nPeace
Veteran Member
What we know about slavery among the Israelites... from the Bible.
Slavery became a practice among the Israelites, after they left Egypt.
It is likely it may have been practiced in Egypt, by an Israelite who was appointed by an Egyptian, over other slaves.
(Exodus 12:43, 44) 43 Then Jehovah said to Moses and Aaron, “This is the statute of the Passover: No foreigner may eat of it. 44 But if someone has a slave man who was purchased with money, you should circumcise him. Only then may he share in eating it.
Hence, rather than end the practice, as was the case with polygamy, Jehovah allowed it, and put laws in place that allowed for just treatment.
As with many things, both in the past, and today, Jehovah allows them, for a time.
This shows that in among the Israelites, slavery was not six years of harsh treatment.
(Exodus 23:12) . . .“Six days you are to do your work; but on the seventh day, you are to cease from your labor, in order that your bull and your donkey may rest and the son of your slave girl and the foreign resident may refresh themselves.
(Leviticus 22:10, 11) 10 “‘No unauthorized person may eat anything holy. No foreign guest of a priest or hired worker may eat anything holy. 11 But if a priest should purchase someone with his own money, that person may share in eating it. Slaves born in his house may also share in eating his food.
(Leviticus 25:6, 7) 6 However, you may eat the food that grows in the land during its sabbath; you, your male and female slaves, your hired worker, and the foreign settlers who are residing with you may eat it, 7 as well as the domestic and the wild animals in your land. Everything the land produces may be eaten.
(Deuteronomy 5:14) but the seventh day is a sabbath to Jehovah your God. You must not do any work, neither you nor your son nor your daughter nor your slave man nor your slave girl nor your bull nor your donkey nor any of your domestic animals nor your foreign resident who is inside your cities, in order that your slave man and your slave girl may rest the same as you.
If a slave master is harsh, he suffers the consequences.
Deuteronomy 23
15 “You should not hand over a slave to his master when he escapes from his master and comes to you. 16 He may dwell among you in whatever place he chooses in one of your cities, wherever he likes. You must not mistreat him.
Eventually, God taught the Israelites the proper view.
(Leviticus 25:47-55)
This shows that God is as described in the Bible, (Exodus 34:6, 7) He is very patient, and reasonable.
Rather than become like a harsh taskmaster, gradually, Jehovah adjusted the thinking of his people.
God did not institute slavery. rather, he allowed it.
Slavery of that kind, will eventually end permanently.
A willingness to serve others, however, will continue, as it is a proper form of slavery.
Slavery became a practice among the Israelites, after they left Egypt.
It is likely it may have been practiced in Egypt, by an Israelite who was appointed by an Egyptian, over other slaves.
(Exodus 12:43, 44) 43 Then Jehovah said to Moses and Aaron, “This is the statute of the Passover: No foreigner may eat of it. 44 But if someone has a slave man who was purchased with money, you should circumcise him. Only then may he share in eating it.
Hence, rather than end the practice, as was the case with polygamy, Jehovah allowed it, and put laws in place that allowed for just treatment.
As with many things, both in the past, and today, Jehovah allows them, for a time.
(Exodus 21:1-11) . . .“These are the judicial decisions that you are to convey to them: 2 “If you buy a Hebrew slave, he will serve as a slave for six years, but in the seventh year, he will be set free without paying anything. 3 If he came by himself, he will go out by himself. If he is the husband of a wife, then his wife must go out with him. 4 If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children will become her master’s, and he will go out by himself. 5 But if the slave should insist and say, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my sons; I do not want to be set free,’ 6 his master must bring him before the true God. Then he will bring him up against the door or the doorpost, and his master will pierce his ear through with an awl, and he will be his slave for life. 7 “If a man sells his daughter as a slave, she will not go free the same way that a slave man does. 8 If her master is not pleased with her and he does not designate her as a concubine but causes her to be purchased by someone else, he will not be entitled to sell her to foreigners, for he has betrayed her. 9 If he selects her for his son, he is to grant her the rights of a daughter. 10 If he takes another wife for himself, the sustenance, the clothing, and the marriage due of the first wife are not to be diminished. 11 If he will not render these three things to her, then she is to go free without paying any money.
This shows that in among the Israelites, slavery was not six years of harsh treatment.
(Exodus 23:12) . . .“Six days you are to do your work; but on the seventh day, you are to cease from your labor, in order that your bull and your donkey may rest and the son of your slave girl and the foreign resident may refresh themselves.
(Leviticus 22:10, 11) 10 “‘No unauthorized person may eat anything holy. No foreign guest of a priest or hired worker may eat anything holy. 11 But if a priest should purchase someone with his own money, that person may share in eating it. Slaves born in his house may also share in eating his food.
(Leviticus 25:6, 7) 6 However, you may eat the food that grows in the land during its sabbath; you, your male and female slaves, your hired worker, and the foreign settlers who are residing with you may eat it, 7 as well as the domestic and the wild animals in your land. Everything the land produces may be eaten.
(Deuteronomy 5:14) but the seventh day is a sabbath to Jehovah your God. You must not do any work, neither you nor your son nor your daughter nor your slave man nor your slave girl nor your bull nor your donkey nor any of your domestic animals nor your foreign resident who is inside your cities, in order that your slave man and your slave girl may rest the same as you.
