Poverty and Wealth in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam

Nathan R. Kollar • Muhammad Shafi q Editors

Poverty and Wealth in Judaism, Christianity,

and Islam

ISBN 978-1-349-94849-9 ISBN 978-1-349-94850-5 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/978-1-349-94850-5

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016942409

© Hickey Center for Interfaith Studies and Dialogue 2016 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifi cally the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfi lms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specifi c statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made.

Printed on acid-free paper

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature The registered company is Nature America Inc. New York

Editors Nathan R. Kollar Rochester , New York , USA

Muhammad Shafi q Nazareth College Rochester, New York, USA

We dedicate this text to those who provide the most important context in our lives: our families—thank you for all you do for us,

enabling our interfaith work here and abroad.

Nathan and Shafi q

vii

Peace Islands Institute (PII) is proud to sponsor this edited volume. PII promotes global human values and aims to spread understanding, toler-ance, dialogue, and peace across our diverse communities. For PII any contribution to the betterment of human life as well as the advancement of knowledge that will serve humanity is most worthy of support. PII strives to accomplish these ideals through bringing people of diverse cul-tures and backgrounds together at dinners, festivals, conferences, trips, lectures, and other intellectual, cultural, and dialogical engagements. The publication of Poverty and Wealth in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam is a major step toward a better understanding and amelioration of one of the most pertinent and detrimental problems of humanity: poverty.

PII is a non-profi t organization, whose actions are inspired by the ideas of Mr. Fethullah Gülen. Mr. Gülen is a Turkish-Muslim scholar, residing in Pennsylvania, an ardent supporter of interfaith, intercultural dialogue, education, and philanthropy. According to Walter Wagner, Gülen, makes an “urgent call” for the formation of both religious and non-religious communities to work toward a just, equitable, and prosperous world. 1 In Gülen’s philosophy, the answer to deep social problems is altruism: pursu-ing a life dedicated to serving fellow humans and devoting one’s life to the prosperity of others. The social movement that is born out of this teach-ing, the Hizmet Movement, has spread across the globe establishing edu-cational institutions in over 160 countries, leading interfaith dialogue in every locality, and remaining concerned about the immediate basic needs of the local communities. In this movement, education is emphasized as a long term, but most defi nitive, remedy of humanity’s widespread

FOREWORD

viii FOREWORD

problems. Hizmet’s philanthropy, best exemplifi ed in the global activism of “Kimse Yok Mu” (“Is There Anyone?”), is the culmination of the Sufi teaching: “serving others is to serve God.” There are several hospitals in Turkey founded by Gülen-inspired entrepreneurs and doctors. These high-tech modern hospitals provide top-notch care in an atmosphere that respects the patients as human beings, and provides help for economically disadvantaged citizens.

The volunteers of Hizmet have reached out to people both near and far. Thomas Michel 2 shows how Gülen, using the teachings of Islam, urges his followers to help the needy wherever they are—not just those who are Muslims. 2 Hizmet’s emergency relief efforts are everywhere: Myanmar, China, Peru, and Sri Lanka, helping those in need. Scholars such as Deusdedit Nukuunziza demonstrate that Hizmet goes beyond emergency relief to the substantive social and economic transformation of the life of the rural poor in Africa. 3 PII is a proud sponsor and supporter of efforts that address the reduction of poverty and strive to improve the conditions of people suffering from poverty.

Poverty and Wealth in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam expresses Hizmet’s diverse mission. This work is a dialogue among scholars of dif-ferent faith traditions, utilizing their sacred resources for the sake of all the poor, whoever and wherever they may be. PII is happy to be involved in this project. PII thanks Dr. Shafi q and Dr. Kollar for their seamless effort in bringing this volume to fruition.

Peace Islands Institute, Upstate , NY

NOTES 1. Walter H.  Wagner, Beginnings and Endings: Fethullah Gulen’s Vision for

Today’s World (New Jersey: Blue Dome Press, 2013). 2. Thomas Michel, “Fethullah Gülen as Educator,” in M Hakan Yavuz; John

L Esposito, Turkish Islam and the secular state: the global impact of Fethullah Gulen’s Nur movement (Syracuse, NY : Syracuse University Press, 2003).

3. Deusdedit Nukurunziza, “Making Friends Across the Boundaries of Religious Differences”, in Theory and Practice of Interfaith and Interreligions Dialogue (Bloomington, IN: Xlibris, 2014).

ix

The Hickey Center for Interfaith Studies and Dialogue has three major goals: to educate the next generation about the benefi ts of diversity in general and religious diversity (interfaith), in particular, through study and dialogue; to facilitate the inherent desire in our local community to understand the religious diversity present in our community; to establish a fi rm academic foundation for interfaith thought and action.

