Was Slavery Allowed in the Bible?

If you travel around the USA, you may come across a billboard like the picture to the left.  And you may wonder, why are they still arguing about slavery and about the bible being God's word?  It could be a legacy from the time of slavery.  The situation, (maybe oversimplified) is that today, there is a sizeable part of the USA that believes in the bible as the literal word of God. Others believe we need to interpret the bible for a modern world.  (Or don't believe it at all)

To anyone who looks further into the debate about the bible, it seems like the strongest support for the literal interpretation of the bible comes from the Southern Confederate states in the civil war.  Did the civil war have anything to do with this split on how the bible is interpreted?

I found this in Wikipedia: "Religious conflict over the slavery question"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_of_the_American_Civil_War#Religious_conflict_over_the_slavery_question

Before the Civil War, most Americans held the belief that the bible was literally true. According to the proslavery side, was written in the bible that white people should enslave the black people.

The slavery debate raged on with each side combing through the bible for passages that supported their cause.  The pro-slavery side won the technical debate by a landslide.  Apparently there are a lot of passages in the bible supporting slavery, and almost none to refute it. So the literal interpretation of the Bible actually does support slavery. The reference given in Wikipedia is a book by Mark Noll, "America's God: From Jonathan Edwards to Abraham Lincoln. (2002)"  I don't have the book, but apparently it explains how the bible debate was won by the pro-slavery faction.  But the abolitionists felt in their hearts that slavery was wrong anyway.

The book "Slavery and Sin: The Fight Against Slavery and the Rise of Liberal Protestantism" By Molly Oshatz has some words about the debate on p 61:

"Christian abolitionists ... endeavored to make the case that the bible did not in fact sanction slavery, an argument that proslavery exegetes quickly dismantled... The most persuasive antislavery moderate of all, Harriet Beecher Stowe, avoided biblical argument in favour of narrative." 

If it is true that a literal interpretation of the bible supports slavery, where does that leave bible literalists?  Today slavery is seen as an evil. Even the Southern Baptists have officially apologized for supporting slavery.  The only concession by literalists seems to be that the word slave was mistranslated.  If an important word like slave could be mistranslated (I don't think it was, but anyway...), what else could be mistranslated?

Before the war, three major branches of American Protestantism split into north and south versions because of their interpretation of God's will on slavery. The Methodists in 1844, the Baptists in 1845, and the Presbyterians in 1857.  The southern versions of these Churches could insist on an even stricter literal interpretation of the bible, while the northern branches had to use a more liberal interpretation of the bible, to support their view that slavery was wrong.  The Northern churches could begin to acknowledge that the Bible was written more for the ancient desert people than it was for 19th century America.

The debate that could have been settled by reading of the bible, ended up in a shooting war, with hundreds of thousands of Americans killed.  But even though the north won the war, southerners apparently remained convinced that the bible was literally true, while eventually conceding that slavery was wrong.  And that is about where we are today, with the bible literalists now attacking Darwinists and homosexuals instead of Abolitionists.  Hopefully this time it will not be resolved with guns.

Who Owned More Slaves, Grant or Lee?

The answer to the well known question about General Grant, which is "Who is buried in Grant's Tomb", is Grant. That question was more like a joke or a riddle than a real historical question.  But there is a real historical question: "Did General Grant own slaves?"  This is a very interesting question, given that Grant was the top General fighting for the Union in the US civil war, and that many people argue whether or not the war was mainly about slavery.  (and I assume everyone knows the Union was the side allegedly opposed to slavery)

The problem with trying to research questions like this is that there is no one source of "truth" in the U.S.A. (or maybe any country, but the distinction is really obvious in America)  So you may find in one book, that Grant did own slaves, thus proving that the Civil war was NOT about slavery.  And you may also come across this quote from Robert E. Lee, the top general of the Southern Confederate states (the ones who allegedly supported slavery)

"There are few, I believe, in this enlightened age, who will not acknowledge that slavery as an institution is a moral and political evil." Robert E. Lee December 27, 1856

That quote, along with Grant's ownership of slaves seems to prove that the war  was not really about slavery.

