The Bible And Slavery

[Lion IRC]

The ancients did not think in terms of slavery as a case wage theft because a slave was the property of the buyer. The bible does not explicitly condemn slavery and its inference against it is weak....'slaves obey your masters' etc.

The ancients?
Slavery in ancient times was frequently a voluntary choice. Work or starve.
Work or next time there's a war, try being on the winning side.

Work or starve to death hardly represents a reasonable set of options. Unless you have a death wish, there is no choice: you work.

Starving to death is not a reasonable option. Choosing to work is not the same as choosing slavery. Starve or choose slavery are not reasonable options.

If someone put a gun to your head and demanded money, your 'choice' being part with your money or die, would you choose death?

If the options were; choose slavery or choose to work for a wage, how many would choose slavery instead of a job?

I agree its a horrible choice/dilemma.
But its nonetheless a fact that selling yourself into slavery was a useful option.
Likewise, the ancient person who provided food and lodging to their bond servant wasn't obligated to do so.

Here's some more voluntary slavery...

The majority of offenders are required to undertake unpaid community work as a condition of their order.

Community work provides offenders with the opportunity to pay back the community for their offending behaviour...

http://www.corrections.vic.gov.au/community-corrections/community-work

 

[ideologyhunter]

But again, in Exodus 21, God himself instructs us in the excusable way to beat your slaves to death.

 

[Lion IRC]

A good deal of the harsh penalties listed in the bible are there for deterrent effect.
Where in the bible do we see disobedient slaves being beaten? Names please?

Exodus 21:20–21 mandates punishment of slave owners who beat their slave.

And if a man beats his male or female servant with a rod, so that he dies under his hand, he shall surely be punished.

 

[Rhea]

This is amazing. It's morally bankrupt. But amazing.

Politesse, when confronted with the bible's condoning slavery versus the argument that humans learned better, replies, "well not completely better" as if that is sufficient to change the subject and pretend that it's okay that the bible condones slavery!

Lion, when confronted with the bible condoning slavery, says, "yeah but some of them liked it," as if that is sufficient to change the subject and pretend that it's okay that the bible condones slavery!


Problem: The bible condones slavery. It is morally bankrupt.
Problem: you two (and most christians) are okay with that.
Problem: Christians try to force this morally bankrupt doctrine on those of us who can see that it is morally bankrupt.


Sure, parts of it are not morally bankrupt. But here's the thing, you can get all of those parts without needing the bible! which means you can completely and utterly condemn slavery without little hedgey acceptance statements, and still love your neighbor.


Christianity offers nothing that other moral systems don't offer better.

Problem that is IRRECONCILABLE to moral people: The bible condones slavery. It is morally bankrupt.

 

[Rhea]

A good deal of the harsh penalties listed in the bible are there for deterrent effect.
Where in the bible do we see disobedient slaves being beaten? Names please?

Exodus 21:20–21 mandates punishment of slave owners who beat their slave.

And if a man beats his male or female servant with a rod, so that he dies under his hand, he shall surely be punished.

You don't read your own bible? He ONLY gets punished if they die. They don't get punished for beatings. They get punished for DEATHS.
Criminy. Critical reading, please.

Morally upright reading, please!

 

[ideologyhunter]

Actually, he (slave owner) only gets punished if they die right then and there. If they linger from their beating and die a few days later, no offense has been done at all, in the eyes of God.

 

[skepticalbip]

A good deal of the harsh penalties listed in the bible are there for deterrent effect.
Where in the bible do we see disobedient slaves being beaten? Names please?

Exodus 21:20–21 mandates punishment of slave owners who beat their slave.

And if a man beats his male or female servant with a rod, so that he dies under his hand, he shall surely be punished.

How is it that you can cite the source and yet not actually read it? From your citation, Exodus 21:20-21, the slave owner is not to be punished for beating their slave unless the slave dies from the beating fairly soon after the beating. If the slave recovers from the beating the slave owner is "not to be punished".

Exodus 21:20-21

20 “Anyone who beats their male or female slave with a rod must be punished if the slave dies as a direct result,
21 but they are not to be punished if the slave recovers after a day or two, since the slave is their property.

 

[DBT]

Work or starve to death hardly represents a reasonable set of options. Unless you have a death wish, there is no choice: you work.

Starving to death is not a reasonable option. Choosing to work is not the same as choosing slavery. Starve or choose slavery are not reasonable options.

If someone put a gun to your head and demanded money, your 'choice' being part with your money or die, would you choose death?

If the options were; choose slavery or choose to work for a wage, how many would choose slavery instead of a job?

I agree its a horrible choice/dilemma.
But its nonetheless a fact that selling yourself into slavery was a useful option.
Likewise, the ancient person who provided food and lodging to their bond servant wasn't obligated to do so.

Here's some more voluntary slavery...

The majority of offenders are required to undertake unpaid community work as a condition of their order.

Community work provides offenders with the opportunity to pay back the community for their offending behaviour...

http://www.corrections.vic.gov.au/community-corrections/community-work

There may be a problem with the terms used under the label of 'voluntary.'

