Early Christian teachings were deeply anti-wealth — but context matters. Back then, wealth mostly came from land grabs, tax farming, and debt slavery. The rich were rich because the poor were poor. Christianity started as a movement of the oppressed under empire, and its ethic of radical sharing was a way to survive a brutal, zero-sum system.
Fast-forward to today: most people aren’t living under that kind of direct economic violence. In fact, doing what early Christians did — selling everything and giving it away — would often create more suffering. Try paying for healthcare or your kid’s college without savings. In a modern context, investing, and wealth-building can be acts of love and protection — not greed. I don't think it'd make me a better man and father to just subject my entire family to poverty.
So maybe the point isn’t “money = evil,” but “systems that enrich some by grinding down others = evil.” The ethical challenge is still valid — just adapted for a world where your 401(k) isn’t funded by enslaving your neighbor.
It's not that we should interpret the Bible differently and make it say whatever we want; but that like any story, we need to look at the context within which it took place.
> Try paying for healthcare or your kid’s college without savings. In a modern context, investing, and wealth-building can be acts of love and protection — not greed.
Only because the present (American) system is set up as such.
Exactly. But we're talking about the present, aren't we?
And with all its flaws, the present isn't all that bad. Capitalism has been a powerful instrument for economic growth and financial liberation. Declining global poverty rates, more opportunities, etc.
Are you going to back those wild claims with some facts, links or how-to's? I would very much like to go study a second degree, a Master's, or a PhD but I fear I can't take several years off work to just study (who'll pay for living expenses?).
Come to Europe.
PhD candidates are not treated as students.
They are treated as adults, and get the salary of an (entry-level) engineer with a master degree.
You get paid a living wage to do a PhD in most countries actually.
If this is about (your) kids?
Send them to Europe for higher education. Many universities with great international ranking have virtually no tuition. But they can be quite competitive in terms of getting a passing grade.
Of course not.
But you might get paid only a 50% salary for a PhD in the natural sciences (or liberal arts).
Different fields have different cultures in that regard.
"Back then, wealth mostly came from land grabs, tax farming, and debt slavery. The rich were rich because the poor were poor."
With all due respect my friend. That is 100% how it still works right now. That is how it has always worked. The reason you think otherwise is because you are not poor.
If it's always been this way, can you explain why most people today live in far greater conditions than 2000 years ago, or even 100 years ago?
Or the dramatically declining global extreme poverty rate during that same period? If being rich always meant you took it from the poor, then you'd never have any improvement for anyone that does not result in worsening for someone else, mathematically.
It seems to me economic growth is the proof that money is not a zero-sum game, and that one can create value, that creates jobs, opportunities and a betterment in life across the board. A tide that lifts all boats.
You can validate that by looking at world economies. The countries with no innovation/entrepreneurship aren't better off for having less people building wealth: everybody is just poorer. In contrast, more capitalist wealth-oriented economies tend to create more opportunities.
No, christianity is not only for poor. Jacobins do jacobins propaganda.
In article "rich young man is mentioned" - uh, oh, hi should give everything! Let's see:
- first Jesus answered: obey commandments in your life - that rich man duty too.
- then when he answered he do that since his young years Jesus proposed him to leave everything behind - it was explanation what this man was looking for: heart tied to earthy things. And invitation.
Not everyone should be monk but definitely we need more peoples devoting lives for others good: nurses, teachers.
And that story shows bright like sunlight that riches make your life miserable - and this article tries to state exactly reverse thing :> Who you trust? I recommend Jesus over Lucis.
Important to note that Christianity also spread amongst the poor/common/persecuted folk first. It wasn't really spread initially by any power structure or crusade.
And Christ straight up kicking out business from the church (as in he flipped their tables over, literally):
It’s interesting to use crusade in that fashion. The origins of the Christian crusades were to help free lands with still largely Christian populations from Muslim conquerors. It wasn’t to spread Christianity.
Now the crusade’s definitely went awry and became an excuse for Venetians and others to take land and power. Especially by the fourth crusade and sacking of Constantinople, etc.
Also, it was spread BY the poor. Early Christians happily donated away all their wealth, thinking the Christ will come and bring an end to the Roman empire any day now.
There is a theory that this was a critical factor in how fast the early Christianity spread across the Roman Empire - that these newly-bankrupted believers had no choice but to travel and try recruit new members to the Church, in a Ponzi-scheme-like fashion (except nobody was cashing out).
The Jewish Temple wasn't a church. Animals were sold there for people who couldn't bring animals with them to sacrifice on that Jewish holiday when they made pilgrimage to Jerusalem. There was plenty of disagreements between Jewish sects. We get the early Christianized perspective on some of the disagreements the Jesus movement had with the Pharisees and Sadducees, who also didn't agree with one another. Paul wasn't poor. He was an educated Pharisee who could write Greek, like Philo or Josephus. Some of the communities he wrote to like the one in Rome probably weren't poor either.
But the Jesus movement led by James the Just and Peter after his death probably was, if the Ebionites were their 2nd-4th century descendants.
It's still left wing coded in many non Christian areas. For example, India. It came as a surprise for my parents that Christianity is right wing in America, but all American political parties are part of the global left in general.
