I certainly do not intend to exhaust the issue of inequality in this last article of the series on statism and idolatry. Yet, since I chose this as an illustration of the broader development, I will attempt to provide a very short sketch on how a specifically theological conception of the State in relation to society, in a discussion how to solve social and economic inequalities, would involve a combination of different areas of responsibilities by different spheres in the social order.

Other examples could be drawn in such areas as racism, reparations, gender relations, social representation, the balancing between individual and collective safeties and even national vis-à-vis international interests—and some of these are hot topics! Because they are such hot topics, however, they are also laden with political snares.

Allow me a very brief, but quite germane, detour. There is no inherent mandate about avoiding political implications when discussing theological and philosophical principles, but there certainly is a need to avoid what can easily become unwise discussions that will cause some to simply turn off their ears while allowing others to basically uncritically acquiesce (remember Titus 3: 9?). I do need, therefore, to set an important caveat. James Lindsay and Helen Pluckrose, in a book called Cynical Theories, while seeking to root Critical Theories and Identity Politics in the philosophy (mode, mood, school, tradition, or even, as Lyotard calls it, “condition”) of postmodernism, highlight some points that most of postmodern approaches share:

The postmodern turn involves two inextricably linked core principles-one regarding knowledge and one regarding politics—which act as the foundation of four significant themes. These principles are • The postmodern knowledge principle: Radical skepticism about whether objective knowledge or truth is obtainable and a commitment to cultural constructivism. • The postmodern political principle: A belief that society is farmed of systems of power and hierarchies, which decide what can be known and how. The four major themes of postmodernism are 1. The blurring of boundaries 2. The power of language 3. Cultural relativism 4. The loss of the individual and the universal.[1]

What they describe as the “Postmodern Political Principle,” as well as the four major themes enumerated, are the reason I believe it wise to avoid the other possible hot topics I also listed above. It is not about avoiding political implications, but about choosing to deny the claim that we must frame this discussion, or any other significant societal discussion, only in political terms—in what I hope is a good Van Tilian tradition, I do not grant the opponent the right to choose the terms of the debate!

So, let me get back to illustrating how we may constructively approach, within the framework of this series of articles, the issue of social and economic inequalities.

 

The Responsibility of the State

Preventing abuses and regulating the relationships between different spheres and the individuals to prevent injustices or economic subjugations that perpetuate inequalities falls squarely within the purview of the state. There may even be other areas of a more proactive nature, such as to encourage economic development of targeted communities or to inspire other spheres to cooperate in mitigating inequalities and poverty.   Yet, the state may never usurp the original jurisdiction that each sphere enjoys. The state cannot call upon itself the role of “balancing the scales of cosmic justice” (borrowing from Thomas Sowell again) or becoming the arbiter of outcomes—that is a Divine role! It cannot engulf the attributions of religion; it may not become the producer of wealth or claim it as its own by assuming final management. Likewise, the state may not dominate science and academics and the free associations. Especially, the state must respect the sovereign realm of the family. 

Disrespecting these limitations, the state easily becomes the sponsor of tyranny, but also the source of its own failure: free enterprise and free initiative wither, knowledge and ingenuity become stale, the social tissue becomes frayed and the transcendental ground for rooting goodness, truth, beauty, alterity and morals is destroyed!

So the state does have a role to play in terms of solving the problems of social and economic inequalities, but it is an important and yet limited role. This would mean that the problem of poverty and unequal distribution of wealth, as well as the matter of meeting the basic needs of individuals in society, is not one that may not be resolved in simply political ways.

To think that by political means we may resolve such issues flies in the face of the coupling of Jesus’ statement “you always have the poor with you” (Matthew 26: 11a) with the prescriptions he often made about helping them. To the rich young man he said, “go, sell what you possess and give to the poor” (Matthew 19: 21). About including the needy, he instructs, “when you give a feast, invite the poor” (Luke 14: 13). When speaking through James he defines the religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father: “to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” (James 1: 27). None of these particular prescriptions is attributed to the state or is political in nature! The responsibility to deal with social and economic inequalities, to address poverty and needs, is a shared responsibility of the different created spheres that make up human society![2]

 

The Role of the Productive and Commercial Units

The productive sphere is responsible for generating wealth in just and fair ways, being called to enjoy and preserve the freedom to produce wealth in a context of equality of opportunities. It must respect not only the limits set by the sphere of the state but also by the other spheres. From the state, it receives limitations that keep it from wielding absolute power or dominating all other spheres by mere economic might. If the state is backed up by the “power of the sword” and must wield this power carefully, the units of the productive sphere have the “power of the purse,” and must keep use this power in a fair and sober manner. It must heed the call from the sphere of religion that asserts that wealth is a relative and instrumental value, not absolute, that the market has its relative sovereignty limited by transcendent values that hold regency over all of human society and that are known and asserted by other spheres outside the market.

