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“Thou Shall Not Covet” Is Not a Defense of Capitalism

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“Thou Shall Not Covet” Is Not a Defense of Capitalism (It’s Actually an Indictment of It.)

(Note: For those who are new to my website, when I critique capitalism, I am in no way suggesting we should embrace the wicked economic/political system known as socialism.)

I recently saw a tweet admonishing Christians not to engage in the politics of envy (which the author ascribed to socialists) because to do so violates the 10th Commandment. I saw another that said God is the ultimate capitalist. These sentiments are not disconnected. In fact, those who think capitalism is “God’s ordained economic system” usually attribute envy (as the primary motivation) to anyone who challenges their worship of capitalism.

Does every Christian who uses the “envy card” to defend capitalism worship capitalism? Of course not, but some do. I make this bold charge of worshiping capitalism because some Christians ascribe to capitalism qualities and purposes reserved solely for God, forgetting that God does not give his glory to another person or thing. I’ve heard some speak of a capitalist paradise; others describe capitalism as the only moral system. In their world, it seems, wealth inequality always occurs as a natural consequence of laziness versus hard work or because of government intervention into the economy and never occurs as a natural consequence of sinners operating in a free market. In their world, wealth accumulation should be one’s goal, the more the better. So anyone who mentions inequality or who challenges capitalism engages in the politics of envy and acts wickedly. And, according to them, the 10th Commandment proves their point.

Here is what the 10th Commandment says:

You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor. —Exodus 20:17

Words Matter

We should be suspicious of any claim that envy violates the 10th commandment when the word doesn’t appear in the verse. The KJV, NIV, NASB and ESV all use the English word covet to translate the Hebrew word chamad which means to desire or to delight in something.1 So we must ask, why didn’t the translators use the word envy?

The English word envy comes from the latin word invidere which literally means “’to look askance at,’ or ‘to have hatred or ill will toward another’ because of their possessions or advantages.”2 If Bible translators thought this was the meaning of chamad, they would have used the word envy instead of the word covet when translating the 10th Commandment into English. But they didn’t.

The Hebrew word chamad, used in the 10th Commandment, means to desire intensely anything that becomes a substitute for love and devotion due to God. The intensity of this desire overpowers the moral demands of the law so that the coveted object must be attained by any means.3

When Jewish scholars produced a Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures (called the Septuagint) they used the Greek word epithumeo for the Hebrew word chamad when translating Exodus 20:17. Epithumeo means to set your heart upon, long for, covet, desire.4 It can be used to express evil desires opposed to the will of God. Exodus 20:17 forbids this kind of desire because it represents a heart not fully devoted to God.5 Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.

Covetousness ≠ Envy

Well, you might say, the 10th Commandment does refer to envy because the English words envy and covet are synonyms and are interchangeable in common usage. Doesn’t matter. What matters is the meaning of the biblical text in the original language. What matters is what sin does the 10th Commandment prohibit.

The problem with using envy and covetousness interchangeably is that the Hebrew words translated into covet and envy do not have the same meaning. As noted above, covetousness is the desire for something in place of God while envy is the resentful dislike (or hatred) of another who has something we desire. Envy seems to describe socialists very well, problem is, that’s not the word used in the 10th commandment.

Covetousness = Idolatry

Both Colossians 3:5 and Ephesians 5:5 label covetousness as idolatry:

Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.

—Colossians 3:5 (ESV)

For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.

—Ephesians 5:5 (ESV)

Covetousness fits well within these lists because, in the Bible, idolatry is often compared to sexual immorality. See Ezekiel 6:9; Jeremiah 3:6-10, 19:5; Isaiah 57:5-8; Ezekiel 16:15-19; Hosea 3:1-5.

So we see that the 10th commandment prohibits desiring the things of the world to the point of being unfaithful to God. Those who violate the 10th Commandment fail to love God with all their heart, mind, soul and strength and instead lust after the things of the world, thereby becoming enemies of God (James 4:4).

An Indictment of Capitalism

Whenever we don’t make a distinction that the Bible makes, we will miss something important. And that “something” will likely convict us of our own sin rather than bolster our argument about someone else’s sin.

