Unit B Week 4
Lecture Summary
 "It
is easy to perform a good action, but not easy to acquire a settled
habit of performing such actions."
Aristotle
(384 - 322 B.C.)
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The first evidence of organized charity emerged in the Middle East several
thousand years ago. The moral codes and laws at the time have commonalities
which have survived in the world's religions and philosophical traditions.
There were taboos on killing, stealing, telling lies, and sexual misconduct
(e.g. incest is a universal taboo). And these codified norms compelled
people to suppress feelings of pride, maliciousness, coveting, envy, greed,
and lust.
As societies developed, the phenomenon of sacrificial destruction
gave way to the giving of alms (a gift of charity). Alms giving was a
simple form of personal, and even anonymous giving. It took the form of
giving food, taking personal care for others, and leaving things for anonymous
consumption or for the gods. The giving of alms helped to mitigate the
harsh economic realities of life and gave the giver empathy for the condition
of the poor so they would feel a sense of solidarity with them. This mutual
aid was a characteristic of the solidarity of the Jewish people. The Greeks
and Romans expanded giving to a form of political economy. The morality
of mutual aid and almsgiving is adopted as the sectarian morality of Christianity.
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