Yes it is. Saying you shouldn't educate the lower classes or not educate girls would be met with huge resistance from most Republicans, whereas that is a common enough sentiment in many areas. People who fought for that are considered left wing.
America is a fundamentally leftist nation. The social issues American political parties fight over are not applicable in most parts of the world. In most parts of the world left wing political movements (communists) hold the same social lines as the GOP.
From a property perspective, America never had to deal with land redistribution because America never had a feudal system that required it. This property rights make sense in America in a way they didnt in feudal systems.
For example the communist party of Kerala enacted major land reform to redistribute land, but now that the land is redistributed, ownership carries on as normal. America had the opportunity to skip the first step.
I don't agree with your contention that the Republicans are part of the "global left".
I do not deny that, compared to places where girls are not educated, America is far more progressive as a nation. That's the baseline parties in the US operate in; it is obviously different in other places.
However, it is common to identify the left as championing progressive causes and the right as aiming to preserve existing (or to return to prior) power structures.
The GOP is very definitely a right wing party, even if the baseline it operates in would be regarded as left wing in more oppressive nations.
This is an interesting perspective, thank you for sharing. We often hear that (compared with Europe, I suppose) America's two parties are relatively far right. Interesting to see the opposite opinion.
You are completely wrong. The US is not a leftist nation by any stretch of the imagination. Honestly, you're so incredibly wrong, that I can't believe you actually believe what you are saying.
In fact, after being on HN since 2008, I have never encountered someone as wrong as you are.
> Saying you shouldn't educate the lower classes or not educate girls would be met with huge resistance from most Republicans,
It would not outrage evangelical conservatives at all. It is what they believe in, except they put it into nicer words. Women should be helpmeet for their husbands. They should homeschool and focus on family, need education only to the level necessary for that.
As for Republicans, they consistently vote for policies to achieve the above.
> America is a fundamentally leftist nation
If you define the left in some completely novel way, maybe.
> America never had to deal with land redistribution because America never had a feudal system that required it.
You might want to read more about how America came to be. The land distribution was rather large issue there.
> If you define the left in some completely novel way, maybe.
I don't think it is an absurd notion. The founding fathers maybe wouldn't be outright Montagnards by the original standards of left-right division in the French Revolution that would start soon after, but they would definitively be on the left. The US liberal democratic republic with no official class system and at least a theoretical commitment to individual freedom would be to the left of almost all European governments until the 20th century, if you don't discount too many points for slavery and its aftermath.
My opinion, is that the fundamentally leftist ideology of liberal democracy has been so ideologically victorious it is now the centre, so people now talk anything but socialism is right-wing.
Fun facts, before muslim migration to Yathrib (now Madinah), one of the popular and richest Christian Byzantine Roman Emperors namely Heraclius was questioning the Meccan leader Abu Sufyan at the time (who later in his life become muslim) regarding Muhammad [1].
One of the question was “Do the nobles follow him or the weak?". It's reported that Abu Sufyan answered: “The weak and poor among us follow him. As for the high born and noble, none follow him.” The Emperor after that replied “I then asked you if the noble or the weak followed him. You answered that the weak followed him. Even so has it been with all the prophets, such having followed them.” [2]
There are evidences that Matthew wasn't written in Koine but Syriac and that significant fragments of the Gospels (which is what is quoted) are translation from Aramaic.
It was. But we're pretty sure that Jesus spoke Aramaic. So the books were originally written in Greek, but the source material for the gospels wasn't spoken in Greek.
Was only calvinism a branch that said "Personal wealth is good, people deserve to strive for richness on earth for themselves as god will promote it for mostly his loved ones"?
Prosperity gospel is one mind-bending example of how you can turn one theme into the opposite. The bad thing is that this has been exported to the African continent too.
I vaguely remember that in Asian countries this is big too.
Robert Heinlein really nailed it in the 50s with the Fosterite Church of the New Revelation in Stranger in a Strange Land. Totally prescient vision of what Christianity + America was going to produce.
They can all converts to Islam. Not much changes since the 7th century. It allows wealth, polygamy and slavery. Now the Jacobin wont dare do some kind of exegesis... it would be deemed blasphemy.
“By Allah, it is not poverty that I fear for you, rather what I fear for you is that worldly riches may be given to you as it was given to those who came before you, and you will compete to attain (more of) it with one another as those before competed with one another, and you will be destroyed as they were destroyed.” (Bukhari & Muslim)
Feel free to seek out what the sharia has to say about usury (strictly forbidden) and what Islam considers a good way to use wealth (hint: giving to the poor, building orphanages, madrasa and mosques, doing pilgrimages). You will be hard pressed to find a monotheist religion which really likes the rich to be honest.
I’m not going to give you about an explanation about all the way Islam has changed and become multiples since the 7th century because that would require a book length essay rather than a paragraph but you get my point.
Like it politico-economical incarnation, the communism (because its ideology was an ad-hoc smear campaign against Christianity, a tree that decides to saw of its roots).
As someone who's pretty significantly left (at least in the US political spectrum) I've become pretty fed up with Jacobin.
The author of this article is a religious historian, which explains a lot of the "circuitous" language (his word).
But to me, the whole article is just "blah blah blah", pointless exposition with no real bearing on current reality.
