How Libertarian is God? (part 2: by T)

How Libertarian is God, Part 2 (by T)

I’d like to begin with a thank you to Scot, as always, for facilitating so many great discussions here. His blog has turned into, for me and others I’m sure, an impressive ongoing theological education for the last 10 years. I’ve not only benefited so very much from his own work and interactions, but also the works and interactions of so many fine scholars and practitioners and thinkers whom he finds and brings here in one way or another. He’s been like a modern theological guide taking virtual buses of us to see this or that book or author or movement that I, at least, would have otherwise never even seen, let alone interacted with. Scot, thanks. [SMcK: Thanks to you T for your continued support of this blog.]

Now, more to the issues of this series, I’d also like to say thanks to those that commented on my first post. In looking again at the post through those comments, I made the mistake of not being clear that the subject I’d really like to discuss in this series is libertarianism. And, further, I’d like to discuss libertarianism not in philosophical detail by looking at a particular libertarian legal philosopher or scholar, but looking at it at the level of a grassroots movement that has increasingly captured the political convictions and passions of many in the Church in the US. I want to look at the philosophical and/or theological justifications that are currently at work at the popular level within the Church on a myriad of public policy matters. Now, because these convictions have, as their primary result, a tendency to justify some public policies and undermine others, we will look at some modern and ancient economic policies to see how libertarianism differs from the kind of thinking and priorities that led God to implement various policies of Israel.

The discussion will involve some economics in the sense that economic policies contain particular assumptions and means and goals, any one of which may be more or less in line with libertarian principles. But this will not be a series in which we examine hard economic data or attempt any sophisticated forecasting. As with many discussions I initiate here, in this discussion I am most interested in which ideas and spirits are animating the Church and why, and whether scripture calls us to any kind of correction of thinking. So it is really a public policy and philosophical discussion. Yes, just as all public policy or even legal or political philosophy discussions touch on economic policy to some extent, but this discussion won’t be at the level or angle of economic analysis. Rather, this discussion gets to questions behind many economic policies, namely, what makes a given set of economic outcomes “good” or what makes one economic outcome “better” or more desirable or just or fair than another? For those of us who recoil, for instance, at the term “redistribution” as either unjust, unwise, or even just a fancy term for theft, why do we think and/or feel that? Perhaps better, is that a reaction God shares?

As always, my focus with these questions is on the Church rather than the world at large. Surely, for those of us in Christ, our answers to these questions should have more to do with God’s own character and concepts of justice, as revealed in Christ and the scriptures, than in popular philosophies of our day and nation?

As I mentioned last time, for the libertarian, individual property rights are given a priority in terms of what makes a society “just.” To generalize, the more that a society upholds individual property rights against infringement or interference, the more “just” it would be from a libertarian perspective. Individual property rights (and the corollary, individual responsibility) are both the highest means and ends for justice in libertarian thought. Indeed, we see the principle of individual freedom and responsibility as part of both the OT code and the NT ethic. Israelites were largely free to conduct their business as they (or, more often, their fathers in a patriarchal society) saw fit within ethical grounds and economic safety net laws we will discuss later. Israelites (and Churches later) would also though collectively give to widows and orphans and others in need. Sometimes “work” was unavailable or insufficient or impossible. The scriptures, throughout, value both individual freedom and responsibility but also grace and second (and third, fourth, fifth, etc.) chances, even at economic cost to others. The question is how are they balanced in God’s economy, God’s public policy, God’s sense of fairness and justice and mercy?

As I mentioned in the first post, my focus for this series has been the various laws for the nation of Israel. For those who want to question this, I understand. I am one who points to Jesus as the highest and best source for knowing God. Instead of using a whole post or more to defend this choice, I offer the following: To the extent we truly believe that God himself ruled in Israel and shaped if not authored their laws, can a Christian who gives any credence to the notion that God is the same, in character, from age to age, think that the economic policies in Israel are irrelevant to God’s own ideas about economic fairness, justice, or the balancing of individual responsibility with grace, even when that grace costs other individuals economically? Can we shape a robust theory of individual and societal economic “goods” or of economic justice while ignoring the only policies written by God himself for his own nation? However great Christ is, he does not render the OT as worthless as revelatory of God. That’s not what Jesus himself taught or believed. Nor do I see him correcting anything in his ministry that pertains to the issues discussed in this post. Quite the contrary.