The Hebrew Bible uses the word qana to denote the concept of the English word envy. Qana denotes jealousy or to blush from strong emotion.6 As previously noted it is not used in the 10th Commandment. Proverbs uses qana to warn against envy of evil men (not righteous rich capitalists!) (Proverbs 3:31; 23:17; 24:1,19. See also Psalms 37:1 and 73:3).

Inserting the concept of envying the rich into the 10th Commandment to argue for the morality of capitalism is both tragic and wicked. It is tragic because it blinds those who do it to their idolatrous love affair with capitalism. It is wicked because it seeks to persuade others to follow them into their sin.

It is wicked, because instead of warning others to flee the world system and to not envy evil men, it encourages others to remain in the world system and admonishes them to not envy the rich.

The 10th Commandment stands as an indictment against any world system that seeks to make us unfaithful to God (1 John 2:15-17). Capitalism is one such system. Christians are called to come out of the world system (Revelation 18:4-5) not to defend it.

 

Did you like this article? For more on economics and the Bible, check out my book, The Narrow Road: Loving God In a World Devoted to Money, on Amazon.

 

Notes:

  1. Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible
  2. S. Barabas, “Envy,” in The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible, ed. Merrill C. Tenney (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1976), 2:314.
  3. W. White, Jr., “Covet, Covetousness,” in The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible, ed. Merrill C. Tenney (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1976), 1:1016-1017.
  4. Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible
  5. H. Schonweiss, “Desire, Lust, Pleasure,” in The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, ed. Colin Brown (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1986), 1:456-458.
  6. V. Cruz, “Envy,” in Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, ed. Walter A. Elwell (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1984), 357.

America’s Fight for Freedom

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Whatever happened to America’s fight for freedom?

Don’t get me wrong. Americans still fight for freedom, but for many people it’s a different kind of freedom than previous generations fought for.

Yesterday morning, a day after celebrating our Fourth of July holiday, I wondered if my memory was accurate. It seemed to me that, during the Cold War, most Americans believed that the battle was between God-fearing nations and God-denying nations. Those who wanted to preserve individual freedom fought those who wanted to enslave individuals under collectivistic communism. The most effective pejoratives against communism were that it was godless and would take away our freedoms. It seemed clear—the Cold War pitted those who believed in a sovereign God and in the right of individuals to serve Him or to reject Him against atheists who demanded service only to the state. For Christians who knew their Bible, which system was good and which system was evil was easily discernible.

That was a major reason why the United States was determined to halt communism’s advance, even if it entailed great sacrifice.

But did we win the war?

Who Won the Cold War?

During the Cold War, the majority of Americans believed that communism was evil. Fast forward to today. Why do so many people in the U.S. believe socialism, which shares many of communism’s evils, is good?

I believe our secular society no longer cares much if we adopt a godless ideology, because in practice, most people already live as if God doesn’t exist. Thus, a call to fight godless ideologies will not have the effect it had on previous generations.

I also believe it is because we live in a secular society in which most people want to do what is right in their own eyes. Many Americans want freedom from religion so they can do whatever they want in their personal lives, including behaviors prohibited by Holy Writ. Many Americans want nearly unlimited freedom from government interference, believing the Bible imposes few if any restrictions on their economic activity.

Instead of fighting for freedom from a godless communism bent on taking away our freedom to serve God, too many of us fight for the freedom to serve our self. Now that our society has chucked God overboard on its journey to progressivism’s imaginary man-made nirvana, the argument has turned to economics.

Now, in what seems to me to be a capitulation to our culture’s dominant worldview, the main weapon many Christians use to fight socialism is a zealous promotion of capitalism, claiming it to be the only moral economic system.

What happened to God? Have Christians really come to believe that God will give his glory to another? Is it capitalism that will save us and demand our service?

Who won the battle for the hearts and minds of humanity that was fought in the Cold War? The West may have halted the geopolitical boundary expansion of communism, we may have won the battle against flesh and blood, but how did we fare “against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms?” (Ephesians 6:12)

The Task Ahead

It is sad that many Christians now fight against godless ideologies, not by proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom of God, but by proclaiming the gospel of capitalism. What message do we send to unbelievers when we are so ashamed of the gospel and the freedom it gives that we promote with all our might the freedom to pursue great wealth via capitalism? Jesus’ words in Mark 8:34-38 ought to sober up any Christian inclined to fight evil by employing the very weapons the enemy uses to destroy him (1 Timothy 6:6-10).

