Ancient Wisdoms - Modern Economy

I’ve written quite a bit lately about the flaws in our economic system. What are the alternatives?

This is where I believe we can find inspiration from Ancient Wisdoms.
You don’t have to be religious to be able to appreciate the wisdom of spiritual texts in the context of the twenty first century. The Bible teaches that money is first and foremost a tool for us to use wisely for the furtherance of the Kingdom of God. But what if you don't believe in God? The Old Testament sets out principles of economics relating to the management of land and debt that in their essence are clearly designed to promote and maintain healthy relationships and prevent the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a minority. That to me sounds enormously relevant for today’s world, whether or not you believe in God!

The Jubilee Land laws
When the Israelites entered Canaan in the fourteenth century BC the land was carved up between them per capita, and the Jubilee Land Laws were formulated.1 No freehold sales were allowed and every fiftieth year, the Jubilee Year, the land had to revert to the original family freeholder, 2 at which time the people were to return to their own clans.3 At this same time bonded servants or debt slaves were released. This sound albeit informal welfare system ensured that the disabled, elderly and infirm were cared for, and the extended family was kept together, maintaining personal dignity and self-reliance for all.
Then there were the laws that gave freedom from debt servitude. There was an interest ban on loans between Israelites (not applicable to refugees and immigrants) and the loan would be cancelled every seven years. This kept the wealth within a family unit and worked to keep the family together.
Lending was about helping the poor and needy through financial crises. Loans were for helping in the short term, they were not intended to cause any hardship to a borrower over the longer term.
These laws for periodic debt cancellation and the return of family property protected a family’s roots and avoided wealth concentration and economic dependency. The laws underlined justice on the one hand with redistribution rules and the importance of relationships on the other, with families being rooted in their own areas. ‘There is hope for your future, says the Lord, and your children shall come back to their own country.’4
This is quite the opposite of the global mobility encouraged today in the workforce. Such mobility brings with it the inherent disadvantages of losing family cohesion, not knowing others around you in society and not feeling part of any community. When people generally do not feel loyalty and attachment to a particular area there can be an increase in crimes against the person and an increase in violence against the environment.
Many of us believe that there is an inextricable link between religious faith and social values, between theology and sociology, between the spiritual and the political. But we must have the courage to uphold these values in our lives. If we do not do so we fail society, and we fail God.5

Comments welcome!

1. Holy Bible, RSV, Joshua chapters 13 to 21
2. Ibid, Leviticus 25.
3. Ibid., Lev 25.10
4. Ibid., Jeremiah 31.17
5. The Rt. Reverend James Jones, Bishop of Liverpool, in his foreword to Schluter, Michael and John Ashcroft, Editors, Jubilee Manifesto: a Framework, Agenda and Strategy for Christian Social Reform, Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press, 2005, p. 11.

The photo, by the way, is of tobacco being dried in the Dordogne.

© Eleanor Stoneham 2011

Fare dodger, turnstile jumper, fare beater, fare evader, fare fiddler

Fare dodger, turnstile jumper, fare beater, fare evader, fare fiddler, we all know what that means - the person guilty of fraudulent travel or just simply “travelling without a ticket.”
In New York City the legal term is apparently “theft of services”
The problem seems to be universal – but the bottom line is that the honest amongst us subsidize the dishonest.

Boris (Johnson – London Mayor) slams the fare-dodging ‘parasites’ who cost us £75million, the London Evening Standard headline shouted. And that’s just in one year, in London, £40million on the buses and the Tube £20million.

And I’m sure New York and other big cities are as bad.

On the next page of the same newspaper: 20,000 speed off with petrol without paying says the headline. Apparently motorists stole nearly £800,000 worth of petrol (gas) in “drive-offs” from petrol stations in London last year.

Again I’m sure London is in no way unique.

In our church there is a little wooden holder on the vestry wall, made many years ago to store the match-boxes and lighters for lighting our candles. It is inscribed: EX. XX. XV.
The text referred to? The Book of Exodus in the Old Testament, specifically the Ten Commandments, and particularly number 8 – Thou Shalt Not Steal!

Someone in the distant past in our church must have got fed up with the matches disappearing!

