I ran across a recent post titled "Taxes and the examples of King Benjamin and the evil King Noah" by Geoff B. over at a good LDS blog, The Millennial Star, and I decided that it was a perfect thing to feature here; it's presented quite thoughtfully. In the course of the post, Geoff looks at the presentation of taxation and government size that one sees in both the Bible and the Book of Mormon, and he observes that both texts tend to favor small, local government over large, centralized government, and that taxation is generally presented as something blameworthy rather than praiseworthy. (This blog isn't a platform for my political or economic predilections, but I'd like to just remark that I'm largely in agreement with Geoff here.) As he observes,
One of the least discussed messages of the Scriptures is that taxes are seen as mostly negative. Taxes are almost always used by tyrants to build up themselves and large central governments that burden the people.
The discussion in the comments is also highly worth reading. In light of the contemporary debate over the proper nature of taxation and government, it's a post that's very worth your attention.
How do you see taxes and human governments portrayed in Scripture?
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