Are you a Christian? Do you think slavery is wrong?

[Elan2413]

If you are a christian that thinks slavery is wrong, then read your bible. The Bible says (somewhere after Exodus 20) that slavery is okay and it is okay to beat a slave as long as it doesn't die within 3 days.

Can a christian clear that one up for me? That would be great because slavery and killing is wrong to me.

 

[Medicine*Woman]

Elan2413: If you are a christian that thinks slavery is wrong, then read your bible. The Bible says (somewhere after Exodus 20) that slavery is okay and it is okay to beat a slave as long as it doesn't die within 3 days.

Can a christian clear that one up for me? That would be great because slavery and killing is wrong to me.
*************
M*W: If 'slavery and killing' are wrong in your eyes, why would you believe or even be concerned with what the Bible says? Follow your own conscious.

 

[anonymous2]

I recall seeing on the internet (where off hand I don't know) a booklet by an abolitionist minded Christian author quoting the Bible to support his viewpoint. I'd guess that was the minority viewpoint. From what I can see, the Bible supports/allows slavery in both Old and New Testaments. And Confederate President Jefferson Davis would have agreed.

 

[Michael]

If you are a christian that thinks slavery is wrong, then read your bible. The Bible says (somewhere after Exodus 20) that slavery is okay and it is okay to beat a slave as long as it doesn't die within 3 days.

Can a Christian clear that one up for me? That would be great because slavery and killing is wrong to me.

Xians I've asked about this (along with women's rights) always say that, that was the OT and the NT replaces it.

But that doesn’t answer the fact that this ALL LOVING "God" thingy promoted slavery - sick really.

So:
Judaism: God promotes slavery (it's a good thing)
Christian: same as above
Islam: same as above
Hinduism: same as above

I believe that only Buddhism suggests slavery should be abolished?

(I wonder what Taoism or Shinto’s would say on the matter?)

 

[neoclassical]

If you are a christian that thinks slavery is wrong, then read your bible. The Bible says (somewhere after Exodus 20) that slavery is okay and it is okay to beat a slave as long as it doesn't die within 3 days.

Can a christian clear that one up for me? That would be great because slavery and killing is wrong to me.

Get off your pretense.

Nothing is right, and nothing is wrong, and you'd enslave and kill under the right circumstances.

You're full of yourself. Eat a bullet.

To answer your question: first, the Jewish people literally invented the chattel slave trade. Previous Muslim-Southern European slavery was limited to conquered peoples. Thus it passes into the Bible as the "word of God" and various tools, morons and other credulous bad DNA believe it.

 

[surenderer]

Xians I've asked about this (along with women's rights) always say that, that was the OT and the NT replaces it.

Xians I've asked about this (along with women's rights) always say that, that was the OT and the NT replaces it.

Actually I dont think that Old and New Testement have anything to do with it because its in the New Testement also:


Slaves, obey your earthly masters with deep respect and fear. Serve them sincerely as you would serve Christ. (Ephesians 6:5 NLT)



Christians who are slaves should give their masters full respect so that the name of God and his teaching will not be shamed. If your master is a Christian, that is no excuse for being disrespectful. You should work all the harder because you are helping another believer by your efforts. Teach these truths, Timothy, and encourage everyone to obey them. (1 Timothy 6:1-2 NLT

 

[David F.]

If you are a christian that thinks slavery is wrong, then read your bible. The Bible says (somewhere after Exodus 20) that slavery is okay and it is okay to beat a slave as long as it doesn't die within 3 days.

Can a christian clear that one up for me? That would be great because slavery and killing is wrong to me.

