Katalin Botos
Journal of Economics, Theology and Religion, vol. 4 (2024): 108-110
Publication history
First view: 17 September 2024
Published: 18 December 2024
The book is a compendium of papers on the economic thinking of different religions. The papers differ both in their topics and methods: some may be characterised as deeply scientific in their approach, others are more descriptive; some are written for researchers, others for political scientists. The starting point of the book is that the increased economic production in the West is somehow dependent on the religion of the majority of the people in the region. This is the reason for the quicker growth that took place in the “western world,” compared to the economic performance of China, for instance, in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Some countries have an “official” state religion even nowadays (some Islamic countries and Israel, for instance), but in most countries various religions vie to win the souls and minds of their people. In the EU and other western countries, citizens are free to choose any religion they wish to follow, should they wish to do so. In the US, a range of very different religions strive to attract followers.[1]
While a few chapters report on the ideas of Christianity and Islam, most of the papers detail Jewish economic teaching. American Jews—according to Sauer’s final chapter—are generally educated at a much higher level than the average American citizen and have a much higher standard of living as well. Sauer analyses the political attitude of American Jews from the viewpoint of religious teaching. From a political point of view, this is probably one of most interesting chapters of the book. One can get information from the different statistics on the internet on how the Jewish population voted in the US. Mostly, they supported the Democrats— although their religious teaching is against the “big state.” Redistribution by the state does not conform to the Jewish attitude, though helping the needy is seen as a religious task for the Jews. Such help, however, always requires the person in need to make an effort of their own to improve their lives, and to have the correct attitude to work.
The Jewish teaching concerning those in need is the following: Give them work, or a loan to start a business, or, if unavoidable, help them with a limited amount. Jews thus tend to prefer the “small state,” because it leaves more in their pockets—even for the purpose of Tzeddakah, the religious obligation to help those in need.
Several other chapters deal with the Jewish religion. Chapter 5 explores the occupational status of American Jews in the twentieth century; Chapter 6 surveys Judaism in Israel and the US; Chapter 7 looks into ultra-religious women in Israel and the labor market; Chapter 9 addresses Judaism, liberalism, and the market; Chapter 11 analyses economic liberty and Zionism. Of the chapters dealing with other religions, Chapter 3 looks into the long-term development impact of Christian missions in developing countries; Chapter 4 reports on the ways in which religions have influenced the evolution of the welfare state; Chapter 10 outlines the economic doctrine in the Church of England since the Reformation.
The remaining chapters cover some very special topics in the book, such as religion and volunteering (Chapter 8), seismic activity in connection with religiosity (Chapter 2), and cultural transmission and religion (Chapter 1—a topic that intrigued me greatly. I found the chapter rather complicated, however, and had to conclude that it was perhaps a bit too scientifically analytical for an ordinary reader).
I turn now to explore in more detail a few of the chapters that I found particularly intriguing. The chapter on Christian missions argues that the literature has stressed the beneficial economic and societal effects more than the existing negative effects. The reason for this is that the literature is based on missionaries’ own information. The author illustrates the negative impact by the fact that after colonisation Sub-Saharan African countries became intolerant of homosexuality compared to attitudes in earlier times. Christian missions brought much progress in education and health, but the author’s point of reference is clearly focused specifically on progress resulting from cultural imperialism.
The chapter “Religion and the Evolution of Welfare State” maintains that in Western Europe after World War II, religious organizations tried to gain political influence by creating political parties; in contemporary Islamic countries, religious organizations sometimes organize groups of religious rebels and compete with the existing political state outside the state. The chapter employs a great volume of literature to investigate whether there are similarities between an Islamic democracy and European Christian democracies. Is there a sense in which democracies in the Muslim world should be designed differently than those in the West? The chapter concludes by saying that that in the contemporary western world the development of the welfare state diminishes not only religiosity but also public support for religious organisations and churches.
The cornerstone of Jewish teaching is presented in the chapter written by J. Jacob: “Judaism, Liberalism and the Market”. Investigating the relationship between Jewish religious teaching and the liberal state order, Jacob argues that, because of the importance of freedom, Jewish people in democracies tend to opt predominantly for the market-type order. Jewish entrepreneurs compete successfully in many different activities. They strive to conform with the religious teaching of the Hebrew Bible, supporting it even if they are not formally religious. Jacob makes no reference as to whether this mentality is relevant for all the citizens or only for Jewish people. Many Jews in America have a strong Jewish identity even if they are not practising their religion—and those who may be critics of the “economic imperialism” of the contemporary order will follow the rules of the market, and consider it important to help the needy. They find an overlap between the teaching of the Jewish Bible and the natural law theory, just as some Christian Hebraists also do. They maintain that responsibility for the created world is a crucial element of Jewish behaviour. (If we look at Christian social teachings, we find mostly the same convictions—so they are not unique to the Jewish tradition.)
Another important chapter is entitled “Economic doctrine in the Church of England since the Reformation.” Social ethics was an important part of the curriculum of future clergy as well as for the elite who attended the two famous universities of England, Cambridge and Oxford. Before the Reformation—and even after the French Revolution, until the end of the 18th century—each European nation was a “confessional state”. But the French Revolution was a frontal attack on Christianity. The Church of England was almost completely unaffected by the events in France, having an unbroken continuity with the past. Even after the Great Rebellion of the 17th century, the Church of England resumed its role at the time of the Restoration of Crown, Church, and Parliament. The Book of Common Prayer (1662) provided the doctrinal framework for its age-old duty to monitor the economic rights and duties of its members. The realities of capitalism in the 19th century inspired socialist ideas. The Anglican Church tried to harmonize these with the teaching of the Church. By 1890, this process led to the creation of the Christian Social Union. Religiosity survived for a longer time in rural areas, but by the end of Victoria’s reign the Church of England was no longer the national religion. Social thinking, however, persisted. The chapter introduces the most influential thinkers of the past two centuries in England—both clergymen and laymen—who addressed social teaching. There was a direct correlation between socialism and the “Anglo-Catholic” movement in the late Victorian Church, which remained influential until 1950. In light of this, I realize that I would have liked the book to provide a short summary of Roman Catholic social teaching. Rerum Novarum was mentioned briefly, but the encyclicals following this letter are also very important concerning the central topic of the book
Note
[1] Depending on religious definitions and varying population data, the United States has the largest or second largest Jewish community in the world, after Israel. (The figure depends on how one is considered to be Jewish.) As of 2020, the American Jewish population is estimated at 7.5 million people, accounting for 2.4% of the total US population.