For my part, I am convinced that the OT gives us a unique and valuable insight to the values and goals of God for a society of people who are organized by his value structure and wisdom and sense of justice, including in the realm of economic freedoms, goals and safety nets. Because Israel was an actual, distinct nation in real time, with God as designer of economic rights, freedoms and limitations, the Jewish laws and scriptures contain the translation of God’s thoughts into policy that is fascinating and powerful in its content and detail. In that light, I want to consider just one of the policies in the Jewish law and contrast it with libertarian-leaning thinking.

Let’s consider the gifting of the land to Israel and the Year of Jubilee. As many recall, the land is presented to Israel as a gift, promised to the patriarchs. The Year of Jubilee was to be celebrated every 7th, 7th year (every 49 years) and the land was “redistributed” among the various tribes of Israel, so that if some families had accumulated more land and others lost land, each family was restored to original ownership every two generations or so. I mention the Jubilee together with the original gifting of land because, after initially reading the story through it struck me that the Jubilee should be seen in light of the fact that Israel’s “rights” in the land have their foundation on grace from the beginning. Another way to put it (and the scriptures do, in fact, put it this way on occasion) is that Israel was only ever a tenant, not an owner, of the land. God owned the land. As such the terms of his “lease” to Israel basically required redistribution/re-gifting of the land to the people anew every 50 years. Grace was not going to be the thing that got the ball rolling then was to be finished, economically, with man’s efforts, to borrow a phrase from Paul. No, grace was to be literally the foundation and ongoing rule in Israel concerning the most important financial asset in their economy: land. Whether the industry was farming or shepherding or even trade, land was the essential capital asset, and God mandated that it be given equally to every tribe in Israel not just once, but every 50 years.

Consider the enormous implications of this twice-a-century gift. Consider how “deeds” in Israel were only to be, at most, 49 year leases. Consider what this policy does in terms of preventing one of the great plagues of our time: generational poverty. I have to give my own imagination substantial time to begin to scratch the surface of what this tangible, institutionalized, perennial grace would do over time to a nation. What would it look like to have minimal generational poverty? What would this kind of law cost or produce in terms of long-term wealth for the nation as well as the gap in wealth between the richest and poorest? What impact would this have on crime? On family stability? We can only imagine these, but they are worth some imagining, no?

While we begin to let our minds see and even feel some of those implications, I want to contrast that with the reaction I mentioned earlier to the term “redistribution” in many circles today. For many, this term might as well have just four letters. What’s more, if we had to find a philosophical root giving justification to this disdain, it would have to be libertarianism or a close relative. Again, libertarianism looks with great suspicion on any restriction or limitation or infringement on individual property rights.

My question, for now, is this: If we have come to hate the very idea of redistribution, can we square that disdain with God’s own actions in Israel, especially with the Jubilee? Whatever might rightly be said of Jubilee, we cannot deny that it is (mandatory) redistribution, and, while not resulting in state ownership or removing general market freedoms, is more aggressive in scope than any redistribution program ever instituted in the US to my knowledge. But I want to stay focused on the heart of it all. At its heart, libertarianism would call God or any government unjust or at least unwise for this policy. They might even call him criminal. Regardless, if any politician proposed anything half as ambitious today, he would be called worse, and many of the accusers would be in the Church. How can we call a policy or goal that God instituted unjust or unwise? What’s the justification? Do we trust libertarian philosophy more? Do we just like it more in a self-serving kind of way? Did this policy destroy all or too much individual incentive to work? What do you see as the downsides in Israel for this policy? What are the upsides?

Some may argue that redistribution is fine when it’s God doing it, but not anyone else. But that’s an argument still based on a conception of justice favoring individual wealth accumulation vs. access to capital at the bottom, and such a theory differs from the theory employed and seemingly held by God himself. From where do we get such a notion of justice? Further, even today there are many lands held and/or used by private persons with limits on their use or containing rights of “reverter” to prior owners in the very deeds, going back decades or more. Many private parties have long term leases that span many decades, after the expiration of which, the property, with all improvements, returns to the owners. These are not the kind of rules that are especially ripe for abuse by power-hungry or corrupt government officials. Indeed, there is no reason that a law of this type could not be a civil matter between private citizens. My point here is not that we could or should do a kind of Jubilee law for land today. My point is that this kind of law is not necessarily or even likely to be one that strengthens the state or tends to encourage corruption. Quite the opposite, to whatever extent that oligarchies encourage corruption and this would we. So, to the extent we are opposed to or disdainful of redistribution, why? And how do feel about opposing in principle that which God himself instituted so radically, even if government corruption is either unaffected or lessened by some version of such a policy? Would we be opposed to redistribution even if the effect on state corruption was neutral or better? Why?