But hold on just a minute.  If you are to learn anything about the "truth" it is that truth can be manipulated.

By doing some further research, you will find out that Grant bought a slave and set him free.  Does that mean that Grant "owned" slaves?  Of course it does.  From the moment a slave is bought, you own him until the moment you officially set him free, which will take at least a few days, or so I imagine.  It's true, Grant owned slaves.  Or one slave, anyway.  And you will also find out that this slave helped Grant build a log cabin, before being set free.  And that later on Grant hired him again on salary as a free man.  And you will also find out that Grant's wife inherited slaves, and that Grant did not set them free until the end of the war. From there you can dig deeper and deeper and never find the truth.

On the other hand, you can research Robert E. Lee's statement about slavery ("as an institution")  being evil.  And then find out that Lee had slaves and whipped them, and sold their children to break up the family units.  And that although Lee knew that slavery was evil, he also "knew" it was ordained by God, and God would forgive the evil (but necessary) deeds of the slave owners.  And that Lee hated abolitionists a lot more than he hated whipping his slave women.  And again the further you dig, the harder it becomes to root out the truth.

For every argument there is a counter argument.  For every interpretation, there is another interpretation.

Be careful when seeking the truth, it's easy to get lost and never find your way home.

REFERENCES

The Book on Amazon  "The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History" claims Grant owned slaves.
http://www.amazon.com/Politically-Incorrect-Guide-American-History/dp/B006J3VA60

Book Review of "The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History" by right wing Christians
http://veritasdomain.wordpress.com/2013/02/10/review-the-politically-incorrect-guide-to-american-history/

Wikipedia article on Grant
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulysses_S._Grant#Historical_reputation

Another bash at Grant vs Lee, with lots of interesting comments at the end.
http://www.american-presidents.org/2007/02/grant-was-slave-owner.html

General Lee's views on slavery in a letter (The whole letter is on this page, not just a cherry picked quote)
http://www.civilwarhome.com/leepierce.htm

Picture: The house built by Grant and his slave from this page.  http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/94503889/

How We Would Have Been Better Off Without Slavery

This is the 150th anniversary of the American Civil War, where slavery was officially abolished. This month is the 50th anniversary of Sierra Leone's independence.

But the effects of the slave trade across the Atlantic to America will continue to be felt long after this year, both in America and in Africa, and to some extent all over the world.

The Lost Motorcyclist has already seen a southern American on TV denying that the civil war was about slavery. Apparently, their argument goes, that very few Southerners actually owned slaves, therefore the war was not about slavery. So, what was it about? "Defending our country from invasion".

It saddens me to think that some people believe this, and worse yet that TV stations will run it on news programs.

Of course the civil war was about slavery, and it was not just the slave owners who were guilty. The vast majority of the white people in the south supported racist slavery. They had jobs supervising slaves, chasing after runaway slaves. And they voluntarily committed racial atrocities for no pay at all. For example, if any union soldiers surrendered, the black soldiers were killed, while the white soldiers were kept for later prisoner exchange. It could even be that some of the slave owners could have been kinder than many of the general southern population.

Slavery does not corrupt only the slave owners. It corrupts the people who benefit materially from slavery, it corrupts people who believe that slavery is just, it corrupts religion that uses the Bible to argue for slavery. And along with corrupt religion and unjust laws, the morals of an entire people become corrupt.

Even today, you can look at the morality and cultural values of the old slave states, and see that it is lower than the morality of places that did not rely too heavily on slavery. To see the lingering effects of slavery, one needs to look at the current culture of the southern USA, starting with their descent into primitive superstitious religion, in this case the religion is masquerading as born-again Christianity. Look at their distrust of science and education, their destructive attitude toward the environment, toward war, toward anyone but white people, toward guns. Look at their love of money and consumerism. Their hatred of other countries (including large parts of the rest of the USA). But they do love Israel, I suspect it is because Israel is the last modern officially racist state. Finally, their firm belief that they are the only real Americans and everyone else should get out.

