Money is curious. It is a means of exchange but also a symbol system, providing meaning in the world. While numerous scholars have examined how money works in the latter sense in the contemporary world, Devin Singh's Divine Currency explores how money did this in the ancient world, both drawing from and shaping theology.
Singh's study is not intended as a comprehensive work of economics and theology in early Christianity. Singh's narrower focus is on Gregory of Nyssa's devil's rights soteriology and the cultural context that gave this theory its power and intelligibility. While this theory—that humanity owed a debt to the devil because of sin, and God tricked the devil into taking the life of Jesus and thereby caused the devil to forfeit his claim over all life—is highly problematic, Singh explores how the soteriology hinges on an understanding of money being linked to the power of a ruler. Using a realm's coin implied one was subservient to the realm's ruler. In accepting moneylenders’ terms, it was as if people were accepting their rule. Moneylenders used this understanding to turn debtors into slaves. Through compound interest, the initial debt quickly became unpayable. Since the borrowers were forever in debt, they were perpetually under the lender's rule, becoming debt slaves.
This was the context for the devil's rights theory. Humans subjected themselves to the devil's authority by accepting the devil's coin: the fruits of sin. As with compound interest on a small amount of money, the initial benefit of sin soon gave way to an ever-increasing debt. This debt could not be repaid, so people became slaves in the devil's kingdom. When the devil accepted Jesus’ life, however, he accepted God's “coin” and, in doing so, inadvertently accepted God's rule. The initial sum quickly saddled the devil with an unpayable debt, so the devil lost control of his realm and came under the control of God and God's kingdom.
Just as this ancient economics informed the devil's right theory, Singh argues that this soteriology shaped the politics of the empire. Drawing on Eusebius’ thought, Singh shows how God's oikonomia was the blueprint for Constantine's empire. God the Father ruled from heaven, and God the Son carried out this rule on earth. When people accepted Jesus, they were accepting God's coin and so God's rule. Likewise, Constantine ruled from the capital. People accepted his rule by using the coin that bore his image.
Further, Singh notes that Eusebius justified Constantine's imperial expansion by mapping the empire upon God's empire and so giving Constantine's actions seeming divine approval. As the Roman Empire grew, it conquered people and brought them under the rule of the emperor by forcing them to use its coin. Such an approach was deemed consonant with the Christian faith as God worked by bringing people, including the devil, under God's rule by having them adopt the coin of the kingdom, Jesus.
Overall, Singh carefully circumscribes his claims, never reducing economics or theology as just an expression of the other. Instead, he explores some interesting ways that these connections shaped each other and, in doing so, indicates how the influence of economics on theological thinking is not just a modern phenomenon. As such, Singh's study is best geared to scholars of early Christian thought and, perhaps, those interested in the ways in which economics and theology interact.
