{"id":1197,"date":"2010-09-19T08:11:29","date_gmt":"2010-09-19T08:11:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/randian-libertarianism--an-anti-christian-credo.html"},"modified":"2010-09-19T08:11:29","modified_gmt":"2010-09-19T08:11:29","slug":"randian-libertarianism-an-anti-christian-credo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/randian-libertarianism-an-anti-christian-credo.html","title":{"rendered":"RANDIAN LIBERTARIANISM—- AN ANTI-CHRISTIAN CREDO"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\"moore.jpg\"<\/a><\/form>\n

 <\/p>\n

            <\/span>I remember
\nreading Ayn Rand a very long time ago. A lonely immigrant from Russia, whose
\nreal name was Alisa Rosenbaum,  <\/span>her books,
\nparticularly Atlas Shrugged <\/i>but also The Fountainhead, <\/i>and The Virtue of Selfishness <\/i> <\/span>touted not merely the philosophy of Gordon
\nGecko (‘Greed is good’), or the take the money and run philosophy of  <\/span>Bernie Madoff (with the cash), but a full
\nblown anti-Christian salvo.  <\/span>Rand not
\nmerely repudiated the notion of a God, much less a God of self-sacrifice who
\ncalls us to self-sacrifice, but advocated the replacing of that God with the
\nself, not merely enlightened self-interest, but full-blown selfishness and
\nself-centeredness—- ‘Coeur in curvatus in se’, as Luther called it, the
\nheart, turned in upon itself.  <\/span><\/p>\n

In the
\nheady and nerdy early teen years,  <\/span>when I
\nwas trying to figure out who I was, these books tickled the fancy of a young
\nman who had a bent towards narcissism—- as do all fallen human beings.  <\/span>I out grew this mirror-gazing philosophy
\nafter a while, mainly through divine intervention during my college years, and
\nso it is with both dismay and shock that I have heard Rand’s views advocated in
\nvarious forms by both current libertarians and right-wing Christians (two overlapping
\ngroups).  <\/span>The dismay has grown to alarm
\nwhen I have discovered Christian investment planners sounding more like Ayn
\nRand and less like Jesus, the more one listens to them.   <\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span><\/p>\n

What is at the heart of Rand’s philosophy, besides the self, and the ‘virtues of
\nselfishness’?   <\/span>In a recent helpful study
\nby Gary Moore (a life long conservative Republican Christian. Go to www.FinancialSeminary.org), a portion of
\nwhich has been published in the most recent issue of Christianity Today  <\/span>(Sept. 2010) under the title ‘Ayn Rand:
\nGoddess of the Great Recession’,  <\/span>Moore helps
\nus to see the roots of her philosophy and monetary theory.  <\/span>One of the chief dogmas that she touted early
\nand late was of course anti-governmentalism. This is not surprising considering
\nwhat she and her family experienced at the hands of various Russian
\ngovernments, including the Bolsheviks, but understanding Rand is one thing,
\njustifying her paranoia about ‘Big Brother’ when it comes to the American
\ngovernment is quite another. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

