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Is Christ a Socialist?

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tosca1

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It's been quite a while since we had this old argument up, until recently at another thread. Just so we can have a real discussion about this without having to hijack that other thread, this topic was created.
It started with my dear friend Nate making an outrageous claim! Let me repost how it started.


OlNate said:
Sorry, darlin', Christ was a socialist. ;) And you just know I've got plenty to back that claim up...haha...so if you're gonna come at me, don't do it half assed.
Click to expand...

Show me where it says Christ is a socialist???? I dare you! Wanna start a threa on that? Let's, okay?

Don't give me the usual argument about everyone giving all their resources pooled together - which is taken out of context - since Christ have not forbade people from being wealthy!

I, on the other hand, can show you He ain't!




2 Thessalonians 3

Warning Against Idleness

6 In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, we command you, brothers and sisters, to keep away from every believer who is idle and disruptive and does not live according to the teaching[a] you received from us.

7 For you yourselves know how you ought to follow our example. We were not idle when we were with you, 8 nor did we eat anyone’s food without paying for it. On the contrary, we worked night and day, laboring and toiling so that we would not be a burden to any of you.
9 We did this, not because we do not have the right to such help, but in order to offer ourselves as a model for you to imitate.
10 For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.”

11 We hear that some among you are idle and disruptive. They are not busy; they are busybodies. 12 Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the food they eat.



Free-loading isn't approved! No such thing as a "right" to minimum wage hike, either!
Or, the right to be able to buy whatever the Jones' can buy!
 
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Jesus spoke to individual morality, not to how the state should be structured. His words were not a road map to state power. They can only be understood in the context of a free society. Those who claim He was a socialist are simply dropping that context.
 
First, we have to know what is SOCIALISM.


Socialism is an economic system in which society is largely run by the government and where the wealth and production of members of that society are distributed equally among other members of society for governmental decrees. Private ownership is lessened, and public ownership of all things is promoted.
Click to expand...
https://carm.org/dictionary-socialism


It does sounds compassionate, doesn't it? However, socialism actually goes against the teachings of Christianity.
Here are some of the reasons:


1. The motivating factor that fuels socialism is.........covetousness.
Thus we hear, "unequal distribution of wealth."

2. It is focused on.........materialism. It's a materialistic worldview.
Thus we hear, "unequal distribution of wealth."



The poster boy for socialism in this day and age is Bernie Sanders. her's what he has to say in his website:

"The issue of wealth and income inequality is the great moral issue of our time, it is the great economic issue of our time, and it is the great political issue of our time."

Notice the emphasis on wealth. We're not merely talking about basic needs here.

1 Tim 6
6 But godliness with contentment is great gain. 7 For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. 8 But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.



To a socialist - all that matters is the material world.
Well, we know what Jesus say about the material world! many verses about that. Here's one.


1 Tim 6
9 Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.






3. Socialism takes by force. Giving is compulsory. It eliminates VOLUNTARY giving and sharing.

That is a big requirement as a Christian. To VOLUNTARILY give and share, and be cheerful about it, too!


1 Tim 6
17 Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. 18 Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. 19 In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life.





4. Socialism disregards virtue, it distributes wealth regardless of virtue.

The industrious is made to pay for those who are not.....and those who are not industrious are given the fruits of the ones who had worked hard. It removes the rewards/consequences designed by God.



To be continued......
 
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Jesus was a card carrying red alright:

Again I tell you, 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.
-Matthew 19:24

/thread
 
Btw, a little something about the father of socialism - Karl Marx:


In his book Intellectuals historian Paul Johnson devotes a revealing chapter to the man who wrote Capital and The Communist Manifesto. Karl was an angry, hate-filled man—quarrelsome, neglectful of his family, lazy, and violent. He suffered from hideous carbuncles in part because he almost never bathed. Some of the most memorable phrases from his two books were lifted from others without appropriate credit. He spent almost all his time at home or in libraries, and almost none where the workers he fumed about actually worked.
He mooched off of others all his life, prompting his mother to say that she wished Karl would “accumulate capital instead of just writing about it.”

