Unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance; but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that he hath. And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness.
Matthew
It is the aim of good governments to stimulate production, of bad governments to encourage consumption.
Jean-Baptiste Say
Rule III used to be known as the law of markets. It says basically that production proceeds consumption, or, in other words, that we pay for what we consume from what we--or someone else--has produced. In our day, it has been renamed "Say’s Law" because the basis of Keynesian economics is essentially a denial of the validity of this law, so, in essence, Keynes rechristened it as "Say’s Opinion." Keynes, in referring to it often quoted James Mill’s attempt at an abbreviation--"supply creates its own demand." This seems to imply that anything that is produced will be sold, which, of course, is clearly not true, at least, not true if we mean by being sold "covering at least the cost of production". But the basic rule is, that production must proceed consumption and we pay for our consumption out of something that someone has produced. For Say, the critical problem is production. For Keynes it is consumption. Indeed, when listening to modern Keynesian economists, you get the feeling that they feel that production is automatic--it takes care of itself. Of course, this isn’t true and even the most die-hard Keynes disciple has to acknowledge that at some point things must be produced; hence part of the reason that modern economics is so laden with mathematics. Economists are busy calculating, using ever increasing sophisticated tools, just exactly when we need to begin to worry about production.
The effect of the denial of Say’s Law in our day is devastating and we see it all around us in a hundred different ways. At the slightest hint of a recession the headline scream, "Consumer confidence is down." Like Elvis Presley, we’ll have a "Blue Christmas" if the retail sales figures early in December indicate that people are spending less than they did the previous year. To get out of, or even to prevent, a downturn in the economy, politicians call for measures to "jump-start the economy" or to "prime the pump". They pass out stimulation money. They start government make-work projects. Anything and everything to "get money moving in the economy". Congressmen fight endlessly to keep defense plants open even if they are building archaic weapons. Military bases and installations that serve almost no useful function e.g. Fort Douglas in my own town, are somehow argued to be vital, if not to the defense of the nation, at least, to its economic welfare.
But most devastating is the effect on individuals, for two reasons. First, they lose the wealth that would have been created if all this spending had been done on productive enterprises, but even more destructive is the idea that we are serving a useful purpose just by consuming and spending.
My own favorite statement of Say’s Law on a personal level came in a graduation speech at my daughter, Natasha’s, graduation from Skyline High School. Lyn Davidson, a member of the Granite School board who had spoken at the two previous graduations I attended because older sons were graduating, admitted that he had run out of things to say on such occasions so he had asked his 90 year old mother what he could say. She responded, "You tell those young people what I told you when you graduated from high school."
"Mom," Mr Davidson complained, "that was a long time ago. I really don’t remember what you told me then. Could you remind me?"
"Well," the mother replied, "if you don’t remember that then tell them what I told you when you graduated from college."
"Mom," he protested, "that was almost as long ago. I really don’t remember."
"What I told you when you graduated from high school, " she said with great emphasis, "is what I told you when you turned 18, what I told you when you turned 21, and what I told you when you graduated from college. It isn’t turning a certain age, or getting a diploma or a degree, or a certificate or a license that makes you an adult. You don’t become an adult until you start producing more than you consume."
On that basis many Americans never become adults. Unfortunately, we don’t even expect it any more. It was with something like this in mind that our forefathers thought it was essential, even if they were famous and making most of their income from political activity, to be able to claim as a profession something in the free market. Daniel Webster, for example, was one of America’s most successful lawyers and a leader in the US Senate, but he always claimed to be a farmer. The same is true of his associates Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun.
Many Americans are eager to get on welfare roles in manner possible, partially, because they see themselves as performing a service by being consumers. Years ago when I was working as a volunteer employment specialist, a neighbor came to me asking me to help him apply for a job that had been listed. "That job is a government subsidized job that can only be given to someone who is handicapped," I informed him.
"I am handicapped." he responded.
"I’m sorry to hear that. I wasn’t aware of it. What’s your handicap?"
He responded so seriously that I didn’t dare laugh, but it took all my self-control not to. "I can’t spell", he said almost in tears. "You can’t imagine what a handicap that’s been to me."
That is an extreme example, but I am always amazed to see how eagerly people of my acquaintance claim handicapped status. I think it happens largely because it excuses them from the rigors of productive work and, after all, they are told repeatedly that what we really need in this country in this Keynesian age, is consumers. They qualify.
Rule III is, therefore, "I pay for what I consume with what I--or someone else--produces. The corollary is that except in very special circumstances if it is someone else, you never really grow up.
Friday, July 10, 2009
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Personal Economics--Rule II
Personal Economics--Rule II
"The race is run by one and one and never by two and two."
Kipling
"What is prudence in the conduct of every private family can scarce be folly in that of a great kingdom."
Adam Smith
The second rule stems from Adam Smith’s overall writing and is implied in the quote above. The rule is "whatever is right, true, correct, or moral for one person does not change if I add a person or a group of persons." This is the rule that divides economists. Most economists, when acting as economists and not as politicians or political yea-sayers will acknowledge rule I, i.e. judge others who you wish to deal with by their works and not in some other way, but rule II divides economists who are collectivists e. g. Keynesians, Marxists, etc from individuals e.g. Austrians and monetarist. It was a shock to me as a freshman when I read in the introduction to my Econ 101 text (Samuelson 5th ed.) That actions which are right and proper for individuals would be disastrous for the nation. Among the examples are the so-called "paradox of thrift", i. e. being frugal is a good thing for the individual, but collectivists believe it is diastrous for the nation as a whole. Because that belief is tied in with rule III to be discussed in the next essay I will chose an example directly from Adam Smith’s work.
Supposing that I work for a hardware store and my neighbor works for a grocery store. I approach my neighbor and say, "I have been checking the store receipts and I discover that I spent over 2000 dollars in your grocery store last year but you only spent about 200 dollars in my hardware store. This is an unforgiveable imbalance of trade. Unless you start spending more in my hardware store, I’m going to have the sheriff start confiscating your stuff to even out the difference so that the trade between us can be more balanced." If I actually went to my neighbor and said that, my neighbor would not be the only person who thought I was nuts.
We do not even carry on in that way about trade between cities. If the mayor of Provo called up the mayor of Salt Lake City and complained that the residents of Salt Lake only spent ten thousand dollars in Provo while the residents of Provo spent more than ten times that amount in Salt Lake and this is a wrong that I am going to call on the govenor to correct by increased taxation on the residents of Salt Lake. When we get to the state level we begin to see actions that approach this, and at the national level, of course, it becomes rampant with tariffs, import restrictions, and numerous other laws and regulations to address the "imbalance of trade".
