Answers for a Skeptic: Slavery and the Bible

Añadido: 2026-06-07

[00:00:00]Authentic is sponsored in whole by Voice of Prophecy.

[00:00:04]You know, there are some pretty tough things in the Bible and some of them are really, really hard to explain to a modern audience, like the mention of slavery. So, what in the world do we do about that? That's our subject on today's episode of Authentic.

[00:00:21][music] Welcome to Authentic. Shaun Bonstra explores real existential questions about the meaning of your life and how you can live a genuine human existence.

[00:00:32]Listen every week right here on this station or [music] on your favorite podcaster. Here's Sha with this week's episode of Authentic. Today we're going to tackle one of the more unpleasant parts of the Bible. But I think that if I'm going to insist that everybody should be reading this whole book, well then we can't just ignore the inconvenient parts. And so this is actually going to be part five of a series that I've been doing that addresses the questions an online skeptic said she would ask if she had an audience with God. And one of the most inconvenient parts of the Bible by far is the fact that it talks about the institution of slavery. And it doesn't simply condemn it. What you and I would expect to find is an outright condemnation of slavery. But but you don't. In fact, what we seem to find is a set of guidelines on how to own and treat slaves, which was the point this skeptic raised. And of course, given the history of the United States, slavery is an understandably touchy subject.

[00:01:34]Because back in the 19th century, when there was a debate raging over the morality of slavery, there were notable examples of supposed Christians who actually used the Bible to justify what they were doing. Look at this. They would say, "Look, Paul writes a letter to a slave owner asking him to treat his slave with decency and he never condemns the institution. And what about the Old Testament which gives us guidelines for owning slaves? How do you explain that if slavery is really against the will of God?"

[00:02:08]So, of course, some people then assume that the Bible must be some kind of oppressive bronze age document that actually promotes inequality and bigotry. If slavery is supported by the Bible, then obviously we should get rid of the Bible, right? [snorts] It's an understandable opinion, but it's also a little too hasty because the practice of slavery as you find it in the Bible was nothing like the slavery practiced by plantation owners in the 19th century.

[00:02:37]An institution, by the way, that was abolished by Christians who knew it was contrary to the scriptures. In fact, there were Christians right from the birth of this nation who warned the founders that the continued practice of slavery was going to compromise what they were trying to accomplish when they drafted the Bill of Rights. So, it wasn't the Bible that led to the practice of slavery here in America, even though the Bible was later used by some people to try and justify it. Even so, what should we do with those passages where the Bible seems to confirm the idea that you can own another human being? Well, you should study it is what you should do. Because it isn't at all what a lot of people think it is. One of the most difficult tasks that you're going to face when reading the Bible is to determine which parts of the Bible actually represents God's ideal for humanity and which parts are simply God's way of dealing with our present broken reality. You'll find a good example of what I'm talking about in Jesus comments on the institution of marriage when the Pharisees asked him to explain his position on divorce. What they were trying to do is trap Jesus into saying something that would make him contradict Moses because they thought that would undermine his popularity. Is it ever permissible to get a divorce? They asked. And Jesus answered by affirming what the Bible teaches. Here's what it says. He answered, "Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female and said, "Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother, and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.

[00:04:29]So what Jesus does is to affirm God's ideal, his original plan. And that plan said that marriage was supposed to last the rest of your life. In fact, Jesus said that nobody has the right to separate what God has put together. And that's when the Pharisees pounced because Moses taught that divorce was actually permissible under certain restrictive circumstances.

[00:04:53]And that would seem to contradict what Jesus said was the plain will of God.

[00:04:57]So, was Moses at odds with God? Was Jesus actually calling his own status into question? Why then, the Pharisees asked, did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?

[00:05:12]And that's when Jesus presented us with a very important concept. The fact that God has a perfect ideal, but he also has a keen awareness of the reality of our broken existence. and he allows certain things to happen even though they would never happen in a perfect world. So here's how Jesus answers the question in Matthew 19:8.

