After all, the New Testament\u2019s condemnations of personal wealth are fairly unremitting and remarkably stark: Matthew 6:19-20, for instance (\u201cDo not store up treasures for yourself on the earth\u201d), or Luke 6:24-25 (\u201cBut alas for you who are rich, for you have your comfort\u201d) or James 5:1-6 (\u201cCome now, you who are rich, weep, howling out at the miseries that are coming for you\u201d). While there are always clergy members and theologians swift to assure us that the New Testament condemns not wealth but its abuse, not a single verse (unless subjected to absurdly forced readings) confirms the claim.<\/p>\n
I came to the conclusion that koinonia often refers to a precise set of practices within the early Christian communities, a special social arrangement \u2014 the very one described in Acts \u2014 that was integral to the new life in Christ. When, for instance, the Letter to the Hebrews instructs believers not to neglect koinonia, or the First Letter to Timothy exhorts them to become koinonikoi, this is no mere recommendation of personal generosity, but an invocation of a very specific form of communal life.<\/p>\n
As best we can tell, local churches in the Roman world of the apostolic age were essentially small communes, self-sustaining but also able to share resources with one another when need dictated. This delicate web of communes constituted a kind of counter-empire within the empire, one founded upon charity rather than force \u2014 or, better, a kingdom not of this world but present within the world nonetheless, encompassing a radically different understanding of society and property.<\/p>\n