In a hundred, probably a thousand, ways, we feel that an action that would appear wrong, even represhensible in some cases, as an individual is perfectly ok if we are part of a group that says the action is right. For another example, if I think I deserve a raise so I refuse to work until I get it, I would probably be severly reprimanded if I beat up or maimed anyone who showed up at my work to replace me, but if a union does that it is ok.
Because of this attitude we have replaced our sense of absolute morality with a statistical sense of morality. We recognize the immorality of an individual robbing another because he is convinced that the person he robs "is better off than I am". But we think nothing of forcing everyone who earns $40,000 a year to help out those who earn $20,000 or less. We begin to decide in some sort of statistic who is rich and who is poor and those statistics are used to decide who should be forced to help whom.
On a personal level the rule simply reauires that we ask outself when acting as part of a group, "would I do this if I were acting alone?" If the answer is "no", you can be pretty sure that what you are doing is wrong
"The race is run by one and one and never by two and two."
Kipling
"What is prudence in the conduct of every private family can scarce be folly in that of a great kingdom."
Adam Smith
The second rule stems from Adam Smith’s overall writing and is implied in the quote above. The rule is "whatever is right, true, correct, or moral for one person does not change if I add a person or a group of persons." This is the rule that divides economists. Most economists, when acting as economists and not as politicians or political yea-sayers will acknowledge rule I, i.e. judge others who you wish to deal with by their works and not in some other way, but rule II divides economists who are collectivists e. g. Keynesians, Marxists, etc from individuals e.g. Austrians and monetarist. It was a shock to me as a freshman when I read in the introduction to my Econ 101 text (Samuelson 5th ed.) That actions which are right and proper for individuals would be disastrous for the nation. Among the examples are the so-called "paradox of thrift", i. e. being frugal is a good thing for the individual, but collectivists believe it is diastrous for the nation as a whole. Because that belief is tied in with rule III to be discussed in the next essay I will chose an example directly from Adam Smith’s work.
Supposing that I work for a hardware store and my neighbor works for a grocery store. I approach my neighbor and say, "I have been checking the store receipts and I discover that I spent over 2000 dollars in your grocery store last year but you only spent about 200 dollars in my hardware store. This is an unforgiveable imbalance of trade. Unless you start spending more in my hardware store, I’m going to have the sheriff start confiscating your stuff to even out the difference so that the trade between us can be more balanced." If I actually went to my neighbor and said that, my neighbor would not be the only person who thought I was nuts.
We do not even carry on in that way about trade between cities. If the mayor of Provo called up the mayor of Salt Lake City and complained that the residents of Salt Lake only spent ten thousand dollars in Provo while the residents of Provo spent more than ten times that amount in Salt Lake and this is a wrong that I am going to call on the govenor to correct by increased taxation on the residents of Salt Lake. When we get to the state level we begin to see actions that approach this, and at the national level, of course, it becomes rampant with tariffs, import restrictions, and numerous other laws and regulations to address the "imbalance of trade".
In a hundred, probably a thousand, ways, we feel that an action that would appear wrong, even represhensible in some cases, as an individual is perfectly ok if we are part of a group that says the action is right. For another example, if I think I deserve a raise so I refuse to work until I get it, I would probably be severly reprimanded if I beat up or maimed anyone who showed up at my work to replace me, but if a union does that it is ok.
Because of this attitude we have replaced our sense of absolute morality with a statistical sense of morality. We recognize the immorality of an individual robbing another because he is convinced that the person he robs "is better off than I am". But we think nothing of forcing everyone who earns $40,000 a year to help out those who earn $20,000 or less. We begin to decide in some sort of statistic who is rich and who is poor and those statistics are used to decide who should be forced to help whom.
On a personal level the rule simply reauires that we ask outself when acting as part of a group, "would I do this if I were acting alone?" If the answer is "no", you can be pretty sure that what you are doing is wrong
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Personal Economics--Rule I
"‘Ye heve read, ye have heard, ye have thought,’ he said, ‘and the tale has yet to run:
"By the love of the body that once ye had, give answer--what ha’ ye done?’"
Kipling
"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, and the baker that we expect our dinner, but from the regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our necessities but of their advantages."
Adam Smith
The first rule of personal economics is derived from the work of Adam Smith. It is a rule of classical economics and is imbedded in much of his writings including the famous quote above. It is important to remember again that Adam Smith was a professor of Moral Philosophy. He believed that what was right was also, in the long run, at least, also what was smart. He is saying here that in the ordinary transactions of life, we do not judge men by their intentions or their thoughts or their hopes or anything else. We judge men the way God judges us--by their works. He does not say that we should do this, he says that in a free and reasonable society that is how we do judge them. When was the last time you were standing in line at the grocery store and the man in front of you held up a loaf of bread and said to the clerk, "If you can prove to me that the man who grew the wheat that went into this bread, the man who milled the wheat, the man who baked the flour, the man who packaged the bread and the man who delivered it to your store were all good Presbyterians, I will buy this loaf of bread."? We would probably think a man who said that was crazy. In the most peaceful interactions we have with others, that is how we do judge them. The reason for this is that most reasonable men in a free society recognize that it is simple justice to be judged by their works. This is the first rule of personal economics--"Judge others the way God judges you, by their works".
Unfortunately, while few of us wish to be judged personally by our works. We wish to be judged by our intentions or our nationality or our ancestry or in some other way that gives us an advantage over others. Politicians frequently play on this desire and try to get us to judge others in almost any way other than their works.
A favorite example of mine stems from a series of ads done by the comedian, Bob Hope, when I was a teen-ager. Because he frequently entertained American troops, he was known as a kind of super-patriot, so the American Ladies Garment Union hired him to do a series of ads for them. The gist of the ads was that when buying a garment i.e. a shirt, a dress, a tie, a pair of slacks, etc., you should not judge the person, or his garment, by his works, i.e. the quality or price of garment. That should be a secondary consideration. Before everything else, you should "look for the union label". If you do that, you can be sure that the person making your garment did not make it in their garage or basement. Union officials usually refer to people who make things in such places as "working in a sweat shop". You can also know that the person making the garment was a genuine American, or, at least, was working in America. You could have the comfort of knowing that the person making your garment was not living in Asia or South America or Europe or some other place where foreigners live. Finally, you could know that your garment--and this is probably most important of all--was not made by a man.
