Being Generous

by Theodore Roosevelt Malloch

Overview

Through the ages, the world’s cultures and great religions have in profound, though different, ways sought to answer the big question: how should we live? Part of the answer has to do with how we ought to treat others, particularly those who are most in need. Ample evidence suggests that giving selflessly to others lies at the heart of what it means to be a thoughtful and moral human being. In Being Generous, author Theodore Roosevelt Malloch leads an exploration of this important concept of generous giving.

He begins by examining how generosity fits into the various spiritual traditions, philosophical schools, and economic systems. Further chapters illustrate how generosity need not always be about money, showing how it might also involve the sharing of time and talent. Elsewhere, Malloch explores the science behind generosity, looking, for example, at the relationship between various chemicals in the brain and generous behavior. Beyond the theory and the science of generosity, readers will also find a wealth of inspiration in a collection of profiles of past and present icons of generosity.

Being Generous concludes with a practical action plan that lays out concrete steps to guide readers toward lives of greater giving.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781599473628
Publisher:	Templeton Press
Publication date:	05/12/2011
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Theodore Roosevelt Malloch, PhD is an international expert on governance, strategy, and business. A former Professor and Senior Fellow in Management Practice at the University of Oxford’s Saïd Business School and Henley Business School, Dr. Malloch previously served as a research professor at Yale University.

He is currently Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of The Roosevelt Global Governance Group, a leading strategic management and thought leadership company. He has served on the executive board of the World Economic Forum (DAVOS); has held an ambassadorial level position at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland; worked in senior policy positions at the US State Department and US Senate; and worked in capital markets at Salomon Brothers on Wall Street. He has experience on many corporate, mutual fund, and not-for-profit boards, including universities, charitable trusts, and foundations.

Dr. Malloch earned his PhD in international political economy from the University of Toronto, a Bachelor of Arts from Gordon College, and an M.Litt. at the University of Aberdeen on a St. Andrews Fellowship. He has written extensively on the nature of the virtuous enterprise, the practices of practical wisdom, the pursuit of happiness, and the virtues of generosity and thrift. His new book, coauthored with the retired chairman and CEO of Cargill, is Common Sense Business.

Read an Excerpt

Being Generous

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By Theodore Roosevelt Malloch

Templeton Press

Copyright © 2009 Theodore Roosevelt Malloch
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-59947-362-8

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CHAPTER 1

Generosity:

A Universal Moral Urge

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We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop. MOTHER TERESA OF CALCUTTA

Ample evidence suggests that being generous—giving selflessly to others—ies at the heart of what it means to be a thoughtful and moral human being. Through the ages, the world's cultures and great religions have in profound though different ways sought to answer the big question: how should we live? Part of the answer has to do with how we ought to treat others, particularly those who are most in need.

Almost all of the more than six billion inhabitants of our planet are connected to a spiritual or moral tradition that has in some way addressed the question of how we ought to live. Thus we all have some capacity to grow in our understanding of generosity as both an ethical virtue and a best practice.

I hope through the following overview to "connect the dots" around the globe and among traditions that have stood the test of time. Focusing on what these traditions have to say about generosity, my goal is not to arrive at some great interfaith boiling down of essentials, but rather to celebrate our human nature and the diverse paths we have taken toward living well in the eyes of God.

Judaism

The religion of the Jews is rooted in the story of a people, which is also the story of the world. The story shows us the beginning of the world, the laws for living in it successfully, and the final goal toward which all things progress, provided we humans behave as we should: the goal of the kingdom, the new Zion in which the good will be rewarded, and the sin of Adam redeemed. It is a story of creation, of loss, and of final redemption—nd its outlines have been bequeathed to the two great successor religions, Christianity and Islam.

In Judaism, we encounter the story of a people chosen by God to be an example to the world through obedience to the divine law contained in the Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible) and through conduct according to the rule of loving-kindness. From the earliest days of the Jewish faith can be found a tendency to condense the divine law into something immediately digestible, hence the Ten Commandments of Exodus, reduced to two in Leviticus and in Deuteronomy: "Love God with all thy soul and with all thy strength and with all thy mind and thy neighbor as thyself." We find this theme also in the famous response of Rabbi Hillel, a contemporary of Jesus, to a question. Said the rabbi, as recorded in the Talmud: "Whatever is hateful to you, do not do it to your neighbor; this is the whole torah, the rest is commentary." We see here the signs of a growing current of opinion that love of God and love of neighbor are one and the same.

