Practices
Tithing
Charitable Practices
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Origin 1000 BCE to 600 CE
The setting aside of a tenth of one's income or produce for the support of religion and the relief of the poor, rooted in the Hebrew Bible, where a tithe of crops and herds was given to the Levites, the temple, and the needy. Christianity carried the practice forward as a guide for proportional giving to the church and to charitable works, and many congregations still teach the tithe as a standard of stewardship. The giver returns a portion of what is received as belonging first to God. Tithing funds worship, clergy, and aid to the vulnerable, and is meant to cultivate gratitude, trust in providence, and freedom from the grip of possessions.
Facts
Status
Status Within the TraditionThe giver is taught to understand the tithe as returning a portion of what is already received as belonging first to God, rather than as a voluntary donation from wealth the giver owns outright, so the practice is framed as an act of gratitude and trust rather than as ordinary charitable giving. 3 Current StatusSourced to the subject's own accountDenominational expectation varies today: the Seventh-day Adventist Church and the Latter Day Saint movement treat tithing as effectively required, the LDS church specifically making it a condition of a temple recommend, and Pentecostal and Methodist bodies expect or set it as a giving goal, while the Catholic Church no longer requires ten percent of income and Baptist bodies encourage rather than mandate it. 2 Legal StatusSourced to the subject's own accountTithing was a compulsory tax in England until the Tithe Commutation Act 1836 replaced it with a voluntary payment and the Tithe Act 1951 abolished what remained of compulsory collection; in most modern jurisdictions a tithe is a voluntary religious donation carrying no legal force. 2 Practice
Category of Practice Who Performs It ObligationRecommended and meritorious, not required 1 Cadence DetailSourced to the subject's own accountTiming differs by tradition and denomination: some Christian practice points to 1 Corinthians 16:1-2 as instruction to give weekly, tithes can also be given as a lump sum or spread across the year, and Latter Day Saint members meet with their bishop once a year for a tithing declaration. 2 Solitary or CommunalPerformed alone or together 1 Origins
Origin Period Place of Origin Scholarship and Forensics
Scholarly NoteSourced to the subject's own accountTithing funds worship, clergy, and aid to the vulnerable, and is meant to cultivate gratitude, trust in providence, and freedom from the grip of possessions. 2 Learn More
The Tenth Given to God
Tithing is the practice of giving a tenth of one's produce or income to religious or charitable ends, an ancient form of sacred giving most strongly associated with the biblical traditions. The word means simply "a tenth," and the practice rests on the idea that a fixed portion of what one receives belongs by right to God and is to be returned, to support the priesthood and the sanctuary, to provide for the poor, and to acknowledge that all increase comes ultimately from the divine. As a defined proportion rather than a free gift, the tithe gives almsgiving a measurable shape and binds the giver to a regular, calculable obligation.
In the Hebrew Bible the tithe is commanded in several forms: a portion of the harvest and herds set aside for the Levites who served the sanctuary and had no land of their own, a tithe consumed in celebration at the central shrine, and, in certain years, a tithe given to the poor, the stranger, the orphan and the widow. The prophet Malachi frames the withholding of tithes as robbing God, and their faithful giving as opening the windows of heaven, a passage that has remained central to later Jewish and Christian teaching on the practice.
Its Afterlife in Christianity and Beyond
Christianity inherited the language of the tithe, and through the medieval period the church tithe became a compulsory tax levied on the produce of the land across much of Christian Europe, collected by the church and a major part of its wealth and of ordinary people's burdens, until it was gradually abolished or commuted in the modern era. With the end of the compulsory tithe, giving to the church became voluntary, and many Protestant traditions revived tithing as a personal spiritual discipline, the free dedication of a tenth of one's income, rather than a legal due. Some churches, especially in the evangelical and Restorationist traditions, teach tithing as a binding obligation and a test of faith, citing the same scriptural passages; others treat the tenth as a guideline for proportionate, cheerful giving rather than a fixed law.
Proportional religious giving of this kind has close counterparts in other traditions, the Islamic zakat, calculated as a fixed fraction of accumulated wealth, and the various fixed offerings of other faiths, reflecting a widespread religious intuition that giving should be measured against what one has rather than left wholly to impulse, so that the poor have a defined claim and the giver a defined duty.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Belongs to Tradition
The tithe is taught and expected far more explicitly here than in the older Western churches, and is the ordinary basis on which a congregation supports itself and its missionaries.
Kept in Breslov Hasidism. Maaser, the tenth, is given from income, and the practice survived the loss of the agricultural tithes it began as.
Kept in Chabad-Lubavitch. Maaser, the tenth, is given from income, and the practice survived the loss of the agricultural tithes it began as.
Kept in Haredi Judaism, where the halakhic standard is the strictest and the most stringent opinion is ordinarily followed. Maaser, the tenth, is given from income, and the practice survived the loss of the agricultural tithes it began as.
Kept in Hasidic Judaism. Maaser, the tenth, is given from income, and the practice survived the loss of the agricultural tithes it began as.
Kept in Modern Orthodox Judaism, alongside full engagement with secular study and with the state. Maaser, the tenth, is given from income, and the practice survived the loss of the agricultural tithes it began as.
Kept in the National Baptist Convention of America International. The tithe is taught and expected far more explicitly here than in the older Western churches, and is the ordinary basis on which a congregation supports itself and its missionaries.
Maaser, the tenth, is given from income, and the practice survived the loss of the agricultural tithes it began as.
Kept in the Progressive National Baptist Convention. The tithe is taught and expected far more explicitly here than in the older Western churches, and is the ordinary basis on which a congregation supports itself and its missionaries.
Element Of
Sources
1. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 3rd revised edition
F. L. Cross and E. A. Livingstone (eds.), Oxford University Press, 2005View the Source 2. Tithe (Wikipedia)
Wikipedia contributors, Wikipedia, 2026on current denominational expectation, the English legal history of compulsory tithes, and comparative cadenceView the Source 3. The Hebrew Bible (Tanakh)
Shulchan Aruch
The Baptist Faith and Message
Encyclopedia of Religion
Mircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.), Macmillan Reference, 2005View the Source Essays About This Entity (1 essay)
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