Community of property of the early Jerusalem community

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The community of property of the early community in Jerusalem (also community of property of the early community , community of property or early Christian community of property ) refers to the bringing in of all property and sharing of the proceeds with the needy, which the Acts of the Apostles of Luke (Acts 2.44 EU ; 4.32 EU ) in the new Testament (NT) as a characteristic of this first community of early Christianity in Jerusalem .

With reference to this NT representation, numerous Christian groups in church history tried to share their property and to administer it in whole or in part together. Above all, research asks where the motive of collective property comes from, how the associated NT texts justify it, what type it was, what historical reality was behind it and what significance it can have today.

New Testament

Texts on community of property

The statement “They had everything in common” is found twice almost word for word in the text units Acts 2,42–47 and Acts 4,32–35. They are formally, linguistically and content-wise closely related summaries. The Evangelist Luke is considered to be their common author.

Directly following the Pentecost miracle and the first sermon of Simon Peter , Acts 2: 42–47 EU summarizes the main features of the early  Jerusalem church:

“They held fast to the teaching of the apostles and to fellowship, to breaking of bread and to prayers. All were seized with fear; for through the apostles many miracles and signs took place. And all who believed formed a community and had everything in common. They sold their belongings and gave everybody as much as they needed. Day after day they stood with one accord in the temple , broke bread in their homes, and shared meals with joy and simplicity of heart. They praised God and were popular with all the people. And the Lord added to their fellowship daily those who were to be saved. "

Luke only uses the word koinonia ("community") here. As the phrase hapanta koina ("had everything in common") confirms, in the NT it means not only personal harmony, but also the social use of property . The distribution of sales proceeds to the needy is therefore a constitutive part of this community and has the same status as apostolic teaching, the feast (in which sacrament and satiety were not yet separated), prayer and mission . For this, according to Acts 2.47  EU , the early church experienced the sympathy of the Jewish people.

The text presents these features as the effect of the Holy Spirit poured out in the Pentecostal miracle and the first sermon of Peter. This centrally proclaims the resurrection of Jesus Christ , who was previously crucified for the guilt of all ( Acts 2,36  EU ). It ends with the call ( Acts 2,38.40  EU ): "Do penance and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins , and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. […] Be saved from this wrong generation! ”This is followed by a mass baptism of the preachers. Their community of property shows that they have received the promised spirit and follow the call to return.

After further successes in the mission, Acts 4,32–35 EU comes back  to the topic of community of property and explains its nature and goal:

“And the multitude of believers was one heart and one soul; nor did one say that any of his goods was his own, but all things were common to them. [...] Nobody suffered want from them either; for those who owned fields or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of what had been sold, and laid them at the feet of the apostles; and one distributed to everyone just as someone was needy. "

According to this, private property was formally retained, but each baptized waiver of property rights to the other parishioners as needed. Lukas uses the phrase hapanta koina to describe the state of common property that has been achieved in this way, analogous to the Hellenistic ideal of friendship at the time, so that the early community here was and should be a model for non-Jews as well.

After these summaries follow examples ( Acts 4,36–37  EU ): “But Joseph, who was nicknamed Barnabas by the apostles […], owned a field and sold it, brought the money and laid it at the feet of the apostles. “ Acts 5 : 1–11  EU tells that Ananias and Saphira sold a piece of land together, but kept some of the proceeds for themselves and Ananias only brought part of it to the apostles. Peter asked him:

“Ananias, why did Satan fill your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep some of the proceeds of the property for yourself? Could it not have remained your property and could you not freely dispose of the proceeds even after the sale? "

With the decision in his heart he lied not to people but to God: "When Ananias heard these words, he fell to the ground and died." The same goes for his wife, who then confronts Peter with her deed.

The examples contrast the desired behavior of donating the entire proceeds of a property sale to the community with the condemned behavior of keeping some of the proceeds for yourself. According to Peter's reaction, the sale of the property and donation were voluntary, but hiding any part was a lie to God because the donor falsely pretended to donate the full proceeds. In doing so, he broke the communion created by the Holy Spirit that was supposed to benefit the needy. Accordingly, the actual sales proceeds should not be concealed in the event of a voluntary donation, or a previously announced donation should be handed over in full. After that, Acts no longer mentions community of property.

Texts on property compensation between municipalities

According to Acts 6.1–7  EU , the community of property did not always guarantee that everyone was provided for: the widows of the Greek-speaking Jewish Christians were overlooked during the daily distribution of food . A plenary assembly of the congregation had transferred the food distribution practiced by the apostles themselves to a newly elected body of seven deacons.

Further NT texts report on collections from other congregations for the early congregation. They show that there was still a shortage there, so that property compensation was introduced between the communities. Acts 11: 27-30 mentions such a collection from Antioch . According to Gal 2:10, at the apostles' council (around 48) a continuous collection was agreed for the early church, which Paul of Tarsus wanted to collect in the churches he founded. A possible reason was a famine in the region around the year 47/48. The example of the Jerusalem community of property may have stimulated external fundraising.

In Rom. 15 : 25–29  EU, Paul described the handing over of this collection “for the poor among the saints in Jerusalem” (cf. Acts 24:17) and wrote about the donors: “They willingly did it and are also their debtors. Because if the Gentiles have been given a share in their spiritual goods, it is right and fair that they also render service to them with bodily goods. ”So he did not understand this collection of the poor as a charitable service, but as the theological duty of the Gentile Christians , who with it the Jewish Christians should give thanks for the received message of salvation and confirm their lasting connection.

In 2 Cor 8 : 1–15  EU Paul encouraged the church in Corinth to continue the collection they had started earlier for the early church: “For you know what Jesus Christ , our Lord, did in his love: He who was rich became poor because of you, to make you rich through his poverty . [...] Because the point is not that you get into trouble by helping others; it's about a balance. At the moment your abundance is supposed to make up for their lack, so that your abundance too will one day make up for your lack. In this way a balance should arise, as the scriptures say: whoever had collected a lot did not have too much, and whoever had little, not too little. ”With this, Paul took up the intention of community of property, the lack of the poor within the Christian community and transferred the notion of property compensation between rich and poor church members to the relationship between all churches.

Effects

The community of property of the primitive community (Acts 2/4) worked in Christian history as a model for Christian minorities who try to live accordingly and thus set themselves apart from the major churches. It forms a critical yardstick for the entire relationship of the churches to poverty, property and possessions. It also justifies social criticism , since it includes an equal coexistence in mutual, binding solidarity without exploitation and thus wants to testify and anticipate the coming kingdom of God .

Late antiquity

The ancient church developed a hierarchy and approaches to a two-tier ethic that issued the commandments of Jesus to most Christians. Church bishops were also large landowners. The sharing of property with the poor was left to the individual as voluntary alms . As a counter-movement to this, Christian monasticism emerged from 300 onwards , which is mostly attributed to motives of asceticism . Otto Gerhard Oexle, on the other hand, sees the idea of ​​the Vita communis, inspired by the community of property of the early community, as the reason for its creation. The anchorites followed the example of Antonius , who in 305 had given away all his possessions and retired to the desert as a hermit . Pachomios founded the first Christian monastery as Koinobion around 325 . For him, the early community was a determining motive, although he probably did not yet introduce a community of property. Representatives of the coinobitic monasticism always referred to Acts 2,44 and 4,32 in order to reject the ascetic model and to justify increasing communalization as the correct form of Christian coexistence that goes hand in hand with Christianization. Eusebius von Vercelli (283–371) introduced in 340 a community of life and property according to Acts 2 for the clergy in his city.

