Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.
Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!
Did Jesus and/or Siddhartha Gautama advocate for redistribution of wealth, or concern for the poor, impoverished, and disenfranchised?
King James Bible
Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me.
Jesus if alive today would be with the poor. He said on many occasions earthly wealth is useless because its not real. The real wealth is to achieve everlasting life via believing in God and by making this life easier for our fellow man by following ie applying his teachings.
: {>
Did Jesus and/or Siddhartha Gautama advocate for redistribution of wealth, or concern for the poor, impoverished, and disenfranchised?
as the road narrows you're forced into the middle.One seems to have advocated a life of poverty. The other favored a middle way.
being middle class is the center of the road.Jesus called for giving away one's possessions, but that was for the benefit of the person embracing an aesthetic lifestyle as well as those who received his charity. Given the incredibly humble living standards Jesus advocated, I'd think he'd find most of what we, from a modern ethnocentric perspective, think of as "poor" to be living a life of luxury and in need of giving up their excess possessions.
i agree.Both really called for having a moderate amount of possessions, but that's mainly for the benefit of the one embracing an unmaterialistic lifestyle.
coming to an understanding from multiple points of view is always beneficial to the observer.I don't think either called for forcible redistribution, if that is what you are talking about.
as much as the wealthy would hopefully learn compassion, hopefully the poor that are slothful would understand the value of thing because of the labor involved in it. you can't help those who won't help themselves. you enable said person to remain dependent.Most modern forms of a "wealth redistribution" mentality are fairly foreign from the ideas espoused by those two thinkers. In the modern era, earning as much money as possible and giving it to uplift those in need would be considered the ideal.
i agree. it frees one from attachment to inanimate things and hopefully increases their attraction towards people.From a Jesus of Nazareth standpoint, the ideal would be giving up a pursuit of wealth, and living in a state of personally chosen poverty with a bare minimum amount of things needed to live. In fact, embracing that kind of lifestyle would make it very hard to give to charity, again reinforcing that this state of giving away one's possessions is more about benefiting the person embracing the lifestyle than it is about benefiting the people receiving his material possessions.
King James Bible
Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me.
Jesus if alive today would be with the poor. He said on many occasions earthly wealth is useless because its not real. The real wealth is to achieve everlasting life via believing in God and by making this life easier for our fellow man by following ie applying his teachings.
: {>
being middle class is the center of the road.
Where do you get a no from, when Jesus said time and time and time again people are to take care of the poor, give their money to the poor, sell their belongings and give the money to the poor, and that rich people won't make it into the Kingdom anyways?
The middle way the Buddha spoke of was the middle between annihilationism and eternalism, not between wealth and poverty, that's just ridiculous.You can't just misapply "middle way" to everything, what's the middle way between being a child molester or murderer and not being one??
The middle way the Buddha spoke of was the middle between annihilationism and eternalism, not between wealth and poverty, that's just ridiculous.You can't just misapply "middle way" to everything, what's the middle way between being a child molester or murderer and not being one??
You actually see deluded Buddhists on the forum calling for a middle way between observing the precepts and not observing them, particularly with regards drugs and alcohol.
Not only that, it also strikes me as odd It would suggest the trade-off of wealth for wealth.What did Jesus say about the poor when he was having his feet washed with some (evidently) very expensive oil?
Yes and no. They were really kinda specific. However, I do note that, at least with Jesus, Jesus never funded anything and bummed off everyone else. If he was put to the grindstone, he used magic to get out of having to do anything himself. Jesus' "charity" consists of photo op moments with no real mission to fix the social infrastructure so this crap will go away. Sure, it's nice to feed the widow, but how's about making it so her life isn't essentially useless without marriage to a man? Giving her rights would do way more than tossing her a bag of cookies every now and again, right?Did Jesus and/or Siddhartha Gautama advocate for redistribution of wealth, or concern for the poor, impoverished, and disenfranchised?
Oh no, a religious leader is a hypocrite -- look at my shocked faceWhat did Jesus say about the poor when he was having his feet washed with some (evidently) very expensive oil?
That's why you bring a jack hammer.But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.
My impression is that the superwealthy can't wipe their own behinds without 20 staff members. As most rich people got that way through everything BUT hard work (because if you're not on the floor, it's really your STAFF doing all that work, not you), they should really learn what using elbow grease is. Meanwhile, California is burning and apparently we're using slave labor with inmates getting 2 bucks for the "privilege of working". No one in their right mind would agree to those conditions in normal society.as much as the wealthy would hopefully learn compassion, hopefully the poor that are slothful would understand the value of thing because of the labor involved in it. you can't help those who won't help themselves. you enable said person to remain dependent.
No, from what I understand, Herod was doing that without Jesus' advice.But He did not tell King Herod to sell all the peoples stuff and give it to other people
Doing it to virtual characters to get your jollies and not actually hurting real people..You can't just misapply "middle way" to everything, what's the middle way between being a child molester or murderer and not being one??
You raise a good point which is why discernment is key in striking balance and equanimity. The middle way plays more as a sliding scale than a specific "immovable" set point, especially when it's discernment involving extremes alone.The middle way the Buddha spoke of was the middle between annihilationism and eternalism, not between wealth and poverty, that's just ridiculous.You can't just misapply "middle way" to everything, what's the middle way between being a child molester or murderer and not being one??
Did Jesus and/or Siddhartha Gautama advocate for redistribution of wealth, or concern for the poor, impoverished, and disenfranchised?