Whatever may, or may not, have been the case in the Levant 2000 years ago (and no one really knows); this is 2025, and according to many US "christians" the most famous quote of the little bebe jesus is "f_ck the poor, let 'em rot in the gutter". Ironically, failing to acknowledge that many of them fit into that very category.
If the author would like to differ with the ideals of christianity regarding wealth, maybe he should write to the vatican? You know, that autonomous country inside of Italy, with it's own central bank, and storehouses of looted nazi treasure. The current pope aside, they haven't exactly been a savior of the poor historically.
I'm sure many earnest, caring, giving christians will be downvoting my post. But a reality of our world, outside of philosophical sophistry. is that religion has been the source of more murder and mayhem than any other single cause.
It may have been originally a practice of the poor, but the only reason it's still a phenomenon in the modern world is because the wealthy and powerful have promoted and used it as a tool to rile the poor into dismembering each other, to see which rich guy gets the goods.
For any large heterogeneous groups, one can only speak statistically. Many "christians" do still seek to help the poor, but there is a significant emerging trend, especially in the "prosperity gospel" that says god blesses the rich.
or, to quote another fictional character: "Greed is good"
Cooperation is a more productive strategy than competition. The primary reason to practice it, is because we'll all be better off.
However with competition, a few players are able to reap even greater rewards individually, in spite of overall productivity being less.
Therefore, competition favors the victors. As for the "losers", see the hyperbolic quote in my original post...
As a Bible-believing Christian, I am appalled by the ahistoricity and the lack of respect for the plain interpretation of the text of the Bible, as displayed by the author of this article. It's mind-boggling that one would choose to cherry-pick what amounts to a few chapters of a far larger body of teachings, and re-interpret Christianity as an economic movement.
Consider: the core teaching of Christianity is that a certain person, Jesus of Nazareth, was the promised Messiah (the Anointed One, King of Jews, a role written about at length by the Old Testament), that He was the Son of God, that He had both a fully divine and a fully human nature, that He died a painful death on the cross as a price for forgiveness of all human sins and direct access to God for every person, and that He literally rose again from the dead three days after that. That's the core of the faith, that's the most important part that makes Christianity, Christianity. Those are the things you need to agree you believe in so that you can legitimately call yourself a Christian. The rest is secondary.
Now tell me, how does this have anything to do with economics or the forgiveness of literal debts? The Bible is very direct and quotes Jesus as saying: "My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not of this realm." (John 18:36). This verse outright contradicts any interpretation that Christianity is about political power or concerns on this side of the divide between mortality and the eternity (parenthetically, this is the reason why to me what American Evangelism developed into is so disturbing). It should be something of concern, but not the concern. Christianity is not communism. Christianity is not benevolent philanthropy. Christianity is none of those things that one tries to pin it down, if one adopts a frame free of God as the core consideration. Christianity is about trying to establish a connection with God, while it's not too late to do that. Trying to reduce it to a cause revolving around money in some way is absurd in the magnitude of misunderstanding on display here.
I know that many here will be sceptics or non-believers, so many will skip this comment. But if you want to critique Christianity, at least do so in the spirit of not misrepresenting fundamental claims and tenets of the faith you disagree with. I trust that intellectual honesty is the name of the game on HN, and that's all I ask for.
I am an atheist but I was raised Christian (Greek Orthodox). I read all four Gospels as a teenager in their original Koine Greek - Greek is my maternal language and I am lucky enough that I still understand its version spoken two thousand years ago.
From my reading, and ignoring any later interpretation, what you say is partly right, but you are leaving out a very big part of what Christ taught and what he did when he was with his students. Yes, he claimed he was the son of God, yes he claimed that those who believe in him will find the kingdom of heaven, yes his followers believed he rose from the dead and ascended to the heavens (? "ανελήθφη εις τους ουρανους") afterwards. And that he will return and judge right and wrong in a second coming (that's actually from the Apocalypse). And all that- all that's cannon and nobody denies it.
But it makes no sense to deny the fact that while he was here, among us, he defended widows and orphans, the poor, the weak, the downtrodden, he fed the hungry, he healed the paralytics and the blind, and the lepers, and he recruited his followers (among whom Paul, or Saul, was not) from fishers and peasants, and called on them to be "fishers of men". And there is no denying all the parables, mentioned in the article, in which the unrighteous, the rich, the powerful, the selfish and the greedy get their just desserts. There is no denying the parable of the Good Samaritan and Christ's commandment to him who has two chitons, to give one to whomever hasn't. There is no denying that he attacked the usurers in the temple in rage, crying that they desecrated his father's house, no denying that he spoke truth to power and held the feet of the scribes and the pharissees over the fire for their corruption and greed.
Christ preached love, and compassion, and philanthropy, for all his followers while they live in the world. And he didn't just preach them! Those are important, fundamental responsibilities that the faithful must observe if they are to gain entry into the kingdom of heaven, after his second coming. His kingdom is not of this world, as you remind us, but to gain entry to his kingdom one must live their life as a Christian in this world. And "it is easier for a camel to pass a needle's eye than a rich man through the gates of heaven" (my liberal translation, from memory).
