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If giving is a universal phenomenon, we try to identify here what in Scripture may have encouraged this social act. If there is no direct relationship between the Biblical Word and the many contemporary figures of gift in our secularized societies, we can nevertheless speak of elective affinities. In the same way that Weber’s puritan and entrepreneur did not speak the same language but understood each other, the charitable believer can maintain a fruitful dialogue with the generous man. The biblical message is well if not the source, at least one of the sources of the generosity of private persons. It is perfectly soluble in the Maussian triple obligation because the Christian conception of the gift strongly values this act as much as it condemns the refusal of the counter-gift.