Is Slavery Moral?

[devolved]

I have read many rationalizations for slavery. When I read these rationalizations from apologists, at least for me, seem to always fall in line with one of the (4)reasons I stated above.

I think you are confusing "rationalization for slavery"... which would be justification FOR ALL SLAVERY EVER EXISTING, including today...

And contextual explanation as to why our moral expectations don't apply to certain contexts of the past.

Again, going back to the Holodomor example. OF COURSE our present expectations would dictate that feeding your dead children to your living children is immoral. It would land you in jail.

But such moral context only exist due to available alternatives. The more narrow the alternatives, the less applicable any moral principle becomes, because it falls outside of its immediately-defined scope and the options are reduced and butt heads with other competing principles.

Hence, what you are doing is projecting the availability of choices and options that we have today on a culture that did not have these due to limiting circumstances.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

Thanks for the ad hominem attack. If you choose not to respond in a dignified manor, then that is fine. This is my own personal and honest assessment from the many answers read in this thread. Yours seem no different. Sorry.

So please carry on... It's fair to say that the many observations I expressed in post #355, will further align with post #355, as I read them moving forward.

Thnx

Speaking of ad hom, it seems to be the most popular form of communicating with Christians used by athestis/agnostics/skeptics here on CF, so if I used the popular form of communicating and it's not popular when used by Christians, what does that tell you? For a subjectivist, the complete lack of compassion or sensitivity in dealing with the views of others who do not share your subjective beliefs, is not a trait I find appealing within the whole of the human race.

 

[cvanwey]

I think you are confusing "rationalization for slavery"... which would be justification FOR ALL SLAVERY EVER EXISTING, including today...

And contextual explanation as to why our moral expectations don't apply to certain contexts of the past.

Again, going back to the Holodomor example. OF COURSE our present expectations would dictate that feeding your dead children to your living children is immoral. It would land you in jail.

But such moral context only exist due to available alternatives. The more narrow the alternatives, the less applicable any moral principle becomes, because it falls outside of its immediately-defined scope and the options are reduced and butt heads with other competing principles.

Hence, what you are doing is projecting the availability of choices and options that we have today on a culture that did not have these due to limiting circumstances.

Hey buddy... I have no doubt you possess a wealth of knowledge... I'm not trying to deflect or change the subject. However, there has been plenty of posts now....

It becomes very simple now IMHO....

If you cannot demonstrate these slavery verses were given by a proven objective agent (i.e.) Yahweh, then we are merely exchanging opinions about books of opinion

Peace

 

[devolved]

All morals are subjective

You are conceptualizing and reifying patterns of reality here, and you need to first understand what morality is, and what objectivity is, and what a "proof" would mean before you even begin speaking these words. I'm not saying that you don't have some internal understanding of the meaning, but it's likely a generic dictionary meaning as opposed to how that meaning maps to reality.

From a ground of certain philosophical presuppositions.

a) Reality is objective
b) Our perception of reality is subjective.

Hence, you end up switching these categories when we are discussing morality. We generally presuppose, and hopefully agree, that if we close our eyes then the world out there doesn't stop functioning. Right?

We can also agree that our perception allows us to merely detect "reduced patterns" that we derive from our senses. These patterns end up mapping to other patterns, and that's how we derive a "model of reality" that our brains use as operation map.

That's essentially what knowledge is. It's a model of reality that exists as interlinking network of concepts that we rely on to map reality and figure out what we see, and what to do with what we see.

I hope we have some agreement on that so far.

What we call morality is not much different from any given "proper contextual behavior" that exists in our brain, except that it takes into account a broader range of our "shared patterns of behavior" that we communicate to each other and compare.

Thus, morality IS NOT subjective in a sense that there are limited amount of behavior that doesn't lead to your death, or death of your kind. You can't say that you subjectively decide not to jump from the roof of the building, because there is a very good objective context out there.

unless you can demonstrate PROOF that not only God exists, but that God's dictates are actually objective.

It doesn't work like that in context of what God is. God, from our position of reality of "here and now" is a foundational presuppostion... and it can only exist as a foundational presupposition.

In short, God is an axiom derived through certain necessity for having a coherent model of reality. It's not something that you "prove". It's something that you presuppose to use as a foundation in which certain context of proof can be possible.

You make plenty of foundational assumptions that you can't prove. Hence, I don't generally demand you to prove them before you can have grounds for some moral proclamations.

