It took me from 1973 until 2012 to complete my 31-volume set, An Economic Commentary on the Bible. That was the homework assignment.
Now I have to begin putting the pieces together. I want to write a large book that is comparable to Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations or Ludwig von Mises' Human Action. But before I do this, I have to complete a preliminary work: The Covenantal Structure of Christian Economics.
I will use the five-point biblical covenant to structure the book. The generic covenantal structure is as follows: God, man, law, sanctions, and time. It applies as follows:
1. Transcendence/presence of God
2. Hierarchy/authority/representation
3. Ethics/law
4. Oath/sanctions/judgment
5. Succession/inheritance/dominion
The acronym is THEOS, the Greek word for God.
I must apply these in a framework that is exclusive to economic theory. This same structure, and this same decision-making process regarding the categories, applies to all of the social sciences. The five-point structure is the universal framework. The question then is the content with respect to each academic discipline. For example, is structures the field of government: sovereignty, authority, law, sanctions, and succession. This is government in the broadest sense: self-government, family government, civil government, and church government.
The scholar wants universality: general principles of interpretation. He also wants specificity: "my academic discipline, not someone else's." This is the challenge of determining the covenantal structure and content of any academic discipline.
The structure is clear. The content of the structure is not. The main problem is not identifying the structure. The main problem is identifying the most applicable, and also the most universal, categories of this structure.
Consider economics. When I say "economics," I am not limiting this to market affairs, or what Mises called "catallactics." I mean the issue of scarcity as it applies to four covenants: individual, family, state, church.
I could go with this structure:
1. God owns everything.
2. God delegates ownership.
3. Theft is immoral.
4. Covenant-keeping prospers.
5. Scarcity will decrease.
There is no question that the Bible teaches that ownership is always accompanied by responsibility. There is also no question that the Bible teaches that theft is immoral. God establishes a boundary around his own name. God establishes a boundary around private property. With respect to point 4, there is no question that the Bible teaches that covenant keeping prospers. We can see this in the first 14 verses of Deuteronomy 28.
The problem is this: this may not be as universal and simultaneously as applicable as this arrangement.
1. God owns everything.
2. God delegates ownership.
3. Ownership establishes responsibility.
4. Contracts increase cooperation.
5. Mankind increases dominion.
Ownership establishes responsibility. This is why theft is immoral. It is an invasion of another person's responsibility, or another institution's responsibility. It announces: "God got it wrong. Wealth and therefore responsibility must be re-allocated."
The more general principle of the fourth point is the oath. Covenantal oaths are legally binding. Therefore, contracts are legally binding. Therefore, agreements are legally binding. Should I focus on the issue of sanctions, or should I focus on the issue of oath? The answer is not intuitive. Yet the focus of the book will be different, depending on which I select.
Here is another issue. Point 4 is also the issue of rendering judgment. So, I could state it as follows: value is imputed. This is the great debate that divided classical economics from modern economics. Is value inherent in a product, or is it merely imputed by an individual? Is there intrinsic value, or is there only imputed value? This is a major issue. Marxism, like classical economics, was tied to the idea of intrinsic value. Classical economists believed that either labor is the source of value or else the cost of production is. In the 1870s, Austrian economists, mainly Carl Menger, switched the idea of value as individually imputed value. Then the same question arises with respect to imputed value as sovereignty. Who imputes value? Is it the individual owner? Or is it a state bureaucrat?
Then there is the fifth point. That point is succession. In economic terms, this is the issue of compound economic growth. The Bible teaches that compound growth is an aspect of covenant-keeping. We can see this in Deuteronomy 8:17-18. There is no question that economic growth is morally incumbent upon godly societies.
Economic growth is considered by almost all economists as the one universally valid goal. Almost all economists promote economic growth as a means of judging the efficiency and therefore the legitimacy of an economy. There are a few exceptions, called zero-growth economists, but there are not many.
If there is economic growth, this reduces scarcity. This is surely a positive sanction. It is taught by the Bible. But is economic growth the broadest category? Isn't the real issue man's dominion in history? That, of course, would apply to areas of life beyond economics. It applies to every area of life. With respect to economic theory, the issue of economic growth seems to be more specific and therefore more relevant. Yet the issue of economic growth must be seen in the context of the Dominion mandate of Genesis 1, verses 26 through 28. So, which should it be? Should it be the broader issue of dominion, or should it be the more narrow focus of economic growth?
At present, I am going with this.
1. God owns everything.
2. God delegates ownership.
3. Ownership establishes responsibility.
4. Value is imputed.
5. Mankind increases dominion.
Now I must fill in the content.
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