Image via WikipediaRead related » History of the Jews [Kindle Edition]It was the European Jews, excluded from virtually all other means of sustaining themselves, other means that were not restricted to gentiles by Christian doctrine, who made ends meet by lending money for interest. Not exorbitant or unlawful rates of interest [usury], as is habitually and falsely alleged, but some interest for the very real services rendered and risks taken. And, in return for such vital service to European society, the Jews were resented, envied, frequently un-repaid, slandered, hated, and murdered. For many centuries, and counting. Moreover, the hatred has spread beyond European bounds, having attained its dubious status of the universal irrational hatred.
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“One of the greatest contributions the Jews made to human progress was to force European culture to come to terms with money and its power. Human societies have always shown an extraordidnary unwillingness to demystify money and see it for what it is — a commodity like any other, whose value is relative. They tend, indeed, to attach absolute values to all commodities — failing to see that the value of a thing varies in time and space [spacetime] — and particularly to money because it has a fixed apparent value [denomination]. They also invest money with special moral overtones. Why did St. Paul lay down, and countless millions thoughtlessly repeat, 'The love of money is the root of all evil'? Why not the love of land or of flocks or horses; or houses or paintings? Or, most of all, the love of power? There is no ascertainable reason why money should be viewed with such opprobrium. Moreover, the moral distinction between money and all other commodities spread over into the notion of investment, making it extraordinarily difficult to construct an ethical framework for saving and economic development. Men bred cattle with honour; they sowed grain and reaped it worthily. But if they made money work for them they were parasites and lived on 'unearned increment', as it came to be termed.” [emphasis added]
— Paul Johnson, History of the Jews
The Jews rationalized the role of money in civilized society and thereby ushered in the concepts of economic theory, becoming bankers and entrepreneurs before those words and concepts had been defined. But those who hated them for such innovations clung to their ignorant world views, the most debilitating (to everyone) and murderous (to Jews exclusively) of which is that acquiring wealth is a zero-sum game. To this day, the conventional ignorance is that Joe Sixpack's financial problems are entirely attributable to the avarice of fat-cat financiers and investors, as if the phenomenal creation of wealth through economic expansion had never occurred.
The only known antidote to such widespread ignorance is education. But in order for education to succeed, society must be persuaded of its inherent value, because it requires time and effort on the part of teachers and pupils. But society tends to take the easy way out when confronted by what are perceived to be challenges without obvious short-term gratifications, especially when there is no shortage of instantly-gratifying alternatives. And so the square-root of evil marches on along its bloody path of destruction.
Have a nice day.
Post 1,495 The Square-Root of Evil Is Ignorance
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