The Conservatives have claimed Good Friday

Actually on the whole it seems a perfectly reasonable discussion to me.

We had North Wales Baptist missionaries in the family and they spent their lives trying to bring others to 'the true faith' both here and overseas, so they were definitely not unaware of other strands of Christianity and other faiths.

Anniebach

Pippa we don’t have mining valleys , it’s relevant to me

No comment on the need for humility when it comes to individual views I see.

Smileless2012 Mon 05-Apr-21 09:53:01. You are right and I should have checked back, I will elucidate.

You do not seem to allow any historical background into what you believe - which is fine until you expect others to accept your view too.

You say Jesus was not an economic reformer and when he turned over the tables in the temple, which Murphy appears to have used to demonstrate that he was, that had nothing to with economics. How do you know? Historically there was a movement against monetising the temple. There had been a long tradition of identifying the religion of Jehova with the ideal of protecting the poor from the increasingly landed aristocracy. You can go back to Elijah, Amos and Hosea who identify it in this way. Isaiah preached on social justice; Josiah uses Deuteronomy on which to base his reforms, and Jeremiah denounces usury. I won't go on but, by the time of Jesus things had changed and the view of economics has moved from one which saw the need for all to have a reasonable share and not be burdened by debt into something closer to our "greed is good" rentier capitalism society.

I would ask you why the hierarchy of the Jewish temple put Jesus to death? It wasn't Pilate - he washed his hands of the in-fighting and left it to the Jews. What had they got to lose if not their accumulated wealth? And they knew Jesus knew the law. He had shown he did when teaching. He had also shown he could answer questions in a way that protected himself and his followers. Jesus was not the only one preaching against the lack of adherence to the law and creditor aggressiveness. There were many around at the time but Jesus worried them because he was winning over the population (Palm Sunday).
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I previously quoted his first sermon and I will point out another. The Unmerciful Servant, Matthew 18:21-35. This is all about the forgiveness of debt. If Jesus managed to bring back the "Jubilee Year" which was part of Judaic law when debts were forgiven, where would it leave those running the religion that they had monetised to make themselves rich - no wonder they wanted to be rid of him.

When Jesus overturned the tables and drove out those using it as a marketplace, where the swearing of debts took place, he was not going to enamour himself to those who had made themselves rich from ignoring the law. He quoted Jeremiah at this point - a prophet who warned against turning the temple into "a den of thieves" by oppressing aliens, orphans and widows and saying the poverty goes hand in hand with its cause; covetous greed.

There is much, much more but the idea that Jesus was not against the leaders of his own society and the wealth they had accumulated at the cost of others poverty seems so far from the truth to me. However, I have no doubt some will continue to believe it which, of course, is their right - as long as you allow others to form their own opinion.

I do not expect others to accept my view Pippa I am providing information to support what I have said.

Rentier capitalism in current political/science and international-relations theory, is a state which derives all, or a substantial portion of its national revenues from the rent paid by foreign individuals, concerns or governments. How does this apply to the first century society in Palestine which was governed by an occupying power the Romans, who allowed the religious authorities to have their own currency for the temple tax, which was to avoid the idolatrous symbols on Roman coinage from entering the temple.

In Jesus' ministry social justice went beyond economics. "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone" for example. You refer to Jeremiah; Jeremiah in chap. 7 v 11 said "has this house which bares my name become a den of robbers in your site". when Jesus overturned the tables it was for the same reason which Jeremiah had spoken about 600 years earlier.

Pilate did put Jesus to death, he had the authority to say 'yay or nay', you do not scourge an innocent man. He washed his hands as a symbolic gesture to absolve himself from his crime.

The Jewish leaders had more to lose than their wealth. They controlled they whole Jewish social system. They had the power to exclude people from the synagogue, the social and religious hub of peoples lives.

They were faced with losing their position in society, the 'respect' of their people and their religious authority so in short, their power.

It wasn't that Jesus could answer questions to protect himself and his followers, he didn't. He answered with the truth and often in a provocative manner rather than defensively. He said to the Pharisees for example "woe to you scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like white washed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside, but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and every kind of impurity". Not the words of a man seeking to protect himself of his followers.

With regard to the forgiveness of debt, the parable to which you refer is more about forgiveness and uses money as an example. A king forgave one of his subjects a massive debt and when that man went out, he wouldn't do the same for one of his own whose debt was much smaller. This parable was to illustrate forgiveness and mercy. Having been forgiven by his king, he was unable or unwilling to offer the same forgiveness and mercy for a considerably smaller debt.

I agree that Jesus was "against the leaders of his own society" but it was way beyond the accumulation of wealth at the expense of others. They were religious leaders, God's representatives on earth. They had no respect for the God they supposedly worshipped or for His people, or the teachings of the Old Testament.