The term mitzvah (plural mitzvot) in Judaism has to do with a Jew's obligations. It is a general term for something commanded, whether by law or by the less formal duty of loving-kindness, tzedakah, which corresponds to the Christian idea of charity, or disinterested love of neighbor. Mitzvot are not confined to any rigid system of law. Rather, they address a goodness of heart that puts others before self in all mutual dealings. Much of the rabbinical literature addresses mitzvot. Various maxims speak to how to live in a condition of obedience and love. As one Midrash states, "Tzedakah was slumbering, and Abraham aroused it. How did he do it? He built an inn with openings in every direction, and he would receive wayfarers."

Mitzvot and tzedakah are thus intimately connected. The way to lead a good life, a life pleasing to God, is to give. In fact, in Judaism the duty to give is considered so important that the recipient is obligated to give something back to others, the only stipulation being that a person should not give to the point where he himself becomes needy.

The emphasis on giving in the Jewish tradition is strongly implied by the fact that, in the Mishneh Torah, Maimonides ranked acts of charity, as follows, from the least to the most meritorious:

• giving and enabling the recipient to become self-reliant;

• giving when neither party knows the other's identity;

• giving when you know the recipient's identity, but he doesn't know yours;

• giving when you don't know the recipient's identity, but he knows yours;

• giving before being asked;

• giving after being asked;

• giving less than you should, but giving it happily;

• giving begrudgingly.

In Jewish tradition, the giving of the tithe (10 percent) to the Temple was expected, but the call to charity went further than the tithe. The ideal is to move beyond performing acts of kindness in order to become a person whose essence is kindness, someone for whom the mitzvah of loving-kindness has become a way of life.

Christianity

Christianity arose out of Judaism, and is in part a reaction to the formalized idea of gift contained in the idea of a tithe. Like Rabbi Hillel, Jesus rebelled against the ossified customs of the Temple. He wanted people to wake up to the reality of tzedakah—in other words, to replace safe routines with risk-taking love. He challenged the priorities of Jews who placed a heavier emphasis on tithing than on charity, mercy, and doing good.

Though early Christians did not tithe, they were fully committed to supporting their leaders and to giving to charitable causes. The Apostle Paul taught that apostles had the right to request financial support, though Paul himself did not exercise this right because he did not want to burden the congregation (1 Cor. 9:14—5). Early churches routinely supported widows, orphans, and other poor people (1 Tim. 5:9, Acts 2:45, Acts 6:1). Paul placed a special emphasis on supporting famished Christians in Jerusalem, asking the Corinthian Christians to take a regular collection to aid them. Prior to asking this, he reminded the Corinthians that the collection was not a command, but voluntary (2 Cor. 9:7).

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The Pew Family

JOSEPH N. PEW founded Sun Oil Company and raised five children in a religious Presbyterian home on Philadelphia's Main Line. After his death in 1912, his children inherited and expanded the company. Their wealth was estimated at over $25 million by 1925. In charity the family supported Christian ideals and conservative ideas, especially private enterprise. In 1948 they created a trust foundation as a tribute to their parents. The Pew Charitable Trusts gave to local charities, small religious colleges, and Christian outreach. They had a rule never to donate to endowments. Originally keen on donor intent, The Pew Charitable Trusts remain today one of the largest charitable foundations in America.

Photo: Joseph N. Pew Jr.

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While the New Testament does not instruct Christians to set aside a fixed percentage of income to support church leaders or church buildings, it does encourage Christians to give freely and generously to worthy causes such as aging parents, the poor, and missionaries.

The New Testament encourages giving out of abundance or prosperity. It sees giving as a blessing. It does not expect or demand sacrificial giving, though it often commends it (Luke 21:2–4, 2 Cor. 8:14, 1 Cor. 16:2, and 2 Cor. 8:8). Nevertheless, the Jewish mitzvah of charity and loving-kindness receives a new impetus from Christ's teaching and from the gloss upon it contained in the letters of Saint Paul. The idea that there is a specific form of love—agape, or "gift love," as C. S. Lewis described it in The Four Loves—and that this form of love is our primary religious duty becomes, in Christian thinking, the foundation of both theology and morality.

