Posted on 02/25/2020 7:40:26 AM PST by SeekAndFind
You’ve heard this question. Since I write a lot about Christianity and economics, I’ve been asked it dozens of times. Was the early Church communist?
It’s not a crazy query. In the book of Acts, just after Pentecost, members of the new Church sold their belongings and shared their wealth. That sounds like communism to some folks. And if Christians are to live up to their origins, the argument goes, then they should be communists too.
Makes perfect sense, as long as you misread the text, ignore the details, and forget the meaning of words.
Still, lots of people have that impression. So let’s look at what the text says:
Now the company of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things which he possessed was his own, but they had everything in common. And with great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of what was sold and laid it at the apostles’ feet; and distribution was made to each as any had need.” (Acts 4:32–35 RSV)
Now, this was the very first church in Jerusalem. These believers were still buzzing from the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. The author (probably Luke) says “they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with boldness.” (Acts 4:31 RSV) If they didn’t get it right, who did?
Fair question. As usual, though, the details and context are everything.
First, let’s define communism. Communism is based on Marx’s theory of class warfare. Under capitalism, Marx predicted, the workers are exploited and at some point, revolt against the capitalists — the owners of the means of production. The workers take control of private property by force and then the state owns it on behalf of the people. Then, after a while, Marx claimed, the socialist state would wither away and you’d get a communist utopia in which everyone lived in peace, harmony and preternatural freedom.
These new Christians freely sold their possessions and shared. This is pretty much the opposite of real-world communism.
There’s none of this class warfare stuff in the early church in Jerusalem. No talk of the “means of production.” No denouncing of private property. No violent revolution.
Second, the state was nowhere in sight. No Roman centurions were kicking down doors, confiscating property and collectivizing farms. No one was forced to do anything. The church in Jerusalem was just that — a church, not a state. The church didn’t act like a modern communist state. As left-leaning evangelical Ron Sider notes, “Sharing was voluntary, not compulsory.”
It’s easy to lose sight of this later in the text, though, when Peter condemns Ananias and Sapphira. They’re the couple whose claim-to-fame is that they kept back some of the money they got from selling their land. They were struck dead as a result.
If you just glance at the text, you might think Peter condemns them for failing to give everything to the collective. But read it carefully. He asks, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back part of the proceeds of the land? While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? How is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God.” (Acts 5:3–4 RSV)
So, Peter condemns the couple not for keeping part of the proceeds of the sale, but for lying about it. In fact, he takes for granted that the property was theirs, even after it was sold. Peter says nothing about private property per se.
Third, the communal life of the early church in Jerusalem was never made the norm for all Christians everywhere. In fact, Luke doesn’t treat it as the norm even for the Jerusalem church.
In Acts, Luke is describing a unique moment in the life of the early Church. Thousands of Jews had come from around the Roman world to worship at the Temple in Jerusalem at Pentecost. They were away from their homes, their jobs and their belongings. Then thousands of them became Christians — all at once. What to do? They would have had to return home right away, alone and untaught, if not for the extreme measures taken by the local Christians. The locals chose to sell their possessions and share with their new brothers and sisters. Given the situation, that makes perfect sense.
The emergency communal life in Jerusalem was never held up as a model for how the entire church should order its life, let alone used to justify the state confiscating private property.
For all we know, this selling-and-sharing stage lasted six months. It’s unlikely that all these new Christians, many denizens of the far-flung Jewish Diaspora, stayed in Jerusalem for the rest of their lives. Many surely returned home at some point, and brought their new faith with them.
We know from the New Testament that other churches in other cities had different arrangements. For instance, Paul sternly warned the Thessalonian Christians, “If any one will not work, let him not eat. For we hear that some of you are living in idleness, mere busybodies, not doing any work.” (2 Thess. 3: 10b-11, RSV)
Some new Christians had begun to take advantage of the generosity of their new brothers in the faith. That may be why the emergency communal life in Jerusalem was never held up as a model for how the entire church should order its life, let alone used to justify the state confiscating private property.
Communal living does have its place. Nuclear families sort of live communally. In functional families, however, the parents are in charge. So, it’s not really a commune.
Many monasteries and religious orders live communally. These are highly disciplined, voluntary communities that are self-consciously separate from the ordinary life of family and commerce. Many of them survive for centuries — and in fact, the productivity of some early monasteries helped give rise to capitalism in medieval Europe.
There have been other Christian groups that have tried to live communally. There were lots of Christian communes in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. And the American Amish and the Jesus People USA live in semi-communal groups today. The ones that survive are small, voluntary and intensely disciplined.
The take-home lesson is clear: The book of Acts doesn’t describe an early communist experiment in Jerusalem, or set a precedent for how all Christians should live.
Still, there’s a strong lesson in the example of these first Christians. In a pinch, we should all be willing to go to great lengths, even to sell all we have, to care for needy believers and to see the Gospel spread to ends of the earth.
“No, the Early Christian Church Was Not Communist...”
But a lot of the new ones are.
I call them the first “communists”, but only from the perspective of them fitting the definition of a “commune”.
But unlike communism, they all did it voluntarily. And then they didn’t. :)
Altruism is a deep-seated human response to the plight of others with whom there is a bond of empathy. The early church was placed in an “us against the world” position, as they were persecuted at virtually every hand, and the brotherhood that grew out of this was sometimes mistaken for some kind of “hive mentality”.
The “hive mentality” quickly grows into a command-and-control regime, with the decisions and thinking all coming from on the top, with little or no participation by the masses subject to the rule of the “Maximum Leader” or the oligarchy that represents the leadership.
Paul was a tent maker during his travels. And, he told the followers of Christ to find a job.
Another example is found with Joseph during the famine. He collected one fifth of the harvest, and SOLD it back to the people. Nothing was free.
Sure as God made little green apples Paul said it you don’t work you don’t eat.
RE: Paul was a tent maker during his travels. And, he told the followers of Christ to find a job.
I don’t think the issue was finding a job. People in Communist countries work too. The issue I think was PROPERTY OWNERSHIP and DISTRIBUTION OF THE FRUITS OF LABOR.
Communists want common ownership of property and equal distribution of wealth and they cite the early church of Jerusalem as their example.
RE: Sure as God made little green apples Paul said it you don’t work you don’t eat.
I don’t think the issue was finding a job/working. People in Communist countries work too. The issue I think was PROPERTY OWNERSHIP and DISTRIBUTION OF THE FRUITS OF LABOR.
Communists want common ownership of property and equal distribution of wealth and they cite the early church of Jerusalem as their example.
RE: But a lot of the new ones are.
Even I doubt that. I don’t see churches today redistributing wealth among their congregation.
I’ll agree that many DO support Communist regimes.
The word “church” (as at Pentecost) is “ecclesia” in the Greek, meaning the called out ones.
Always in the New Testament, the church is described as Holy Spirit baptized (the precedent set at Pentecost), called out of the world, its sin, sexual perversion, hatred, etc. Called out to holiness: “Holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord,” Heb. 12:14.
It is a travesty of the first order to try and make what the Bible says of the ecclesia in the New Testament, to be godless and wicked Marxism, socialism and its first cousin Communism.
Consider this, do they fit the description the New Testment has for the ecclesia?
Do they believe Jesus Christ is the only way to God, The truth and the life...like the ecclesia of the New Testament?
Are they Holy Spirit baptized?
Are they a people endeavoring to separate themselves from sin, sexual perversion, hatred, etc.?
Do they believe in holiness of life, which no man shall see the Lord without it?
I have long had the opinion that the early Church sold their property and lived together because they expected Christ to return soon after he ascended to heaven.
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