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Bible Dictionaries
Wealth
Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament
or There seem to be in the NT two main conceptions about wealth and the wealthy: the first that wealth and the desire for wealth are dangerous to the moral and spiritual life, the second that the wealthy as a class are wicked. It is possible that these two conceptions are related to each other, but it is also possible that the conception of the rich as normally an ungodly class represents some special tradition of the later Judaism.
There are not many references to the subject in the Gospels, but the few there are are very emphatic. In the exposition of the Parable of the Sower our Lord speaks of the ‘deceitfulness of riches’ as one of those things which ‘choke the word’ and render it unfruitful (Mark 4:19, Matthew 13:22; cf. Luke 8:14), and this conception finds a dramatic illustration in the story of the rich young ruler, whose refusal to give up his wealth and follow Christ leads our Lord to say, ‘How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God!’, and ‘It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God’ (Mark 10:23; Mark 10:25, Matthew 19:23-24, Luke 18:24-25). To these sayings of our Lord is probably related the phrase, ‘Ye cannot serve God and mammon’ (Matthew 6:24, Luke 16:13). It is alongside of these passages in the Gospels that we should place the treatment of wealth and of the desire for wealth in 1 Timothy. The desire for wealth is dangerous to men, and ‘the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil’ (1 Timothy 6:9-10); the wealthy are warned not to be high-minded, or to put their trust in riches, but to use their wealth in good works (1 Timothy 6:17-19). In these passages of the Synoptic Gospels and of the Pastoral Epistles we have, then, no condemnation of the wealthy, or of wealth as intrinsically evil, but warnings against the great dangers that attend its possession.
In the Epistle of St. James we have a somewhat different conception. Here the wealthy are treated as though they were normally wicked and enemies of the Christian community. God has chosen the poor, but the rich dishonour and set them at naught, and drag them before the judgment-seat, and ‘blaspheme the honourable name by the which ye are called’ (James 2:5-7). And, again, the rich are warned of the judgment which is about to over-take them; they have oppressed and defrauded the labourers, and have killed the righteous man (James 5:1-6).
It is not very clear to which of these conceptions our Lord’s words as reported in St. Luke’s Gospel belong, ‘Woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation! Woe unto you, ye that are full now! for ye shall hunger’ (Luke 6:24-25).
A. J. Carlyle.
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Wealth'. Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdn/w/wealth.html. 1906-1918.
