In leviticus 25:44-46
Is it true that God supported slavery?
Please enlighten me
Discussion
44 comments
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No
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No the term is not the same term slavery that we know of today. It’s more of a bond servant which is equivalent to a contractor job or work study for a college student.
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The old covenant doesn’t apply to Christians
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Even if the slavery that is mentioned in the bible was like that of the slave trade (which is was not) people would have still done it even if there was a law. What the Bible does is try to make the best of the historical situation. Whatever situation you find yourself in life, master or slave. God is your Lord and he has no favourites.
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here read and tell us what it says.
https://www.rzim.org/read/rzim-global/how-can-i-trust-the-bible-when-it-was-used-to-justify-slavery
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No.
In liviticus it says anyone who kidnaps a man and sells him into slavery will be put to death
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?
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No
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It was to bail them out of debt. Obviously you didn’t read the next few verses or purposely left them out
Leviticus 25:46-55 (KJV) And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your bondmen for ever: but over your brethren the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigour.
And if a sojourner or stranger wax rich by thee, and thy brother that dwelleth by him wax poor, and sell himself unto the stranger or sojourner by thee, or to the stock of the stranger’s family:
After that he is sold he may be redeemed again; one of his brethren may redeem him:
Either his uncle, or his uncle’s son, may redeem him, or any that is nigh of kin unto him of his family may redeem him; or if he be able, he may redeem himself.
And he shall reckon with him that bought him from the year that he was sold to him unto the year of jubile: and the price of his sale shall be according unto the number of years, according to the time of an hired servant shall it be with him.
If there be yet many years behind, according unto them he shall give again the price of his redemption out of the money that he was bought for.
And if there remain but few years unto the year of jubile, then he shall count with him, and according unto his years shall he give him again the price of his redemption.
And as a yearly hired servant shall he be with him: and the other shall not rule with rigour over him in thy sight.
And if he be not redeemed in these years, then he shall go out in the year of jubile, both he, and his children with him.
For unto me the children of Israel are servants; they are my servants whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God. -
O T is in types so a slave is a type how The SON of GOD came as a slave to serve humanity..
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no—- god does not support slavery anymore than he supports patriarchy. both are in the bible as a matter of record not commands or endorsed.
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No
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Slavery as we know it today was bit like it was in the Bible.
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Read it in context. It’s humans that insisted on slavery, so God wrote laws to keep the treatment as humane as possible.
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1. Only in the cases of POWs, prisoners of war was it specific groups, never race based.
2. God allowed it because the people already had many servants at the Covenant at My. Sinai. Immediately after, he made laws which ensured servants had rights.
3. Slavery as we know it was lifelong. Theirs had short limits and was more like indentured servants. So, our word slaves and their word slaves have important differences. Also, some Bibles use the word slaves, while others use servants. Servants is better and more accurate here.
4. And this is the MOST important one. Servants/slaves could runaway and the law PREVENTED the servant from being returned as a fugitive. So, there were not only no fugitive laws to return them, but people kidnapping a runaway servant was the one punished, it was like wrongful imprisonment. So, slaves had rights AND protections. -
Indenture is different to chattel slavery. People often ignore that.
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Not the same slavery in biblical times. The Law forbids the kidnapping and selling of slaves. Ex 21:16
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Slavery back then was different to the slavery in history books, eg Indian slaves or African slaves. Yes they were still owned, but there were very strict rules on how to treat slaves. They were a lot more like domestic workers. In house workers, etc. Most slaves were more like family …., but it was the norm none the less. You just always hoped you were a slave of a Israeli, and not slave of Egyptians etc.
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God allowed all kinds of impurities in this imperfect world, even death. But this will not be the case in the new earth (new heaven) where God “Jahweh” will rule together with his son Jesus and everyone will be their servants. God bless.
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Dennis Prager’s “The Rational Bible, Exodus edition” says that slavery was a very normal part of the OT culture and if the scriptures were to be taken seriously, and not laughed at to the point of outright rejection, the Torah had to accommodate that fact.