Our task hasn’t changed. Our mission is the same. True freedom comes from Christ (John 8:36). The pearl of great price cannot be obtained via capitalism or by voting into power a certain political party. Our job is to spread the good news of the kingdom of God.

 

Did you like this article? Check out my book, The Narrow Road: Loving God In a World Devoted to Money, on Amazon.

My Kingdom Is Not of This World

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Heavenly Image Rapture Left Behind

Many Christians say that Social Justice Warriors (SJWs) and cultural marxism pose the greatest ideological threat to the gospel in our day. They may be right. Others fear that the spread of these ideas will lead to full-blown socialism in our nation.

Another concern some Christians share is that these ideas have infiltrated the Church thus diluting or even destroying its ability to proclaim the truth of the gospel.

This raises some interesting questions:

  • Are today’s false doctrines any more dangerous than those faced by previous generations?
  • Has Satan come up with a new strategy or has he merely recycled old lies?
  • Is our battle against flesh and blood (politicians, leftists and deceived church leaders) or is our battle “against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms?”

Those sounding the alarm correctly surmise that we are responsible to fight for truth and to proclaim a biblical gospel. But whom do we fight and how do we wage war?

Suppose the heretofore unthinkable happens and the United States slips into the evil of socialism/marxism. Is the Kingdom of God threatened by an economic system?

Let’s keep these questions in mind as we look at the threat posed by cultural Marxism.

Critical Theory

Ideas such as social justice, identity politics, radical feminism, intersectionality, classism and white privilege fall under the umbrella of critical theory. Neil Shenvi (a Christian apologist) defines critical theory this way—“Critical theory is an ideology that divides the world into oppressed groups and their oppressors and aims to liberate the oppressed.”1

The oppressed groups are not confined to economic status as in traditional marxism or Liberation Theology. Women are also oppressed, as are people of color and members of the LGBTQ community. Lots of people are oppressed, and of course, the only people left to play the role of oppressor are white males, especially Christian white males.

So how is the gospel threatened? The most common response I have read is that social justice warriors confuse justice and mercy, two concepts that are very clear and very distinct in the Bible. Sinners deserve justice for their sin, but God in his mercy “gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” SJWs affirm a different idea—that somehow the oppressed deserve mercy in the same way they deserve justice, that they are two sides of the same coin. If that be the case, then we deserve our salvation.

My first reaction to reading Shenvi’s definition of critical theory was to recall Jesus’ words in Luke 4:18–19:

The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

Indeed, this passage refers to both spiritual and literal freedom, poverty, blindness, and oppression. But critical theory ignores the spiritual component. Jesus sets us free from sin’s oppression and Satan. Critical theory doesn’t see sin as the problem or Christ as the solution because it focuses on real and imagined oppression by other people. They proclaim moral superiority over their oppressors and exhibit a hubris that excludes them from the moral requirements that the Bible applies equally to every human. It perpetuates Satan’s lie that someone else (perhaps even God) is withholding something from us.

Thus, critical theory doesn’t allow us to identify with Adam so that Christ, the second Adam can free us. Instead, we must belong to an oppressed group (or repent of our wrongs as a member of an oppressor group) and fight for liberation. The gospel is unnecessary as critical theorists virtue signal their way into hell. Tragic.

Critical theory ups the ante on post-modernism’s disdain for objective truth by claiming objective truth acts only as a cover for the evil perpetrated by oppressors. Subjective experiences trump objective facts.2 So, in critical theory, Satan’s lie —“has God said” takes on a form that refuses to consider any appeal to the Bible.

At Odds With the Gospel

We are either in Adam or in Christ. We are lost or we are found. We travel the road to destruction or we travel the road to eternal life. These are the only two identities that matter. Critical theory ignores the gospel and divides people into two groups—the oppressed and their oppressors. In the worldview of critical theory there is neither room for good in the oppressor group nor evil in the oppressed group. But our identity (and certainly our virtue) does not lie in our gender, skin color or oppressed status.