In the fourth century, the Roman Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity. Prior to Constantine's conversion, Christianity was illegal and churches met secretly in homes with part-time leaders who had other sources of income. After his conversion, Constantine made Christianity both legal and a status symbol, causing the church to expand rapidly. The church moved out of homes and into buildings and employed full-time ministers, thus creating a much greater need for income and upkeep. The tithing of the Old Law provided an obvious model and it began to be taught—more commonly in the West, however, than in the East—that the faithful should give tithes of their income. When the view began to obtain sufficient support, it found legislative expression. The Council of Macon in 585 CE ordered payment of tithes and threatened excommunication to those who refused to comply.

Catholic Christians believe in the authority of the pope, the councils, and the Bible. As such, they subscribe to the tithe as defined by the Council of Macon and later pronouncements (Encyclicals and Letters) on tithing. For Protestant Christians, relying solely on the Bible to inform their faith and practice, understanding early church practice as reflected in the New Testament resulted in some different conclusions regarding giving. For Protestants, each time the New Testament talks about tithing, it is referring to the Old Testament law requiring Jews to give 10 percent of their income to support the operation of the Temple and the Jewish priests. The Letter to the Hebrews teaches that Christ's sacrifice rendered the Temple and the priests obsolete. This is why the New Testament never applies the practice of tithing to Christians or followers of Christ.

Church reformers John Calvin and Martin Luther, both of whom saw the tithe as something to expand upon, reinforced this early understanding. They maintained that giving ought not be restricted, since all God's creation is already his and to him it must return. The ideal of being faithful and responsible stewards of all that we have is part and parcel of Reformation thought. We are trustees of what we have received, not free possessors.

The New Testament does not give exact guidance on Christian priorities when deciding whether, or how much precisely, to give to the church, missionaries, or to the poor and needy. It is worth mentioning that 1 Timothy 5:8, 1 Timothy 5:2, and Mark 7:10–13 suggest that caring for one's family and parents is the top priority of believers. The Vulgate translates agape as caritas, and the concept of charity, developed down the centuries through law and moral teaching, has a claim to be Christianity's distinctive contribution to modern ways of thinking. Exploring this concept will be one part of the story of this book.

Islam

Islam has preserved the Jewish tradition of obligatory giving, establishing as one of the five "pillars" of Islam the zakat, a percentage of income to be set aside for the use of the poor and to satisfy communal needs. The other four "pillars" are:

1. The declaration of faith, or shahadah (witness): "There is no God but the God and Muhammad is his messenger." This is a profession of faith in the oneness or unity (tawhid) of God.

2. Prayer. Five times a day the muezzin calls from the minaret, crying allahu akbar, God is most great, and Muslims must then leave off what they are doing and prostrate themselves in prayer (salat), which is preceded by various ritual ablutions or acts of purification. Salat is not a petition, but an act of worship, and a repetition of the "witness" idea, remembering God's greatness and his word. On Friday prayer is communal, in a mosque (masjid—place of prostration, or jami', place of congregation). There is then a sermon during the midday prayers. There is no priesthood in Islam and anyone can lead the prayers—though in large mosques there tends to be a paid imam, chosen for his Qur'anic knowledge.

3. The fast of Ramadan—the ninth month of the Islamic lunar calendar. No food, drink, or sex between dawn and dusk. The fast ends with the great feast of 'Eid al-Fitr—the feast of the breaking of the fast—which goes on Christmas-like for three days.

4. Pilgrimage (hajj) to Mecca, which follows Ramadan, and which each Muslim should perform at least once in his lifetime. On arriving there the pilgrim performs various rituals centered on the Ka'bah and the Plain of Arafat (place of the Prophet's last sermon), and then participates in a ritual sacrifice of animals ('Eid al-Adha, feast of sacrifice), commemorating the substitution of a ram for his son in Abraham's original sacrifice (though in the Muslim view the son in question was Ismael, not Isaac).

Jihad is sometimes identified as the sixth pillar of Islam, though this has no authority in the traditions. The word means "struggle" (on behalf of the faith), and includes holy war—though no war is holy if conducted as an act of aggression rather than defense, and the duty of jihad is satisfied by struggling to fulfill the previous five obligations. Needless to say, this is an area of huge controversy. It has greatly affected the interpretation of zakat in recent years, some believing that it is legitimate to spend the money raised in this way on warlike preparations in defense of the faith—even on terrorism.

