Perichoretic exchange

A friend, Chuck Hartman, offers a Trinitarian account of economic exchange: He describes it as a perichoretic reality. Each party to the exchange benefits the other, so there is a mutual glorification in exchange. It “amens the Trinity.” He points to an analogy with the Fifth Commandment, where those who honor father and mother are themselves honored with long life in the land. Because it is mutual glorification, exchange is also an act of love. Mutual glorification is the source of profit.

To extend this point a few steps: The perichoretic character of the exchange is quite literal. Purchase involves a transfer of things that used to be in another’s possession into my possession, and vice versa. My house is full of stuff that used to belong to someone else, and so my home is indwelt by the goods of others, as the seller’s home is indwelt by goods that I once possessed. Using money rather than barter makes the relationship indirect. I go to a store; I see something I need or want; I give the owner money and bring his stuff into my home; he indwells my life-zone. What does he get? Just my money, not any goods. Yet, he uses that money to restock his store, or to purchase goods for himself. Money I once owned indwells his home or store in the form of goods purchased.

We can extend this point by noting that our possessions are part of our “selves” broadly considered. Some property is only loosely connected to myself, but some property is quite intimately part of me. An heirloom, or a gift from a beloved grandmother, is bound up with the person and feels like an extension of my memory. If someone breaks into my house, that feels like a personal violation, a kind of rape. More generally, an assault on property is always an assault on persons. If that is the case, then an exchange of property is an exchange and transfer of self. I give some of my goods – a small piece of myself – and take a small piece of another self. Exchange involves not only mutual indwelling of goods, but indirectly of persons, of selves.