After posting a recent blog and video on Slavery and the Old Testament, several questions were raised, as well as criticisms, regarding God’s apparent condoning of chattel slavery. Now, it was agreed by those in the discussion that what is called “slavery” in the Old Testament (OT) among fellow Jews was debt-service which was humane and for the purpose of keeping people from descending into poverty and creating an economic underclass. Yet, there are passages, some seem to think, which indicate that the slavery of foreigners (non-Israelites) was an endorsement and even promoter of what we know as chattel slavery.
“The Bible is a radically pro-slavery document. Slave owners waved Bibles over their heads in the Civil War and justified it.”
Dan Savage
In this blog post, I will respond to some of the interaction I received and make the case that the Bible never endorses or even regulates chattel slavery for non-Israelites. In the following post I will deal with the most difficult passage by answering questions surrounding Leviticus 25. But I will make the case here that foreigners who came to live in Israel came in not as slaves but debt-servants, under refugee safeguards, who were given equal rights of protection and covenant participation along with the Jews.
In this series, we have made the case that the Bible is the story of restoration of all that is broken by self-centered sinfulness. In the OT Law God is not even endorsing or regulating slavery, but rather providing a sanctuary and asylum of humane and responsible treatment for oppressed people, especially foreigners. The OT is moving away from the destructive and oppressive system of slavery and providing the first ever legal asylum. Emma Lazarus, a Jewish writer deeply schooled in the OT, wrote these words, now emblazoned in bronze on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty:
“Give me your tired, your poor,
The New Colussus
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
The very first sneak preview of this spirit of protection and asylum to the oppressed is in the OT. We have said that the story of restoration in the Bible occurs in several acts. Act 1: The World’s Beginnings God created humanity in a world with flourishing beauty and life-giving abundance without anything to spoil it. Slavery, as with any exploitation of one human or group of people by another, was NEVER part of God’s original plan. Act 2: Humanity’s Rebellion People rebelled from this original divine artistry and purpose. They traded life-giving abundance for a world governed by self-centered brokenness. As the world descended into a moral fall, severe economic scarcity and the exploitation of the powerful over the weak became widespread and common. Act 3: Israel’s Quest God stepped in to save his story and set in motion a plan to restore the world from this place of brokenness by taking one nation (from the descendants of Abraham) and setting them apart to be a light and guide to other nations. This was the dawn of this restoration from brokenness. Though an enslaved people for 430 years, they are redeemed and brought into freedom. As they become established in the the new nation of Israel, the goal was for there to be no poverty or economic oppression or slavery, period:
“However, there need be no poor people among you, for in the land the Lord your God is giving you to possess as your inheritance, he will richly bless you…”
Deuteronomy 15:4
As will be seen, this was to include the non-Israelite. So, for the Jew, what God does is take this broken system and opens up a pathway of restoring freedom to people who fall into economic bondage. The God of Israel will change slavery to a voluntary debt-service. It would be different from slavery in at least five ways:
- It would be voluntary and never forced.
- It would only own a person’s labor, not the person himself.
- It would have a six year limit.
- It would give provisions to the debt-servant so he would be able to rebuild his life after the service.
- It would give rights and protections during the term of service.
By the time of the New Testament, there was no permanent economic underclass like that of the nations around them because of these laws. From there, the elimination of slavery would move forward in a gradual and steady process with Act 4: The Arrival of the King (Jesus) and Act 5: The Kingdom Coming (Expansion of the Church). Yet, going back to Act 3: Israel’s Quest, how did this apply to the non-Israelites?
Were Non-Israelites Sold Into Chattel Slavery?
Peter Garnsey, a classical scholar at Cambridge University, stated that chattel slavery had three characteristics:
- A slave was property.
- The slave owner’s rights over the slave’s person and work were total and absolute.
- The slave was stripped of his identity—racial, familial, social, marital. The legal power of the master amounts to an absolute despotism over body and soul.
Harriet Beecher Stowe in Uncle Tom’s Cabin, wrote that Southern masters had absolute control over every facet of their slaves’ lives. Did the OT condone or even regulate this type of slavery over foreigners? The answer is a clear, NO. In fact, had the regulations of the OT been in place during the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade (16th to the 19th centuries), the buying and selling of human beings for economic use would not have existed.
Doesn’t the Bible Use the Term “Slavery?”
