It is. When we look at the establishment of the nation of Israel, that nation that received its civil law directly from God, we find that that law left the citizens of Israel free to buy and sell as they wished. The only exception was with respect to the law by which God forbade His people to sell their inheritance in perpetuity. Otherwise, agreements were just that, agreements. If Abishai is willing to pay ten shekels for a bushel of olives and if Zunni is willing to sell a bushel of olives for ten shekels, the deal happens.
This, in the end, is precisely what we mean by free markets. It describes the freedom we ought to have to make our own decisions with respect to all that God has put under our care. As stewards we remember that He ultimately owns all things, we only proximately. He has not given the government the freedom to dictate the economic decisions of the citizens. When governments take it upon themselves to dictate those decisions they are no longer ministers of justice but injustice.
The new covenant teaches the exact same thing, though without the law of Jubilee. Where does it do so? Matthew 7:12, where we are commanded to do unto others as we would have them do unto us. What does that have to do with economics? Everything. Economics is nothing more nor less than the sum total of economic decisions made by individuals. Each of us wants the freedom to make our own decisions. We ought then to want our neighbors as well to be able to make their own decisions. Enjoining the state to force my neighbor to make economic decisions they would otherwise not wish to make is failing to love our neighbor.
All of us want to be able to enjoy goods and services at no cost to ourselves. All of us want to be able to sell the goods and services we have, including our labor, at infinite cost to our neighbors. Abishai wants olives for free. Zunni wants a cajillion shekels per olive. When an economy is free, we all seek to find the intersect between what we’re willing to pay and what we’d like, what we’re willing to sell for and what we’d like. If that intersect is found, the sale freely takes place. If that intersect isn’t found, the sale freely does not take place. In either instance each party is free. Each is choosing what they wish.
Doesn’t the Bible teach that people are bad? Indeed it does. Which is precisely why it’s not safe, wise or biblical to give bad people the power to make other bad people do what they don’t want to do. “But sin” isn’t an argument against free markets but an argument for them. God knows what He’s doing. We should do as He says.
If you’re interested in learning more about the moral issues embedded in questions of economics, I’d commend my series Economics for Everybody, and/or, as discussed last week on the Jesus Changes Everything podcast, The Law by Frederic Bastiat.
The Old Testament law was voluntary socialism. Because Moses received a law that cursed the smallest violation. This is why Sinai is more than giving of law. It was actually God coming to dwell on the Temple mount. The Old Testament law that was never kept, was the foundation of Gods sure defense against the lawless nations surrounding Israel. So you have the practice of devaluing of a person by breaking a law, but at the same time that broken law demanded death which protected the abuse. God had to send the nation into exile to protect his people from their own leaders through the prophets curse. Which are written in the Psalms. God gave us the curses to satisfy the abuses of the wicked. We are storing up eternal punishment’s by the curse.
You’d have to unpack what you mean by “voluntary socialism.” If you mean individuals were free to share if they wished, then that’s a free market. Otherwise I can’t make sense of the term.