I’ve long argued that the story of the Tower of Babel1 is an indicator of the mercy of God, and not his wrath. E.F. Schumacher wrote a seminal book for me called Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered, indicating that humans tend to thrive in smaller, less complex societies. The more complex we make it, the more prone it is to failure, abuse, and oppression. Or, the more economics becomes about the ends of economics, and not about the people for whom it is intended.
If I’m walking somewhere and I’m only one degree off course, I don’t vary far if I’m only walking a couple of miles. In this short distance, I’ll still come close enough to my destination. A hundred miles takes a long time to walk, and it’s relatively simple to correct course along the way since it’s such a slow process. But 100 or 1000 miles is nothing in an airplane and at great speed which forces the navigator to be more precise and more exacting, stressing the limits of human perfection.
If I build a one story building a corrupt foundation is not the end of the world. But in a 100 story building, and slight imperfection can be catastrophic.
And what if that building was for human oppression, or to worship horrific Gods like Moloch2 more efficiently? What if the airplane is to carry slaves quickly, or to drop bombs further across the world. We haven’t progressed, we’ve merely created more efficient systems of horror.
Babel, was the human belief that we can accomplish anything if we continue towards a goal, ultimately sacrificing our very humanity in the process. The tower took on a deified state in and of itself, and like all idols, we end up working for its ends rather than our own needs. It is the ongoing alienation of ourselves from our purpose and the conditions in which we most thrive. And it furthered us from repentance, correction, and relationship with God. There’s a reason it appears shortly after the story of Eden.
In this way, its destruction, and the confusion of humankind, was God intentionally limiting our own hubris for our own good.
Of course, a fundamental Christian belief is that all individuals are sinful, and no system is perfect, and therefore both individuals and societies veer off course quite consistently. In the long run, all systems, even ones we believe to be healthy and good3, become oppressive, corrupt, or misaligned with their purpose without a consistent reset and recheck. Power and wealth accumulates, and opportunities for others diminish. Self-interest dominates and redirects. It’s why God introduced another salvific mechanism to his people: The jubilee4, or the great economic reset. Nothing was permanent. Even the slave had hope in this system. His labor was not forever as one day his bondage would be freed — shocking in a world run by slavery. Everyone, and everything reset after 50 years. Land sales, bondage. There was a chance for a reordering of all things to keep things small, and to allow for humans to flourish.
Movements like antitrust and bankruptcy laws, which are essential to human centered market economies emerged out of this idea.
I wonder what would jubilee look like today. Land is the ultimate scarcity, and much of it, especially in key regional areas has been accumulated during the population and development boom of the last few generations. Corporations that buy houses and property don’t die and distribute their wealth at the end of their life, but hold onto it. Or what of the conglomeration of small businesses, especially by overseas companies with less interest in local issues? Their heft and muscle make it increasingly difficult for upstarts to compete. As competition increases, the demand and reward for high skills accelerates, leaving behind greatly those who do not have the aptitude for them. What of the prisoner? How would it look for the migrant longing for opportunity?
The number of young people who don’t want children because it might derail their careers5, which will affect their savings, and retirement plans indicates the extremes of the stress of the current system. When babies are sacrificed for economics, something has gone seriously wrong. And no hope for a reset.
When is our Jubilee?
- Genesis 11:1-9
↩︎ - The Canaanite God that demanded child sacrifice. The Hebrew people are regularly chastised for this practice. ↩︎
- I’m looking at you Church
↩︎ - Leviticus 25
↩︎ - https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/11/19/growing-share-of-childless-adults-in-u-s-dont-expect-to-ever-have-children/
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