Acts: "And all that believed were together, and had all things common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all [men], as every man had need."
Did Karl Marx read scripture?
Angry Bear
The Economic System of the Apostles
Mike Kimel
"Did Karl Marx read scripture?"
ReplyDeleteHa! Doesn't look like it! ;)
I would point out that these sales and "re-distribution" was only conducted within the small group of these pentacostal Apostles... the concept could not scale as if "everybody sold everything" who would be left to buy it?
I guess in Marx view, perhaps it would be "the state" but if he DID read and have been given to understand the Hebrew scriptures, he would have seen that under the Law of Moses, the land belongs to God, those of the house of Israel only tenant on the land which is assigned via guaranteed allotment...
Marx almost gets it as this land was allotted "to each according to ability", Marx just leaves out "the God part" and mixes a few other things up related to national allotment (aka 're-distribution') of means of subsistence vs national allotment of output, exogenous "money", etc...
Correction of surplus is at work here. These pentacostal believers sold, in effect, only their surplus possessions in preparation for the heralding of and in expectation of the earthly Kingdom during which they would have received their legal allotment of the land (ie JG/BIG) according to the Law of Moses (vs 10 dogs after 9 bones style as was current in Judea back then and here in the nations at present, the "metals at work" looks like in both instances).
They were told by the Lord to prepare for the Kingdom:
"4 And, being foregathered, He charges them not to be departing from Jerusalem, but to be remaining about for the promise of the Father, "which you hear of Me,
5 seeing that John, indeed, baptizes in water, yet you shall be baptized in holy spirit after not many of these days."
6 Those, indeed, then, who are coming together, asked Him, saying, "Lord, art Thou at this time restoring the kingdom to Israel?"
7 Yet He said to them, "Not yours is it to know times or eras which the Father placed in His own jurisdiction." Acts 1:4-7
This heralding of the Kingdom by these pentacostal believers of course went on to be rejected (this making for the second time overall) by Israel and the Temple destroyed: "Verily, I am saying to you, Under no circumstances may a stone here be left on a stone, which shall not be demolished." Mat 24:2
Meanwhile the Lord adjusted and commissioned the Roman-Israelite persecutor Saul (Paul) to be going to the nations with the evangel of the grace of God to the 'ecclesia which is His body'.... and here we are... quo vadis? imo it's ultimately not up to us. rsp,