I don't believe in any gods, and I'm not sure what that's supposed to mean.
Is that advice actionable for you in some way? What do you take it to mean as it relates to modern employment?
Is that advice actionable for you in some way? What do you take it to mean as it relates to modern employment?
One of the lines that proceeds that is:
>27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life[a]?
Humans should be smart enough to figure out how not to starve and and not to freeze to death without working themselves to death preparing for a future that may not even come. We should care about each other enough to admit that those outcomes are not necessary and be willing to give and accept support form others from time to time.
Gospel of Thomas has a similar parable > , "There was a rich person who had a great deal of money. He said, 'I shall invest my money so that I may sow, reap, plant, and fill my storehouses with produce, that I may lack nothing.' These were the things he was thinking in his heart, but that very night he died.'
Ie, don't make yourself miserable for material possessions out of fear that if you lack them for a period you will never be ok ever again. You'll lack them when you're dead too. Stress yourself out too much about those things and you'll probably just die early without even attempting the things you wanted to do. At least attempt to improve the world in some way if you think you have the means and desire to do so. And even if you risk your material possessions to do so, it probably isn't the end of the world.
Maybe the bible is right here, but another way to view that parable might be that the rich person was planning for his safety, which is wise. And by dying, he has transferred the safety that he was building for himself to his legacy, which can continue without him. I think most people in our society would describe that rich person as being prudent, not foolish. We call that "estate planning" today and it's recommended that everyone does it.
There's a lot of other guidance that I consider very wrong in the same bible though, so its authority doesn't help me much in deciding if it's correct about how to view life. It also seems like this advice might have been more applicable before the invention of medicine.
In any case, I appreciate the explanation.