{"id":30,"date":"2009-09-17T22:27:49","date_gmt":"2009-09-18T05:27:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fiduciarydutiesblog.com\/?p=30"},"modified":"2009-09-17T22:27:49","modified_gmt":"2009-09-18T05:27:49","slug":"religious-roots-for-fiduciary-duties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/?p=30","title":{"rendered":"Religious Roots for Fiduciary Duties"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Legal commentators have differing opinions regarding the origin and background of fiduciary duties.\u00a0 A recent article by Mary Szto would seem to focus on the business side of things, as her article is entitled \u201cLimited Liability Company Morality: Fiduciary Duties in Historical Context,\u201d <em>23 Quinnipiac Law Review 61<\/em> (2004-2005).<\/p>\n<p>However, the author strikes a deep religious tone to fiduciary relationships.\u00a0 Says Ms. Szto, \u201cFiduciary duties are the offspring of ecclesiastical property views and Roman legal forms.\u00a0 They would then mature into agency and trust law; partnership and corporate law would later wed them to the business association.\u00a0 They are <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Christological_argument\" target=\"_blank\">Christological <\/a>in origin.\u00a0 Fiduciary duties acknowledge that property ownership, including the business enterprise, requires stewardship.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In analyzing the history of fiduciary duties, she argues that, \u201cThe origin of fiduciary duties has religious and secular roots.\u00a0 These roots were wed by canon lawyers in the medieval era . . . Fiduciary duties in the biblical tradition begin in the Genesis creation account.\u00a0 The human mission on earth is being a fiduciary, being  a steward of God\u2019s and other\u2019s property.\u00a0 Israel is a fiduciary.\u00a0 So is Jesus Christ.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Continuing in this vein, she explains that,\u00a0 \u201cIn the biblical account, after creating the world, God appoints man and woman as agents.\u00a0 They steward the world, exercise dominion, and are fruitful. \u00a0 God is the world\u2019s eternal owner, and his agents are stewards.\u00a0 Fiduciary duties thus bond God, his creation, and his creatures.\u00a0 Adam and Eve failed in the enterprise, however, and the rest of biblical history is the story of redemption.\u00a0 It is a search for the faithful fiduciary and a permanent inheritance.\u00a0 God redeems Israel from Egypt and gives Canaan to her as an inheritance.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWithin this creative-redemptive-consumptive framework, business people in the Bible have fiduciary duties to God and others . . . In Christian theology, Christ is the perfect fiduciary.\u00a0 He is the selfless steward who lays down his life for others.\u00a0 By dying and rising, he enables those who accept him to have an eternal inheritance.\u00a0 Christ is the bridge between death and life, time and eternity, temporal and permanent property.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Next week we\u2019ll continue an analysis of this article.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Legal commentators have differing opinions regarding the origin and background of fiduciary duties.\u00a0 A recent article by Mary Szto would seem to focus on the business side of things, as her article is entitled \u201cLimited Liability Company Morality: Fiduciary Duties in Historical Context,\u201d 23 Quinnipiac Law Review 61 (2004-2005). However, the author strikes a deep [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-law-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}