(Deuteronomy 15:12-18) 12 “If one of your brothers, a Hebrew man or woman, is sold to you and has served you for six years, then in the seventh year you should set him free. 13 And if you should set him free, do not send him away empty-handed. 14 You should supply him generously with something from your flock, your threshing floor, and your press for oil and wine. Just as Jehovah your God has blessed you, you should give to him. 15 Remember that you became a slave in the land of Egypt and that Jehovah your God redeemed you. That is why I am commanding you to do this today. 16 “But if he says to you, ‘I will not go out from your company!’ because he loves you and your household, since he has been happy while with you, 17 you should then take an awl and put it through his ear into the door, and he will become your slave for life. You should do the same with your slave girl. 18 Do not consider it a hardship when you set him free and he leaves you, because his service to you for six years was worth twice as much as that of a hired worker, and Jehovah your God has blessed you in everything that was done.
(Deuteronomy 16:11-15) 11 And you are to rejoice before Jehovah your God, you and your son, your daughter, your male slave, your female slave, the Levite who is inside your cities, the foreign resident, the fatherless child, and the widow, who are in your midst, in the place that Jehovah your God chooses to have his name reside. 12 Remember that you became a slave in Egypt, and observe and carry out these regulations. 13 “You should celebrate the Festival of Booths for seven days when you make an ingathering from your threshing floor and from your press for oil and wine. 14 Rejoice during your festival, you and your son, your daughter, your male slave, your female slave, the Levite, the foreign resident, the fatherless child, and the widow, who are inside your cities. 15 Seven days you will celebrate the festival to Jehovah your God in the place that Jehovah chooses, for Jehovah your God will bless all your produce and all that you do, and you will become nothing but joyful.
If a slave master is harsh, he suffers the consequences.
Deuteronomy 23
15 “You should not hand over a slave to his master when he escapes from his master and comes to you. 16 He may dwell among you in whatever place he chooses in one of your cities, wherever he likes. You must not mistreat him.
Eventually, God taught the Israelites the proper view.
(Leviticus 25:39-46) 39 “‘If your brother who lives nearby becomes poor and he has to sell himself to you, you must not force him to do slave labor. 40 He should be treated like a hired worker, like a settler. He should serve with you until the Jubilee year. 41 Then he will leave you, he and his children with him, and return to his family. He should return to the property of his forefathers. 42 For they are my slaves whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. They should not sell themselves the way a slave is sold. 43 You must not treat him cruelly, and you must be in fear of your God. 44 Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you, from them you may buy a male or a female slave. 45 Also from the sons of the foreign settlers who are residing with you, from them and from their families that are born to them in your land you may buy slaves, and they will become your possession. 46 You may pass them on as an inheritance to your sons after you to inherit as a permanent possession. You may use them as workers, but you must not subject your Israelite brothers to cruel treatment.
(1 Kings 9:20-23) 20 As for all the people who were left from the Amʹor·ites, the Hitʹtites, the Perʹiz·zites, the Hiʹvites, and the Jebʹu·sites, who were not part of the people of Israel, 21 their descendants who were left in the land—those whom the Israelites had been unable to devote to destruction—were conscripted by Solʹo·mon for forced labor as slaves until this day. 22 But Solʹo·mon did not make any of the Israelites slaves, for they were his warriors, servants, princes, adjutants, and the chiefs of his charioteers and horsemen. 23 There were 550 chiefs of the deputies who were over the work of Solʹo·mon, the foremen over the people who were doing the work.
(Jeremiah 34:8-17) 8 The word that came to Jeremiah from Jehovah after King Zed·e·kiʹah had made a covenant with all the people in Jerusalem to proclaim liberty to them, 9 that everyone should free his Hebrew slaves, male and female, so that no one would keep a fellow Jew as his slave. 10 So all the princes and all the people obeyed. They had entered into the covenant that everyone should free his male and female slaves and not keep them as slaves any longer. They obeyed and let them go. 11 However, they later brought back the male and female slaves whom they had freed, and they again forced them back into slavery. 12 So the word of Jehovah came to Jeremiah from Jehovah, saying: 13 “This is what Jehovah the God of Israel says, ‘I made a covenant with your forefathers in the day I brought them out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, saying: 14 “At the end of seven years, each of you should free his Hebrew brother who was sold to you and who has served you six years; you must set him free.” But your forefathers did not listen or incline their ears to me. 15 And recently you yourselves turned around and did what was right in my eyes by proclaiming liberty to your fellow men, and you made a covenant before me in the house that bears my name. 16 But then you turned around and profaned my name by bringing back your male and female slaves whom you had freed according to their desire, and you forced them back into slavery.’ 17 “Therefore this is what Jehovah says: ‘You have not obeyed me in proclaiming liberty, each one to his brother and to his fellow man. So I will now proclaim liberty to you,’ declares Jehovah, ‘to the sword, to pestilence, and to famine, and I will make you an object of horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.
This shows that God is as described in the Bible, (Exodus 34:6, 7) He is very patient, and reasonable.
Rather than become like a harsh taskmaster, gradually, Jehovah adjusted the thinking of his people.
God did not institute slavery. rather, he allowed it.
Slavery of that kind, will eventually end permanently.
A willingness to serve others, however, will continue, as it is a proper form of slavery.
(Proverbs 22:7) . . .And the borrower is a slave to the lender.