For many church fathers , the community of goods of the early church was the ideal of the apostolic age, from which they criticized luxury , corruption , unjust profits, the taking of interest (as usury ) and greed . In doing so, they did not develop any economic theory . The presbyter Basil the Great , who had previously lived as an anarchist for a long time, sharply criticized the rich in 368 on the occasion of a severe famine in Cappadocia in sermons on Luke texts of the NT, who took advantage of the lack of food for price increases and shortages of goods. He demanded the immediate and unreserved use of their goods for the common good , lowering prices and lending rates. He used ongoing donations to organize a regular feed for the poor and, following this emergency aid, built a settlement for the poor that provided them with permanent food and medical treatment. His basic idea was that all private property belonged to God, so that every wealthy person was only his trustee and administrator and had to mobilize all surplus profits for the poor. Gregor von Nazianz and Gregor von Nyssa followed this principle, called patronage . Hieronymus legitimized the coinobitic monasticism around 380 with the reference that Jewish Christians in Alexandria and elsewhere had practiced community of property for centuries. Johannes Cassianus wrote about Acts 2,44: "The whole church lived like this at that time, whereas today there are only a few in the monasteries that lead this life." In this way he idealized early Christianity in contrast to the church of his time.

When Christianity had become the state religion (380), community of property was only practiced in separate monasteries. The Rule of Augustine , written around 397, paraphrases Acts 2: “That is what we command you in the monastery. The first goal of your communal life is to live together in harmony and to be one heart and one soul in God. Therefore do not call anything your own, everything belongs to you together ”(chap. 1). For Augustine of Hippo the community of property of the early church was the norm and the historical starting point for the coexistence of Christians in house communities (vita communis) and thus for the cohesion of all Christians. He emphasized this norm in 407 sermons against the Donatists , whom he accused of having an egoistic attitude only interested in their own ethical perfection.

The Regula Benedicti (6th century) also required the abandonment of all private property from prospective monks. The community of property also establishes a common economy and duty to strictly regulated, daily joint work. The administration of the monastic common property was the sole responsibility of the respective abbot , so it was tied to the order hierarchy and did not include any criticism of the church.

middle Ages

The mendicant orders practiced a lively charity activity, persuaded many rich people to give up property and at the same time welcomed the expanding interest economy. Their conflicts with the clergy influenced the universities and led to the formation of lay orders in many cities. In this way they made a major contribution to the stabilization of medieval feudalism .

The Franciscan orders founded in the 11th century also renounced ownership and shared ownership. The Minorites in particular linked this more strongly than their predecessors with explicit criticism of unequal property and power relations in church and society. Attempts to encourage the clergy to dispose of possessions and the church to renounce wealth were rejected by the popes.

The community of property of the mendicant orders caused a scholastic dispute over the role of private property in the 13th century : Thomas Aquinas justified private property and its inheritance with natural law as a form of Christian life with equal rights to community of property. On the other hand, Johannes Duns Scotus saw common property as normal, only admitted a right to use goods as legitimate, denied the right to private property and interpreted it as a positing invented by the princes.

Church and socially critical forms of community of property appeared more often since the 14th century. Around 1370 the movement of the Brothers of Common Life was born in the Netherlands , who did not want to form a new order. Rather, they saw their community of property as a direct command of Jesus Christ, the sole "abbot", for all regular canons . For them, the model of the early church as apostolic teaching was a generally binding way of life for all Christians, whether clerics or lay people, which the church had only covered up.

Reformation time

Since the 15th century there have been attempts for a radical reformation in church and society, whose representatives often demanded community of property and temporarily realized it locally or regionally: for example the Czech Taborites (1420) and Hans Böhm (Pauker von Niklashausen) (1476).

From 1520, during the Reformation , groups of Anabaptists made such attempts. They often sympathized with the German peasant uprisings and partly took over their demands for cities reformed by them: for example Nikolaus Storch , Thomas Müntzer and Hans Hergot in Saxony and Thuringia. In Zollikon (Switzerland) a group around Konrad Grebel , Felix Manz and Wilhelm Reublin founded a communal property community after their expulsion from Zurich in 1525. In addition to the Schleitheim articles , the Anabaptists distributed a community code in 1527 that was intended to establish community of property in future Anabaptist communities. This included the demand for a special budget to provide for the poor in an acute emergency. The peasant leader Michael Gaismair tried unsuccessfully in Tyrol in 1526 to enforce a new, Christian property system. Hans Hut , a student of Müntzer, tried unsuccessfully to enforce the community of property in Nikolsburg (Moravia) in 1527 against the moderate Anabaptist Balthasar Hubmaier . Hut understood community of property as overcoming the original sin of desire in the sense of the ninth and tenth of the Ten Commandments . His followers also practiced it in their families and with refugees who took them into their homes. They founded a community of property in 1528, first in Austerlitz , then in 1530 in Auspitz and also represented a radical pacifism that included the renunciation of armed self-defense.

As a result of the internal conflicts over these issues, Jakob Hutter founded the first Bruderhöfe in Tyrol in 1533 as agricultural housing estates and labor-sharing workshops with their own kindergartens and schools. Hutter had to flee to Moravia as early as 1535; but while other attempts soon disappeared, the Hutterites were able to maintain their community of property to the present day. Especially from 1556 to 1578 under Peter Walpot , new brother farms were built. During the strong persecution in the Counter Reformation they emigrated to Hungary, Wallachia and later to the Ukraine . In the 19th century, Bruderhöfe was established in the USA . Further examples are the Stäbler , Gabrieler and Philippians . These Anabaptist attempts were mostly intended as a forerunner of an expected reorganization of society as a whole, but they did not want to force it in general. Only the Anabaptist Empire of Munster enforced community property and polygamy with a new constitution as a duty of all Munster Christians.

Martin Luther accused the rebellious peasants in 1525 of misusing the gospel for social change and thus confusing heavenly and earthly justice ( doctrine of two kingdoms ). The grace of God granted in baptism is independent of social position. The community of property from Acts 4,32ff. be voluntary and do not justify any demands on others. On the other hand, the peasants wanted to keep their property and create common property with property belonging to others. The Augsburg pastor Urbanus Rhegius presented the theology of the Anabaptists and their way of life in 1528 in a polemic requested by the city council as an anti-divine seduction of the faithful. He interpreted their community of property as a mere means of providing inactive vagabonds material security, as envy and disguised greed. He interpreted their poor relief as unregulated chaos with which they sought to evade a bourgeois order. The reformer Johannes Brenz, on the other hand, defended the persecuted Anabaptists in 1528/30: just like earlier monks, they had tried to impose community of goods on all Christians; this cannot be equated with riot. Only actual rebellion that was not assumed to be a future intention should be punished. By 1525 the peasant revolts and by 1534 most of the Anabaptist communities were suppressed by massacres of tens of thousands of their followers. Nevertheless, the Anabaptists stuck to their faith and their way of life, which for them was a life-threatening attack on the medieval Corpus Christianum .

