Is slavery wrong?

[RDKirk]

Not so. Even in the 1800's the Bible was used to justify slavery. The fact that there were people on both sides of the argument shows that the Bible can be used to support almost any argument. There are parts of the Bible that are clearly pro-slavery. Those parts were never corrected. That is because a major flaw in the Bible is the inability to correct its many errors.

I said this earlier:

The Church had determined that slavery was prohibited in the first two centuries, and the Church had abandoned it.

When Constantine gave the Church a stake an empire that depended on slavery, Church prohibition was blunted in favor of the needs of the empire. The fortunes of the Church had been tied by Constantine to the fortunes of the empire, and the empire depended on slavery.

But even in that time, the Church never gave slavery any theological justification. There were Popes who permitted it on the basis of the rights of nations--not theology.

Protestants arrived at the conclusion that slavery was sinful throughout the Protestant world, including the American south by the mid 1600s. Even Southerners, even slaveholders at the time acknowledged its sinfulness.

That changed in the South--and only in the South--with the invention of the cotton gin, which made slavery wildly profitable. It is only in the American south in the early 1800s that any theological justification has ever been posed by Christians, and that justification was obviously absurd.

All the rest of the Christian world had regained the non-slave culture of the early Christians.

 

[biggles53]

It's a horse you're flogging, not I. Christianity is the religion that developed a specific anti-slavery theology, and nobody even developed a secular anti-slavery philosophy who had not been influenced by Christianity. If you refuse to see how or why, that's rather your own problem in understanding history.

Wrong.....some of the PEOPLE involved with Christianity may have eventually developed an anti-slavery view, but we are talking about the supposed word of your god/s which speaks about the practice and upon which the moral code we are to follow is supposedly based...

You can find me NOTHING, in either the Old Testament or the New, which forbids the practice of slavery. In fact, there are many references to both Yahweh and Jesus condoning the practice...

If I am wrong, please show me where Jesus is purported to have said something like...'oh, sorry....that whole slavery thing...? Yep, we're now saying that's bad and you shouldn't keep slaves any more...'

Just. ONE.......

 

[Aldebaran]

Wrong.....some of the PEOPLE involved with Christianity may have eventually developed an anti-slavery view, but we are talking about the supposed word of your god/s which speaks about the practice and upon which the moral code we are to follow is supposedly based...

You can find me NOTHING, in either the Old Testament or the New, which forbids the practice of slavery. In fact, there are many references to both Yahweh and Jesus condoning the practice...

If I am wrong, please show me where Jesus is purported to have said something like...'oh, sorry....that whole slavery thing...? Yep, we're now saying that's bad and you shouldn't keep slaves any more...'

Just. ONE.......

Well, maybe Christianity followed the rest of the world into thinking slavery was wrong when it really wasn't. You have to remember that slavery was part of a payment system for people to sell themselves into as a means of payment (as a last option). It wasn't something based on skin color as we know as slavery in American history.

 

[South Bound]

Nope, not indenture. Indentured servitude only applied to Jews. Name the version of the Bible you want and I will get the verses that show foreigners could be slaves for life.

And I've already shown you verses that say that non-Jewish slaves were to be released every fifty years and their debts forgiven.

And what of your ability to beat your slaves to death, as long as they linger for a couple of days?

...the penalty for which is that the slave goes free and his debt is forgiven.

 

[SoldierOfTheKing]

Man stealing, the abduction of free people for sale into slavery, is forbidden by Christian teaching. Owning slaves in and of itself is not. If it were, Paul would have demanded that all slave owners in the church manumit their slaves at once. Manumission is a magnanimous act of charity, but it is not obligatory. If a Christian does own slaves, he takes responsibility for their welfare, and he is to use his authority over them for their benefit and not his own.

Slaves, if they can obtain their freedom lawfully, ought to do to so, but they are forbidden to run away, and they are to obey their masters unless doing so would conflict directly with God's commandments.

That's historical Christian teaching on slavery in a nutshell.

 

[Subduction Zone]

And I've already shown you verses that say that non-Jewish slaves were to be released every fifty years and their debts forgiven.



...the penalty for which is that the slave goes free and his debt is forgiven.

No, only if you knock out an eye or a tooth. I have not seen the 50 year verse, but will look it up for myself.

 

[Subduction Zone]

I am still checking into the details of the 50 year jubilee, but Exodus 21: 2-6 describe how to trick a fellow Hebrew into being a slave for the rest of his life, the Bible's wording not mine.

 

[Subduction Zone]

No, on further inspection it seems there are more than one verse that says alien slaves are slaves for life:

Leviticus 25:46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.


And a discussion on Jewish slavery:

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/slavery.html

 

[South Bound]

No, on further inspection it seems there are more than one verse that says alien slaves are slaves for life:

Leviticus 25:46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.

Is there a reason you guys refuse to quote scripture properly, in context? If you were sincere about what learning what the Bible teaches about slavery or any subject, why wouldn't you start from the beginning of a passage and not merely carving out just a couple of verses that appear to support you without bothering to read the whole thing?