If a mugger puts a gun to your heads and demands, your money or your life, are your 'voluntarily' - as a matter of choice - handing over your money?

 

[rousseau]

The ancients did not think in terms of slavery as a case wage theft because a slave was the property of the buyer. The bible does not explicitly condemn slavery and its inference against it is weak....'slaves obey your masters' etc.

The ancients?
Slavery in ancient times was frequently a voluntary choice. Work or starve.
Work or next time there's a war, try being on the winning side.

Work or starve to death hardly represents a reasonable set of options. Unless you have a death wish, there is no choice: you work.

Starving to death is not a reasonable option. Choosing to work is not the same as choosing slavery. Starve or choose slavery are not reasonable options.

If someone put a gun to your head and demanded money, your 'choice' being part with your money or die, would you choose death?

If the options were; choose slavery or choose to work for a wage, how many would choose slavery instead of a job?

If we want to get literal about the bible we have to account for a large degree of cultural relativism - the 1st century was a different time. At that time, for some people, slavery was a means of survival. And at that time, this was a completely reasonable condition for many people - slaves and slave owners. It wasn't necessarily agreeable for all parties, but would have been largely normalized to those involved.

You can't really judge reality at that time from a 21st century standard - it was a wholly different world and culture, with different norms. So the bible as written at that time reflected reality as lived during that period.

Now, I'm not interested in whether the bible condemns slavery, because like most of us on this forum I realize that it was a human made document from a long time ago. But unlike others here I find talking about the bible extremely boring. But from a cultural perspective what it wrote about slavery was likely just indicative of it's time.

To put it in another way, people in the year 4000 AD might have some strong opinions about our current, global economy, but to many of us it's just business as usual.

 

[Rhea]

Except that the CHristians argue that it is a valid document for morals TODAY and that it’s writings were inspired BY A DIVINE.

So sure, you are right, as long as it is being talked about as a history book.

But that’s not the discussion.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Except that the CHristians argue that it is a valid document for morals TODAY and that it’s writings were inspired BY A DIVINE.

So sure, you are right, as long as it is being talked about as a history book.

But that’s not the discussion.

And it's not a history book. It's an historical artifact.

 

[DBT]

Work or starve to death hardly represents a reasonable set of options. Unless you have a death wish, there is no choice: you work.

Starving to death is not a reasonable option. Choosing to work is not the same as choosing slavery. Starve or choose slavery are not reasonable options.

If someone put a gun to your head and demanded money, your 'choice' being part with your money or die, would you choose death?

If the options were; choose slavery or choose to work for a wage, how many would choose slavery instead of a job?

If we want to get literal about the bible we have to account for a large degree of cultural relativism - the 1st century was a different time. At that time, for some people, slavery was a means of survival. And at that time, this was a completely reasonable condition for many people - slaves and slave owners. It wasn't necessarily agreeable for all parties, but would have been largely normalized to those involved.

You can't really judge reality at that time from a 21st century standard - it was a wholly different world and culture, with different norms. So the bible as written at that time reflected reality as lived during that period.

Now, I'm not interested in whether the bible condemns slavery, because like most of us on this forum I realize that it was a human made document from a long time ago. But unlike others here I find talking about the bible extremely boring. But from a cultural perspective what it wrote about slavery was likely just indicative of it's time.

To put it in another way, people in the year 4000 AD might have some strong opinions about our current, global economy, but to many of us it's just business as usual.

Ethical problems arise not only with our own relative moral values, but especially with the claim that the bible is the inerrant word of God, representing eternal values, heavenly values, on Earth as it is in Heaven.

 

[J842P]

Appeals also to moral relativism are silly. Fine, I won't judge slavery by 21st Century ideals, I'll judge them by the ideals of the 5th Century BCE Achaemenid Persia: slavery is wrong.

 

[Politesse]

Politesse, when confronted with the bible's condoning slavery versus the argument that humans learned better, replies, "well not completely better" as if that is sufficient to change the subject and pretend that it's okay that the bible condones slavery!

This is nothing but libel. I absolutely do not condone slavery in any form or at any time, and never have. Not in Exodus, not in any book, time or place. In the present, I have fought very hard to end the practice, and find this gotcha game of clobber verses to be a hindrance to the project rather than a benefit. You don't give a flying shit about slaves, you just want to get a cheap shot off at your religious enemies.

As for observing that the human condition is unchanged, that is because these issues are important to me, and the tendency of modern Europeans and Americans to regard slavery as a "solved problem" is similarly an enormous obstacle to ending the practice in truth and in law.

 

[rousseau]

Viewed as a societal action, abolition of slavery timeline:

1831 - Bolivia, Brazil
1832 - Greece
1833 - Britain
1835 - Serbia, Denmark
1840 - Venezuela, New Zealand
1841 - Russia, Austria
1848 - France
1851 - Ecuador
1853 - Argentina
1863 - Netherlands
1865 - U.S.
1868 - Cuba

Caveat: In some cases, abolition came with specific exclusions, usually in reference to colonies, and, in a few cases above, the original laws were overturned and then reenacted years later. Still there's a definite historical trend toward abolition of slavery and serfdom (and most especially the maritime slave trade) in the 19th Century. But the Bible stayed the Bible.