[00:05:35]He said to them, "Because of your hardness of heart, Moses allowed you to divorce your wives. But from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife except for sexual immorality and marries another commits adultery."

[00:05:52]In other words, what God allows in this world is not necessarily what he wants.

[00:05:57]And what he sometimes does is allow us to chart our own course through life, but at the same time, he sets up important guidelines in order to mitigate the damage that we're causing.

[00:06:09]So, in the case of marriage, God tells us, "Look, I understand who and what you are, and that you fall a long way short of my perfect ideal. So, I'm going to allow this, but only within these specific guidelines.

[00:06:24]The same thing happened when the nation of Israel demanded a king. It was not what God had in mind for his covenant nation, but he allowed it and only within certain specific guidelines. So, when it comes to the issue of slavery in the Bible, you've got to ask yourself, is servitude God's ideal for the human race? or was it a response to the harsh realities of living in a broken world?

[00:06:50]Does God value every individual equally?

[00:06:53]Or does he actually think that some of us are less suited to a dignified life than others? What I want to propose is that the first option is the right one.

[00:07:03]God was addressing our broken reality. I find it particularly interesting that he laid out his rules for slave ownership pretty much right after he gave his people the ten commandments from the top of Si.

[00:07:16]This was a group of people who had just escaped Egyptian slavery. And now God appears to be outlining how they should treat their slaves.

[00:07:28]And in a few minutes we're going to explore that story in a little more detail. But before we do that, I think it's important that we take off our modern 21st century glasses and make an effort to read this from an original perspective. Unfortunately, our perception of slavery has been shaped by the atrocities committed here in the New World up to the latter part of the 19th century. And so, it's easy to think that this is the same thing, and it isn't.

[00:07:57]The Bible's not discussing an international slave trade where people were treated worse than animals and herded into ships where a lot of people died before they ever actually made it to the slave market. We're not talking about stripping away basic human dignity, chopping off their feet if they try to run away, or separating families for the sake of a quick buck. If we're going to understand what the Bible is getting at, we're going to have to suspend our current understanding of slavery and step back thousands of years into a different time and place. And what we're going to find is that even in a bad situation, God actually preserves human dignity and always seems to be working towards salvation and redemption, usually in spite of us.

[00:08:45]Now, personally, I find it very telling that American slave owners didn't want their slaves to actually read the Bible because it might give them ideas about dignity, freedom, and worth. In fact, they produced this something we now call the slave Bible. It's a pairedback version of the scriptures that deliberately left out all the parts that might give people the idea that they were being treated in a way that God didn't approve of. In fact, more than 50% of the New Testament is missing in here and 90% of the Old. I'll be right back after this.

[00:09:23]>> Life can throw a lot at us. Sometimes we don't have all the answers, but that's where the Bible comes in. It's our [music] guide to a more fulfilling life.

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[00:09:52]>> This is [music] Authentic with Shaun Bonstra and the Voice of Prophecy.

[00:09:57]If slavery is a practice ordained by God, as some people say, [music] if the scriptures really promote it, then you have to wonder why American slave owners went to so much trouble to keep their slaves from actually reading the Bible. In some cases, it was just a matter of basic literacy. If you can't read, you'll never discover what the Bible says. And in other cases, they actually paired back the Bible, cutting it down to the bits that wouldn't give readers the notion that their rightful God-given state of existence is liberty.

[00:10:29]But of course, skeptics can still easily point to parts of the Bible that seemed to suggest that God was in favor of what we were doing. And that's where the confusing practice of slavery in America with the way the Israelites did it becomes a serious problem. what the Bible describes is nothing at all like what we were doing. Let me show you what I mean. And I think maybe the best place to start is with the Bible's instructions for slavery found in Exodus chapter 21. Now remember this was given to a group of people who had just escaped a life of slavery in Egypt. And so what you'd expect to find is outright condemnation of the practice, but you don't. And that's because God was proposing something different than the idea we have. So here we go in Exodus 21 starting right at the top of the chapter where it says, "Now these are the rules that you shall set before them. When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing." One of the first things we should notice is the fact that there was an allimportant cap on slavery. It couldn't last more than six years. and in the seventh year you had to liberate your slave. And that's because among God's people, servitude was a way of handling economic inequality.