Here it is especially important to note that just as the state must be prevented from swallowing up the other spheres by the use of force, likewise, the productive sphere must never be allowed to use wealth to subvert or redefine the other spheres of society or even society itself. The fairness required in the production of wealth and in commercial enterprise is not a value that has origin in the market itself; rather, it will only be truly fair if it has true transcendent grounding (as well as enjoying political and legal protection by the sphere of the state). Again, this has a double direction: fairness within the productive and commercial sphere itself, from unit to unit, and fairness as it relates to other domains, such as the individuals, the families, the spheres that deal with knowledge, the free associations and religion.

 

The Responsibility of the Free Associations

The many different free associations come together so that their individual and collective interests and actions may have a voice in society, especially in relation to the spheres of the state and of wealth generation—whether these interests relate to their own benefit or the benefit of others. They may struggle for equality of opportunity in the domains of the state and the productive units. They may challenge the productive units to philanthropy and altruism or struggle for fairness in labor relations. They may also come together to encourage and support other spheres, such as the domains of knowledge production and promotion, or even the interests of realms such as religion and the family. In all of this, they do carry a responsibility to contribute in many different “associative” ways to the mitigation of poverty and the promotion of equitable relations and structures within society.

Still, if the limits of the role of the free associations are extrapolated, there is always a danger of competing with the state in trying to govern the relations between the spheres of society and between the spheres and the individuals. Elements within free associative units may seek to build a parallel state, or to restrict economic freedom, or even impose their particular interests, perspectives or ideologies upon the spheres of the family, science or religion. Even worse, actors or units within this domain, may attempt to coopt the state and wealth generating agents to act in collusion, no longer under their original limited jurisdictions, but as a cohesive whole.

When this “cabal” puts itself under the guidance of myopic-yet-comprehensive narratives that are particular to interest groups and yet get elevated to transcendental status, they may be used to try to reinterpret (reimagine) all other spheres and society itself. This usually does not happen without the collaboration of segments within the academic and scientific domains, whose function ends up being to establish the appearance of transcendence and universality (scientific certitude?) for the newly created values. The attempt to seek economic and social redemption by sheer political means, seems to be such a case, and I believe it is a deeper kind of statist, economically enforced and ideologically justified idolatry! Here is where the sphere of religion gets switched from being the teacher of the transcendent values needed for life in society to being viewed as a threat.

 

The Role of the Church

The church works so that her transcendent values may inform and form the other spheres, by bringing the values of the Kingdom of God to bear on the earthly spheres. This is done through the proclamation of true redemption, of reconciliation with God, but it carries by implication also the possibility of earthly reconciliation. The church bears the prophetic burden of proclaiming justice and divine grace, pointing the ways in which the higher law, the law of love, may have a transforming effect upon society. She does not seek to do so by dominating and coopting the other spheres by might, economic influence or political strategy. Rather, she does it by proclamation of her message that God is the only true possible final reference to every predication, the only true source of meaning for life, existence and society. The role of this sphere is guidance, offering a true north for human society, and, therefore, the church must refrain from claiming jurisdiction over that which belongs by God’s design to other spheres, impeding the fulfillment of their mandates and purposes. Yet, it is the church that must decry when those purposes have been distorted and the jurisdictions have been extrapolated. Can you see how the realm of religion easily becomes an impediment, an inconveniency, for any form of idolatrous totalitarianism?