Yes, you have hit upon a significant difference between the bible and modern western society. But, I don't know about the 3 day thing. It does say that if a master beats his slave and the slave looses an eye, or a tooth, or a hand or a foot (basically a body part) then the slave gets to go free. It also says that male salves were to go free after 6 years of service (Ex 21). Slavery was not quite the same thing that we found in the American South. There were rules about how to treat slaves, like in most cases you couldn't break up marriages (even slave marriages). I don't think slaves were exactly merchandise (when you took on a slave you were committed to caring for that slave, and his family, for the full six years) so you couldn't just sell your slaves (there may be some differences between foreign slaves and fellow Israelite slaves - I don't know all the rules). But your point is that, yes, the bible does permit slavery, in both the OT and NT.

The biggest problem for Christians between our modern worship of Liberty and the bible is that God literally asks Christians to voluntarily become His slaves - which doesn't exactly square with modern thought. When Paul says we must "confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord" he uses the Greek word word Kurios, which means Lord/Master in the sense that we become His slave. By saying it out loud, we are making a bargin with God - "You are my master but it is now your (God's) job to save/rescue me from the fires of Hell." Yes, this is exactly the bargin Paul tells Christians to make with the Almighty.

 

[Michael]

Yes, you have hit upon a significant difference between the bible and modern western society.

David do you think it's OK to own a personal slave in the manner inwhich God laid out in the Good ole' Bible? To actually OWN someone.

Yes or No?

It also says that male salves were to go free after 6 years of service (Ex 21).

What does that say about Gods thoughts on women? A women can be someones property indefinately?

What kind of God promotes Slavery?

Seems sick doesn't it?

 

[David F.]

David do you think it's OK to own a personal slave in the manner inwhich God laid out in the Good ole' Bible? To actually OWN someone.

Yes or No?

What does that say about Gods thoughts on women? A women can be someones property indefinately?

What kind of God promotes Slavery?

Seems sick doesn't it?

I thought we were discussing what the bible said? My personal opinion is that we have only traded in one kind of slavery for another - one set of slavery rules for another. In one sense (as pointed out in the bible), the borrower is the slave of the lender - the banks own those who have a mortgage. The government owns (through taxation) their citizens. God owns His followers (even though His followers enter into His service voluntarily). The employer in a way owns his employees. The welfare state owns those on Welfare (Yes a large portion of the black community is still in slavery, they have just changed from massa to Uncle Sam). Slavery is inevitable. Every slave has the right/opportunity to try to escape and be free, but it is the chains you don't know you have which hold you the tightest.

Would I own a slave? Definitely Not. Do I want to be a slave - no but I find it unaviodable at times. Does God promote slavery - no but He recognizes that it is sometimes inevitable. God is a King and He knows what is best for us, better than we know ourselves. He asks that we learn to obey Him and, if we will do this voluntarily, He will accept us into His kingdom. With God, the key question is: Would you rather starve to death free or serve in the house of a loving master?

Anyone who thinks slavery is gone, had better check their own hands and feet for those hidden slave chains.

 

[Dr Lou Natic]

This thread is ironic, because if it weren't for christianity no one other than slaves and a few eccentrics would think slavery is wrong.
It's because of christ's influence that you're opposed to killing and slavery, it's thanks to christ that you can go back over the bible and find nasty bits that distress your christ-softened mind.
If you think slavery is wrong you inherently are a christian whether you realise it or not.

 

[mis-t-highs]

DR: do you think slavery, and killing, are good things then.
please elaborate, thank you.

 

[Dr Lou Natic]

I'm not personally a fan of slavery, but I definately can identify more with the slave keeper than the slave. I'd be like "hehe, your a sick bastard keeping these things alive and in chains" to a slave keeper, but then if one of his slaves touched me I'd beat it.
Killing I'm a fan of. I'd just kill those I overpowered and harvest their carcasses for resources before I would bother enslaving them.

 

[c20H25N3o]

What if there were others stronger than you Dr Lou Natic. I guarentee you there will be people stronger than you.
You see Dr Lou Natic your arguments and philosophies are at best amusing and at worse satanic.
According to the philosophy of survival of the fittest - we would be left with a 'Last Man Standing' scenario and as I have pointed out in another thread we know it is not 'good' for man to be alone sooo...
Are you prepared to admit that you may have got it all wrong?

