# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_August 1864_S227
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Martin Chemnitz on Usury. 227

but one that, out of poverty, is unable and faltering, so that he cannot do the
work of his calling. This man, the text says, you shall take in and support,
before he is brought to extreme want or to the beggar's staff. Is this,
however, to be done by purchase or exchange? Does not Scripture itself say
that he is unable and faltering? Or by alms? Paul answers, 2 Thessalonians
3:12: He who is able to work shall eat his own bread; and 1 Thessalonians
4:12: That you may need none of them. To this class of people, therefore,
God prescribes two kinds and manners: that either their service be hired out
(for in that very place, Leviticus 25:39, he gives instructions concerning day
laborers or servants who, out of poverty, sell themselves to others), or that,
where their calling does not well allow for a hiring out of services, they be
helped by lending. And God wills that this service be a gratuitous one, so
that the one who is to be helped is not oppressed and exploited. 3. There
are, finally, also those who have God's blessing and possess goods and
means with which they can acquire and maintain the necessities of life. But
because God has not given even the rich so much that they can dispense
with contracts altogether, he wills that they too be bound together, socially,
with the rest of mankind, in civil life, through those lawful exchanges. It is
plain, however, that exchange with this estate — when they have need of our
goods or services — need not take place by way of alms; and when Scripture
commands that we come to the aid of the needy and impoverished through
gratuitous lending, it thereby shows that this duty of service is not
prescribed for the sake of those who themselves have abundance. To this
estate, therefore, the remaining lawful contracts — purchase, lease, exchange,
etc. — are set before it. This is so evident that it is recognized also from the
law of nature. For God has willed that among all estates of men such
exchange should take place, so that there might be a societal bond, as has
been said in the chapter on contracts.

But two rules must be added: 1. that almsgiving and lending have
special and exceedingly glorious promises in Scripture. Not so, however, the
remaining contracts; rather, these are included within the general promises
of the divine commandment. The second rule is: that over everything we
have so far said about the distinction of contracts and persons, love is set as
mistress and governor. For within the several estates, even lawful forms of
exchange become wrong and impermissible when they are practiced without
love for one's neighbor, or when they conflict with it. As indeed, concerning
lending, Scripture plainly and expressly teaches that rule. For the 37th Psalm
says, verse 21, that it is fair that in lending the principal be restored; but if
the debtor has become poor, then the law says, Exodus 22:24: You shall not
cause him harm; verses 25–26: If you take a pledge, and it is the only thing
he has for the necessary preservation of his life,