Societal Economics and the Kingdom of God:
A Consideration of Two Parables of the Kingdom
(Matthew 18.21-35 and 20.1-16)
Daniel W. Hardy
University of Cambridge
For Scriptural Reasoning at the AAR
Preparing to Read the Texts
Economic practices are intimately interwoven with
social ones, and both with natural, moral and
religious preconditions for the world. Because these
practices are so often dealt with in
mono-disciplinary fashion, their complex
interconnections are easily overlooked, not only in
general but also as they are found in scriptural
texts. In the texts which will concern us here, all
these appear with still another dimension embedded in
them, a dynamic relation between socio-economic
practices in the world—in which natural, moral and
religious preconditions are embedded—and the coming
kingdom of God. All these dimensions need to be
considered together if we are to understand the full
implications of these texts, not only in their own
terms but also for the combination of theology,
socio-politics and economics in today's world. It
helps to remind ourselves how there are such
interwovennesses lest we miss them in the texts,
while also realizing that they happen in ways that
are particular to situations, as the two different
parables we will consider below show.
First of all, we need to be aware of what are the
dynamics of sociality, and how they are mediated in
economic practices. By 'the dynamics of sociality' I
mean the combination of two things:
Two foundations there are which bear up public
societies, the one, a natural inclination, whereby
all men desire sociable life and fellowship,
the other an order expressly or secretly
agreed upon, touching the manner of their union
in living together. The latter is that which we
call the law of a commonweal, the very soul of a
body politic, the parts whereof are by law
animated, held together, and set on work in such
actions as the common good requireth.[1]
So we might say that sociality is always generated
and continued by its operations, in which 'life and
fellowship' and 'the manner of union in living
together'—the first generating the second, and the
second ordering and directing the first—are combined
in forward movement. Building on Schopenhauer and
Durkheim[2] we can see (1) that
what we have called 'sociable life and fellowship'
enacts a moral and religious 'field' of
responsibility or obligation, without which it would
not occur, (2) that it is in various configurations
of this field — 'meaning created collectively' or
'rules of conduct that have received
sanction'[3] — that they tacitly
agree the 'manner of their union in living together,'
and (3) that moving interactively within these
configurations not only extends their 'sociable life
and fellowship' but also redevelops the
configurations, begetting new life and collective
meaning.Very simply put, this is:
(1) 'sociable life' ↔ (2) configurations → (3)
extended/developed sociable life and configuration
↔ further extended/developed sociable life and
configuration, etc., etc.
At each step, the prior sociable life and
configuration is 'universal' for those who
live within it, and is particularized by them
in its extension and development, a particularization
which becomes a 'precedent' or 'universal' which then
undergoes further particularization, etc., etc. But
it may also undergo an adaptation in the process,
which may appear to conflict with the 'precedent' yet
may also serve as a universal norm of another
kind.
As forms of social life become more and more
complex, 'sociable life and fellowship' and the forms
of 'union in living together' vary from the most
preliminary (or proto-social) through developing
coordination to the most corporate and
managed.[4]This deserves careful
investigation, but we cannot pursue that here. It
will lead us, however, to ask of the texts:
- what sort of 'sociableness' or 'field of
responsibility' is present here?
- what sort of 'manner of union in living
together' is being enacted?
- to what do the actions lead?
Like it or not, the field of responsibility is
always embodied, and 'sociableness' always occurs as
embodied movement toward (or away from) each other,
either as this person moving toward that, or under
some circumstances transferring something or someone
to or from another situation or person as an
expression of what is to be the accepted 'manner of
union in living together'. One form of sociableness
is the agreement to work for someone on the condition
that he/she pays for it, which is not only an
exchange of labor for pay, but also agreeing to
uphold the agreement.Each 'contract' therefore
presumes a pre-contractual mutual trust or
solidarity, without which the parties cannot function
unchecked; this is based on belonging to a community
with others, itself—so Durkheim claims—the product of
ritual social interaction through which members have
come to feel that they are in the presence of a force
greater than any of them individually, which provides
moral norms through adherence to which employer and
employee trust each other sufficiently to engage in
an exchange.
