The Economics of Religion
Christianity was adopted as the official religion of the Roman Empire by Constantine the Great, because it was thought to be a suitable religion for slaves. It was a “hotch-potch religion," or a “cemetery of dead religions,” because when the slaves were brought into Rome from many different lands, they brought with them their many religious ideas. Professor Seeley says, “the age was religious because it was an age of servitude" and the Christian teachings of “blessed are the meek, the humble, and the merciful,” fitted very well into needs of society at that time. “ Christianity produced a complete change in the attitude to the Emperor. It made their loyalty more intense.” (Professor Seeley, lectures and essays page 75.) As the New Testament admirably puts it, “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but God; the powers that be are ordained by God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God; and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation." Romans Ch. 13 ver. 1 and 2. The Roman Empire was already in decay when Christianity was ushered in, and it was no coincidence that some spiritual opium was needed to quieten the slaves against revolt
In the middle ages the church controlled most of the land. This meant that they had a considerable amount of real economic control in their hands, for under feudalism he who controlled the land controlled most of what was on it. Of more recent times we have seen the power of the Catholic political parties in pre-Nazi Germany, Spain, France, Austria, etc. The controlling of education by the Church, and antagonism to divorce, contraception, etc.
When capitalism was beginning to expand, missionaries played a very important part in paving the way for the trade that was to come, and often in a very crude way. The African natives who were discovered in a state of nakedness, were told by the missionaries that God frowned on such things, and that to be a good Christian one should at least cover the genitals. But the natives had no clothes with which to gain the favours of God; they only had bars of Gold, diamonds and ivory tusks. As chance would have it Lancashire had plenty of cheap pants and pyjamas in all the colours of the rainbow which no self-respecting Englishman would wear, not even in bed. Then guess what happened—yes trade started—and no wonder they called it the “Gold Coast” Where the missionaries didn’t conduct the trade themselves, it didn’t need a lot of imagination for an enterprising trader to follow the missionaries up.
“Look up to Heaven,” said the missionary to the native, and the latter did so. When he looked down again he found that his land was appropriated! As the Zulus say “When white man first came to us he had the Bible, and we owned the land. Now he’s got the land, and we’ve got the Bible.”
Of recent years Bishops and other church dignitaries have become in some cases fabulously rich, so rich that many have been able to invest thousands of pounds in armament firms. (See Alan Handsacre “The Revenues of Religion.”) In Russia we had many examples of millionaire priests investing sums as large as half a million roubles in Soviet War Bonds. This is strange in a country which not long ago was turning churches into anti-religious museums, and persecuting followers of all religions.
It is often argued that Jesus was a Socialist, and Keir Hardie stated that he learnt his socialism from the New Testament. The idea of the disciples having all things in common gives rise to this misunderstanding. Jesus could only have been a socialist if he and his disciples fished with a steam trawler in an environment in which capitalism had already developed. Nothing that Jesus was alleged to have said, makes him a socialist in any way. The whole essence of his teaching was to tolerate the unpleasant things of life for treasure to come in heaven. His whole teaching and prophesies were based on survival after death. We socialists want to survive before death, and to have our good time in this world which we know that we have to live and work.
There are plenty of arguments against religion, and they come from many angles. Perhaps the chief one is that religion is false, and because of this it discourages people from thinking. Socialism, unlike religion, needs understanding and not just believing. Well did Marx say “the criticism of religion is the beginning of all criticism” for when we come to realise that there is no subject so holy that we must not or dare not criticise, then we begin to look at everything critically and to accept nothing at its face value. Again Marx wrote “For too long has religion explained history, let us with history explain religion”!
Horace Jarvis
(Concluded.)
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