Chronicle of Tithing
The origins of tithing can be found in the Bible, yet many Christians and non-Christians alike, practice some form of tithing today.
Tithe is a traditionally a Christian term that means to contribute one tenth of your income to charity or to your Church as a form of Chrch giving. However it has similarities with practices in other religious cultures. In Islam it is called ‘Zakat’. In India the Sikh religion also provides for such practice called ‘Dasvandh’ meaning one-tenth part of income to be devoted for religious purposes. Tenth Master Guru Gobind Singh started this practice. In Classical Indian society the Upanisads and the Bhagavadgita commend ‘true alms’ given with a sense of duty in a fit place and at a fit time to a deserving person from whom one expects nothing in return.
The word tithe derives from the Hebrew word ‘asair’, which means to donate one-tenth portion of something, mostly a person’s earnings. Nowadays tithes or tithing is optional and is given in cash. Still, in some European countries church can demand tithing and thus make it enforceable by law.
Denmark is an example where members of the Church of Denmark pay a church tax, which varies between municipalities. The tax is generally around 1% of the taxable income. And in Finland members of state churches pay a church tax of between 1% and 2.25% of income and the Church taxes are integrated into the common national taxation system.
However the practice of regular tithes was not established until after Exodus. Tithes were common throughout the ancient Near East, as well as in later Lydia, Arabia, and Carthage.
The Hebrew practice of giving tithes was mentioned in the Bible, beginning with the gift from Abraham to the Canaanite king and priest Melchizedek (Genesis–:20). Tithes were also given in ancient Lydia, Arabia and Carthage. Tithes were adopted by the early Christian church, being mentioned in councils at Tours in 567 and at Macon in 585. They were formally recognised under Pope Adrian I in 787.
Tithing in certain Christian churches is a disputed issue as it deals with an Old Testament process to a New Testament institution (the Church). There is no proof in the New Testament that tithing can be applied to Christians. In fact, it was obligatory only on those Jews who were living in the Promised Land to pay the tithe according to the Old Testament, as it was in reality a form of income tax required to support not just the government of the Israel of the Old Testament, but also its religious institutions and priests.
Present day Tithing
In spite of its origins in the Bible and olden day Christianity, nowadays it is a perfect way to give every time you get something. Giving EVERY time you get things is such a perfectly beautiful form of giving as it allows the giver to feel in fullness something indescribably powerful – more on that afterwards.
Let us have a little more of history. Malachi 3:10 is the section of the Bible that Christians hold in importance when they deliberate on tithing. Many Christians do tithe to their church as they feel that they are duty bound to do as per the rules of the Bible. Many Churches have all throughout maintained that their members should tithe to the church to help it conduct its activities. The core of giving is its voluntary nature and its delightful experience, without which it does not get its ideal effect – if in fact you are hoping to create an ideal effect by giving.
Controversy about Tithing
Tithing has often been a controversial subject.The question of should a Christian pay tithe is often raised in many Christian circles.
In an article in Wall Street Journal regarding tithing named ‘The Backlash Against Tithing’, Suzanne Sataline says, ‘As Churches push donations, congregants balk; ‘that’s not the way God works’.’
Unfortunately, the potent mix of ideology, power equations, and a narrow perspective, can often give rise to a Jekyll and Hyde situation – the perfection of giving being lost in the mishmash and mix-up of mysticism. Despite the conflict, tithing is still a complete and amazingly forceful action that anyone can carry on to turn their lives around to come face to face with a more plentiful direction.
For those who are desirous of understanding the Christian perspective of tithing there is unlimited material available to read. For those who are interested in understanding the reason WHY tithing is so wonderful, continue reading.
Why is Tithing so compelling?
This is indeed a very forceful question because if you just heedlessly take a certain path without considering what the whole process entails you may be advancing on the wrong road.
If more people who regularly tithed knew exactly why tithing works when it is done in the spirit of pure giving, then it would probably unleash a greater desire to give even more. And for those that give irregularly, it could inspire them to give first every time they received.
To analyse the real ‘why’ of how routine giving leads to more we have to understand something about Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Physics. The laws of these realms vary a lot from that of our own material or Newtonian world.
The picture ‘What the Bleep’ paints the quantum world through easily graspable examples. The link to the movie here gives some details about how matter gets converted into waves and behaves like liquids when seen from a quantum physics angle: http://video.yahoo.com/watch/1349535/4653525.
The movie paints the picture of a startling world visible from a quantum space. When a line of electrons is fired through a plate with a cut in it onto a wall – predictably, it would hit the wall straight across the cut in a single line.
If the same experiment is done using an energy wave that has the properties of a water wave, again one can get an expected outcome. As the surge hits the plate the tendency for the wave is to ricochet but still because of the cut, some parts of the wave goes in through that cut. Emerging from the cut, the wave spreads out in an arched way, thus resulting in a new wave more or less similar to the old wave. It is exactly like the experiments one would have done in smaller classes regarding the behaviour of waves. It hits the wall opposite with a lot of force at the point just opposite the cut and hits with lesser strength all around the wall. This is just like the pattern the electrons create.
If we added a second slit in the plate, again we would get a predictable result with the wave experiment – two small waves would appear through the slits and when those new waves touch each other they would cancel each other out creating an interference pattern. Several waves would now hit the wall making a stripped affect on the wall. All this is as expected for wave energy behavior, so nothing new here.
Here is where the whole experiment takes on an entirely different direction. When electrons are sent through the two cuts in the plate, what should ordinarily result are two lines in the wall opposite. On the contrary what one sees is a stripped appearance with an intersecting pattern. This is unbelievable. The matter seems to have been turned into a wave. We can perhaps imagine that electrons were hitting against each other and ricocheting and causing a wave pattern; so if electrons are sent across separately the result should be different. But it is not, it is the same. The explanation has to be that the electron leaves as a single particle, and splits into a wave on collision with the plate, then goes across through the cuts and intervenes with itself after that on the other side. This idea of solid having fluid properties -or mattering acting like a wave – is totally surprising. The world is much more than we understand it to be.
Though the overall properties of the world appear to be solid in nature, it does seem that it has enough of properties of a liquid as well – flux or liquid energy, which behaves like fluids in the physical world. The laws of physics clearly state that liquids that are alike in nature are attracted towards each others, while those which are unlike each other has a tendency to segregate and form its own group. The ineffective combining of water and oil is an example of this. Chromatography shows clearly the dispersion in clear bands of one substance into the many substances of which it is made of, just like larger collections of human beings split into smaller groups of people sharing common passions, strengths and interests.
The essence of it is that we feel total fulfilment when we give a thing to another. The act of giving, the sense of bliss of it, is the greatest of all gifts. It is wrongly understood that he who is in receipt of the object is the only receiver and people fail to notice that it is the one who gives who is the real recipient. If you’re not still convinced, then look at yourself among children and see how fulfilled you become when you give to them whatever their reaction be.
When we appreciate that we are actually giving to ourselves when we give and that we do this because we want to feel satisfied then we have an answer. This answer unlocks the door of cognizance to giving. And when we give again and again the impetus builds up just like a swelling wave that grows larger the more we put in to it with our idea of our bountifulness.
The fact that we feel joyful when we give changes our energy literally – we feel better and in that moment we are more attractive to other people. Have you experienced someone on the street selling something that you don’t want such as tissues and normally you do not buy, but one day you do and the only reason why is because the person is happy and smiling? You may have experienced the same with buskers playing music on the street.
A contended individual radiates a natural magnetism that draws others to him and in doing so he enriches himself. It is clear-cut. They pull towards them both those who are desirous of experiencing that feeling as well as those who have already known the richness of it.
Similar to water and oil, givers and non-givers tend to collect together in different places. And the greatest place to get something is a place where givers come together! But of course you will be allowed entry into that group only if you are ready to give! Givers relish to give to those who love to give.
We may be able to look at quantum physics for resolving things, but these are very much in front of us all the time. Alike attracts alike – right. See what is going on all over the world. Lions like to be with lions, students like to be with students, women prefer the company of women, guys like other guys, ‘poor’ people prefer to be with ‘poor’ people and ‘rich’ people like to form groups with ‘rich’ people. And yes – givers like to make friends with givers.