 

[Subduction Zone]

Is there a reason you guys refuse to quote scripture properly, in context? If you were sincere about what learning what the Bible teaches about slavery or any subject, why wouldn't you start from the beginning of a passage and not merely carving out just a couple of verses that appear to support you without bothering to read the whole thing?

It was in context. I read the whole chapter and it says nothing about releasing foreign acquired slaves. It says how Hebrews still have the right of Jubilee even if sold to foreigners in the area, but nothing about the rights of foreign slaves. Did you even bother to read the article that I included too?

Probably not, otherwise you would not have made such a hypocritical statement.

 

[BL2KTN]

I think it is poignant that there are some Christians here who dislike what the bible says and refuse to accept it.

 

[biggles53]

Well, maybe Christianity followed the rest of the world into thinking slavery was wrong when it really wasn't. You have to remember that slavery was part of a payment system for people to sell themselves into as a means of payment (as a last option). It wasn't something based on skin color as we know as slavery in American history.

What's skin colour got to do with it...?

And, predictably, you only want to talk about 'debt payment'........it is sooooo telling that you completely dismiss the major facet of slavery which involved the life-long ownership of other humans...!

But that's ok......if I knew that the philosophy I supported involved such atrocious behaviour, I'd probably want to cover up the 'nasties' as well.....!

 

[PsychoSarah]

It is wrong

A statement that shouldn't have taken this many pages to reach, and should be at a consensus completely. So what if the bible doesn't state slavery is wrong, since when does that obligate us to accept the practice? I don't see anything in the bible that says we have to own slaves or that we can't limit ourselves even more.

 

[Subduction Zone]

A statement that shouldn't have taken this many pages to reach, and should be at a consensus completely. So what if the bible doesn't state slavery is wrong, since when does that obligate us to accept the practice? I don't see anything in the bible that says we have to own slaves or that we can't limit ourselves even more.

Yet the Bible says that such small things as eating shellfish or even wearing mixed clothing is wrong. If such inconsequential activities are banned why wasn't slavery banned?

 

[PsychoSarah]

Yet the Bible says that such small things as eating shellfish or even wearing mixed clothing is wrong. If such inconsequential activities are banned why wasn't slavery banned?

Because the bible went by the standards of more than 1000 years ago, again, it never says we can't limit ourselves more.

 

[biggles53]

Because the bible went by the standards of more than 1000 years ago, again, it never says we can't limit ourselves more.

Which provides strong evidence that it was written by men, not gods, of course....men who were reflecting their own understandings and self-interests, not taking dictation from a god laying down a universal moral code....

 

[South Bound]

It was in context.

No it wasn't. You purposely omitted the first twelve verses of the passage.

The passage begins with v 35, not v 46.

I read the whole chapter and it says nothing about releasing non-Jewish slaves.

This of course, coming from the same guy who purposely ignored half a passage and then insists he posted it in context.

 

[Subduction Zone]

No it wasn't. You purposely omitted the first twelve verses of the passage.

The passage begins with v 35, not v 46.



This of course, coming from the same guy who purposely ignored half a passage and then insists he posted it in context.

I ignored nothing. And please don't make false claims. You cannot know what I purposefully omitted or not. If my verse was quoted out of context you should be able to show how. What part of that chapter says anything about freeing non-Hebrew slaves? I am not a Christian, I do not need to quote mine the way that Christians do.

 

[South Bound]

I ignored nothing. And please don't make false claims. You cannot know what I purposefully omitted or not. If my verse was quoted out of context you should be able to show how.

I did show how. Your quote started at v 46, when the passage begins at v 35.

I am not a Christian, I do not need to quote mine the way that Christians do.

Actually, by ignoring the context of a passage and only carving out those words you believe supports your opinion, quote mining is exactly what you're doing.

 

[RDKirk]

Wrong.....some of the PEOPLE involved with Christianity may have eventually developed an anti-slavery view, but we are talking about the supposed word of your god/s which speaks about the practice and upon which the moral code we are to follow is supposedly based...

You can find me NOTHING, in either the Old Testament or the New, which forbids the practice of slavery. In fact, there are many references to both Yahweh and Jesus condoning the practice...

If I am wrong, please show me where Jesus is purported to have said something like...'oh, sorry....that whole slavery thing...? Yep, we're now saying that's bad and you shouldn't keep slaves any more...'

Just. ONE.......

This is something you've been told but refuse to accept, something you've read, but refuse to believe:

But the Counselor, the Ruach HaKodesh, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things, and will remind you of all that I said to you. -- John 14

Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written. -- John 21

Now, this is all mystical woo-woo to you, but it is a constant to a Christian who is filled with the Ruach HaKodesh. It is why Christianity--the Body of Christ as a whole--did indeed abandon slavery in the first two centuries and re-arrive at a non-slavery theology after going astray with government entanglement.