God axiom at its core, if we strip any other presuppositional dogma assumes that there's a guiding force that arranged our reality as certain way, as opposed to having an arbitrary reality in which meaning WOULD BE subjective and preferential.

Hence, it's actually a presupposition out of certain necessity to have meaning as opposed to having arbitrary consensus.

 

[cvanwey]

Speaking of ad hom, it seems to be the most popular form of communicating with Christians used by athestis/agnostics/skeptics here on CF, so if I used the popular form of communicating and it's not popular when used by Christians, what does that tell you? For a subjectivist, the complete lack of compassion or sensitivity in dealing with the views of others who do not share your subjective beliefs, is not a trait I find appealing within the whole of the human race.

I 'agree', and if do it as well, I sincerely apologize!

I'm not attempting to regurgitate, cherry pick, or other. When I read the Bible, it appears shamelessly human opinionated (from the era it was composed).

Sorry, this is nothing towards you.

Moving forward, my request is very simple...

If you cannot demonstrate that the Bible was actually given by God, then like I stated to others, it's just one opinion verses another

 

[cvanwey]

You are conceptualizing and reifying patterns of reality here, and you need to first understand what morality is, and what objectivity is, and what a "proof" would mean before you even begin speaking these words. I'm not saying that you don't have some internal understanding of the meaning, but it's likely a generic dictionary meaning as opposed to how that meaning maps to reality.

From a ground of certain philosophical presuppositions.

a) Reality is objective
b) Our perception of reality is subjective.

Hence, you end up switching these categories when we are discussing morality. We generally presuppose, and hopefully agree, that if we close our eyes then the world out there doesn't stop functioning. Right?

We can also agree that our perception allows us to merely detect "reduced patterns" that we derive from our senses. These patterns end up mapping to other patterns, and that's how we derive a "model of reality" that our brains use as operation map.

That's essentially what knowledge is. It's a model of reality that exists as interlinking network of concepts that we rely on to map reality and figure out what we see, and what to do with what we see.

I hope we have some agreement on that so far.

What we call morality is not much different from any given "proper contextual behavior" that exists in our brain, except that it takes into account a broader range of our "shared patterns of behavior" that we communicate to each other and compare.

Thus, morality IS NOT subjective in a sense that there are limited amount of behavior that doesn't lead to your death, or death of your kind. You can't say that you subjectively decide not to jump from the roof of the building, because there is a very good objective context out there.



It doesn't work like that in context of what God is. God, from our position of reality of "here and now" is a foundational presuppostion... and it can only exist as a foundational presupposition.

In short, God is an axiom derived through certain necessity for having a coherent model of reality. It's not something that you "prove". It's something that you presuppose to use as a foundation in which certain context of proof can be possible.

You make plenty of foundational assumptions that you can't prove. Hence, I don't generally demand you to prove them before you can have grounds for some moral proclamations.

God axiom at its core, if we strip any other presuppositional dogma assumes that there's a guiding force that arranged our reality as certain way, as opposed to having an arbitrary reality in which meaning WOULD BE subjective and preferential.

Hence, it's actually a presupposition out of certain necessity to have meaning as opposed to having arbitrary consensus.

Thanks for assuming what you 'think' I know.

Since you seem to have a much better grasp of definitions, and since I appear to be misdirected about claimed objective moral foundations, I pose one very simple question to you instead...

Which presuppositional God(s), are you appealing to, and why? Then tell me how your conclusion is not circular in reasoning.

Thanks

 

[devolved]

I'm not trying to deflect or change the subject. However, there has been plenty of posts now....

You are attempting to re-frame this subject matter in context in which it doesn't make sense.

I'm telling you that circle is a circle (from what I would define as a circle), and you coming back and saying "sorry... if you can't demonstrate that circle is what I would define it ... a square... that would mean that it's just your opinion vs mine".

Of course it's your "opinion" vs mine. What we are talking about is a scope of any given opinion as opposed to some arbitrary "apples can talk too". So what? That's the eventual question... So what?

If you can't provide the answer to that question, then relevance of your opinion in scope of reality doesn't matter much. It's merely a nominal presupposition that doesn't match to any meaningful mechanics or builds any meaningful models of behavior.

It becomes very simple now IMHO....

It's not. You clearly don't understand the issue at hand.

Please read this first before you ever ask for any proof of anything again

Münchhausen trilemma - Wikipedia

If you cannot demonstrate these slavery verses were given by a proven objective agent (i.e.) Yahweh, then we are merely exchanging opinions about books of opinion

Again, read the wiki article first, and perhaps that you can understand that any and every explanation and demand for proof is predicated on assumption that you are in a good position to judge whether such proof is valid, and that you have adequate information to rationally deduce what is viable in that context and what is not.

