to return to your place in the text.To read endnotes, click on the the note number, then click on the
But the questioner persisted. "That's a great idea, but how
do we do that?"
Rogers responded, "Hey, I am a concept man. You will have
to work out the details for yourself."
I confess to feeling a bit like Will Rogers in preaching on
"You shall not covet," especially at Christmas. For a capitalist
society which has built itself into one of the most powerful
economic forces on earth by setting our sights high, by creating
in us a desire...a covetousness...for more and better of almost
everything, these are hard words to hear. The concept is fine,
but, as the old phrase goes, "the devil is in the details." How
do we boil the water?
At first blush, this does sound like a strange commandment.
Why on earth would God tell us not to want things? And frankly,
how could a normal person KEEP from wanting things? Does it make
sense for God to tell an African mother not to want food for her
starving baby? Does it make sense for God to tell a man living
in a cardboard box under a railroad bridge not to want a decent
home? Does it make sense to tell parents not to want the
wherewithal to provide an education for their children? On the
face of it, "You shall not covet" is more than strange; it is
nonsense.
Now, before you accuse me of blasphemy, I want you to
realize the problem here. To render this commandment simply as
"You shall not covet" misunderstands it. Leaving it at just
those four words is an incomplete reading. Leaving it there also
ignores the context. Both of those lead us into difficulty.
Reverse order. First, the context. Over and over during
our study of the other commandments we have pointed out that
God's aim in giving these rules was the creation of a just and
decent society, one in which all are treated fairly and honestly.
One commentator calls the commandments "policy statements." They
are not in themselves guidelines for specific action, but provide
the ground and framework from which specifics may be drawn.(1)
The first two commandments - it is unjust to delude people into
pursuing false gods, whether ancient pagan deities or their
modern equivalents (money, power, pleasure, etc.) that ultimately
demean and destroy; the third commandment - it is unjust to treat
people dishonestly by not being as good as your word; the fourth
commandment - it is unjust to overwork people (even yourself);
the fifth commandment - it is unjust to allow aging parents (or
anyone else who might be vulnerable) to go without the
necessities of life; number six - it is unjust to deny someone
their very life by killing them; number seven - it is unjust to
put a man's home and family at risk, to jeopardize inheritance
rights, by seducing his wife; eight - it is unjust to take
someone's private property without permission; nine - it is
unjust to subvert the judicial system with false testimony or
anything else. Justice is a trumpet that sounds through every
commandment. The obvious conclusion, of course, is that this
word against covetousness would follow that same pattern.
The other problem - the incomplete reading. We often quote
the commandment as "You shall not covet," and end it there. It
says more. It mentions specifics...house, wife, male or female
slaves, ox, donkey, property in general. The prohibition is not
all-inclusive. It does not say that we are not to want food for
our babies, a decent home for ourselves, the money to pay for
school for our kids, even neat stuff to give for Christmas. It
is FINE and even NOBLE to want all that, but it is NOT fine, and
certainly not noble, to set our hearts on what rightfully belongs
to someone else.
Why not? Well, if we take the context of the other
commandments seriously, we conclude that wanting what belongs to
our neighbor leads to...injustice. And an unjust social order is
contrary to the will of God.
A word here about justice. Very often, like beauty, justice
is in the eye of the beholder. To a grocer, it is unjust that
someone should steal a loaf of bread, but to the father who stole
it, it is unjust to let his child starve. To an employer, it may
seem unjust to be forced to pay a worker a certain minimum wage
regardless of the task performed, but to the employee, 40 hours
of labor to only collect enough at the end of the week to support
a family at the poverty line is also unjust. To a banker, it is
unjust when folks do not repay their honest debts, but to the one
about to be evicted in a foreclosure proceeding, it is seen as
unjust to be tossed out in the street. As we say, justice and
injustice depend upon your point of view.
Some years ago, I attended a seminar on Christian Faith &
Economics at Presbyterian College. The day began with a lecture
by Dr. Douglas Oldenburg, the President of Columbia Seminary (and
who currently is Moderator of our PCUSA General Assembly) - the
lecture was entitled, "A Biblical Vision of Economic Justice."