Nevertheless, what about the realm of religion and the example of social and economic inequality? Well this is the original sphere where values such as alterity, fraternity, justice and freedom find their original and fertile soil. Without such values, there is no relevant and strong basis to affirm and promote justice, equality, mercy, compassion and social responsibility as a guiding principle for individuals and for other domains of society. Attempts to ground transcendence from the immanent such as justify human values on evolutionary theory have been frustrated repeatedly.[3]  At the same time, when the proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus is faithful (and of course, as a Christian I believe this is the only place where the realm of religion finds its true expression!) there are strong implications. The prescriptions of Jesus that I mentioned above, and all the other biblical commandments about doing mercy and caring for the poor, about impartiality (for example, James 1: 1) and about teaching mercy, will become not only a prophetic duty for the community of believers before the watching world, but also a practical task and call to action.

Moreover, remember, anti-religion is not something that takes place outside this sphere, it is simply an inversion of polarity, so that the negation of religious belief is structurally analogous to religious belief even in its field of action. When someone affirms the inexistence of the divine and the relativity and contingency of all values, that person is making claims of a religious nature—claims that, I believe, will ultimately foment anarchic nihilism or statism.

 

Conclusion

In the end, a Reformed confessional perspective on society, whether this perspective is structured in such a Kuyperian framework as I have suggested or whether through other approaches that seek to remain faithful to the Scriptures, should incite us to a deep concern with the statist idolatry—when the state claims the roles that belong to God alone. In the statist idolatry there are very strong characteristics that may be described as belonging to the political left. This idolatry cannot be challenged, however, by simply substituting it by another idolatry, for example, of the free market or of the global community of human beings or by national passions. No domain of human society can be invested with absolute sovereignty without dire consequences to the very fabric of society. The only absolute sovereign is God the Creator, but in life in society He has ruled that different spheres have shared responsibility and relative sovereignty, or, so to say, have complementary roles. This demands that we resist any kind of absolutistic idolatry.

Finally, we must understand that God has, in His common grace, structured human society the way he has done because we are still under the effects of the fall. Though as church (all of creation, as a matter of fact!) we long for the redemption of all things under the kingship of Lord Jesus, this longing, in fallen humans, also tends to make them look for a counterfeit lord, for a counterfeit version of the universal Kingdom of justice and mercy. We are sinful, whether because of the sin that still dwells shortly in the lives of believers or the inescapable sin that rules unbelievers, and our inclination toward evil must be restrained in different ways and realms if we are to live and seek any semblance of a just and peaceful society while we tarry. As a Brazilian poet of the seventeenth century so aptly put it in the closing of his poem about vices:

…

Only one nature has been granted us,

the Creator has not made us of sundry natures,

one Adam has He made, and he from nothing.

We all are bad, we are perverse,

what distinguishes us is the vice and virtue,

of which some are friends and other adversaries.[4]

…

Hence, rejecting all idolatries that place the expectations of human redemption as ultimately political, economic, social or aesthetic endeavors, we must work conscientiously within each sphere to be friends to virtue and adversaries of vice, but we must also know and teach that our regency within each distinct domain and realm of action is penultimate, not final.  That the shared responsibility and jurisdiction exists to limit tyranny, which is idolatry. But that in the end, the final regency of all things belongs to God alone, who leads all things to His greater glory and our final delight!   

See also:

No Idols (part 1 of 3): A Confessional Approach to the State

No Idols (part 2 of 3): A Confessional Approach to the State and Shared Responsibility

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[1] Helen Pluckrose, James Lindsay. Cynical Theories: How Universities Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity – And Why this Harms Everybody. London: Swift Press, 2020. (original emphasis)

[2] Note: It would be interesting to extend these reflections and look the social implications of Old Testament laws regarding social safeguards for Israelites, but at this point, all I can do is offer it as a suggestion for you, the reader.  

[3] A very good starting point to explore this is: Michael Polanyi. Science, Faith and Society. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1964. For a deeper discussion, see my PhD dissertation: Davi Charles Gomes. De rationibus cordis coram deo: The Limits of Michal Polanyi’s Epistemology. Glenside: WTS, 2000. This text may be downloaded at https://wrf.global/images/2021/Depository/de-rationibus-cordis-polanyi---by-d-c-gomes.pdf and can be purchased by following the links here.

[4] Gregório de Matos Guerra (1636-1696). Aos Vícios. Excerpt, my translation.

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Dr. Davi Charles Gomes is the International Director of the Wolrd Reformed Fellowship, a graduate of Westminster Theological Seminary, he is a minister of the Presbyterian Church of Brazil and the former Chancellor of Mackenziue Presbyterian University, in São Paulo, Brazil. Click here for a brief bio.