As a scholar of historical theology
and religious ethics, I read both scripture and economic analyses with a
critical eye. I propose that the current fascination with tithing misses two
crucial economic and historical points: (1) it fails to recognize the
differences between the historical context in which tithing emerged and our own
time, and (2) it avoids the harder questions that should be asked about general
economic policy in today's society.
In a time of enormous economic
injustice we need to press the question of why the widow is poor in the first
place: what failures of moral, social, and economic policy keep her in poverty?
We assume that she is not simply a "welfare queen" or otherwise she would not
have been extolled in the first place. When that question has been addressed on
the basis of the traditional moral criteria of justice and compassion, we then
must ask whether tithing to the Church is in any way relevant to dealing with
the widow's poverty. By failing to ask the right questions, we often wind up
straining at the gnat of tithing and settle for swallowing the camel of an
economic system which forces us to resort to band-aid, make-shift, voluntary,
and church-based charitable efforts to solve complex social problems.
We ought instead to focus on the
structural, systemic, institutional changes needed in our economic practices,
if our social and economic systems are to address responsibly and effectively
the crisis of the poor and the needy. We should not expect the systemic problem
of poverty to be solved by extolling the virtue of economic charity either on
the part of the very victims of poverty or by private, voluntary groups -
including the churches (which have an historical record of woeful ignorance
about economic realities).
The notion of the tithe has had a
checkered and morally ambiguous history. It originally developed in ancient
Israel as a way of supporting the priesthood, the guardians of the temple. (See
"Tithe" in the Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible.) It was, in effect, a tax
on the populace - possibly one that was coercive, and not voluntary - to pay
the salaries of those persons whom the community had set aside to perform the
specific functions assigned to priests in the temple. This notion of the tithe
cannot be the model for its contemporary defenders, because that would make it
appear to be nothing more than a crass appeal to enlarge the salaries of
priests. Nor was it a uniquely Hebrew practice; and in at least one instance it
was regarded as an abusive act of injustice by a bad king. (I Samuel 8:15) In
Deuteronomy there is some evidence that the tithe, connected with the offering
of the first fruits, became associated with a household affair, not primarily
with the support of the temple priests. Deuteronomy is the first to mention the
use of the tithe (every third year) for charitable purposes beyond the temple,
namely for the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow. Later, in
the Priestly code, the tithe was to go exclusively to the Levites who in turn
would give a tenth of it to the priests. This reveals that the notion and use
of the tithe was a "living, developing thing," not, as some contemporary
supporters of the tithe would have us believe, a fixed and immutable Biblical
principle. In fact, only later did the tithe come to express the conviction,
common to all contemporary uses of the term, that the fruits of the earth and
of human labor belong to the Lord (though clearly that conviction did not need
the tithe for its justification). All persons standing in the Biblical
tradition can accept the claim that nothing we possess is absolutely ours as a
sacred right; our ownership is actually a stewardship of the earth's resources.
We are to use these resources for building up the creation, and especially for
the building up of human community according to the principles of justice,
fairness, and equity. This conviction should still be at the heart of our
Christian discipleship.
As we appropriate the underlying and
more universal meaning of the later development of the tithe, we must recall a
most significant feature about the early historical context in which the tithe
developed; namely, the tithe was not intended primarily for the support of the
poor and needy (assuming we aren't inclined to identify the priests as poor and
needy). While present-day clergy may be poor relative to many of their
wealthier parishioners, that fact is hardly a justification for misreading the
historical record of the tithe in Biblical times. Moreover, when it was used to
aid the sojourner, the fatherless, and widow, it was not added to or used to
supplement a vast array of additional social taxes for the support of the poor
and needy. Their needs could be met only if the first fruits of the land were
given to them, and the tithe became the means of doing so. But that very fact
suggests the fundamental difference between the historical/economic context of
early Israel and contemporary society. We have evolved, positively I think, to
the point where we understand in theory (if not always in practice -- witness
the outrage at the recently enacted Connecticut state income tax) that every
citizen should be taxed according to his or her economic means for the support
of those needy members of the community.
As a society we have decided that we
have a moral obligation to address what the Roman Catholic Bishops have called
the "preferential option for the poor." Therefore, modern societies have
developed a whole system of taxations which seek to transfer resources from
those who have to those who have not. While there are legitimate disagreements
about the forms and details of taxation schemes, a taxation system at its root
is ultimately an expression of a moral commitment - the commitment to assist
those who require supportive services, the true costs of which they could not
afford from their own meager economic resources.