Dr. Oldenburg defined justice as "giving what is due."
Unfortunately, as we have already noted, people disagree on "what
is due" - how to boil the water in the harbor - so we need some
help.
Dr. Oldenburg gave three principles for making that
determination. First, people are due what they DESERVE - we
ought to get what we earn and earn what we get. Basic fairness;
most of us would agree with that. But Biblical justice does not
stop there, so we get a second principle: we are due some things
because of our WORTH as human beings - equal protection under the
law, the right to vote, and so on. Again, basic fairness, and
most can go along with that. Finally, the third principle: we
are due what we NEED regardless of merit - most would agree that
even the worst of us cannot simply be left to starve in the
street; that a criminal should not be denied medical attention
even if wounded while committing the crime. Good, solid Biblical
principles to insure the kind of society God would establish.
But there is a question. Which of those principles takes
precedence when they come into conflict? For example, does my
right to my hard-earned income take precedence over my neighbor's
right to food? There is no easy answer, but perhaps our
commandment can give us some guidelines.
Think about the items listed. "You shall not covet your
neighbor's house." What would make that unjust? Can we not
dream of getting as fine a home as the Joneses down the street?
Of course, we can. What it means is that we have no right to
earnestly desire (which is the definition of the word covet)...to
EARNESTLY DESIRE the Jones house itself because the temptation
will be there to find some way to get it (and that is the force
of the Hebrew word chamad in the commandment(2)), whether the
Joneses want to keep it or not. The further danger is that, if
we DO get the Jones house, the Joneses might not have one, and,
if the commandment is our guide, to let someone become homeless
is unjust.
Does this mean that there should be no real estate business,
that no property should ever change hands except by inheritance?
Not at all. Buying and selling property was just as much a part
of the Israelite economy as it is ours. But there was one major
difference. Hebrew law tried to insure that, should a father
find it necessary to trade or sell the family farm, the children
and grandchildren would not be permanently condemned to a
landless underclass. The rule was that every 50th year, the year
of Jubilee, all property would automatically revert to the family
of original ownership - slaves were to be freed, land was to be
returned.(3) Debts were to be canceled every seventh year.(4)
People would regularly have the chance to start with a clean
slate. In that way, no real or imagined injustice would be
perpetuated.
How about "You shall not covet your neighbor's wife"? We
have already heard that seducing her is forbidden, but there is a
further step than a "one night stand" that is implied here. Sex
is not the issue, property is. Granted, men no longer consider
wives as property (not if we want to stay alive), but ancient
Israel did have that understanding, and with that in mind, the
rule here is do not set your heart on having something of someone
else's that would unjustly upset the basic unit of society that
insures the provision of the necessities of life, the family.
There was good reason for such a rule. It had nothing to do
with any emotional trauma that a family break-up might cause. It
was economics. In Hebrew society, it was a man's right to have a
family because children insured that the parents would be cared
for in their old age. As we found when we studied the Fifth
Commandment, the family was the Israelite answer to Social
Security.
"You shall not covet your neighbor's male or female slave,
or ox, or donkey..." Again, the issue is property, but in this
case, the special property that allows someone to create a
sustainable existence. In other words, it would be unjust for
you to want those things of your neighbor's that help him make a
living. The farmer had a right to his plow, the carpenter had a
right to his hammer, and so on.
Other ancient laws even sought to insure that those who, for
one reason or another, did not have property of their own, would
still be able to survive. The rule about gleaning made sure that
some grain around the edges of every field and some grapes in
every vineyard would be left for the poor of the community to
gather and sustain themselves.(5) To be sure, those gleanings were
not just handed out; that poor person had to come and do the
gathering. But the foundation of the law was an understanding
that people had an inherent right to make a living.
Finally, the catchall, "You shall not covet ANYTHING that is
your neighbor's." If there is anything that belongs to someone
else that, in your heart of hearts, you would like to take for
yourself, do not even think about it. The temptation to stoop to
injustice in satisfying that desire is too great to fool with.
Justice, justice, justice...giving someone what is due. The
commandment IS helpful. Apparently God's standard for a just
society involves a home, a family, and the chance to make a
living. And when Dr. Oldenburg's three principles of justice
come into conflict with one another, these standards can be
applied to sort out any difficulties.