As a result, God had to work within societal norms and begin to change them from the inside. Exodus 20, commandment number eight, forbids stealing, so this stopped the Israelites from simply taking someone they wanted as a slave. Exodus 21:16 clearly teaches that anyone who kidnapped someone else was to be killed. All of Exodus 21 is about the fair treatment of slaves. So, it’s not that God did nothing to deal with slavery. God’s prohibition to the Israelites didn’t prevent other cultures from stealing people and forcing them into slavery which might have been the reason God dealt so swiftly and severely with the nations conquered by Israel, as well as other practices God found abominable. God very well might have been using Israel to execute judgment on those other cultures. Any conquering king would pillage and do with survivors as he saw fit. Atheists would do the same thing if they were conquering invaders. For instance, a conquering atheist king would forbid and, probably mortally kill, anyone who worshiped God. If it’s okay for atheists, why is it wrong for God, especially when God is the One who made them all in the first place?
The original language paints the complete picture of Leviticus 25:44-45. The part about slavery begins back up in verse 39. The remainder of the chapter makes a distinction between the Israelites and the Gentiles. This, of course, is consistent with the way God behaves because He was teaching Israel to be His people. People identified as ‘slaves’ in this Leviticus passage were purchased from Gentile people. Which means the Gentiles, who SOLD their OWN family members, were just as much a part of the ‘problem’ as the Israelites you hate so much. Because these servants, and that’s the word the Hebrew language uses, were purchased and not stolen, they did not break the eighth commandment by stealing people away from their families and their own lives and forcing them into slavery. No, these people were sold into servitude by their own families.
Second, 25:44-46 clearly state that these servants, because they had been legally purchased could and should be handed down to subsequent generations as part of their inheritance. Because they’d been purchased they were to serve the family forever, which I take to mean, as long as they lived.
Third, verses 47-55, explain how Israelites who’d been purchased, yes the Hebrews were sold as servants just the same as the Gentiles, could be redeemed and restored to their rightful place within the nation of Israel. God does make the distinction that Israelites could be redeemed from servitude while Gentiles couldn’t. This is to demonstrate that there are massive benefits to be had when one belongs to God, a truth which remains to this day.
In summary, it appears that both Israelites and Gentiles played active roles in what was a common cultural practice. So, while you rail at God’s immorality, please remember that He worked with the resources He had, rebellious stubborn people, much the same as people today.
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Yes.
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First, looking at all the cultures surrounding Israel of the era—the various Sumerian civilizations—the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Babylonians, the Phoenicians and all others—all these civilizations owned slaves. There is no culture of this age that did not.
This is not claiming that fact makes slavery a moral “right.”
But it probably means it’s legitimate to claim this reality made it a necessity to allow Israel to also practice slavery.
It probably means God really had no other choice for Israel’s survival if He wanted to give Israel a chance at life in the very real non-theoretical and non-ideal world Israel was actually growing up in.
It means God has a level of moral pragmatism, true—along with universal ideals and absolute universal truths—in dealing with limited humans living in a limited reality and the limited choices that produces—there also have to be pragmatic applications and adjustments that are not just black and white, all or nothing.
Moral truths have to be more than that concrete ideals. They also have to work in the real world.
Think of it like this:
Slavery was the machinery of civilization back then. It was how stuff got done—everything.
It was how things got built, and how food was planted and grown, and then made, and how cloth was spun, and clothes were made, from that cloth—all of the aspects of civilization— all ran on the work of slaves at every level, just like we run on technology and machinery now.
What if—just for arguments sake—God decided technology was immoral and told us, as a nation, to completely stop using all technology? What would the immediate economic and social effects be?
Everyone else in the world around us is using technology, but we would become unable to compete economically because our God—instead of blessing us—keeps us from doing the very thing we need to do that will enable us to succeed. We would decline economically; there would eventually be civil war, no doubt, as some would probably object to this impractical approach!
For Israel, it is reasonable to believe that if God had taken this unrealistic tach it would likely have led to the destruction of the nation He was attempting to provide and care for before it even had a chance to really begin.