In 2004 the Hickey center began a weeklong summer program, “The Next Generation,” for high school students interested in deepening their knowledge of each other and their religious life. Within a few years, the graduates of these programs suggested that a daylong program titled “Global Citizenship: The Next Generation Living in a Pluralistic World” be offered. The program began in 2011. It was organized and designed by these graduates. Over 500 students from twenty-one different high schools participated in the fi fth annual conference in 2015. Through this conference and other programs our fi rst goal is being achieved.

Upstate New  York and especially Rochester, New  York has a long history of religious sensitivity and inter religious support. The Hickey Center, in its own way, is a result of these interreligious concerns but with one very important difference: a college campus. A college campus is a neutral ground dedicated to examining all things in a neutral, objective, fashion. With such a realization in mind we bring together clergy, academ-ics, and interested lay people in workshops, community lecture series and gatherings to delve into the diverse types of religious music, understand-ings of health, war, poverty, belief systems, and other contemporary issues.

PREF ACE

x PREFACE

Through such initiatives, people in our community come to understand their religious selves in dialogue with each other.

In fulfi lling the goals associated with our youth and our community we came to realize a need that has been present with us from our birth at the beginning of the twenty-fi rst century: the need to study the inter-faith movement as it has blossomed during the previous generations. This study occurs when we gather experts from diverse disciplines together with professors of religion and theology to discuss topics of importance to the interfaith movement. These gatherings resulted in a great deal of creative and critical talk among the participants but very few publications of what was said. At the suggestion of the participants and many others, we began the Sacred Texts and Human Contexts series of conferences and publications. The purpose of both is to bring together experts in inter-preting the traditions of the world’s religions to examine common issues. The series provides a source for new ideas and critical refl ection upon old ideas in order for the interfaith movement to stimulate the intellectual life of a global society. The conferences are open to all; the peer reviewed publications result from these conferences. We had our fi rst conference, which dealt with those sacred texts that divided and united humanity in June, 2013 at Nazareth College in which 250 religious studies professors and religious professionals participated and more than 70 academic papers were presented. The peer-reviewed papers resulted in a text of twenty- six chapters titled Sacred Texts and Human Contexts: A North American Response to “ A Common Word between us and you .” Our second interna-tional conference dealt with the topic of Wealth and Poverty. It was held at Fatih University, Istanbul, Turkey in June 2014. This is the text you are about to read. Our next international conference in 2016 will focus on nature and the environment in the Sacred Texts of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Subsequent conferences are being planned.

No institution can thrive without collegial and fi nancial support. The Hickey center is blessed by an abundance of such support by Nazareth College’s president, administration, faculty and staff; by the Religious Studies Department—especially Dr. Susan Nowak, its chair and Dr. Thomas Donlin-Smith, its advisor to the Center; by Brian and Jean Hickey; by the International Institute of Islamic though (IIIT) at Herndon VA—particularly Dr. Jamal Barzinji and Dr. Iqbal Unus.

The challenge of discerning the scholarly needs of the interfaith move-ment and designing the programs to fulfi ll these needs would not have been possible without a team of committed religious leaders, professionals, and

PREFACE xi

academics, all dedicated to the common cause of respectful tolerance and peaceful coexistence among religious people. The Hickey Center is for-tunate to have Dr. Nathan Kollar, Chair of the Center’s Advisory Board, whose behind the scene work and expertise makes the impossible pos-sible. He, together with other members of the Sacred Texts and Human Contexts publication and conference committee, is responsible for this scholarly endeavor. Of course this book and the conference that gave it birth would never have happened without the Peace Island Institute and Fatih University who hosted the conference. Murat Kaval, the CEO and Bulent Ozdemir, the Director of Peace Island Institute worked energet-ically to provide comfort and the best of hospitality to the conference delegates. The arrangement was excellent and the tour of historic sites provided and deepened everyone’s interfaith experience.

An entity such as the Hickey Center for Interfaith Studies and Dialogue is always in need of an institutional bond of interfaith ideals and friendship. Even more, when the bond is evidenced by participation and fi nances, the ideals become realized in the sharing of goals resultant in shared programs and research. Our institutional colleagues are found in the Department of Religious Studies at Hobart and William Smith colleges, Geneva, NY through its leaders Dr. Michael Dobkowski and Dr. Richard Salter; the Catholic Muslim Studies Program at the Catholic Theological Union, Chicago and Dr. Scott Alexander; the Dialogue Institute of Temple University and the support of my teacher Dr. Leonard Swidler, and fi nally the Chautauqua Institute, Department of Religious Studies, and especially Maureen Rovengo.