It's not a matter of proof. Either your model overlaps and allows for certain possibility that you accept as viable, or it doesn't.

If it doesn't, then no matter how much "proof" I throw your way would not matter in context of your presupposed baseline assumptions.

Thus, what would you consider to be a proof?

 

[cvanwey]

You are attempting to re-frame this subject matter in context in which it doesn't make sense.

I'm telling you that circle is a circle (from what I would define as a circle), and you coming back and saying "sorry... if you can't demonstrate that circle is what I would define it ... a square... that would mean that it's just your opinion vs mine".

Of course it's your "opinion" vs mine. What we are talking about is a scope of any given opinion as opposed to some arbitrary "apples can talk too". So what? That's the eventual question... So what?

If you can't provide the answer to that question, then relevance of your opinion in scope of reality doesn't matter much. It's merely a nominal presupposition that doesn't match to any meaningful mechanics or builds any meaningful models of behavior.



It's not. You clearly don't understand the issue at hand.

Please read this first before you ever ask for any proof of anything again

Münchhausen trilemma - Wikipedia



Again, read the wiki article first, and perhaps that you can understand that any and every explanation and demand for proof is predicated on assumption that you are in a good position to judge whether such proof is valid, and that you have adequate information to rationally deduce what is viable in that context and what is not.

It's not a matter of proof. Either your model overlaps and allows for certain possibility that you accept as viable, or it doesn't.

If it doesn't, then no matter how much "proof" I throw your way would not matter in context of your presupposed baseline assumptions.

Thus, what would you consider to be a proof?

I'll give it a twirl...

1) Is the presented evidence met with any conformation bias, or, might the presented evidence be partial to one's own a priori position in any possible way? 2) Is the evidence situational, rather than repeatable at any time? 3) Does the evidence lack unbiased peer review in a controlled and/or well established environment? 4) Was the evidence unable to be corroborated with other pieces of independent and unbiased evidence? 5) Is the presented claimed evidence met with any fallacious reasoning? Meaning, inconsistent or demonstrable errors in reasoning. If the answer is 'yes' to any of these questions, then it 'may' not meet an acceptable standard for evidence. This does not mean the claimed evidence is immediately discarded otherwise. The above five points can at least provide a baseline or starting reference point. Each claim merits individual scrutiny and examination accordingly.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

I 'agree', and if do it as well, I sincerely apologize!

I'm not attempting to regurgitate, cherry pick, or other. When I read the Bible, it appears shamelessly human opinionated (from the era it was composed).

Sorry, this is nothing towards you.

I apologize too, my response was more out of frustration from the responses (not just yours) to my response to post #1.

Moving forward, my request is very simple...

If you cannot demonstrate that the Bible was actually given by God, then like I stated to others, it's just one opinion verses another

Without going into a novel length post, I would describe belief, the belief that the Bible is the self-attesting Revelation from God to man, communicated in language men can relate to and understanding, through the writing of men chosen to communicate the spoken Word of God into written form to preserve for future generations. I hold to the classical verbal plenary view of inspiration. I also describe belief in the Bible as the Word of God as a properly basic belief, it is an axiom, and just as if not more valid than the circularity involved in every other worldview. However perplexing it may be, I am not a foundationalist, , because the technical phrase for the epistemology I hold to is "revelational" that is a revelational epistemology where all knowledge is dependent on the knowledge of God, where all empirical facts, are created facts. I could go into further details, but am thinking this will be passed off as no demonstration, perhaps not, but it is an explanation that goes beyond the typical response you might receive.

 

[devolved]

I'll give it a twirl...

You obviously did not read the link. I've posted it twice now.

1) Is the presented evidence met with any conformation bias, or, might the presented evidence be partial to one's own a priori position in any possible way?

Before you can present it as a claim you'd need to justify it first. How would you justify the above claim? What proof would you use that it's a valid claim?

2) Is the evidence situational, rather than repeatable at any time?

Same as above

3) Does the evidence lack unbiased peer review in a controlled and/or well established environment?

Same as above

4) Was the evidence unable to be corroborated with other pieces of independent and unbiased evidence?

Same as above

5) Is the presented claimed evidence met with any fallacious reasoning? Meaning, inconsistent or demonstrable errors in reasoning.