And there is no denying the fact that his teaching was for his followers to share. Share everything, like he shared everything with them. "This is my flesh, eat from it. This is my blood, drink from it". Λάβετε, φάγετε τοῦτο ἐστί τό σῶμα μου, τό ὑπέρ ὑμῶν κλώμενον εἰς ἄφεσιν ἁμαρτιῶν. Take, eat, this is my body, parceled for you to relieve your sins. The most sacred rite of Christianity, even the most modernised, Westernised Christianity, far removed from its Eastern roots, is the rite of communion.
The author of the piece did not hallucinate. Christianity is a form of sacred communism. Maybe the message was twisted and its meaning lost as it travelled in time and space away from its origins, but the message was loud and clear when Christ was here: share everything with your brothers and sisters and take care of each other in this world otherwise you will not be with Christ in the other.
In a novel tangential appreciation of Ο Τελευταίος Πειρασμός, O Teleftéos Pirasmós I hope you enjoy a local school production of a Greek classic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-MucVWo-Pw
If I can summarize something I've felt the past 10 years:
> It's mind-boggling that one would choose to cherry-pick what amounts to a few chapters of a far larger body of teachings, and re-interpret Christianity as an political movement
Biblical scholar Bart Ehrman argues that there are many versions of Christianity, and there always have been since its inception. What you are representing as the "core teaching of Christianity" is the version that was primarily articulated by Paul, and that became the orthodox version due to its eventual adoption as the religion of the Roman Empire. But even at the time of Paul there were rival interpretations. There were the Gnostics, the group led by James in Jerusalem, and even those who insisted one had to adopt Judaism to follow Jesus. And significantly, Jesus himself probably wouldn't have recognized the interpretation of Paul.
And looking beyond early Christianity, one can pick any period of Christianity's history and find numerous rival doctrines.
Knowing God, knowing Christ, is supposed to change you. (If it doesn't, maybe you're headed for "Depart from Me, for I never knew you".) It's supposed to change you to love people, even your enemies. It's supposed to change you to not love the things of this world - money and power. You're supposed to live that out.
So, yes, to first order, Christianity is very much not about money or politics. It's about you and God. But to second order, it's about everything. It's about caring for the widow and the orphan and the alien. It's about not ripping other people off, but instead giving to meet the needs of people around you. It's about loving people, even if they're not in your church or of your race or your political persuasion. It's everything you do, and how and why you do it.
> And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
The Christianity I’m familiar with (Eastern Orthodox) places radical humility and fraternal equality starkly in the foreground. (“I believe, Lord, and I confess, that You are truly the Christ, the Son of the living God, Who came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the first.”) Any wealth is God's wealth; any beggar, criminal, or "undesirable" is a fellow human that needs to be lifted, not scorned. Spiritual movement forward comes by the grace of God against the kicking and screaming of earthly attachments. There is no place for “you” in this religion.
Is it an economic movement? No. But it directly calls believers to let go of the things that bind them to the material world, wealth in particular, and to share whatever they have with others. (“If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.") Indeed, ascetic monks who live in caves and continuously pray for humanity under their breath are seen as coming closest to a Christ-like existence.
That is a far cry from the distorted version of the faith being peddled by mega-churches and echoing in the halls of American power. Apparently, believing in Jesus is sufficient without all the other inconvenient bits.
Anyway, while it may be a mistake to label Christianity “communist” as a whole, nothing in the article remotely jumps out to me as egregious or revisionist as far as the most traditional variant of the religion is concerned. (And, FWIW, this label should not be confused with big-C Communism, which is an explicitly anti-religious movement.)
Well, it was until it became the state religion of the Roman Empire. Christians with the power of the state, at a time when religious tolerance wasn’t invented yet, were something else. Things got pretty complicated due to the bitter political disputes between the bishops of different cities.
Early Christian teachings were deeply anti-wealth — but context matters. Back then, wealth mostly came from land grabs, tax farming, and debt slavery. The rich were rich because the poor were poor. Christianity started as a movement of the oppressed under empire, and its ethic of radical sharing was a way to survive a brutal, zero-sum system.
Fast-forward to today: most people aren’t living under that kind of direct economic violence. In fact, doing what early Christians did — selling everything and giving it away — would often create more suffering. Try paying for healthcare or your kid’s college without savings. In a modern context, investing, and wealth-building can be acts of love and protection — not greed. I don't think it'd make me a better man and father to just subject my entire family to poverty.
So maybe the point isn’t “money = evil,” but “systems that enrich some by grinding down others = evil.” The ethical challenge is still valid — just adapted for a world where your 401(k) isn’t funded by enslaving your neighbor.
It's not that we should interpret the Bible differently and make it say whatever we want; but that like any story, we need to look at the context within which it took place.
> Try paying for healthcare or your kid’s college without savings. In a modern context, investing, and wealth-building can be acts of love and protection — not greed.
Only because the present (American) system is set up as such.
Exactly. But we're talking about the present, aren't we? And with all its flaws, the present isn't all that bad. Capitalism has been a powerful instrument for economic growth and financial liberation. Declining global poverty rates, more opportunities, etc.
> Try paying for healthcare or your kid’s college without savings
For hundreds of millions of people they are a basic human right and completely free.