But the worst thing about Karl Marx was not his personality or his hygiene. It was the evil web he spun with deceitful bait that snared and doomed millions. He called the workers of the world to revolution, but, as the Italian writer Ignazio Silone put it, “Revolutions, like trees, must be judged by their fruit.” Without exception, wherever Marxist ideology found root, it grew into monstrous depravity. Some of Karl’s disciples have attempted to explain this away with the old phrase, “To make an omelet, you have to break a few eggs.” The problem is, communists (and socialists and fascists, their kissin’ cousins) only break eggs; they never, ever, make an omelet.
Click to expand...
https://fee.org/articles/confessions-of-a-secret-marxist/



Actually, we can't say, Jesus was a socialist. There's no such thing called socialism in His day.
 
PoS said:
Jesus was a card carrying red alright:

Again I tell you, 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.
-Matthew 19:24

/thread
Click to expand...

And? How does that verse tie up with what you claim?
You're not interpreting that as to mean, "no rich man will enter the kingdom of God," do you?

It is indeed harder for a rich man to make it to the Kingdom of God - what with all the distractions his wealth can afford him! Money corrupts!


Just look at all the people who covet the wealth of others! They're already getting corrupted - just by thinking about it - even when they haven't got it yet! :lol: What more when you have it?


But that doesn't mean no rich man can enter the Kingdom of God.
 
He was a cultist.
 
tosca1 said:
And? How does that verse tie up with what you claim?
You're not interpreting that as to mean, "no rich man will enter the kingdom of God," do you?
Click to expand...
Absolutely. Since a camel cannot enter through the eye of a needle, therefore anyone who lives above the median annual household income of $10K will not be going to heaven. Sorry.
 
Considering Jesus refused to have anything to do with man-made earthly governments while on earth, I think he would resent any type of man-made, earthly governmental label assigned to him in any way, shape or from...He always upheld the kingdom of God while he was here, and since He is in heaven on his heavenly throne as of now, representing God in that kingdom, he is no doubt 100% for Theocracy...always has been, always will be...
 
PoS said:
Jesus was a card carrying red alright:

Again I tell you, 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.
-Matthew 19:24

/thread
Click to expand...

That has nothing to do with being a 'card carrying red' though. That was said in the context of a man being unable to worship two masters: wealth and God.
 
Fletch said:
That has nothing to do with being a 'card carrying red' though. That was said in the context of a man being unable to worship two masters: wealth and God.
Click to expand...

Nope, its pretty simple logic. Jesus is basically saying its impossible for a rich man to enter heaven.
 
PoS said:
Nope, its pretty simple logic. Jesus is basically saying its impossible for a rich man to enter heaven.
Click to expand...
Right. Because a man cannot serve two masters. The rich man who worships his money cannot worship the lord. Plus you have to keep in mind that the rich man of 2000 years ago is a bit different from the rich man of today.
 
Fletch said:
Right. Because a man cannot serve two masters. The rich man who worships his money cannot worship the lord. Plus you have to keep in mind that the rich man of 2000 years ago is a bit different from the rich man of today.
Click to expand...

Rich today is no different than being rich before, so they wont be going to heaven.
 
Fletch said:
Surely there are other threads where you guys can contribute nothing. Seek and ye shall find.
Click to expand...

Jesus was a cultist. And, his cult was surely socialist in nature. Facts.
 
tosca1 said:
First, we have to know what is SOCIALISM.



https://carm.org/dictionary-socialism


It does sounds compassionate, doesn't it? However, socialism actually goes against the teachings of Christianity.
Here are some of the reasons:


1. The motivating factor that fuels socialism is.........covetousness.
Thus we hear, "unequal distribution of wealth."

2. It is focused on.........materialism. It's a materialistic worldview.
Thus we hear, "unequal distribution of wealth."



The poster boy for socialism in this day and age is Bernie Sanders. her's what he has to say in his website:

"The issue of wealth and income inequality is the great moral issue of our time, it is the great economic issue of our time, and it is the great political issue of our time."

