Threading the Needle

Wealth and the Kingdom of God

Oct 16, 2024

brown camel in the desert — Photo by Oskars Sylwan on Unsplash

“It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” - Jesus[1]

Of all the ways that the world of the New Testament can seem strange to us, perhaps none is stranger than the attitude towards wealth that we find there. Our ancestors in the faith were more than a little ambivalent about the accumulation of personal wealth, and were deeply concerned about the moral and social consequence of economic inequality. Concern for the poor was the sin qua non of sincere faith. This is evident from St. Paul to the Letter of James to the Book of Revelation.[2] It was a central concern of Jesus as well.

In fact, our Christian forebears seriously wondered, “Can a rich person be saved? That is the question at stake in Jesus’ dialogue with the rich man and, subsequently, Peter, about wealth and the kingdom of God.[3] Jesus’ response to the question is equivocal: yes, but . . . What is going on here? We need some historical context to understand why this was a live question for Jesus and his contemporaries.

Jesus is the heir of a long tradition of prophetic critique of economic injustice, especially the accumulation of individual wealth at the expense of the poor. This passage from the prophet Amos is typical:

Therefore, because you trample on the poor
and take from them levies of grain,

you have built houses of hewn stone,
but you shall not live in them;

you have planted pleasant vineyards,
but you shall not drink their wine.

For I know how many are your transgressions,
and how great are your sins—

you who afflict the righteous, who take a bribe,
and push aside the needy in the gate.[4]

The prophets of Israel understood well that wealth inequality created social unrest and perverted the ideal of impartial justice, undermining the egalitarian ethos of the Mosaic covenant. Remember that in the ancient world, the main source of wealth was land, and the estates of the rich grew in several ways. Assets were sometimes consolidated through the joining of households in marital or political alliances. At other times expropriated land was distributed through political patronage. But the primary mechanism was acquiring land through the debt-default of small agricultural land holders.[5] This is why the prophet Isaiah cries out, “Woe to you who add house to house and join field to field till no space is left and you live alone in the land.”[6]

This is, of course, a problem endemic to many places in every age. The Torah sought to address this problem by periodic debt forgiveness and the return of ancestral lands to the original owners.[7] This ensured that no family was permanently displaced and deprived of a livelihood, and that wealth inequality would be maintained within a stable equilibrium. It is unclear if this was ever really observed in Israel – or anywhere else.

This is how socioeconomic inequality had become widespread in the time of Jesus. And it is almost certainly how the rich man ended up with “many properties,” which is another possible translation for “many possessions.”[8] He had expropriated the land of many peasant families, who were delinquent on their debt payments and thus unable to maintain even a subsistence living.

Jesus’ public ministry included the proclamation of the year of the Lord’s favor, the Jubilee year, in which the program of debt forgiveness and restitution outlined in the Torah would be instituted. We can think of it as a form of reparations. This is why the rich man ends up turning away from Jesus, grieving; because he is unwilling to return the properties he has expropriated.

It is interesting that the rich man, upon initially approaching Jesus, seems to think that eternal life is something that one can inherit, like wealth. It is a privilege passed down from one person to another. “What must I do to inherit eternal life,” he asks. Jesus replies by citing the well-known commandments, but curiously adds another, “You shall not defraud.” Does he have in mind the prohibition against exploitation of the poor?

The rich man believes he has fulfilled the requirements of the commandments. “I haven’t murdered anyone! I haven’t stolen anything! I haven’t lied! I haven’t defrauded anyone!” On one level, he has met the formal requirements of the law. He probably has acquired his properties legally. But he lacks one thing – the practice of reparations that also is a part of the covenant.

The rich man here is a stand-in for everyone who works hard and obeys the rules, but has benefited from the expropriation of the lands and labor of others. Then, when others show us the bill for reparations, we walk away grief stricken at the threat of losing what we claim as our rightful inheritance. This isn’t because we are particularly morally odious people, but because we cling to our possessions as the source of our security – the source of eternal life.

The making of reparations is not an impossible standard – though Peter wondered aloud how any rich person can enter the kingdom of God. Germany made reparations to the state of Israel after WWII, including restitution to holocaust survivors; an imperfect response, but it was a start. The U.S. made mostly symbolic reparation payments of $20,000 per person to Japanese-Americans, some 40 years after their forced relocation to internment camps during that same war.

Today, we continue to debate making reparations to the descendants of formerly enslaved Americans, who are still catching up to the 300 year head start that descendants of free Americans have in the accumulation of wealth. And poor countries are demanding that the developed countries, the greatest beneficiaries of the fossil fuel economy, pay their fair share for the impacts of climate change.

Making reparations isn’t impossible. But it is hard. And it can be costly, whether addressing the harms we have caused to others personally, or collectively. People recovering from addictions know about making reparations. It is an essential part of taking responsibility for their lives and restoring their self-respect. Cleaning up the messes we have caused is just part of being a mature adult.

Jesus, looking at the rich man, loved him. This is the only instance in Mark’s Gospel where we are explicitly told that Jesus loved someone. When Jesus invites the rich man to sell his properties, give the proceeds to the poor, and follow him, we may hear this as a harsh judgment. But Jesus saw it as the one thing necessary for this man to experience the kingdom of God. It was the key to restoring him to himself, to his humanity in the image of God. This was not a judgment. It was a gift.

The rich man could not earn eternal life any more than he could inherit it. But he could let go of the baggage from his past that prevented him from experiencing real life, eternal life, for himself and for those whose lives he had harmed. It is possible, with God’s help.

Can a rich person be saved? I hope so. For my sake, and for the sake of all of us, whose lives are deeply and irrevocably intertwined. The one thing necessary is to take responsibility for our lives. That is really all that Jesus is asking of us.

And if we can’t or will not do that? “But many of the first will be last, and the last first.”[9] Get in line – and enjoy watching the folks we’ve harmed enter the kingdom before us. We will get there too, eventually. It just might take us a little bit longer.

Awakened Heart

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