In Adam Smith’s day, feudalism was disappearing, but one aspect of it remained--what was called Mercantilism. The Mercantilists were very suspicious of foreigners. They should not be traded with. By sending goods to a country they were very sneakily trying to get gold out of the country. They were creating an "inbalance of trade" and trying to destroy a country’s wealth, i.e. its gold reserves. Adam Smith was simply saying we should judge the man across the river, or channel, or mountain range who happens to speak a different language, the way we judge the man next door or the man who runs the local bakery--by his works.
Rule I simply says that we don’t judge a man by his attitude, his nationality, his religion, his outlook, we judge him by his works.
"By the love of the body that once ye had, give answer--what ha’ ye done?’"
Kipling
"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, and the baker that we expect our dinner, but from the regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our necessities but of their advantages."
Adam Smith
The first rule of personal economics is derived from the work of Adam Smith. It is a rule of classical economics and is imbedded in much of his writings including the famous quote above. It is important to remember again that Adam Smith was a professor of Moral Philosophy. He believed that what was right was also, in the long run, at least, also what was smart. He is saying here that in the ordinary transactions of life, we do not judge men by their intentions or their thoughts or their hopes or anything else. We judge men the way God judges us--by their works. He does not say that we should do this, he says that in a free and reasonable society that is how we do judge them. When was the last time you were standing in line at the grocery store and the man in front of you held up a loaf of bread and said to the clerk, "If you can prove to me that the man who grew the wheat that went into this bread, the man who milled the wheat, the man who baked the flour, the man who packaged the bread and the man who delivered it to your store were all good Presbyterians, I will buy this loaf of bread."? We would probably think a man who said that was crazy. In the most peaceful interactions we have with others, that is how we do judge them. The reason for this is that most reasonable men in a free society recognize that it is simple justice to be judged by their works. This is the first rule of personal economics--"Judge others the way God judges you, by their works".
Unfortunately, while few of us wish to be judged personally by our works. We wish to be judged by our intentions or our nationality or our ancestry or in some other way that gives us an advantage over others. Politicians frequently play on this desire and try to get us to judge others in almost any way other than their works.
A favorite example of mine stems from a series of ads done by the comedian, Bob Hope, when I was a teen-ager. Because he frequently entertained American troops, he was known as a kind of super-patriot, so the American Ladies Garment Union hired him to do a series of ads for them. The gist of the ads was that when buying a garment i.e. a shirt, a dress, a tie, a pair of slacks, etc., you should not judge the person, or his garment, by his works, i.e. the quality or price of garment. That should be a secondary consideration. Before everything else, you should "look for the union label". If you do that, you can be sure that the person making your garment did not make it in their garage or basement. Union officials usually refer to people who make things in such places as "working in a sweat shop". You can also know that the person making the garment was a genuine American, or, at least, was working in America. You could have the comfort of knowing that the person making your garment was not living in Asia or South America or Europe or some other place where foreigners live. Finally, you could know that your garment--and this is probably most important of all--was not made by a man.
In Adam Smith’s day, feudalism was disappearing, but one aspect of it remained--what was called Mercantilism. The Mercantilists were very suspicious of foreigners. They should not be traded with. By sending goods to a country they were very sneakily trying to get gold out of the country. They were creating an "inbalance of trade" and trying to destroy a country’s wealth, i.e. its gold reserves. Adam Smith was simply saying we should judge the man across the river, or channel, or mountain range who happens to speak a different language, the way we judge the man next door or the man who runs the local bakery--by his works.
Rule I simply says that we don’t judge a man by his attitude, his nationality, his religion, his outlook, we judge him by his works.
Friday, June 12, 2009
Personal econ--natural law--Adam Smith
Personal economics--Natural law--Adam Smith
Newton convinced us forever that the interactions between particles are governed by natural law. The man most responsible for convincing intellectuals, at least, that there is a possibility that interactions between individuals is also governed by natural law is Adam Smith. Of course, scripture has always told us that interactions between people is governed by law, but many do not believe in scripture; therefore, Adam Smith’s contribution is mighty.
Adam Smith was a professor of moral philosophy in Scotland. Effectively that meant that his job was to teach young men, many, if not most, of whom were planning for careers in the ministry, that living by the Christian moral code is not only the good thing to do, but also that it is also the smart thing to do. He wrote a book outlining his ideas on the subject that was an enormous "hit" with the intellectuals of Europe. People rather liked books on morality and ethics in those days.
His book made such a big impression that an English noble decided that he, Adam Smith, was the best man he could hire to take his son and his ward on what was then called "The grand tour" of Europe. So Adam Smith went all over Europe with his young students in tow. And everywhere they went, they met with intellectuals who were eager to meet the author of "The Theory of Moral Sentiments". For his part, Adam Smith became convinced that there were good people in every country and, therefore, the precepts of Christian morality should be applied across national boundaries. Of course, he knew that if he wrote a book expressing this idea in the same way that it was expressed in his first book, that it would be so much waste paper. So he decided, I believe, to write a book rather like Newton’s, that is, one relying heavily on data and mathematical analysis.
In doing this, Adam Smith effectively founded the social science of economics. Most economists essentially follow his method, that is, they collect data and analyze it using logic and mathematics, and from that analysis draw conclusions. But while most economists follow his methods, most also disagree radically with his conclusions, something we will explore in coming blogs.
His achievement was remarkable. He showed that gold and wealth are not synonymous. He demonstrated that a free economy is not a "zero sum" society, i. e. one man’s gain is not another man’s expense. He made clear that "getting along" is a major key to wealth, because it allows each man to do what he does best and, depend on others to do likewise. This is in fact a major key to wealth. The other key is that thrift and saving allow men to get better and better tools; hence, increasing their productivity and ultimately, their material well-being.
He concluded from all this that men’s long term interests are in harmony. He believed in a system of natural liberty for all men and that such a system would greatly multiply their wealth. Finally, he believed that ordinary individuals could be trusted to manage their own affairs as long as they did not infringe on the rights of others.
The first famous person to use Adam Smith’s methods and quote his work, but who disagreed radically with his conclusions, was Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton believed strongly that ordinary men are incapable of being trusted with their own affairs and hence, must be directed, even controlled, by their superiors.
I believe that Adam Smith’s insights and those who followed him with similar beliefs can be very helpful to us as individuals to understand and even to live by the natural law. We will explore some of the ways in future blogs.
Newton convinced us forever that the interactions between particles are governed by natural law. The man most responsible for convincing intellectuals, at least, that there is a possibility that interactions between individuals is also governed by natural law is Adam Smith. Of course, scripture has always told us that interactions between people is governed by law, but many do not believe in scripture; therefore, Adam Smith’s contribution is mighty.
