Slavery

It is not "obliged" under the OT system.....The OT system has a set of laws and rules which regulate what is permitted, but it is not "obliged". Does that make sense? In other words... there were regulations established for how the already existing "slavery" system might be applied....but those regulations served to place the appropriate limitations upon how "slavery" might be properly applied....it does not, strictly speaking....establish slavery as a practice.

"Slavery" simply was not generally understood or practiced in the same sense in the ancient Eastern world as it was in the 17th-19th centuries in the Western World..... We have to divorce ourselves of the correlation between those two respective practices...In short, "slavery" as understood in the OT was more akin to "indentured servitude" or the working off of owed debt. It was not understood in the same sense as the somewhat racially centered and perpetual status as it was in the Western practice later understood by us (as Westerners) in the 17th to 19th Centuries.

As far as the NT is concerned...Christ did not, neither did Paul (see Philemon) condemn the practice (as understood in the Eastern world at the time). This is NOT to be understood as a tacit agreement with it...it is simply that neither Christ nor Paul had, as their goal, some sort of moral societal reformation in mind. Christ (as you know) did not come to be a moral reformer, he wasn't Mahatma Ghandi, he came to save us from sin....Christ's "teachings" except as they referenced himself and his mission were not a morally ground-breaking set of teachings...Jesus (sorry to say) did not originate the "turn the other cheek" idea, nor was he introducing unheared of thoughts with "love your enemies" Buddha pulled that off centuries before Jesus. I always liked C.S. Lewis's quote here:

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: “I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.” That is the one thing we must not say. A man who said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”[/U]
Hope this is decent "short" answer.....I could add more, but this is already as long as need be. Great OP question!!! :thumbsup:

 

Paul's short letter of Philemon gives us a glimpse into his handling of the situation that might teach us a thing or two about how we handle difficult societal problems. Elsewhere, paul says things like "slaves, obey your masters, masters, treat your slaves well...remember you are all in Christ." He does NOT SEEK to abolish it through community action or reform.

In Philemon, instead he petitions one slave owner to release his slave for the higher purpose of service to Christ. He does not go after legislators, he goes after the heart of the one who needs to change his view of his "property."

 

God allowed for it under old testament, as he also allowed for Divorce, "permitted it", due to "hardness of their hearts"...

IMportant disnction between OT slavery and say American is that it was regulated for under the law of God, had to be treated humanly, and MANY of the slaves were those who were paying off debts owed, be like working to pay off obligations owed to creditors!

And the roman slavery was more akin to servants working in homes/businesses to pay off their debts, NOT what we call slavery!

 

There are three kinds of slavery, two permitted and one was not. One is where you sell yourself as an indentured servant and had to be set free in the 7th year.

Another was where people were taken in war as captives and kept as slaves, but there was conditions for their treatment.

The last was if someone was kidnap like what was done by those in this nations early years with the blacks. That called for the death penalty.

So the same principles would apply today. If someone works for us they would be considered our slave even if we do not like the term. If a person is forced against their will we should be held accountable under our laws. I have long held that no person could be a Christian and have slaves (forced slavery) like those in our early history and I base that on 1John 3:10

 

The Israelis treated Jewish slaves( we would call them indentured servant today) different from Gentile slaves. The Gentile slaves who were acquired and sold in the pagan world. These remained the perpetual property of the family, and were treated as slaves in the social sense of the word (Lev. 25:44-46).

 

Accomodation is often the same as permitting something to happen. Outside of the above noted references in the replies I also refer you to the household codes of the NT and the book of Philemon where treatment of slaves is brought up by Paul.

Likewise it should be noted (and FAL makes a good point) there are different kinds of slavery than the immoral and unbiblical practice most Americans are familiar with.