The Christian Bible condones slavery explicitly in numerous passages. One of those reference often by slave owners in the Antebellum South comes from the story of Noah.
Genesis 9:24-27
9:24 And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.
9:25 And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.
9:26 And he said, Blessed be the LORD God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.
9:27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.
The book of Joshua also demonstrates the Christian god’s support of slavery:
9:27 And Joshua made them that day hewers of wood and drawers of water for the congregation, and for the altar of the LORD, even unto this day, in the place which he should choose.
In fact, there are numerous biblical instructions on how to acquire slaves, making it clear that buying people for money is perfectly acceptable.
Exodus 21:2-7
21:2 If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing.
21:3 If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him.
21:4 If his master have given him a wife, and she have born him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master’s, and he shall go out by himself.
21:5 And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free:
21:6 Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an aul; and he shall serve him for ever.
21:7 And if a man sell his daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not go out as the menservants do.
Leviticus 22:10-11
22:10 There shall no stranger eat of the holy thing: a sojourner of the priest, or an hired servant, shall not eat of the holy thing.
22:11 But if the priest buy any soul with his money, he shall eat of it, and he that is born in his house: they shall eat of his meat.
Or slaves can be taken in war.
Deuteronomy 20:10-14
20:10 When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it.
20:11 And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee.
20:12 And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it:
20:13 And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword:
20:14 But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee.
Leviticus goes on to make it clear that slaves are inheritable possessions.
25:44 Both thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids.
25:45 Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession.
25:46 And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your bondmen for ever: but over your brethren the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigor.
There are also many biblical instructions on how to treat slaves. Genesis 16:6-9 says that angels will force slaves to return to their owners.
16:6 But Abram said unto Sarai, Behold, thy maid is in thine hand; do to her as it pleaseth thee. And when Sarai dealt hardly with her, she fled from her face.
16:7 And the angel of the LORD found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the fountain in the way to Shur.
16:8 And he said, Hagar, Sarai’s maid, whence camest thou? and whither wilt thou go? And she said, I flee from the face of my mistress Sarai.
16:9 And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself under her hands.
Beating slaves as long as they don’t die immediately is perfectly fine.
Exodus 21:20-21
21:20 And if a man smite his servant, or his maid, with a rod, and he die under his hand; he shall be surely punished.
21:21 Notwithstanding, if he continue a day or two, he shall not be punished: for he is his money.
Leviticus shows that slaves are property, not covered by the laws protecting other people.
19:20 And whosoever lieth carnally with a woman, that is a bondmaid, betrothed to an husband, and not at all redeemed, nor freedom given her; she shall be scourged; they shall not be put to death, because she was not free.
The New Testament doesn’t fare any better. Slavery is explicitly condoned in many places.
Luke 12:46-47
12:46 The lord of that servant will come in a day when he looketh not for him, and at an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him in sunder, and will appoint him his portion with the unbelievers.
12:47 And that servant, which knew his lord’s will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes.
Luke 17:7-9
17:7 But which of you, having a servant plowing or feeding cattle, will say unto him by and by, when he is come from the field, Go and sit down to meat?
17:8 And will not rather say unto him, Make ready wherewith I may sup, and gird thyself, and serve me, till I have eaten and drunken; and afterward thou shalt eat and drink?
17:9 Doth he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him? I trow not.
1 Corinthians 7:21-22
7:21 Art thou called being a servant? care not for it: but if thou mayest be made free, use it rather.
7:22 For he that is called in the Lord, being a servant, is the Lord’s freeman: likewise also he that is called, being free, is Christ’s servant.
Ephesians 6:5 Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; not with eyeservice, as menpleasers; but in singleness of heart, fearing God.
Colossians 3:22 Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in singleness of your heart, as unto Christ.
1 Timothy 6:1 Let as many servants as are under the yoke count their masters worthy of all honor, that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed.
Titus 2:9-10
2:9 Exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters, and to please them well in all things; not answering again;
2:10 Not purloining, but shewing all good fidelity; that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things.
1 Peter 2:18 Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward.
Nowhere in the Christian Bible is slavery explicitly condemned nor are any of the verses that explicitly support the practice repudiated. Of course, numerous verses are interpreted to be anti-slavery. The fact that both slavery proponents and abolitionists were able to quote scripture in support of their views demonstrates clearly that the bible is, at best, ambiguous. Surely a book intended to provide moral guidance could have found room in the Ten Commandments for “Thou shalt not own slaves.”