Same as above

If the answer is 'yes' to any of these questions, then it 'may' not meet an acceptable standard for evidence. This does not mean the claimed evidence is immediately discarded otherwise. The above five points can at least provide a baseline or starting reference point. Each claim merits individual scrutiny and examination accordingly.

Same as above

In short, how did you conclude that the above would be pre-requisites for acceptable standards of evidence? What justification do you have to claim that it's superior to my standards?

 

[devolved]

Which presuppositional God(s), are you appealing to, and why? Then tell me how your conclusion is not circular in reasoning.

1) Presupposing by definition is not circular in reasoning. It's axiomatic, meaning it's a model that exist out of necessity for the rest of the model to function and for reality to have some intelligible context.

2) I presuppose a Christian God. It would not be the model of reality that most Christians would imagine. I'd be happy to lay out a few points if you care to read these.


a) God is a causal force that arranged our reality as both intelligent and intelligible.

We have two known options here. Either there is an intelligent agency behind universal constants that result in intelligent and intelligible functions, or there is not.

If there is not, then it would lead to accidental reality that we live in, and thus it's rather arbitrary in terms of what we are, and what it is. There is no inherent meaning, because it's not a background for life, but life is rather a meaningless pattern among many other meaningless patterns. People may infuse whatever meaning they desire, but in scope of reality such meaning is largely irrelevant.

If there is, then it's a reality infused with specific meaning that exists as a background for intelligent life that's a very special part of such reality, because it's the ultimate result of such reality and that's what such reality was created for.

That's the basal assumption from two possible scenarios. I think it should be fairly obvious as to how such basal assumption would lead one to different moral points.

Taking that further to a Christian God, we would evaluate the wide scope of religious presuppositions, and see which one is the closest to that model. You end up with either vagueness of Bhuddism, or specificity of Christianity which we can take as an allegory or reality that can't be described apart from some references that we can intelligibly understand.

That's basis for my model in a few words.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

You are conceptualizing and reifying patterns of reality here, and you need to first understand what morality is, and what objectivity is, and what a "proof" would mean before you even begin speaking these words. I'm not saying that you don't have some internal understanding of the meaning, but it's likely a generic dictionary meaning as opposed to how that meaning maps to reality.

From a ground of certain philosophical presuppositions.

a) Reality is objective
b) Our perception of reality is subjective.

Hence, you end up switching these categories when we are discussing morality. We generally presuppose, and hopefully agree, that if we close our eyes then the world out there doesn't stop functioning. Right?

We can also agree that our perception allows us to merely detect "reduced patterns" that we derive from our senses. These patterns end up mapping to other patterns, and that's how we derive a "model of reality" that our brains use as operation map.

That's essentially what knowledge is. It's a model of reality that exists as interlinking network of concepts that we rely on to map reality and figure out what we see, and what to do with what we see.

I hope we have some agreement on that so far.

What we call morality is not much different from any given "proper contextual behavior" that exists in our brain, except that it takes into account a broader range of our "shared patterns of behavior" that we communicate to each other and compare.

Thus, morality IS NOT subjective in a sense that there are limited amount of behavior that doesn't lead to your death, or death of your kind. You can't say that you subjectively decide not to jump from the roof of the building, because there is a very good objective context out there.

It doesn't work like that in context of what God is. God, from our position of reality of "here and now" is a foundational presuppostion... and it can only exist as a foundational presupposition.

In short, God is an axiom derived through certain necessity for having a coherent model of reality. It's not something that you "prove". It's something that you presuppose to use as a foundation in which certain context of proof can be possible.

You make plenty of foundational assumptions that you can't prove. Hence, I don't generally demand you to prove them before you can have grounds for some moral proclamations.

God axiom at its core, if we strip any other presuppositional dogma assumes that there's a guiding force that arranged our reality as certain way, as opposed to having an arbitrary reality in which meaning WOULD BE subjective and preferential.

Hence, it's actually a presupposition out of certain necessity to have meaning as opposed to having arbitrary consensus.

We may not agree 110% but that is entirely besides the point for all the similarities between our shared worldview and how I view your outstanding response!

 

[cvanwey]

1) Presupposing by definition is not circular in reasoning. It's axiomatic, meaning it's a model that exist out of necessity for the rest of the model to function and for reality to have some intelligible context.

2) I presuppose a Christian God. It would not be the model of reality that most Christians would imagine. I'd be happy to lay out a few points if you care to read these.


a) God is a causal force that arranged our reality as both intelligent and intelligible.

We have two known options here. Either there is an intelligent agency behind universal constants that result in intelligent and intelligible functions, or there is not.