First, the right to a home. According to the commandment,
it is unjust for people to sleep over heating grates on our city
streets. It is unjust for a society to care nothing about
citizens who have never had and probably never will have enough
money to buy a home.
The right to family. According to the commandment, it is
unjust to create welfare rules that demand that a household not
have an able-bodied father living in the home to qualify for
public assistance - thousands of fathers have had to leave wife
and children just to allow the mother and babies to qualify for
government help.
The right to a decent lifestyle. According to the
commandment, it is unjust to be satisfied with unemployment. It
is unjust to leave some workers behind in a changing economy
simply because of lack of training. It is unjust for mills and
factories to be shut down, and loyal employees thrown out in the
street just because some corporate "down-sizer" decides to
maximize profits. It is unjust to pay millions of tax dollars to
store grain and cheese and milk when citizens are forced to rely
on food banks and soup kitchens to supplement their diets. It is
unjust to pay farmers NOT to plant crops when hundreds of
millions of people around the world - hundreds of millions for
whom Christ died - are living in abject poverty and 40,000
infants die DAILY because of improper nutrition.
Why do such injustices exist? Not because of lack of
resources. According to the World Bank, it would take a
redistribution of only two percent of the global food supply,
only TWO PERCENT, to wipe out malnutrition on this planet.(6) The
problem is that some folks have taken and kept for themselves
what, according to this commandment, rightfully belongs to
others. Why have we done that? Meanness? Selfishness? Greed?
Some of that perhaps. But more likely it is just the normal
concern that we keep our OWN home, our OWN family, and our OWN
decent life. We do not want any children to go hungry, but most
of all, not our OWN.
Such thinking has been around since the beginning of
history. Centuries ago, on a gentle Judean hillside, Jesus
talked about it. He said, "Do not worry about things like that.
Your heavenly Father knows what you need. God takes care of the
birds of the air and flowers of the field. Are you not worth
more than they?"(7)
These are difficult issues, no question, and generally
beyond the scope of decent individuals to solve. But frankly,
whether or not a mother has food enough to feed her baby should
have nothing to do with how many decent individuals are around.
Firm public policies and legislation should be in force to see
that ALL citizens have a chance for their due...a home, family,
and an opportunity for a decent life. The task of the church,
you and me, is to insist that society address these questions,
and further, to challenge our elected officials with our lobbies
and our votes and our willingness to participate in the electoral
process to see that justice is done.
Some years ago, Henry Kissinger, the former Secretary of
State, and William Sloane Coffin, at the time the minister of
Riverside Church in New York City, were on television together.
Social responsibility was the topic and Dr. Coffin noted many of
those injustices that we have mentioned here. In exasperation,
Dr. Kissinger asked, "But what would you have us DO?"
Coffin responded, "As a minister, it is my task to say `Let
justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever
flowing stream.' It is YOUR job to design the irrigation
system."
"You shall not covet"...and in particular the things that
are the DUE of your neighbor...for the good of society, at least
as good a concept as boiling the water in the harbor. When we
begin to take the commandment seriously, when we begin to get to
the details, that is the beginning of justice. For those who ARE
serious, we do well to remember what Jesus said on that hillside:
"Strive first for the kingdom of God and [God's] righteousness,
and all these things will be given to you as well."(8)
Let us pray.
O God, our prayer is that of the writer of Proverbs: "Give
me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that I need,
or I shall be full, and deny you, and say, 'Who is the LORD?' or
I shall be poor, and steal, and profane the name of my God."(9)
For we pray in the name of Jesus. Amen!
1. Walter Brueggemann, CD-ROM, "The Book of Exodus," New Interpreter's Bible,
Electronic Edition, disk 4, (Nashville: Abingdon, 1997) 2. Walter Harrelson, The Ten Commandments and Human Rights, (Philadelphia, Fortress
Press, 1980), p.148 3. Leviticus 25:8 ff 4. Deuteronomy 15:1 5. Leviticus 19:9-10 6. Oldenburg lecture 7. Matt. 6:25-30 8. Matthew 6:33 9. Proverbs 30:8b-9
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