yeah, how could you possibly say the government 358 00:40:03.280 --> 00:40:04.640 ever does anything wrong? 359 00:40:04.640 --> 00:40:11.080 And at the same time, forget anarcho-capitalism, just with people with regular political beliefs, 360 00:40:11.080 --> 00:40:15.920 it seems that Paul's statements here can't possibly mean what it seems that they say. 361 00:40:15.920 --> 00:40:23.960 For example, he himself in the previous chapter is saying, if it is possible, as much as depends 362 00:40:23.960 --> 00:40:27.320 on you, live peaceably with all men, beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give 363 00:40:27.320 --> 00:40:31.200 place to wrath, for it is written, vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord. 364 00:40:31.200 --> 00:40:35.200 and then a little bit later, do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good. 365 00:40:35.200 --> 00:40:44.200 Okay, so I've discussed that with non-anarcho-capitalist Christians at Hillsdale College, other professors and they don't, 366 00:40:44.200 --> 00:40:50.200 and I say, how do you reconcile those two? Is he assuming that the people in government aren't themselves Christians? 367 00:40:50.200 --> 00:40:56.200 And the answer, the person was, what are you talking about? No, he's not assuming that, it's just that in your private life, 368 00:40:56.200 --> 00:41:02.540 If you're not supposed to be wrathful and you're supposed to turn the other cheek and so on, 369 00:41:02.540 --> 00:41:08.040 but if you're acting as God's minister of justice in a governmental capacity, then of 370 00:41:08.040 --> 00:41:13.300 course the other chapter is relevant and that's your fulfilling God's...that's the way that 371 00:41:13.300 --> 00:41:18.440 the Lord takes his vengeance is that he works through the government officials. 372 00:41:18.440 --> 00:41:23.880 So again, that's an understandable interpretation. 373 00:41:23.880 --> 00:41:28.320 Even beyond that though, I mean certainly it just seems there's no qualification here 374 00:41:28.320 --> 00:41:32.040 that Paul doesn't say governments that seem to be doing the right thing. 375 00:41:32.040 --> 00:41:36.240 I mean there were plenty of historical cases of governments persecuting Christians. 376 00:41:36.240 --> 00:41:43.400 And so clearly I don't think Paul would say to them, don't worry about it, that the government's 377 00:41:43.400 --> 00:41:45.280 persecuting you because you did something wrong. 378 00:41:45.280 --> 00:41:49.620 I mean I'm not sure exactly what he would do with that, but what I'm suggesting is this 379 00:41:49.620 --> 00:41:53.980 This passage in and of itself, I don't think, if you're an anarcho-capitalist and a Christian, 380 00:41:53.980 --> 00:41:58.460 this should make you realize you're being inconsistent because it seems hard to reconcile 381 00:41:58.460 --> 00:42:01.820 with all sorts of more moderate political views. 382 00:42:01.820 --> 00:42:07.000 For example, of course, I don't endorse this, but many mainstream Christians who, if they're 383 00:42:07.000 --> 00:42:11.940 arguing me over anarchism, would point to this, also supported the invasion of Iraq, 384 00:42:11.940 --> 00:42:15.460 but you could just as well ask them, well, wasn't Saddam Hussein the minister of God 385 00:42:15.460 --> 00:42:19.060 and if the Iraqis were getting killed by him, they must have done something unrighteous 386 00:42:19.060 --> 00:42:29.060 And that's why they were, right? And so I think, you know, even mainstream Christians who were, you know, fundamentalists and literally believed every word of the Bible would say, well, no, that doesn't follow. 387 00:42:29.060 --> 00:42:41.060 And so by the same token, it's just that with our political views, if you're an anarchist, that you think all types of human government are similarly not following other precepts of Christianity. 388 00:42:41.060 --> 00:42:48.300 Okay, and then the last thing I want to talk about is the famous render unto Caesar's what 389 00:42:48.300 --> 00:42:50.240 is Caesar's quotation. 390 00:42:50.240 --> 00:42:56.960 Now there, the context of that, of course, is they were trying to trap Jesus, okay? 391 00:42:56.960 --> 00:43:01.220 So I think it's wrong to conclude from that that, oh, see, Jesus said, therefore, pay 392 00:43:01.220 --> 00:43:05.720 your taxes, because he couldn't have said one thing or the other. 393 00:43:05.720 --> 00:43:09.980 In order to get out of that situation, he had to give an answer that was unobjectionable, 394 00:43:09.980 --> 00:43:10.980 The Theory of Money and Credit 395 00:43:10.980 --> 00:43:12.980 The Theory of Money and Credit 396 00:43:39.980 --> 00:43:47.980 And of course, he was very ambiguous because he prefaced that by saying, you know, show me the coin, whose image is that on the denarius and it was Caesar's. 397 00:43:47.980 --> 00:43:52.980 And so that certainly makes it sound as if he's saying, oh well then therefore the coin belongs to him. 398 00:43:52.980 --> 00:44:01.980 But again, it's not clear that, you know, I could hold up a box of Wheaties and say whose picture, whose image is that, and you could say Michael Jordan's and say, okay, well give unto Jordans what is Jordans. 