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Managing Financial Resources in Late Antiquity Greek Fathers' Views on Hoarding and Saving

:	Gerasimos Merianos, George Gotsis
:	Managing Financial Resources in Late Antiquity Greek Fathers' Views on Hoarding and Saving
:	Palgrave Macmillan
:	9781137564092
:	1
:	CHF 94.90
:

:	Regional- und Ländergeschichte
:	English

:	263
:	Wasserzeichen/DRM
:	PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
:	PDF

This book examines the views of Greek Church Fathers on hoarding, saving, and management of economic surplus, and their development primarily in urban centres of the Eastern Mediterranean, from the late first to the fifth century. The study shows how the approaches of Greek Fathers, such as Clement of Alexandria, Basil of Caesarea, John Chrysostom, Isidore of Pelusium, and Theodoret of Cyrrhus, to hoarding and saving intertwined with stances toward the moral and social obligations of the wealthy. It also demonstrates how these Fathers responded to conditions and practices in urban economic environments characterized by sharp inequalities. Their attitudes reflect the gradual widening of Christian congregations, but also the consequences of the socio-economic evolution of the late antique Eastern Roman Empire. Among the issues discussed in the book are the justification of wealth, alternatives to hoarding, and the reception of patristic views by contemporaries.

Gerasimos Merianos is Senior Researcher in Byzantine History at the Institute of Historical Research of the National Hellenic Research Foundation, Athens, Greece.

George Gotsis is Associate Professor of Economics in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece.

	Managing Financial Resources in Late Antiquity	4
	Contents	6
	Abbreviations	8
	Chapter 1 Introduction and Acknowledgements	13
	Chapter 2 Historical Background: Early Christian Conceptions of Hoarding	26
	The New Testament World: Social and Economic Context	26
	Intellectual Encounters: The Greek and Roman Literature on Household Management	28
	Conceptualizing Hoarding	30
	The Synoptic Gospels: Hoarding as Endemic to Human Acquisitiveness	30
	The Excesses of Wealth Accumulation	32
	Framing Early Christian Rhetoric on Hoarding	33
	Hoarding Denounced: Wealth Employed to Perpetuate Injustice	33
	Hoarding Mitigated Through Circulation of Surplus: Alleviating the Needy in Paul	34
	Hoarding Abolished: The Ideal of Sharing Possessions	36
	Hoarding as a Morally Perilous Practice	37
	Hoarding as a Socially Detrimental Practice: Delivering Hoarders to Divine Judgment	38
	Hoarding as the Corollary of Rapid Economic Growth: Endangering Faithfulness to Christ	39
	Hoarding as a Form of Alienation from Fellow Believers: The Need for Benevolent Aid	40
	Chapter 3 Justifying Savings but not the Pursuit of Wealth: Contradictions, Tensions and Accommodations in Early Patristic Texts	53
	Economic Pursuits in the Graeco-Roman Urban Centres: The Social Setting	53
	Glimpses of Hoarding and Saving in Graeco-Roman Literature of the Imperial Period	54
	Justification and Distribution of Surplus	56
	Work Ethic, Business Activities and Trade	56
	The Justification of Moderate Prosperity	59
	An Organicist View of Society	61
	Welcoming the Rich	63
	The Framework of Christian Discourse on Savings	66
	Universalizing Moral Exhortations for Charity	66
	Two Distinct Models of Almsgiving	68
	Motives for Almsgiving	70
	Chapter 4 Savings for Redistributive Purposes: Stewardship of Wealth in the Teachings of Basil of Caesarea and John Chrysostom	83
	Sketching Out the Setting: New Responsibilities and Challenges	83
	Aspects of Basil of Caesarea’s Views on Property and Wealth	87
	Famine in Cappadocia, 368/9	87
	Private Vs. Common Property, Hoarding Vs. Sharing	90
	Institutionalizing Poverty Relief: Basil’s Pt?chotropheion and the Bequest of Gregory of Nazianzus	92
	Delineating John Chrysostom’s Views on Hoarding	95
	The Ideals of Self-sufficiency and Stewardship of Wealth	95
	The Monastic Stewardship Paradigm	99
	Hoarding as a Socially and Individually Inefficient Practice	101
	A Call for Almsgiving	102
	Usury in Basil of Caesarea and John Chrysostom	106
	Chapter 5 Fifth-Century Patristic Conceptions of Savings and Capital: Isidore of Pelusium and Theodoret of Cyrrhus	126
	Isidore of Pelusium	126
	Pelusium	127
	Isidore’s Attitude Toward Wealth: Benefaction vs. Accumulation and Luxury Consumption	128
	Theodosius II Exhorted to Disperse Wealth	130
	Mismanagement of Church Property: “Who Watches the Watchers?”	131
	Eusebius, Bishop of Pelusium	133
	Two of Eusebius’ Accomplices	135
	Presbyter Zosimus	135
	Martinianus the Oikonomos	136
	An Assessment of Isidore’s Accusations of Ecclesiastical Mismanagement	138
	Theodoret of Cyrrhus	141
	Theodoret as a Civic Patron	141
	Theodoret as a Mediator	144
	Wealth, Poverty and Divine Providence	145
	Economic Exchange Viewed as Social Cooperation	148
	Theodoret’s Conception of Social Dynamics: An Appraisal	151
	Chapter 6 Contextualizing Patristic Concepts of Hoarding and Saving	168
	Economic, Monetary and Social Transformations	168
	Debasements, Inflation and Reforms in an Age of Crisis	168
	Shifting Gradually into the “Byzantine” World	171
	The Constantinian Solidus: A Lever for Change	173
	The Emperor as the “Lord of the Gold”	175
	Imperial Reserves	176
	The Formation of a “Golden” Elite	178
	Melania the Younger: A Case Study of a Super-Rich Person’s Divestment	183
	The First Steps of Divestment: Italy	183
	The Role of Imperial Intervention in the Sale of the Couple’s Property	185
	Melania’s “Poverty”	186
	Coveted Patrons in Africa	187
	The African Bishops’ Advice: A Turning Point in the Couple’s Benefaction	188
	Transferring Monetary Capital in the Mediterranean	191
	Chapter 7 Conclusions	205
	Bibliography	214
	Index	247