BILL, IN MY OPINION, ALL GOOD RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY MUST INCLUDE A DISCUSSION OF HOW WE EARN AND SPEND MONEY--THE TOOL WE USE TO MEASURE WHAT WE VALUE. The BIBLE, THE KORAN AND THE PHILOSOPHERS, have a lot to say about the use and abuse of power and wealth.

I assume you have noticed that much of the Bible--from Genesis to Revelation--like the Koran, is about the search for morality, justice and peace.

The prophets and all the great philosophers preached--not without great risk to themselves--and wrote about the need for people to be good in though, word and deed and to use honest weights and measures. They all warned those with power and money not to exploit the poor; that without justice there would be no peace.

MONEY AND WEALTH, PER SE, ARE NOT EVIL--what we do with them can be good, or evil. The choice is ours.

As his parables, especially the ones about the use of money, clearly show Jesus was not against people of wealth who earned their money honestly, spent it justly and in the service of the whole community. I am not a BIG-brother socialist. The only thing we need to take from the rich--and the good and moral rich will give it, freely--is their knowledge of how to create real wealth, for the whole community.

But we should all be on the alert to prevent corruption. Note that John 2:13-25; Matt. 21:12-13; Mark 11:15-17 and Luke 19:46-46 makes it clear that Jesus began and ended his ministry by attacking--an act that cost him his life--the corruption practiced by the "moneychangers", the Temple bankers, who he specifically called "thieves. They were supposed to make sure the coins were the real thing--made with pure silver, gold, copper and bronze.

Before the invention of paper money, the debasing of metals caused the evil of inflation (the theft of value) and was a primary cause of fall of Rome.

BTW HAVE YOU NEVER HEARD OF COLONIAL SCRIP? (CS)
===============================================
Prior to the American War of Independence, people in the American colonies--when they were free to create and use their own interest-free community currencies--were far more prosperous than the people of the motherland, England, who, including the king and the nobility, were always in debt to the banks.

Unlike the Federal Reserve (a group of private banks) bank notes, CS notes--based on what the community produced--were issued debt and interest free.

The merchant bankers of England set out to destroy the Colonial Script System. This, not just the import taxes, is what led to the American Revolution.

However, over time, groups of powerful Americans merchants followed the way of those in England. Eventually they persuaded (no doubt using bribery) the new governing class--always in need of money to support their life-style and their new wars to build America--to give them charters to control banking and to set up an interest-based banking system. Once again the people were back in a time of booms and busts--mostly the latter. It is no wonder that the American private Central Banking system rapidly built up a debt which can never be repaid.

CHECK OUT:
http://www.kamron.com/Liberty/colonial_script.htm


G~O~D--Now & ForeverIS:Nature, Nurture & PNEUMA-ture, Thanks to Warren Farr&ME AT www.unitheist.org