Time to get back, I think, to a few good old fashioned moral codes and ancient wisdoms.

We need Compassion and Empathy not War and Violence

King David’s Census of Israel and Judah
The Holy Bible 2 Samuel chapter 24, vv. 1-17

 Whatever your faith or none, this has a message for today!

The reading at our recent mid week Eucharist was this longish passage, and I confess to not really understanding it at all whilst I was reading it to the congregation, so I was determined to look it up when I got home.

We apparently don’t know why the anger of God was aroused in the first place in this story – we are just told it was. God was angry with David. So He asked David to count the people of Israel, from Dan to Beersheba. So David sent his army commander Joab to count, and against Joab’s better judgment he took his army captains with him and came back to David to report that “there were in Israel eight hundred thousand valiant men who drew the sword, and the men of Judah were five hundred thousand men.”

Then of course David realised he had not properly understood the situation and felt very guilty for not realising that Israel should not measure its strength in the number of its fighting men, as other countries did, when of course its true strength came from Yahweh. David’s sin was inappropriate pride, and he wished to be punished for this. God offered him a choice: seven years of famine, or three months fleeing from the enemies or three days of plague. David chose the last option that seemed the least of three evils. So God sent a plague that killed seventy thousand men and lasted but three days.

Back here in the twenty first century, we do not learn. We still measure our strength and security in terms of army mass and stockpiles of conventional weapons and weapons of mass destruction, instead of by love to all humanity, and compassion, and empathy, and happiness.
I blogged just a couple of days ago on our irrational behaviour, as part of a series: We develop and stockpile Hi -Tech weapons that are more dangerous than the conflicts they could possibly resolve, at vast investment of money and resources.

What a nonsense this all is. Again I cannot help being drawn to Jeremy Rifkin's new book, The Empathic Civilization, reviewed here a couple of days ago. And I have written at length myself on the global need for compassion and empathy in Healing This Wounded Earth: With Compassion, Spirit and the Power of Hope. Is it but a pipe dream that one day we shall have a global and totally empathic civilization? Or will we self-destruct first through using up our finite energy resources helped along by Climate Change and weapons of mass destruction.  

Will entropy or empathy win?

Nine Hours to go

Nine Hours to go:

to view on BBC i player the most remarkable drama, The Nativity, based, the TV Guide rather coyly said, on "a story from the Bible." Not the most important story of all time, portraying the birth of Jesus in a stable in Bethlehem, but just "a story." It was beautifully staged, with sensitive and splendid acting, and superb sets. I would love to know where it was filmed. And I would love to be able to watch it again - and again. And if you have not seen it, and you read this in time, dear readers, you have just 9 hours from me posting this to catch up with it. And if you miss the repeat, there is also a good blog with detailed reviews of each episode
that will surely whet your appetite.

The first letter of St Paul to the Corinthians ch. 7: 25-31

"Now concerning virgins, I have no commandment of the Lord; but I give counsel, as having obtained mercy of the Lord, to be faithful.

I think therefore that this is good for the present necessity, that it is good for a man so to be. Art thou bound to a wife? seek not to be loosed. Art thou loosed from a wife? seek not a wife. But if thou take a wife, thou hast not sinned. And if a virgin marry, she hath not sinned: nevertheless, such shall have tribulation of the flesh. But I spare you. This therefore I say, brethren; the time is short; it remaineth, that they also who have wives, be as if they had none; And they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as if they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not;

And they that use this world, as if they used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away."

I had to read this at our mid week Holy Communion today and I really wondered what on earth it meant. Indeed it seems that this has puzzled scholars of the New Testament through the years, and there appears to be no one definitive answer.

One suggestion is that the Christ's coming was at that time expected to happen any day; not some time in the distant future, but now. Therefore Paul counsels everyone to avoid the distractions of entering new relationships or altering existing ones - as all must be ready for the Lord's coming.

But this is also about Paul's own views on all the principles of marriage in various circumstances.

One third of the New Testament is either written by Paul or about him, including the 13 letters that he wrote to the various churches in the region, and also the second half of The Acts of The Apostles. Apart from Jesus Himself, Paul has had more influence on 2000 years of Christian church history than any other person. And his letters make for some interesting reading. I shall return to them again in the weeks to come.

