A Christian's Rationale For Owning Slaves...

[POI]

Taken from "1213" --> http://www.kolumbus.fi/r.berg/Owning_slaves.html

Notably, the quote below:

Owning slaves?

According to the Old Testament, peoples at least had right to own slaves. Many wonder, is that same right also valid for today’s disciples of Jesus.

1) Jesus didn’t directly deny owning slaves. So maybe it can be taught that it is valid right today also. However Jesus taught to do same to others that you want others to do to you. Therefore, if you don’t want yourself to be slave, don’t keep others in that position.

2) Therefore whatever you desire for men to do to you, you shall also do to them; for this is the law and the prophets.
Mat. 7:12

3) It is also good to notice that disciples of Jesus shouldn’t consider themselves superior to others. If we are all brothers and sisters, how could we keep other as a slave? Rather we should be servants to each other.

*************************

My response, thus far:

1) You are right, Jesus never tells humans that slavery is wrong. Instead, He looks to endorse the following two Bible passages A) and B):

A) Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to curry their favor, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord. 23 Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, 24 since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. (Col. 3:22-24)

B) All who are under the yoke of slavery should consider their masters worthy of full respect, so that God’s name and our teaching may not be slandered. 2 Those who have believing masters should not show them disrespect just because they are fellow believers. Instead, they should serve them even better because their masters are dear to them as fellow believers and are devoted to the welfare[a] of their slaves. (1 Tim. 6:1-2)

A) This massage tells the slave to remain subservient, work as hard as one can; even when the master is away. This way, God will be proud of you, via the slave.

B) Respect your slave master. If the master happens to be a Christian, respect them even more.

As you can see, Jesus appears not to be against slavery at all. In fact, He condones such practices.

2) If this were the case for all humans, (the free and the enslaved), then Jesus would not have endorsed instructions for slavery.

3) Please remember the 'golden rule' was already expressed in the OT (i.e.) "you shall love your neighbor as yourself"(Lev. 19:18). Either never speak about the topic of slavery at all, or, tell the Bible readers that slavery is 'wrong'. Instead, the OT already instructs on how you may obtain slaves, how you may beat your slaves, and informs the reader that the slave master can own the slave for life, and also treat them as their property for life. The NT then merely reinforces such OT instruction.

Question(s) for debate:

Why didn't Jesus just abolish slavery practices, or never mention slavery at all? Seems rather confusing, to have left what He left in the NT Bible....?

Answer (post #401)

I'd say that the matter is clear. The OT does refer to chattel slavery - for foreigners. The Bible gives rules (attempting to be fair, no denial) for Jews enslaving others. It does not look like God, knowing that slavery is going to be a no- no in the age when his religion is user scrutiny, thought that he should make it clear that it was wrong. It looks like God thought it was ok, within limits. Paul gave it a thumbs -up and Jesus at least by not commenting, seems to be unaware that it is going to be one of the worst human crimes in modern times.

Thus, it is one more reason to believe the Bible, cover to cover...as the word of men of the time. And that's all it is. It is not even a valid guide to life- advice, morals or social conduct. It is, like any other book, judged by human moral standards, and I can prove it. If Christians did not judge the Bible by human moral codes, we wouldn't even be having this conversation.

[JehovahsWitness]

.... in line with avoiding any punishment deemed by God. --- Via Exodus 21.

The claim that beatings (from the front side or back) carried absolutely no punishment has been debunked. See post #43

[JehovahsWitness]

In the case of the Bible, and the 'golden rule', the EXCEPTION lies with the human ---> which is deemed property.

So you claim but have yet to demonstrate.

Oh I've demonstrated plenty. You just choose to ignore.

Please provide proof of the above claim (either a cut and paste quotation with reference to the claimed "demonstration" ) or a link.


JW

[POI]

You walk into a building which states "no firearms". But you see the attending security guard is packing heat. Of course, common sense would allow one to know there exists exception, for protection's sake.

Exactly; there is a different rule for the security guard but the security guard still operates under the same Law. In other words, the Guard is not above "The Law"; there is still " one law" (as in a single unique penal code) for security guards and ordinary citizens despite the fact that different rules apply depending on the circumstance.

Thus, the security Guard can have a gun but he can only use it for protections sake, he cannot use it to shoot anyone he likes with impunity since THE LAW, as in the law code to which he is still subject, prohibits murder. The prohibition against unlawful killing of ANY citizen (even a bank robber or a known criminal) contains and controls the rule of exception which allows him to carry arms.