Israel would have had an inability to compete economically with the surrounding countries who all had cheaper labor at hand that Israel would not have had; this would have produced economic weakness, would likely have increased real hunger and other associated issues of poverty. It would have increased military weakness and the likelihood of invasion and then increased the likelihood of being conquered and wiped out—all before Israel ever got a chance to fully form.
All to fulfill the expectations of some moralists in the twentieth and twenty-first century?
Instead, God says, “okay, this is the world you live in, but I am going to give you some strict rules about it because if you have to have it, you can’t be like the other nations; I can’t stand that” because if God has a priority to the things that matter to him, justice is right at the top.
So God gives what amounts to the first list of human rights—and it’s for slaves.
And if you read the whole Bible, it becomes quite clear—God really hates inequity. God really didn’t like slavery even a little bit. He allowed it only reluctantly.
Slavery is in the Bible because slavery was in the world the Israelites lived in. And because God accepts people where they are. He accepts you—it doesn’t mean He approves of everything you do. That’s a really important difference.
He eventually set a “time bomb” against the whole institution of slavery through Jesus, and again through Paul in the book of Philemon—but that’s another story.
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Because of the hardness of their hearts God permitted them to have slaves. But God made Sure that the slaves the Israelites had were treated a lot more humanely than they were treated by the people around them. There were also more benefits for the slaves of the Israelites as well which I won’t mention.
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Sla ery and zervant are the same word in many languages and infact much of employment in our world is too since many employer claim tge same kind of loyalty.
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Slavery in the Bible isn’t the same as the picture of slavery you have in your mind. These people weren’t in shackles and beaten with whips. They were members of the household.
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slavery is a different meaning back then, due to semantic evolution
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God approved of purchasing humans for money and making them permanent slaves, yes. The verse is clear.
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One must remember the type of slavery from Greco-Roman times and more recently in the US and elsewhere. The English term slace is misleading as the Hebrew term could describe morally illegitimate and legitimate forms of servitude. Remember, it was not allowed to treat slaves as it was practiced in the US. Isralite law stated they had legal rights in Israel – for example, being set free if they were abused (Ex 21-26:27) and a Sabbath rest (Ex 20:10). In addition, permanent servitude was not allowed unless the servant chose (Exodus and Deuteronomy). I would caution that often words that we see as translated from Hebrew and English often carry theological baggage in the English that is not present in the original texts. For more questions on Leviticus – Dr. Jay Sklar of Covenant Theological Seminary has a wonderful book entitled “Leviticus” – I hope this has helped. Was there a reason for your question?
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Not at all. Read in context according to the time culture and situation. Simple people who look for simple answers to complex situations are challenged by adult literature. In Christ there is no slave or master we are all one.
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More like He was giving guidelines on how to righteously navigate the situation you were born into or found yourself in while living in this fallen world.
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Yes and no
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Both the Old and New Testaments condemn the practice of “man-stealing,” which is what happened in Africa in the 19th century. Africans were rounded up by slave-hunters, who sold them to slave-traders, who brought them to the New World to work on plantations and farms. This practice is abhorrent to God. In fact, the penalty for such a crime in the Mosaic Law was death:
“Anyone who kidnaps another and either sells him or still has him when he is caught must be put to death” (Exodus 21:16).
Similarly, in the New Testament, slave-traders are listed among those who are “ungodly and sinful” and are in the same category as those who kill their fathers or mothers, murderers, adulterers and perverts, and liars and perjurers (1 Timothy 1:8–10).
Exodus 21:16
“He who kidnaps a man and sells him, or if he is found in his hand, shall surely be put to death.
