Debt: The First 5000 Years - autonomous learning

Chapter Three
PRIMORDIAL DEBTS
In being born every being is born as
debt owed to the gods, the saints, the
Fathers and to men. If one makes a sacrifice,
it is because of a debt owing to
the gods from birth . . . If one recites a
sacred text, it is because of a debt owing
to the saints . . . If one wishes fo r offspring,
it is because of a debt due to the
fathers from birth . . . And if one gives
hospitality, it is because it is a debt owing
to men.
-Satapatha Brahmana 1.7.12, r-6
Let us drive away the evil effects of bad
dreams, just as we pay off debts.
-Rig Veda 8-47·17
THE REASON THAT economics textbooks now begin with imaginary
villages is because it has been impossible to talk about real ones. Even
some economists have been forced to admit that Smith's Land of Barter
doesn't really exist.1
The question is why the myth has been perpetuated, anyway.
Economists have long since jettisoned other elements of The Wealth of
Nations-for instance, Smith's labor theory of value and disapproval
of joint-stock corporations. Why not simply write off the myth of barter
as a quaint Enlightenment parable, and instead attempt to understand
primordial credit arrangements-or anyway, something more in
keeping with the historical evidence
The answer seems to be that the Myth of Barter cannot go away,
because it is central to the entire discourse of economics.