I think your question is too general. Are you referencing a specific religion?

Dear sir

Link may be help you

Appreciate your efforts… best wishes https://www.utm.edu/staff/jfieser/class/120/1-meaning.htm

You can own the property or you can be a steward of this property - it does not matter - since everything isn't eternal

Please allow me to repeat the given that you have presented:

Given:

(1) In view of the theological belief that everything belongs ultimately to God, what does it mean to "own" property?, and

(2) What does it mean to be a "steward"?

It appears to me that to understand the dynamics of which you speak , your questions need further dissection. For example: Theo - Logical consists of 2 parts -- that of the Theo and the Logical -- that being the case , simple reasoning would fall into the trap of the (R*L)^2 Syndrome

(Rational Reasoning: Logic Loop Syndrome) -- the Logical Part. The Theo part (God ) requires the knowledge of the supernatural -- for most of us simple humans a step way beyond our ability.

However, having said that, does the investigator have any choice but to conduct further investigation -- or does she/he just quite(sp) because of the headache cause by the "thought process"--- Oh WOW -- another notion is uncovered which creates diversion from the original question. For example: NOW the investigator NEEDS (or)WANTS to understand "THOUGHT" --- soooo....... being a control theorist and a applied mathematician the LOGIC LOOP SYNDROME part of Rational Reasoning has been isolated -- leading to the conclusion that there are "internal and external " forces at work -- and they are of 2 type -- physical and spiritual -- to big a step -- sooo... enter in the META -- Conclusion: Draw one must draw from history. The question posed has only answers in the mind of the beholder. It is simply answered by the 2 motions of human Motion and Emotion -- found in the brain EEG's and the HEART EKGs. Good luck in your travels

This sounds like a re-run of the mediaeval monastic debates on poverty.

I suppose it depends on whether you take the view of the mendicant orders or the ecclesiastical hierarchy.

According to Matthew 19:23-26, accumulating property may not be a good idea.

Well Prof , you take me back to Hinduism Bhakti movement (medieval times) . Almost all saints and religious reformers asked the same question !!!

Famous kirthana from Purandara Dasa - he tells , "My home is elsewhere , I came here for a visit !!!" . He composed many many songs and till date Karnatik music is filled with Dasapada , outcome of the Bhakti movement for spiritual well being ...

They also talk about why and how mean and women have to be a part of society and contribute . Only few have the capacity to leave everything behind and serve god !!

e.g: Mira Bai , Tulsi Das etc etc

Kirk, it really doesn't matter. In geological time, our existance is just one tiny flash, and then its gone. While we live, we fuss around with all manner of trivialities, including ownership of property, and all manner of other "brownian motion," that is here and gone, and then soon forgotten. Our property and ourselves soon decomposed, back to the original elements.

I think that if one must put everything in a religious context, the only sensible way to think about life on earth is as a test of character. Ownership of property is just one of the many aspects of that test.

Your all activities are yours

The stewardship concept is driven by the belief that humans have been assigned the task of taking good care of the resources in nature and the environment ( reference in the Bible at Genesis 1:28). They would finally answer or give an account of their stewardship to their maker (God). This belief help by many people motivate them to protect, care, conserve and judiciously use the resources in the environment. All forms of greed and selfish pursuance of the biodiversity in nature, engaging in unfriendly environmental activities and destruction of the environment are shunned by believers of stewardship of nature and it's accountability. The stewardship concept is a theological concept that have a lot of weight in driving Christians and traditionalists in living sustainably while preserving nature always in its pristine form.

I have discussed this in my paper titled 'Traditional Cosmology and Nature Conservation'. You can freely download it from my RG page. Best regards

Dickson Adom

following

Our economic accounting systems are not applicable to earth sharing or stewardship; our book-keeping techniques are based on the privatization of nature (land, location, resources) as banking collateral for finance (money, investment, saving). These are the calculation operations, since Sumeria and Babylon. The accumulation (ownership) of property by credit and interest is consequently the logical foundation of our civilization. Stewardship would require a new economic taxation and accounting system, i.e. land value taxation as proposed by the Bible, B.Spinoza, D.Ricardo and H.George.

I agree with Dr Albert Manfredi. Thanks for sharing similar thinking.

Indeed everything belong to God. Let us consider birth and death. What do we bring with us when we are born; and what do we take away when we die. Vanity upon vanity, they are all vanity!

Given the theological belief that everything belongs ultimately to God, then, as Remi Okeke correctly interpolated above, “everything” includes “all of us”! Our relationship to God would thus be akin to that of slave to slave owner: people would be a means to achieve God’s ends and would not have the status of an end in themselves. Not a good prospect! So the belief in God’s “ownership” seems untenable if taken literally.

Treating people as means instead of ends is a violation of the categorical imperative in Kant’s moral philosophy (but many non-Kantians also regard it as a correct principle). Since Kant’s moral philosophy also required a belief in God, perhaps a Kant scholar might want to respond here?

The concept of God as owner is somewhat strange. Ownership is a concept of exclusivity, proprietorship and rights. Who is God exercising this over?

If we are talking about Gods in the plural, such as in Ancient Egypt, Greece or Rome then we can see individual Gods having domain over different elements of the Universe, Earth and human experience. This conveys ownership or exclusivity in those

If we are talking about the God(s) of the monotheistic faiths he/it/they have domain over everything rendering ownership, proprietorship or possession meaningless.

It is not necessary to believe in a supernatural entity to follow Kant's categorical imperative. The categorical imperative is evident in cultures and religions predating the montheistic faiths. It would be more accurate to say that the categorical imperative requires a belief in either a natural order or universal morality. That is why, except in a few limited applications Kantian deontology is unworkable.

Medical ethics are a fine example of the applcation of categorical imperatives and they predate monotheistic faiths by at least 2000 years. No deity is required.

Religion is not science and therefore should not be understood as a meaning to the truth. Religon acts as a belief system or a copying mechanism for life whereas science is objective and opinonless. We are all scientists to understand why and how things act or happen the way they do, not to subject others to our opinion of why or how life is here.

In The Name of God

When all of the creatures and human beings themselves are from God, in fact, "own" property has not an essential meaning,

but by an other vision namely by contingent perceptions, the own property has meaning but along with and under of God's ownership because human beings and their properties themselves are from God.

Best biblical story to guide you with your concern is the book of Job.

The book of Job is great for guidance, as is Ecclesiastes, alluded to earlier by Harry Barton Essel.

Spiritual leaders or religion says that we have limited time on this world and death is ultimately end.

Since you cannot carry anything with you, everything remains here and dedicated to God.

Following

We are only trustees of those possessions and should use them with utmost care, sincerity and sense of gratitude and not sense of ownership.

When the two sons of the second-century Rabbi Me'ir Ba'al Ha'Ness took ill and passed away, their mother, Beruriah, carried them up to the loft , placed them on their beds, and waited for the rabbi to return home from prayer, thinking and thinking of how to break the news to him. When he arrived, she took him aside and said: "My teacher, I have a legal question."

"Speak, my love. What is your question?"

"A long time ago, someone left with me with two items of theirs to watch over until they would return to retrieve them. Years have passed, and suddenly the owner has come back and required of me that I return what he left with me. My question is, do I have to return them to him? After all, I have invested so much time and energy in caring for them all these years that by right they ought to belong to me."

"No, my love, you must return them to their rightful owner regardless of how much you have given of yourself to care for them. That is the law."

Beruriah then took her husband by the hand and led him up to the loft to where their sons lay. "These are they," she said. "And the owner has asked that they be returned."

Way way back when I was a young Talmudic student in Jerusalem, I used to accompany the elder master Rabbi Yussef Ratzabi on his periodic strolls through the marketplace because I learned more from his actions than from his discourses. When we approached a corner where a beggar sat crouched, extending his coin-filled tin can, Rabbi Ratzabi stopped, withdrew a wad of bills, handed it to the man and half-shouted in excitement: "My brother! Where have you been? I've been holding onto your money now for days! It's about time I found you!" We then walked on, leaving the beggar sitting there with his jaws ajar in utter shock, completely oblivious to the bills he now grasped in his arthritis-stricken hands.

"Did you know this man?" I asked the rabbi.

"Never met him before."

"Then why did you say to him that you've been holding onto his money all this time?"

The rabbi stopped, turned around, placed his ancient weather-beaten hands on my shoulders, looked me straight in the eyes and said:

"My son, do you not know the meaning of tithing? It is not about giving a tenth of what we own. Not at all. Rather, it is giving of that which God has placed in our keep for the purpose of allocating to those in need. That money, in other words, was his all along."

Gershon

"My son, do you not know the meaning of tithing?"

What a pity we cannot convince our leaders of such wisdom!

Sally McFague suggested “the earth is God’s body”. If she is correct, all materials and structures technically belong to God. Susan

Being owned by a god is by extension being owned by a parent, teacher, state, etc, up to the most appalling tyrannies.

In addition: the concept of god-ownership is an interesting one. YHWH acted as Adam and Eve's landlord in Eden, allowing them to stay on condition that they paid their dues and kept the rules. Paradise was his, and they were required to obey at all times. Once they infringed his landlord -based rules they were ejected. YHWH then decided to call casual disobedience 'sin'. Well, he made the rules after all! But surely it was YHWH who placed the serpent in Eden knowing full-well what the serpent would do? Perhaps YHWH already had another tenant lined up and needed the room?

The idea of ownership of land, property, things and people appears to have originated in Ancient Mesopotamia where negotiations relied upon contracts. There the god/goddess owned cities and the king was merely their agent taking in rents on a regular basis. Over time, the god/goddess assumed the king's executive powers becoming sole ruler.

The ancient rules of Israel reminded the people that they didn't really own anything. And so, seasons were instituted wherein all debts were forgiven, and all slaves were freed, and all lands that had been sold were restored to those who originally inherited them, and basically, then, nothing was really "for sale" or for "ownership," but rather on loan for stewardship and for cultivation toward the sustenance of Self and Other. Thus, if you "owned" a field, you were obligated to leave a corner of it, a tenth of it, and what you forgot to harvest, and what you dropped during the harvest -- for the needy, the orphan, the widow, the stranger... And every seventh year your fields belonged to the local wildlife and the needy, and every seventh day the same, plus you couldn't work your animals either -- all of it to remind us that "The earth belongs to Me, and you are but sojourners" (Leviticus, Ch. 25). And when David was fundraising for the project of constructing the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, he acknowledged to God what a joke it was to presume we were giving anything to God when everything came from and belonged to God: "But who am I, and what is my people, that we presume to be able to offer so altruistically for this purpose? for all things come from You, and we have gifted you of what already is Yours. For we are strangers before You, and sojourners, as were all of our ancestors. O YHWH our God, all this material that we have prepared in order to build You a house for Your Holy Name comes from Your handiwork, and it has all been Yours all along" (1 Chronicles 29:14-16).

The invention of evil in the continuance of old myths is probably not part of a theological view, which thinks of evil as part of the divine person or the divine substance, but as the absolute opposite. But this should be discussed.