The Argument From Prosperity
The claim that prosperity is a sure evidence of divine favor, and that adversity is a sure proof of the divine displeasure, is as old as the time of Job. The three friends, “miserable comforters,” of that afflicted man argued that his loss of property and sons and daughters was positive proof that he had departed from the ways of righteousness, and had forfeited the favor of God. And so Eliphaz said: “Remember, I pray thee, who ever perished, being innocent? or where were the upright cut off? According as I have seen, they that plow iniquity, and sow trouble, reap the same. By the breath of God they perish, and by the blast of his anger are they consumed.” Job took the opposite view, and declared: “The tents of robbers prosper, and they that provoke God are secure; into whose hand God bringeth abundantly.” The book of Job was written with special reference to this argument from prosperity, and to give such light upon this subject that the Jews need not reject the Messiah when he should come, on the ground that his poverty and his life of toil and sorrow were sufficient proof that he could not be Isaiah’s Emmanuel, “God with us.” We have no desire to shake the confidence of any one in the fact that God does often bless his children with temporal prosperity, but it is also true that wicked men acquire large wealth. The psalmist testifies: “I was envious at the arrogant, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.” And again he says: “Fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass.” So Jeremiah, the prophet, inquires, “Wherefore doth the way of the wicked prosper? wherefore are all they at ease that deal very treacherously?” It is clear that in order to render a true verdict in any particular case some other factors must be taken into account besides the mere fact of financial prosperity. If any one is inclined to argue that the success of one business enterprise and the failure of competitors is a proof of right principles at the foundation and of divinely approved methods of administration, let him consider the facts concerning the greatest commercial combination in the world to-day: “The Standard Oil Company of to-day is a New Jersey corporation, which controls ninety per cent of the Eastern oil production. It makes twenty-one and one-half million barrels out of the twenty-four million barrels of petroleum products made in this country. Its receipts are enormous. For five years its annual dividends have averaged about forty-five million dollars, or nearly fifty per cent on its capitalization—a sum which, capitalized at five per cent, would be nine hundred million dollars.” And yet the same writer who calls attention to these facts characterizes the record of the doings of the Standard Oil Company as “perhaps the blackest page in the history of American commerce,” and declares that “there are too many features of its career which tend so to stir the blood as to make the impartial temper of the historian hard to maintain.” The wrecks of competitors strew the whole path of the Oil Trust, while it has been amassing almost untold wealth; but who would like to urge this as an evidence of divine approval of its policy and methods? To do so would be to overthrow all received standards of righteousness in conduct. The argument from prosperity will not stand against the fact of disobedience to divine instruction and a disregard of divine principles. We can not prove God’s way wrong and our own way right by pointing to temporal prosperity. In the end God’s way will be vindicated as the only way of real prosperity.