[00:11:51]This is a clear case where God is permitting his people to do something even though it's obviously not his ideal.

[00:12:00]One of the things that human beings have struggled with since time immemorial is the unequal distribution of resources.

[00:12:06]No matter what we try, we always seem to end up in a situation where some people become really, really rich and other people end up living a life of brutal subsistence. It happens in free market economies and it also happens in Marxist economies which seem to produce even more poverty. And on this side of the kingdom of God, there is no solution in sight. Even Jesus said, "You always have the poor with you."

[00:12:32]This is one of the hard realities of living in a world populated by sinful and selfish people. They will always, always, always put their own desires ahead of somebody else's needs. And it seems that no matter what measures we take to mitigate the problem, we always come back to the same situation. On the one hand, we have those who tell us that free markets are the ultimate solution.

[00:12:54]A rising tide lifts all boats. And to a large extent, that's been true. It is a system that historically speaking lifted more people out of abject poverty and granted more people personal liberty than anything else. It's a system built on rugged individualism which is simultaneously both its strength and its weakness. Because while it certainly promotes self-sufficiency, it can also demolish any sense of responsibility for our fellow human beings. to the point where in Matthew 25, Jesus openly condemns those who ignore suffering.

[00:13:31]But then on the other hand, we have those who feel like more government is the answer. So they build a system they say will produce equality. But the price for that is to strip people of their individual worth, treating them like wards of the state instead of real flesh and blood human beings. As Stalin or in some versions Lenin was rumored to say, "If you want to make an omelette, you're going to have to break a few eggs." And those eggs sadly were people. Now, the quote is a bit of an urban legend because it actually came from Robert Louis Stevenson, but the attitude was there in the former Soviet Union. So far, our human attempts to provide permanent solutions to poverty have pretty much failed. And while some of our so-called solutions are clearly better than others on this side of paradise, I think we're going to continue to meet with failure. Of course, that that doesn't mean we shouldn't try because Jesus clearly expects us to do something about pain and suffering. That much is clear in Matthew 25. But in this side of the second coming, we're not going to find a permanent solution.

[00:14:38]What we have in Exodus 21 is an honest recognition of our brutal situation.

[00:14:44]Some people in this broken world are going to meet with incredible hardship.

[00:14:47]And what you could do about your situation back in those days was sell your labor. You could actually sell yourself into servantthood, becoming a full-time employee for somebody wealthy, and that would provide sustenance for your family or even settle your debts.

[00:15:05]This wasn't a case of people rounding up unsuspecting victims and selling them as slaves. This was a case of individuals who needed to get their debt under control. And that happened in one of two ways.

[00:15:18]Either you were a criminal, a thief, and you were required to make things right, or you were a person who ran into financial trouble and you needed some kind of escape valve. Either way, selling yourself into servitude became an emergency measure for somebody who found themselves in some kind of financial freefall. And from this point forward in the text, you'll find a series of rules designed to keep things neat and tidy. If you sold yourself into slavery and you were single, you would leave your master still a single man. In other words, there was a plan to keep the ledger balanced so that nobody could complain that the period of servitude was somehow unfair or that somebody, whether the purchaser or the servant, had been taken advantage of. There was even a provision that if the slave felt like he'd like to stay, he could actually sign on permanently. Here's what it says. But if the slave plainly says, "I love my master, my wife, and my children. I will not go out free." Then his master shall bring him to God, and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear through with an all, and he shall be his slave forever. So what are we supposed to make of that? Well, if he chooses to get married during his time of indentured servitude, he's supposed to leave his wife and kids behind because he agreed to labor for a set amount. And by acquiring a family, he's earning more than was agreed. Again, it's a matter of keeping the ledger balanced and clear. So, if he wants to stay, he can. And that was a matter of personal choice.

