Henry George
Henry George's Social Problems (1883) is a collection of essays analyzing contemporary issues like poverty, inequality, unemployment, and political corruption, arguing they stem from private land ownership and advocating for a single tax on land value as the solution, a concept also central to his more famous work, Progress and Poverty. The book critiques the widening gap between rich and poor, the negative effects of machinery, and the corrupting influence of money in politics, proposing that land value taxation would benefit the community and address these ills.
Henry George mistakenly identifies the private ownership of land and the economic rent it generates as the fundamental cause of social ills, not technology or overproduction.
Yet, the kingdom of God as described by Moses is meant to return every man to his property and to his family.[1]
He passionately critiques the "corrupting influence of money and power in politics," the "ever-widening gap between rich and poor," and "rampant unemployment". It is true "money and power in politics" has a corrupting influence but that is because hi idea of politics was fundamentally flawed do to a lack of understanding about both Moses and Christ and their version of the kingdom of God and its politics.
The book we know as the Bible is about the people and the governments they create for themselves.
Was Christ and Christianity political?[2]
Abraham, Moses, and Jesus the Christ taught one form of government called the kingdom of God which sets the captive free returning everyman to his possessions and to his family.[3]
Henry George argues that material progress must be matched by moral and ethical advancement, including a stronger sense of justice and public spirit, to avoid societal collapse.
What had we been doing that decreased that sense of justice and public spirit?
Certainly the Fatal Sequence that rises in society during during prosperity and affluence but also a lack of knowledge concerning what makes a nation great. The many elements of society must be diligently attended to on a daily bases.
- ↑ Return to family
- Leviticus 25:10 "And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout [all] the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubile unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family."
- Leviticus 25:41 "And [then] shall he depart from thee, [both] he and his children with him, and shall return unto his own family, and unto the possession of his fathers shall he return."
- Exodus 20:2 " I [am] the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage."
- John 8:32 "And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."
- Matthew 23:9 "And call no [man] your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven."
- Romans 8:14 "For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. 16 The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: 17 ¶ And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with [him], that we may be also glorified together."
- 2 Corinthians 6:18 "And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty."
- 1 John 3:1 ¶ "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not."
- ↑ Was Jesus political 2012 podcast http://www.hisholychurch.net/audio/2012-02-11WasJesuspolitical.mp3
- ↑ What is the Bible about?
- The term Religion appears five times but only once do we see mentioned in a good sense as Pure Religion.
- Forms of Governments and law are constant topic in the Bible.
- Babylon, the Bondage of Egypt and their flesh pots, Cities of Blood, eating the dainties of rulers and the Benefactors who exercise authority where people bite one another but the Kingdom of God was not of the "world" of Rome.
- "This Bible is for the Government of the People, by the People, and for the People." Attributed to the General Prologue to the Wycliffe Bible translation of 1384, and quoted by Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg.