# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_August 1864_S231
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Martin Chemnitz on Usury. 231

of a house, of a donkey, etc., can be sold, so that the right of ownership
remains with the lessor, then the use of money too could be sold, so that
the right of ownership over the principal, which is to be reclaimed again,
remains with the creditor. For just as, for the convenience of trade, the
use of coined money has been necessary, so too, for the maintenance of
civil business dealings, the use of borrowed money is necessary, and in
any case equality must be maintained, so that not only the recipient is not
burdened, but also not the one who lends. As therefore, in the remaining
contracts, merchants can, in a permissible way, stipulate a profit for
themselves by agreement, so too, in the loan contract, something over
and above the principal can be stipulated with the third estate for the use
of the money. Further, usury is condemned for this reason, that it
conflicts with love; if, therefore, it is not against love, then it is no sin.
For just as the creditor should not enrich himself to the debtor's harm,
so conversely the debtor should not enrich himself either. And Justinian
seems to have had this in view, that the recompense for the use of
borrowed money among people of the third estate should be made equal
between giver and taker, and civil law has assessed usury more in favor
of debtors than of creditors. And this kind seems to be less harmful and
harsh to debtors than the contract of repurchase and the sale until a
certain term, as it is called. These, more or less, are the grounds that are
made use of.

But against all these and other wretched grounds this simple, firm,
and unshakable foundation is set: if Scripture, in describing usury, had
established such a distinction — that if, in lending, something over and
above the principal is demanded from a poor man, it is sin, but if from a
rich man, it is a lawful and godly transaction — then the answer would
present no difficulty. But as it is, Scripture condemns usury and every
overcharge in general and without qualification, whenever it is
demanded, in lending, over and above the principal, without distinction
as to from whom it is demanded. Psalm 15:5; Ezekiel 18:8; Luke 6:35.
Because, therefore, God pronounces judgment according to his revealed
word, the conscience certainly cannot be secure if, without any plain
word of God, it wants to invent such a distinction for itself. For
whatever rational arguments may be devised, those general verdicts will
always sound out against them: He who does not put out his money to
usury, etc. But that mention is made of the poor in some of these
testimonies happens for the same reason as in the fifth and seventh
commandments, where mostly widows, orphans, and the poor are named,
so that no wrong be done to them. But it does not follow from this that
a wrong done to the married, the grown, the powerful, or the rich, etc.,
is therefore no sin! Further,