If there is not, then it would lead to accidental reality that we live in, and thus it's rather arbitrary in terms of what we are, and what it is. There is no inherent meaning, because it's not a background for life, but life is rather a meaningless pattern among many other meaningless patterns. People may infuse whatever meaning they desire, but in scope of reality such meaning is largely irrelevant.

If there is, then it's a reality infused with specific meaning that exists as a background for intelligent life that's a very special part of such reality, because it's the ultimate result of such reality and that's what such reality was created for.

That's the basal assumption from two possible scenarios. I think it should be fairly obvious as to how such basal assumption would lead one to different moral points.

Taking that further to a Christian God, we would evaluate the wide scope of religious presuppositions, and see which one is the closest to that model. You end up with either vagueness of Bhuddism, or specificity of Christianity which we can take as an allegory or reality that can't be described apart from some references that we can intelligibly understand.

That's basis for my model in a few words.

When I read the Bible, and I intrinsically disagree with slavery, and if God also gave me my intrinsic moral compass (whether I decide to follow it or not), then why do I disagree intrinsically? If distinction between absolute right/wrong is built within humans from a God, but the human disagrees, then doesn't this 'disprove' the assumption that morals are inherited from God's moral nature?

When I read the Bible (Genesis, Leviticus, Exodus, other), it appears to represent many occurrences, which do not follow known discovered reality. Hence, and therefore concluding, it is written by men, and claimed to be inspired by a higher power (for various human adopted reasons).

 

[Allandavid]

Yes. It makes total sense. Especially when their entire written history is that of being slaves themselves, and then continual disappointment and disobedient to the principles they've ascribed to keep.

Well, you’ve stepped into another patch of quicksand. There is no evidence that the Jews were ever enslaved in Egypt, nor that there was an ‘exodus’. So much so that in the decades following David Ben Gurion’s decree to ‘find me the deeds of Israel’, most prominent Jewish historians and archaeologists have concluded that the stories were myths...

 

[cvanwey]

I apologize too, my response was more out of frustration from the responses (not just yours) to my response to post #1.



Without going into a novel length post, I would describe belief, the belief that the Bible is the self-attesting Revelation from God to man, communicated in language men can relate to and understanding, through the writing of men chosen to communicate the spoken Word of God into written form to preserve for future generations. I hold to the classical verbal plenary view of inspiration. I also describe belief in the Bible as the Word of God as a properly basic belief, it is an axiom, and just as if not more valid than the circularity involved in every other worldview. However perplexing it may be, I am not a foundationalist, , because the technical phrase for the epistemology I hold to is "revelational" that is a revelational epistemology where all knowledge is dependent on the knowledge of God, where all empirical facts, are created facts. I could go into further details, but am thinking this will be passed off as no demonstration, perhaps not, but it is an explanation that goes beyond the typical response you might receive.

When I receive a similar response from a Muslim, when reading the Qur'an, and also assuming one of the two are the only choices one may conclude, how might one conclude which one is correct?

Also, to remain on topic, is slavery actually moral? A simple yes or no answer, followed by a brief explanation why it's yes/no, would be preferred

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

When I receive a similar response from a Muslim, when reading the Qur'an, and also assuming one of the two are the only choices one may conclude, how might one conclude which one is correct?

Not sure if you recall but I answered the same question in another post in another one of the threads you started (I understand how things can get confusing with so many people joining in lengthy threads with so many responses, it's easy to loose track). Perhaps a couple of simple questions would be helpful. Which came first, the Hebrew Scriptures or the Qur'an? What is the Qur'an based on? How or does the Qur'an provide origins answers in a way resembling the Hebrew Scriptures?

Also, to remain on topic, is slavery actually moral? A simple yes or no answer, followed by a brief explanation why it's yes/no, would be preferred

Option C. It all depends. Post #348 for details. Sorry to be so brief, time slips away!

 

[Par5]

Do you write posts of the immoral connections of Santa Claus? Do you write about Santa Claus at all? If not, that santa clause is not the same category as God. Him your write about. Why?

And just so you know, if you write about God and use insulting words, words that would be insulting if someone said that of you, know that believing He is not there and not listening will not be an excuse. Same as if employees thought the boss was on vacation and talked very badly about him only to find that he was listening because his vacation was posphoned and he had business in the adjecent room would not be able to say, "we thought you weren't there."
When you extract bits to present the picture you want changing what was actually said, it is called editing and changing the meaning.You have no interests in the circumstances. You just want to accuse God of evil. It is like if I wrote, "A man stood over the frightened woman with the sharpest knife in the room" and you cried "cruel and evil man" only to have edited out the fact that he was a surgeon about to save her life. OK, Par5, I give up. You WANT to believe God is evil and no one will convince you otherwise. You will certainly understand less of the Bible than most. "Whoever has not, what he has will be taken away." You will need to find someone else to express your hatred for God. I tried and you do not want to be corrected on matters that are relatively easy to understand.