1 Timothy 1:8-10
8 But we know that the law is good if one uses it lawfully, 9 knowing this: that the law is not made for a righteous person, but for the lawless and insubordinate, for the ungodly and for sinners, for the unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, 10 for fornicators [SEX OUTSIDE BIBLICAL MARRIAGE], for sodomites, for kidnappers [>>> KIDNAPPERS<<<], for liars, for perjurers, and if there is any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine, Because, had He not, knowing how evil man is, the treatment would have been as it is with Islam today, perhaps. But obviously, it would have been worse. Man is evil - God is good! Keep in mind, many 'slaves' at that time were prisoners of war. It was not a 'racial' thing - there is ONLY 1 race, as God teaches. Now, THOUSANDS of years later, scientists admit that they can only identify "1" race. Gee, what a surprise! In America, for example, we too provide limitations on POW treatment. Many 'slaves' at that time were NOT slaves as you would consider, but loved their masters and willfully made oaths to them for life or a number of years and were very well treated. The truth paints a very different picture than your emotion does, my friend.
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Matthew 7:12
Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.1 Peter 4:8
And above all things have fervent love for one another, for “love will cover a multitude of sins.”Matthew 22:36-40
36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?”37 Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
YES, slavery ONLY exists because of GODLESS humans! It’s NOT God’s way, but man’s. God has given people free will and within their free will, “HUMANS,” NOT GOD, make SINFUL CHOICES – EVIL CHOICES, one can ONLY blame humans.
Had the SINFUL HUMANS done what a PURE, HOLY, BLAMELESS, SPOTLESS and LOVING GOD said, we would have NO slaves, NO rape, NO murder, NO stealing, NO disrespect of parents, NO God mockers, NO false religions, NO abortion, NO porn, NO adultery, NO lying. LOVE GOD, LOVE OTHERS! REJECT God’s ways and we have … well … THIS!
Jeremiah 17:9
“The heart is deceitful above all things,
And desperately wicked;
Who can know it? -
CHRISTIANITY CONDEMNS SLAVERY
The founding apostles of Christianity lived during the reign of the powerful Roman Empire where slavery was the norm. The early Christian writers were not officials and could not abolish the existing Roman laws concerning slavery, but they did denounce such practices as evil. The apostle Paul admonished Christians to abandon any participation in this abhorrent market. In verse sixteen of his letter to the Christian, Philemon, he asked that the runaway slave, Onesimus, be returned and to be regarded, “No longer as a servant, but above a servant, a brother beloved.” In the context, the term ‘servant’ meant “slave” in Koine Greek. Slave trading was considered a serious sin in the New Testament. The Bible ranked this transgression among others:
For the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of mothers, for menstealers, for whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine (I Tim. 1:9-10).
The original Greek renders ‘menstealer’ (antrapodistais) as: “Manstealer, a slave-dealer, kidnapper, one who unjustly takes free men into slavery, or one who steals the slaves of others and sells them.” Anyone who has partaken in the slave trade business or owned slaves has broken the New Testament’s teachings.
Even among Christians, the abuse of slavery resulted in a bloody civil war among the states of the Union. This sin brought mass carnage upon brothers and sisters of the same faith. Disobedience to scriptural teachings ultimately brings judgment from Yahveh. Muhammad (Islam), however, also opposed the original biblical scriptures in favor of his way of life. Frequently, he claimed Moses as a great hero who led his people out of Egyptian bondage; yet, hypocritically, he personally demonstrated his engagement in the slave trade as both owner and instigator.
Obviously, Muhammad was not a prophet of the biblical tenets and doctrinal persuasion prescribed in the New Testament. Consequently, Muhammad and his followers will face a final judgment for disobeying the Judaic scriptures and for following after the false moon-god, Allah.
From Chapter 15 of Mecca, Muhammad & the Origins of Islam: A Candid Investigation Into the Origins of Islam.
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Depends on what you mean by “slavery” and “supported”.
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This guy does an excellent series on this topic. https://youtu.be/pERsLtciNhY
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This was municipal law for an ancient Hebrew theocracy that no longer exists.
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Bible is against slave masters
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Dont forget Jubilee when everyone was set free and all debts forgiven
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No. The biblical “slavery” was more like indentured servant not the cruel, inhumane, acts of the American slavery system.
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In that context, many people survived because they were slaves. And the people that they served were commanded to treat them as a brother in humanity. The death sentence was to be given to anyone who steals a person and the person found in possession of the stolen person was to be put to death Exodus 21:16.
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Slavery is in the Gods plan on earth.
One has to know His Will
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