Adam Smith was a professor of moral philosophy in Scotland. Effectively that meant that his job was to teach young men, many, if not most, of whom were planning for careers in the ministry, that living by the Christian moral code is not only the good thing to do, but also that it is also the smart thing to do. He wrote a book outlining his ideas on the subject that was an enormous "hit" with the intellectuals of Europe. People rather liked books on morality and ethics in those days.
His book made such a big impression that an English noble decided that he, Adam Smith, was the best man he could hire to take his son and his ward on what was then called "The grand tour" of Europe. So Adam Smith went all over Europe with his young students in tow. And everywhere they went, they met with intellectuals who were eager to meet the author of "The Theory of Moral Sentiments". For his part, Adam Smith became convinced that there were good people in every country and, therefore, the precepts of Christian morality should be applied across national boundaries. Of course, he knew that if he wrote a book expressing this idea in the same way that it was expressed in his first book, that it would be so much waste paper. So he decided, I believe, to write a book rather like Newton’s, that is, one relying heavily on data and mathematical analysis.
In doing this, Adam Smith effectively founded the social science of economics. Most economists essentially follow his method, that is, they collect data and analyze it using logic and mathematics, and from that analysis draw conclusions. But while most economists follow his methods, most also disagree radically with his conclusions, something we will explore in coming blogs.
His achievement was remarkable. He showed that gold and wealth are not synonymous. He demonstrated that a free economy is not a "zero sum" society, i. e. one man’s gain is not another man’s expense. He made clear that "getting along" is a major key to wealth, because it allows each man to do what he does best and, depend on others to do likewise. This is in fact a major key to wealth. The other key is that thrift and saving allow men to get better and better tools; hence, increasing their productivity and ultimately, their material well-being.
He concluded from all this that men’s long term interests are in harmony. He believed in a system of natural liberty for all men and that such a system would greatly multiply their wealth. Finally, he believed that ordinary individuals could be trusted to manage their own affairs as long as they did not infringe on the rights of others.
The first famous person to use Adam Smith’s methods and quote his work, but who disagreed radically with his conclusions, was Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton believed strongly that ordinary men are incapable of being trusted with their own affairs and hence, must be directed, even controlled, by their superiors.
I believe that Adam Smith’s insights and those who followed him with similar beliefs can be very helpful to us as individuals to understand and even to live by the natural law. We will explore some of the ways in future blogs.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Personal econ--Natural law, Newton
Personal Econ--Natural Law, Newton
Isaac Newton gave us modern science. He took the work of his forerunners, Galileo and Kepler, stripped them of their sarcasm and mysticism, respectively, added his own remarkable insight, and gave us the book that launched modern science. At the end of his book, he adds a postscript in which he explains his motivation. There were problems with the theory of vortices--the theory with which Des Carte had attempted to explain the universe. The problems, Newton claimed, stemmed more from Des Carte’s philosophy than from his science or his mathematics. He failed to recognize that God is a governor and, as such is interested in the affairs of those over whom he has governance.
The French, predictably, did not care for Newton’s explanation. After all, the French and the English did not get along. Rather than admit that their objections were political, they attempted, as is so often the case, to show that Newton’s work was unscientific. Newton, they claimed had the universe held together by a "perpetual miracle". The "miracle" was the "action at a distant" force, gravity. We no longer consider "action at a distance" miraculous, because, it is necessary to our understanding of science. Einstein was able, in a way, to eliminate the Newtonian miracle, but his efforts to do so with the similar miracle of Gauss, Faraday, and Maxwell was not so successful.
In my history of science class, our teacher referred to Des Cartes theory, admittedly, somewhat derisively as "the whirlpool theory". It is my conviction that when we attempt to eliminate God as a governor, we wind up with a lot of "whirlpool-like" theories, i. e. theories that sound plausible enough but when applied the results are most unsatisfactory. This is particularly true in the field of economics.
It was, in my opinion, Adam Smith’s belief that interpersonal relationships between men was subject to law, what we call natural law, in the same way that the relationship of physical matter is subject to law. In writing "the Wealth of Nations" , he attempted to explicate some of those laws.
Isaac Newton gave us modern science. He took the work of his forerunners, Galileo and Kepler, stripped them of their sarcasm and mysticism, respectively, added his own remarkable insight, and gave us the book that launched modern science. At the end of his book, he adds a postscript in which he explains his motivation. There were problems with the theory of vortices--the theory with which Des Carte had attempted to explain the universe. The problems, Newton claimed, stemmed more from Des Carte’s philosophy than from his science or his mathematics. He failed to recognize that God is a governor and, as such is interested in the affairs of those over whom he has governance.
The French, predictably, did not care for Newton’s explanation. After all, the French and the English did not get along. Rather than admit that their objections were political, they attempted, as is so often the case, to show that Newton’s work was unscientific. Newton, they claimed had the universe held together by a "perpetual miracle". The "miracle" was the "action at a distant" force, gravity. We no longer consider "action at a distance" miraculous, because, it is necessary to our understanding of science. Einstein was able, in a way, to eliminate the Newtonian miracle, but his efforts to do so with the similar miracle of Gauss, Faraday, and Maxwell was not so successful.
In my history of science class, our teacher referred to Des Cartes theory, admittedly, somewhat derisively as "the whirlpool theory". It is my conviction that when we attempt to eliminate God as a governor, we wind up with a lot of "whirlpool-like" theories, i. e. theories that sound plausible enough but when applied the results are most unsatisfactory. This is particularly true in the field of economics.
It was, in my opinion, Adam Smith’s belief that interpersonal relationships between men was subject to law, what we call natural law, in the same way that the relationship of physical matter is subject to law. In writing "the Wealth of Nations" , he attempted to explicate some of those laws.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Personal Economics--Natural Law--I
Personal Economics--Natural Law
I have decided that for the next little while, I will explore the uses of economics in our personal lives, beginning with a discussion of natural law.
My boss often says that he hates stupid people. When exploring his meaning I have discovered that what he really means is that he is annoyed when people who do things that are important to him differently than he would do them. This leads to an intriguing question, "Is there always one right way to do things?" More important, "Is there a best way to behave?" The answer to both questions touches, I believe, on the question of natural law.
Of course, most men believe in natural law governing physical phenomena, that is, they acknowledge the absolute "law governing thing", but as soon as we seek out the "law governing man" there is a wide spread divergence.