The rational conclusion is that the bible is an amalgamation of writings by many different men, each with his own political goals and views on morality. It is only those who hold it to be the inerrant word of their god who find themselves in the position of attempting to defend the odious passages that clearly support slavery. That attempted defense is a blatant and appalling demonstration of religious belief overriding common decency and empathy.
IF BIBLICAL AWKWARDNESS = 1 THEN GOTO METAPHOR ELSE OBFUSCATE
An observation.
Jefferson the slave owner had the right idea about the bible at least. No Old Testament for him!
And reinterpreting has being going on for centuries. The Cathars (who called themselves Good Christians) rejected the Old Testament as the work of the Devil.
What on earth do you suppose it is that motivates a member of such a group to post an OP about “Slavery in the Bible,” which provides as its sole example the “maid” Hagar?
And the part that Patrick left out:
Sure seems like a case of a selective “quote-mine” to me.
Patrick, how do you justify your obvious quote mine?
I mean, if you are going to accuse God of wrongdoing, perhaps you should be more circumspect.
Some more of Patrick’s “logic.”
Nowhere in the Christian Bible is slavery explicitly condemned nor are any of the verses that explicitly support the practice repudiated.
It would certainly appear that in spite of all the disparate authors, they are in agreement, a fact which Patrick finds objectionable (thought not on any objective moral grounds).
Yet Patrick concludes:
Apparently, because they all fail to disagree on slavery. Wow. Just wow.
Is Patrick the best and brightest the atheists here at TSZ have to offer?
It seems difficult to imagine that someone who has been schooled so often could remain so ignorant of the difference between belief and lack of same. I won’t bother to explain it to you again, as that wouldn’t help, nor would it be even remotely interesting. What is a bit interesting is the genesis of this persistent idea that values and morals ought in some way to be derived from the things one doesn’t believe in.
I suspect that it is related to the lack of empathy evident in so many fundamentalists. In much the same way that they are unable to step outside of their belief system and see themselves through the eyes of the believers in other faiths, they are equally unable to imagine what it means to not believe.
Since everything in their lives revolves around their belief in a god, they seem to imagine that everything in the unbeliever’s live life must necessarily then revolve around that unbeliever’s lack of belief. It is a variant of the “you’re just mad at God” trope, and evidently arises from the same narcissistic inability to imagine that someone might actually think differently from them.
It’s really pretty entertaining, in a bug-under-the-microscope sort of way.
Immanuel Kant.
KN,
What are the “principles of atheism”, and how does Kant’s argument against slavery depend on them?
Mung,
Said the guy whose entire belief system was stolen and repackaged many many times.
Anyway, you’d think Mung would be asking for an atheist philosopher who has been giving advice on how to punish your slaves, as that’s what the Bible has been doing.
By asking for what he is asking Mung is tacitly admitting the truth of what’s been proposed in this thread – the bible condones slavery.
Kantian Naturalist,
Well, If even Immanuel Kan’t then I guess no one kan.
Mung,
Read the following passage:
Now tell us: does the Bible condone slavery?
Here, perhaps this will help Mung
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/condone
By using ‘condone’, we may be giving Yahweh too much credit.
His approval isn’t tacit — it’s quite explicit:
Surely you must realize that I’m not going to let you put words in my mouth so easily.
The issue is what the bible says about slavery. I know that you and fifthmonarchyman would like to distract from that, but your fervent wishing doesn’t make those passages go away.
Well, you are the expert on that particular behavior, but you’re wrong as keiths has already shown with the full context of the discussion.
Congratulations, you’re more moral than fifthmonarchyman.
The bible sanctions slavery and was used to defend the practice in the antebellum south.
In other words, you’re going to plug your ears, cover your eyes, and ignore the evidence.
I’ve provided evidence for my summary of intelligent design creationism. There is no other reading to do because there is no scientific theory of IDC. “Somewhere, somehow, someone did something” is all you’ve got.
I can’t speak for keiths, but I pay attention to the bible because people like you, fifthmonarchyman, mung, and far too many others take it seriously and vote based on your beliefs. When religion stops being such a political force, I’ll be more than happy to ignore your old book.
That’s actually the problem with theists.
You should have a word with fifthmonarchyman, then.
That is by no means the sole example. Re-read the OP and many of the comments.
Again, I would normally defer to you as the expert quote miner, but the additional verses you provide do not change the fact that the bible sanctions slavery. Or are you saying that having many offspring makes up for being property?