The picture of course is the view of St Paul's Cathedral across the river Thames by the Millennium Bridge.

Women of the Bible No 17 Esther

"And King Ahasuerus loved Esther above all the women, and she obtained grace and favour in sight, so that he set the royal crown upon her head, and made her queen."

Esther II v. 17

This is one of only two books in the Bible named after a woman - the other is Ruth. Curiously, along with The Song Of Solomon, it is also one of only two books in the Bible that does not directly mention God by name, although He is there by implication.

There are plenty of summaries of the book to be found on the internet. Here are links to two. It's a long story, but it's a good one.

Women of the Bible No. 16 The Queen of Sheba

"And she came to Jerusalem with a very great train, with camels that bore spices, and very much gold, and precious stones."

I Kings X v. 2
Why did the Queen of Sheba make this journey? It was to see for herself that the wisdom and prosperity for which Solomon was famed was indeed true.

And after satisfying herself on this point, indeed finding that his wisdom and wealth far exceeded her expectations, they showered each other with many gifts and she returned to her own country.

The Queen was probably a pagan, but even she could appreciate that the Lord was the source of all Solomon's blessings. Indeed she was breathless with amazement at what she found at the royal court.

(Sheba, by the way, was c. 1200 miles from Jerusalem, a mountainous country, identified as the modern Yemen.)

Women of the Bible No. 15 Susanna

When I came to write my blog tonight I couldn't understand why the Bible story of Susannah was not up there for yesterday, when I posted it. Then I realised I had written it in draft on 4th August - and that is where the post appeared - yesterday - if you see what I mean. Since it is such a good story I have copied and pasted again for tonight - in case no one goes back to August 4th - indeed why should they. So here goes - again:

"Susanna went in as aforetime with two maids only, and she was desirous to wash herself in the garden; for it was hot. And there was nobody there save for two elders, who had hidden themselves, and watched her."

This flower arrangement for our church flower festival was so beautifully arranged around the edge of the font, with a lake for bathing in the centre. And I cannot believe that I didn't take a photo to include those two elders hidden in the undergrowth! They were certainly there! (made from those miniature bottles of shampoo etc you get in hotels - the ones with spherical caps - like heads!)

The story continues... the two elders lust after Susanna - and they have been both watching for their opportunity to "lie" with her. (I love the quaint and coy language - so much nicer than our blunt references to sex). On this day Susanna sends the maids away to fetch oil and ointments for her so that she may bathe. As soon as the maids are gone, the two elders set upon Susanna, and blackmail her. Let us have our wicked way with you, they say, or we will tell everyone that we saw you here with a young man. This of course would be a serious crime, for which Susanna would surely die. She refused the unwelcome attention of the elders, and was accordingly called by them to answer to her family for her alleged behaviour with the young man in the garden.

But the young Daniel is called by the Holy Spirit to come to her rescue. Interviewing the two elders separately, he tricks them. One says on cross examination that Susanna was seen under a mastic tree, the other under a an evergreen oak. They were clearly both lying. Susanna was cleared of any impropriety and Daniel enhanced his public reputation for showing up the elders for what they really were.

In its simplest interpretation, this story shows that virtue, in this case conjugal chastity, triumphs, with God's help, over vice, in this case in the in form of lust and deceit.

This story is from The History of Susanna I vv. 15-16, in the Apocrypha, and is an addition to the Book of Daniel in the Old Testament.

The End of Faith; Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason.

I wrote on 31 July about Sam Harris' book, The End of Faith; Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason. I have now finished it and find its conclusions unsatisfactory. Another time I will write a more detailed review but for today it is late and I am tired so I will just make one or two points!

