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As stated, slavery was a fact of the Ancient World, and so when the Bible addresses the topic, it should not be compared against the sensibilities of the modern world, but rather against the sensibilities of the ones to whom the Bible was addressed. It is an anchronism to apply questions of, for example, feminism or communism, to the Scriptures, because ...

Anything can be harmful. If you're going to talk about something being harmful, you have to keep this in mind and ask whether it is more harmful or less harmful than the alternatives. If you actually study the Mosaic laws on the subject of slavery, a couple things become apparent. First, that indentured servitude under the Law was a contract that a person ...

In America at least, the word "slave" has a connotative meaning that conjures up images of slavery prior to the Civil War, where people were beaten, mistreated, sold indiscriminately, and many other horrors. In the Bible, slavery was much different. For one thing, a slave would only be a slave for six years and then had to be set free. When he was set ...

Hilaire Belloc enlightened me to the meaning of pre-christian slavery in the Servile State. There was no question in those ancient societies from which we spring of making subject races into slaves by the might of conquering races. All that is the guess-work of the universities. Not only is there no proof of it, rather all the existing proof is the other ...

The letters of Paul tell us that the law was given to show us that we do not measure up. It is impossible to live a God pleasing life by works. So failing was an expected part of the laws. So things would exist that were humane, and God gave guidelines on how to go about all this. Even more, we live in a fallen world, and God gives us means to survive in a ...

I think this could easily become an answer about American history and and politics unless we confine our answer to usage of the Bible. Flimsy is right in his comment above - the Bible does not condone slavery, but it does not officially abolish the institution (much like the US Constitution). What it does do is place Christ in the master-slave relationship, ...

There have been egregious applications of slavery throughout history which have dehumanized people (often through racist justification) by arbitrarily deeming them property of another person. From my understanding, slavery in OT Jerusalem was not like that. It wasn't ethnically-based (Jews were often slaves of Jews), and it was temporary. It was more of ...

Here's what Wikipedia has to say about it (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_and_slavery#Revival_of_slavery_in_the_Early_Modern_Period) (empasis is mine): Before Columbus The Portuguese sought confirmation that they could enslave infidels in a crusade. In 1452 Nicholas V issued the papal bull Dum Diversas to King Alfonso V of Portugal which ...

Historically, these verses have not been applied to employer/employee relations, at least not in the sense that we understand employment today. In ancient times slavery was fairly common; employment, however, was not. Most free people lived and worked on the family farm. Employment contracts did exist, but only to protect the employer's interests. Contracts ...

SHORT ANSWER One major example is the USA Southern States (The South) in the four or five decades leading up to the Civil War of the USA (1860's). Slavery was very common in The South and using the Bible and other religious arguments was very common to justify the morality of it. Although the verses you site were not as commonly used, except perhaps 1 ...

Quakers were one of the first groups who condemned slavery. The anti-slavery sentiment started back in the 1600s. By the 1750s, they were actively trying to have the slavery laws changed in Britain (which ruled Colonial America at that time). More information So, clearly there was at least one group of Christians during the Colonial America times who ...

While the Bible does not, to my knowlege, prohibit slavery, it certainly does condemn it: 1 Timothy 1:9-11 NIV1984 We also know that law is made not for the righteous but for lawbreakers and rebels, the ungodly and sinful, the unholy and irreligious; for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers, for adulterers and perverts, for slave ...