Davey, you ask Frank at his site, “is there any one passage in the Bible which tells us to be on guard lest the rich be oppressed?” Does the Decalogue really qualify sins based on social classes? Is it as sinful to take the life of a helpless infant as it is to murder a wealthy man lounging in his yard? (Were the biblical consequences the same?) And is it less of a sin to steal from the rich guy on the other side of the tracks than stealing from someone living in a poor neighborhood? Agreed, we need to go out of our way to (be reminded to) protect the poor and not oppress them (e.g. Nathan’s bedtime story to King David). But it does not diminish the fact that a sin is a sin is a sin… And to build a system (economic or otherwise) on such a mindset will only lead to another kind of oppression eventually.

I think I (very poorly) tried to explain in #5 that justice and fairness before the law is, without question, necessary (Ex 23:3). You really won’t find me arguing against that. A sin is a sin is a sin.

My issue was more: What makes God angry? When a poor man steals a loaf a bread to feed his family, or when a fat cat wins a sweet gov’t contract and refuses to give his workers a decent wage?

We have to confront the problem of why Jesus railed against the “pure” Pharisees while he associated with tax collectors and prostitutes. Apparently, when it comes to what makes our Lord angry, not all sins are created equal.

So, do you really think that I share in “the conservative preoccupation with protecting the rich”? I’m fairly certain that’s not the case.

I was not writing to proclaim that we all need to stop oppressing those poor rich people, and I think you know that. Further, I think you also know that my goal is balance. Sure, we disagree on the particulars and on the free market, but I’m far from saying, “Don’t care about poor people.” Am I not?

Is this really an issue where you can rightly say, “If you’re not 100% for me, you’re against me”? I’m sure that’s not what you’re trying to say, but it comes off that way.

I’m really trying to ask questions, find out why it’s okay to talk about how the rich need to stop oppressing the poor and why it’s not okay for others to point out that the government is stealing from us all.

Frank,

No, I don’t think you’re defending the typical conservative view. Your post (which I very much appreciated) did spark my thoughts, though. Other conservatives are not nearly as balanced as your post was–my comments were directed toward them.

Like the Bible’s, the conservative preoccupation is with protecting property, not the wealthy’s property. Property can’t be protected unless the rules of property are applied without reference to the status of the owner. The wealthy need laws to protect their wealth less than the poor; they actually tend to do better in lawless societies than in lawful ones because they can use their influence both to hold their own assets and seize those of the oppressed. Consider Latin America. And, read De Soto if you want to understand why property is more important for the poor than for the rich there. Property rights are the most effective mechanism for raising people out of property . . . that’s an obvious lesson to take from the miraculuous effect of the repropertization in China and the destruction wraught by the destruction of property in Zimbabwe.

Questions of rich versus poor gloss over the fact that the poor need property much more than the rich do. Comparing the massacres of the twentieth century, the property grabbers have done substantially more damage than anyone else. Property — though not wealth — is necesary for human flourishing.

Also,

(1) The Pharisees weren’t defined by economic status, but religious conviction. It was their legalistic hypocrisy, inter alia, and not their wealth that attracted attention. As I recall the theories, most believed that they were artisans. They may have been tombs but they weren’t rich.

(2) 2 Sam 12 certainly does not prove that God hates some sinners more than others based on wealth, but close to demontrating the opposite. God rejects the unlawful judgment of David that would have imposed death on theft by a rich man and instead punishes him according to the measure of the law for theft, which requires disproportionate return of what has been stolen. Part of the point is that God does not show the partiality that Daivd does in judgment. The correct view is expressed by Prov. 30:9 which rightly suggests that we should seek to avoid both the characteristic sins of wealth and poverty. On your view, it would be safer to try the sins of the poor.

(3) With respect to stealing loaves, the issue between you and conservatives does not turn on condemnation, but legal punishment. Prov. 31 does not teach that the thefts of the poor should go unpunished. Indeed, it says that the man is punished sevenfold even though he is not despised as an adulterer is. Of course, the purpose of the proverb is to warn against adultery by pointing out that if the law is applied evenly even to a poor man who is not despised for his crime, then it will certainly be applied in the case of hatred arousing adultery.

(5) As a practical matter, the defense of property is of little import in oppression. The fat-cat who obtains a government contract relies on governmental favoritism, not property. God, however, cares a great deal about property rights and speaks at length about the need for inalienable property . . . hardly a favorite topic of property destroying statists.

Pensans, I agree that private property is important to the poor. But one can critique aspects/emphases of capitalism and still believe in the value of property (e.g. Distributionism).

But you spoke of a critique of conservatism. Distrubutism is not anti-conservative. It’s primary proponents have always been ULTRA-conservative, e.g., Chesterton and Belloc. In any case, the U.S. is a distributist heaven compared to 19c or 13c Europe. There are more people who own there own businesses, own means of production than ever in history. But the U.S. anti-conservatives aren’t distributist; they are statist.

The facts on the ground in the U.S. are clear. There is absolutely zero danger of laissez-faire capitalism overpowering the currently entrenched statist regulatory government. Fighting against capitalism in the U.S. is like cursing the dead. After the next election, we will probably socialize the medical industries, about one fifth of the U.S. economy, and increase the extra tax load on business to european levels. If you care about property rights or distrubtism, then you ought to join with the most effective antistatists — who for right now consist of exclusively American conservatives.