In addition to all those mentioned above I must mention my family: their forbearance has been amazing, especially that of the grandchildren who are so often disappointed that their grandpa is busy with college work at home and can never spare enough time to play with them—thank you to all my family for acknowledging by their patience this most important work of interfaith.

The Hickey Center is indebted to its founders and many community leaders and individuals who continue to give us hope for future and sup-port to continue in our quest for respectful religious and cultural dialogue and peaceful coexistence. Thank you

Muhammad   Shafi q Hickey Center, Nazareth College

Rochester , NY , USA

xiii

CONTENTS

Part I Personifi cations of Poverty and Wealth 1

1 Reading Job 19:2–22: A Symbolic- Interactionist View of Poverty 3 Thomas Decker

2 The Story of Qarun (Korah) in the Qur’an and Its Importance for Our Times 23 Zeki Saritoprak

3 Mughal Munifi cence: Care and Concern for the Poor in Islamic Hindustan from Tuladan to the Taj 31 Michael Calabria

4 Mary’s Magnifi cat: The Anawim and Church on the Margins 55 C. Denise Yarbrough

xiv CONTENTS

Part II Doctrines About Poverty and Wealth 75

5 Socioeconomic and Gender Justice in the Qur’an: Modern Challenges 77 Zainab Alwani

6 Gospel Readings on Poverty and Affl uence in Most Eastern and Western Churches 105 Regina A. Boisclair

7 Orthodox Christianity and Islam on Economic Justice: Universal Ideals and Contextual Challenges in Russia 127 Adrii Krawchuk

Part III Spiritual Traditions About Poverty and Wealth 153

8 From Possessio to Paupertas: The Emergence of Religious Poverty as a Critical Spiritual Component of Medieval Christianity 155 Michael F. Cusato

9 Poverty, Wealth, and the Doctrine of Al-Fana’ in the Qur’an 173 Hussam S. Timani

10 Prophetic Ethics as Monotheistic Spirituality 189 Steven Kepes

11 Christian Ethics: The “Non-Person” and the Insights of Liberation Theology for a Twenty-First Century World 209 Curt Cadorette

CONTENTS xv

12 A Spirituality for Rich and Poor: Contemporary Catholic Ideals for Economic Justice 225 Marvin L. Krier Mich

Part IV Sharing Our Wealth 243

13 Geography-Based Giving in Jewish Tradition 245 Malka Z. Simkovich

14 Poverty and Wealth in Islam’s Sacred Texts 263 Abdullah Allheedan

15 Overfl owing Riches: Generosity, Divine and Human 275 Clare Amos

Conclusion 287

Glossary 303

Bibliography 315

Index 321

xvii

CONTRIBUTORS

Abdullah   F.   Allheedan is Associate Professor of Political Science at the King Saud University as well as Advisor to the Minister of Islamic Affairs and the Supervisor of the Knowledge Exchange Program in the Ministry of Islamic Affairs in Saudi Arabia.

Zainab   Alwani is the Founder, Program Director, and the fi rst Associate Professor of Islamic Studies at the Howard University School of Divinity (HUSD). She is also the chair of the Master of Arts (Religious Studies) program at HUSD. She is the fi rst female jurist to serve on the board of the Fiqh Council of North America and currently serves as the Council’s Vice-Chair. She has authored and co- authored a wide variety of publications ranging from textbooks and book chapters, to scholarly articles. She recently co-edited a special issue of The Muslim World published by Hartford Seminary, titled “Judaism and Islam in America,” October 2014 Volume 104, Issue 4. Her latest book is titled Muslim Women and Global Challenges: Seeking Change Through a Qur’anic Textual Approach and the Prophetic Model.

Clare   Amos is Programme Coordinator, Interreligious Dialogue and Cooperation, the World Council of Churches, Geneva, Switzerland. Before taking up her cur-rent position in September 2011 she worked for the Anglican Communion Offi ce in London as Director for Theological Studies, with responsibility for both theo-logical education and interfaith concerns. Clare Amos studied at the University of Cambridge and the Ecole Biblique, Jerusalem. In 2012 she was awarded a Lambeth DD by the then Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, to mark her con-tribution to theological, biblical, and interreligious studies.

