Christians Defending Slavery

[owen652]

After our prime minister Kevin Rudd's awesome smackdown of a bigoted pastor recently, Christians all over the country have suddenly come out defending slavery, or so it seems, anyway. I have had a couple of big arguments online about it, and it blows me away that they can actually read the Bible and not notice that it doesn't say a single word against the worst institutionalised injustice in human history. They defend it using some very clever, torturously contrived arguments such as this one:http://www.reasonifyouwill.com/2012/10/the-bible-approves-of-slavery.html

So I find myself in the ridiculous position of actually explaining to Christians why owning other human beings as if they are commodities is wrong. It beggars belief.

 

2+2=5 in the world of Christianity.

[flockoff]

Knew someone personally who went online once and told people on a forum we posted at that American slavery wasn't really as bad as its made out to be today because he knew a guy who knew a guy who was a black slave and loved his "owners" enough that he stayed with the family even after he gained his freedom. After some normally civil posters told him to go fuck a goat and sell them his mom, he tried to admonish them for not having a gentlemanly discussion with him. Didn't even seem upset about what they said about his mom, he just picked up his bible and made a scriptural argument against selling her.

 

Somehow this wasn't the most offensive thing he ever said. I think he really would sell his mom into slavery if he were convinced god told him to. Sometimes it seemed like he had no real conscience outside of what the bible told him.

[mymistake]

After our prime minister Kevin Rudd's awesome smackdown of a bigoted pastor recently, Christians all over the country have suddenly come out defending slavery, or so it seems, anyway. I have had a couple of big arguments online about it, and it blows me away that they can actually read the Bible and not notice that it doesn't say a single word against the worst institutionalised injustice in human history. They defend it using some very clever, torturously contrived arguments such as this one:http://www.reasonifyouwill.com/2012/10/the-bible-approves-of-slavery.html

So I find myself in the ridiculous position of actually explaining to Christians why owning other human beings as if they are commodities is wrong. It beggars belief.

 

2+2=5 in the world of Christianity.

 

And if you see somebody who's religion says 2+2=3 then you have to launch a crusade against them.  Those a the people Christians can have as slaves . . .  and butcher . . .    and rape . . . 

[★ Citsonga ★]

Knew someone personally who went online once and told people on a forum we posted at that American slavery wasn't really as bad as its made out to be today because he knew a guy who knew a guy who was a black slave and loved his "owners" enough that he stayed with the family even after he gained his freedom.

 

Yeah, because looking at one isolated case is a really scientific way to establish statistics. [/sarcasm]

 

Of course there were probably cases where slaves weren't treated badly, but that's irrelevant to the point. Most slaves have been treated like crap, and all slavery is a matter of humans being owned as property. It's a shame how some can't see that.

[owen652]

When they can't come up with a reason for the bible's endorsement of slavery it always ends with, 'well, Jesus makes everything new anyway.' Blah blah blah love, blah blah Jesus. 

 

Well, Kevin Rudd just got defeated in the election and now we have Tony Abbott, the most overtly racist, bigoted prime minister we have ever had.  Sigh.

[centauri]

I didn't see anything in the article that addresses the slavery commanded by God in Deut 20:10-14.

This is not the softer form described in Exodus between Hebrews but is the slavery associated with conquest of new lands.

It's forced labor of men, women and children.

The ultimatum is to surrender your home and become a slave.

 

Deut 20:10-14(RSV)

“When you draw near to a city to fight against it, offer terms of peace to it.

And if its answer to you is peace and it opens to you, then all the people who are found in it shall do forced labor for you and shall serve you.

But if it makes no peace with you, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it;

and when the Lord your God gives it into your hand you shall put all its males to the sword,

but the women and the little ones, the cattle, and everything else in the city, all its spoil, you shall take as booty for yourselves; and you shall enjoy the spoil of your enemies, which the Lord your God has given you.

 

These cities are the "lucky" ones, they can surrender and become slaves.

Those cities on the sh*t list are to have their populations exterminated.

 

Deut 20:16(RSV)

But in the cities of these peoples that the Lord your God gives you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes,

 

Also of note is that slave labor was used to build God's temple.

 

1 Kings 9:20-21(RSV)

All the people who were left of the Amorites, the Hittites, the Per′izzites, the Hivites, and the Jeb′usites, who were not of the people of Israel—

their descendants who were left after them in the land, whom the people of Israel were unable to destroy utterly—these Solomon made a forced levy of slaves, and so they are to this day.

 

The Bible God not only commanded that people be made slaves, his Temple was built by slaves.

Holy, Holy, Holy.

[sdelsolray]

Just a friendly reminder folks  - Biblegod is a little shit.  Fortunately, he is an imaginary being.

[★ Citsonga ★]

I didn't see anything in the article that addresses the slavery commanded by God in Deut 20:10-14.

 

Of course not. They always focus on the lesser of the slavery passages, because they're easier to manipulate into what they want them to be.

 

In addition to your example, the article's discussion of Exodus 21 stops at verse 11 and completely ignores this:

 

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

 

So, according to Biblical law, beating slaves within an inch of their lives is perfectly acceptable, as long as the slaves don't die within a couple days! How's that for a God who supposedly hates slavery?

