tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2761684730989137546.post2490597558757447442..comments2024-03-28T07:50:06.102-04:00Comments on Mike Norman Economics: "The Poor" in the Greek Scriputuresmike normanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03296006882513340747noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2761684730989137546.post-52401920939040189202013-12-01T11:49:09.698-05:002013-12-01T11:49:09.698-05:00In ancient time and still in many places today, pe...In ancient time and still in many places today, people are "land-rich" but money poor, that is, illiquid. People are forced to either sell their land under duress, often at a disadvantage, or to borrowing against the asset by putting it up for collateral. This means one could be subsistent or even "middle class" one minute and impoverished the next.<br /><br />The inner meaning of "Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" is that internal renunciation of the worldly desire is necessary for spiritual enlightenment. Same teaching as Krishna in the Gita, Buddha in the Four Noble Truths, and many other spiritual luminaries. <br /><br />The way I put it is, You can't "own" everything if you "own" anything. This has little if anything to do with physical title, although the wealthier one is the more difficult to achieve discrimination between the important and trivial and internal renunciation of desire for trivial pursuits.Tom Hickeyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08454222098667643650noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2761684730989137546.post-41680449614489627182013-12-01T09:41:36.881-05:002013-12-01T09:41:36.881-05:00y,
Look at the scripture, the Lord is often depic...y,<br /><br />Look at the scripture, the Lord is often depicted as recommending that SOMEONE create economic flow...<br /><br />rsp,Matt Frankohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11978352335097260145noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2761684730989137546.post-42121080123044951532013-12-01T09:30:52.184-05:002013-12-01T09:30:52.184-05:00y,
I think Lazarus was depicted as having a house...y,<br /><br />I think Lazarus was depicted as having a house or dwelling to live in, etc... but yet he is described as "poor" in the scriptures ... (Bill O'Reilly Christendumbs latest economic expert says "Lazarus was not poor he had a house" so right there is your tip-off)<br /><br />Just like if you have US Treasury bonds (financial assets) you cant spend them to live... you have to first be able to find someone to take over your savings position in the bonds who has currency they can give you in exchange and then you can spend the currency on food, etc...<br /><br />The Greeks had another word(s) for "rich", "great possessions", etc...<br /><br />Even today there is the concept of being "house poor" to describe a household that buys too big/expensive of a house so the mortgage is so much that they end up with not much income (flow) leftover after the mortgage is paid to be able to spend (flow) on household provision...<br /><br />Someone who inherits a million dollars would have to keep it in a liquid account to be able to spend from it for subsistence...<br /><br />iow if they keep it in "the checking account" then I think you are correct they have "means of subsistence" but if they put it in anything else I would say they technically do not, they could still be termed "ptochos".<br /><br />This is the power of a system of state currency (like our Greco/Roman ancestors were running at this time) ... as govt is the "monopolist", then by definition, govt can control the distribution to guaranty that NO ONE ever lacks a basic "means of subsistence" ... "the church" CANNOT do this Christendom has to get to a point of realization of this...<br /><br />Look at all of these occurrences of this term above: NONE of the occurrences of this word is applied to ANYONE in Greece or Rome... or what is termed "the nations" in the Greek scriptures.<br /><br />ALL of "the poor" are depicted OUTSIDE OF THE NATIONS (ie in or around Jerusalem/Judea/Gallilee)... the nations ran systems of state currency so there were no "poor" there according to the Greek scriptures... everyone in the nations had some sort of access to a "means of subsistence" so there were not any "ptochos" there.. this should be revealing to us imo...<br /><br />rsp<br /><br />Matt Frankohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11978352335097260145noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2761684730989137546.post-17463642013673659602013-11-30T19:38:02.956-05:002013-11-30T19:38:02.956-05:00"The Greek word commonly translated into the ..."The Greek word commonly translated into the English word "poor" is ptochos, which is best translated in personal form as a person "lacking means of subsistence", lacking economic flow, rather than a person who is lacking an economic stock measure of wealth or possessions."<br /><br />I don't think that makes sense. If you have a stock of wealth you have a means of subsistence, so long as you can sell parts of that stock for the things you need on a day to day basis. <br /><br />As an extreme example, someone might inherit a million dollars and just hold it as a stock of wealth in an account. They could spend bits of it whenever they needed to, without ever having to worry about generating a flow of income to pay for their expenses.yhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03233997168975370006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2761684730989137546.post-35409272675113797082013-11-30T10:33:33.438-05:002013-11-30T10:33:33.438-05:00Goog, these scriptures suggest (to me) that the mo...Goog, these scriptures suggest (to me) that the more important point to keep in mind when we fix these flows is NOT the 'how' and not even the 'if' but rather the 'why'... RspMatt Frankohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11978352335097260145noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2761684730989137546.post-23524726960671718462013-11-29T17:49:54.590-05:002013-11-29T17:49:54.590-05:00This a lot justification, explanation, and energy ...This a lot justification, explanation, and energy not to help the poor. This is protestant refusal as usual. 700 club just a click away.<br /><br />The pope is pointing out the obvious and getting splinted for what?<br /><br />The typical run to the greek version by the german run up of things.googleheimhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14459089745473598235noreply@blogger.com