One day Mung will actually say why some blob of text he’s dropped in supports the argument he’s making.
I might take that bet.
Yet the assemblage of texts that ended up as the Bible seems somewhat of a chance process. Who decided?
link
The Holy Spirit.
Checkmate atheists!
Any inerrantist lurkers out there who would like to join the fray? Fifth and Mung are doing a poor job of defending God’s holy word, but perhaps you’ll do better.
Another lovely passage, this one from the New Testament:
Inerrantists, are those the words of the perfect Creator of the universe?
That may be because Fifth and Mung are defending the indefensible! I always manage a chuckle at the expense of “believers” who do not even have a rudimentary grasp of Biblical Hebrew. Few (if any) present fail to grasp the salient fact that the Hebrew Scripture was second in importance to the Oral Law (תורה שבעל פה) which bears no resemblance to the silliness spewed by Fifth, Mung & their ilk, who for all intents and purposes represent Gentile Karaites ( as irony is heaped upon irony).
Bottom Line: the Hebrew Scriptures were NEVER considered by the sages to be invariant, but rather were a continuing work in progress as exegesis itself EVOLVED even as humankind participated in G-d’s ongoing creation. That is correct, creation was not completed in six days but is ongoing according to believers that actually understand Biblical Hebrew. That would also explain why the Oral Law was NEVER to be written down, because doing so would fossilize archaic interpretations for future generations.
Even so, Fifth’s and Mung’s version of events cannot even be justified by Torah. It boils down to the very first word in Genesis: “B’reshid”
“In the beginning of God’s creation of Heb. בְּרֵאשִית בָּרָא. This verse calls for a midrashic interpretation because according Creationists’ simplistic interpretation, the vowelization of the word בָּרָא, should be different.
Jewish scholars from time immemorial have realized that the sequence of the Creation as written is IMPOSSIBLE… and Genesis is NOT to be read literally!
Parenthetically, many commentators (especially of kabbalistic bent) have long interpreted Genesis to be totally compatible with Evolution.
ITMT – the ancient world the Israelites found themselves in was very different from today’s. As a light unto the nations of the world, the Hebrew version of slavery was very different from their Gentile neighbors’ and as practiced (for just one example) on plantations in the American South.
So-called slavery in the Hebrew Bible was more of an indentured servitude with a prescribed time-limit. http://biblehub.com/exodus/21-1.htm
So-called “ownership” (for lack of a better word) was never intended to be permanent. Only under very extenuating circumstances was the slave-master relationship ever made permanent.
http://biblehub.com/exodus/21- 5.htm
http://biblehub.com/exodus/21- 6.htm
But frankly speaking – this is not my field of expertise and I am no authority on exegesis, so I will leave off here.
One word answer: Ezra
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis
Tom Mueller:
Not so:
I ask you to refer to my previous post. Israelite slavery was much different than the version practiced by Gentile neighbors. You are correct – there seems to be a different set of rules for Hebrew vs non-Hebrew. The rules for making a Hebrew a slave for life was explained above AND could only occur with slaves’ consent BUT was strongly discouraged. Slavery in Israel was very “enlightened” (check your own quote “…but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly) and time limited.
The question then becomes how non-Hebrew slaves were treated differently. Again, this question is open to quite some interpretation and interpretation changes as Oral Law evolved. That said – a slave could always convert to Judaism. At that point – the rules described above applied no differently.
As I understand it, enlightened interpretations also applied to non-converts. This is where interpretation becomes very problematic. The question becomes one of how to interpret the terms Ger Teshuva and Ger Tzedek. I have an opinion on interpretation; but that and $1.71 will get you a cup of coffee at our local Tim Horton’s.
The story of Avram’s conversion together with his ENTIRE household is telling IMHO (not to mention Ruth 1:16) – but as mentioned earlier, I am no longer dabbling with any modicum of expertise.
Hey Tom,
I’m not sure what you think I’m defending but it’s certainly not a literalistic interpretation. That is the position of the peanut gallery here.
My position is basically the same as yours if I understand it except that I believe that the understanding of the Messiah should be given deference in when it comes to the interpretation of the text.
peace
Peace to you as well… pity more like it. There really is nothing you and I have to discuss. I strongly suggest you learn some Classical Greek and some Biblical Hebrew if you really desire any authority on the subject.
Tom,
You’re making the same mistake as fifth. The passage means what it says, not what you want it to say.
