Knight and Rose Show – Episode 31: Was Jesus a Socialist, Part 2

Welcome to episode 31 of the Knight and Rose podcast! In this episode, Wintery Knight and Desert Rose continue discussing what the Bible says about Christianity and economics. We discuss Bible passages that support the free enterprise system. If you like this episode, please subscribe to the podcast, and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We would appreciate it if you left us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

PLEASE NOTE: Rose is sick with the same thing that I had during the Christmas and New Year’s holidays. For me, that lasted about 4 weeks, and I was on a prescription cough suppressant just so I could sleep! So, we have have a delay until we can record episode 3 in this series on Christianity and socialism.

Podcast description:

Christian apologists Wintery Knight and Desert Rose discuss apologetics, policy, culture, relationships, and more. Each episode equips you with evidence you can use to boldly engage anyone, anywhere. We train our listeners to become Christian secret agents. Action and adventure guaranteed. 30-45 minutes per episode. New episode every week.

Episode 31:

Episode Summary:

Wintery Knight and Desert Rose look at several passages of the Bible where Jesus speaks about economics issues, and discuss whether his words are more compatible with socialism or free enterprise. What view of property does Jesus assume? Who should redistribute wealth to alleviate poverty – governments or individuals? What does the Bible teach about greed, envy and coveting? We end the episode with book recommendations. This is the second episode of a three-part series.

Speaker biographies

Wintery Knight is a black legal immigrant. He is a senior software engineer by day, and an amateur Christian apologist by night. He has been blogging at winteryknight.com since January of 2009, covering news, policy and Christian worldview issues.

Desert Rose did her undergraduate degree in public policy, and then worked for a conservative Washington lobbyist organization. She also has a graduate degree from a prestigious evangelical seminary. She is active in Christian apologetics as a speaker, author, and teacher.

References:

Basic Economics: A Common Sense Guide to the Economy by Thomas Sowell
Money, Greed, and God 10th Anniversary Edition: The Christian Case for Free Enterprise by Jay Richards
Common Sense Economics: What Everyone Should Know About Wealth and Prosperity by James Gwartney, Richard Stroup,Dwight Lee, Tawni Ferrarini, and Joseph Calhoun
The Maker Versus the Takers: What Jesus Really Said About Social Justice and Economics by Jerry Bowyer
The Poverty of Nations: A Sustainable Solution by Wayne Grudem and Barry Asmus

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Music attribution:

Strength Of The Titans by Kevin MacLeod
Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/5744-strength-of-the-titans
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

One thought on “Knight and Rose Show – Episode 31: Was Jesus a Socialist, Part 2”

I enjoyed both your segments (finally got around to listening to both as of yesterday).

I agree with you there are a lot of people who view socialism positively because they want the government to be the middle man/policer of income disparity, which is really read: I covet or I am greedy for what my neighbor has.

I’ll take you on a bit of a tangent: I can think back to times that I’ve become unemployed due to layoffs and then looking at the range of salaries that I could command. If I were willing to take on more hours (e.g., business analyst consultant are sometimes 7 days a week and up to 80 hours a week), the pay can be much higher. If I were willing to take on more responsibility (e.g., be a manager) and a bit more hours, I would also be paid more. If I’m more skilled (e.g., manual QA -> automated QA -> SDET -> Software engineer and especially with a lot of specializations and/or training), the more I am paid. I could also move to a higher cost of living area, but while the pay is more, the cost of living is more e.g., in terms of round numbers, it’s about $70,000 in Cleveland OH would be around $114,000 in Boston which would be $140,000 in San Francisco and $182,000 in New York. But moving to a higher cost of living place isn’t actually a good way to increase what you earn for various reasons.

So the summary here is:
“If you want more money,”
* become more skilled
* get more specializations
* become more technical / have more rare skills
* take on more responsibility
* work more hours

I did think up a few other reasons why people I know like socialism:
(1) Not only do they feel underpaid and below median, they also feel threatened by corporations in terms of power and/or wealth, and see the government as the only way to be able to challenge corporations.

(2) Laziness: they don’t want to put in the hard work, learning, hours, etc., and yet want the same results, pay, etc.

So these people want socialism to redistribute.

(2a) Some assumptions that people who have wealth will have more opportunities and this isn’t “fair”.

They want the government to “level the playing field” (or give everyone a participation trophy).

(3) Mediocrity is okay / Regression towards the median: I think it’s more common in public schools than private schools.

In a nutshell, “we all want to be average or maybe very slightly above average” and “being average is okay.” Along with this is “being exceptional (except for in terms of sports) is weird.”

With many public schools, teachers tend to focus on the failing and below average students while taking away time from the top students. Or as my friend puts it, usually the B to B+ to A- students don’t get enough challenge because they’re good enough that they don’t need a lot of help but they’re not good enough that the teachers think they should be challenged more.

(Oddly enough, a certain country with which WK+I are very familiar … socialist government + unions including teachers union + public schools tend to go hand in hand.)

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