 

The article is clearly a bunch of baloney. It's twisted reasoning at its worst. Typical apologetics.

[owen652]

 

 

 

In addition to your example, the article's discussion of Exodus 21 stops at verse 11 and completely ignores this:

 

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

 

 

 

I didn't see anything in the article that addresses the slavery commanded by God in Deut 20:10-14.

 

Of course not. They always focus on the lesser of the slavery passages, because they're easier to manipulate into what they want them to be.

 

In addition to your example, the article's discussion of Exodus 21 stops at verse 11 and completely ignores this:

 

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

 

 

 

That is the exact verse which started my whole facebook shitfight. In response to someone sneering at Kevin Rudd's supposedly inferior knowledge of Scripture I posted it and asked if anyone could explain it. Needless to say, they couldn't. It was VERY obvious that no-one had read it before. The other thing I pointed out was, Jesus may very well have 'made all things new', but considering he is part of the Triune Godhead, he was there when the OT laws were instituted and was therefore a part of the codification of slavery into Hebrew law. Besides which, even if the OT is indeed redundant now under the 'New Covenant', so what? You still have a God who, at one point in history, thought it was perfectly acceptable to enslave people. If slavery is morally wrong now, it has always been morally wrong, since, as the Bible itself states very clearly, God is unchanging. 

 

blah blah blah love

[★ Citsonga ★]

Besides which, even if the OT is indeed redundant now under the 'New Covenant', so what?

 

Speaking of the "new covenant," it's interesting to note that Genesis 17:7 refers to the first covenant as an "everlasting covenant"! So much for the old covenant vanishing away, as Hebrews 8:13 claims. Or did God have a brain fart and forget what he promised Abraham? Maybe he should have created a symbol as a reminder to himself like he did with the rainbow after the flood!

[GoddessOfWisdom]

 

 

 

Huh...divine post-its. I could run with that idea.

[centauri]

 

Besides which, even if the OT is indeed redundant now under the 'New Covenant', so what?

 

Speaking of the "new covenant," it's interesting to note that Genesis 17:7 refers to the first covenant as an "everlasting covenant"! So much for the old covenant vanishing away, as Hebrews 8:13 claims. Or did God have a brain fart and forget what he promised Abraham? Maybe he should have created a symbol as a reminder to himself like he did with the rainbow after the flood!

 

Good point.

The Book of Hebrews attempts to discredit the covenant with Abraham by claiming a new and improved one (via Jesus) was required.

 

Heb 11:39-40

And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:

God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.

 

Tough luck for all those Old Testament folks who had faith in God's promise.

Like a new and improved laundry detergent, the new covenant gets sold as something better, even if it doesn't conform to the description given in Jer 31.

It was issues like this that exposed Christianity as a sham for me.

[★ Citsonga ★]

 

 

Besides which, even if the OT is indeed redundant now under the 'New Covenant', so what?

 

Speaking of the "new covenant," it's interesting to note that Genesis 17:7 refers to the first covenant as an "everlasting covenant"! So much for the old covenant vanishing away, as Hebrews 8:13 claims. Or did God have a brain fart and forget what he promised Abraham? Maybe he should have created a symbol as a reminder to himself like he did with the rainbow after the flood!

 

Good point.

The Book of Hebrews attempts to discredit the covenant with Abraham by claiming a new and improved one (via Jesus) was required.

 

Heb 11:39-40

And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:

God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.

 

Tough luck for all those Old Testament folks who had faith in God's promise.

Like a new and improved laundry detergent, the new covenant gets sold as something better, even if it doesn't conform to the description given in Jer 31.

It was issues like this that exposed Christianity as a sham for me.

 

 

Yeah, not only is the new covenant referred to as "better," but it even goes so far as to say, "For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second" (Heb 8:7). Now, why would a perfect, all-knowing God issue a faulty covenant in the first place? Also, if the first covenant turned out to be faulty and temporary, even though it was supposed to be grand and everlasting, then how much stock can be put in the new covenant?

 

The Bible is so rife with problems like this that it blows my mind that I used to think that the Bible was a fully consistent and coherent book. Damn indoctrination!

[Guest Marty]

That is the exact verse which started my whole facebook shitfight. In response to someone sneering at Kevin Rudd's supposedly inferior knowledge of Scripture I posted it and asked if anyone could explain it. Needless to say, they couldn't. It was VERY obvious that no-one had read it before. The other thing I pointed out was, Jesus may very well have 'made all things new', but considering he is part of the Triune Godhead, he was there when the OT laws were instituted and was therefore a part of the codification of slavery into Hebrew law. Besides which, even if the OT is indeed redundant now under the 'New Covenant', so what? You still have a God who, at one point in history, thought it was perfectly acceptable to enslave people. If slavery is morally wrong now, it has always been morally wrong, since, as the Bible itself states very clearly, God is unchanging. 

 

 

 

 

blah blah blah love

 

 

I always love to remind christians of the gospel story of the Roman soldier who brought his sick slave to jesus for him to heal.  Jesus heals him and then preaches to the crowd how wonderful it is that a Roman has more faith than all of Israel.  NO mention at all about the moral implications of slavery.  He just heals him so he can continue a long life of servitude under the Romans...