Let’s say back in biblical times you agreed to barter a carpenter like Jesus or blacksmith or other tradesman food for doing some work you needed done, but his work is very poor quality when finished. What would be your recourse other than threatening or killing him?
Who would make the call if you were due anything and if the work was substandard?
Who would you call today…the BBB has no enforcement authority, and short of criminal activity many state consumer affairs agencies really dont do much.
Much like today, a partial payment with final payment due when finished goods are produced is a good system. Also word of mouth was pretty much the only advertising. If Jesus the carpenter always built poor quality stuff but Lazarus down the street made much better stuff for similar cost everyone will start buying stuff from him.
I would imagine much the same as exist now… don’t use him again, spread the word to your friends and neighbors, etc. His continued business relies on satisfied customers, for the most part. Even today, unless there are things done not to code or illegally, the customer doesn’t really have any legal recourse if the contract was fulfilled.
If the work was for a cabinet or horseshoes or something portable, the customer could always refuse to take the merchandise as well as refuse to pay for it (null the contract). A little harder to do if the work was done on your house or your stable.
Even in biblical times though I believe there were magistrates/judges/officials to which people could appeal to resolve a dispute. I imagine the first step would be to go to the craftsman themselves and ask them for satisfaction… it would be in their best interests to resolve it amicably if possible.
Of course, customers can get a reputation as well for being difficult to deal with, and perhaps may find it difficult to find someone willing to do their work. So it benefits everyone to be civil.
The Roman Empire had a well-developed court system, and Jewish communities also had rabbinical courts. Between the two, a person who was cheated by a workman could get recourse.
Is everyone forgetting who this guy’s father is? You don’t do a thing unless you want to burn for all eternity. Or at least an immediate smiting.
Pantera?
Ralph: Jeez, Jesus, this thing is all crooked and swaybacked. I’m not paying for it!
JC: God damn it, Ralph, you. . . .BLAM! Man, I really have to stop saying that.
Agreed. I think that one of the first things that civilization anywhere did was set up a system for deciding personal disputes so that they didn’t end in killing.
I always parsed the term ‘Jesus was a poor carpenter’, to mean he didn’t get much work and wasn’t very prosperous as a carpenter.
Granted, I can see where poor carpenter skills would translate into little or no repeat business and/or no ‘recommendations or endorsements of skill’, but is there some record of him having poor skills as a carpenter?
Nazareth was a town of about 500 - 1000 people in Jesus’ time. Disputes would have been settled informally, like every other small town in history.
I’ll admit that I’m not up on small town history circa 30 A.D., but I would imagine the “You took my sister on a date and told everyone in town that you fucked her” dispute would have been handled informally like in most small towns today, but simple contract disputes like the one in the OP were certainly capable of the rudimentary courts of the time.
A divine’s carpenters work should still be around.
But the “system” was very far from a court of law as it is known today in America, it was an informal system where elders or others in authority decided cases based on the common good, which meant keeping the peace, which meant those who had friends or were influential got their way and those who didn’t were fucked.
That has been the way of most of humanity most of the time and even today.
One has to be very naive to think a mechanical and impartial system for adjudicating disputes is the norm even today. You really think a customer in Africa who is not satisfied can or will go to court?
Heck, even in parts of Europe it is not practical. In Italy you disagree with something and maybe you are better off going to the elder, the godfather because going to court may be a way to make enemies for life.
I can tell you that in Spain today, the year of our lord 2013, there is no practical way to solve small disputes through the courts. If you get stiffed you are pretty much fucked and I know it well through experience. Filing a court case will cost more than the matter under dispute is worth. And the result is pure chance.
And if the dispute is big enough to make filing a claim it may be worth finding other ways to settle. I have known more than one case where people knew they were right and would probably win but they also knew they would never do business in that field again if they did.
The notion that people are good sports and go to a judge for adjudication and then the matter is settled and resolved is just not the way things work in most of the world. Just head down to Mexico and see how things work there. Maybe you win in court and the next thing you get is a bullet in the back of the head.
Jesus was a poor carpenter. That’s why he got into the preaching business. Being able to multiply loaves and fishes and make water into wine meant that he would never miss a meal.
Actually, anyone wanting high-quality carpentry work done would be well-advised to hire the Perfect Son of God as your carpenter, whose work would certainly never be less than Perfect. You just gotta have some faith, dude!
They’d crucify him.
Would be a shame is his carpentry shop burned down. Wood and other flammables just laying around.
It wasn’t an issue. Everyone who bought his stuff would look at it and say, “Oh! That is just divine.”
Wasn’t it the 2000 year old man who said Jesus made him a nice chest of drawers, but they fell apart?
Really… IMO the proper description of the BarYosefs should rather be they were “humble carpenters” – there is in the Gospel no indication that the family was particularly needy relative to the standards of the place and time: needing to pinch their shekels, yes, no luxuries, one single good cloak per person, but not charity cases (The whole manger incident is clearly blamed on overcrowding in Bethlehem at the time, not on destitution.) Otherwise all signs point to Joseph being able to support a wife and child (or several, depending on your reading), including ocassional Holiday trips to Jerusalem, and to Jesus carrying on in the trade until he was 30ish when he decided to go out preaching.