Regina   A.   Boisclair is Professor of Religious Studies at Alaska Pacifi c University where she holds the Cardinal Newman Chair of Catholic Theology. She earned her

xviii CONTRIBUTORS

Master’s degrees from Providence College and Yale Divinity School, the title Élève Titulaire of the École Biblique de Jérusalem and a Ph.D. from Temple University, Philadelphia, PA. She is an active participant in the Catholic Biblical Association of America, College Theology Society, the Society of Biblical Literature, and the Anchorage Interfaith Council. Her major research interest in lectionaries is refl ected in her recent publication The Word of the Lord at Mass: Understanding the Lectionary (Chicago: Liturgical Training Publications, 2015).

Curt   Cadorette is John Henry Newman Associate Professor of Catholic Studies at the University of Rochester, Rochester, NY. Author of such books as Catholicism in Social and Historical Contexts and Liberation Theology: A Reader (an edited text produced in conjunction with three other author-editors), he is currently working on Benedict XVI and the Theology of Intolerance.

Michael   D.   Calabria is a Franciscan friar and graduate of the Institute for Arab and Islamic Studies, University of Exeter (Ph.D. 2015). He is the founding Director of the Center for Arab and Islamic Studies at St. Bonaventure University, NY and is the author of articles and published papers on various aspects of Islam including Qur’anic studies, Sufi sm, and Islam in popular culture.

Michael   F.   Cusato is a Franciscan friar who received his Ph.D. from the Université de Paris IV (Sorbonne) in 1991 under Dr. André Vauchez. He is the author of ninety scholarly articles on the medieval history of the Order of Friars Minor. Most recently, he taught at St. Bonaventure University (1999–2011), serving as director and dean of the Franciscan Institute (2003–2011). He lives in Washington D.C.

Thomas   Decker is a lecturer in Philosophy and Sociology at the University Of Ontario Institute Of Technology in Oshawa, Ontario and is completing a doctoral degree at the University of Vienna, Austria in Hebrew Bible, and Ancient Near Eastern Studies. He earned two graduate degrees in Philosophy and Theology from the University of Vienna. His research interests focus on the phenomenon of social alienation and stigmatization past and present. Thomas is a priest in the Anglican Diocese of Niagara, Ontario, Canada.

Steven   Kepnes is Chair of the Department of Religion and Director of the Chapel House, a retreat center for silent contemplation and study of World Religions, at Colgate University. He has numerous publications, the most recent of which is The Future of Jewish Theology, (NY: Blackwell, 2013). He also wrote Jewish Liturgical Reasoning (NY: Oxford University 2007) and, with Basit Koshul, Studying the ‘Other,’ Understanding the ‘Self’: Scripture, Reason and the Contemporary Islam-West Encounter (NY: Palgrave Macmillan 2007).

Nathan   R.   Kollar is professor emeritus of Religious Studies at St. John Fisher College. Aside from his many administrative positions he has authored fi ve books—most recently Defending Religious Diversity in Public Schools (2009) Spiritualities:

CONTRIBUTORS xix

Past, Present, and Future—An Introduction (2012). He has edited four books; the latest is Sacred Texts and Human Contexts: A North American Response to ‘A Common Word between Us and You’ (2014). He has also written over two hundred book chapters, articles, and reviews. Among his numerous awards and grants is the Trustees’ Award for Distinguished Scholarly Achievement at St. John Fisher College, the highest award for a faculty member.

Andrii   Krawchuk is Professor of Religious Studies and past President of the University of Sudbury, Canada. He is a member of the Religion in Europe Group (American Academy of Religion), the Canadian Association of Slavists and Vice-President of the International Council for Central and East European Studies. Author of Christian Social Ethics in Ukraine: the Legacy of Andrei Sheptytsky and of numerous publications on religion, society, and ethics in Eastern Europe, he co-edited, with Thomas Bremer, Eastern Orthodox Christian Encounters of Identity and Otherness: Values, Self- Refl ection, Dialogue (NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014). In 2013, he participated in the fi rst Sacred Texts and Human Contexts conference at Nazareth College, with a paper on Orthodox Christian responses to A Common Word.

Marvin   L.   Krier   Mich is the director of Advocacy and Parish Social Ministry at Catholic Family Center (Catholic Charities) in Rochester, NY. He earned his doc-torate (S.T.D.) from the Alphonsian Academy in Rome and taught for seventeen years at St. Bernard’s School of Theology and Ministry in Rochester, NY. His cur-rent work focuses on social justice education, societal advocacy, and organizing of interfaith- based communities. Publications include Catholic Social Teaching and Movements , (1998); The Challenge and Spirituality of Catholic Social Teaching Revised Edition (2011); co-author with George Dardess, In the Spirit of St. Francis and the Sultan: Catholics and Muslims Working Together for the Common Good (2011).

