The Bible and Slavery

Way back when I myself was a Christian I would have told you that the Bible contained glimpses of the divine. Others take it further still believing the entire Bible contains the edicts, precepts, commands and moral code that God himself ordained for us. Many believe that these aren't just God's rules for man but they are inherently, or objectively moral. Things like the ten commandments and love thy neighbor, they might say, are part of God's righteous character.

But the more I studied the Bible the more I came to realize that God's moral code seemed more like the primitive morals of a bronze age group of human beings. The Old Testament is rife with violence, bloodshed and depicts God as all but merciless. Many are punished simply for one sin, other times God punishes the innocent for the sins of the wicked (as we saw in Egypt with the first born, also see the David and Bathsheba story)

Now onto the meat of this post. The Bible is meant to have that divine moral code we talked about. One might think that if its morals are divinely inspired, something like slavery would be against the law. Slavery is something that God is said to have saved the Israelites from, he brought them out of Egypt.

The ten commandments, however, show that Yahweh is showing preferential treatment to the Israelites. In the opening of the ten (Exodus 20) God says that he led them out of the land of slavery. But the Thou Shalt not Covet they neighbors goods commandment mentions maidservants and manservants as if they are property to be owned.

Exodus 20:17

" "You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor." "

The God of the Bible is once again LESS moral than human beings. While it did take us human beings until the 1860s (later in some countries) to finally outlaw slavery and come to terms with the moral repugnance of taking people as property Yahweh, the God of the Bible, seems okay with slavery and never recants that. Even in the New Testament slaves are instructed, by the Apostle Paul, to obey their masters. (Colossians 3:22).



In fact not long after setting the Hebrews free God sets up some ground rules for taking Hebrew slaves. So out of one enslavement and into another eh? Yahweh is lenient here though, he only allows them to take Hebrew slaves as indentured servants for six years before they are allowed to go free. Exodus 21 verses 7-11 are even more disturbing:

" 7 "If a man sells his daughter as a servant, she is not to go free as menservants do. 8 If she does not please the master who has selected her for himself, [b] he must let her be redeemed. He has no right to sell her to foreigners, because he has broken faith with her. 9 If he selects her for his son, he must grant her the rights of a daughter. 10 If he marries another woman, he must not deprive the first one of her food, clothing and marital rights. 11 If he does not provide her with these three things, she is to go free, without any payment of money. "

Apparently a Hebrew man get's to go free, but God, almighty, merciful, wonderful, loving God, says that women don't get to go free after six years. Exodus 21:20-21 gives directions on how hard you can beat your slaves. According to the Bible you can beat your slave until near-death, if he dies however the slave-owner must be punished, but if the slave manages to get up again in a few days he won't be punished. Seriously you can read this stuff for yourself people.

The book of Leviticus is where the rules for taking foreign slaves are laid down, the book even says you can purchase children as slaves. So not only does Yahweh, the merciful God of the Bible, condone and indulge in murdering kids on numerous occasions he also condones purchasing them as slaves. Slaves that can then be beaten within an inch of their lives - as long as they get up in a day or two, before the vultures get to them.

I'M NOT MAKING THIS UP - THIS STUFF IS IN THE FRIGGIN BOOK.

The God of the Bible condones slavery, even lays down the rules for it. The best part is that Christians cannot escape this with the Get Out of the Old Testament Free card because the Apostle Paul mentions that slaves should obey their masters. Perhaps the Christians should also have a Get out of the Epistles Free Card.

Of all the scriptures in the Bible that make mention of slavery the most repugnant and glaringly evil one that I have come across takes place in the book of Numbers in the 31st Chapter. The Chapter begins with God, once again, commanding the Israelites go out and commit genocide. They are to lay waste to the Midianites to quote "carry out the Lord's vengeance". So God openly admits the blood of the Midianites is on his hands because he wants revenge. After the Israelites have thoroughly routed the Midianites they return to Moses with the spoils of war, including women and children they have taken prisoner.

In the 15th verse of Chapter 31 Moses condemns their action and in the 17th verse tells them to:

"17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, 18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man."

Now I am aware that Moses is not Yahweh himself but Moses was God's chosen prophet who led them out of Egypt. Should he not be aware that taking virgin slaves is not a good idea? Some apologists will say that these virgin girls were not going to be taken and repeatedly raped for the rest of their lives by their "owners" but I think its fairly obvious that they are especially when you read the portions of Exodus where they talk of purchasing a slave girl for your son. Even if it isn't Yahweh's direct command it is still another example of how the Bible fails to be morally sound on even a human level, let alone a divine level.





So what did we learn today? We learned that the Bible and its God Yahweh condone slavery and think that when you commit genocide you should kill the boys and the sluts and keep the virgins for yourself.