Christians are commanded “If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone” (Romans 12:18). Critical theory promotes strife and conflict between groups while denying that we are all born into the same sinking boat. It is contrary to Christianity because the Bible teaches we are all separated from God by our sin, and need a solution that can only be provided by God. They don’t need Jesus or his gospel because they have substituted oppression for sin as mankind’s biggest problem. And, they believe they can solve the problem themselves.

Critical theory is at odds with Christianity because it makes distinctions between people that the Bible doesn’t consider as important as the distinction between those in Adam and those in Christ:

So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise. Galatians 3:26-29

So those who are alarmed are correct – we have to preach the true gospel. To do so requires us to identify and reject any false gospel.

Will the Social Justice Movement Lead to Socialism?

The Social Justice Movement is currently a hot topic in the Church. You may have heard the phrase “Woke Church.” It refers to churches and their members who embrace the idea that racism and injustice are systemic in America. For some, righting this wrong becomes the main mission of the church instead of preaching the gospel.

For secular critical theorists and SJWs to reach their objectives, the existing power structures must be overturned. Thus, many people fear that this ideology will lead to socialism. The social justice movement is more likely to result in socialism than simple class warfare because so many more people can be incited to rise up against the status quo.

Marxism and socialism destroy individual freedom and private ownership of the means of production. Thus they undermine biblical principles of reaping what you sow and stewardship. Capitalism must have freedom and private ownership in order to operate so it preserves them.

Does Jesus’ Kingdom Depend On an Economic System?

But herein lies a trap. Instead of defending the gospel, some Christians are tempted to spend much of their time defending capitalism rather than simply fighting against biblical heresy and the horrors of socialism.

Most Christians would probably agree with the statement that capitalism is better than socialism because evil men can do the least harm under capitalism. But is it really capitalism that restrains evil or is it individual freedom, the rule of law and the preservation property rights that cause a society to flourish?3 The fact that it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom should alert us to the fact that capitalism’s prosperity may hinder the gospel as well. Capitalism may only encourage a weak faith. Jesus’ proclamation that the kingdom of heaven is more important to Christians than their material prosperity suggests that our priority must be to defend the gospel, not capitalism:

The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field. “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls. When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and bought it. Matthew 13:44-46

Let’s not promote capitalism (a system that preserves market freedom yet easily diverts us from God’s purposes) over God’s economy in which Christians steward their resources to promote the kingdom of God. Let’s defend freedom, property rights and the rule of law, but let’s not promote a capitalism that encourages and depends on debt and covetousness to enslave its participants.

And, let’s not make the same mistake as the critical theorists. They are not the enemy we must ultimately overcome. “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms (Ephesians 6:12).

Let us remember this when the injurious treatment of others provokes us to revenge. Our natural disposition would lead us to direct all our exertions against the men themselves; but this foolish desire will be restrained by the consideration that the men who annoy us are nothing more than darts thrown by the hand of Satan. While we are employed in destroying those darts, we lay ourselves open to be wounded on all sides. To wrestle with flesh and blood will not only be useless, but highly pernicious. We must go straight to the enemy, who attacks and wounds us from his concealment, — who slays before he appears. (From Calvin’s commentary on Ephesians.)

This is a battle that we can’t win on our own. We must spend time praying before any encounter with the lies of Satan (including lies we believe unawares) and we must keep ourselves unstained by the world as we proclaim the truth. Christ will establish his church and his kingdom and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

But Isn’t Oppression a Problem the Church Should Address?

Yes! The Bible condemns oppression whether it occurs in ancient Israel, in America’s slave trade, in South Africa’s apartheid or in today’s society. Christians must defend the rights of the weak and vulnerable. We must soberly examine our society against Scripture and root out any evil practices (and laws that abet them) without compromising the main point of the gospel—we are all born sinners in need of Jesus Christ.

(To learn more about economic oppression in our modern world and the ways in which capitalism and socialism compete against God’s economy for the hearts and souls of humanity, look for my book, The Narrow Road, available on Amazon later this month.)

Notes:

  1. Neil Shenvi, “Critical Theory Quotes” https://shenviapologetics.com/critical-theory-quotes/
  2. Neil Shenvi, “Christianity and Critical Theory” https://shenviapologetics.com/critical-theory-and-christianity-part-1/
  3. These three principles distinguish capitalism from socialism, but they don’t sufficiently define capitalism. These principles can exist outside of capitalism.