Modern times

There were other communities of property among persecuted Christian minorities in the 17th century, such as the Levellers in the English Civil War (1642–1649). Their spokesman Gerrard Winstanley justified the demand to expropriate all English nobles and to replace the feudal order with common property, directly from the entire Bible, without referring to continental theologians. From 1668 the Jesuit Jean de Labadie introduced household communities in several regions of Europe, which shared income and property. His followers, the Labadists, emigrated to the USA, bought a piece of land in Maryland and founded a rural commune there in 1683. It was run authoritatively by a "bishop" who assigned the daily work to everyone. All private property was forbidden and consumption was rationed. This community is said to have failed in 1725 due to the self-enrichment of the leader.

The English Quaker Ann Lee , after a visionary experience she had in prison around 1758, founded a group known as the Shaker because of their ecstatic dances . The initially eight people emigrated to the USA in 1770 and founded a celibate , pacifist, spiritualist and missionary community of life and property near Albany (New York) . The group took in orphans and homeless people, who later often became members. By 1826 it grew to 18 parishes with around 6,000 members, but by 2000 it melted down to a few people.

The 1740 probably founded by a Quaker Russian Doukhobors made with the permission of Tsar Alexander I. 1801 a tightly organized settlement, labor and community property in Tauris . They punished apostates with death and were therefore exiled to Transcaucasia in 1839 . After several waves of persecution because of their conscientious objection , Tolstoy succeeded in allowing them to emigrate to North America in 1886. In his late writings, Tolstoy described the future society he hoped for as an agricultural community of goods that would abolish the state, the army, private property, trade and the industrial division of labor. Around 1900 he triggered the movement of the Tolstoyans , which he had not founded , and who sought pacifist anarchy .

In Pietism , Philipp Jacob Spener, in his work Pia desideria (1675), named common property according to Acts 2/4 as the ideal of a Christian way of life. Gottfried Arnold had developed this ideal in his "impartial church and heretic history" (1699) as a criticism of the previous church history. Since then, the primitive community community of property has been a role model for social reform pietists such as Ernst Christoph Hochmann von Hochenau and Friedrich Christoph Oetinger . In his work “Die Güldene Zeit” (1759), Oetinger identified the expected millennial kingdom of Jesus Christ with the pagan idea of ​​the Golden Age: the 19th century would bring a democratic social order in which money, the state and private property would be abolished. His work inspired the foundation of the Pietist settlement Wilhelmsdorf (Württemberg) as a community of property in 1824 .

The Wuerttemberg weaver Johann Georg Rapp , influenced by Pietism, founded the Order of Harmonists in Pennsylvania , USA, in 1805 , which existed from 1814 to 1824 under the name " New Harmony " in Indiana , then until 1916 under the name "Economy" again in Pennsylvania. The originally about 800, at last about 150 members lived celibate and transferred all ownership rights to a board of directors under Rapp's chairmanship. The municipality split in 1832 due to leadership conflicts and gradually transformed into a pure production cooperative from 1840 onwards.

In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), Joseph Smith founded the United Order of Enoch in 1831 , whose members lived in community of property. The order influenced the settlement of Mormons in Missouri and Utah .

20th century

Inspired by the religious socialists and the Hutterites, whom they initially joined, the married couple Emmy and Eberhard Arnold founded the first "Bruderhof" in Sannerz (Hesse) in 1920 . The Bruderhöfer maintained a community of property based on the Sermon on the Mount . During the time of National Socialism , they were persecuted as pacifists and moved into alternative quarters in the Principality of Liechtenstein , Great Britain and Paraguay . Other brother farms later opened in the USA and Australia .

Hans and Wally Klassen, Mennonites and Tolstoyans who emigrated from Russia , belonged to the commune in Sannerz. In 1923 they founded a settlement in Sonnefeld (Upper Franconia) whose members - mostly Quakers - practiced community of property and strict vegetarianism and took in orphans.

In 1943 Chiara Lubich founded a community of women in Loreto (Marken) who vowed poverty, chastity and following Jesus in everyday life. This gave rise to the Focolare Movement : an initially Catholic lay movement that has now become non-denominational and interreligious. Some of its members live celibate in shared flats that pursue normal professions, but pay all their salaries into a group fund. Surpluses are transferred to a central cash register in Rome, from which essential goods are bought and distributed to places where they are missing.

After 1945, a large number of evangelical and ecumenical communities emerged in Europe , which take the primitive community of property as a model and therefore see themselves as part of the church, not as special groups ( sects ) apart from the church. Brother Roger , the founder and first prior of the Evangelical Community de Taizé , introduced a community of property there in 1949, which was associated with celibacy and strict obedience. The ecumenical Jesus Brotherhood founded in 1961 also cultivates a way of life based on Acts 2 within the framework of the major churches .

research

In research on the NT, its texts on the community of property of the early community have been discussed since the 19th century. Questions are asked about their meaning in their own context, contemporary analogies, biblical references, their possible organizational form, historicity, effectiveness and current significance.

Ancient analogies

Long before Christianity, community of goods was a social utopia widespread in antiquity . Since the Histories of Herodotus (around 460 BC), some ancient historians ascribed community goods to past primitive peoples who did not yet know money as a medium of exchange. Other writers described these as part of fictional, ancient, or sunken communities that would have realized ethical ideals. Such utopias projected into the past were common in Hellenism as a moral counter-image to the present at the time.

Pythagoras in particular was often ascribed an ideal society of philosophers that also practiced community of property. In his dialogue Timaeus (around 360 BC), Plato traced the traditional saying “what belongs to friends” back to Pythagoras. Aristotle handed down the proverb ( Nicomachean Ethics 1159b): “Property of friends is common.” This phrase can also be found in the “Proverbs of Sextus” (≈180–200), which an anonymous author used from older sources of Hellenism (especially from Platonism and Stoa ). Antonios Diogenes wrote about Pythagoras: (around 200): "But he loved his friends beyond measure, whereby he was the first to take the view that among friends everything is common (ta ton filon koina) and the friend is an alter ego ." Iamblichos von Chalkis wrote in his work On Pythagorean Life (≈300): "The origin of justice is now community, equal rights and a bond in which everyone feels the same as a single body and soul and designates mine and yours equally [ ...]. This is what Pythagoras has done best of all people by completely banning the bond to private property from the nature of his disciples and instead strengthening the sense of what is common. "

Many researchers assume that Luke knew the ancient idealization of the Pythagoreans and that it influenced his style of language (including koinonia , "one heart and one soul", hapanta koina : "they had everything in common"). Martin Hengel (1996), Gerd Theißen (2008) and other New Testament scholars assume that Luke took the phrase hapanta koina literally from Hellenistic proverbs that circulated at the time. According to Matthias Konradt (2006), he adopted the phrase from the Hellenistic friendship ethic. According to Niclas Forster (2007), he consciously stylized the summaries in Acts 2/4 according to the then usual literary model of ideal communities.

Community of goods belonged to some variants of the ancient utopia of the Golden Age . Roman authors like the poet Virgil saw this age dawning with Emperor Augustus ( Aeneid , 29–19 BC). However, they left out the traditional characteristic of community of property, apparently because reality contradicted it too clearly. On the other hand, Acts 2/4 emphasizes the community of property of the early community: possibly in deliberate contrast to the Roman environment, just as the Lukan birth story describes Jesus with imperial sovereign titles as the (true) “savior” and bringer of “peace on earth”. Such "anti-imperial allusions" are considered to be the basic feature of the Lukan double work.