Not exactly. The Hebrews did not have a term for slavery because it did not exist in their culture. But don’t passages in the Law of Moses say they were “slaves?” OT scholar, J. A. Moyter writes, “Hebrew has no vocabulary of slavery, only of servanthood.” The Hebrew term translated “slave” in modern translations is ebed” This is the term used for the debt-servants of Israel. This could mean slave, but it usually meant “servant,” “worker” or, to use modern lingo) “employee.” John Goldingay, a professor of OT at Fuller Seminary, states that “there is nothing inherently lowly or undignified about being an ‘ebed.’” Interestingly, the earlier translations of the OT does not translate ebed as slave. For example, the Latin Vulgate, which is the 4th century Latin translation of the Bible, usually translates ebed as “servus” (Latin for servant). At times the Vulgate uses “famulus” (Latin for family.) This is quite distinct from the Latin term, “mancipum,” which means a slave as property. The King James Version (1611) regularly translates ebed as “servant,” while occasionally using the word, “bondman.” It never renders ebed as “slave,” and neither do the nineteenth-century revisions of the King James Version. The translation of ebed as slave did not become common in translations until the Revised Standard Version (1952) onwards. Whatever the reason for this change, it is misleading, as John Goldingay explains:
“Hardly ever does that definition apply to an ebed. The position of an ebed was more like that of a servant, not least the English bond-servants who came to the Americas without paying for their passage, on the basis of serving a master there for a set number of years after their arrival. The Hebrew Bible does not describe the legal position or the experience of an ebed as generally very like that of a slave, specifically not like the African slaves who came to the Americas on a different basis from the European bondservants…”
So the meaning of “ebed” has to be determined by its use and context in the passage. For the sake of this writing, when ebed is used of a non-Israelite, I will use the word “debt-servant,” meaning a person who is bound to service without wages. (This does not mean they did not receive fair compensation in other forms.)
Three Reasons the OT Does Not Have Slavery
Reason # 1: Foreigners Were Given Equal Rights of Protection The heart of God toward foreigners living in the land of Israel was that they were to be accepted and loved as native born Israelites:
“When a stranger resides with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.”
Leviticus 19:33–34
- YOU SHALL NOT DO HIM WRONG
- SHALL BE TO YOU AS THE NATIVE AMONG YOU
- YOU SHALL LOVE HIM AS YOURSELF
The Jews were told to give the foreigner (none excluded) all of the rights and privileges of the other Jews because the Israelites “were slaves in Egypt.”
“Do not deprive the foreigner or the fatherless of justice, or take the cloak of the widow as a pledge. Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you from there. That is why I command you to do this.”
Deuteronomy 24:17-18
God defends the foreigner:
“He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.”
Deuteronomy 10:18-19
Reason # 2: A foreigner could not become a debt-servant by force, only voluntarily
“Anyone who kidnaps someone is to be put to death, whether the victim has been sold or is still in the kidnapper’s possession.”
Exodus 21:16
The context of this prohibition in regard to kidnapping is for profit which involves slave trading. This is why it refers to the the victim as being “sold.” This was a key practice of chattel slavery. It was commonly practiced in the Middle East at the time but could not be in Israel. It was a capital crime. Further, these debt-servants were refugees from others countries who were to be given protection:
“If a slave has taken refuge with you, do not hand them over to their master. Let them live among you wherever they like and in whatever town they choose. Do not oppress them.”
Deuteronomy 23:15-16
- TAKEN REFUGE
- DO NOT HAND THEM OVER
- LET THEM LIVE AMONG YOU WHEREVER THEY LIKE
- DO NOT OPPRESS THEM
The Code of Hammurabi (the laws of ancient Babylon) demanded the death penalty for those helping runaway slaves. In a society built on chattel slavery, protection of runaway slaves could in no way be permitted. Otherwise, they are no longer viewed as only property for an economic ends.
Reason # 3: A debt-servant was to be released from service if they were injured
“An owner who hits a male or female slave [debt-servant] in the eye and destroys it must let the slave go free to compensate for the eye. And an owner who knocks out the tooth of a male or female slave [debt-servant] must let the slave go free to compensate for the tooth.”
Exodus 21:26-27
Paul Copan explains, “When an employer [owner] accidentally gouged out the eye or knocked out the tooth of his bond-servant, he or she was to go free. No bodily abuse of servants was permitted.” By contrast, the Code of Hammurabi permitted the master to cut off a slave’s ear as a form of punishment. Jewish scholar Nahum Sarna observes about this passage, “This law—the protection of slaves from maltreatment by their masters—is found nowhere else in the entire existing corpus of ancient Near Eastern legislation.” Yet, if they were chattel slaves, these protections would not have been given.
The Verdict?
- Equal rights of protection as native born
- Voluntary refugee status
- Compensation for bodily injury
This is not chattel slavery. The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade could not have existed with these guarantees and protections. More importantly, no slavery could exist with these in place. Why? This is not slavery. This was debt-service as a protection to the oppressed in other nations. In the spirit of Emma Lazarus’ writing, this was a beautiful call for asylum.
Bigger Picture
The goal, centuries before the establishment of Israel as a nation, was for Israel to bring restoration of brokenness to all the nations of the world. At the founding call of Abraham, God promised:
“I will make you into a great nation,
Genesis 12:2-3
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you.”
Who will be blessed? All people’s of the earth.
Through these refugee laws, foreigners (gentiles) were already able to participate in the covenant blessings and rights given by God to the Israelite people. This would sow seeds for God’s restoration of brokenness for the world. God’s goal was never to enslave the gentiles but to bring increased peace and blessing. As Paul wrote of God’s purpose for the Jews and Gentiles all along:
“His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace…”
Ephesians 2:15
This model in the OT presents the very spirit and example of how we should extend mercy and love to the needy and the vulnerable.
Our next topic in this series is How NOT To Misread the Bible (Part 9): Difficult Questions Regarding Slavery and the Bible
Story of Grace 