Slavery was never universally abolished in the U.S., we are literally still fighting this fight.

Now I'm curious to hear your perspective.

 

[rousseau]

Work or starve to death hardly represents a reasonable set of options. Unless you have a death wish, there is no choice: you work.

Starving to death is not a reasonable option. Choosing to work is not the same as choosing slavery. Starve or choose slavery are not reasonable options.

If someone put a gun to your head and demanded money, your 'choice' being part with your money or die, would you choose death?

If the options were; choose slavery or choose to work for a wage, how many would choose slavery instead of a job?

If we want to get literal about the bible we have to account for a large degree of cultural relativism - the 1st century was a different time. At that time, for some people, slavery was a means of survival. And at that time, this was a completely reasonable condition for many people - slaves and slave owners. It wasn't necessarily agreeable for all parties, but would have been largely normalized to those involved.

You can't really judge reality at that time from a 21st century standard - it was a wholly different world and culture, with different norms. So the bible as written at that time reflected reality as lived during that period.

Now, I'm not interested in whether the bible condemns slavery, because like most of us on this forum I realize that it was a human made document from a long time ago. But unlike others here I find talking about the bible extremely boring. But from a cultural perspective what it wrote about slavery was likely just indicative of it's time.

To put it in another way, people in the year 4000 AD might have some strong opinions about our current, global economy, but to many of us it's just business as usual.

Ethical problems arise not only with our own relative moral values, but especially with the claim that the bible is the inerrant word of God, representing eternal values, heavenly values, on Earth as it is in Heaven.

Appeals also to moral relativism are silly. Fine, I won't judge slavery by 21st Century ideals, I'll judge them by the ideals of the 5th Century BCE Achaemenid Persia: slavery is wrong.

It doesn't have to be an argument that slavery is ok, or that it's ok that the bible condemns slavery. But similarly, applying 21st century ideals to a 1st century culture is kind of silly. If all you're wanting to do is attack the bible, fair enough, but if we actually need to convince someone in the 21st century that slavery isn't ideal, that conversation was likely a lost cause from the get go.

I don't think our argument is 'the bible is evil because it condones slavery', I think our argument is 'the only reason you believe in the bible is because it's been normalized as the word of God for 2000 years'. At least that would be the more accurate argument.

 

[Rhea]

Politesse, when confronted with the bible's condoning slavery versus the argument that humans learned better, replies, "well not completely better" as if that is sufficient to change the subject and pretend that it's okay that the bible condones slavery!

This is nothing but libel. I absolutely do not condone slavery in any form or at any time, and never have. Not in Exodus, not in any book, time or place. In the present, I have fought very hard to end the practice, and find this gotcha game of clobber verses to be a hindrance to the project rather than a benefit. You don't give a flying shit about slaves, you just want to get a cheap shot off at your religious enemies.

As for observing that the human condition is unchanged, that is because these issues are important to me, and the tendency of modern Europeans and Americans to regard slavery as a "solved problem" is similarly an enormous obstacle to ending the practice in truth and in law.

I am only observing that when discussing the printed fact that the bibles condones slavery, you chose to not talk about that, but about some other small tidbit.

This discussion is about the bibe because so many people use the bible for immoral ends - like slavery - and it, the bible, should be condemned for its immorality. The topic is the bible. You left the topic.

 

[Rhea]

It doesn't have to be an argument that slavery is ok, or that it's ok that the bible condemns slavery. But similarly, applying 21st century ideals to a 1st century culture is kind of silly. If all you're wanting to do is attack the bible, fair enough, but if we actually need to convince someone in the 21st century that slavery isn't ideal, that conversation was likely a lost cause from the get go.

I don't think our argument is 'the bible is evil because it condones slavery', I think our argument is 'the only reason you believe in the bible is because it's been normalized as the word of God for 2000 years'. At least that would be the more accurate argument.

On the contrary. People STILL use te bible to promote immoral acts, like he oppression of homosexual people. So the argument is that the bible is immoral and cannot be relied on as a moral guide, proven by it’s immoral support of slavery.

“If it’s wrong about this, what else is it wrong about?”

 

[rousseau]

Except that the CHristians argue that it is a valid document for morals TODAY and that it’s writings were inspired BY A DIVINE.

So sure, you are right, as long as it is being talked about as a history book.

But that’s not the discussion.

Ok, but you do realize that when you take the arguments of Christians seriously, this further normalizes their belief that the document is the word of God right? That the bible is the word of God shouldn't be argued with, it should be laughed at, and ignored.

From a distance your argument gives credibility to your opposition.

 

[Rhea]

Sometimes here we stipulate thing for discssion.
But yeah, laughing at them is another way.