Community of goods was also known in ancient Judaism . Some Dead Sea Scrolls , the Manual of Discipline and the Damascus Document (written around 180 v. Chr.), Describe an eschatological community of "priests" that their goods according to Ez 44,28 (priests should be possessions in order not to live for God ) should submit when joining this group. These texts contain further parallels to Acts 2/4, such as water baptism as a condition of admission, a governing body of twelve lay people and three priests. In contrast to Acts 2/4, they emphasize living together in shared houses, the formation of fixed community assets by paying wages into a shared fund and a firmly organized welfare system. Whether the group described existed and whether they lived in the nearby historical settlement of Qumran is controversial.

In the 1st century, Jewish authors influenced by Hellenism presented the presumed Essenes as analogous to the Pythagoreans. Flavius ​​Josephus wrote:

“They despise wealth, and their sense of community is admirable; It is the law that those who join the sect transfer their property to the order, so that overall neither the lowliness of poverty nor the primacy of wealth appears, but after the merging of the property of the individuals only one property is available for all as brothers is ... The administrators of the collective property are elected, and each individual is indiscriminately obliged to serve for all. "

Philo of Alexandria wrote:

“They show their love for people through benevolence, equality ... and community life (koinonia) [...]: First of all, no house is the property of a single person without it being in fact the house of everyone; because apart from the fact that they live together in brotherhoods ... their apartment is also open to members of the same sect who come from elsewhere. […] Consequently, they have a common fund for all and common expenses. The clothes are common and the food common; they have also adopted the custom of communal meals ... Sharing the same roof, the same way of life and the same table is actually nowhere better realized. And that is the reason for it: Everything that you earn as wages for your daily work you do not keep for yourself, but put it down in front of everyone ... so that it is available for everyone who wants to use it. "

These ideal-typical descriptions are considered literary cultural criticism . Although no direct influence on Acts 2/4 can be proven, it is assumed that Luke got to know community of property through the Hellenized Judaism of that time. According to Martin Honecker , Acts 2/4 do not contain any protest in principle against wealth and private property.

Biblical references

The land law of the Torah is based on the principle ( Lev 25,23  EU ): YHWH alone owns the land of Israel, the Israelites only "leased" it. This establishes the commandment of the year of remission , which requires Israelites who have fallen into slavery to be released every 50 years and to return to everyone their original God-given inheritance. Because this commandment was disregarded in the reign of Israel (approx. 950–586 BC), it was included in the future promise of exiled-post-exilic biblical prophecy ( Isa 61 : 1-2  EU ). Jesus of Nazareth quoted this promise according to Lk 4,18-21  EU during his public appearance in the synagogue of Nazareth and claimed to fulfill it. At that time, however, the Romans and dependent Jewish landowners owned the land of Israel. Therefore, the community of property of the original community is interpreted as an attempt to anticipate the promised eschatological year of remission under foreign rule and to partially realize it.

Many interpreters understand the expression “one heart and one soul” ( Acts 4,32  LUT ) as an allusion to the Jewish Schma Yisrael ( Dtn 6,5  EU ): “Therefore you should love the Lord your God with all your heart with all his soul and with all his strength. ” Gerhard Jankowski (1995) concluded: For Lukas, the first of the Ten Commandments , as described here, was realized by the community of property. Because nobody called anything his own, but everyone had everything together, they would have recognized God again as the sole owner of Israel ( Lev 25,23  EU ). That is why Luke reports on property sales and emphasizes the example of a Levite: According to Dtn 18.1–2 EU, this tribe of priests was not allowed to own  any land. Apparently, like the Levites, the early community gave up all property. With this, Lukas presented the original community as an alternative to the Roman Empire, which was founded on large estates, slavery and military violence . This counter-draft can only be realized in a completely different social order, which Acts had worked towards with the sermon of the resurrection of Jesus in Rome .

For many New Testament scholars, Acts 4,34 (“There wasn't one among them who suffered need…”) clearly alludes to the Torah commandment Dtn 15.4  EU : “But actually there shouldn't be any poor with you…” For Luke I have the community of property of the original community thus fulfilled the goal of the necessary sabbatical year (Dtn 15), which provided for general debt relief for the poor. But while for Dtn 15:11 (“The poor will never completely disappear from your country ...”) this goal remained unattainable, Luke deliberately did not take up this verse, which Jesus also referred to ( Mk 14.7  EU ): “In The promise given to Israel will therefore be fulfilled to the community, Dtn 15.4. ” Michael Schäfers (1998) also concluded: By remedying the shortage of the needy according to Acts 4.34, Luke had fulfilled the utopia of the Torah that it there should be no more poor among the people of God. Your community of property therefore strived for the permanent overcoming of poverty in the sense of Dtn 15.4  EU . It goes beyond mere individual generosity which poverty has never been able to eradicate. Only when the early community actually practiced community of property could it be the model for the Diaspora Judaism of that time, as ancient sources attest.

Mostly the community of property of the early church is explained as an effect of Jesus. Jürgen Roloff cited Jesus' direct influences in 1988: his renunciation of property ( Luke 6.24  EU ), his corresponding demands on his successors ( Luke 9.3  EU ; 10.4 EU ), his criticism of wealth ( Mk 10.21-27  EU ; Lk 12.16-21  EU ; 16.13.19-31 EU ) and his warning against worry ( Mt 6.25-33  EU ). The early church followed this preaching of Jesus. With her community of property she tried to heed his warning against mammon as a power hostile to God and used property for coexistence, for the poor, not for her own interests that separated others. Peter Stuhlmacher (2005) assumed that Jesus' commandments and the Decalogue continued to apply in the early church . He interpreted Acts 2/4 as an attempt by the early church to obey Jesus' command to give up possession ( Lk 12.22–32  EU ; Mt 6.25–34  EU ). That is why she formed a community of life that was entirely geared towards the rule of God.

Organizational form

The historical-critical debate on the topic began in the 19th century in the context of the social conflicts of the time. Since around 1830, the community of property of the original community was used to justify the goals of early socialism and interpreted as the impetus for a comprehensive social reform or social revolution: for example by Félicité de Lamennais and Wilhelm Weitling .

In 1843 Friedrich Engels distinguished himself from the equation “Christianity is communism ”, popular in France at the time : Although “a few passages in the Bible seemed to favor communism”, the “general spirit” of biblical teachings completely contradicted this and every other “reasonable measure”. He admitted, however, that the rebels in the German Peasants' War had rightly invoked the early Christian community of property: their oppression and lack of rights "stood out very much from the community of the first Christians and from the teachings of Christ as set out in the Bible". The peasant leader Thomas Müntzer therefore only drew “logical conclusions” from Luther's teaching when he concluded from the Bible that “community of property” and democracy were the only correct form of society for Christians.