In short, they were not following the first and most important commandment; "love the Lord your God with all your heart ....." which was the foundation on which their faith was supposed to be built upon.

I don't agree with you and you do not agree with me. However, I still insist you have the right to hold your views. Can you tell me where you offer the same tolerance to me?

It appears that you and I have a different definition of "rentier capitalism". I would describe it more as Brett Christophers does in his book "Who Owns the Economy, and Who Pays for It?"

How did Britain’s economy become a bastion of inequality?
In this landmark book, the author of The New Enclosure provides a forensic examination and sweeping critique of early-twenty-first-century capitalism. Brett Christophers styles this as ‘rentier capitalism’, in which ownership of key types of scarce assets - such as land, intellectual property, natural resources, or digital platforms - is all-important and dominated by a few unfathomably wealthy companies and individuals: rentiers. If a small elite owns today’s economy, everybody else foots the bill. Nowhere is this divergence starker, Christophers shows, than in the United Kingdom, where the prototypical ills of rentier capitalism - vast inequalities combined with entrenched economic stagnation - are on full display and have led the country inexorably to the precipice of Brexit. With profound lessons for other countries subject to rentier dominance, Christophers’ examination of the UK case is indispensable to those wanting not just to understand this insidious economic phenomenon but to overcome it. Frequently invoked but never previously analysed and illuminated in all its depth and variety, rentier capitalism is here laid bare for the first time.

So I was talking about a small elite owning and the rest paying. I certainly think this can be compared first century society in Palestine and other times when the state or state religion have become corrupted by a few.

It seems that the US Christians are objecting to their faith being taken over and used for far-right Conservative political purposes too -
www.theguardian.com/world/2021/apr/05/americans-religion-rightwing-politics-decline

That's a shame Pippa as I thought we'd moved onto an intelligent and informed discussion free of personal criticism.

I spent a great deal of time going through your post @ 11.10 to give a thoughtful and respectful response which I believe I have done.

If you are unable or unwilling to to carry on this discussion without extending the same courtesy I shall not engage with you any further on this thread.

What personal criticism? None was intended.

I am neither a Christian nor a Conservative, but I was finding the discussion interesting. I didn't see any personal criticism from Pippa.

PS. Pippa's definition of rentier capitalism is the one I've always understood. Foreign individuals don't necessarily form part of it, although of course some do.

"Can you tell me where you offer the same tolerance to me?"

I'll leave this discussion with you there.

Yes I am a non believer but was finding it interesting. It would be a shame if it didnt continue.

PippaZ
I don’t understand why you have put a link on your reply to far right republican Christianity. What on earth did that have to do with the discussion you’ve having with Smileless?

I was too growstuff but there you go. To be accused of not showing another poster tolerance, when time was spent putting together a detailed response which included answering questions asked, for me is personal criticism.

"Foreign individuals don't necessarily form part of it, although of course some do" exactly, which is why they are included in the definition I used.

I thought it was irrelevant to the discussion too Agedp.

Foreign individuals weren't just included in your definition of rentier capitalism:

"Rentier capitalism in current political/science and international-relations theory, is a state which derives all, or a substantial portion of its national revenues from the rent paid by foreign individuals, concerns or governments."

According to that definition, foreign individuals provide all or a substantial part as rent. That is not the defining characteristic of rentier capitalism and misses entirely what it's all about. Whether the individuals concerned are foreign or not is irrelevant.

I don't know where your definition came from, but it's just not the accepted one.

Agedp1953

PippaZ
I don’t understand why you have put a link on your reply to far right republican Christianity. What on earth did that have to do with the discussion you’ve having with Smileless?

Maybe because the thread is about the relationship between politics and religion.

I think if you look at the OP it's relevant. Perhaps I should have put it on a separate post.

It's an acceptable definition to me growstuff or I wouldn't have used it.

The link though refers to politics and religion in the US and this thread was about UK politics and religion.

I didn't see anything in the OP that said we couldn't compare the Conservatives and Christianity to what was happening in the US Smileless. I'm afraid I missed that.

No neither did I, but as this thread started with a tweet made by a UK politician and as far as I can remember the responses have focused on UK politicians and political parties, I didn't see the relevance of the link.

That's okay then. It just means your irrelevance is my comparison which I thought might be interesting for others, but I should have put it as a separate point so as not to confuse.

Passing thought: Earlier in the thread someone compared Jesus to a "holy Jeremy Corbyn". If Corbyn had been assassinated by the right, as a threat to their power, would they have ended up claiming them as their own in a couple of thousand years, do you think?

PippaZ
I can’t see Corbyn ever coming back from the ‘dead’.

Agedp1953

PippaZ
I can’t see Corbyn ever coming back from the ‘dead’.

And Corbyn had about as much passion as a stuffed mouse!