Zakat is not a ritual, but an obligation, originally to give one tenth, now 2.5 percent, of one's accumulated wealth annually, provided that wealth reaches a certain minimal level (nisab). In order to deal with the zakat, Islamic societies have established a kind of trust (waqf), which devotes the funds to some specific social purpose, such as education, hospitals, poor relief, or whatever. People whose hearts are to be reconciled—in other words new Muslims or those close to becoming Muslim—must follow the five pillars. Even non-Muslims are, under certain formulations, expected to be included and to pay zakat.

Traditional zakat laws generally do not cover trade. It is not permissible to pay zakat to some members of the family (i.e., grandparents, parents, spouses, children), for they are under the custody of the eligible man, while zakat is considered to be a public, not a private benefit. (This corresponds to provisions in the English common law of charity, to which I return in the next chapter.) Zakat doesn't become obligatory on a Muslim if he does not have a minimum amount in his possession that has remained unchanged for a whole lunar year.

According to the Shi'ite interpretation, based on the Qur'an and reported sayings of the prophet Muhammad and his household, there are two major forms of almsgiving: khoms ("the fifth") and zakat. The Shi'ites consider both types to be a personal obligation, meaning that every Muslim has the full responsibility of purifying his own money, but the governor should use no force upon any individual to give up zakat or khoms. Khoms ("the fifth") is taken from war loots, metals, treasures, divings (pearls), and the money that is a mix between halal (pure) and haram (taboo). Khoms for money involves taking the fifth of the increment or the increase in the income stored after one lunar year, and this is done after paying debts or bills (if any). Khoms is paid specifically for:

• Allah;

• the Messenger of Allah;

• the near relative of the Messenger (i.e., a member of the ahl ul-bayt);

• the orphans;

• the needy; and

• stranded travelers.

Zakat on the other hand, according to traditional Islamic teachings, is assigned to specific goods. There are nine types of goods from which zakat is paid out: gold, silver, camels, cows, sheep, wheat, barley, dates, and raisins. Each type has its own nisab, or limit under which zakat need not be paid.

In modern days, Muslims are more concerned with khoms than zakat, mainly because few of them are farmers and own the goods by which zakat is paid out. On the other hand, khoms is given by many people, especially from the middle class and above, and is also expected from employees. It might be asked, who administers these funds, and how accountable is that person? Traditionally the funds were deposited in a waqf administered by the officials of the mosque. They had a religious duty to dispense them justly on recognized needs of the community. But a waqf is not a trust in the sense of English and American law: there is no defined class of beneficiaries, with a right to sue the trustees for malpractice. Hence more and more is the obligation to give interpreted as a private rather than a public matter, so that giving becomes a continuous thread in a Muslim's life.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Being Generous by Theodore Roosevelt Malloch. Copyright © 2009 Theodore Roosevelt Malloch. Excerpted by permission of Templeton Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Table of Contents

Foreword by John M. Templeton Jr., MD / xi
Preface / xv
Introduction   xix
1: Generosity: A Universal Moral Urge / 3

• The Pew Family / 7
• Calouste Gulbenkian / 13
• Wafic Rida Saïd / 19
• Li Ka-shing / 27

2: Charity and Gift / 30

• The Maclellan Family / 33

3: Stewardship Spirituality / 36

• Sebastian Spering Kresge / 41
• George Cadbury / 47

4: Time, Treasure, and Talent / 49

• William Wilberforce / 51
• Johann Sebastian Bach / 55
• Felix Mendelssohn / 59

5: Generosity and Economics / 61

• J. C. Penney / 63
• John Walton / 67
• Henry Ford / 71
• Eli Lilly / 73

6: Generosity and Science / 75

• Jeffrey Skoll / 77
• John Templeton / 79

7: Responsible Generosity / 81

• John D. Rockefeller / 85
• Gary Ginter / 89

8: A Generous Society / 93

• Andrew Carnegie / 95
• Joan Kroc / 97
• Mother Teresa / 99

9: Generosity and Purpose in Life / 103

• Bill and Melinda Gates / 105
• Warren Buffett / 107
• Oprah Winfrey / 109
• Michael Bloomberg / 111

10: Final Thoughts / 114

• Arthur Blank / 117
• C. S. Lewis / 121

Appendix A: Twenty-one Books to Read on Generosity / 125

Appendix B: Real Life Stories of Giving to GlobalGiving / 129

Appendix C: About GlobalGiving / 139

Notes / 141