Since the March Revolution in 1848 , Christian interpreters demarcated the community of property of the early community from early socialism: Acts 2.44 / 4.32 did not mean the abolition of private property by another, collective form of ownership. The deacon Heinrich Merz emphasized in 1849: Private property is a right and a duty in order to be able to help the needy. Compulsory expropriation would only make the rich poor and so make the poor poorer. Everyone only paid into the community treasury what was possible and currently necessary, but kept the rest: in the knowledge that “everything from God and everything for the brothers” is there. So it depends on the inner readiness of love. Gerhard Uhlhorn (1895) emphasized similarly : Acts 2/4 are about voluntary, spontaneous, unregulated almsgiving out of enthusiastic love from the beginning.

The Catholic priest Wilhelm Hohoff has been proclaiming since 1871: The equality of goods, i.e. an equalization of property for society as a whole, is the goal of Christianity because of charity . This is therefore compatible with socialism . This made him an early representative of religious socialism . In contrast, most Catholic interpreters from the NT, following the encyclical Rerum Novarum (1891), concluded that there was no social reform, but the general social obligation of property . They interpreted the community of property as an increased form of almsgiving or as a special ethic for an ethically perfect minority. Theo Sommerlad (1903) interpreted Acts 2:44 as “a poor relief organization” without a fixed form of organization. The NT texts showed no trace of an association or joint management of the property.

The Marxist Karl Kautsky classified early Christianity since 1895 as a reform movement supported by an ancient " lumpen proletariat ", the poor poor, small craftsmen and medium-sized merchants. This had responded to the mass poverty of the time with a fair distribution of goods and joint management of goods. However, the early Christians would have sold the means of production or left them in private hands and thus could not overcome poverty. Because they limited themselves to a “communism of enjoyment” and a common household, they would have had to give up their family-oriented egalitarian ideal with the increasing spread of Christianity. That is why Christians can help build a classless society , even though their beliefs are incompatible with scientific socialism.

Some Marxists criticized Kautzky's theses, others took them up positively. Rosa Luxemburg wrote in 1905 that in accordance with the impoverishment of the population at the time, the early Christians had proclaimed common property, sharing of the rich with the poor, social equality and thus communism, but limited to the abandonment of property by the baptized and food, not the means of production. Class rule has therefore historically established itself in the church. The permanent overcoming of class domination corresponds to the message of Jesus Christ. The anti-communism of today's priests is therefore directed against his teaching. The first apostles in particular were "the most passionate communists". She quoted Acts 2:32–35.

Most theologians and church representatives subsequently rejected this view. Ernst Troeltsch contradicted Kautsky from 1908: The early Christians had no social reform goals and no special class interests . They would have tried to implement Jesus' commandment to love only in their own circle, although initially they did so radically. Their community of goods only included the distribution of consumer goods , not the means of production. It was about a "love communism" based on internal solidarity of the believers as communism of consumption . The church historian Hans von Schubert (1919) considered the category of love communism to be inappropriate: The early community had no compulsion to manage consumer goods together. Leonhard Ragaz, on the other hand, followed on from Troeltsch: The early community had formed a free cooperative and strived for a "socialism of voluntarism" that corresponded to the spirit of Christ. In 1972 Ernst Bloch also affirmed the term love communism for the primitive community of property. Heinz-Dietrich Wendland , Wilhelm Schneemelcher , Wolfgang Schrage , Jürgen Roloff and others, on the other hand, emphasized that “communism” is incompatible with “love” and is not a suitable category for the early Christian community of property. There it is neither a question of complete loss of property nor the socialization of means of production.

According to Michael Schäfers (1998), the early community practiced a mixture of individual renunciation of property and social welfare, in keeping with its possibilities and circumstances, with the aim of overcoming poverty internally and creating equal ownership. That is why it made private property subordinate to this goal and made it subordinate to it, but not replaced it with a collective form of ownership or a collectively exercised right of disposal. The process of voluntary surrender of property sought a compensation for property, behind which private property rights and rights of disposal were subordinated. She understood and legitimized this procedural compensation of property as an expression of following Jesus under the sign of imminent expectation.

Peter Stuhlmacher (2005) concluded from the differences between Acts 2 and ancient texts, which describe firmly organized communities of goods and supplies: “In Jerusalem it was only a matter of a vita communis on the basis of spiritual spontaneity and voluntariness ... the whole interest in life was focused on prayer and the end-time coming of the Lord implored in maranatha. "

According to Jürgen Roloff (2010), the community of property reacts in both summaries to the resurrection testimony of the apostles and proves its effectiveness (Acts 2.34; 4.33). Luke said that both aspects were inextricably linked. Act 2 put the community of property first as a summary, Act 4 describes its concrete implementation: “Whenever the situation requires it, the owners of land and houses sell their property and deliver the proceeds to the apostles. They manage the community coffers, from which needy parishioners get what they need (cf. 6.1f.) “In this way, Luke has a time-limited practice, which he was probably only known from the individual examples handed down, as a historical model for the Church of all time exalted. Because the apostles, as witnesses to the apparitions of the risen Christ, expected his imminent return , they spontaneously used available funds for the needy, but did not organize long-term care.

historicity

Hans Conzelmann (1969) argued against the historicity of the community of property in literary criticism: The summaries represented a general renunciation of property (Acts 2.44 / 4.32), while the example narratives described renunciation as a special achievement of individuals (Acts 4.36f.) , so as an exception. Ancient texts on the community of property of the Pythagoreans are also ideal images. The transfer of property and wages when entering the community of Qumran (which Conzelmann assumed to be historical) shows that a community of property could only exist if production was also organized jointly. Therefore, Acts 2/4 is a retrospectively idealized representation; there was “no such thing” as a complete community of property.

Gerd Theißen (1989), on the other hand, assumed a historical core of the community of property. The early community had probably adopted the Hellenistic slogan “Everything is common to all” as a reaction to the conflict between Hebrews and Hellenists (Acts 6: 1ff.) In order to oblige the conflicting parties to share equally and to prevent an authoritarian development.

Ulrich Luz (2005) argued for the historicity as follows: Lukas deliberately formulated the summaries in such a way that they echoed motifs of ideal forms of society and friendship ethics in ancient philosophy as well as biblical Torah commandments. But he certainly did not invent the community of property, since regular common meals in the early church are reliably occupied, which reminded of the last meal of Jesus before his death. Such religious meals always included the social security of the poor. Since Palestine was constantly threatened by famine at that time, many former followers of Jesus came from Galilee , could not practice their jobs as fishermen and farmers in the city, the early community as the center of early Christianity was often visited by other Christians and also a local group of the Essenes in Jerusalem community of goods practiced that some form of communitarian life in the early church was most likely historical.

Jürgen Roloff (2010) cited similar and additional arguments: Many of the first members from Galilee had given up their family associations, residences and professions there and could hardly find work as fishermen and farmers in Jerusalem. In this situation local Christians had to pay for their subsistence. Pharisees had established welfare for the poor by offering and collecting donations for the needy at the synagogue meal . The early Christians in Jerusalem followed this example.

effectiveness

The community of property was often portrayed as the cause of the impoverishment of the early community: Selling property and consuming the proceeds led to economic ruin. That is why the early church was later dependent on material help from outside, as Paul's collection shows. Thus the community of property has inevitably failed and is not a model for the present. This view was taken by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel , Adolf Stoecker (1881), Friedrich Lahusen (1890), Hans von Schubert (1919), Max Weber , Gotthilf Schenkel (1946), Werner Elert (1949), Martin Robbe (1967), Rudolf Bultmann (1968), Heinz Kreißig (1970), Barry Gordon (1989) and others.