So those who give out of remorse cannot benefit from it – it will only help in attracting to him others with similar guilt complexes who are not able to sense joy or ecstasy. Guilt is very close to anger in the ladder of negative emotions; for those who give out of a sense of self-reproach anger might be their next step in understanding things. Joy is very near the pinnacle of human sensations – you can graduate from there only to love – something that everyone is trying to do.
So when you initiate the act of giving, you are very close to knowing perfect love – really wonderful to know that it is. More so as we know that most people are continuously trying to find love. We now know that the answer is so easy – begin giving! And gifting money is only an aspect of giving – giving on the whole will create a special place of joy for us, no matter how ‘little’ the amount.
There is also an emotional aspect to giving consistently. This aspect might not in the beginning appear to have connections to the sensation of joy – in the end it completely bonds us to the absolute bliss of joy.
When we give something – especially something we don’t feel we have much of – then we send a powerful signal to our brain that life can be trusted. When we give something and later on we look back and we observe that all worked out well we connect with trust. The opposite of trust is fear. So again, a party of fearful people would not be a happy and joyful one so their attraction point would be pretty darn low. However, a party of trusting people would be a joyful experience and would attract others seeking that experience. So in the end when we trust it converts to joy and again we are only one step away from the number one thing that most of us are seeking – love.
The sum and substance of what has been ignored for years is fully in front of us for anyone to bond with in finely. For Christmas my son got a good amount of money. I queried him as to what he planned to do with all that money. He replied that he wanted to set aside almost whole of it. Then I enquired how much of it he would like to give to someone. It was something that he had not even taken into account until I introduced the idea. What would be the result if upon receiving anything our first consideration was to give away part of it – do you think we would know delight in abundance?
Transaction based charity – or transaction based generosity
This takes us to the force of transactional giving. Many enterprises give when they have enough of money to give. When they do not have much they do not prefer to give. So their possible levels of joy fluctuate depending upon market variations – they do not have any restraint. But whoever gives EVERY time they get something is in charge and has their relationship with perfect joy forever.
Transactional giving rather than single payments is connected with the ups and downs of profit so it is an easy way of giving. The rule is that whenever you get something you give proportionately – easy. If you have a bad season you might give, but less depending on sales. And when business is better one can give more.
One of the key powers of transaction based giving is that you can share the joy of giving so easily with all stakeholders – customers/community – staff – and business. Because a customer knows that when they buy from you they get to give without it costing them anything except the energy to choose and shop with you they feel ownership of the giving – hence traditional CSR – Corporate Social Responsibility, coverts readily to Customer Social Responsibility, with your customer being able to powerfully respond to the giving by talking about you and have an additional emotional albeit intangible reason, for choosing to continue shopping with you.
Your staff also get to share in the joy of giving because every time they are personally involved in creating a sale, they know directly they have helped give something to someone in need. This experience is powerful within a team because it can be used in so many ways such as team motivation and staff incentives.
Any venture, even a completely new one with no profit margin, can manage Buy1GIVE1 transaction-based giving – there are no problems in every sense to be part of it and everything is controlled by the business. The payment amount per deal begins from as low as one cent and rises to any large amount the person can decide with every business left to choose their own type of gifting and providing to sustain on the basis of their business type and success. There is simply no justification not to give in this manner when the advantages that ensue from giving are so many. Enterprises that are presently giving to a cause can easily change over very promptly and effortlessly to Buy1GIVE1 transaction-based giving while still helping the same cause giving additional substantial benefits to the venture.
When the game is over business -based giving is a present day form of tithing that is practical and possible for anyone, at any place. Now that we realise that it is not about the actual money that we give such as a tenth of the income, but only the fact that we are gifting it that makes the change. When we enter the fraternity of donors we move into a special and fortunate world that only those who give to others are allowed to enter. And unless you start giving today itself, you just may not start doing it and might never will till you start. So begin today.
‘We’re not here to gift in order ‘to take.’ We want more to be able to give more.
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