In the same way, the Mosaic law contained many different RULES for different circumstances or citizens, not everyone had the same rights but (and here is the point) certain constitution rights applied to all citizens; the Ten commandements for example contained principles that applied indescriminaently to all citizens regardless of their status and this governed the limits of any subsequent rules. There were no exceptions for these basic principles as demonstrated (proven) by the implimentation of rules protecting bodily integrity and the sanctity of life. If the life of a slave was not sacred there would be no death penalty for his murder. If his body had no right to be protected, there could be no compensation for its injury.

CONCLUSION: The existence of universal laws which cannot be violated is demonstrated by the existence of rules which explicity prohibited their violation . There is thus no valid basis to claim slave were nit protected by the law of love or that the Mosaic Laws offered no justice to the foreign slave.

JW

* facepalm *

I've answered you exhaustively. Post 145 describes you to a "T".

Your tactics are not unnoticed. You first tried to accuse me of a 'silence' fallacy. And after I pointed out that my OP negates that claim, you shifted gears and moved to many red herring arguments, as I started to explain in post 199. (i,e,) Consists in diverting attention from the real issue, by focusing instead on an issue having only a surface relevance to the first.

You then continue doing the same.

If God thought that beating a slave, in which the slave later recovers, is wrong; He would order civil and/or criminal punishment of some sort. But He orders the opposite. Meaning, impunity to the slave master and no compensation to the slave.

Conclusion: God is A-okay with the slave master beating their slave --- short of death, missing eyes, or missing teeth. This is likely why many masters customarily beat their slaves from the backside. It is much harder to kill them or knock out their eyes/teeth.

Thanks for your time.

[POI]

[JehovahsWitness]

You walk into a building which states "no firearms". But you see the attending security guard is packing heat. Of course, common sense would allow one to know there exists exception, for protection's sake.

Exactly; there is a different rule for the security guard but the security guard still operates under the same Law. In other words, the Guard is not above "The Law"; there is still " one law" (as in a single unique penal code) for security guards and ordinary citizens despite the fact that different rules apply depending on the circumstance.

Thus, the security Guard can have a gun but he can only use it for protections sake, he cannot use it to shoot anyone he likes with impunity since THE LAW, as in the law code to which he is still subject, prohibits murder. The prohibition against unlawful killing of ANY citizen (even a bank robber or a known criminal) contains and controls the rule of exception which allows him to carry arms.

In the same way, the Mosaic law contained many different RULES for different circumstances or citizens, not everyone had the same rights but (and here is the point) certain constitution rights applied to all citizens; the Ten commandements for example contained principles that applied indescriminaently to all citizens regardless of their status and this governed the limits of any subsequent rules. There were no exceptions for these basic principles as demonstrated (proven) by the implimentation of rules protecting bodily integrity and the sanctity of life. If the life of a slave was not sacred there would be no death penalty for his murder. If his body had no right to be protected, there could be no compensation for its injury.

CONCLUSION: The existence of universal laws which cannot be violated is demonstrated by the existence of rules which explicity prohibited their violation . There is thus no valid basis to claim slave were nit protected by the law of love or that the Mosaic Laws offered no justice to the foreign slave.

JW

* facepalm *

I've answered you exhaustively.

I haven't asked you anything. I have addressed the specific points you have raised. If you would like to challenge the above post or believe you have already addressed the points raised therein, feel free to point me to the specific post or recopy your challenge.






JW

[POI]

You walk into a building which states "no firearms". But you see the attending security guard is packing heat. Of course, common sense would allow one to know there exists exception, for protection's sake.

Exactly; there is a different rule for the security guard but the security guard still operates under the same Law. In other words, the Guard is not above "The Law"; there is still " one law" (as in a single unique penal code) for security guards and ordinary citizens despite the fact that different rules apply depending on the circumstance.

Thus, the security Guard can have a gun but he can only use it for protections sake, he cannot use it to shoot anyone he likes with impunity since THE LAW, as in the law code to which he is still subject, prohibits murder. The prohibition against unlawful killing of ANY citizen (even a bank robber or a known criminal) contains and controls the rule of exception which allows him to carry arms.

In the same way, the Mosaic law contained many different RULES for different circumstances or citizens, not everyone had the same rights but (and here is the point) certain constitution rights applied to all citizens; the Ten commandements for example contained principles that applied indescriminaently to all citizens regardless of their status and this governed the limits of any subsequent rules. There were no exceptions for these basic principles as demonstrated (proven) by the implimentation of rules protecting bodily integrity and the sanctity of life. If the life of a slave was not sacred there would be no death penalty for his murder. If his body had no right to be protected, there could be no compensation for its injury.