399 00:44:01.980 --> 00:44:08.980 And it doesn't follow, right? And so again, and it's, I don't think I'm just being flippant that, you know, they were trying to trap it. 400 00:44:08.980 --> 00:44:13.440 to trap it, I didn't explain why in case you're not familiar with the story. They were trying 401 00:44:13.440 --> 00:44:17.240 to trap him because they said, you know, is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar? So if he 402 00:44:17.240 --> 00:44:23.460 says yes unambiguously, then the masses who view him as their savior, the one who's going 403 00:44:23.460 --> 00:44:27.300 to deliver them from the occupation, you know, the Roman authorities, they're going to be 404 00:44:27.300 --> 00:44:31.180 upset, they're going to think he's a sellout, so he can't just clearly say yes, but he can't 405 00:44:31.180 --> 00:44:34.700 say no because then, you know, he's saying don't pay your taxes to Caesar and then he 406 00:44:34.700 --> 00:44:49.700 And so they were trying to give him a question, no matter which way he answered, he was going to be in trouble, and so that's why I think he needed to use that sort of evasion to be as wise as a serpent but as harmless as a dove. 407 00:44:49.700 --> 00:45:19.700 And then the last thing I'll say, and then there's a few more minutes for questioning, is certainly the libertarian objection to taxes on the very same page in my Bible earlier, he's telling the chief priests, you know, they're arguing with him back and forth, and he says, okay, tell me, so there's one son, he says, what do you think, a man had two sons, and he says that the first one go to work in my vineyard, and he says I'm not going 408 00:45:19.700 --> 00:45:43.380 So, the fact that he's picking tax collectors in conjunction with Harlots to tell them just 409 00:45:43.380 --> 00:45:49.380 I think shows that certainly Jesus was not a big fan of taxation. 410 00:45:49.380 --> 00:45:54.380 So, okay, I'll, so thank you and I'll let Jeff come up. 411 00:45:54.380 --> 00:46:04.380 Let's start with you. 412 00:46:04.380 --> 00:46:10.380 Bob, just kind of an addition on that too, that particular incident in the temple, if you remember, 413 00:46:10.380 --> 00:46:14.380 you're inside the temple, he asks, does anybody have a denarius? 414 00:46:14.380 --> 00:46:18.380 And who pulls out a denarius? Well, it has Caesar's head on it. 415 00:46:18.380 --> 00:46:21.380 Now, that's an image of Caesar, remember, who claimed to be God, 416 00:46:21.380 --> 00:46:51.380 which would be absolutely anathema to have carried, you're not supposed to carry images of other gods into the temple, carry itself, so at that point Jesus already had them, because, you know, that, in other words, there's a larger hidden aspect of that as well, and one other thing too, that Romans 13 was written at a time when the Roman government was not persecuting the Christians per se, 417 00:46:51.380 --> 00:47:03.380 that their actual, they were having a fight with, in Jerusalem, with the, you know, with the Jews, because the Jews were saying, you know, know that you're wrong, and they were arguing back and forth. 418 00:47:03.380 --> 00:47:17.380 If you go into the book of Revelation, okay, and with the reference towards Nero, you know, the 666, then in fact, they're not saying very nice things about the Roman government at all. 419 00:47:17.380 --> 00:47:46.380 Paul's calling them harlot, they're going to get overthrown, these guys are evil, and so it seems to me that also in the context of that time, Paul's telling people to live peaceably, that our job is not to overthrow the Roman government any more than that, but later on, when in fact the Roman government really does start persecuting the Christians in full force, at that point we also see the judgment put upon them. 420 00:47:47.380 --> 00:47:54.380 Yeah, I certainly think it would be entirely appropriate if he just said, you know, don't use violent means against the government. 421 00:47:54.380 --> 00:48:01.380 But it does seem like he says more than just that, that what they're doing is God's will, and that's difficult to understand. 422 00:48:01.380 --> 00:48:02.380 Yes, Dr. Pree. 423 00:48:02.380 --> 00:48:11.380 I think the most unusual thing about the Jewish beliefs is to honor the Almighty with your everyday activity in the market. 424 00:48:11.380 --> 00:48:26.380 and Market. It says the Lord loves honest weights and measure, for example. And then, especially around private property, it is so well documented that even the king couldn't use eminent domain to see, say, the vineyard. 