I mentioned before how I disliked and questioned his assumption about the link between wars and religion. I also have to take issue with his basic assumption, made very early in the book, and perpetuated throughout, that the sacred texts are nothing but myth and should be dismissed as such in the same way as the Greek myths. "...most of the people in this world," he writes, believe that the Creator of the universe has written a book." ... "Whatever their imagined source," he goes on to say, "the doctrines of modern religions are no more tenable than ...those cast upon the scrap heap of mythology millennia ago; for there is no more evidence to justify a belief in the literal existence of Yahweh and Satan than there was to keep Zeus perched upon his mountain throne or Poseidon churning the seas."
Continually trashing the Holy Bible as fairy tale does little to enhance his credibility, as he thereby ignores the vast theological and archeological knowledge underpinning its writings and its historical truths. I would recommend that he reads some of the many good books available on the subject. He could start with John Bartlett's The Bible; Faith and Evidence, A Critical Enquiry into the Nature of Biblical History.

Interestingly, Harris does understand the need for and existence of, a human spirituality, but he is adamant that this can and indeed must be developed without faith. He senses, he says, that the problem is hopeless, but that if parents and teachers in a single generation simply answered their children's questions honestly, there could be an utter revolution in our thinking, faith and religion would disappear in that generation and the world would be saved.

If that is the only way to save our world, as Harris seems to think, then I really believe the situation is hopeless. I really cannot believe that our faiths and our religions can be abolished so easily. They have a great deal more substance than Harris would like to think. And one cannot abolish deeply held beliefs so easily.

Instead I think we need to do all we can to foster true religious pluralism. The Dalai Lama in his book, Ancient Wisdom, Modern World (Ethics for the New Millennium), finds the idea of a world parliament of religions very appealing.

Harris suggests a world government - how else, he asks, "will a war between the USA and China become as unlikely as a war between Texas and Vermont?" But his vision is devoid of religion and it just will never work.

Women of the Bible No 15 Susanna

"Susanna went in as aforetime with two maids only, and she was desirous to wash herself in the garden; for it was hot. And there was nobody there save for two elders, who had hidden themselves, and watched her."

This flower arrangement for our church flower festival was so beautifully arranged around the edge of the font, with a lake for bathing in the centre. And I cannot believe that I didn't take a photo to include those two elders hidden in the undergrowth! They were certainly there! (made from those miniature bottles of shampoo etc you get in hotels - the ones with spherical caps - like heads!)

The story continues... the two elders lust after Susanna - and they have been both watching for their opportunity to "lie" with her. (I love the quaint and coy language - so much nicer than our blunt references to sex). On this day Susanna sends the maids away to fetch oil and ointments for her so that she may bathe. As soon as the maids are gone, the two elders set upon Susanna, and blackmail her. Let us have our wicked way with you, they say, or we will tell everyone that we saw you here with a young man. This of course would be a serious crime, for which Susanna would surely die. She refused the unwelcome attention of the elders, and was accordingly called by them to answer to her family for her alleged behaviour with the young man in the garden.

But the young Daniel is called by the Holy Spirit to come to her rescue. Interviewing the two elders separately, he tricks them. One says on cross examination that Susanna was seen under a mastic tree, the other under a an evergreen oak. They were clearly both lying. Susanna was cleared of any impropriety and Daniel enhanced his public reputation for showing up the elders for what they really were.

In its simplest interpretation, this story shows that virtue, in this case conjugal chastity, triumphs, with God's help, over vice, in this case in the in form of lust and deceit.

This story is from The History of Susanna I vv. 15-16, in the Apocrypha, and is an addition to the Book of Daniel in the Old Testament.

Women of the Bible No 14 Veronica

There is no evidence whatsoever that Veronica existed, but her story is one of the most beautiful of all stories about saints, also one of the strangest.

The story goes that as Jesus made his agonizing way up the Via Dolorosa to Golgotha for his crucifixion, a group of women from Jerusalem met him, and as he stumbled, one of them, Veronica, came forward to wipe the sweat and blood from his brow with her napkin. When she returned home and unfolded the napkin, there was imprinted on it an image of the face of Christ.

But this story appears nowhere in any of the crucifixion accounts in the bible.

The legend may have been composed to give a background to the existence of the supposed relic, "The Veil of Veronica," which has been in Rome since the eighth century, and has a shrine on one of the main pillars in St Peter's Basilica.

