[hellojesus]

I get what you're saying, but as someone completely unfamiliar with the Bible but familiar with the common phrase, "Money is the root of all evil", I agree that the GP's original statement is much clearer.

> For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils.

This reads not that money itself is the root of evils, or even that a desire for money ensures you live a sinful life.

To me this reads that money, as a motivator, can be a catalyst to dip into immoral practice. If someone wants riches but cares not about how they acquire it, they may steal, they may start wars, they may con others, etc. But someone who uses their desire of money as a catalyst for bringing world change via a new product, service, knowledge, is well found in their desires and implementation, as they are making the world better while achieving their goals.

The contrast in translations completely alters the takeaway for me.

[gen220]

> But someone who uses their desire of money as a catalyst for bringing world change via a new product, service, knowledge, is well found in their desires and implementation, as they are making the world better while achieving their goals.

For what it's worth – and I think it is a worthwhile thing to note – I do not believe that Jesus would condone this.

To Christ, the root of "well-founded" behavior is the golden rule – treat others as you would want yourself to be treated. This comes from the Sermon on the Mount.

Capturing value (a requirement to satisfy the desire for money) from exchange with your customers is not how you would want to be treated, as a customer. If you become wealthy from this exchange, you are violating the Golden Rule.

This sentiment is corroborated elsewhere, with another a famous saying of his that's often "explained away" but should probably be taken seriously.

> It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.

Martin Luther (of Lutheranism) has some interesting writings/interpretations on this subject [1], if you're interested.

[0]: https://biblehub.com/mark/10-25.htm, the larger story has more interesting context https://biblehub.com/bsb/mark/10.htm#17.

[1]: https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=501...

Edit just to make it clear in a TLDR; the severity of the "money is the root of all evil" translation is warranted. I'd interpret the "all kinds of evil" translation as "every kind of evil", rather than "many kinds of evil" (which is how we colloquially interpret 'all kinds' in contemporary english).

[hellojesus]

Thank you for the response and the links. It's an interesting perspective on life, but I'm not sure I'm totally sold.

> 17And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 18And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. 19You know the commandments: ‘Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.’” 20And he said to him, “Teacher, all these I have kept from my youth.” 21And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” 22Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

Here we do see the commandment for this rich man to rid himself of his possessions, but the command instructs him to take the proceeds and give it to the poor.

In selling his goods, does the man not capture value from his customers? He does so, and then is able to transfer the value freely to those who have none.

IMO, capturing value through voluntary transactions isn't robbing the counterparty. In fact, you may be treating them exactly as they wish to be treated. For example, I am quite happy to buy a phone for $700. It would take me far more than $700 to make my own phone, so the trade is really quite good for me. And I don't mind that some of the $700 goes to paying the people that did create the phone. Both parties are left better off.

Assumingly my employer feels the same about me, and we trade time for money. With the money, I can support myself and use the surplus to give freely to others.

I don't see any of this as a bad thing. But if I did rent out a house that was mold infested, knowingly, and refused willfully that fix it, that would be a violation of the golden rule.

[gen220]

> In selling his goods, does the man not capture value from his customers?

No, because selling goods is not the same thing as capturing value. Jesus is not asking for the man to first accrue wealth and then distribute it, he's asking the man to liquidate his wealth and distribute them. The implication is that the man developed his wealth through value capture.

> I don't mind that some of the $700 goes to paying the people that did create the phone. Both parties are left better off.

This unfortunately omits the many other parties involved in the supply chain, who are exploited and whose exploitation is carefully elided or hand-waved away by the phone vendor.

You're not exploiting them, though. Even the vendor has plausible deniability – because local governments have "different norms" around worker safety. And hey, they have money now that they didn't have before! So don't look too closely, OK?

You're a point of negative pressure (demand) in the system, that collectively keeps the whole system in balance. It's difficult to wrap our brains around and difficult to accept, which (IMO) makes its informed maintainers worse than a petty criminal.

Of course, capturing value through voluntary transactions does not necessarily rob the counterparty. But in today's complicated global economy, it's unfortunately insufficient to look at your transactions in isolation to know that you're not robbing somebody by proxy, or becoming an accessory to a robbery.

To put it in relief: is money laundering a violation of the golden rule, even if you capture no value from said laundering?

[hellojesus]

I don't think it was possible to investigate the entire supply chain even before the modern era. I go to a farmer and buy some crops, or barter with them. Who's to say they don't have slaves, or don't have good working conditions, etc.?

How does an economy work under your system? I must create demand somewhere. I need food. I need clothes. I need shelter. Amd I want things. Eventually I'll need to trade, and that trade will benefit both parties by making them both better off. But by becoming better off, some value was captured: I value what I purchase equal to or more that what I gave up. The concepts of marginal costs and revenue come into play here. Under your system, do I have to abstain from all trade if my marginal revenue exceeds my marginal cost? How do I scale?

[gen220]

> Who's to say they don't have slaves, or don't have good working conditions, etc.?

This is what social norms are for, and we have done it forever. The modern era has made this exponentially more difficult.

> Eventually I'll need to trade, and that trade will benefit both parties by making them both better off.

Yep yep, totally fine if you're not exploiting anybody.

> But by becoming better off, some value was captured: I value what I purchase equal to or more that what I gave up.

As long as you're creating value throughout the chain, you're doing just fine.

> Do I have to abstain from all trade if my marginal revenue exceeds my marginal cost?

This is actually an interesting question! The Luther piece touches on this a lot (where is the line between "Usury" and "Commerce"?). The answer he arrives on is no, you don't need to abstain, and that division of labor is not Usury.

The point is not to avoid profit, it's to avoid breaking the golden rule – there's no hard cutoff around how much profit is "too much" profit, but a rule of thumb that's often quoted (for whatever reason) is around 30% – i.e. if you see a gross profit that's consistently at or above that number, there's usually exploitation happening somewhere.

> How do I scale?

The answer depends on what we mean by scale. Revenues? Profits? Headcount? Volume of throughput?

[hellojesus]

Very interesting perspective. Thank you