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C. S. Lewis on interest (from Mere Christianity): >There is one bit of advice given to us by the ancient heathen Greeks, and by the Jews in the Old Testament,
by attende_domine 8y ago
C. S. Lewis on interest (from Mere Christianity):
>There is one bit of advice given to us by the ancient heathen Greeks, and by the Jews in the Old Testament, and by the great Christian teachers of the Middle Ages, which the modern economic system has completely disobeyed. All these people told us not to lend money at interest: and lending money at interest — what we call investment — is the basis of our whole system. Now it may not absolutely follow that we are wrong. Some people say that when Moses and Aristotle and the Christians agreed in forbidding interest (or “usury” as they called it), they could not foresee the joint stock company, and were only dunking of the private moneylender, and that, therefore, we need not bother about what they said.
>That is a question I cannot decide on. I am not an economist and I simply do not know whether the investment system is responsible for the state we are in or not. This is where we want the Christian economist. But I should not have been honest if I had not told you that three great civilizations had agreed (or so it seems at first sight) in condemning the very thing on which we have based our whole life.
- umanwizard 8y agoYou can find plenty of stuff that those three groups agree on that would horrify modern people. It's a really poor argument.
- canhascodez 8y agoThe quotation is factual and avoids making an argument. I'm not sure what you're trying to refute.
- leibwiht 8y agoAlternatively, it's exactly because modern people would be horrified at what those three groups agree on that it is an excellent argument.
- Kalium 8y agoCool! Now we have two equally credible arguments from antiquity. Perhaps it's time to consider forming some fundamental principles and reasoning from them instead?
- leibwiht 8y agoThat would be good, except that if you told anyone about it, they'd probably be horrified.
- Kalium 8y agoI mean, I already believe in a lot of basic principles that would horrify a lot of people - free speech, freedom of religion, I don't care at all what someone's sexual orientation is, and so on. So I don't see where this should stop us from trying to form principles as an alternative to arguing that something must be or must not be true because of what someone wrote down millennia ago.
- C1sc0cat 8y agoInvestment returns are not usury - see sharia banking
- attende_domine 8y ago>Originally, usury meant interest of any kind.[0] For example, here's Aristotle on usury[1]: >There are two sorts of wealth-getting, as I have said; one is a part of household management, the other is retail trade: the former necessary and honorable, while that which consists in exchange is justly censured; for it is unnatural, and a mode by which men gain from one another. The most hated sort, and with the greatest reason, is usury, which makes a gain out of money itself, and not from the natural object of it. For money was intended to be used in exchange, but not to increase at interest. And this term interest, which means the birth of money from money, is applied to the breeding of money because the offspring resembles the parent. Wherefore of an modes of getting wealth this is the most unnatural. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usury https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usury [1] http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/politics.1.one.html http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/politics.1.one.html
- C1sc0cat 8y agoHow does "not to increase at interest" rule out investing in trade ?