 

[Bells]

I'm not personally a fan of slavery, but I definately can identify more with the slave keeper than the slave. I'd be like "hehe, your a sick bastard keeping these things alive and in chains" to a slave keeper, but then if one of his slaves touched me I'd beat it.

Of course you'd want to identify more with the master than the slave. Because then it would not be you who would be owned or humiliated or beaten. I'm sure that the slaves of the past and of today in certain areas of Africa where someone will give a family member over to another to become a slave to repay a debt, would prefer to be the master as well.

Killing I'm a fan of. I'd just kill those I overpowered and harvest their carcasses for resources before I would bother enslaving them.

So why don't you? Why merely advocate the action but not partake in it?

I have to ask. Harvest their carcasses for resources? Eh? What, you in need of a new kidney?

And Lou, if you've killed someone and harvested their bodies for resources, you would not be able to be bothered to enslave that individual.

 

[c20H25N3o]

If you are a christian that thinks slavery is wrong, then read your bible. The Bible says (somewhere after Exodus 20) that slavery is okay and it is okay to beat a slave as long as it doesn't die within 3 days.

Can a christian clear that one up for me? That would be great because slavery and killing is wrong to me.

I would be happy to clear this up for you.

Man decided that Satan must be right and God was wrong or hiding something from them for his own purposes. Satan tempted man with thoughts of glory above his own station and man fell to that temptation and specifically went against God's will for them (which was to never know good and evil), but just to know the good things he had given them and to know him.
But man was tempted. Having knowledge now of everything they realised they were naked and were 'ashamed' whereas before they were naked and couldnt have cared less. They were ashamed because they 'knew' they were competely exposed and vulnerable and their glorious care free state was now at an end. They were ashamed of themselves for having disobeyed God.
But man was now in this state and there was nothing God could do about it. Man had chosen not to listen to God's will for them and were now suffering the consequences. Not because God willed it ( as many seem to think today) but because man was deceived by the serpent who was jealous of man and sought to trick them or trip him up. In this way the serpent would feel smarter than God because he had caused the Almighty's creation to fail from the outset.
God's judgement on serpent and man after all this? Simple - The serpent will bite mans heel but man will crush the serpents head - thus predicting victory for man over their adversary although the full plan for how that was to happen had not been revealed to man yet. At this point you can see that God will not let His plan for creation fail. He sees Himself as a Father with a child who has been tricked into being naughty. Woe to that which caused us to sin!
Anyway - this long intro is just to show God's will for us and to highlight the fact that we now know good things and bad things and have the power to exact both.
Time goes on and man gets up to all sorts of mischief with his knowledge of good and evil. Some men strive to be good but these men are constantly attacked by those who love their evil. we have real conflict in the world as man decides which side of the fence he sits on.
God is a realist - he knows what potential there is for evil and so gives Moses the law so that His judgement would be known i.e. the wages of evil are ultimately death. Going against God's will in the first place was a pretty arrogant thing to do given all that he had given man including life. Evil acts or 'sin' only lead us to be destroyed because it is 'not good'. Evil cannot exist indefinately with good - there would be a struggle but who wins? Good or Evil? Well man gets his heel bitten and the serpent gets his head crushed by man.
So what of slaves and masters?
The first relationship between man and another like him (woman) was that woman would be man's helper. Helper in what? Help to look after everything of course! They would work together to subdue the garden and bring everything under their control, they would have children who would help too and so the whole earth would be filled with their kind.
So man has a good and a bad notion of 'control'. Control to subdue for the common good in a spirit of unity (family) or control to subdue for self irrespective of others wills.
Since some men leant towards controlling things for their benefit alone and others leant towards acting in the common interest, it makes sense that we would see a master/slave relationship develop over time. Bear in mind that this was bound to happen because of man's knowledge of good and evil, not because it was ever God's first intention for us!
So God is a realist and has to introduce laws to protect the weak who wish to serve for the common good from the strong who would exploit the weak and their servile natures. What does God say? Does He say "Right masters - I am going to kill you all to protect the slaves?" or does He say "Masters treat your slaves well?"
The slaves cannot believe that God would favour them ( it is not in their natures to be so assuming) so much so that even after God had set them free from slavery in Egypt by sending plagues to the masters that enslaved them, they just wandered about lost in the desert never trusting that Moses' God loved them - it was not in their natures to believe that they would be so favoured by the Almighty. So God told them then that they would not receive the land He had promised them. Why? To free them from their mental slavery thats why! Suddenly whereas before they were apathetic about their lot, now they were being actively told that they couldnt have it anyway! This was so that they may become frustrated with their lot and no longer apathetic. So that the slaves would see that God is a good master who has set them free from their bad masters. God showed them he was their master in the end by frustrating them and withholding the promised land.
God knew that these creatures lot was slavery! So when God says to the masters 'treat your slaves well' is he against the slaves? No of course not! He is for them! God works with us in the state we are in. He doesnt wave a magic wand and change our wills to His pattern. He lets us get on with it and has set the rules so that His judgement may be known.
Whilst the judgement and therefore the law is good, we are not under the law when there are no slaves! In fact the law becomes a complete insignificance to us that live in love because we fulfill the law by helping eachother to subdue this world for the common good. The law is for the lawless.