Today we are engaged in a great
battle over the seriousness and the extent of that moral commitment. As a
nation and as a state, and even in our local municipalities, we have
historically been divided between different ethical positions: one calls us to
an individualism in which self-interest plays the leading role, in which it is
assumed that we can follow our own unlimited, private interests - provided that
we do not interfere with the freedom of other individuals to pursue their
unlimited, self-interests. On this basis, we resist any incursion into our
private economic wealth by "government" in order to help others; these "others"
are responsible for themselves, just as we are ostensibly ready to be
responsible only for ourselves (or willing to rely on the charity of our
friends in times of crisis: though one wonders if this distrust of government
help would be as strong among the survivors of Hurricane Andrew).
The other ethical position that still
beats, however weakly, in the American breast is one that calls us to a
commitment to a common good; within this context, the welfare of the whole
community, especially its weaker and most vulnerable people, leads those of us
with ample means to sacrifice (as a social, not private, obligation) some of
our own interests; so that the demands of social and economic justice,
fairness, and equity for the needy may be satisfied.
In the past, our national abundance
kept us from noticing that there could be a conflict between these two ethics.
As long as we could continue to produce ample, ever-growing resources, we could
trickle down to the most impoverished, mainly through private charity (often
related to various church missions and social outreach agencies), enough aid to
lift them out of the worst kinds of destitution, thereby providing them with
the opportunity to make it on their own.
However, today more and more people
feel as if they have no more abundance from which to give, and many are
choosing to abandon the ethic of the common good, in order to protect their own
private financial interests within the ethic of individualistic self-reliance.
In the process they are turning their backs on the moral underpinnings of a
social system which has used its tax structures to support and fulfill the
ethic of the common good.
The tragedy is that as the moral
foundation of community crumbles, as people retreat into an ethic of
selfishness and "looking out for number #1," the responsibilities of serving
the poor and needy are placed more and more on the backs of private charity.
Increasingly individuals are called upon, out of private resources rather than
social wealth, to address needs which at one time the community as a whole saw
as its mandated duty, because it accepted the ethic of the common good. When
this happens, individuals with meager means as well as private agencies working
outside governmental structures are expected to provide the same help as
individuals with ample resources. Only individuals (singly or in voluntary
groups) are assumed to have moral character. As a result the social system
becomes exempt from moral scrutiny and moral responsibility.
The widow, who by the principles of
the common good, justice and fairness, who ought to be able to expect the whole
social community to be addressing these issues as well, is instead expected to
address them herself regardless of her situation viz-a-viz the wealth of the
larger society. Moreover, the most tragic injustice of all is to load onto
already destitute and brutalized individuals the guilt of not giving one tenth
of their meager incomes as tithes to support the Church (which in turn will
presumably make an effort to assist the poverty-stricken) when these tithers
themselves are the very poor whom the community as a whole ought to be
supporting!
This is not to assert that needy
persons are incapable of extraordinary moral effort or are exempt from moral
responsibility; in fact, proportional to their income, they often do far more
than the wealthy in empowering others and sharing with them. Regrettably, a
focus on the tithe and the widow's mite simply permits us to forget about the
communal and social responsibilities to address the ever-growing discrepancy
between the rich and the poor (a gap which has widened with alarming speed
during recent years under "trickle-down economics" - a tax-system which favors
the very wealthy over the middle class and virtually ignores the necessities of
the impoverished, an economic system which rewards self-interested behavior and
ridicules actions which seek the common good.
When they become the dominant model
of Christian moral responsibility, the widow's mite and the tithe simply
produce needless guilt among the economically less well off, a moral
satisfaction among the wealthy that personal charity alone will do the job, and
an inadequate and inefficient way of dealing with the basic moral issue of our
society: namely, how is our communal wealth, drawn from the labor of all, to be
used equitably in the pursuit of economic and social justice?
Ironically, the Church finds itself
in an increasingly untenable situation with respect to helping the poor.
Churches, as private groups, are simply unequipped, systemically as well as
with respect to their general lack of political and economic expertise, to fill
the vacuum left when society abandons its obligation of helping the needy.
Churches simply cannot be expected to provide the kind of economic resources
and infrastructure necessary for addressing effectively such society-wide
issues as health-care for all, job procurement, worker retraining, conversion
of defense plants to commercial uses, family planning, medical research, the
national debt, etc.