Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Luke Timothy Johnson is R. W. Woodruff Professor of New Testament and Christian Origins at Candler School of Theology, Emory University. His many other books include The Creed: What Christians Believe and Why It Matters and Brother of Jesus, Friend of God

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Sharing Possessions

William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company

Contents

Preface to the Second Edition.........................................................viIntroduction..........................................................................11. Searching for a Mandate............................................................112. Toward a Theological Understanding of Possessions..................................293. Sharing Possessions: Mandate and Symbol of Faith...................................734. Critical Observations on the Community of Goods and Almsgiving.....................109Epilogue..............................................................................135Study Questions.......................................................................157Suggestions for Further Reading.......................................................161Scripture Index.......................................................................163

Chapter One

We want to take the Bible seriously as the norm for our Christian identity and action. How can we do this? To get our thinking started, I will begin with some propositions with which I do not agree but which are not uncommonly held. By digging away for a while at these propositions, we may begin to excavate the real question posed for us by the Scriptures.

The first proposition is that the Christian life, whatever else it may be, is surely a code of ethics. To be Christian means to live in one way and not another, to have certain definite values manifest themselves in certain definite patterns of behavior. What makes Christians different from others is the way they perceive and deal with life's important issues. The second proposition is that if this code of behavior is to have any consistency, and if the individual Christian is to know whether he or she is acting in a Christian manner, there must be a place where the appropriate ways of behaving are laid out. Where there is a code, we should be able to expect a codification. For Christians, this codification is found in the Bible, the Christian rulebook. The third proposition is that if the way people use money and possessions is at all significant for the Christian life, if the employment of material things is at all an ethical or religious issue, then this rulebook should have something clear and unambiguous to say about it. All we need to do to check whether our behavior is consonant with the Christian ethic is to consult the proper code.

Here, of course, is where we start to run into trouble. There is no lack of directives concerning the use of possessions in the Bible; they are everywhere. Nor is there any doubt that the Bible considers the use of material possessions significant for the life of faith. The problem is that the directives seem to be saying different things: they seem to point us in different directions. When we face these conflicting demands squarely and refuse to harmonize them, we are forced to ask ourselves about our starting point. Is the Christian life a matter of a code of behavior? Is the Bible to be appropriated as a rulebook of behavior? Is what we do with material possessions really important for our Christian lives?

But is it really so difficult to derive a consistent mandate concerning the use of possessions from the Bible? I think it is, if we are really looking for a clear, consistent, and unequivocal direction for our behavior. In order to demonstrate this, I invite you to look with me at what is said in a single New Testament writing that is particularly replete with commands about possessions — Luke-Acts.

Luke-Acts is the shorthand title adopted by scholars for the two-volume work ordinarily called, respectively, the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles. The title Luke-Acts indicates that although these writings appear separately in the canon, they were undoubtedly written by a first-century Christian teacher and historian as one continuous, though two-part, work. The first volume tells the story of Jesus; the second, the story of the beginning of the church. Both are told as the continuation of the biblical story of God's work among the chosen people through the prophets. The literary unity of Luke-Acts is important for the interpretation of this scriptural witness; to find out what Luke wished to teach on any particular subject, we must read Luke-Acts as a whole.

Even a cursory reading of Luke-Acts shows the author's concern about riches, poverty, and the use of possessions. References to these matters are more frequent in this Gospel than in any other. Luke has all the material on possessions found in Mark, and most of what is found in Matthew, with the exception of Matthew 5:5; 6:1-4; 13:44-45; 17:24-27; 18:23-35; 20:1-16; 25:31-46; and 27:3-10. Beyond this, there is a great deal of material dealing in one way or another with possessions which is unique to Luke, quite apart from what we find in Acts (see Luke 1:51-53; 3:10-14; 6:24; 8:1-3; 10:1-16; 10:38-42; 11:41; 12:13-21; 14:12-14; 15:8-10; 15:11-32; 16:1-9, 14, 19-31; 17:28-30, 32; 18:9-14; 19:1-10; 21:34-36; 22:35-38). Apart from 12:6 and 13:29, John's Gospel adds nothing to the synoptic tradition. So, in Luke, we have a compendium of the gospel teaching on possessions, and no end of attention has been paid to this "evangelist of the poor" by scholars. The trouble is that, after all this attention, scholars have a hard time deciding just what exactly Luke wants to teach his church (and, by extension, us) about the use of possessions. If we ask the simple and straightforward question posed by the hearers of John the Baptist, "What, then, are we to do?" (Luke 3:10), the answer is not altogether clear. Although Luke consistently speaks about possessions, he does not speak about possessions consistently. In what follows, I will deliberately isolate various strands within his text and refuse to harmonize them. I will, in effect, be treating Luke-Acts as a "code of Christian life," to see if we can follow Luke's directions concerning the use of possessions.

The Poor Are Privileged in the Eyes of God, and the Rich Condemned

In the beginning of the Gospel of Luke, when Mary praises God for the blessing of bearing the Messiah, she says, "he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent empty away" (1:53). The sending away of the rich, together with the "scattering of the proud" and the putting down of the "mighty from their thrones" (1:51-52), is a sign of the reversal of fortunes and expectations brought about by God's visitation to his people (see 3:5-6; 14:11). The filling of the hungry with good things accompanies the exalting of "those of low degree" (1:52). The Greek word used for "those of low degree," tapeinoi, has definite resonances in the tradition. It designates not only those who are without possessions but those who are oppressed by their fellow human beings and must look to God for help, since they can expect none from elsewhere (for example, see Zeph. 2:3-9; 3:11-13; Isa. 25:4; 26:5-6; 28:5-6; 29:18-19; 41:17; 49:13; 61:1-4; 66:2; Jer. 20:13; Pss. 9:9, 12, 18; 10:14, 17-18; 12:5; 14:6; 22:24; 33:18-19; 34:6; 35:10; 36:7; 40:17; 55:22; 56:11; 62:1, 5-8; 68:5-6, 10; 69:32-33; 70:5; 71:4; 94:22; 102:17; 103:6; 124:8; 140:12; 146:7-9).

When Jesus starts his ministry, he applies to himself the...