cheers

c20

 

[beyondtimeandspace]

c20H25N3o,

Your reading of OT myth seems far too literal for my liking. However, in the sense that, realistically speaking, slavery happens, I would agree. I think, though, and don't quote me on this, that in Biblical thought servitude and slavery were very much interchangable. It is quite obvious that we today are not opposed to service of others. We do it all the time, from helping someone pick out and buy some clothes, to pumping gas at the esso. Everyone, in whatever profession, does service to someone else. That is how our society works. In the Biblical era slavery was a social class, and very much different from our conception of slavery. Our conception of slavery is servitude without payment. However, in the Biblical forms of slavery there was payment. The payment was the care given to the servant. Giving the slave decent housing, food, etc... basically taking care of living needs. The service that the slave gave was to take care of the needs to which the master didn't have the time to attend. Another aspect of slavery was payment for an offense. In this sense, I see slavery as a better system than our penal system of "bar and cell." Why? Because in the slave system of payment, the slave is making restitution TO THE OFFENDED, while such is not the case in our system. Again, as different with our notion of slavery, in the Biblical sense, it was not a life-term. It was also not a case of "owner versus the owned." A slave was servant to the master, but the slave was not a "piece of property," as we would think of them.

Modern conception of slavery, yes, I'm entirely against. Biblical conception of slavery, if it is as I believe it to be, then no, I'm not entirely against it.

 

[§outh§tar]

What if there were others stronger than you Dr Lou Natic. I guarentee you there will be people stronger than you.
You see Dr Lou Natic your arguments and philosophies are at best amusing and at worse satanic.
According to the philosophy of survival of the fittest - we would be left with a 'Last Man Standing' scenario and as I have pointed out in another thread we know it is not 'good' for man to be alone sooo...
Are you prepared to admit that you may have got it all wrong?

Cripes, are you that arrogant?

 

[Dr Lou Natic]

Arrogance is the least of his problems. He's incredibly thick, to a phenomenal degree. It's truely astounding. He possibly understands english the least adequately out of any english speaking person I have ever met.
He seriously has no idea what I'm talking about, and proudly exhibits his lack of comprehension as if it's glorious plumage.
It's actually quite fun to watch. Ofcourse, speaking to him as though he's a human being would only be usefull for some kind of comedy routine, which I'm not in the mood for. So I'll ignore him untill I am.

Bells

I have to ask. Harvest their carcasses for resources? Eh? What, you in need of a new kidney?

No, dog food.