Never had a job? Doesn’t matter, still free.
Are you going to back those wild claims with some facts, links or how-to's? I would very much like to go study a second degree, a Master's, or a PhD but I fear I can't take several years off work to just study (who'll pay for living expenses?).
Are you an engineer?
Come to Europe. PhD candidates are not treated as students. They are treated as adults, and get the salary of an (entry-level) engineer with a master degree.
You get paid a living wage to do a PhD in most countries actually.
If this is about (your) kids? Send them to Europe for higher education. Many universities with great international ranking have virtually no tuition. But they can be quite competitive in terms of getting a passing grade.
Can't go to Europe :( my partners are not engineers
Europe is not just for engineers.
Of course not. But you might get paid only a 50% salary for a PhD in the natural sciences (or liberal arts). Different fields have different cultures in that regard.
"Back then, wealth mostly came from land grabs, tax farming, and debt slavery. The rich were rich because the poor were poor."
With all due respect my friend. That is 100% how it still works right now. That is how it has always worked. The reason you think otherwise is because you are not poor.
If it's always been this way, can you explain why most people today live in far greater conditions than 2000 years ago, or even 100 years ago? Or the dramatically declining global extreme poverty rate during that same period? If being rich always meant you took it from the poor, then you'd never have any improvement for anyone that does not result in worsening for someone else, mathematically.
It seems to me economic growth is the proof that money is not a zero-sum game, and that one can create value, that creates jobs, opportunities and a betterment in life across the board. A tide that lifts all boats.
You can validate that by looking at world economies. The countries with no innovation/entrepreneurship aren't better off for having less people building wealth: everybody is just poorer. In contrast, more capitalist wealth-oriented economies tend to create more opportunities.
No, christianity is not only for poor. Jacobins do jacobins propaganda.
In article "rich young man is mentioned" - uh, oh, hi should give everything! Let's see:
- first Jesus answered: obey commandments in your life - that rich man duty too.
- then when he answered he do that since his young years Jesus proposed him to leave everything behind - it was explanation what this man was looking for: heart tied to earthy things. And invitation.
Not everyone should be monk but definitely we need more peoples devoting lives for others good: nurses, teachers.
And that story shows bright like sunlight that riches make your life miserable - and this article tries to state exactly reverse thing :> Who you trust? I recommend Jesus over Lucis.
Important to note that Christianity also spread amongst the poor/common/persecuted folk first. It wasn't really spread initially by any power structure or crusade.
And Christ straight up kicking out business from the church (as in he flipped their tables over, literally):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleansing_of_the_Temple
It’s interesting to use crusade in that fashion. The origins of the Christian crusades were to help free lands with still largely Christian populations from Muslim conquerors. It wasn’t to spread Christianity.
Now the crusade’s definitely went awry and became an excuse for Venetians and others to take land and power. Especially by the fourth crusade and sacking of Constantinople, etc.
Southern France was largely Christian yet Albigensian Crusade was a thing.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albigensian_Crusade
Depends which crusades. The Baltic Crusades definitively were to spread Christianity.
We need an adblocker like that. Every poor person's phone and browser is turning into a cash register for thieves and merchants.
Also, it was spread BY the poor. Early Christians happily donated away all their wealth, thinking the Christ will come and bring an end to the Roman empire any day now.
There is a theory that this was a critical factor in how fast the early Christianity spread across the Roman Empire - that these newly-bankrupted believers had no choice but to travel and try recruit new members to the Church, in a Ponzi-scheme-like fashion (except nobody was cashing out).
> Christianity also spread amongst the poor/common/persecuted folk first
Modern Christianity is probably closer to what Justinian codified [1] (to when the first Bibles date [2]) than earlier traditions. (Not an expert.)
[1] https://www.britannica.com/biography/Justinian-I/Ecclesiasti...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Sinaiticus
The Jewish Temple wasn't a church. Animals were sold there for people who couldn't bring animals with them to sacrifice on that Jewish holiday when they made pilgrimage to Jerusalem. There was plenty of disagreements between Jewish sects. We get the early Christianized perspective on some of the disagreements the Jesus movement had with the Pharisees and Sadducees, who also didn't agree with one another. Paul wasn't poor. He was an educated Pharisee who could write Greek, like Philo or Josephus. Some of the communities he wrote to like the one in Rome probably weren't poor either.
But the Jesus movement led by James the Just and Peter after his death probably was, if the Ebionites were their 2nd-4th century descendants.
It's still left wing coded in many non Christian areas. For example, India. It came as a surprise for my parents that Christianity is right wing in America, but all American political parties are part of the global left in general.
Yes it is. Saying you shouldn't educate the lower classes or not educate girls would be met with huge resistance from most Republicans, whereas that is a common enough sentiment in many areas. People who fought for that are considered left wing.
America is a fundamentally leftist nation. The social issues American political parties fight over are not applicable in most parts of the world. In most parts of the world left wing political movements (communists) hold the same social lines as the GOP.
From a property perspective, America never had to deal with land redistribution because America never had a feudal system that required it. This property rights make sense in America in a way they didnt in feudal systems.
For example the communist party of Kerala enacted major land reform to redistribute land, but now that the land is redistributed, ownership carries on as normal. America had the opportunity to skip the first step.