One of the main reasons she said
\nthings like ‘I want to be known as the greatest champion of reason and the
\ngreatest enemy of religion” (quite specifically Christianity is what she had in
\nmind)  <\/span>is because of the numerous
\nstatements in the NT which tell us to honor the governing officials, pay our
\ntaxes and the like.  <\/span>The notion of
\ntaxation as a form of theft of money that a people have a right to, of course
\nis not in the Bible at all.  <\/span>Both Jesus
\nand Paul council against such a view, but it is part of the ranting and raving
\nof those Libertarians who have been influenced mightily by the philosophy of
\nAyn Rand, and they are not few in number.  <\/span>Tea Party advocates, are you listening?  <\/span>Suppose you were to discover that Jesus would
\nbe outraged with your supposedly moral outrage about taxes?  <\/span>Suppose he told you, you had a civic duty to
\nrender unto Caesar, something Paul and Peter reiterate (see Rom. 13 for
\nexample)?<\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span>Also at the
\nheart of Rand’s philosophy, without question
\nwas a notion of a free market economy that should be unfettered by any altruism
\nor ethical concerns.  <\/span>As Martin Marty the
\ngreat Lutheran church historian once said “Every line of the Bible is
\nchallenged, countered, and dismissed by the 1,168 pages of Atlas Shrugged.”  <\/span><\/i>It’s just
\nthat too many Christian’s grasp of what the Bible actually says about money and
\ntaxes is so superficial that they see no contradiction between Randian
\nlibertarianism and anti-government rhetoric on the one hand, and Christianity
\non the other.  <\/span>I was shocked to discover
\nthat one Randian Duke professor of (what he euphemistically calls) business
\nethics states flatly—“Religion is incompatibile with business.” It is from Rand that economists like Milton Freidman found
\njustification for the dictum that “the only social responsibility of a business
\nis to make money” and indeed make it by any means possible, it would seem.   <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Working through the list of
\nprominent conservative Christians and financial planners who have touted one or
\nanother of Rand’s dictums reads like a who’s
\nwho of Christian financial planning, and TV evangelism.  <\/span>Thus we often here the rhetoric of a ‘nation
\nunder siege by its government and an oppressive tax burden’. We hear this from
\nwealthy Christians like Pat Robertson and Larry Burkett  <\/span>(who once famously said “as cruel as it may
\nsound, it would be better to raise taxes on the poor, than on the wealthy”!!!).   <\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span>What has
\nhappened to Christian financial planners influenced by a combination of Randian
\nphilosophy and libertarianism is the divorce of business from ethics, including
\nthe divorce of investing from ethics. 
\n<\/span>For example Austin Pryor publisher of a popular investment news letter for
\nChristians says “I want you to shift your thinking away from ethics when
\ninvesting”.  <\/span>He adds: “I receive more
\nquestions asking for suggestions on ethical investments than any other topic….Unfortunately
\nI must tell them I can be of no help.” !!  
\n<\/span>Gary Moore says as well that Dave Ramsey’s website, despite promoting
\nBiblical fidelity, takes much the same tack as Austin Pryor.  <\/span>Just close your eyes and invest in whatever
\nmakes money.  <\/span>As Bobby Dylan said, “Don’t
\nthink twice Ma, its alright.” If this is the advice of your Christian
\nfinancial counselor, you should run, don’t walk in the opposite direction.  <\/span>Moore
\npoints out that the Social Investment Forum says only 10 per cent of
\ninstitutional money under management is integrated with a traditional Christian
\nethic.  <\/span>And we wonder why it is that
\nthings go wrong on Wall Street and main street, and we blame the government,
\ninstead of where much of the blame belongs— with greedy investors and greedy investment
\nfirms determined to play by their own rules— which is ‘whatever they can get
\naway with’. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

            <\/span>I am not an
\neconomist, nor the son of an economist, but I do know when an economic
\nphilosophy flatly contradicts what the Bible says about this, that, or the
\nother subject, especially about the ethics of care for the poor, about loving
\nneighbor as self, the ethics of self-sacrifice and the like.  <\/span>At the end of the day, Ayn Rand was clear
\neyed and right—- godless capitalism of the form she advocates— a market
\nwithout any rules or ethical restraints, 
\n<\/span>business without ethics, is flatly contradicted by the Bible and
\nChristianity.  <\/span>This should have given
\nmany conservative Christians who listen to libertarians and financial gurus
\ninfluenced by Randian libertarianism pause.  
\n<\/span>Maybe their problem is not too much government…. Maybe their problem is
\ntoo little Bible filtering through their economic and political philosophies.  <\/span> <\/span>It’s
\nworth a thought.  <\/span> <\/span> <\/span>  <\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

              I remember reading Ayn Rand a very long time ago. A lonely immigrant from Russia, whose real name was Alisa Rosenbaum,  her books, particularly Atlas Shrugged but also The Fountainhead, and The Virtue of Selfishness  touted not merely the philosophy of Gordon Gecko (‘Greed is good’), or the take the money and run…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nRANDIAN LIBERTARIANISM- AN ANTI-CHRISTIAN CREDO - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/randian-libertarianism-an-anti-christian-credo.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"RANDIAN LIBERTARIANISM- AN ANTI-CHRISTIAN CREDO - The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"              I remember reading Ayn Rand a very long time ago. A lonely immigrant from Russia, whose real name was Alisa Rosenbaum,  her books, particularly Atlas Shrugged but also The Fountainhead, and The Virtue of Selfishness  touted not merely the philosophy of Gordon Gecko (‘Greed is good’), or the take the money and run…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/randian-libertarianism-an-anti-christian-credo.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-09-19T08:11:29+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/09\/moore-thumb-400x400-17910.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ben Witherington\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"RANDIAN LIBERTARIANISM- AN ANTI-CHRISTIAN CREDO - The Bible and Culture","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/randian-libertarianism-an-anti-christian-credo.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"RANDIAN LIBERTARIANISM- AN ANTI-CHRISTIAN CREDO - The Bible and Culture","og_description":"              I remember reading Ayn Rand a very long time ago. 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A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1197\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}