[00:16:52]And this is obviously one of the key differences between this account in the Bible and the atrocities we committed here in America. There were clear rules designed to preserve everybody's dignity. And unless you were a criminal who couldn't pay your debt, this was a matter of free will. And above it all, you have God saying, "I understand why you think you need to do this, but listen, this doesn't last forever, and I'm drawing a line in the sand. This does not go past the seventh year." So maybe think about it in terms of a labor contract. I will perform 6 years of labor in exchange for X, which is what Jacob did when he wanted to marry Rachel. Long before these rules were drafted, he gave 7 years of servitude to Laban in exchange for his daughter. Of course, we might not like it and we might have a lot of trouble not thinking about this from our 21st century perspective, but put back in its historical context and suddenly it seems a little more reasonable than the brutal treatment of slaves in more recent times. And again, this is not God's ideal. This is not how he intended us to live. But given the time and circumstances, it starts to look more like a reasonable compromise with a broken way of life.

[00:18:10]Now, of course, I'm oversimplifying this because some of you will already know that I haven't gotten to the part where a man can sell his daughter into slavery, which really complicates things by mixing slavery with what appears to be the clear mistreatment of women.

[00:18:26]Chapter 21 and:e 7 says, "When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do." That would appear to be a huge ethical problem, which I'll deal with as soon as we come back from this break.

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[00:19:12]>> This is Authentic with Shaun Bonstra and the voice of prophecy.

[00:19:17]You know, it's one thing to sell yourself into slavery, but what do we do with a guy who sells his daughter?

[00:19:23]To the 21st century mind, it seems morally repugnant on a number of levels.

[00:19:29]Not only are we dealing with selling people against their will, but we're treating women differently from men. And it seems to be God's idea. And for those who already believe that the Bible is some kind of misogynistic document, this can become fodder for criticism.

[00:19:45]But again, what we're dealing with is God accommodating himself to our reality, the harsh reality that we created quite apart from God's will. And we're also reading this with Western eyes, which creates all kinds of unnecessary friction. When you go back and read it in the context in which it was written, it actually begins to make some sense. Back in those days when the world was mostly an agrarian society, your fortunes were tied to the land and land was passed on to those most physically capable of working it, which was the men. Now, I understand you and I would probably do it differently, but again, we're talking about the world the way it was, not the way we wish it was.

[00:20:28]And honestly, you'll find God taking all kinds of measures throughout the Bible to move the needle in the right direction toward a better world all the way down to the moment when he finally took on humanity for himself and lived here among us. But as you and I wait for the restoration of all things, the Bible reveals that God is patient and long-suffering. And back when this was written, he was dealing with a current reality.

[00:20:54]Let's imagine a father is incredibly poor. He's got nothing to offer his daughter except a long life of hardship or even a short life depending on how bad it is. On the other side of town is a wealthy man who could easily provide for your daughter. And you hope against all odds that he might show interest in your daughter and marry her. An arrangement that would probably be a permanent solution to her poverty. It appears to be win-win. There's a settlement for the family which helps curve their poverty and the daughter's placed with a rich family where her lot is certainly better than it was at home.

[00:21:30]And I know the word we have in the English Bible is slave which implies harsh and regular mistreatment. But that's a misunderstanding that you and I are reading into the text. You could think of this more like household chores. If you read the passage carefully, you'll discover that the intention with this arrangement was actually marriage. It says she shall not go out as the male slaves do, which at first glance makes it look like she doesn't have the same privileges and rights as a male slave. But she does.

[00:22:01]The Bible makes it clear that she also gets to leave in the seventh year. There is no difference in the way that she's treated except with regard to one thing.