Walter Rauschenbusch , representative of Social Gospel (1907), Leonhard Ragaz (around 1920), Harmannus Obendink (1949) and Hans Joachim Iwand (1964) contradicted this . Iwand emphasized: From a human point of view, the community of goods is just as possible or impossible as God's incarnation. Those who believe in Jesus Christ cannot reject community of property.

Wolfgang Reinhardt (1995) emphasized: Lukas deliberately did not harmonize contradictions to the initial community of property. The impoverishment of the early church had external, not internal causes. One should not speak of the failure of the community of property, because Acts 11: 27-30 already show its effect on other congregations: “Rather, one could speak of an expansion of the model to the whole ecumenical movement .” He quoted Klaus Haacker approvingly : “The example of So the primitive community has in reality set a precedent and has been implemented in supra-regional actions to equalize burdens within the church. ”The attractive poor provision was the main reason for the growth of early Christianity in antiquity.

According to Martin Leutzsch (1999), early Christian texts ( Didache , Apologie Justins , Lukian ) confirmed the effectiveness of community of goods. Extra-Christian ancient parallels also showed their feasibility. According to Acts, it was a success story for Lukas, not a failed experiment.

Validity claim

In 1780 the Lübeck surgeon Jakob Leonhard Vogel interpreted Acts 2/4 as a valid legal claim of poor to rich Christians and a common right of disposal of all Christians:

“After the fraternal relationship, every Christian had a right to the goods of all members of the whole congregation and, in case of need, could demand that the well-to-do members give him as much of their property as was required for his needs. Every Christian could avail himself of the goods of his brothers, and the Christians who had something could not deny their needy brothers the use and use of them. A Christian, for example, who had no house, could ask another Christian who had 2 or 3 houses to give him an apartment, so he remained master of the houses. Because of the community of use, however, one apartment had to be left to the other to live in. "

Martin Leutzsch sees most of the traditional interpretations as attempts to fend off the Lukan model's claim to validity for today's Christians. He includes the following arguments:

  • Consistent historicization: The community of property only existed in the special, unrepeatable situation of the original Christians (their near expectation).
  • consistent dehistoricization: it was never historical reality, only an ideal construct of Luke.
  • Denial of the role model: Acts only speak of community of property, the Jerusalem model was only one among others in early Christianity.
  • Comparison of the history of religion: The community of goods was taken over from non-Christian parallels and did not follow from Jesus' message.
  • Limitation of relevance and effectiveness: The community of property is a community model, not a social model. According to Acts themselves, it was not practiced by all early Christians, but only under the guidance of the first called apostles. Those involved were addicted to a Pentecostal intoxication. It led to the impoverishment of the early church.