Women of the Bible No 13 Dorcas (or Tabitha)

"In Joppa there was a disciple named Tabitha (which, when translated, is Dorcas), who was always doing good and helping the poor. About that time she became sick and died, and her body was washed and placed in an upstairs room. Lydda was near Joppa; so when the disciples heard that Peter was in Lydda, they sent two men to him and urged him, "Please come at once!"

Peter went with them, and when he arrived he was taken upstairs to the room. All the widows stood around him, crying and showing him the robes and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was still with them.

Peter sent them all out of the room; then he got down on his knees and prayed. Turning toward the dead woman, he said, "Tabitha, get up." She opened her eyes, and seeing Peter she sat up. He took her by the hand and helped her to her feet. Then he called the believers and the widows and presented her to them alive. "

Both Tabitha (in Aramaic) and Dorcas (in Greek) mean gazelle.
Joppa was just south of the modern Tel Aviv.

Acts IX vv. 36-41 New International Version

Women of the Bible No. 12 Salome

"And when Salome, the daughter of Herodias, came in and danced, she pleased Herod and them that sat at eat with him; and the king said unto the damsel, Ask of me whatever thou wilt, and I will give it thee."

St. Mark ch. 6 v. 22

Herodius was Herod's niece, and his brother Philip's wife. Herod seduced Herodius and married her after his own divorce. John the Baptist did not approve and told Herod it was not lawful to marry his brother's wife. Herodius therefore bore a grudge against John, and would have killed him, except that Herod respected John and protected him.

Therefore when Herod promised to Salome whatever she wanted, and Salome went to her mother for advice, Herodius saw her opportunity for revenge on John. Ask, she told Salome, for John the Baptist's head on a platter. This Salome did, and as Herod had made a promise, he could not refuse the request, although it is said that he was "exceedingly sorry." He ordered the execution of John the Baptist and Salome was granted her wish.

When the disciples of Jesus heard of the death of John the Baptist they came and took the body and laid it in a tomb.

Women of the Bible 10 Martha and Mary

"And Martha had a sister called Mary, who also sat at the Lord's feet, and heard his word. But Martha was cumbered about much serving; and she came up to him, and said, Lord, dost thou not care that my sister did leave me to serve alone?"

St Luke X, vv. 39-40

We've all been there, at least we women have! We rush around doing all the work while others talk, watch, and generally don't help. But Martha received little support from Jesus, who told her she was too distracted, worried and fussing around to fulfill her hospitable role, when she should also have regard to the need to listen to His teaching.

"Martha, Martha," Jesus says. "You are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her."There is a balance, He is reminding us, between the spiritual and the practical sides of life. Both are equally important.

There is a further interpretation to be found in modern biblical commentary, to the effect that Mary is behaving as any man would in this Jerusalem suburb of Bethany of that time. She is listening to the Rabbi's teaching, so that she may impart that knowledge to others. And Jesus is accepting her in that role, albeit that she is a female. I leave that thought with you, dear reader!

Women of the Bible No. 9 Miriam after Crossing the Red Sea

"And Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Moses and Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand; and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dances. And Miriam answered them, Sing ye to the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously."

Exodus XV, vv. 20-21

A timbrel was a percussion instrument rather like our tamborine, played mostly by women.

Women of the Bible No. 8 Miriam and the Birth of Moses

"And when she could no longer hide the baby, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid it in the reeds by the river's brink. And his sister stood afar off, to know what would be done to him. And the daughter of the Pharoah came down to the river to bathe... and she saw the ark among the reeds...Then said his sister to Pharoah's daughter, Shall I go and call thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee?"


Exodus Chapter II, vv. 3-7

Women of the Bible No. 7 Jael

Jael was not a nice woman!
"Blessed above women shall Jael be the wife of Heber the Kenite, Blessed shall she be above women in the tent. He asked for milk, and she gave him milk; she brought him butter in a lordly dish. She put her hand to the nail, and her right hand to the workmen's hammer; and with the hammer she smote Sisera, she smote through his head, Yea, she pierced and struck through his temples."


Judges Chapter V, vv. 24-26

This story is taken from The Song of Deborah, a song of victory, and one of the oldest examples of such a song in biblical literature.