Our fore-fathers believed that in the Scripture they had found the rule book of life, i. e. the natural laws governing conduct were laid out. For the most part those rules are rather strict and have never been particularly popular. As Jesus said, the way is strait and only a few bother to travel it. Those who choose self-indulgence, can usually find an excuse in the fact that many of those who profess belief do not follow the rules themselves. Or they may choose to be disbelievers. With the exceptions outlined later, disbelief itself is a form of self-indulgence, since it allows the disbeliever to pick and choose his rules, since there is no way that rules of human conduct can be derived from those governing physical phenomena.
It is a personal conviction that all understanding of real law, helps us as individuals to overcome the temptation to self-indulgence. So I will be exploring the ideas of how an understanding of economics can help us in that way. But I begin, in the next installment by looking first at a natural law philosopher who, I believe, was an important inspiration to the father of economics, Adam Smith, namely Isaac Newton.
I have decided that for the next little while, I will explore the uses of economics in our personal lives, beginning with a discussion of natural law.
My boss often says that he hates stupid people. When exploring his meaning I have discovered that what he really means is that he is annoyed when people who do things that are important to him differently than he would do them. This leads to an intriguing question, "Is there always one right way to do things?" More important, "Is there a best way to behave?" The answer to both questions touches, I believe, on the question of natural law.
Of course, most men believe in natural law governing physical phenomena, that is, they acknowledge the absolute "law governing thing", but as soon as we seek out the "law governing man" there is a wide spread divergence.
Our fore-fathers believed that in the Scripture they had found the rule book of life, i. e. the natural laws governing conduct were laid out. For the most part those rules are rather strict and have never been particularly popular. As Jesus said, the way is strait and only a few bother to travel it. Those who choose self-indulgence, can usually find an excuse in the fact that many of those who profess belief do not follow the rules themselves. Or they may choose to be disbelievers. With the exceptions outlined later, disbelief itself is a form of self-indulgence, since it allows the disbeliever to pick and choose his rules, since there is no way that rules of human conduct can be derived from those governing physical phenomena.
It is a personal conviction that all understanding of real law, helps us as individuals to overcome the temptation to self-indulgence. So I will be exploring the ideas of how an understanding of economics can help us in that way. But I begin, in the next installment by looking first at a natural law philosopher who, I believe, was an important inspiration to the father of economics, Adam Smith, namely Isaac Newton.
Friday, May 29, 2009
My Church Basketball Career
Some years ago I wrote this as a speech and offered to give it in church "if they were really desperate" and needed a long speech. No one has ever been that desperate.
My Church Basketball Career
My initial Church basketball career was very short.
As a young man growing up in the Church, I was blessed to be a part of a very active youth program. Our leaders were dedicated and saw to it that we had many opportunities to participate in all kinds of activities. I was the student body president of our high school, and so was active at school, but far and away my fondest memories are of the many activities at Church. Music, drama, speech, writing, and, or course, sports, were all on a busy agenda. Although very active in every thing else, I didn’t participate in the sports program, mostly because I had, as a young boy never developed the skills necessary for the games.
Sensing, perhaps, that I may have felt left out, the ward athletic director approached me at the beginning of basketball season one year and told me that if I would come out to the games and suit up that he would see to it that I got to play. Excited, I reported for the next game. True to his word, he put me in for about 10 minutes at the end of the game. Even more excited, I reported again for the next game. Apparently, too much was riding on the game for him to risk even a few minutes of my caliber of play, so I sat out the entire game. Much less excited, I reported again for the next game, with the same result as the previous game. Too proud to risk the same result one more time, I quit coming.
Do I resent what happened? In hind sight, at least, not at all. I made no real effort to become a more effective basketball player. I never went to practices, nor did I attempt to improve my skills on my own. In a sense, I was really hoping for the reward of recognition with little or no effort and I realized, even at the time, the small humiliation involved in the experience was a good thing. For one thing, it taught me that if I wanted to receive recognition, I needed to merit it. I also decided that sports was not an area into which I was willing to put my efforts, and I concluded that my basketball career, brief as it was, was over.
Years--a mission, a college education, and a stint in the army--later found me in a Singles Ward in the Avenues area of Salt Lake City. I was sitting peacefully in Priesthood meeting, contemplating the wonders of eternal bliss, when a counselor (I was the other) in the Elder’s Quorum Presidency, Mark Anderson, announced that he was passing around a sign-up sheet for basketball. He said it with a grin, because in the two years I had been in that ward, no one had ever signed up for any sport. We were not a very athletically inclined group. But, of course, at the beginning of every season, we would dutifully pass around a sign-up sheet, because--well, I’m not sure why we did it--I suspect that we sort of somehow, someway, felt we were supposed to.
We were well into our lesson that day, detailing I’m sure, some duty incumbent upon us to achieve the aforementioned eternal bliss--most likely, home teaching--a rather frequent topic in that particular ward, since each of us who were active had between 15 and 20 people assigned to us to visit--as I said, were well into the lesson, when all of sudden from the back of the room heard--without his having been called on or anything--a roar sounding something like,"hey, what is this! Nobody has signed up for the basketball team."
Mark quickly jumped to his feet and explained, "We’ve never had a team. We’re simply no interested in sports."
The man responsible for the disturbance also jumped to his feet. I recognized him as a new-comer to the ward, so new, in fact, the he didn’t even have a home teaching beat--which, in that ward meant that he had probably come for the first time the week before. He waved the blank basketball list--wildly, I thought--and threatened, "If we don’t have a basketball team, I’m going to stop coming to this ward."
My own thoughts at that moment were, as I remember them, "although it would be nice to have had you stay and help with the home teaching, it is obvious that we are incompatible, so I can only hope, in all charity, that you can find some other place to contemplate eternal bliss. Depart in peace."
Just as I was thinking these most charitable thoughts, I was handed a note saying, "There will be an emergency meeting of the Elder’s Quorum Presidency immediately after church."
I suspected, as I walked into the little room where we held our presidency meetings, that this was not one of those meetings where I would be asked for counsel, and I was right. The president, Joe Harris, was very to the point. We needed this brother in our ward, he declared in no uncertain terms, and if it required a basketball team to keep him there, then we were going to have a basketball team. "How can we have a basketball team?’ I demanded to know. "Nobody want to play basketball."
"We are going to have a basketball team," President Harris continued unflinchingly, "because everyone in this room has just received an official Church calling from his Elder’s Quorum President to be on the ward basketball team. Here’s the schedule."
