XIII
CONCERNING MONEY
"How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God! For it is easier for a camel to enter in through a needle's eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God."--LUKE xviii. 24, 25.
I
The most significant thing in the teaching of Jesus concerning money is the large place which it fills in the records of our Lord's public ministry. How large that place is few of us, perhaps, realize. Even religious writers who take in hand to set forth Christ's teaching in detail, for the most part, pass over this subject in silence. In Hastings' great Dictionary of the Bible we find, under "Money," a most elaborate article, extending to nearly twenty pages, and discussing with great fullness and learning the coinage of various Biblical periods; but when we seek to know what the New Testament has to say concerning the use and perils of wealth, the whole subject is dismissed in some nine lines.
Very different is the impression which we receive from the Gospels themselves. It is not possible here to bring together all Christ's words about money, but we may take the third Gospel (in which the references to the subject are most numerous) and note Christ's more striking sayings in the order in which they occur. In the parable of the sower, in the eighth chapter, the thorns which choke the good seed are the "cares and riches and pleasures of this life." Chapter twelve contains a warning against covetousness, enforced by the parable of the rich fool and its sharp-pointed application, "So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God." The fourteenth chapter sheds a new light on the law of hospitality: "When thou makest a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends, nor thy brethren, nor thy kinsmen, nor rich neighbours ... but when thou makest a feast, bid the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind; and thou shalt be blessed." Chapter fifteen tells how a certain son wasted his substance with riotous living. Chapter sixteen opens with the parable of the unjust steward; then follow weighty words touching the right use of "the mammon of unrighteousness." But the Pharisees, who were lovers of money, when they heard these things, "scoffed at Him." Christ's answer is the parable of Dives and Lazarus, with which the chapter closes. Chapter eighteen tells of a rich young ruler's choice, and of Christ's sorrowful comment thereon: "How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God." And then, lastly, in the nineteenth chapter, we hear Zacchæus, into whose home and heart Christ had entered, resolving on the threshold of his new life that henceforth the half of his goods he would give to the poor, and that where he had wrongfully exacted aught of any man he would restore four-fold. It is indeed a remarkable fact, the full significance of which few Christians have yet realized, that, as John Ruskin says, the subject which we might have expected a Divine Teacher would have been content to leave to others is the very one He singles out on which to speak parables for all men's memory.[49]
II
The question is sometimes asked how the teaching of Jesus concerning money is related to that strange product of civilization, the modern millionaire. The present writer, at least, cannot hold with those who think that Christ was a communist, or that He regarded the possession of wealth as in itself a sin. Nevertheless, it is impossible not to sympathize with the feeling that the accumulation of huge fortunes in the hands of individuals is not according to the will of Christ. Mr. Andrew Carnegie is reported to have said that a man who dies a millionaire dies disgraced; and few persons who take their New Testament seriously will be disposed to contradict him. But, inasmuch as all millionaires are not prepared like Mr. Carnegie to save themselves from disgrace, the question is beginning to arise in the minds of many, whether society itself should not come to the rescue--its own and the rich man's. No man, it may be pretty confidently affirmed, can possibly earn a million; he may obtain it, he may obtain it by methods which are not technically unjust, but he has not earned it. Be a man's powers what they may, it is impossible that his share of the wealth which he has helped to create can be fairly represented by a sum so vast. If he receives it, others may reasonably complain that there is something wrong in the principle of distribution. And unless, both by a larger justice to his employees, and by generous benefactions to the public, he do something to correct the defects in his title, he must not be surprised if some who feel themselves disinherited are driven to ask ominous and inconvenient questions.
This, however, is a matter which it is impossible now to discuss further. Turning again to Christ's sayings about money, we may summarize them in this fashion: Christ says nothing about the making of money, He says much about the use of it, and still more about its perils and the need there is for a revised estimate of its worth. Following the example of Christ, it is the last point of which I wish more especially to speak. But before coming to that, it may be well briefly to recall some of the things which Christ has said touching the use of wealth. Wealth, He declares, is a trust, for our use of which we must give account unto God. In our relation to others we may be proprietors; before God there are no proprietors, but all are stewards. And in the Gospels there are indicated some of the ways in which our stewardship may be fulfilled. I will mention two of them.