Americans have no idea how good they have it
I don't agree with your contention that the Republicans are part of the "global left".
I do not deny that, compared to places where girls are not educated, America is far more progressive as a nation. That's the baseline parties in the US operate in; it is obviously different in other places.
However, it is common to identify the left as championing progressive causes and the right as aiming to preserve existing (or to return to prior) power structures.
The GOP is very definitely a right wing party, even if the baseline it operates in would be regarded as left wing in more oppressive nations.
This is an interesting perspective, thank you for sharing. We often hear that (compared with Europe, I suppose) America's two parties are relatively far right. Interesting to see the opposite opinion.
I think people saying that are comparing them to their favourite European social democracy yes.
You are completely wrong. The US is not a leftist nation by any stretch of the imagination. Honestly, you're so incredibly wrong, that I can't believe you actually believe what you are saying.
In fact, after being on HN since 2008, I have never encountered someone as wrong as you are.
> Saying you shouldn't educate the lower classes or not educate girls would be met with huge resistance from most Republicans,
It would not outrage evangelical conservatives at all. It is what they believe in, except they put it into nicer words. Women should be helpmeet for their husbands. They should homeschool and focus on family, need education only to the level necessary for that.
As for Republicans, they consistently vote for policies to achieve the above.
> America is a fundamentally leftist nation
If you define the left in some completely novel way, maybe.
> America never had to deal with land redistribution because America never had a feudal system that required it.
You might want to read more about how America came to be. The land distribution was rather large issue there.
> If you define the left in some completely novel way, maybe.
I don't think it is an absurd notion. The founding fathers maybe wouldn't be outright Montagnards by the original standards of left-right division in the French Revolution that would start soon after, but they would definitively be on the left. The US liberal democratic republic with no official class system and at least a theoretical commitment to individual freedom would be to the left of almost all European governments until the 20th century, if you don't discount too many points for slavery and its aftermath.
My opinion, is that the fundamentally leftist ideology of liberal democracy has been so ideologically victorious it is now the centre, so people now talk anything but socialism is right-wing.
Fun facts, before muslim migration to Yathrib (now Madinah), one of the popular and richest Christian Byzantine Roman Emperors namely Heraclius was questioning the Meccan leader Abu Sufyan at the time (who later in his life become muslim) regarding Muhammad [1].
One of the question was “Do the nobles follow him or the weak?". It's reported that Abu Sufyan answered: “The weak and poor among us follow him. As for the high born and noble, none follow him.” The Emperor after that replied “I then asked you if the noble or the weak followed him. You answered that the weak followed him. Even so has it been with all the prophets, such having followed them.” [2]
[1] Heraclius:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heraclius
[2] The Hadith of Heraclius | Part 2 | Heraclius Interrogates Abu Sufyan on the Prophet:
https://www.aljumuah.com/the-hadith-of-heraclius-part-2-hera...
It raises some interesting issues about translation. The implication being translators veer away from what is uncomfortable to their society.
And the article only quotes the Greek bible which is itself a translation.
It quotes the New Testament which was written in Koine Greek.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koine_Greek
Debatable and debated.
There are evidences that Matthew wasn't written in Koine but Syriac and that significant fragments of the Gospels (which is what is quoted) are translation from Aramaic.
It was. But we're pretty sure that Jesus spoke Aramaic. So the books were originally written in Greek, but the source material for the gospels wasn't spoken in Greek.
Sure, but that is different than being a translation.
A "translation" of the Bible is always considered moving from the original text, not from the likely language of the speaker.
Fair enough.
Was only calvinism a branch that said "Personal wealth is good, people deserve to strive for richness on earth for themselves as god will promote it for mostly his loved ones"?
recently prosperity gospel in evangelical churches too
Prosperity gospel is one mind-bending example of how you can turn one theme into the opposite. The bad thing is that this has been exported to the African continent too.
I vaguely remember that in Asian countries this is big too.
Robert Heinlein really nailed it in the 50s with the Fosterite Church of the New Revelation in Stranger in a Strange Land. Totally prescient vision of what Christianity + America was going to produce.
https://www.realclearreligion.org/articles/2013/01/15/a_triu...
They can all converts to Islam. Not much changes since the 7th century. It allows wealth, polygamy and slavery. Now the Jacobin wont dare do some kind of exegesis... it would be deemed blasphemy.
“By Allah, it is not poverty that I fear for you, rather what I fear for you is that worldly riches may be given to you as it was given to those who came before you, and you will compete to attain (more of) it with one another as those before competed with one another, and you will be destroyed as they were destroyed.” (Bukhari & Muslim)
Feel free to seek out what the sharia has to say about usury (strictly forbidden) and what Islam considers a good way to use wealth (hint: giving to the poor, building orphanages, madrasa and mosques, doing pilgrimages). You will be hard pressed to find a monotheist religion which really likes the rich to be honest.
I’m not going to give you about an explanation about all the way Islam has changed and become multiples since the 7th century because that would require a book length essay rather than a paragraph but you get my point.
Like it politico-economical incarnation, the communism (because its ideology was an ad-hoc smear campaign against Christianity, a tree that decides to saw of its roots).