And so we had a basketball team and I can look back on a Church basketball career that lasted one entire season. Of course, I was not planning on it lasting one entire season. Unlike my first time, I never went to the game excited--not the first game, not the last, not any in--between. But, unlike the first time, I got to play in every game--every minute of every game. It turns out that of the four of us forced--that is "called"--to play, myself, Mark, Joe and Doug Anderson, I was the tallest at under 6', which proved to be a bit of a handicap since, it turns out that in basketball, having tall players is an advantage. Of course, I personally do not think that the height disadvantage would have hurt us all that much if any of us could have dribbled or shot the ball. To make matters worse, it turns out that the other wards in our stake took basketball very very seriously. Most of the other ward teams had players who had recently played on the varsity teams for BYU or the UofU. None of the teams other than ours had any players that I ever met who had not at least been first string high school players. So, as you might suspect, we did not fare well, score wise, at least. The only person who really had developed the basic basketball skills was the newcomer--whose name I forget. I forget his name because after the first very sound defeat, we never saw him again. I’m not sure he moved, but I am sure he moved on.
Then why did we continue playing? Because--as so often happens in this lone and dreary world where weeds grow everywhere and bliss never lingers eternally--someone else moved into our ward who wanted to play ball. At our second game Glenn Fenn showed up. Glenn, at 6' 4", took over my place at center, and I took over the spot of the newcomer--who, as mentioned, had ceased to come. Glenn was a really good ball player and to this day I admire his sportsmanship. He seemed happy just to be playing, even though it meant playing on a team that counted it a victory if they lost by only 40 points.
And for all the fun I make of that experience, it really was a very unpleasant one for me. I really don’t know how Glenn felt, or for that matter how Mark or Doug or even Joe felt. For my part, losing never bothered me, not for a minute. After all, I was there because I was told to be. What really bothered me, what bothers me still, was the violence. Of course, the hurts and the bruises have long since healed. Fortunately, they were never very serious, even at the time, but they were deeply resented.
The problem was that, with all our disadvantages, we had one very important advantage--we were, all of us, in excellent physical condition. For my part, I swam a mile almost every day; the others on the team either did that or ran for several miles. Our opponents were, for the most part, in poor physical condition, at least in the sense, that they were out of shape.
The result was that our games, which I can at this distance view philosophically, took on an interesting but unpleasant patter. Always it became quickly apparent in a game that we were not here dealing with a real contest. Usually, within minutes, we were as many as twenty points behind. In the early part of the game, our opponents were courteous to a fault. If there was a hit or other physical violation, they generally apologized. But as the game wore on things changed. For one thing, the difference in the score began to narrow. This occurred initially because the opposing team relaxed after they had a very comfortable margin, but as they became tired, we began to get points simply because we had more stamina (and also, because we did, after all, have one player who could actually play).
It was usually at this point that the game became, in my opinion, violent. I, or one of my teammates, would run down the court with the ball. One of the opponents would come behind, and , unable to block the ball fairly, would simply strike, or shove, or even kick the man with the ball. Of course, the first few times this happened, the offender was punished with a foul, but then the thing occurred which I found, and still find, most offensive of all.
The official in our games was chosen from the young men, usually a volunteer who had just completed a game in the junior team games which preceded our own. Early in the game his decisions were treated with respect, but as the game wore on and the players became tired, they were not. In the latter part of the game, as a team member found himself being called for a foul, he would often yell, sometimes even swear at, and on a few occasions, even threaten, the official. After that happened, the young man would essentially retreat from the game. He would stay on the floor, but it was fairly clear to everyone that they were free to do as they chose.
By the end of the game, frequently I felt like I had been beaten up. Fortunately, the one thing the official always retained the courage to do was to blow the final whistle. As we would change our clothes in the dressing room after the game, I can remember feeling deep resentment toward many of those who, in my opinion, at least, had been so brutal.. I’m sorry to say that on more than one occasion, my resentment got the best of me. On a member of the opposing team attempted an apology, "I guess things got a little rough out there and I got carried away," he said. I’m afraid that my own resentment boiled over at that point. I’m sure he expected me to say, "that’s O.K., its only a game" or some such. What I actually said was "They did, and you did." He walked away obviously a little miffed.
Their lack of discipline on the court, I am sorry to say, led to a lack of discipline on my part at stake meetings, where I would encounter these brethren in their official Church capacities, and occasionally as these men were called on to speak or otherwise give instructions, I would find myself asking, "How can you speak of love and compassion now and yet be so brutal on the basketball court?"
This was, of course, years ago and I had all but forgotten about it until recently when, in bishopric meeting, it was reported that a member of the High Council had gotten into a very nasty fight during a basketball game. Apparently, such fighting is common, but the Stake President was a little disappointed that a member of the High Council would be involved.
I have asked myself, why men act in a manner so obviously contrary to all that they profess and admonish. As I expressed this question to some of my fellows they have simply responded, "You, being not interested in sports, do not understand." That is probably true. My Bishop told me about being deliberately hit with a baseball bat during a fight after a Church baseball game. He laughed about it and said, "That’s just the way it is in sports. People sometimes get carried away." While I probably don’t understand everything about it, I do understand enough to know that to all a game to become violent in even the slightest degree, to lose one’s self control, is wrong.
I sometimes regret not having been involved with sports, because the discipline of sports is, I recognize, extremely important. We are often told that next to religion it is the most important discipline, particularly in the life of youth. But there is a vast difference in the two as disciplines. The apostle Paul outlined the difference best, I believe, in his comment in Corinthians, about those who participate in athletics, "they do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible." (Icor. 9:25) The only real reason for participating in athletics at all, in my opinion, is to develop the discipline of living by rules when the competition is terribly, terribly intense, but the stakes are very very low. The crown is, as Paul said, "corruptible". In his day it was a laurel wreath which would last for a few weeks. It is probably with this in mind that he made his famous comment, "Bodily exercise profiteth little" (I Tim. 4:8) He certainly did not mean that we should "let our bodies go", so to speak, because in the Corinthians passage, he tells us that he feels that his very salvation dpends upon keeping his body in subjection.
In religion, in almost complete contrast to sports, the stakes are very very, almost infinitely, high, but there is little if any intensity of competition or urgency. Those who can exercise discipline when there is great intensity but almost nothing at stake--or at least, nothing of any value, are better prepared, we are told, to exercise discipline when there is something of value at stake but the intensity of feeling is lower.
But of the competition in my basketball games, it could be said, not only was there little at stake, there was absolutely nothing at stake, not even a game. All that could be said to be at stake at all was a little momentary glory, a vain imagination. I have decided the real problem was that those men had ceased to be what they saw themselves as being and they were unwilling to pay the price to really become what they wanted to be, so they simply made up the difference by taking a shortcut. As so often happens in the world, that shortcut involved violence and the breaking of the rules. It was excused with the feeling that "this is only a game and, therefore, this time doesn’t count.
