The
merchant, the businessman, has often been looked down upon in communities,
whether in the East or the West, whether ancient or modern. The Ancient Chinese placed merchants in the
lowest social strata ‘because they didn’t
produce anything and gained profit from other organizations.’
--Quote
from https://www.quora.com/Why-were-merchants-considered-the-bottom-of-the-society-by-ancient-Asians-shi-nong-gong-shang
The
Ancient Greeks saw a threatening tension between money-making and virtue-making:
And then one, seeing
another grow rich, seeks to rival him, and thus the great mass
of the citizens become lovers of money.
And so they grow richer
and richer, and the more they think of making a fortune the
less they think of virtue; for when riches and virtue are placed
together in the scales of the balance, the one always rises as the other
falls.
And in proportion as riches
and rich men are honoured in the State, virtue and the virtuous
are dishonoured.
That is obvious.
--Plato, The Republic,
http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.9.viii.html
Modern
writers see in the businessman a weak conformist who will not challenge the
currents pushing against him:
No longer independent or
self-reliant, the entrepreneur or manager was not an individual but was rather,
as at least Lewis portrayed him in Babbitt,
a conformist. Unlike the economic giants of the Gilded Age, men
such as Babbitt do not command. They follow the crowd. Motivated less by human
relationships than by public relations, they shun difference and fear dissent.
And,
yet, here and now in the States, many (particularly Evangelical Protestants)
are flabbergasted that the corporate heads of Chick-fil-A have decided they
will no longer give charitable donations to Christian organizations:
On the Family Research
Council's radio program, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee told Tony
Perkins he doesn't understand the decision, saying it will have a wider impact
on society.
"It's such a
disappointment," Huckabee said. "Such a bewildering situation as to why
Chick-fil-A after being so successful would decide they are going to surrender
to the bullies. And I think the implications of this are far broader than
Chick-fil-A and that's what I'm concerned about."
--Charlene Aaron, https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2019/november/why-chick-fil-as-decision-matters-the-implications-of-this-are-far-broader-than-chick-fil-a
They
have no reason to be surprised by this moral cowardice and betrayal, and yet
they are. This is the bitter fruit that
Puritanism has begotten, even beyond its borders in New England. The Puritan doctrine of predestination stated
that those who are among God’s elect will be granted worldly prosperity in this
life. It has left in the minds of the
peoples of all the cultural regions of the (unnecessary) union the impression
that ‘successful’ entrepreneurs are the most praiseworthy people of the
earth. But this is not what Christ
taught. The greatest and best are those
who give up everything (life, wealth, family, reputation, etc.) for the sake of
acquiring the Kingdom of Heaven.
It
is for this reason that wherever the True Faith, the Orthodox Faith, has been
preached, believed, and lived, those who hold the highest places of honor in
society have been the martyrs and all the other holy saints:
“The sepulchres of those
who have served Christ crucified,” says St. Chrysostom, 1 “surpass the
palaces of kings, not so much in the greatness and beauty of the buildings
(though in this also they go beyond them) as in another thing of more
importance, namely, in the multitude of those who, with devotion and joy,
repair to them. For the emperor himself, who is clothed in purple, goes to the
sepulchres of the saints, and kisses them; and, humbly prostrate on the ground,
beseeches the same saints to pray to God for him; and he who wears a royal
crown upon his head, holds it for a great favour of God, that a tent-maker and
a fisherman, and these dead, should be his protectors and defenders, and this
he begs with great earnestness.” And St. Austin, or another ancient father. 2
“Now at the memory of the fisherman the knees of the emperor are bowed, and the
precious stones of the imperial crown shine most where the benefits of the
fisherman are most felt.”
--Rev Alban Butler, https://www.bartleby.com/210/11/181.html
Today
in the States the business owner wears the crown, but it will go ill with the
South and the rest of regions/States until the saints gain it back again from
those usurpers.
--
Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England,
South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð,
unworthy though we are!
Anathema to the Union!
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