Zeki   Saritoprak is Professor and the Bediüzzaman Said Nursi Chair in Islamic Studies at John Carroll University. He received his Ph.D. in Islamic Theology from the University of Marmara in Turkey. Besides over thirty academic articles and encyclopedia entries on topics in Islam, he is the editor and translator of Fundamentals of Rumi’s Thought: A Mevlevi Sufi Perspective and the editor of a critical edition of al-Sarakhsi’s Sifat Ashrat al-Sa’a and the author of Islam’s Jesus . He is currently preparing a book on Islamic spirituality.

Malka   Simkovich is a visiting instructor at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago and earned a doctorate in Second Temple Judaism from Brandeis University. She earned an M.A. degree in Hebrew Bible from Harvard University, and a B.A. in Bible Studies and Music Theory from Stern College of Yeshiva University in New York. Her research focuses on universalist Jewish literature that emerged from Egypt under the Roman empire.

xx CONTRIBUTORS

Hussam   S.   Timani is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies and co- director of the Middle East and North Africa Studies Program at Christopher Newport University. He is co-editor of Strangers in this World: Multireligious Refl ections on Immigration (2015) and the author of Modern Intellectual Readings of the Kharijites (2008).

Denise   Yarbrough is Associate Professor of Religious Studies in the Department of Religion and Classics and Director of Religious and Spiritual Life at the University of Rochester. She is an ordained Episcopal priest, serving the Diocese of Rochester as Canon for Interreligious and Ecumenical Relations and as Priest in Charge of St. Peter’s Church, Bloomfi eld, NY. She has published a number of articles on interfaith dialogue, with a focus on bringing interfaith dialogue into local religious communities. She is a member of a number of bilateral, interfaith dialogue commissions, including Christian–Muslim, Christian–Jewish, and Hindu–Christian dialogues.

xxi

Fig. 1.1 Suggested structure for Job 19:2–22 6Fig. 1.2 Compositional structure for Job 19: 8–12 10Fig. 3.1 The weighing of Prince Khurram

(British Museum 1948-10-9-069) 35Fig. 3.2 Jahangir eradicating poverty (Los Angeles

County Museum of Art M.75.4.28) 44Fig. 3.3 The southern façade of the gateway (darwaza-i rauza)

of the Taj Mahal inscribed with sūrat al-Fajr 46Fig. 3.4 The portion of al-Fajr that concerns the orphaned

and poor (top left) 47

LIST OF FIGURES

xxiii

LIST OF TABLES

Table 6.1 Affl uence and poverty from the Gospel of Mark according in the lectionaries 110

Table 6.2 Affl uence and poverty from the Gospels of Matthew according in the lectionaries 111

Table 6.3 Affl uence and poverty from the Gospel of Luke in the lectionaries 114

Table 6.4 Affl uence and poverty from the Gospel of John in the Lectionaries 117

Table 13.1 A comparison between Leviticus 10:9–10 and Deuteronomy 24:17–22 249

Table 13.2 A comparison between Leviticus 10:9–10, Leviticus 23:22–24, Deuteronomy 15:7–11, and Deuteronomy 24:17–21 250

xxv

INTRODUCTION

In the Sacred Texts and Human Contexts series, of which this is the second volume, we bring together experts in interpreting the traditions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The fi rst volume , Sacred Texts and Human Contexts: A North American Response to A Common Word between Us and You, dem-onstrated what the Abrahamic religions held in common and the diverse contexts of those texts used to denigrate other religions. This book answers the question: What do our sacred texts and religious traditions have to say to the rich and poor? The principle focus of the interpretations found in both books is the sacred texts of these religious traditions, especially the Tanakh, the Christian Bible, and the Qur’an. But it is not only the texts that concern the contributors to these books but also the human beings for whom they are written and who are ultimately the hearers and readers of these sacred texts. It is both the sacred texts and their human contexts that constitute the religious traditions we call Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

The interfaith perspective is one important human context for under-standing what follows. The purpose of what is written here is to describe a particular religious tradition as found in its text, not to demean or criticize those within one’s religion, other religions, or those of no religion. This means that while reading a chapter you may feel uneasy because the author does not share your methodological, religious, or non-religious beliefs. To understand a writing that does not follow your religious or methodologi-cal presuppositions you must suspend disbelief and enter into the text and into the way of thinking of the author of the text. Those involved in the

xxvi INTRODUCTION

interfaith movement have found such an approach both intellectually chal-lenging and personally fulfi lling.