(1) labor for pay ↔ (2) pre-contractual trust ↔
(3) community ← (4) moral norms ← (5) greater
order/energy ↔ (6) ritual social interaction
Transferences—such as occur in the exchange of
labor for pay—are not generalized but
particularized, and they produce
differentiated change. Hence, any transference
will bring qualitative changes both in 'sociable life
and fellowship,' its 'manner of union' and in their
higher basis, diminishing them or reinforcing
them.For example, just as a diminishment in (3-6
above) will have a negative impact on (1-2), so a
change in (1) will imply a change in (2-6)
respectively. This is how, at the most basic level,
economics works, and it is deeply social in
character.
Finally, in this preparation for reading the
texts, we need to recognize that gifts —
transferences that exceed what can be expected in the
exchange of pay for labor — bring special questions.
Like the exchange of pay for labor, however, giving,
receiving and reciprocating gifts are expressions of
social responsibility. On the one hand, (1) they
appear also to differ: giving gifts is free and
voluntary, not a repayment/exchange for previous
'goods'; one can voluntarily give gifts, not as
repayment, while denying that there is any obligation
involved; the giving may be taken to spring from
direct adherence to some 'higher' norm and to
exemplify the 'greater order/energy' which—at least
for Durkheim—is found through ritual social
interaction. (2) They may also reflect the donor's
intent to exceed what recipients can possibly
give—worth here being seen asymmetrically—and 'the
donor's intention to be exempt from return gifts
coming from the recipient'; if so, they break the
cycling gift system which is society, and do not
enhance social solidarity.[5] In this case, they
enact a reciprocity between human beings—or between
them and God—that is always asymmetrical.
On the other hand, they may be seen as following
the logic of exchange, where a society is constituted
through the obligatory giving of gifts and repayment
by return gifts. In this case, following Marcel
Mauss's account, we acknowledge that sociality is
built by organized sharing through which 'things' are
transferred to others in a reciprocity of gifts. Here
there is a symmetry of expectations—'you give' and 'I
shall give something of equal value' with the
expectation that others will do the same—and society
continues to be reconstituted by the giving of gifts:
worth is the equality of the value of
these.
All the issues we have just traversed can be seen
in the reading of the two texts we will now consider,
but must be allowed to emerge through the reading of
them, and not to predetermine them. There is one
particular reason for this: the content of the texts
is primary and determinative for their meaning, while
our discussions so far have been formal and—insofar
as this is possible for formal
considerations—content-blind.
Reading the Texts
The texts are amongst those called the 'parables
of the kingdom,' and convey what they have to say in
socio-economic terms.They address certain issues in
the dynamics of sociality, how—and how long—we are to
recover the ordered dynamics in which sociality
consists in the face of disorder and reversal, and in
what the order will eventually consist. But these are
not presented as 'abstract' issues: they are worked
out through their embodiments in economic
negotiations. In each case, a leader—a king or
land-owner—is central, someone who negotiates with
others, and acts as final arbiter.
Here Peter goes toward Jesus, a basic activity of
sociableness, already presuming — in asking him a
question—what is their 'manner of union in living
together': making use of a fundamental pairing of
character and constituency, Jesus is presumed as
the one in whose character there is the intensity to
enable him to lead others in a fuller form of
sociality.
The issue presented to Jesus is a hypothetical
one, an instance of social disorder which disrupts
the relatedness of two members of the church (the
church is the context here). 'Lord, if another member
of the church sins against me, how often should I
forgive? The questioner's concern is quantitative:
how many times? And the answer he provides is
quantitative, matching sins with forgiveness, but
only a limited number of times, 'as many as seven
times?' But Jesus corrects him, first acknowledging
the commitment the man is prepared to make ('seven
times'), and then correcting it, 'Not seven times,
but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.' Where the man
had quantified the forgiveness he was prepared to
give in finite terms, Jesus responds by multiplying
the quantification. As if to acknowledge that this is
unintelligible in the socio-economic frame of
reference the man is using, Jesus uses a parable,
recontextualizing the issue in another socio-economic
frame of reference, in order to show what this
'multiplied quantification' might mean.