Notice the emphasis on wealth. We're not merely talking about basic needs here.

1 Tim 6
6 But godliness with contentment is great gain. 7 For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. 8 But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.



To a socialist - all that matters is the material world.
Well, we know what Jesus say about the material world! many verses about that. Here's one.


1 Tim 6
9 Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.






3. Socialism takes by force. Giving is compulsory. It eliminates VOLUNTARY giving and sharing.

That is a big requirement as a Christian. To VOLUNTARILY give and share, and be cheerful about it, too!


1 Tim 6
17 Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. 18 Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. 19 In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life.





4. Socialism disregards virtue, it distributes wealth regardless of virtue.

The industrious is made to pay for those who are not.....and those who are not industrious are given the fruits of the ones who had worked hard. It removes the rewards/consequences designed by God.



To be continued......
Click to expand...

This really is the problem. Definitions.

You have sought out the worst possible way of defining socialism.

It is a definition given by those who appose socialism. The equivalent of going to an atheist site and looking up the definition of religion.

Here is another version.
https://www.iep.utm.edu/socialis/
Socialism is both an economic system and an ideology (in the non-pejorative sense of that term). A socialist economy features social rather than private ownership of the means of production. It also typically organizes economic activity through planning rather than market forces, and gears production towards needs satisfaction rather than profit accumulation. Socialist ideology asserts the moral and economic superiority of an economy with these features, especially as compared with capitalism. More specifically, socialists typically argue that capitalism undermines democracy, facilitates exploitation, distributes opportunities and resources unfairly, and vitiates community, stunting self-realization and human development. Socialism, by democratizing, humanizing, and rationalizing economic relations, largely eliminates these problems.
Click to expand...

Ask yourself this. If we were discussing religion would you be content to start the conversation from the point of a degrading and false version of religion given by an atheist who obviously has no interest in fairness or understanding of religion?

If not then why are you here committing the very thing you would not do yourself?
 
soylentgreen said:
This really is the problem. Definitions.

You have sought out the worst possible way of defining socialism.

It is a definition given by those who appose socialism. The equivalent of going to an atheist site and looking up the definition of religion.

Here is another version.
https://www.iep.utm.edu/socialis/


Ask yourself this. If we were discussing religion would you be content to start the conversation from the point of a degrading and false version of religion given by an atheist who obviously has no interest in fairness or understanding of religion?

If not then why are you here committing the very thing you would not do yourself?
Click to expand...

Have you ever come across a religious type who had been on the internet doing these debates for any length of time who would ever look at both sides of the argument?
 
Tim the plumber said:
Have you ever come across a religious type who had been on the internet doing these debates for any length of time who would ever look at both sides of the argument?
Click to expand...

No i have not. But what else can be done? As long as they seek out the worst possible way of defining socialism the argument cannot be advanced.
 
PoS said:
Rich today is no different than being rich before, so they wont be going to heaven.
Click to expand...

Not true at all. Wealth today is earned, back then it was stolen or confiscated and kept withing certain families. Plus admission to heaven is not through deed but through grace and accepting Christ. So of course, wealth alone is not an obstacle. But again, the idea was that man cannot serve two masters, If the rich mans master iw wealth, he cannot serve God. The point was not so much that wealth is the obstacle but how ones views it.
 
soylentgreen said:
No i have not. But what else can be done? As long as they seek out the worst possible way of defining socialism the argument cannot be advanced.
Click to expand...

There is no way to advance the argument of socialism. It is an ideology built upon the confiscation of wealth and ultimately the corpses of others.
 
Fletch said:
There is no way to advance the argument of socialism. It is an ideology built upon the confiscation of wealth and ultimately the corpses of others.
Click to expand...

No, that is an interpretation that does not look at socialism but instead seeks out the most stupidest way of doing socialism and then insisting it has to be done that way.

You do realise that same slur can be thrown at capitalism.. The workers who have died because of poor conditions just so a minority elite can confiscate the wealth of their production for themselves.
 
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