And Lou, if you've killed someone and harvested their bodies for resources, you would not be able to be bothered to enslave that individual.

You're nearly as bad as this other idiot. I mean, you naturally assume people can read at this place.
I meant I'd be more likely to kill someone than enslave them.
I actually disagree with depraving something of freedom for an extended period, I'd prefer to hunt them down and kill them as soon as I had the opportunity. Its also risky to keep enemies alive, even if they are weak, as we have seen in history slaves can revolt. Keeping slaves alive may very well have been what allowed the inferior people's numbers to increase to unmanageable sizes.
Once someone has proven themselves inferior to the extent they could be enslaved it's best to rid the genepool of them then and there.
I would kill someone before I would be bothered enslaving them- read it again.
How anyone could read that as "I'll kill someone and then I'll enslave them afterwards" is beyond me, what kind of fucking moron do you take me for?
You can't be serious even saying that.
I'm disappointed when people fail to understand the main message I am putting forward (which is really quite simple- there is an animal we're supposed to be that we are not being), but after seeing you(a non-joke member, someone who apparently has a brain) fumble with that sentence in such a horrific way its clear I'm asking way way too much of the people here.

 

[Bells]

No, dog food.

Pal just not working for puppy?

You're nearly as bad as this other idiot. I mean, you naturally assume people can read at this place.
I meant I'd be more likely to kill someone than enslave them.
I actually disagree with depraving something of freedom for an extended period, I'd prefer to hunt them down and kill them as soon as I had the opportunity. Its also risky to keep enemies alive, even if they are weak, as we have seen in history slaves can revolt. Keeping slaves alive may very well have been what allowed the inferior people's numbers to increase to unmanageable sizes.

What is it with you and the 'inferior people' thing? You're obsessed. Keeping the slaves alive is what allowed their masters to assume their self professed power and to increase their wealth. Without the slaves, the master would have been nothing but a fat, sad, little white man with a whole lot of land and no money. Without the slaves, that sad little white man would have been the inferior species because he would not have the strength to plant the cotton to survive. The slave was not inferior. He/She had the strength to do what was forced of them. The slave who made it to the US and the Caribbean was strong enough to survive a voyage that no inferior person would have been able to survive.

Once someone has proven themselves inferior to the extent they could be enslaved it's best to rid the genepool of them then and there.
I would kill someone before I would be bothered enslaving them- read it again.

So you'd be inferior if someone, for example, kidnapped you, robbed you, tied you up and beat you? You'd be inferior if you survived that kind of treatment? You'd be inferior if you tried everything you could to escape that kind of treatment, even though you'd know that such an action would result in your death? You'd be inferior if you turned on your masters and killed them, and then know that you'd be hunted down and killed?

Lou, it wasn't the slave who was inferior, but the master who enslaved him. Once the people you deemed to be inferior started to rise up against their masters, as happened in the Caribbean for example, the masters had no where to go but to their graves. Never forget Lou, that the hunter can become the hunted in the blink of an eye.

How anyone could read that as "I'll kill someone and then I'll enslave them afterwards" is beyond me, what kind of fucking moron do you take me for?

I see that sarcasm also escapes you. And do you really want me to answer that question?

I'm disappointed when people fail to understand the main message I am putting forward (which is really quite simple- there is an animal we're supposed to be that we are not being), but after seeing you(a non-joke member, someone who apparently has a brain) fumble with that sentence in such a horrific way its clear I'm asking way way too much of the people here.

So why don't you be that animal? Most importantly, why aren't you that animal? Why do you only talk about it and call people inferior for not being that animal, when you yourself aren't the animal you're supposed to be? Could it be that you're enslaved yourself? Could it be that you are enslaved by the thought of the law and society, because you know that once you become that superior animal, you'd be hunted down and imprisoned or even killed?

 

[FieryIce]

First off, why don't you define the word slavery or slave then go from there before this thread gets blown out of proportion like most other threads get disrupted by information control and acquisition.