literature

  • Eberhard Arnold: They had everything in common. In: Friedrich Siegmund-Schultze (ed.): The social message of Christianity for our time presented in speeches by men and women from different directions and parties. 2nd edition, 1921, pp. 22-26.
  • Hans-Jürgen Goertz (Ed.): Everything belongs to everyone. The Community of Goods Experiment from the 16th Century to the Present. Beck, Munich 1984, ISBN 3-406-09289-6 .
  • Friedrich W. Horn: The community of property of the original community. In: Evangelische Theologie 58, 1998, pp. 370–383.
  • Hans-Josef Klauck : Community of property in classical antiquity, in Qumran and in the New Testament. In: Hans-Josef Klauck: Community - Office - Sacrament. New Testament Perspectives. Echter, Würzburg 1989, ISBN 3429011825 , pp. 69-100.
  • Martin Leutzsch: Remembering the community of property. About socialism and the Bible. In: Richard Faber (Ed.): Socialism in past and present. Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 1994, ISBN 388479731X .
  • José Porfirio Miranda : Communism of the Bible. (Spanish original: 1981) Edition ITP-Kompass, Münster 2014, ISBN 978-3-981-3562-6-7 .
  • Hans-Dieter Plümper: The community of property among the Anabaptists of the 16th century. Alfred Kümmerle, Göppingen 1972.
  • Hermann Schempp: Community settlements on a religious and ideological basis. Mohr / Siebeck, Tübingen 1969, ISBN 3-16-529272-8 .
  • Manfred Wacht: Community of property. In: Theodor Klauser (Ed.): Reallexikon für antike und Christianentum . Volume 13, Anton Hiersemann, Stuttgart 1984, Sp. 47-79.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kiyoshi Mineshige: renunciation of property and alms with Luke: essence and requirement of the Lukan property ethos . Mohr / Siebeck, Tübingen 2003, ISBN 3-16-148078-3 , p. 218.
  2. ↑ Kiyoshi Mineshige: renunciation of property and alms with Luke: essence and requirement of the Lukan property ethos . Tübingen 2003, p. 221.
  3. ↑ Peter Böhlemann: Jesus and the Baptist: Key to the theology and ethics of Luke. Cambridge University Press, 1997, ISBN 0-521-59421-9 , p. 309.
  4. ↑ Gerd Theißen: Early Christian love communism: On the "seat in life" of the topos απαντα κοιναvin: Acts 2,44 and 4,32. In: Tornd Fornberg, David Hellholm (Ed.): Texts and Contexts. Biblical Texts in Their Textual and Situational Contexts. Scandinavian University Press, Copenhagen / Oslo 1995, pp. 689-711.
  5. ↑ Walter Schmithals: The Acts of the Apostles of Luke. Zurich Bible Commentaries NT 3.2. Theological Verlag, Zurich 1982, ISBN 3-290-14731-2 , p. 56.
  6. ↑ Kiyoshi Mineshige: renunciation of property and alms with Luke: essence and requirement of the Lukan property ethos . Tübingen 2003, pp. 232-234
  7. ↑ Kiyoshi Mineshige: renunciation of property and alms with Luke: essence and requirement of the Lukan property ethos . Tübingen 2003, pp. 245f.
  8. ↑ Friedrich W. Horn: The end of Paul. Walter de Gruyter, 2001, ISBN 3-11-017001-9 , p. 29.
  9. ↑ Oscar Cullmann: Ecumenical collection and community of goods in early Christianity. In: Oscar Cullmann: Lectures and essays 1925–1962. Mohr / Siebeck, Tübingen 1966, ISBN 3-16-103201-2 , pp. 600-604.
  10. ^ Christoph J. Karlson: On the socio-cultural and theological background of the Pauline collection. In: Frank Adloff, Eckhard Priller, Rupert Strachwitz (eds.): Prosocial behavior. Lucius & Lucius, 2010, ISBN 978-3-8282-0507-9 , pp. 24-27.
  11. ↑ Michael Schäfers: Prophetic Power of Church Social Doctrine? Poverty, Work, Property and Business Criticism. Münster 1998, p. 133.
  12. ↑ Michael Borgolte: Social history of the Middle Ages: A research balance sheet after German unification. Oldenbourg, Munich 1996, ISBN 3-486-64447-5 , p. 340.
  13. ↑ Hans J. Milchner: Imitation of Jesus and Imitatio Christi. Lit Verlag, 2003, ISBN 3-8258-6948-2 , p. 224.
  14. ↑ Ulrich Meyer: Social action under the sign of the "house": On economics in late antiquity and in the early Middle Ages. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1998, ISBN 3-525-35455-X , p. 243, note 3
  15. ↑ Georg Schwaiger: Monasticism, Orders, Monasteries: From the Beginnings to the Present. A lexicon. Beck, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-406-49483-8 , p. 132.
  16. ↑ Martin Honecker: Geld II. In: Gerhard Müller, Horst Balz: Theologische Realenzyklopädie Volume 1 , Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 1993, ISBN 3-11-013898-0 , p. 283.
  17. ↑ Ulrich Meyer: Social action under the sign of the "house": On economics in late antiquity and in the early Middle Ages. Göttingen 1998, pp. 110-120.
  18. ↑ Georg Holzherr: The Benedictine Rule: A Guide to Christian Life. Paulusverlag, Freiburg 2007, ISBN 978-3-7228-0635-8 , p. 71. and footnote 29
  19. ↑ Ulrich Meyer: Social action under the sign of the "house": On economics in late antiquity and in the early Middle Ages. Göttingen 1998, pp. 264-267.
  20. ↑ Jürgen Kocka, Claus Offe: History and future of work. Campus Verlag, 2000, ISBN 3-593-36487-5 , p. 71.
  21. ↑ Thomas Schilp: Norm and Reality of Religious Women's Communities in the Early Middle Ages (Pietism und Neuzeit). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1998, ISBN 3-525-35452-5 , p. 119.
  22. ^ Anton Grabner-Haider, Johann Maier, Karl Prenner: Cultural history of the late Middle Ages: From 1200 to 1500 AD. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2012, ISBN 978-3-525-53038-2 , p. 47f.
  23. ^ Anton Grabner-Haider, Johann Maier, Karl Prenner: Cultural history of the late Middle Ages: From 1200 to 1500 AD. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2012, ISBN 978-3-525-53038-2 , p. 47f.
  24. ↑ Michael Schäfers: Prophetic Power of Church Social Doctrine? Poverty, Work, Property and Business Criticism. Münster 1998, p. 207 and note 97
  25. ↑ Gerhard Faix: Gabriel Biel and the brothers from living together: Sources and studies on the constitution and self-image of the Upper German General Chapter. Mohr / Siebeck, Tübingen 1999, ISBN 3-16-147040-0 , p. 144.
  26. ↑ Werner O. Packull : The Hutterites in Tyrol: early Anabaptism in Switzerland, Tyrol and Moravia. Universitätsverlag Wagner, 2000, ISBN 3-7030-0351-0 , p. 57f.
  27. ↑ Heinold Fast: Huttersche Brothers. In: Theologische Realenzyklopädie Volume 15, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 1986, ISBN 3-11-008585-2 , p. 753.
  28. ↑ Product Baptist / Anabaptist communities. In: Horst Balz and others (ed.): Theologische Realenzyklopädie Volume 32 , Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-11-016712-3 , p. 604.
  29. ↑ Hans-Jürgen Goertz: Religious movements in the early modern times. Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, Munich 1992, ISBN 3-486-55759-9 , p. 27.
  30. ↑ Hans-Dieter Plümper: The community of goods in the Anabaptists of the 16th century. 1972.
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  31. ↑ Gottfried Seebaß, Irene Dingel : The Reformation and its outsiders. Collected essays and lectures. Göttingen 1997, 157
  32. ↑ Gottfried Seebaß, Irene Dingel: The Reformation and its outsiders. Collected essays and lectures. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1997, ISBN 3-525-58165-3 , p. 46.
  33. ^ Hellmut Zschoch: Reformation existence and denominational identity. Mohr / Siebeck, Tübingen 1995, ISBN 3-16-146376-5 , p. 258.
  34. ↑ Gottfried Seebaß, Irene Dingel: The Reformation and its outsiders. Collected essays and lectures. Göttingen 1997, 289
  35. ↑ Jürgen Moltmann: Ethics of Hope. Gütersloher Verlagshaus, Gütersloh 2010, ISBN 978-3-579-01929-1 , p. 40ff.
  36. ↑ Hermann Schempp: Community settlements on a religious and ideological basis. Tübingen 1969, p. 29.
  37. ↑ Corinna Dahlgrün: Christian Spirituality: Forms and Traditions of the Search for God. Walter de Gruyter, ISBN 3110178028 , pp. 26-28
  38. ↑ Hermann Schempp: Community settlements on a religious and ideological basis. Tübingen 1969, p. 175ff.
  39. ↑ Günter Bartsch: Communism, socialism, anarchism: from Mazdak to Mao - from Saint Simon to Saragat - from Godwin to Bakunin to the anarchos of today. Series of publications by the Federal Agency for Civic Education, Volume 72, ISSN  0435-7604 , p. 45; Michael Walter: Tolstoy according to his socio-economic, state-theoretical and political views. Printed by Schulthess, 1907, pp. 85f.
  40. ^ Ulrich Bräker: Complete Writings Volume 5: Commentary and Register. Beck, Munich 2010, ISBN 3406435394 , p. 244
  41. ↑ Hans-Joachim Mähl : The idea of ​​the golden age in the work of Novalis , 2nd edition, Tübingen 1994, pp. 236–244
