A Christian Approach to Interest

Jock Stein ()
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Jock Stein: University of Glasgow

Chapter Chapter 5 in Ethical Discourse in Finance, 2021, pp 83-102 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract This chapter relates Christian beliefs to interest and the modern banking system, and discusses how ethical approaches to interest have developed over time. After seven ‘snapshots’ of attitudes to charging interest, from ancient Greece and Rome up to the present day, it outlines five beliefs shared by Christians which have correlates in the field of economics and society. It then examines the question of interest today, the modern banking system and arguments for and against using interest as part of it. It concludes that there are some good moral and practical reasons for a non-interest banking system, but it cannot easily co-exist with a conventional banking system. Christians are more concerned with the spirit and purpose, than with the letter of any law. If there are good arguments for interest-free banking, they will want to pursue them, but they will not postpone finding other ways to help the poor when one particular way may be unavailable.

Keywords: Interest; Financial ethics; Social economics; Christian stewardship; Christian social ethics; Usury; Aristotelian ethics; Jubilee and debt; Basil of Caesarea; Aquinas and money; Cessant gain; Emergent loss; Capitalism and religion; Islamic banking; Hermeneutics and debt; Banking systems; Lehman Brothers; Credit unions; Wealth tax; Value economics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:psifcp:978-3-030-81596-7_5

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-81596-7_5

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