CONCLUSION: The existence of universal laws which cannot be violated is demonstrated by the existence of rules which explicity prohibited their violation . There is thus no valid basis to claim slave were nit protected by the law of love or that the Mosaic Laws offered no justice to the foreign slave.

JW

* facepalm *

I've answered you exhaustively.

I haven't asked you anything. I have addressed the specific points you have raised. If you would like to challenge the above post or believe you have already addressed the points raised therein, feel free to point me to the specific post or recopy your challenge. In the absence of your doing this, the above stands.

Um, I can answer your posts without you asking questions And I have, extensively. The readers can read the exchanges and make their own decisions at this point...

Ta ta

[TRANSPONDER]

I've been looking for that for ages. It does deal mainly with refuting the 'indentured servitude' misdirection and the point that God apparently prefers to prohibit irrelevant minutiae and ignores (never mind endorses) a serious business like slavery.

You walk into a building which states "no firearms". But you see the attending security guard is packing heat. Of course, common sense would allow one to know there exists exception, for protection's sake.

Exactly; there is a different rule for the security guard but the security guard still operates under the same Law. In other words, the Guard is not above "The Law"; there is still " one law" (as in a single unique penal code) for security guards and ordinary citizens despite the fact that different rules apply depending on the circumstance.

Thus, the security Guard can have a gun but he can only use it for protections sake, he cannot use it to shoot anyone he likes with impunity since THE LAW, as in the law code to which he is still subject, prohibits murder. The prohibition against unlawful killing of ANY citizen (even a bank robber or a known criminal) contains and controls the rule of exception which allows him to carry arms.

In the same way, the Mosaic law contained many different RULES for different circumstances or citizens, not everyone had the same rights but (and here is the point) certain constitution rights applied to all citizens; the Ten commandements for example contained principles that applied indescriminaently to all citizens regardless of their status and this governed the limits of any subsequent rules. There were no exceptions for these basic principles as demonstrated (proven) by the implimentation of rules protecting bodily integrity and the sanctity of life. If the life of a slave was not sacred there would be no death penalty for his murder. If his body had no right to be protected, there could be no compensation for its injury.

CONCLUSION: The existence of universal laws which cannot be violated is demonstrated by the existence of rules which explicity prohibited their violation . There is thus no valid basis to claim slave were nit protected by the law of love or that the Mosaic Laws offered no justice to the foreign slave.

JW

* facepalm *

I've answered you exhaustively.

I haven't asked you anything. I have addressed the specific points you have raised. If you would like to challenge the above post or believe you have already addressed the points raised therein, feel free to point me to the specific post or recopy your challenge.






JW

You have posted answers, yes, but you have refuted nothing. They posts seem either to be misdirection and strawman (that the Bible does not instruct people to beat their slaves is not the point) confused posts that seem to make no sense and claims that you posted rebuttals that didn't.

[JehovahsWitness]

You have posted answers, yes, but you have refuted nothing.

I disagree but if you point out to the post or link or copy past the specific point I have failed to address, I will be happy to look at it again.

[JehovahsWitness]

My argument, which was kind of addressed above, is that differing laws exist between (the enslaved VS the free).

You are wrong: different RULES one LAW ...

You walk into a building which states "no firearms". But you see the attending security guard is packing heat. Of course, common sense would allow one to know there exists exception, for protection's sake.

Exactly; there is a different rule for the security guard but the security guard still operates under the same Law. In other words, the Guard is not above "The Law"; there is still " one law" (as in a single unique penal code) for security guards and ordinary citizens despite the fact that different rules apply depending on the circumstance.

For full explanation please read post #206

RELATED POSTS

Did the principle of loving one's neighbour exclude foreign slaves?
viewtopic.php?p=1078723#p1078723

To learn more please go to other posts related to...

SLAVERY, SLAVE BEATING and ...THE MOSAIC LAW

[JehovahsWitness]

They [sic] posts seem either to be misdirection and strawman ...

This is not the first time you have made such an allegation without producing evidence of anything of the kind. On the 26th of this month you claimed the following, please note my response.

What you are doing (if anyone hadn't seen it) is the strawman fallacy

Not at all, I have simply addressed the specific claims being made (I usually quote word for word the claim being addressed in the rebuttal)

If somebody says .. " the bible says you can beat your slave" , I address the point of whether the bible says you can beat your slave.

If someone claims.. " the bible implies a slaveowners can beat their slaves or says its silence on the matter amounts to permission to beat ones slave I address that.

Despite the 101 ways the same basic objection can be worded (or the font size or colour used) they can all be squashed with the same simple fact: the bible does not say, tell, instruct imply, condone, encourage, permit or allow Hebrew slaveowners to beat their slaves with impunity.


No strawman required.


JW