  42. ^ Jobst Reller: Pastoral care, community, mission and diakonia: Impulses from Ludwig Harms on the occasion of his 200th birthday. Lit Verlag, 2009, ISBN 3825819426 , p. 19, fn. 12
  43. ^ Robert P. Sutton: Communal Utopias and the American Experience Religious Communities, 1732-2000. Greenwood, 2003, ISBN 0275975541 , pp. 37-46
  44. ↑ Hermann Schempp: Community settlements on a religious and ideological basis. Tübingen 1969, p. 171.
  45. ^ Stephan Wehowsky: Religious interpretation of political experience: Eberhard Arnold and the Neuwerk movement as exponents of religious socialism at the time of the Weimar Republic. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1997, ISBN 3525873689 , pp. 41–44 and p. 62
  46. ↑ Markus Baum: Eberhard Arnold: A life in the spirit of the Sermon on the Mount. Neufeld, 2013, ISBN 9783862560356 , p. 245
  47. ↑ Hermann Schempp: Community settlements on a religious and ideological basis. Tübingen 1969, p. 126; Edith Hanke: Prophet of the Unmodern: Leo N. Tolstoi as a cultural critic in the German discussion at the turn of the century. Max Niemeyer, 1993, ISBN 3484350385 , p. 145
  48. ^ Oswald Eggenberger: Churches sects religions. Theological Verlag, Zurich 2003, ISBN 3-290-17215-5 , p. 44.
  49. ^ EKD: The evangelical communities. Report of the representative of the EKD council for contact with the evangelical communities 1997
  50. ↑ Georg Schwaiger: Monasticism, Orders, Monasteries: From the Beginnings to the Present. A lexicon. Munich 2003, p. 127.
  51. ↑ Hans-Josef Klauck: Community of property in classical antiquity, in Qumran and in the New Testament. Würzburg 1989, pp. 69-100; Vincenco Petracca: God or Money. Luke's ethics of property. Francke, 2003, ISBN 3-7720-2831-4 , pp. 261-273.
  52. ↑ Marek Winiarczyk: The Hellenistic utopias. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 2011, ISBN 978-3-11-026381-7 , p. 150.
  53. ↑ Christoph Riedweg: Pythagoras. Life, teaching, aftermath. An introduction. Beck, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-406-48714-9 , p. 56.
  54. ↑ Christoph Riedweg: Pythagoras. Life, teaching, aftermath. An introduction. Beck, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-406-48714-9 , p. 56.
  55. ↑ Quoted from Niclas Forster: The common prayer in the view of Luke. David Brown, 2007, ISBN 90-429-1900-0 , p. 358.
  56. ↑ Kiyoshi Mineshige: renunciation of property and alms with Luke: essence and requirement of the Lukan property ethos . Tübingen 2003, p. 225, fn. 44
  57. ↑ Martin Hengel: Studies on early Christianity. (1996) Mohr / Siebeck, Tübingen 2008, ISBN 978-3-16-149509-0 , p. 360.
  58. ↑ Gerd Theißen: The wisdom of early Christianity. Beck, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-406-57743-7 , p. 168.
  59. ^ Matthias Conradt: God or Mammon. In: Christoph Sigrist (Ed.): Diakonie und Ökonomie. Theological Verlag, Zurich 2006, ISBN 3-290-17388-7 , p. 126.
  60. ↑ Niclas Forster: The common prayer in the view of Luke. 2007, p. 367.
  61. ↑ Stefan Schreiber: Christmas Politics: Luke 1–2 and the Golden Age. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2009, ISBN 3525533926 , p. 33
  62. ↑ Frank Kürschner-Pelkmann: From Herodes to Hoppenstedt: On the trail of the Christmas story. tredition, 2012, p. 387
  63. ↑ Otto Betz: Jesus - the Lord of the Church: Essays on Biblical Theology II. Mohr / Siebeck, Tübingen 1990, ISBN 3161455053 , p. 12
  64. ↑ Erich Grässer: Research on the Acts of the Apostles. Mohr / Siebeck, Tübingen 2001, ISBN 3161475925 , p. 126
  65. ↑ Peter Stuhlmacher: Biblical Theology of the New Testament. Volume 1: Foundation. From Jesus to Paul. Göttingen 2005, p. 205.
  66. ↑ Quoted from Gottfried Orth: Can't you see the beam? Social justice. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2008, ISBN 3-525-61038-6 , p. 56
  67. ↑ Quoted from Peter Stuhlmacher: Biblical Theology of the New Testament. Volume 1: Foundation. From Jesus to Paul. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2005, ISBN 3-525-53146-X , p. 204.
  68. ↑ Outline of social ethics. Berlin 1995, p. 478
  69. ↑ Martin Honecker: Grundriss der Sozialethik. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 1995, ISBN 3110144743 , p. 475
  70. ↑ Martin Hengel, Anna M. Schwemer: The messianic claim of Jesus and the beginnings of Christology. Mohr / Siebeck, Tübingen 2003, p. 209
  71. ↑ Herbert Stettberger: Have nothing - give everything? A cognitive-linguistically oriented study on the ethics of property in the Lukan double work. Herder, Freiburg 2005, ISBN 3451285320 , p. 102; Kim Tan: The Jubilee Gospel: An Entrepreneur Discovers God's Justice. Neufeld Verlag, 2011, ISBN 3937896996 , p. 140
  72. ^ Gerhard Jankowski: ... and had everything in common (Acts 4,32). In: Kuno Füssel, Franz Segbers (ed.): "... this is how the peoples of the world learn justice." A workbook on the Bible and economics. Anton Pustet, Salzburg 2000, ISBN 3-7025-0324-2 , pp. 139-146.
  73. ↑ Jacob Jervell: Critical-exegetical commentary on the New Testament, Volume 3: The Acts of the Apostles, new interpretation. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1998, ISBN 3-525-51627-4 , p. 192. and note 495; Daniel Marguerat: Luke, the First Christian Historian: A Study of the Acts of the Apostles. Theological Verlag, Zurich 2008, ISBN 978-3-290-17472-9 , p. 264 ; Kiyoshi Mineshige: renunciation of property and alms with Luke: essence and requirement of the Lukan property ethos . Tübingen 2003, p. 225 and fn. 50
  74. ↑ Michael Schäfers: Prophetic Power of Church Social Doctrine? Poverty, Work, Property and Business Criticism. LIT Verlag, 1998, p. 133 and footnote 229
  75. ↑ Jürgen Roloff: The New Testament German (NTD) Volume 5: The Acts of the Apostles. (1988) Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2010, ISBN 978-3-525-51361-3 , p. 95.
  76. ↑ Peter Stuhlmacher: Biblical Theology of the New Testament. Volume 1: Foundation. From Jesus to Paul. Göttingen 2005, pp. 203 and 205
  77. ↑ Hans Jürgen Goertz: Everything belongs to everyone. The experiment of community of goods from the 16th century until today. Munich 1988.
  78. ^ Friedrich Engels: Progress of the social reform on the continent. Manchester 1843; in: Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Works Volume I, Dietz Verlag, Berlin-Ost 1981, pp. 487–489
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  80. ^ Klaus Kreppel : Decision for socialism: the political biography of Pastor Wilhelm Hohoff 1848-1923. Neue Gesellschaft, 1974, ISBN 3-87831-182-6 , p. 39.
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  89. ↑ Michael Schäfers: Prophetic Power of Church Social Doctrine? Poverty, Work, Property and Business Criticism. Münster 1998, p. 129f.
  90. ↑ Peter Stuhlmacher: Biblical Theology of the New Testament. Volume 1: Foundation. From Jesus to Paul. Göttingen 2005, p. 205.
  91. ↑ Jürgen Roloff: The New Testament German (NTD) Volume 5: The Acts of the Apostles. Göttingen 2010, p. 88f.
  92. ↑ Hans Conzelmann: Outlines of the New Testament, Volume 5: History of early Christianity. (1st edition 1969) 6th edition, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1989, ISBN 3-525-51354-2 , p. 24 f.
  93. ↑ Gerd Theißen: From Jesus to the early Christian world of signs: New Testament boundaries in dialogue. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2011, ISBN 978-3-525-55023-6 , p. 30.
  94. ^ Ulrich Luz: Biblical Foundations of Diakonie. In: Günter Ruddat, Gerhard Schäfer (Ed.): Diakonisches Kompendium. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2005, ISBN 3-525-62379-8 , pp. 25f.
  95. ↑ Jürgen Roloff: The New Testament German (NTD) Volume 5: The Acts of the Apostles. Göttingen 2010, p. 90.
  96. ↑ Martin Leutzsch: Remembering the community of goods , Würzburg 1994, pp. 80–92.
  97. ↑ Martin Leutzsch: Remembrance of the community of goods , Würzburg 1994, p. 86.
  98. ↑ Wolfgang Reinhardt: The growth of God's people. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1995, ISBN 3-525-53632-1 , p. 177.
  99. ↑ Martin Leutzsch: Remembrance of the community of goods , Würzburg 1994, p. 92.
  100. ↑ Jakob Leonhard Vogel: Antiquities of the first and oldest Christians. Hamburg 1780, p. 47f .; quoted by Rosa Luxemburg: Church and Socialism. (1905)
  101. ↑ Martin Leutzsch: Memory of the community of property. About socialism and the Bible. In: Richard Faber (Ed.): Socialism in past and present. Würzburg 1994, pp. 88f.
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