Blui

The Old Testmant very blatantly supports slavery, it frequently regulates whom Israeli's could get slaves from (nations outside of their own) and various rules concerning children of slaves, Hebrew-born slaves etc.

The New Testament doesnt say much about it, but iirc Paul does mention a slave must obey their master.

WishboneDawn

I see it as less for or against then simply describing a reality. People had slaves, the bible describes that and how to treat them. There was simply no argument about slavery to be had when the different books were being written. They were and that was that.

WCH

The NT has a few encounters between Jesus or Paul and people who owned slaves, but there's never any condemnation, despite the opportunity. I'd call that tacit approval.

WishboneDawn

Was there any movement or thought that slaveholding was wrong then? Not just by christians, by anyone?

Joan of Bark

I couldn't find the reference in an online Bible, but if memory serves me, there is a passage where Jesus says "call no man master on earth, for you have one master, who is in heaven". I believe this is the closest statement to a rejection of slavery that Jesus makes.

Underseer

It is strongly implied that taking "God's chosen people" (the Jews) as slaves was wrong, but I don't think that is a condemnation of slavery in general, just an example of exceptionalism towards "God's chosen people."

Berggy

I assume your speaking in reference to Exodus 21:20-21. I would also assume that your talking about the word "punished". Well, according to some Hebrew lexicons, that word means to be avenged, not just something that would be a slap on the wrist and obviously, the only one in context that could be spoken of is the servant being killed by the master.

I would also bring to mind Dueteronomy 19 and how God also commanded them to build cities of refuge for those who had killed another and they were to flee to those cities to escape the wrath of the "avenger of blood", who wanted "revenge" against what happened to their family members.

So, based upon that context, of the word "punished" means vengeance or avenging, which means that if they did smite their servernt and that servant died, the servant was to be avenged, which means that the master would be made to suffer the death penalty. So yeah, the death penalty applies to masters over their servants as well as Israelite killing an Israelite.

Oh, and the usage of the word "jew" is misleading. Its a mis-nomer. That word merely means someone from the country of Judea or a resident of Judea and at the Law was given to the Israelites way before the nation of Israel split into two seperate kingdoms, namely Israel and Judah. You can still be apart of the family of the Israelites and not be considered a "jew" if you werent from that specific region.

Anat

Breggy, if one hits a slave and causes the slave to die within that day, the slave is to be avenged, but if the slave survives a day or two before dying the master goes free. This difference does not apply to a free Israelite.

Berggy

The point was to see if that person was actually going to die. Not all strikes kill instantly. Even more so, the evidence concerning an Israelite is down-right instant murder, but even if it were the same as the case with the servant, the punishment is still death.

Johnny Skeptic

Regardless of how you wish to misinterpret the Bible, enslaving people against their will is wrong, and the Bible does not clearly oppose that. The Bible's failure to clearly oppose slavery is an example of gross, needless negligence. Just a few additional words about slavery would have helped humanity a lot, but if God does not exist, then he would not be able to clearly tell people that slavery is wrong.