Women of the Bible No. 6 Hannah

The story of Hannah and her son Samuel is told in the First Book of Samuel, written between 931 and 722 BC.

This is a classic story of the oppressed woman; barren and as a consequence scorned in her own household, she cries to the Lord for a son and pledges him back to the service of the Lord.
Hannah is one of two wives of Elkanah, the other being Peninnah. We are told that Elkanah loved Hannah more than Peninnah. Peninnah had several children, sons and daughters, but Hannah was childless and this grieved her very much. It didn't help that Peninnah mocked her. Women can be very cruel to each other.
Every year the family would go to the Tabernacle in Shiloh to worship and sacrifice to the Lord. There Hannah would become very miserable and would not eat, which perplexed her husband. Why, he said, didn't his love for her more than make up for the lack of children. Men can be very obtuse sometimes!
So Hannah silently prayed to the Lord from her heart for a son, and promised that if a son was born, he would be given back to the Lord.
Sure enough, a son was born to Hannah in the fullness of time, and she called him Samuel, and once he had been weaned, at perhaps the age of 2 or 3, he was taken according to her promise to the Tabernacle, together, we are told, with three bulls, (for ritual sacrifice), one ephah (about one half bushel) of flour, and a skin of wine....
...and Samuel was established as a prophet of the Lord....

The First Book of Samuel: Chapter 1, and Chapter 3, v.20

Women of the Bible No. 5 Rachel

"Rachel came with her father's sheep...and Jacob kissed Rachel, and lifted up his voice, and wept."




Genesis XXIX vv. 9,11


This needs a little more explanation. It was in fact a family reunion. The bit of the story missed out above is that Rachel's father was Laban, and Jacob's mother was Rebekah, Laban's sister. Therefore Laban is Jacob's uncle, and Jacob and Rachel are of course cousins. Jacob told Rachel of the family connection, and she ran to tell her father, and Jacob stayed with the family for a month.

The kiss was the traditional patriarchal greeting between man and woman, and Jacob's tears were almost certainly of joy at finding his family again.

The story goes on...Rachel had an older sister, Leah. But it sounds as if Rachel was the family beauty. Perhaps what happened was therefore inevitable. Jacob fell in love with Rachel, and it was agreed that he would work for Laban for seven years in return for her hand in marriage. Those seven years apparently flew by because Jacob was so in love with Rachel, but at the end of that time Laban deceived Jacob - after what must have been a wild feast, Jacob was tricked into spending the night with Leah. On tackling Laban about this afterwards, Laban explained that the first born must be matched up first, and made Jacob work another seven years for the hand of Rachel! The story continues in v. 31 et seq ... for another time!



When I was a little girl I used to cycle the lanes of Kent in the summer evenings, and particularly liked stopping at a field where a small herd of black and white speckled goat-like sheep, with horns, used to graze. They had tinkly bells round their necks - and I loved the noise those made as the sheep moved across the pasture. My mother told me they were called Jacob sheep.

It is said that these Jacob sheep were so called after the story in Genesis Chapter 30, v. 32 et seq., where Jacob takes all the speckled and spotted sheep and goats from Laban's flock as wages for work done. That again is a longer story for another day...

Women of the Bible - Mrs Noah

Last weekend we had a flower festival in our church. The theme was "Women of the Bible." That gave plenty of scope for the fertile imagination and sense of humour of our many talented flower arrangers. (I certainly cannot be counted as one of them - my skill with cut flowers is limited to finding a vase and putting them all in together and hoping they look OK!)

Here we have "Mrs Noah after the flood."

"And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights. In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark...

And God spake unto Noah, saying, "Go forth of the ark, thou, and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons' wives with thee... "

And God spoke unto Noah, saying, "And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you; And with every living creature, that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth...I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a token of a covenant between me and the earth."

The Holy Bible Old Testament: Genesis VII vv. 12-13, VIII vv. 15-16, IX vv. 8-13.

This incidentally is the first of five covenants God makes to mankind in the Old Testament. Here is an unconditional promise from God to all life on the earth that He will not destroy the earth by water ever again.

What are the other 4 covenants? I shall write about those another day.