As we move through the book, we see many ways of reading the sacred texts. One way is by arranging quotes from the individual scriptures around a common theme such as poverty or riches. A word or phrase is chosen many times by highlighting the word, sentence, or paragraph. In its own way, this chain texting creates a text of its own as it draws each quote from its original context. In placing all these quotes together, the reader can reach an easy conclusion that because they use the same word, “rich” or” poor,” the words all have the same meaning. That “meaning” also, many times, is taken for granted to be the same today as when it was fi rst written. Chapter 8 shows how meanings of words change and how the religious energy surrounding them rise and fall depending upon the context. We all know this but seldom pay enough attention to the fact that poverty and riches have multiple meanings. 1 People’s survival needs change as they move out of a hunting and gathering economy to an agri-cultural economy and from mere subsistence agriculture, as indicated in Chap. 8 , to one of overabundance. 2

We know that life in the deserts of the Middle East is different than life in the Arctic or the Mississippi valley. The textual words remain the same but the meaning changes. For example, at one time up was where heaven was, beneath the ground was hell, and the world was fl at. At one time slavery was accepted; at one time male and female roles were clearly demarcated and, at another time, with printing and education, the sacred text had to be read within the contexts of the other available texts in order for the reader to possess meaning for living her or his religious life. As you read this book you will see some of those “other times” as well as read how religions struggle to bring their core message about poverty and riches into the twenty-fi rst century. The Jobs, and the Marys of our twenty-fi rst century life still cry out for justice but the enfl eshment of this justice is different today than yesterday. Religions must hear the present cry and discover how to answer it.

Although a text is usually thought of as composed of words, it may be understood as anything created by a human being. Accordingly a context is what accompanies any text, somewhat as a frame provides a way of see-ing a painting. Take, for example, when a frame and its border (context) is larger than a painting (e.g. 40 in × 40 in. landscape with a 20 × 20 frame with a 10 in border). As I make the frame bigger or smaller I can see more or less of the landscape. All texts and their infi nite number of contexts are like that. The sacred texts of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have

INTRODUCTION xxvii

contexts of history, personhood, culture, geography, cosmology, and eco-nomics to name a few. We focus here on poverty and riches. These are the frames through which we read the sacred books. Contemporary research usually brings two frames into play that control the meaning we fi nally discover in a text: reductionism and quantitative analysis.

Reductionism is almost always used and expected in modern research and public presentations of that research. 3 “Keep it simple stupid!” is a mantra often used in both. The attempt in both instances is to reduce an event or explanation to one cause—thus to the question: Why are you coughing? The proper answer is “Because you have a certain virus.” To the question “Why are you poor?” The answer often heard is “Because you are lazy”. The fact that a person does not have enough to eat is reduced to a single cause: “He or she is lazy.” Any attempt to go beyond that is seen as obfuscation. The consequences of any sincere attempt to answer our question are devastating for both rich and poor.

Another framework that is often used is a quantitative one. Deep data, algorithms, and computers are the principle means and descriptors of pov-erty and riches. Reductive descriptions based upon quantitative analysis result in not only easy misinterpretations of the data but also the dismissal of the poor and/or rich human beings we want to know more about. The reduction of poverty usually says nothing about the poor human being and what is happening in her or his life but talks a great deal about the number of calories ingested or diseases eliminated. 4

Every week I visit the homes of fi fteen people to serve them a meal. Each person has passed a means test demonstrating that they are poor enough to be served this meal without cost to them. Each time the door opens for me to come into a home, I enter the home of an “offi cial” poor person as demonstrated by their fi nancial statement. They are marked “poor” because of an agreed upon data set that indicates that they could not continue to survive without the help of others (in this instance the tax payers of the town in which I live). Their registration as someone in need (poor), though stereotypical, is a bare hint as to what “poverty” is to the person who lives in it. Every person I serve also has other characteristics which place them well below the norm of a fully functioning adult in our society. Some are suffering from a stroke, others from fragile old age, others from lack of family and friends, and still others from chronic unem-ployment. Hunger is their common denominator; poverty their perma-nent lifestyle; multiple defi ciencies their ever present challenge. The vast majority shake my hand with a smile, a nod of the head, and a recognition that life is worth living both individually and socially.

