A Marxist Reading of the Parable of the Talents

Jesus Christ the Nazarene sits on the Mount Olives, probably dressed in flowing robes as was customary in those days, his robes perhaps not in the most aesthetically-pleasing of states — a reflection of his social class, being the son of a carpenter. As he sits in solitude, his disciples come to meet him in private seeking exclusive information on his coming kingdom. Jesus obliges by telling them a story — a story which has come to be known as the Parable of the Talents and can be found in the book of the gospel according to Matthew, chapter 25 verses 14 to 29. Jesus told this story to illustrate to his faithful twelve the nature of the Kingdom of Heaven and how God rewards his servants according to their deeds. But beyond the purpose of this parable as intended by Jesus, parallels can be drawn between the parable of talents and the nature of capitalism.
Let us examine the first two verses:
14 “For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. 15 To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away.
We can liken the master in the story to the system of capitalism. Although the story doesn’t specify the metric for deciding how much each servant gets except an ambiguous, “to each according to his ability”, it is safe to assume that the criteria for appropriation was fairly arbitrary. That is to say, that the master decided who he felt was worthy of each amount according to his own assessment of each servant’s “abilities”. This takes away a broad assessment of ability and replaces it with one that is based solely on what an authority believes to constitute “ability”.
To illustrate this, take an example of a really good jumper who decides he wants to find a niche to hone his skills. He then chooses to become a footballer. Football isn’t likely to reward him because even though he does have an ability (jumping), that ability is not crucial in succeeding in football, meaning he isn’t likely to be classified as a footballer with “ability”.
So, in actuality, the master (capitalism), didn’t give according to each servant’s actual ability, he gave according to a narrow conception of what he deemed relevant to his own interests – whatever they were.
Here’s what the next three verses say:
16 He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. 17 So also, he who had the two talents made two talents more. 18 But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master's money.
Capitalism is an ideology which sells itself as one of meritocracy. It tells people that if they pull themselves up by their bootstraps, work hard enough and for long enough, they too can gain access to financial resources, i.e. capital, and attain financial freedom. What it doesn’t reveal though, is that access to these resources is structural, not individual. Meaning no matter how hard you work, unless the social and economic structures around you favour your financial growth, you’re very likely to keep living from paycheck to paycheck. Also, capital begets capital (you need money to make money), meaning without owning some significant amount of capital yourself, you aren’t likely to go very far in a capitalist world.
We see this play out in chapters 16 to 18 of Matthew 25. The servants who had relatively higher amounts of talents (capital) were better positioned to double the amount of resources at their disposal because capital begets more capital. The servant with just one talent, had too little room for investment because investments are risky. He had to play it safe and save the money (a patronising narrative peddled by capitalism) for fear of losing the little he had.
Here is where it gets interesting:
19 Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them. 20 And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here, I have made five talents more.’ 21 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ 22 And he also who had the two talents came forward, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me two talents; here, I have made two talents more.’ 23 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ 24 He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, 25 so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’ 26 But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed? 27 Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. 28 So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents. 29 For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.
This reveals perhaps the most sinister mechanism of the dark underbelly of the capitalist ecosystem — its reward system for those who succeed and its unjust punishment of those who don’t. Like the master in the parable, capitalism punishes the vast majority who fall short by locking them out of the corridors of moral and economic equality, while continually rewarding the few who make it big by ensuring they have all that they need to make it even bigger. These come in the form of structural benefits: government policies which favour the elite, such as unfair tax systems which give the top 1% access to tax exemptions and lower income-tax ratios, government bail-out funds (got from the money paid in taxes by the bottom 99%), and other perks that come with being on the right side of the master and ensure that capital continues to self-propagate.
And just like the master took the one talent from the lazy and shiftless servant and gave it to the servant who already had ten, capitalism oftentimes takes money out of the hands of the poor and keeps it in the hands of the elite, under a false narrative that the wealthy are better equipped to handle such capital.
Such is the hypocrisy of capitalism’s claims to being a meritocracy — in that it rewards those who through morally-arbitrary factors and lottery of birth already are disproportionately advantaged to being a success, while ensuring that access to capital will always take you places hard work never can.
