Christianity and Islam free essay sample

Christianity and Islam are the two most recognized religions in the world today. And their attitudes toward merchants and trade has had a major effect on the worlds economy even dating back to the founding of the religions. Islams firsts views on trade where very positive most likely due to the fact that its founder, Muhammad was a merchant himself. However Christianities first views on merchants and trade were more negative. Jesus the founder of Christianity was a carpenter and thought that the only way to reach heaven was through spiritual means rather than through the shady arts of merchants and trading. Although the first attitudes on merchants and trade were negative from Christianity and positive from Islam over the next 1500 years their views had changed into the opposite of what was first conceived. When Christianity came into existence Jesus first said to his disciples in around the year 70 – 80 C. We will write a custom essay sample on Christianity and Islam or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page E. In the book of Matthew (Doc 1) it says â€Å"Then said Jesus unto his disciples, Verily I say unto you, That a rich man shall hardly enter into the kingdom of heaven. And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. This shows how Jesus point of view on merchants and trade was that it was a business of sinners and that the rich would never go to heaven. However Islam even after being founded 600 years after Christianity showed positive attitudes toward trade and merchants. There is a teaching in the Muslim Quran from around 620 to 650 C. E. (Doc 2) that says in the first three lines â€Å"O ye believers! devour not each others property among yourselves unlawfully save that by mutual trading consent. Woe to the cheaters! ho, when they take measure of their dues from men, take it fully; and when they measure out to others or weigh out for them, they give less than is due. And give full measures when you measure out and weigh with true balance. This is fair and better in the end. † What Muhammad was showing was that trade is acceptable as long as it was done fair and in the final line in this teaching (Doc 2) it says â€Å"On the day of judgment, the honest, truthful Muslim merchant will take rank with the martyrs of the faith. This shows that Islams attitude towards traders and merchants was taken very highly. During the next 520 years the attitudes toward trade and merchants begins to change the first noted is in Christianity. In the year 1170 C. E. a monk of Durham by the name of Reginald who was a younger contemporary and colleague of St. Godric. He wrote a book on the life of St. Godric before his death. In the book titled The Life of St. Godric (Doc 3), Reginald says â€Å"He chose not to follow the life of a husbandman, but rather to study, learn and exercise the rudiment of more subtle conceptions. For this reason, aspiring to the merchant’s trade, he began to follow the chapmans [peddler’s] way of life, first learning how to gain in small bargains and things of insignificant price; and to gain from things of greater expense. † In this paragraph Reginald is saying that this man chose to follow the life of a trader which according to Jesus was something that would deny you the path to heaven. However later on in St. Godrics life â€Å" And now he lived sixteen years as a merchant, and began to think of spending on charity, to God’s honor and service, the goods which he had so laboriously acquired. He therefore took the cross as a pilgrim to Jerusalem. Godric was now already firmly disposed to give himself entirely to God’s service. Wherefore, that he might follow Christ more freely, he sold all his possessions and distributed them among the poor. For above all things he coveted the life of a hermit. † This shows that even though St. Godric was a wealthy trade but since he gave all his money and valuables to the Church in pursuit of religious solitude he became a saint. This book however may be bias do to the fact that it was written by a colleague of St. Godrics and also it was released before his death so some things may have been held back by Reginald. Around 103 years later in the year 1273 C. E. another book is published by a Christian theologian by the name of Thomas Aquinas. In his book titled Summa Theologica (Doc 4) Thomas says â€Å" It is written (Matthew vii. 12): All things†¦whatsoever you would that men should do to you, do you also to them. But no man wishes to buy a thing for more than its worth. Therefore no man should sell a thing to another man for more than its worth. This shows that Thomass point of view and Christian attitudes on merchants and trade have gone from strongly negative to accepting. Thomas Aquinas goes on to quote the non-Christian writings of Cicero. He says â€Å"Hence Tully [Cicero, the Roman writer] says: Contracts should be entirely free from double-dealing: the seller must not impose upon the bidder, nor the buyer against one that bids against him. † This Christian Theologians book is bias however in the fact that he was trained by the church and was probably written in order to benefit themselves by reaching out to a wider circle of people. Into the fourteenth century Islams attitudes on trade and merchants begins to change and not in favor of merchants and traders. In an article published by Ibn Khaldun, leading Muslim scholar, titled Universal History (Kitab al-ibar). In the beginning Ibn goes on to say that (Doc 5) â€Å"Commerce is the increasing of capital by buying goods and attempting to sell them at a price higher than their cost. This is done either by waiting for a rise in the market price; or by transporting the goods to another place where they are more keenly demanded and therefore fetch a higher price; or, lastly, by selling them on a long-term credit basis. Ibn is fine with this idea but he goes onto state what truly happens. â€Å"In order to achieve this increase in capital, it is necessary to have enough initial capital to pay in cash the sellers from whom one buys the goods; it is also necessary to sell for cash, as honesty is not widespread among people. This dishonesty leads on the one hand to fraud and the adulteration of goods, and on the other to delays on payment which diminish profits because capital remains idle during the interval. It also induces buyers to repudiate their debts, a practice which is very injurious to the merchant’s capital. The manners of the tradesmen are inferior to those of the rulers, and far removed from manliness and uprightness. We have already stated that traders must buy and sell and seek profits. This necessitates flattery , and evasiveness, and litigation and disputation, all of which are characteristic of this profession. And these qualities lead to a decrease and weakening in virtue and manliness. For these acts inevitably affect the soul. Ibn Khaldun is saying that the basis of the practices that merchants use to make profits is sinful and which inevitably affects the soul. This shows how the Islamic community has been affected by unfair dealings which Muhammad didnt see as what was the framework for how merchants made profit. While this was happening in the Islamic community the Christian community was bright with merchants and trade. People began to use God as a support for doing business. One such example is that of letters written to and from Italian merchants in the ourteenth century. In the first two letters an order is being placed for a painting of the Virgin Mary and God (Doc 6) in the letters it says â€Å"A panel of Our Lady on a background of fine gold with two doors, making a fine show with good and handsome figures by the best painter. Let there be in the center Our Lord on the Cross, or Our Lady, whomsoever you can find – I care not, so that the figures be handsome and large, the best and finest you can purvey, and the cost no more than 51/2 or 61/2 florins. After this the merchants responds that nothing can be found so the buyer says â€Å"You tell me you can find no pictures for the money we will pay, for there are none so cheap, and therefore we bid you, if you find no good things at fair cost, leave them, for here there is no great demand. They should be bought when the master artist who makes them is in need. † This shows how the buyers will wait until the painters almost out of work when the prices will be lowered only in order for the painter to stay alive to buy the painting. The other letters describe how merchants have become so valued that people put trade before religion and the people around the traders fear that they might start to crave the materiel world, this is one thing Christianity did not allow. These changes finally ended with Islam showing that its attitudes were strongly against merchants and trade. This happened in around the seventeenth century at an Islamic Court decision where a man was tried against by his former guild for breaking their trade rules in order to make money form himself instead of the guild. In the Court decision (Doc 7) it says â€Å"that Sah Mehmed and Haci Mehmed and others from the weavers’ guild summoned [to court] Sakaoglu Nasuh from the said guild and said in complaint: â€Å"Whenever cotton yarn comes to [town], the aforementioned arrives, pays an extra price, and takes it from its owner, and the other weavers remain deprived [of cotton yarn]. As of old, when cotton yarn came, we all bought it together. The aforementioned has now acted contrary to the old custom; we do not agree to this. †