The text is clear:
Your claim is incorrect:
What subject is that? The interpretive authority of the Messiah?
peace
The majority of modern Christians do NOT accept the Pauline authorship of 1 Timothy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Epistle_to_Timothy
Lampooning and mocking those you term “inerrantists” is really a futile and unworthy pursuit.
http://tinyurl.com/zuqobv7
http://tinyurl.com/humez68
No Keiths – you will just need to take my word for it… my understanding on this particular topic is somewhat (I don’t know how to say this gently) more accurate and precise than Fifth’s & Mung’s and even your literalist interpretations.
Again I must refer you to Oral Torah aka Oral Law i.e. תורה שבעל פה
On that note, I decided to perform a quick google-whack on Talmudic interpretation of slavery and lo and behold I even stumbled across a Wikipedia article that mirrors my contentions.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_views_on_slavery#Biblical_era
I have nothing more to add (I refer you to my immediate post above).
best regards
Thanks for the links and info, Tom.
Tom,
I choose to rely on the evidence itself rather than on the proclamations of a self-appointed expert.
The text of Leviticus 25:44-46 is unambiguous. It contradicts your claim.
Tom,
Who said anything about Pauline authorship?
Slow down, Tom. Read and respond to what I wrote, not to what you wish I had written.
Hi Alan,
… Actually – I need to thank you and Keiths. You have conjured happy memories from a previous life-time when I immersed myself in yiddishkeit and acquired some expertise in certain esoteric corners.
There once was a time I was able to discuss Talmud with scholars and even needed to have one certain point of contention adjudicated by a Rav. (Boy – I am really tripping down memory lane). Forgive my lack of modesty – my interpretation of Ger Teshuva vs Ger Tzedek was deemed correct, much to the consternation of some more orthodox-minded yeshiva buchers who were flabbergasted at having been bested by a German Gentile’s pilpul posed from a cyber-stendl.
like I said – happy memories from times long past… I remain in your (and Keith’s) debt. Off to bed.
Keiths – I mean no offense: but have you paused to consider that you may be guilty of the same fallacy of “literalism” as Fifth & Mung, and all at the expense of “Truth”?
This sort of silliness should be reserved for sandwalk and not here. ITMT – It really is my bedtime.
Pax tecum.
Tom,
You mean the “literalism” of interpreting this…
…as meaning that you could bequeath your slaves to your children as inherited property and make them slaves for life?
I think a more appropriate term for that would be “sanity”, not “literalism”.
Keiths – you need to define your terms… define “slavery” and then determine whether what you mean by that term bears any resemblance to what was practiced in ancient Israel.
You do not want to defer to my authority – you are most correct in saying so. I then ask you to check out the wikipedia link above which is foot-noted and referenced.
I would be curious what your thoughts are after a little research on your part.
best regards
Tom,
It’s right there in the passage itself:
The passage says that you can buy people, own them for life, and even pass them on to your heirs.
Your claim is incorrect:
@ Keiths
In the interest of truth and in a sincere attempt to help your research on the subject:
The notion of voluntary slavery because a slave loves his master is somewhat incongruent to what what generally is considered slavery.
Yes “servitude” could be perpetuated from one generation to the next (not dissimilar to generations of servants serving in English manors) except the Israelites treated their slaves better than the English treated their servants.
However – as you continue your research I remind you that there were two reset buttons: one after 6 years when the slave was sent of with a generous severance and another reset after 49 years aka the “Jubilee Year” where debts were absolved and all slaves (even those who volunteered to perpetual servitude as you as mentioned in your Leviticus reference) were freed. During this year – former slaves would beg their masters to take them back as “slaves” and the Jubilee Cycle would begin anew.
Meanwhile – it appeared common practice for slaves to marry their master’s daughters/sons… “marriage?” – exchanging one form of slavery for another? I can only imagine the ancient Israelite comedians.
I remind you that these lenient rules applied to non-Jewish “slaves” who converted and under certain circumstances even to those that did not convert (you really should checkout Ruth 1:16). FTR – any abuse by a master to a slave that resulted for example in physical disfigurement (eg a broken tooth) garnered immediate freedom for the “slave”.
Needless to say, the Greeks’ & Romans’ version of “slavery” was quite different.
So like I said before, you need to “define your terms”.
Tom,
Like fifth, you are denying the clear meaning of the passage.
Exegesis that ignores the obvious meaning of a text isn’t exegesis, it’s whitewashing.
You and fifth are ashamed of the passage as written. That’s good! Why spoil things by dishonestly trying to rewrite it?