I was watching a Bill Mahar clip on YouTube and was giving his one of his usual rants about how slavery isn’t condemned in the Bible. And how Jesus and the New Testament gives guidance to owners and slaves alike, rather than calling for its end. As it did for prostitution, divorce, and homosexuality.

I’m sure Bill Mahar sees himself as sophisticated, insightful, and wise with these rants. However, he is just showing himself to be ignorant and sophomoric. His rants show that he has definitely never read the Levitical Law. I doubt he has read any of the Bible. If he had read the Biblical teachings on slavery he would have noticed several unusual things about its commands. The Israelites were not to take prisoners of war and make them slaves or kidnap people into slavery. If any male slave master had sex with a female slave, he was to marry her and take her into his house. If any slave was injured while in service, he was to be freed and compensated for his injury and years of service. Finally, all slaves were to be given a chance to earn their freedom. All these directives were violated in the African slave trade, whether the slaves went west to America or east to Arabia.

It seems as though Bill Mahar is setting himself up as being morally superior because of the Bible’s, and Jesus’s silence on slavery. He fails to see that accepting people in spite of their imperfections is not endorsing their sins. Consider the time the Pharisees came and asked Jesus if it was lawful for a man to divorce his wife. Jesus in effect said no. So, they sought to justify themselves by pointing out it was permissible under the Torah. To which Jesus retorted that it was allowed because of the hardness of their hearts, but it was never God’s wish. God was forced to take the Israelites where they were and not where He wanted them. So, God allowed divorce but wanted to make it as gentle and as benign as possible. I think slavery was one of those things as well. God knew Israel, and the rest of the world, could only give up slavery slowly and in time. In the interim, He gave directions to make it as humane and gentle as possible. Failing to follow God’s instruction meant you’d have hell to pay. And America, especially the South, paid that hell in the Civil War. He gave us eighty years to start the process in correcting it, but instead the South made slavery stronger, and at the same time allowed the violation of everyone of God’s instructions.

#BillMahar, #slavery, #God’sWill