As someone who's pretty significantly left (at least in the US political spectrum) I've become pretty fed up with Jacobin.
The author of this article is a religious historian, which explains a lot of the "circuitous" language (his word).
But to me, the whole article is just "blah blah blah", pointless exposition with no real bearing on current reality.
Whatever may, or may not, have been the case in the Levant 2000 years ago (and no one really knows); this is 2025, and according to many US "christians" the most famous quote of the little bebe jesus is "f_ck the poor, let 'em rot in the gutter". Ironically, failing to acknowledge that many of them fit into that very category.
If the author would like to differ with the ideals of christianity regarding wealth, maybe he should write to the vatican? You know, that autonomous country inside of Italy, with it's own central bank, and storehouses of looted nazi treasure. The current pope aside, they haven't exactly been a savior of the poor historically.
I'm sure many earnest, caring, giving christians will be downvoting my post. But a reality of our world, outside of philosophical sophistry. is that religion has been the source of more murder and mayhem than any other single cause.
It may have been originally a practice of the poor, but the only reason it's still a phenomenon in the modern world is because the wealthy and powerful have promoted and used it as a tool to rile the poor into dismembering each other, to see which rich guy gets the goods.
Sorry, I'm an evangelical atheist for life...
> this is 2025, and according to many US "christians" the most famous quote of the little bebe jesus is "f_ck the poor, let 'em rot in the gutter".
Cite that's not to your imagination?
Just one article as a reference:
https://newrepublic.com/article/176117/prosperity-gospel-chr...
and one citing the "optimal economic output" theory of the real lib-tards:
https://thereformedconservative.org/christians-engaging-in-s...
For any large heterogeneous groups, one can only speak statistically. Many "christians" do still seek to help the poor, but there is a significant emerging trend, especially in the "prosperity gospel" that says god blesses the rich.
or, to quote another fictional character: "Greed is good"
Cooperation is a more productive strategy than competition. The primary reason to practice it, is because we'll all be better off.
However with competition, a few players are able to reap even greater rewards individually, in spite of overall productivity being less.
Therefore, competition favors the victors. As for the "losers", see the hyperbolic quote in my original post...
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The video you added is horrifying. As a sibling comment said, this is idolatry.
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I rather see people engaging than giving lazy down votes btw. If these facts are inconvenient, try to choose a better way to handle them.
Users (correctly) flagged your GP comment because it broke the site guidelines, including these:
"Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents."
"Please don't use Hacker News for political or ideological battle. It tramples curiosity."
"Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive."
If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.
As a Bible-believing Christian, I am appalled by the ahistoricity and the lack of respect for the plain interpretation of the text of the Bible, as displayed by the author of this article. It's mind-boggling that one would choose to cherry-pick what amounts to a few chapters of a far larger body of teachings, and re-interpret Christianity as an economic movement.
Consider: the core teaching of Christianity is that a certain person, Jesus of Nazareth, was the promised Messiah (the Anointed One, King of Jews, a role written about at length by the Old Testament), that He was the Son of God, that He had both a fully divine and a fully human nature, that He died a painful death on the cross as a price for forgiveness of all human sins and direct access to God for every person, and that He literally rose again from the dead three days after that. That's the core of the faith, that's the most important part that makes Christianity, Christianity. Those are the things you need to agree you believe in so that you can legitimately call yourself a Christian. The rest is secondary.
Now tell me, how does this have anything to do with economics or the forgiveness of literal debts? The Bible is very direct and quotes Jesus as saying: "My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not of this realm." (John 18:36). This verse outright contradicts any interpretation that Christianity is about political power or concerns on this side of the divide between mortality and the eternity (parenthetically, this is the reason why to me what American Evangelism developed into is so disturbing). It should be something of concern, but not the concern. Christianity is not communism. Christianity is not benevolent philanthropy. Christianity is none of those things that one tries to pin it down, if one adopts a frame free of God as the core consideration. Christianity is about trying to establish a connection with God, while it's not too late to do that. Trying to reduce it to a cause revolving around money in some way is absurd in the magnitude of misunderstanding on display here.
I know that many here will be sceptics or non-believers, so many will skip this comment. But if you want to critique Christianity, at least do so in the spirit of not misrepresenting fundamental claims and tenets of the faith you disagree with. I trust that intellectual honesty is the name of the game on HN, and that's all I ask for.
Happy Easter.
I am an atheist but I was raised Christian (Greek Orthodox). I read all four Gospels as a teenager in their original Koine Greek - Greek is my maternal language and I am lucky enough that I still understand its version spoken two thousand years ago.
From my reading, and ignoring any later interpretation, what you say is partly right, but you are leaving out a very big part of what Christ taught and what he did when he was with his students. Yes, he claimed he was the son of God, yes he claimed that those who believe in him will find the kingdom of heaven, yes his followers believed he rose from the dead and ascended to the heavens (? "ανελήθφη εις τους ουρανους") afterwards. And that he will return and judge right and wrong in a second coming (that's actually from the Apocalypse). And all that- all that's cannon and nobody denies it.