In the parable which Jesus tells, the king is the
determinant; his character evident in his actions,
constitutes the kingdom. There is a direct
correlation of character, actions and
constituency, in which the three are fully
matched, this 'sociality' (the kingdom) fully—and
reliably—identified by the characteristic actions of
its leader. That is important in our age, when the
three are normally disengaged from each other, and
where the leader is reduced to what is attractive to
would-be voters. Here, the monarch by his actions
constitutes the community, and is the
normative force—the organizing dynamic (see above) of
the community. The situation is comparable to the
creator constituting the original and continuing
social community, as in the Book of Genesis or John
Chapter 1.
The episode told by Jesus translates these things
in very specific socio-economic terms ('For
this reason the kingdom of heaven may be
compared...'). If the king is the organizing dynamic
of the community, his character—his integrity—is
enacted by putting his economic relations in order;
insofar as they are not in order, this will undermine
his kingship. His economic relations are, of course,
transactional, and putting them in order will involve
him in transactions with those who owe him. (The fact
that they owe him only shows that his identity is
dispersed in the form of economic relationships.)
Here, then, is a complex sociality whose organizing
dynamic is the king in his transactional relations
with others.
The key case in this reordering is a man whose
debt is completely beyond his ability to pay: a man
owing him ten thousand talents was brought to him,
and could not pay. Here is a man who, while deeply
dependent (both contractually and in terms of the
pre-contractual trust upon which a contract depends)
upon the king, is completely incapable of fulfilling
his contract. It seems that the pre-contractual trust
between them meant that the capacity of the man to
fulfill his contract had not previously been
checked.
This is not a matter of owing the king interest;
he is simply unable to repay.And this throws both
pre-contractual trust and contract into doubt. In
effect, his inability to pay undoes both the
sociableness of king and their 'manner of their union
in living together.' They are divided by his
incapacity to fulfill the economic contract between
them. As if to confirm this, the king makes
him an object in exchange, taking
him in place of his liability, ordering
that he—and all that comprised his 'value,' including
his generativity and all that he had previously
generated, his wife and children and possessions —
become an 'object' for sale. Would such a 'yard sale'
have sufficed for 'payment to be made,' or only
covered part of a bad debt? That is not the point:
the sale would at least restore the orderliness of
the king's (and therefore the community's) economic
relations. Although it would neither restore
pre-contractual trust nor fulfill the contract
between king and slave, it would restore economic
order of a sort. It would restore the economic
equilibrium, but not bring greater energy into the
economic situation.In the terms we introduced at the
outset, it reinforces order, but does not enhance the
organizing dynamics by which a society moves
forward.
The situation changes entirely when 'the slave
fell on his knees before him, saying, "Have patience
with me, and I will pay you everything."' In effect,
the slave appeals not for more time, but for the
de-quantifying of the temporality of his
pre-contractual trust with the king, as if to say
'our mutual trust should have no temporal limits.' He
also appeals for another kind of contract by which to
express their relationship: 'with this trust I will
pay you everything.' These moves are not simply
slipperiness on his part; they seem to be evidence of
his preparedness for a new kind of economic
relationship, one which will develop and expand their
sociableness and 'manner of union in living
together,' thereby enlarging the basis of the society
itself.And the king responds to the possibility of a
fuller organizing dynamic for his society, and
expresses this in economic terms; he releases both
person and debt: 'out of pity for him, the lord of
that slave released him and forgave him the debt.'
The effect is a development of 'character' on both
sides, and a corresponding renewal of society.