Yes, I'm talking about the modern right wing fundamentalist, Republican voting conservatives. These warped ideas fuelled by Nazi style propaganda and lies do not spring naturally from a free civilized society. They are born of fear and terror. Fear of the terror they unleashed with the institution of slavery. Fear of what may become of them. Sadness at how they have ruined their country by importing slaves, but at the same time anger that they needed to have their asses kicked before they were forced to give up slavery forever.

But just the way slavery has corrupted American society, it has also had devastating effects on Africa. Although the Africans have been able to make up for the loss of population by birth rates, the African culture has also been perverted. We really do not know much about African history, or what actually went on there during the slave trade. We imagine that it was simply a matter of white people getting off a boat and chasing black people, and bringing them back to the boat in chains. It was not that simple.

The Europeans needed to first destroy African society in order to make the slave trade work on the large scale they needed. On the very simplest level, ancient Africa was made up of many tribes and social groupings. The Europeans devised a scheme of franchising certain tribes as their slave trade partners. The selected tribes were provided with guns. The tribes that were not selected were not allowed to have guns. That is all you need in your basic recipe for destroying a civilization, and destroying it for generations to come. It was so thoroughly destroyed, that even today, many Americans believe that there is something basically flawed about black people.

So we have a very sad situation for the USA, which might have been a better country without slavery and the civil war. More freedom, less violence, better relations with other countries, and better treatment of the native Americans. I'm not saying it would be perfect, just better than it turned out to be.

And the same could have been true for Africa without the slave trade. More democracy, more education, less corruption, more sustainable jobs. Again, I'm not saying it would be just like Europe (and I am also not saying our modern civilization is necessarily the best model), but much better than it has turned out, especially in places like Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, and Congo.

For a quick look at how slavery affected Africa:

http://www.shunpiking.com/bhs2007/200-BHS-EM-impactof.htm

Picture: Gallows built for war criminals after the US civil war. There were only two war criminals executed, must have been a very civil war compared to most. Anyway the alleged war crime was for the death by starvation of thousands of Union prisoners at Andersonville prison camp, which came about after the prisoner exchanges were halted, which came about because the south refused to treat black and white Union soldiers the same. Namely, the southern policy of killing the black prisoners of war, a war crime which came about because of slavery.

http://old-photos.blogspot.com/2008/02/execution-in-washington-dc.html

The Connection Between Abolitionists and the War of 1812

The War of 1812 might not have happened without the Slave Trade Act of 1807.

In 1807, the British Parliament passed a law against the slave trade, although not against slavery itself.

This law came after many years of a campaign for the abolition of slavery that had been fought in England, led by William Wilberforce. The abolitionists really wanted the end of slavery, but their motions were defeated year after year.

In 1807, Britain was at war with France, and no British ships were allowed to trade with the French. Many British slave ships had converted to the US flag in order to continue selling slaves to French colonies. The slave trade was particularly important to the French Colonies, because the slave ships that sold the slaves also transported the sugar that the colonies produced.

The abolitionists backed an anti-slave trade law that was promoted as a way to cripple France's trade. The Slave Trade Law of 1807 said (among other things) that it was illegal for any British subject to be involved with the slave trade.

While researching this aspect of history, I was confused about the actual enforcement. On the internet, I found references to slave captains being fined a fixed amount for each slave aboard their ship, which apparently led to slave ship captains throwing slaves overboard to avoid fines. On the other hand, the Slave Trade Act of 1807 clearly states that any slave ship shall be forfeit.

http://www.pdavis.nl/Legis_06.htm

Also confusing was the fact that the Americans passed their own law against the slave trade the same year. But they were not in a position to vigorously enforce their law, like the Royal Navy was. Also, the war between Britain and France encouraged the enforcement of the anti slave trade law by Britain.

In any case, it resulted in increased searches and seizures of ships flying the American flag, by the British navy.

There is also a connection with Sierra Leone, as the city of Freetown was the place that slaves on seized ships were set free by the Royal Navy.

Royal Navy ships continued to stop and search American ships for several more years, and became one of the well-known causes of the US government declaring war on Britain in 1812. What is not so well known is that there was a connection between the war of 1812, and the campaign to abolish the slave trade.

The abolitionists' campaign carried on, and eventually, the actual practice of slavery would be declared illegal.