Yahweh is a Baby Killer

Today I'd like to talk about Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament, also sometimes referred to as El, Elohim, the big G, the alpha the omega, you get the idea. In particular I want to focus on the peculiar tendency of Yahweh to either kill, or command his people to kill, innocent children. I think that first its important to establish that according to most current Christian theology a child below a certain age cannot be held accountable for their sins. In the old testament however it seems the sins of the father really are passed onto the sons and Yahweh doesn't even shed a tear as he visits horrible punishment against innocent children.

If any one of us decided to kill a kid, for whatever reason, you can bet we'd end up in prison for the rest of our lives. Yahweh, on the other hand, abides by an apparently different set of rules. What would constitute a sin of the highest order if a mortal committed it is apparently not a sin when a Holy and Loving God commits it. There in lies the conundrum as far as I'm concerned, exactly how does killing a child become LESS sinful when the being committing it is MORE Holy? Shouldn't it be the other way around? Should Yahweh really be allowed to breach his own commandments with impunity (and command the Israelites to do the same)?

Let's take a look at case number 1 from Samuel 15 Verse 1-3:
1 Samuel said to Saul, "I am the one the LORD sent to anoint you king over his people Israel; so listen now to the message from the LORD. 2 This is what the LORD Almighty says: 'I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up from Egypt. 3 Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy everything that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.' "

Here is God commanding that the Israelites go out and slaughter and once again God must appoint a metatron, a prophet, to speak for him. Apparently Yahweh had laryngitis that week and had to hire a helper. Apologists will likely be quick to scream "Wait, the Amalekites deserved to be punished, the verse even says they came against the Israelites". On some level they are right, if the Amalekites were being bad maybe some of them do deserve punishment but what God is commanding here is total genocide. Surely the animals and infants the Amalekites possessed were not evil or deserving of death. And why is God, supposedly loving and merciful, not drawing up plans to form an alliance with the Amalekites. Yahweh could have found a way to cause repentance amongst the Amalekites, making them give up their idols to serve Him. Instead of finding a way to achieve peace or punishing ONLY those who can be held morally responsible for what happened to the Israelites God decides the best bet is to slaughter babies.

This time God doesn't get involved in the baby killing himself, I guess Yahweh doesn't want to get his hands dirty now that he has a posse of powerful warriors to do his infanticidal work for him. But here is the iconic example that is brought up nearly every time a non-theist or non-christian gets into a debate with a fundamentalist... that's right ladies and gents, EXODUS.

The book is filled with God's injustice against the Egyptians. I think its an ultimate testament to Yahweh's outstanding hypocrisy that he frees the Hebrews and adopts them as his people only to turn around and allow them to keep slaves (Leviticus 25:44-46). Right in Exodus 21 there is even talk of keeping HEBREW SLAVES for a few years at a time. So apparently God's people don't have an issue enslaving themselves. I have to mention that slavery was not the Pharaoh's only sin by far, he also went on a baby slaughtering campaign against the Hebrews to prevent an eventual uprising as the slaves grew too numerous. So when Pharaoh does it baby killing is evil (let's see how that plays out).

God decides to speak to Moses, formerly an adoptive part of the Egyptian royalty, in the form of a burning bush. Moses is meant to free his people and so he heads into town thinking that I am that I am guy is crazy for picking him. God begins unleashing plagues on Egypt when Pharaoh refuses to let his work force go free.

There are several opportunities for Pharaoh to let the Hebrews go and each time he nearly goes through with it, but Yahweh, as if just dying to bathe in baby blood, keeps hardening Pharaoh's heart. Seriously read Exodus, God repeatedly hardens Pharaoh's heart to stop the man from letting the Hebrews go! Rather than bringing Pharaoh to repentance God is consumed with desire for petty vengeance against the would-be God-King of Egypt. How loving and merciful is this guy, sending boils, frogs, flies and fire from the heavens upon the Egyptian citizens who, for the most part, are entirely innocent. The majority of Egyptians can't afford slaves, what did they do to incur the wrath of Yahweh? About as much as their children did... And yet Yahweh decides to punish the children with the ultimate price instead of punishing the man responsible for Pharaoh's stubbornness - HIMSELF.

Yahweh heads out at night and kills the firstborn of Egypt. When God does it believers view it as an act of divine justice, when Pharaoh did it it was just plain evil. So when a loving God sheds the blood of the innocent its okay, as long as he has petty revenge as an excuse.

You might think that Exodus is the first time Yahweh has dipped his deviant hands in the blood of the innocent, you'd be wrong. Remember that Noah guy, you know the one who built the boat? Well Noah and his family survived the Flood right? What about everyone else?




So what have we learned today? Well today we learned that Yahweh, the God of the Bible, doesn't mind the killing of children when either he is the one doing it or he is the one commanding it. So keep your Bible close but your babies closer.