The shock, however, comes when it becomes clear
that this new 'character' is not fully embedded in
the slave, and his economic actions follow the prior
norms. In his transaction with the king, the slave is
himself forgiven ('re-charactered') in being given
freedom from debt. If we follow the economic norms of
the king's earlier behavior, forgiveness of debt is
not necessary, but introduces another dimension: it
is a 'gift' or grace on the part of the king, and
shows his own movement beyond previous economic
norms. As a new 'space' for the life of the slave was
opened by that, we would expect that the slave, now
're-charactered,' would give to others a like
'space' for life.But the reverse happens: the slave
acts according to economic norms of the king's
earlier behavior, bringing his own economic affairs
into the order governed by those norms. So he ends
both the pre-contractual trust and the contract for a
fellow-slave—abrogating their social solidarity—and,
for a debt no more than a fraction of his own to the
king. He quantifies the debt, and makes the
debtor an object in exchange, taking
him in place of his liability (seizing
him by the throat) and—despite his pleas—throws him
into prison until he pays. The man's pleas are much
the same as were his own to the king: 'have patience
with me and I will pay you.' But whatever new
character the wicked slave had been accorded by the
king, he will not enact it: he will give no new basis
of trust, no new contract, and instead he insists
that 'the time is up,' closing for his fellow-slave
the space for life he had himself been given. The
effect is to reduce the organizing dynamic of their
relationship to a lesser form, confinement in the
norms employed in the king's behavior at first. The
consequence is a reduction in social vitality.
Does this happen where it is invisible to the
king? Having restored pre-contractual trust with the
first slave, the king wouldn't think it necessary to
check on his behavior. So it needed to be reported by
other slaves. Could they have been aware of the
inconsistency of the first slave's behavior with that
of the king, or that he was violating a perceptively
new socio-economic order based in the king? Was it a
vicious streak in his character at odds with the
grace of the king, or was it the destruction of the
solidarity of slaves that motivated them? Whichever
it was, recognizing the centrality of the character
of the king to the coherence—whether social or
economic—of the organizing dynamic of social life,
they spoke up. Perhaps the best explanation is that
they were instinctively aware that the slave's
behavior would drag the organizing dynamic of society
backward into an anti-dynamic mode in which each
person had a right to reclaim from others regardless
of the consequences for them.
'Then his lord summoned him and said to him, "You
wicked slave! I forgave you all that debt because you
pleaded with me." 'The slave is reminded how
forgiveness had come to him, because he had appealed
and the gift of a pre-contractual trust and contract
had been the result. While forgiveness had come in a
tangible form, it was to be embedded in him as a
change of character. And a change of character should
be acted upon in the formation of other
relationships: a change of character should lead to
changed sociableness and a changed manner of union in
living together, transforming solidarity into
something higher, living by mercy. It is these
expectations that lead to the strong words of the
king:' Should you not have had mercy on your fellow
slave, as I had mercy on you?' The normative
organizing dynamic the king had established in his
relationship with the servant is one of mercy; and
this is now the basis of society. Failing that,
relationships revert to the prior norm: fulfill the
contract or expect anger or punishment for
defaulting. Correspondingly, in anger his lord
hands him over for torture, to a place he
which he can only be destroyed and never pay his
debt.
The passage is highly important. It shows how,
centered on its determinant, the king, sociableness
is configured in a particularized way which forms a
basis for action, how this is a precedent until
transformed and—in its transformation—embedded in
those concerned, to become the basis for their
action. In this case, economic behavior is the medium
for the occurrence and configuration of sociableness.
The particular form which this takes here is not
'labor for pay,' where the leverage for undertaking
labor is the prospect of reward (pay), but
'obligation for debt-relief,' where the leverage for
undertaking the obligation to repay is the prospect
of relief from debt. We see in the parable an extreme
case, where the obligation to repay cannot be
fulfilled, and there are two possible outcomes: a
'default' option where failure to repay leads not to
relief but to punishment, and a 'higher' option where
failure to repay is met with mercy. Ironically, it is
the second which is seen to be more conducive to the
organizing dynamic of society, its forward movement:
it moves upward through the more profound engagement
of those who determine it (here the king) with all
others. But the default option remains the
alternative for those—whether individuals or
societies—which do not follow the 'higher' option.
'So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of
you, if you do not forgive your brother or sister
from your heart.' Mercy exemplified in the
forgiveness of debts, firmly planted within the
integrity of each person and society, is the basis
for the future.
In this second 'parable of the kingdom,' the key
person is the landowner; here too, his character and
actions are the determinative for what happens. And
here too, 'normal' economic arrangements give way to
others, not without resistance from those involved.
