In this Year of Jubilee everyone is to return to their own property. – Leviticus 25:13

Today’s Scripture Reading (October 14, 2018): Leviticus 25

Lord Polonius offers his guests this advice in “Hamlet;”

Neither a borrower nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all: to thine ownself be true …

                                                (William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 3)

The advice in our culture seems antiquated. And yet there is truth in the words. Husbandry, a word not used much in contemporary society, extends well beyond the agricultural meaning of “the care, cultivation, and breeding of crops and animals.” It indicates the level of control each of us has over the management and conservation of our resources. In a world of easy borrowing, often at a very high-interest rate, the need for the conservation of our resources seems to be often not worth the effort. And so we sell ourselves away. The personal debt level in the developed nations betrays that we have become accustomed of living on the money we borrow rather than preparing for the emergencies that will inevitably come through the conservation of our resources. It is a practice that can only end in disaster. Part of being true to ourselves is living within our resources, and conserving for the emergencies that are waiting just around the corner

On the international stage, this problem of a lack of husbandry is exhibited by a high level of foreign ownership and debt. Foreign ownership is considered, at least by some, to be a significant problem within the developed nations. The difficulty is revealed in that prices can often be driven up by foreign investors so that the national investor can no longer afford the commodity. A good example of this is found in the housing market in some North American cities. Foreign ownership of companies means that the largest share of profit for that company is not being reinvested or spent within the nation, but is being taken and invested somewhere else. And there is a significant amount of influence that is wielded by these foreign investors over domestic policies. And if we combine a high level of foreign ownership with foreign debt, then we begin to lose control of our own governments.

This is the warning shot that is being sounded in some developed nations. The United States, as an example, in the past has been very concerned about the amount of their debt held by China. Combine China’s holding of debt with Chinese foreign ownership in the country, and we have the beginnings of a significant problem of control within the nation. Each of us are slaves to whoever it is that we owe money. And if the fear mongers prediction of the national deficit of the United States reaching the yearly level of 1 Trillion dollars is even remotely true, then in the future American policy will be increasingly influenced by Beijing, no matter what the dance that the government performs for the American citizens might imply.

The biblical answer to the problem of debt was that it was simply was outlawed. There was to be a fifty-year cycle, and every fifty years the land was returned to its original owners. It was a reset on the economy of the nation, and it made foreign ownership illegal. No outside nation could own Israel. At best, they could be a renter of space in the nation. The amount of the investment in Israel was shaped by the place the nation was in the fifty-year cycle. Because at some point twice a century, your investment would be lost as the land reverted back to the original owners.

In the end, it was only God who could own Israel. And this was demanded by the law of God himself.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Leviticus 26