The testimony of scripture is that ever conscious moment counts. Eternity hangs on every moment. If we are willing to take shortcut, to compromise values, when only a bit of vainglory is at stake, what will we do when we perceive our livelihood, our basic needs, our standing in the community, our respectability are at stake? I suspect that we will find ourselves more and more saying, "this time doesn’t count." We will make exceptions for not only "only a game" but the vacation, a trip, a time of stress, "I’m out of work", "he made me mad", until the exceptions encompass life.
When the imagination runs too far away from the reality, we say a man has gone insane--he thinks he is something that he does not even closely resemble. Fortunately, this is rare. Less rare is the case in which the vain imagination, nurtured while neglecting the subjection of the body, leads to actions that a labeled immoral or irresponsible--a sort of temporary insanity. But most often those kinds of actions begin with actions that we simply label as "inappropriate" or even "inadequate". Many of the actions on the sports fields fall into this category.
My basketball career, I feel confident, is completely closed, but as I contemplate it I can’t help but feel that what I learned--the subjugation of the body and the "casting down of vain imaginations" are as important now as then. I feel that therein lies the key to peace--in life and even on the basketball court.
My Church Basketball Career
My initial Church basketball career was very short.
As a young man growing up in the Church, I was blessed to be a part of a very active youth program. Our leaders were dedicated and saw to it that we had many opportunities to participate in all kinds of activities. I was the student body president of our high school, and so was active at school, but far and away my fondest memories are of the many activities at Church. Music, drama, speech, writing, and, or course, sports, were all on a busy agenda. Although very active in every thing else, I didn’t participate in the sports program, mostly because I had, as a young boy never developed the skills necessary for the games.
Sensing, perhaps, that I may have felt left out, the ward athletic director approached me at the beginning of basketball season one year and told me that if I would come out to the games and suit up that he would see to it that I got to play. Excited, I reported for the next game. True to his word, he put me in for about 10 minutes at the end of the game. Even more excited, I reported again for the next game. Apparently, too much was riding on the game for him to risk even a few minutes of my caliber of play, so I sat out the entire game. Much less excited, I reported again for the next game, with the same result as the previous game. Too proud to risk the same result one more time, I quit coming.
Do I resent what happened? In hind sight, at least, not at all. I made no real effort to become a more effective basketball player. I never went to practices, nor did I attempt to improve my skills on my own. In a sense, I was really hoping for the reward of recognition with little or no effort and I realized, even at the time, the small humiliation involved in the experience was a good thing. For one thing, it taught me that if I wanted to receive recognition, I needed to merit it. I also decided that sports was not an area into which I was willing to put my efforts, and I concluded that my basketball career, brief as it was, was over.
Years--a mission, a college education, and a stint in the army--later found me in a Singles Ward in the Avenues area of Salt Lake City. I was sitting peacefully in Priesthood meeting, contemplating the wonders of eternal bliss, when a counselor (I was the other) in the Elder’s Quorum Presidency, Mark Anderson, announced that he was passing around a sign-up sheet for basketball. He said it with a grin, because in the two years I had been in that ward, no one had ever signed up for any sport. We were not a very athletically inclined group. But, of course, at the beginning of every season, we would dutifully pass around a sign-up sheet, because--well, I’m not sure why we did it--I suspect that we sort of somehow, someway, felt we were supposed to.
We were well into our lesson that day, detailing I’m sure, some duty incumbent upon us to achieve the aforementioned eternal bliss--most likely, home teaching--a rather frequent topic in that particular ward, since each of us who were active had between 15 and 20 people assigned to us to visit--as I said, were well into the lesson, when all of sudden from the back of the room heard--without his having been called on or anything--a roar sounding something like,"hey, what is this! Nobody has signed up for the basketball team."
Mark quickly jumped to his feet and explained, "We’ve never had a team. We’re simply no interested in sports."
The man responsible for the disturbance also jumped to his feet. I recognized him as a new-comer to the ward, so new, in fact, the he didn’t even have a home teaching beat--which, in that ward meant that he had probably come for the first time the week before. He waved the blank basketball list--wildly, I thought--and threatened, "If we don’t have a basketball team, I’m going to stop coming to this ward."
My own thoughts at that moment were, as I remember them, "although it would be nice to have had you stay and help with the home teaching, it is obvious that we are incompatible, so I can only hope, in all charity, that you can find some other place to contemplate eternal bliss. Depart in peace."
Just as I was thinking these most charitable thoughts, I was handed a note saying, "There will be an emergency meeting of the Elder’s Quorum Presidency immediately after church."
I suspected, as I walked into the little room where we held our presidency meetings, that this was not one of those meetings where I would be asked for counsel, and I was right. The president, Joe Harris, was very to the point. We needed this brother in our ward, he declared in no uncertain terms, and if it required a basketball team to keep him there, then we were going to have a basketball team. "How can we have a basketball team?’ I demanded to know. "Nobody want to play basketball."
"We are going to have a basketball team," President Harris continued unflinchingly, "because everyone in this room has just received an official Church calling from his Elder’s Quorum President to be on the ward basketball team. Here’s the schedule."
And so we had a basketball team and I can look back on a Church basketball career that lasted one entire season. Of course, I was not planning on it lasting one entire season. Unlike my first time, I never went to the game excited--not the first game, not the last, not any in--between. But, unlike the first time, I got to play in every game--every minute of every game. It turns out that of the four of us forced--that is "called"--to play, myself, Mark, Joe and Doug Anderson, I was the tallest at under 6', which proved to be a bit of a handicap since, it turns out that in basketball, having tall players is an advantage. Of course, I personally do not think that the height disadvantage would have hurt us all that much if any of us could have dribbled or shot the ball. To make matters worse, it turns out that the other wards in our stake took basketball very very seriously. Most of the other ward teams had players who had recently played on the varsity teams for BYU or the UofU. None of the teams other than ours had any players that I ever met who had not at least been first string high school players. So, as you might suspect, we did not fare well, score wise, at least. The only person who really had developed the basic basketball skills was the newcomer--whose name I forget. I forget his name because after the first very sound defeat, we never saw him again. I’m not sure he moved, but I am sure he moved on.
Then why did we continue playing? Because--as so often happens in this lone and dreary world where weeds grow everywhere and bliss never lingers eternally--someone else moved into our ward who wanted to play ball. At our second game Glenn Fenn showed up. Glenn, at 6' 4", took over my place at center, and I took over the spot of the newcomer--who, as mentioned, had ceased to come. Glenn was a really good ball player and to this day I admire his sportsmanship. He seemed happy just to be playing, even though it meant playing on a team that counted it a victory if they lost by only 40 points.