While there is still 'labor in exchange for pay,' it
is not supposed—at any rate, not by the
landowner—that there should be a parity in 'labor for
pay' for all those hired. A standard contractual
socio-economic order based on equality is included in
and yet exceeded by one based on gift. In that, we
see how ordinary contractual arrangements may be
leveraged into those more fitting to the kingdom of
heaven.
The action takes place in two places: first,
outside the vineyard/kingdom itself, from which
people need to be drawn to it, and second, in a
market where there are laborers for hire, to which
the landowner goes first early in the morning, then
at 9, 12, 3 and 5, five times in sequence. In all
cases, he makes a verbal contract to hire them for
the appropriate pay. Through a pre-contractual trust
with the landowner which is carried forward into
verbal contracts, they go from a market-based
sociality to a work-based one, from a negotiable
labor-for-pay one to an agrarian-productive one. Two
kinds of socio-economic order are in play, the one
contracting for the other. The verbal contracts vary:
in the case of the first set of laborers, he agrees
to pay 'the usual daily wage'; this is the norm for
such work, established by precedent, and it remains
the reference-point for the others, but with the
others he agrees to 'pay them whatever is right';
they are included in contractual arrangements based
on a more fluid standard of labor-for-pay. There is
something else: in the market-place, the landowner
draws from those who are idle, that is unable
to participate in that form of socio-economic
exchange, those who are marginal and vulnerable
'because no one has hired us.' At the invitation of
the landowner, they go from that marginality
to inclusion in the economy of the
vineyard.
A determinative moment is reached at evening, when
labor for the day is done, and pay is due, when the
contract is complete. While the vineyard-owner had
gone into the market-place to find and contract
laborers, now he discharges his obligations to them
through his manager, a mediator between
contract-maker and the fulfillment of contractual
obligations. At the instruction of the
vineyard-owner, he calls the laborers in reverse
order of hiring to give them their pay. Here is where
the surprise comes. Of course, there is no 'free
lunch': all have worked, some longer than others.
Instead of differential contracts, this much pay for
labor this long, it turns out that all—whether hired
early in the morning, or at 9, 12, 3 or 5—are on the
same contract and are paid 'the usual daily wage'.
Those who are hired later are given pay in
excess of what would be normal for the length of
their work; this is what turns out to be the 'right
pay' promised them. What kind of an arrangement is
this? It suggests that, where they were marginal to
the market-place socio-economic structure, they are
now fully within the socio-economic dynamics of the
vineyard to which all are to contribute equally.
Compare them [the marginal, part-day workers
integrated into the vineyard] with those 'who have
borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat,'
who now also receive the 'usual daily wage'.While
they now receive the pay for which they had
contracted their labor, they think that the new
'right pay'—that which the vineyard-owner gives in
excess of what would be normal—should set a new
standard superseding the old, a new norm
supplanting the old, which would be the
reference-point for differentiated pay by which they
'thought they would receive more'. In effect, they
were bidding for the system of the market outside to
be brought within the vineyard, whereby the position
of people would be negotiated and differentials of
labor-for-pay would be kept, even if they left some
people marginalized and vulnerable.
But they grumble against the landowner
nonetheless: hasn't he violated the pre-contractual
trust uniting them, and also the contract between
them? 'These last worked only one hour, and you have
made them equal to us.' The issue is not trivial; it
amounts to a division within the socio-economic order
of the vineyard, brought about—ironically—not by
equal pay, but by the expectation of differentiated
pay.
This evokes a complex and much-debated issue of
market economics.Can a free market produce outcomes
that are just? By one argument, according to the
principle of distributive justice, outcomes are
important and one's productive contribution to a
given outcome deserves reward: the market is
just when this occurs. By the other argument, market
outcomes are just when there is an exchange of
resources and certain constraints on just
appropriation and transfer are observed.[6] In the
former case, outcomes and distributions of burdens
and benefits are primary in justice, while in the
latter, individual acts are primary.If this
differentiation is well-founded, those who go
earliest into the vineyards are utilizing the first
kind of argument, and claiming an injustice because
they have not received the higher reward due for
their longer work. But the vineyard-owner replies
appropriately, "Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did
you not agree with me for the usual daily wage?"
'This implies a stronger message: live in the freedom
which results from being paid according to the
original agreement—'take what belongs to you and
go."'
