"The enlightened Americans actually adopted the worst model of slavery that ever existed."
Completely irrelevant. We are discussing slavery in the Bible.
Are you going to tell me there is a moral form of slavery? Whether there are varying degrees of immorality between one form of slavery and another is not even an argument. Slavery is either moral or immoral. It is a binary choice.
"A declaration by the Christians to ban slavery would have had no effect on the Roman system"
So what? the Christians banned murder and adultery with out regard to whether it would affect the Roman empire. Why would god care about the Roman empire? Either slavery is moral or immoral. Whether it affects the Romans or not is of absolutely no consequence. But you are also ignoring that there were Romans who were Christian....does that make slavery moral for them?
Besides, we were talking about a set of laws set forth for Israelites. At the time, there were no Christians.
"The Bible God has only His People and has no RIGHT to make the other nations do ANYTHING"
Then why do Christians preach their religion to people who are not of the Jewish faith? Or that are not at least already Christian? The Christian religion (and Judaism) would die out if it wasn't. But, I didn't know that god's "rights" were limited. Who limited them?
"God, in the Bible account, has stepped out of History except for one family that he chooses as His people, he has left mankind to prove that they can make their owns choices."
Then Christians should do the same? They should not "Spread the gospel"? But if people are to make own their choices, should they not be informed choices? Should they not be told that slavery is immoral? If not, then why tell them adultery or murder is immoral?
If he has stepped out of history, there should be no miracles, no answered prayer, etc. Because after each supposed occurrence of any of those, they become a part of history.
"Every single society in the ancient world had a mechanism for "voluntary slavery" and while you may not like the concept it was an essential safety valve for those who had no other option"
I dispute the claim that every single society had a mechanism for voluntary slavery (that is actually a bit of an oxymoron). You would be hard pressed to demonstrate that. However, even if I accept that assertion, that does not make it moral. How many nations must accept a particular immoral human condition before it becomes moral, anyway??? Ten? A hundred? A thousand? The answer is NONE. There is no number of nations that can magically change a fundamentally immoral act into a moral one.But I am not talking about "voluntary slavery". Lets concentrate on involuntary slavery to keep it simple.
"You have just defeated an Assyrian force in battle and captured 20 000 hardarse Assyrian footmen....etc. This is a non-sequitur. If this is a valid reason for slavery, then the United States should by now have enslaved England, Germany, Japan, Vietnam, Korea, Cuba, Mexico (yes, we invaded Mexico) and a number of other nations. I will counter with this bible passage instead of making up another hypothetical:
However, you may purchase male or female slaves from among the foreigners who live among you. You may also purchase the children of such resident foreigners, including those who have been born in your land. You may treat them as your property, passing them on to your children as a permanent inheritance. You may treat your slaves like this, but the people of Israel, your relatives, must never be treated this way. (Leviticus 25:44-46 NLT)
So here we see not only the purchase of people to use as slaves (as opposed to taking prisoners of war), but obvious racist inclinations. No invading armies in sight.
Also, are you not aware that god commanded his "people" to invade other nations and literally wipe them off the face of the earth? Even their livestock??? Except of course for virgin girls, whom they could take for themselves? What do you suppose Israeli soldiers would want with young virgins? It doesn't take much imagination.
This is another hyperbolic statement. The God of the Bible did NOT send his people out to conquer and enslave other peoples....
Really? Want to reread the Old testament?
“This is what the Lord Almighty says... ‘Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.’” (1 Samuel 15:3)
"Happy is he who repays you for what you have done to us – he who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks.” (Psalm 137:9)
They attacked Midian just as the LORD had commanded Moses, and they killed all the men ... Then the Israelite army captured the Midianite women and children and seized their cattle and flocks and all their wealth as plunder. They burned all the towns and villages where the Midianites had lived. After they had gathered the plunder and captives, both people and animals, they brought them all to Moses and Eleazar the priest, and to the whole community of Israel, which was camped on the plains of Moab beside the Jordan River, across from Jericho. Moses, Eleazar the priest, and all the leaders of the people went to meet them outside the camp. But Moses was furious with all the military commanders who had returned from the battle. "Why have you let all the women live?" he demanded ... Now kill all the boys and all the women who have slept with a man. Only the young girls who are virgins may live; you may keep them for yourselves. (Numbers 31:7-18 NLT)
As you approach a town to attack it, first offer its people terms for peace. If they accept your terms and open the gates to you, then all the people inside will serve you in forced labor. But if they refuse to make peace and prepare to fight, you must attack the town. When the LORD your God hands it over to you, kill every man in the town. But you may keep for yourselves all the women, children, livestock, and other plunder. You may enjoy the spoils of your enemies that the LORD your God has given you. (Deuteronomy 20:10-14)
"it seems pretty clear that if you were to be unfortunate enough to be enslaved at any time in history then you should hope that is was by an Israelite or a christian."
So I would be more fortunate if I lived in a time when the Israelites bought me as property that they could pass to their heirs and my wife and children would become slaves as well that could be inherited? I would be fortunate that my Israeli owner could beat me with a rod and as long as I survived for a couple of days before finally dying from my injuries, he would not be punished for beating me?
There is NO good slavery. Period.
In conclusion, I just want to point out to you that so far in your posts, only offered excuses for the immoral edicts of god with regard to slavery, and have not once tried to offer evidence for why it was moral for god to sanction slavery and not condemn it. That is the crux of the problem. Slavery is immoral, no matter the reasons. If you are only going to offer excuses for why god did something immoral, then you are automatically admitting that he did indeed do something immoral.
EDIT: Just realized you had mentioned Roman slavery as somehow a nicer form of slavery. Is that the form of slavery god sanctioned? No. It is a rather poor defense of god to point out that the Romans had a more moral system than he did. You might want to rethink that one.
You know, I almost deleted all of this and just drop the thread. I begin to feel like I'm almost brow-beating you. But then maybe it would be unkind not to point out that your arguments do not even begin to hold water in regard to god's stance on slavery. If you continue to use these on other atheists, some will not be so kind in their rebuttals, and I will have played an indirect part in that by not having told you.