[00:22:10]She has the ability to escape servitude through marriage. If the master likes her or the son likes her and they marry her, she's free and she's to be treated, it says, with the full honor of a real wife. And even if the master or the son goes on to marry other women, she must never be treated as a lesser wife because she used to be a servant. It says if he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights. And if he doesn't want to marry her, she goes back to her family. Now again, you and I might not like this, and you might still think the Bible is some outdated Bronze Age document that promotes misogyny.

[00:22:52]But then we're asking the world of 3500 years ago to be exactly like the world we live in right now. And that's just not the case. And if time should last, you can be sure that the people living centuries from now will look back at us and think we were barbarians, no matter how enlightened we think we are. And we're also assuming that all of this was God's idea in the first place. And it wasn't. I mean, just remember the words that God spoke to Adam and Eve during the exit interview from Eden. Look, God said, "You had a perfect, painless existence, but now that you've decided to go your own way, I'm going to let you. But it does mean that life is going to be hard and you're going to have to exist by the sweat of your brow. And from that point forward, God moves heaven and earth to accommodate our new reality to put clear limits around our ability to destroy ourselves. He knew that we were going to be incredibly selfish and make a huge mess. But he made sure that there was a way to keep us from just eradicating ourselves. At the end of the day, poverty and suffering are our fault, not God's. And what you find in the pages of the Bible is an unparalleled ethical code that attempts to mitigate the damage that we cause.

[00:24:10]The idea behind placing your daughter in a rich man's house was to provide a way out of poverty, which is hard for us to fathom here in the modern wealthy West, where even the poorest among us live better than most of our distant ancestors.

[00:24:25]But I've got to tell you, I continue to witness that kind of poverty in other places on this planet where a family with too many children is starving. So they trust the person who comes along and says, "Look, I have a work arrangement for your daughter where she doesn't have to live like this." Most of us here don't live with that kind of desperation, so we don't understand. But it is still happening. And I mean today, there was no safety net 3,500 years ago, except for the ones that God created. We find him telling farmers to leave something behind for the poor when they harvest the crops. We find rules for getting out of crippling debt. There was a prohibition on usery, a practice that made poverty even tougher to escape. And we had a win-win arrangement where poor children had a shot at the good life.

[00:25:14]And again, it might be hard for us to understand now, but it wasn't back then.

[00:25:20]I'll be right back after this.

[00:25:24]>> Dragons, beasts, cryptic statues.

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[00:25:54]Welcome back. It's Authentic with Shaun Bonstra and the voice of prophecy. We could probably spend [music] another hour dissecting the provisions God made for escaping poverty, but I think we've covered enough to make a really important point. This was a matter of God mitigating the damage we cause and not a matter of God instituting slavery because he's cruel or vindictive. I guess what I want you to do is just read the Bible. Read it broadly. Read it honestly. I think what you're going to find is a God who consistently moves the needle in his direction, always pushing us toward a better, more authentic life without taking away our freedom to choose. He always finds the middle ground between personal liberty and social conscience. And he always preserves our dignity regardless of what we've done. And while we're on the topic, let me just spend half a second talking about some of today's brutal realities. And I want to ask you to help. The voice of prophecy sponsors a home for girls rescued from human trafficking. These are girls from very poor families. And when someone promises work for their children, these desperate families jump at the chance and then they never see their kids again. These reprehensible people are putting these girls in the sex trade. So, a few years ago, my wife Jean met a remarkable woman who breaks into these brothel and rescues these girls. And they need a place to go. So, here's what you could do. We've got a home where these girls get a brand new life. They learn important skills and I could use your help. You could turn someone's life around for as little as say a hundred bucks. So, please head on over to vop.com, click on the big orange donate button, and then when you're asked what you're giving for, click on the rescue project in the drop- down menu. Here's what I know about the Bible, folks. All of it.

[00:27:45]Even the seemingly hard stuff. Even the stuff that we struggle to understand now in the 21st century, it's all designed to redeem us, to restore us to an authentic human existence. Thanks for joining me again today. I'm Sean Bonstra and this has been another episode of Authentic.

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