425 00:48:26.380 --> 00:48:31.380 David had to pay for it, and this is so well documented that I don't tell anybody to click. 426 00:48:31.380 --> 00:48:33.380 Yeah. Roger. 427 00:48:33.380 --> 00:48:40.380 Paul came from Carson, the center of stoic philosophy, and he often borrows stoic terminology to make a point, 428 00:48:40.380 --> 00:48:44.380 which makes me wonder, if stoics held, we should always obey the law, we should always obey the ruler. 429 00:48:44.380 --> 00:48:49.380 They also held that no one counts as a genuine ruler unless they rule justly. 430 00:48:49.380 --> 00:48:52.380 Nothing counts as a genuine law unless it's done. 431 00:48:52.380 --> 00:48:56.380 Given the poem as a passage says that all legitimate authority comes from God, 432 00:48:56.380 --> 00:49:01.380 you could read it the other way and say that any authority that doesn't come from God, therefore it's not legitimate, 433 00:49:01.380 --> 00:49:05.380 any rulers that aren't from God are not legitimate rulers. 434 00:49:05.380 --> 00:49:10.380 So that passage might be ambiguous the same way that the temple passage is. 435 00:49:10.380 --> 00:49:14.380 Obey any legitimate ruler whose authority comes from God. 436 00:49:14.380 --> 00:49:16.380 Okay, well, which way does that set? 437 00:49:16.380 --> 00:49:18.380 Okay, yeah, that's very interesting. 438 00:49:18.380 --> 00:49:20.380 Yes? 439 00:49:20.380 --> 00:49:28.380 I would like to make a point about usury. It has a long history, especially in Roman Catholic thought, of being just misunderstood. 440 00:49:28.380 --> 00:49:35.380 And I think part of it is that they didn't get time preference until some of the early Austrians came on the scene. 441 00:49:35.380 --> 00:49:42.380 But in addition to that, there's a history of God's people being subjected to other people than being taken advantage of. 442 00:50:12.380 --> 00:50:18.380 Hans-Lewis' criticism of the change in doctrine. 443 00:50:18.380 --> 00:50:21.380 There was no change in doctrine. 444 00:50:21.380 --> 00:50:31.380 See, one of our guys made his master's thesis on analysis of riches in the Bible, 445 00:50:31.380 --> 00:50:36.380 and comparing riches at that time with riches today. 446 00:50:36.380 --> 00:50:40.380 At that time, there was no opportunity called. 447 00:50:40.380 --> 00:50:59.940 The latin phrase of it is domino emergent, and little by little we came to realize that if one did loan one, he is losing on another field, he is losing on alternative investment, and that type of interest is perfectly legitimate. 448 00:50:59.940 --> 00:51:06.940 It wasn't realized that bridges in the Old Testament was a barn full of food for the next few years. 449 00:51:06.940 --> 00:51:10.940 And so then that stuff, that interest, is mostly lost. 450 00:51:10.940 --> 00:51:15.940 Because there's no domino emergence, there's no opportunity for it. 451 00:51:15.940 --> 00:51:20.940 And that explains the difference and the change in the theory. 452 00:51:29.940 --> 00:51:41.940 The interest was being paid back to compensate you for the lender's loss, whereas usury was charging over and above that. 453 00:51:41.940 --> 00:51:49.940 I make the point to my students that yes, in a modern economy, at least in general equilibrium, those two things are the same. 454 00:51:49.940 --> 00:51:56.940 You can't charge over and above that. The opportunity cost is exactly what you would be able to get in the market. 455 00:51:56.940 --> 00:52:21.940 I thought you left out that passage in Acts that mentions the early church and how they did not consider their property to be their own. Maybe you left it out to the key to show the problems that be. Could you address that just briefly and why that's not so much communistic? 456 00:52:26.940 --> 00:52:32.620 Clearly, if particular Christians want to come together and pool their property and 457 00:52:32.620 --> 00:52:37.500 live communally, and they think that that's how Jesus wants them to live, then that certainly 458 00:52:37.500 --> 00:52:39.940 is radical libertarians. 459 00:52:39.940 --> 00:52:44.940 Not only do we have, you know, we wouldn't object to that in terms of that's not violating 460 00:52:44.940 --> 00:52:48.620 one's rights, but perhaps that even, there should be examples of that in those types 461 00:52:48.620 --> 00:52:49.620 of communities. 462 00:52:49.620 --> 00:52:52.500 And maybe, that's what I'm saying, I can't say whether or not that should happen, that's 463 00:52:52.500 --> 00:52:56.180 a personal decision, and maybe it would be good if more people would live like that. 464 00:52:56.180 --> 00:53:09.180 I'm not sure, but clearly that's consistent with anarcho-capitalism, and as you say, that's not communism the way, when I say I'm an anti-communist, I don't object to people doing that.