The response of the vineyard-owner utilizes the
second form of argument.Here is a situation in which
the owner exchanges pay for their labor, and
observes suitable constraints on appropriation and
transfer. By way of appropriation, he takes account
of the marginalized situation of those hired late,
and—as transfer—pays them in such a way as to
incorporate them fully in the situation into which
they come when they are hired. So his statement,
which appears to justify his actions to both by
reference to his character ('I choose to give to this
last the same as I give to you.'), making them equal
in socio-economic terms, is also more: it is a claim
to act justly toward all. The resources are his—' am
I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs
to me?—and this makes it legitimate for him to
dispose of them so long as abides by suitable
constraints on appropriation and transfer. If his
action is just, how can they be envious because he is
generous?
Another way of seeing this is to recall Mauss's
argument that societies—at least those amongst the
Inuit and the Melanesians—are socio-economic systems
of totalized competitive giving incorporating all
things and services and persons.If so, however, the
vineyard-owner in this case seems to stand within the
system as its most intense determinant, who
makes the norms for giving, not as one member of the
system amongst others.
If these observations are correct, the concluding
statement—'So the last will be first, and the first
will be last'—becomes more clear. The last are not
simply the 'last in,' nor are the first the 'first
in,' nor is this an arbitrary reversal of standing.
What is established by the parable is a comparison
between two forms of socio-economic situation, one
marginalizing some and the other including all, and
between two forms of justice, one operating by a
notion of just desert for productivity and the other
by agency within constraints. If so, the parable
clearly exemplifies the priority of inclusion over
marginalizing, and the priority of the 'intense
determinant' who—by giving — establishes a just
socio-economic order.
In Conclusion
What have we learned from this combination of
preparatory reasoning and text-reading? The
preparation showed something of the dynamics of
sociality, in which sociable life and the 'manner of
union in living together' are combined in forward
movement, how their 'organized dynamic' varies in
social form, and how these occur though particular
economic behavior, whether contractual or
gift-exchange. Altogether, these give some assistance
in reading two chosen texts more deeply to find the
intersection of social and economic issues in them.
The specific content of Christian views is found in
the texts per se, however, not in general
principles to which they give rise.
In both of the texts chosen for closer study, the
character of the central figure—king or
landowner, presumably of the kingdom of heaven — is
overarchingly important: it is the norm or
determinant—whether by direct action or gift—of the
specific economic actions considered legitimate, and
the socio-economic order constituted by them. Those
who fail to embed these norms in their 'heart' also
fail to provide 'space' for others to live fully, and
typically revert to a lower set of norms which
'guarantee' their position. How in specific terms
this happens is told differently in the two
parables.Both, however, show how ordinary
socio-economic norms, practices and social
configurations are also 'leveraged' into those
appropriate to the kingdom of heaven. That is
highly significant for the intersection of theology,
sociality and economics. It also shows that the
primary issue for these texts, whether seen through
their central character or in his actions or in the
resultant socio-economic order, is the kind of
dynamic sociality through which the economic affairs
of this world can be transformed into those suitable
to the kingdom of heaven.
ENDNOTES
[1] Richard Hooker, Laws of
Ecclesiastical Polity (1593), ed. A.S.McGrade,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989, p. 87.
Italics added.
[2] Arthur Schopenhauer, On
the Basis of Morality (1839), Cambridge: Hackett,
1995; Emile Durkheim, The Elementary Forms of
Religious Life (1912), New York: Free Press,
1995.
[3] Emile Durkheim,
Professional Ethics and Civic Morals
(unpublished lectures), London: Routledge, 1957,
p.1.
[4] See Richard Newbold Adams,
Energy and Structure: A Theory of Social
Power, Austin: University of Texas, 1975, Ch.
4.
[5] Mary Douglas, 'Foreword:
No Free Gifts' in Marcel Mauss, The Gift: The Form
and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies,
trans. W.D. Halls, London: Routledge, 1990, p.
vii.
[6] See Serena Olsaretti,
Liberty, Desert and the Market,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
Title Page |
Archive
© 2005, Society for Scriptural
Reasoning
|