xxviii INTRODUCTION

My wife, on the other hand, works as membership coordinator at a local museum that depends entirely upon private funding for its existence. I meet these members at parties and other social gatherings. When I shake their hands I do not know what their income is or how much they give to the museum; however, I can easily fi nd out through my wife, my brief meetings with the members, or through other means. There are many indi-cators to show someone is rich that do not require a great deal of research: their occupation, where they live, how they dress, how they interact with others, their level of education, amount and type of vacations, and food and/or drink preferences to name a few. They are among the top 1 % of the economic elite in the United States if they have an annual income of over four hundred and twenty thousand dollars. Interestingly, only 28 % of those with investable assets of over one million dollars consider them-selves wealthy. 5

This book asks the question: “What do our sacred texts and religious traditions have to say to the rich and poor? You have just read about some of those people. You have your own pictures and experiences in your mind as well as I do. Our personal places and times provide us with a collection of real people to whom the texts presented in the following chapters seek to speak.

In a more abstract manner, economists, sociologists, health care pro-fessionals, political scientists, and researchers of various kinds seek to describe and analyze information about these poor and rich people. This information and the theories based upon it provide important contexts for answering our question which focuses on the religious dimensions of poverty and riches. We focus on religion because we are convinced that each religion and all religions offer important ideas on the ways of life that may be necessary for our survival into the second half of the twenty-fi rst century. What religious people say and do is important to them because their beliefs about rich people and poor people are essential to their iden-tity—the core of their religious message disappears without their tradi-tion of preaching and caring for rich and poor. Love of one’s neighbor is central to the message they purport to bring us from God; love of their poor neighbor is part of that message. Take away that part of their sacred word to us and their sacred text loses the core of its message.

You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your kinsfolk. Love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD. Leviticus 19:18, Tanakh

Do to others what you want them to do to you. Matthew 7:12. Christian Bible

INTRODUCTION xxix

“None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself.” An-Nawawi’s Forty Hadith 13

If the religious way of life has much to say and mandate about the rich and poor to their adherents, what of those who do not belong to their religious way of life? If religious people who are truly consistent with their tradition must speak up for a caring and loving society, why should those who do not belong to their religion listen to them? The simple answer is that they do not have to listen and the fact is that many do not. They dismiss what these religious people say as mere opinion. They dismiss what religious people do in response to their sacred commands as misguided action that many times causes poor people to remain in a lazy lifestyle. Instead of providing poor people with the fi shing rod of a productive life, these people claim, religious “do gooders” give them a fi sh that increases their habits of depen-dence and taste for free food. They say that religious people do not recog-nize the science of economics and have no right to replace economics with religious piety. Religious preachers should stick to religion and, knowing nothing about economics, they should keep silent regarding poverty. From these speakers’ perspective, God’s word, when applied to the poor and the rich, holds no signifi cant import to modern life because God does not exist.

All non-believers do not have such negative attitudes to religious doc-trines and mandates dealing with poverty and riches. In fact, most con-temporary researchers argue strongly for the complex nature of a society’s economic development and the nature of poverty in particular. 6 Religious imperatives, texts, community, and rituals may easily be included in the complex nature of the human situation which consists of poverty, riches, and a just communal life. Certainly religious values may also be under-stood as the necessary attitudes for eliminating poverty. Most researchers are also convinced that all previous explanations of poverty are no longer tenable explanations for poverty. 7 This may provide an opening for the religious views of poverty and wealth dealt with in this book to help shape the understanding of all those seeking to move beyond our current global situation to more sound understandings of poverty and wealth.

The chapters of this book contain some of the core beliefs of these religious people as well as their moral imperatives. In Part One we see fi ve people who are iconic images of their respective religious beliefs: Job, Korah, Akbar (r. 1556–1605), Aurangzeb (r. 1658–1707), and Mary, the mother of Jesus. Job and Korah are mythic fi gures whose stories portray the life of those on the margins of society (Job) and of riches (Korah) as tests of one’s ability to follow God’s will; Akbar and Aurangzeb are

xxx INTRODUCTION

historical fi gures who use their vast wealth as a means of alleviating the extreme severity of poverty in the land they governed; the song of Mary, the Magnifi cat, is used to portray her life and the Christians’ belief in how and why the poor will become rich and the rich poor. Part Two looks into the entirety of the sacred texts to garner the essentials of belief sur-rounding living a poor life or a rich life as a devoted follower of Islam or Christianity. As it does so it also looks more deeply into the relationship of gender and poverty and the interaction between Muslim and Orthodox Christian institutions to alleviate poverty. Part Three brings the core religious traditions about riches and poverty into the modern world. It takes for granted that poverty is both an individual and a social evil that is manipulated by societal and economic forces. It does so fi rst by reminding us of how a culture’s view of poverty changes. In Medieval Europe deeply spiritual people changed from seeing pride as the worst sin to realizing avarice as such because it was destructive of society and individual holi-ness. Consequently the virtue of voluntary poverty was affi rmed as a mark of true holiness. Part Three goes on to show how Christians today would advocate not so much for voluntary poverty but for social justice for all. These contemporary Christian perspectives fi nd resonance in the Muslim Doctrine of fana’ and the Jewish tradition, the face of the poor is the face of God . Part Four emphasizes the religious mandate common to all these religions, that we must share our wealth.