But it makes no sense to deny the fact that while he was here, among us, he defended widows and orphans, the poor, the weak, the downtrodden, he fed the hungry, he healed the paralytics and the blind, and the lepers, and he recruited his followers (among whom Paul, or Saul, was not) from fishers and peasants, and called on them to be "fishers of men". And there is no denying all the parables, mentioned in the article, in which the unrighteous, the rich, the powerful, the selfish and the greedy get their just desserts. There is no denying the parable of the Good Samaritan and Christ's commandment to him who has two chitons, to give one to whomever hasn't. There is no denying that he attacked the usurers in the temple in rage, crying that they desecrated his father's house, no denying that he spoke truth to power and held the feet of the scribes and the pharissees over the fire for their corruption and greed.
Christ preached love, and compassion, and philanthropy, for all his followers while they live in the world. And he didn't just preach them! Those are important, fundamental responsibilities that the faithful must observe if they are to gain entry into the kingdom of heaven, after his second coming. His kingdom is not of this world, as you remind us, but to gain entry to his kingdom one must live their life as a Christian in this world. And "it is easier for a camel to pass a needle's eye than a rich man through the gates of heaven" (my liberal translation, from memory).
And there is no denying the fact that his teaching was for his followers to share. Share everything, like he shared everything with them. "This is my flesh, eat from it. This is my blood, drink from it". Λάβετε, φάγετε τοῦτο ἐστί τό σῶμα μου, τό ὑπέρ ὑμῶν κλώμενον εἰς ἄφεσιν ἁμαρτιῶν. Take, eat, this is my body, parceled for you to relieve your sins. The most sacred rite of Christianity, even the most modernised, Westernised Christianity, far removed from its Eastern roots, is the rite of communion.
The author of the piece did not hallucinate. Christianity is a form of sacred communism. Maybe the message was twisted and its meaning lost as it travelled in time and space away from its origins, but the message was loud and clear when Christ was here: share everything with your brothers and sisters and take care of each other in this world otherwise you will not be with Christ in the other.
> Yes, he claimed he was the son of God ... all that's cannon and nobody denies it.
That Jesus claimed to be the son of God is actually contested among bible scholars. See e.g.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis%27s_trilemma#Criticism
Happy Easter from Northern Australia.
In a novel tangential appreciation of Ο Τελευταίος Πειρασμός, O Teleftéos Pirasmós I hope you enjoy a local school production of a Greek classic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-MucVWo-Pw
Thanks. That was uplifting :D
If I can summarize something I've felt the past 10 years:
> It's mind-boggling that one would choose to cherry-pick what amounts to a few chapters of a far larger body of teachings, and re-interpret Christianity as an political movement
Biblical scholar Bart Ehrman argues that there are many versions of Christianity, and there always have been since its inception. What you are representing as the "core teaching of Christianity" is the version that was primarily articulated by Paul, and that became the orthodox version due to its eventual adoption as the religion of the Roman Empire. But even at the time of Paul there were rival interpretations. There were the Gnostics, the group led by James in Jerusalem, and even those who insisted one had to adopt Judaism to follow Jesus. And significantly, Jesus himself probably wouldn't have recognized the interpretation of Paul.
And looking beyond early Christianity, one can pick any period of Christianity's history and find numerous rival doctrines.
Jesus taught Paul everything he knew about Christianity, by the way.
What you say is true. And yet...
Knowing God, knowing Christ, is supposed to change you. (If it doesn't, maybe you're headed for "Depart from Me, for I never knew you".) It's supposed to change you to love people, even your enemies. It's supposed to change you to not love the things of this world - money and power. You're supposed to live that out.
So, yes, to first order, Christianity is very much not about money or politics. It's about you and God. But to second order, it's about everything. It's about caring for the widow and the orphan and the alien. It's about not ripping other people off, but instead giving to meet the needs of people around you. It's about loving people, even if they're not in your church or of your race or your political persuasion. It's everything you do, and how and why you do it.
> And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
The Christianity I’m familiar with (Eastern Orthodox) places radical humility and fraternal equality starkly in the foreground. (“I believe, Lord, and I confess, that You are truly the Christ, the Son of the living God, Who came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the first.”) Any wealth is God's wealth; any beggar, criminal, or "undesirable" is a fellow human that needs to be lifted, not scorned. Spiritual movement forward comes by the grace of God against the kicking and screaming of earthly attachments. There is no place for “you” in this religion.
Is it an economic movement? No. But it directly calls believers to let go of the things that bind them to the material world, wealth in particular, and to share whatever they have with others. (“If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.") Indeed, ascetic monks who live in caves and continuously pray for humanity under their breath are seen as coming closest to a Christ-like existence.
That is a far cry from the distorted version of the faith being peddled by mega-churches and echoing in the halls of American power. Apparently, believing in Jesus is sufficient without all the other inconvenient bits.
Anyway, while it may be a mistake to label Christianity “communist” as a whole, nothing in the article remotely jumps out to me as egregious or revisionist as far as the most traditional variant of the religion is concerned. (And, FWIW, this label should not be confused with big-C Communism, which is an explicitly anti-religious movement.)
Well, it was until it became the state religion of the Roman Empire. Christians with the power of the state, at a time when religious tolerance wasn’t invented yet, were something else. Things got pretty complicated due to the bitter political disputes between the bishops of different cities.