On Hedonism
Part 1
How much is too much? Is there some point at which having a lot, even if you earned it honestly, is immoral? Do those that have made great fortunes owe the world a portion of their winnings?
These have been central questions of my life for many years now. I’ve been living and working in Naples, Florida for give or take seven years. In this town there is a Bentley, Ferrari, and Lamborghini dealership. There are countless designer clothing stores like Gucci and Hermes (and many high-end boutique places I’ve never heard of).
Many of the people who buy cars at these dealerships or clothes at these designer stores are retired. They play pickleball, bridge, and dine at fancy restaurants. The final days of their life are marked by a hedonic sprint to the finish line.
Wealthy retirees are not the only ones living a life of hedonism. Most wealthy people live this way. They hire people to solve all their problems and then go on fancy vacations with private chefs. Mothers go shopping while the nanny looks after the kids.
And my simple question is: Is that okay?
hedonism noun · he·do·nism · ˈhē-də-ˌni-zəm
the doctrine that pleasure or happiness is the sole or chief good in life
I’m certainly comfortable criticizing the materialism of others. Such things are easy when you’re young and broke (as I am.) As a result of my careless comments, I usually get pushback with such pithy phrases like “Well, that person worked hard for it,” or “It’s their money, they can do what they want with it,” or my favorite “Yeah but they came from such modest beginnings.”
It doesn’t seem to be harming anyone that rich people overpay for stuff. Like I was told, it’s their money, they worked for it, why not? But then that voice in the back of my head fights me and says Think of all the problems that money, wasted on things only purchased for status, could fix?
I’ve battled with these two parts of my mind for as long as I can remember. On one hand, I think people should be able to build the life they want. I’m also a staunch capitalist and deep supporter of personal freedom. At no point in this essay am I going to advocate for a law to prevent hedonistic lifestyles. On the other hand, I want people focused on the greater good. I want the people of today to genuinely care for the people of tomorrow. I also want the wealthiest of us to realize that it wasn’t all hard work that got them to where they are. Sure, that was part of it. And lazy people don’t get much out of life unless they are born into it. But I’ve seen time and time again that right place and right time is a large factor in lifetime earnings.
I’ve realized while examining this internal conflict that the moral question I’m struggling with is: What is the right balance between enjoying what you’ve earned from this world and giving back to the world that helped you earn it?
The Biblical Response to Hedonism
On my way here to write this piece, I drove past a church parking lot overflowing with luxury cars. Even the church they were parked in front of was sprawling and lavish. Something about the scene didn’t feel right to me.
Although Jesus didn’t anticipate the modern automobile, something about his subsistence lifestyle and distaste for luxuries would make me think that he isn’t looking fondly upon that parking lot.
I’m not a believer that Jesus was the Son of God. My theory on Jesus is that he was probably this incredibly impressive person. He was somebody so good that when he died, his acts of kindness and stubbornness of moral code were so uncommon that they were embellished by his disciples, who could only explain that his manner of being must make him the Son of God. They were so impressed with his goodness that they thought “There’s literally no way he was that moral and good and didn’t come directly from some higher power.”
As I said, Jesus was not a big fan of excess wealth. From Matthew 19:24, Jesus says “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.”
I’m not sure he is saying that rich men are bad or that being rich inherently makes you a bad person. It’s just that Jesus understood people. He understood their greed. He knew that the typical path of a man who becomes rich is not one of benevolence, but of greed and pleasure.
The Bible offers guidance for man to approach wealth and the pleasures that it can bring. In John 2:15-17, John offers a way to view the pleasures that the world has:
“Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.”
To give my own interpretation of this passage, John is saying that sex, materialism, and pride are aspects of the world to which we are often drawn. God cannot be found within any of these things. When we obsess too much over the pleasures the world provides for us, the further we become removed from God. He reminds us that this world is not eternal, only God is. And if we follow his will, which is not those worldly pleasures that pull us from him, we will join him forever in Heaven.
I hope the Christians aren’t too mad at that interpretation. I’m doing my best.
However, the whole Bible does not condemn all pleasure. It’s just that pleasure needs to come from the right place. From Ecclesiastes in the Old Testament, Solomon gives a long sermon on how he indulged in all the pleasures of life. These pleasures align with the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life that John mentions. Solomon then tells us that these worldly pleasures made him feel empty. However, he does not reject enjoying the things that are of this world.
“There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour. This also I saw, that it was from the hand of God.” (Ecclesiastes 2:24)
This line tells us that Solomon felt that he is allowed to enjoy food, wine, and the work that we do in the world. However, he must only enjoy these things if he is following God and His commandments (he mentions this later), and only when these pleasures come from God himself as a gift.
I don’t believe in the Christian God and therefore don’t regard the Bible as the true Word. However, I use it in moments like these because I think it is full of wisdom. It has simple lines, like John 2:16, or Matthew 22:39 when Jesus says that “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself,” which is the Second Commandment. They are good guidelines for life. And I think people could do well to behave as the Bible describes.
However, I think the Bible is vague. It is subjective. You and I could each read those three verses that I have quoted and deduce different things from them. Sometimes, the Bible is strikingly clear, as is true with the Second Commandment. Other times, however, it gives the reader too much room to interpret in their own way. That is probably why there are 44,000 Christian denominations.
I think many people would read those two verses from John and King Solomon and be able to make many concessions to excuse their bad behavior. A rich man, to a naysayer condemning his materialistic purchase (me), should not say, “I don’t feel bad about driving this Bentley because I earned it.” Instead, he should say “I don’t feel bad about driving this Bentley because it was handed to me as a gift by God.”
Think back to all those luxury cars in the church parking lot I drove by. I’m sure most of those people have some Biblical workaround like that to justify their excessive purchases.
I asked Claude AI about this contradiction, and it gave me an interesting response. It called out the line from Ecclesiastes where Solomon notes that these pleasures that man is permitted to enjoy were from “the hand of God.” It said that the “moment pleasure becomes the objective rather than a byproduct, you’ve crossed from the Ecclesiastes model into the hedonism John warns against.” (Claude).
But how do you prove the direction of a worldly pleasure, in that it was pursued or received?
Money complicates this. When it comes to determining the morality of utilizing what you have earned from this world, money can skew the line between pursuing and receiving worldly pleasures.
Let’s imagine you are a dentist and use a barter system for payment. One day, you pulled the tooth of a wealthy customer. He is so grateful that you relieved his pain that he gave you something far more than your usual metric of bartered goods, which you typically accept a bag of rice or a pound of flour for such a service. Instead, this gracious man gifts you a Porsche with a bag of rice in it. Because you did not ask for such a thing, only a bag of rice or flour, you might feel as though you are receiving a gift from God.
But, what if instead you charged money to this wealthy client and didn’t use a barter system? And instead, out of his graciousness for the quality of your tooth-pulling services, he gave you a tip big enough to buy a Porsche and then you went out and bought that Porsche? Is that Porsche still a gift from God? Is that hedonism or holy?
That completes today’s piece. Next week, we will explore more Biblical lessons for wealth. And I will give you my ultimate guide for giving.