Is there something wrong with your reading comprehension? I have stated clearly that I do not consider the god you believe in to be evil for the simple fact that I don't believe in your god. I also stated the atrocities recorded in the bible were the acts of men and men alone. Those actions may have been carried out by people with the mistaken belief that it was the will of the god they believed in, but it was still just their actions, and theirs alone.
You accuse me of changing things when in fact it is you and the rest of the Christians on this thread who are changing things. I have never witnessed so much tap dancing by Christians around the subject of biblical slavery, calling it anything other than what it is, slavery.
Claiming ownership of another human being is totally repugnant and it matters not one jot if the slave owner was kind to his slaves, it is still wrong. In some cases the slave's ears were tagged to show his master's ownership. Perhaps you think that's ok too? You tag the ears of farm animals, not humans.
You said you give up. I think what you did give up was your sense of reason!

 

[devolved]

When I read the Bible, and I intrinsically disagree with slavery, and if God also gave me my intrinsic moral compass (whether I decide to follow it or not), then why do I disagree intrinsically?

I think that you are assuming that God agrees with slavery anymore that God agrees with a mother feeding her dead babies to the living as means of survival, as per example I gave you earlier.

When I read the Bible I would disagree with stoning people for breaking the Sabbath, and I would certainly disagree with taking my brother's wife as my wife if my brother dies. But my disagreement exists in a cultural context that I don't reside in.

If your cultural context has shifted to that of OT Israel, I doubt you would have problems with these concepts. Not because these magically become ok in our context, but because morality does have certain embedded measure of "contextual grace" that's directly proportional to available options that we get.

If you think that I wouldn't lie to save Jews from Nazis... I'd lie to the best of my ability to lie. Certain contexts employ "compound morality", meaning that you can't atomize moral concepts and apply these individually.

When I read the Bible (Genesis, Leviticus, Exodus, other), it appears to represent many occurrences, which do not follow known discovered reality. Hence, and therefore concluding, it is written by men, and claimed to be inspired by a higher power (for various human adopted reasons).

Of course it was written by men. And of course it is claimed to be inspired by a higher power. I suspect my definition of "inspired" would drastically differ from yours.

 

[DogmaHunter]

Exactly what does that mean in terms of law.

"Though shall not keep slaves! Though shall not engage in the trading of human beings! Though shall not consider human beings your personal property!"

It's not hard, nore is it dificult to understand.

How is the this measured? Does your country have laws that say something like this?

yes, slavery is very much illegal here.

Do you think Sadam Hussain was a tyrant? Do you know that the Christians begged Bush not to invade because Hussain would not let the Muslims slaughter the Christians? That is right. He protected them as Christians.

While gassing thousands of Kurds.

I can think of more tyrants in history who protected some people from injustice.

And oppressed and killed others.

This is probably not going to go well if you do not see the difference between measurable laws and vague "be nice" laws

What's vague about "don't keep slaves"?

Seems like you just want to accuse God of evil as well.

Seems like you just want to say anything and everything about the bible and god's laws is good, even when it is obviously barbaric and evil.

Understanding the matter does not seem to be of interest. You are not alone.

I understand the matter just fine, thanks.

But I have to thrown in that that society, Israel, did not murder their babies and call it "rights of a woman to do to her offspring whatever she likes."

lol, changing the subject a bit, are we?

Slaves were allowed to live and have children and a partner and were fed. The unborn in most western countries are treated like..............................products one can keep or throw away.

lol, changing the subject indeed.

The topic is slavery in the bible.

 

[DogmaHunter]

This is such a weak response...and it’s not as though it’s original either...

Slavery involves the ownership of another human being as your property...! It is not you choosing to be a gambler or a drug addict...it is someone else taking ownership of your freedom and your life, whether you have agreed to that ownership or not.

Let’s try to be a little intellectually honest here...

Amazing isn't it, how they will start talking about slavery in "poetic" or "philosophical" terms (like the alcoholic being a "slave" to his addiction), in some kind of attempt to defend the barbaric practice of trading in humans and claiming ownership of them.