For those of us who believe that religion in general, and Judaism, Christianity, and Islam in particular, has a great deal to contribute to the common search for economic justice, we must always be cognizant of the varied frameworks of our discussions. This book continues a plea by many specialists in the fi eld for a wholistic approach to both poverty and riches. I will use the word “wholistic” or “wholism” here. Many times dictionaries provide only one spelling for this word: “holism.” There are two reasons I retain the “w”. One is that we are whole. To sustain our wholeness, we must pay equal attention to every part of our being: body, mind, soul, and spirit. To reduce us to only one of these manifestations of who we are deprives us of our humanity. To reduce a poor or rich person to just the economy also results in such a deprivation. The second reason is that, like the letter “w” in wholistic, we are people who seek to touch, hear, see, taste, and smell. We are people who are curious and seek to know, understand, and connect with “the other” and “others.” We are all this and more. We are whole. The “w” in wholistic is like our arms stretching out to every living and nonliving being. Our outstretched arms with open

INTRODUCTION xxxi

palms are seeking to engage in the dance of life with them all. That is what it is all about and why we must grow in what is necessary to build a culture committed together to improving the common good.

Such wholism begins here with your reading of this text and by keeping both the people and the text in mind as you read—especially the people. When holding a book we can easily forget the people. This book is about human beings. Human beings who laugh, cry, dance, and sing, and many times are also hungry, thirsty, uneducated, without clothing and hous-ing, insecure, and totally dependent upon others for daily subsistence. Of course, some of these are very holy people and some very sinful people, as we all are. The reading, studying, and explanations of God’s word should result in the betterment of human lives. What we, who study God’s word, do is an expression of that same God who loves all of us and asks us to love others.

Studying God’s word and the religious traditions that claim its posses-sion is not easy. It is more than a mouthing of those words in their original language or our native language; it’s more than having its entirety memo-rized; it’s more than knowing its interpretation throughout the history of the religion within which it abides. 8 It is all of these and much more. The authors who have undertaken the task of studying God’s word about rich people and poor people offer us their understanding of that word in what follows. We must be sensitive to the context in which we read their work and in which they did their work before we begin to do ours after we read it. Reading without action leaves God’s word unheard.

Nathan R. Kollar

NOTES 1. See http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/pages/what-is-sustainable- development.

html for what is necessary for sustainable development and all that is con-tained in the Human Development Index (HDI) http://hdr.undp.org/en/content/2014-human-development- report-media-package and World Development Report 2015 op. cit.

2. For an excellent description of both the cultural changes and religious changes that provide diverse contexts for a discussion of poverty and riches see Robert N. Bellah, Religion in Human Evolution: From the Paleolithic to the Axial Age (Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press, 2011).

3. This attitude of necessary reductionism is within a worldview found in both religious as well as secular fundamentalism see, for example, my “Secular

xxxii INTRODUCTION

Fundamentalism and Secular Humanism: Value Sets for the Twenty-First Century” in Studies in Formative Spirituality XIX (May, 1993).

4. The results of both reductionism and quantitative description upon contem-porary charitable institutions may be found in Peter Buffett, “The Charitable Industrial Complex,” New York Times (July 27, 2013). Also see Leon Wieseltier, “Among the Disrupted,” in NYT Book Review (Jan 18, 2015) 1, 14–16.

5. Brad Tuttle, “What It Means to Be ‘Wealthy’ in America Today,” Time (July, 24, 2013).

6. World Development Report 2015: Mind, Society, and Behavior . Washington, DC: World Bank.

7. Martin Ravallion, “The Idea of Antipoverty Policy,” NBER Working Paper No. 19210, July 2013 and a review of the literature associated with this chapter “Free exchange: Penury Portrait , ” Economist (July 27, 2013), 63.

8. The fi rst volume of this series contained three chapters, each dealing respec-tively with Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, that described the origins, development, and ways of understanding the text of each religion.