And for all the fun I make of that experience, it really was a very unpleasant one for me. I really don’t know how Glenn felt, or for that matter how Mark or Doug or even Joe felt. For my part, losing never bothered me, not for a minute. After all, I was there because I was told to be. What really bothered me, what bothers me still, was the violence. Of course, the hurts and the bruises have long since healed. Fortunately, they were never very serious, even at the time, but they were deeply resented.
The problem was that, with all our disadvantages, we had one very important advantage--we were, all of us, in excellent physical condition. For my part, I swam a mile almost every day; the others on the team either did that or ran for several miles. Our opponents were, for the most part, in poor physical condition, at least in the sense, that they were out of shape.
The result was that our games, which I can at this distance view philosophically, took on an interesting but unpleasant patter. Always it became quickly apparent in a game that we were not here dealing with a real contest. Usually, within minutes, we were as many as twenty points behind. In the early part of the game, our opponents were courteous to a fault. If there was a hit or other physical violation, they generally apologized. But as the game wore on things changed. For one thing, the difference in the score began to narrow. This occurred initially because the opposing team relaxed after they had a very comfortable margin, but as they became tired, we began to get points simply because we had more stamina (and also, because we did, after all, have one player who could actually play).
It was usually at this point that the game became, in my opinion, violent. I, or one of my teammates, would run down the court with the ball. One of the opponents would come behind, and , unable to block the ball fairly, would simply strike, or shove, or even kick the man with the ball. Of course, the first few times this happened, the offender was punished with a foul, but then the thing occurred which I found, and still find, most offensive of all.
The official in our games was chosen from the young men, usually a volunteer who had just completed a game in the junior team games which preceded our own. Early in the game his decisions were treated with respect, but as the game wore on and the players became tired, they were not. In the latter part of the game, as a team member found himself being called for a foul, he would often yell, sometimes even swear at, and on a few occasions, even threaten, the official. After that happened, the young man would essentially retreat from the game. He would stay on the floor, but it was fairly clear to everyone that they were free to do as they chose.
By the end of the game, frequently I felt like I had been beaten up. Fortunately, the one thing the official always retained the courage to do was to blow the final whistle. As we would change our clothes in the dressing room after the game, I can remember feeling deep resentment toward many of those who, in my opinion, at least, had been so brutal.. I’m sorry to say that on more than one occasion, my resentment got the best of me. On a member of the opposing team attempted an apology, "I guess things got a little rough out there and I got carried away," he said. I’m afraid that my own resentment boiled over at that point. I’m sure he expected me to say, "that’s O.K., its only a game" or some such. What I actually said was "They did, and you did." He walked away obviously a little miffed.
Their lack of discipline on the court, I am sorry to say, led to a lack of discipline on my part at stake meetings, where I would encounter these brethren in their official Church capacities, and occasionally as these men were called on to speak or otherwise give instructions, I would find myself asking, "How can you speak of love and compassion now and yet be so brutal on the basketball court?"
This was, of course, years ago and I had all but forgotten about it until recently when, in bishopric meeting, it was reported that a member of the High Council had gotten into a very nasty fight during a basketball game. Apparently, such fighting is common, but the Stake President was a little disappointed that a member of the High Council would be involved.
I have asked myself, why men act in a manner so obviously contrary to all that they profess and admonish. As I expressed this question to some of my fellows they have simply responded, "You, being not interested in sports, do not understand." That is probably true. My Bishop told me about being deliberately hit with a baseball bat during a fight after a Church baseball game. He laughed about it and said, "That’s just the way it is in sports. People sometimes get carried away." While I probably don’t understand everything about it, I do understand enough to know that to all a game to become violent in even the slightest degree, to lose one’s self control, is wrong.
I sometimes regret not having been involved with sports, because the discipline of sports is, I recognize, extremely important. We are often told that next to religion it is the most important discipline, particularly in the life of youth. But there is a vast difference in the two as disciplines. The apostle Paul outlined the difference best, I believe, in his comment in Corinthians, about those who participate in athletics, "they do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible." (Icor. 9:25) The only real reason for participating in athletics at all, in my opinion, is to develop the discipline of living by rules when the competition is terribly, terribly intense, but the stakes are very very low. The crown is, as Paul said, "corruptible". In his day it was a laurel wreath which would last for a few weeks. It is probably with this in mind that he made his famous comment, "Bodily exercise profiteth little" (I Tim. 4:8) He certainly did not mean that we should "let our bodies go", so to speak, because in the Corinthians passage, he tells us that he feels that his very salvation dpends upon keeping his body in subjection.
In religion, in almost complete contrast to sports, the stakes are very very, almost infinitely, high, but there is little if any intensity of competition or urgency. Those who can exercise discipline when there is great intensity but almost nothing at stake--or at least, nothing of any value, are better prepared, we are told, to exercise discipline when there is something of value at stake but the intensity of feeling is lower.
But of the competition in my basketball games, it could be said, not only was there little at stake, there was absolutely nothing at stake, not even a game. All that could be said to be at stake at all was a little momentary glory, a vain imagination. I have decided the real problem was that those men had ceased to be what they saw themselves as being and they were unwilling to pay the price to really become what they wanted to be, so they simply made up the difference by taking a shortcut. As so often happens in the world, that shortcut involved violence and the breaking of the rules. It was excused with the feeling that "this is only a game and, therefore, this time doesn’t count.
The testimony of scripture is that ever conscious moment counts. Eternity hangs on every moment. If we are willing to take shortcut, to compromise values, when only a bit of vainglory is at stake, what will we do when we perceive our livelihood, our basic needs, our standing in the community, our respectability are at stake? I suspect that we will find ourselves more and more saying, "this time doesn’t count." We will make exceptions for not only "only a game" but the vacation, a trip, a time of stress, "I’m out of work", "he made me mad", until the exceptions encompass life.
When the imagination runs too far away from the reality, we say a man has gone insane--he thinks he is something that he does not even closely resemble. Fortunately, this is rare. Less rare is the case in which the vain imagination, nurtured while neglecting the subjection of the body, leads to actions that a labeled immoral or irresponsible--a sort of temporary insanity. But most often those kinds of actions begin with actions that we simply label as "inappropriate" or even "inadequate". Many of the actions on the sports fields fall into this category.
My basketball career, I feel confident, is completely closed, but as I contemplate it I can’t help but feel that what I learned--the subjugation of the body and the "casting down of vain imaginations" are as important now as then. I feel that therein lies the key to peace--in life and even on the basketball court.
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