Tentmaker

Paul the Apostle worked as a Ordained Minister of the Church and all he had belonged to the Church as a whole and not for his own profit.

The Tentmaker

Was Paul the Apostle a tentmaker and a minister of Christ?

Tarsus was a major tent manufacturing city. It imported wool and hair from all over the world by ship and shipped out as finished products. It was a major industry in that area and it was big business. Tents were in big demand and not merely the habitation of nomadic Bedouins.

Paul's family almost had to be connected to tent manufacturing as almost everyone in that city was connected to it. He was clearly of the wealth class. and the Bible is clear about his occupation.

Acts 18:3 And because he was of the same craft, he abode with them, and wrought: for by their occupation [τέχνη techne] they were tentmakers [σκηνοποιός skenopoios].

Aquila and Priscilla were always considered part of the 120 from the upper room by many historians and also well to do holding the same occupation.

The idea that Paul the Apostle was sowing tents sitting on the floor would not fit a clear view of his life and connection with some of the wealthiest families in the Roman Empire.

Because they sold tents does not mean they did it for profit?

Profit is gain or increase but labor is an exchange.

The ministers of the early Church like the Levites of Moses had no personal "estate". They owned all things in common. The ministers of Christ could eat of the table of the Lord like the Levites did before them. They had a unique status because they were legally "bondservants and could carry funds and supplies through ports of entry without being taxed.

1 Corinthians 9:6 "Or I only and Barnabas, have not we power to forbear working? Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges? who planteth a vineyard, and eateth not of the fruit thereof? or who feedeth a flock, and eateth not of the milk of the flock? 8 Say I these things as a man? or saith not the law the same also? 9 For it is written in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? 10 Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope. 11 If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things? 12 If others be partakers of this power over you, are not we rather? Nevertheless we have not used this power; but suffer all things, lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ. 13 Do ye not know that they which minister about holy things live of the things of the temple? and they which wait at the altar are partakers with the altar? 14 Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel."

Paul talks about "others be partakers of this power over you" rather than the Church. But the church had "not used this power; but suffer all things, lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ."

Instructions of Christ

The gospel included the instructions that the ministers of Christ were not to be like the Benefactors of other governments. They could not exercise authority. But like the Levites and the Essenes they often engaged in what could appear as trade or business but was not because it was not for personal profit or gain but the support of a body that held all things in common.

Barnabas had been a Levite who sold all the property he had obtained in his Hasmonean apostasy and delivered the proceeds to the Church to become a minister of the good news of the Gospel of the Kingdom at hand.

Paul and Barnabas could forbear working[to trade, to make gains by trading, "do business"] at trade and business and merely eat of the offering.

Ministers of Christ had to meet the qualification and conditions imposed by Christ which was common among priests in those days. We also see this same approach among the Essenes who were doing things much different than the Sadducees.

Ministers of Christ had to give all their personal property away or to the church as a whole and become the bondservants of Christ. They held all things they did have in common. One qualification was what we call today a Vow of poverty.

Acts 20:33-35 "I have coveted no man’s silver, or gold, or apparel. Yea, ye yourselves know, that these hands have ministered unto my necessities, and to them that were with me. I have shewed you all things, how that so labouring ye ought to support the weak, and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, It is more blessed to give than to receive."

Because each congregation of ministers were connected through a network of minister congregations they were also joint heirs.

The tents were manufactured by them with an expenditure of labor which was turned into those tents, which were sold for denarii and then trade into things they needed or was need in the service of the Christian Church.

This is no different than the Levites who belonged to God but were also his ministers of the people serving the tents of the congregations. The Levites had lands and also worked in many industries which often made them independent financially but they could not sell their lands to others because they only had a legal title to what they held. They had no inheritance in the land itself.

This labor of Paul's was not outside the Church but within the Church. It was not for personal profit or to create a personal wealthy estate. It was labor for the estate of Christ where he was a bondservant and his work with other ministers clearly made it within the Church. It would not be considered "trade or business" by the definition of those terms. See The Free Church Report

There is a general lack of understanding of the ministry of the early Church and how it was organized to serve the Congregations of the people in Free Assemblies of Tens. The Tens was a general system of establishing a network through which the whole country or nation could do their part in operating a free system of government without overlooking participants or neglecting responsibilities.

Tents and tabernacles

The Hebrew Bible mentions the tabernacle which in Hebrew is often seen as MemShinKafNun מִשְׁכַּן, mishkān. The meaning of this word is said to be mean "residence" or "dwelling place". The Israelites were not residents of city states or districts or states but of their own family.

When they accepted a king they went under a civil authority but when they rejected the king they had chosen they went back to their tents.

There was also the Tent of the Congregation which meant more than just a big tent. Commonly we see AlefHeyLamed MemVavAyinLamed (אֹ֣הֶל מוֹעֵד֩ ’ōhel mō‘êḏ with other variations including Tent of Meeting, etc. which clearly include different meanings that expressed by MemShinKafNun).

The Tabernacle was a symbol of their connection through the social safety net of the Levites and was the portable dwelling place of the Spirit of Yahweh which moved through the tribes of Israelites.

Moses was instructed at Mount Sinai to construct and transport the tabernacle with the Israelites on their journey through the wilderness and their subsequent possession of the Promised Land.

After 440 years, Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem was a departure from the precepts symbolized by these tents and tabernacles.

The Tabernacle was the symbol of a voluntary society that was to practice Pure Religion without no king to exercise authority. City states centralized their welfare systems and with that the power over the people and became cities of blood that devoured the liberty of the people as the masses became accustomed to biting one another to obtain the dainties of the kings they have chosen for themselves with seared consciences.

The Rulers of the world from Cain to Nimrod, and Caesar to FDR were the protectors of the peace, the benefactors of their welfare systems but they exercise authority one over the other bringing the people back into the Bondage of Egypt.

There was corruption, as always with a balancing distribution of reform. But as mires will do the more the people struggled the deeper they sank.

2 Peter 2:22 "But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, The dog [is] turned to his own vomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire."

Nothing dissolves the bands of a free society and divides the people from each other like the One purse systems of welfare through the socialist state. Many Romans forgot the warnings of Polybius concerning "The masses ... with an appetite for benefits and the habit of receiving them by way of a rule of force..." which is the essence of legal charity. But the people of Judea also forgot the commandments of God and the the warnings of Proverbs 1 about consenting to have "One purse", or those of Proverbs 23 concerning eating the dainties of rulers without a "Knife to thy throat".

Herod, with the apostasy of the Pharisees, instituted their alternative form of social welfare that would no longer strengthen the poor following the ways of Sodom.

A social safety net instituted through the power of the state is not only a "snare" but will divide and weaken the social bonds of society as "The people, having grown accustomed to feed at the expense of others and to depend for their livelihood on the property of others... degenerate again into perfect savages and find once more a master and monarch." They would need to repent of that grievous sin before they could be saved of its consequences.

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