10/10/22

I enjoyed the most recent podcast episode from Central Lutheran's pastor, Amanda Zentz-Alo, on the topic of Jubilee. It's short but good.

It's probably no surprise to the people who know me well that I'm critical of capitalism and the way that much of our socio-economic system is exploitative and predatory. And while most of my criticisms are from a political-economic POV, there are also many ethical, philosophical, and religious ideas and criticisms that I think are equally as valid. One of the most interesting ideas and practices that's unfortunately long since been abandoned by most is that of Jubilee—an erasing of debts, a resetting of property rights and the returning of property to the dispossessed, a freeing of those in bondage, and a year of rest from toil to let ourselves and the land recharge. I definitely think that we should bring this practice back, and not necessarily wrapped in any specific religious context, but as a secular program of renewal for our communal health and wellbeing. There are clear economic as well as personal benefits to cleaning the slate and balancing out inequalities. But since there's a biblical basis for it, I think religious people and leaders should seriously revisit this idea and push for a modern reinterpretation.