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Please don't use Hacker News for political or ideological battle. It tramples curiosity.
No one is literally claiming that Jesus was espousing some kind of proto-Marxist economic theory so much as pointing out that in the context of modern (specifically American) political discourse, Jesus would be considered a socialist.
Then again, so would Ronald Reagan and Adam Smith. At this point the Overton window of what constitutes "socialism" has drifted so far that anyone to the left of Ayn Rand might as well be a tankie.
This. Thank you.
Tankie (authoritarianism with little red flags (after precipitating incident)) is to Tank Man (precipitating incident) in relation to China (socialist status quo (before precipitating incident)), is as Fonzie is to jumping the shark in relation to Happy Days.
Do you know when tankie was first used in this authoritarian socialist sense, or is that what you're saying?
My understanding is that it was first used in the immediate aftermath of 1956 in internal criticism within the British Communist Party, and gained wider international currency after the Prague Sprint in 1968.
The Year of Jubilee alone, from the Pentateuch, basically eliminates capitalism as we know it (if enacted at a full societal scale.)
So I would say that on the Bible, we'd still have free markets but with more guard rails so that nobody falls through the cracks if they're at least trying.
I do think we should bring back the Year of Jubilee though. Ironically, 2025 is a Year of Jubilee. I'm a big fan and I'm sure there are viable modern interpretations for it.
Capitalism is more about ownership of the means of production and the relationship of labor to capital.
None of those things have anything to do with who owns the means of production or taking things from people who produced them, though. Jesus advocated for voluntary selflessness, not charity by compulsion. And certainly he didn't advocate for there to be a hall monitor on someone's personal life and income in order for that hall monitor to be the arbiter of whether or not it's all according to Jesus' "socialist" tendencies.
In modern American political discourse, if Jesus showed up he'd be expected to do miraculous things like multiplying resources. So...I don't see how meaningful it is for someone to say Jesus would be a socialist as if it is any kind of informed or useful commentary on the state of American discourse.
This is something he has in common with many of the people that modern dominant (in the US, at least) political groups condemn for "socialism".
You can't equivocate terms like this, identifying with the more extreme definition but walking it back when pressed. This is active distortion and manipulation of language, and this is far from the only instance of such in society.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism
[1] https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/11/06.htm
> the people that modern dominant (in the US, at least) political groups condemn for "socialism"
They weren't talking about actual socialists, they're talking about the right's propensity to call anyone else a leftist. For example, if you ask my dad if Biden was a socialist, he'd tell you yes, and then if you asked how, he would list many things that have nothing to do with economic policy.
On a postmodern basis: if enough people believe in that narrative, it becomes reified as the truth, which is socially constructed. Therefore if the dominant belief is that they are socialist, then it is so.
The people that are condemned by others for "socialism" very often do not identify with socialism in any respect.
I'm not religious, but this is a bad take.
One thing Jesus was definitely not, was an optimizing utilitarian. He repeats in a dozen different ways in the Sermon on the Mount that people should do what is right, right now, and not worry about what's going to happen (worry about tomorrow, worry about what they will eat, what they will wear etc.)
This is obviously not the case, as any economic structure is more complex than just being a chill dude, and the bible has a more complex view of morality than just "being nice to thy neighbor".
No, it doesn't.
It relies on understanding what views today have been described by their opponents as "socialist", and what views Jesus espouses in the Scripture. It does not require:
(1) thinking Jesus is good, or
(2) thinking socialism is good, or
(3) knowing or applying any actual definition of socialism (since it only involves the term "socialism" being used as a hostile epithet, not any concept of whether or not something actually is socialism.)
> I'm not religious, but this is a bad take.
???
In the same vein, claiming you know more about a religion than the millions/billions of people who follow it is a low-IQ take, especially if the person making the claim knows nothing about the religion.
Though he did throw out some wicked burns a time or two.
I think you might be forgetting about the bulk of the Old Testament
> I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty” (Revelation 1:8).
> And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment” (Revelation 21:6).
> “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end” (Revelation 22:13).
Furthermore Jesus was the God of the Old Testament, at least if you accept the New Testament as scripture[2].
[1]: "Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil." --Matthew 5:17
As for the second, you’re leaving out the last couple of millennia of Christians debating the exact nature of God and fissuring into different groups over the details. Most variants recognize some difference between the OT and NT gods, however, because you have to explain the difference in their actions and instructions.
> I think you might be forgetting about the bulk of the Old Testament
I'm pretty certain Jesus Christ does not show violence or aggression in the OT even as much as the one time being described as him showing violence or aggression in the NT.
I mean, I think that's a necessary consequence of a pretty fundamental element of the OT vs. NT distinction.
I personally am 100% sure Jesus would be dead pretty quick if he came back - a lot faster than before, and I doubt it would take 30 pieces of silver either!
Even today most Christians haven’t read the whole thing. I’m not Christian in large part because I did. And it’s almost all batshit.
Haha, same. I was forced to go to church and Sunday school as a kid, which I hated. But since I was there, I read large parts of the bible. This led me to asking a lot of questions, some of which caused me to be remove from Sunday school a few times. Eventually I was old enough to explain why I was an atheist and never went back.
The OT god is an abuser who demands unconditional and unquestioning love and admiration and threatens disobedience with eternal torture. It's textbook.
The NT is more complex, but huge swathes of Christianity are still hypnotised by the OT. They like the idea of Jesus as an authority, but not so much the reality of the teachings.