The Bible could straight up say, "Slavery is awesome 👍" and these types of apologists would still try to find a way to say, "Here's why it doesn't actually mean that."
Because it doesn't matter what the Bible says, it matters what the effect of the Bible's laws are historically. Historically, the Biblical Mosaic law made slavery temporary, and the later Christian version eliminated slavery entirely in Christian nations. It doesn't matter what the Bible said, that's not the direct source of doctrine.
They would, they dismission the neo-Nazi Elon Musk's fascist Nazi salute, as a "weird gesture," nothing more. NOPE, it was a fascist Nazi salute to his and Trump's white supremacist followers.
But God had already addressed fundamental moral problems like eating shellfish or wearing robes made of two different fibres, so it perfectly understandable that he didn't find time to specifically mention something as trivial as slavery.
I love how the argument is alwasy "but it was Nice Slavery™" as if enslaving someone can ever be a kindness. This entire argument is, effectively, "I'm not as bad to you as I could have been" which is the sort of gaslighting an abuser does.
Down hill from that comes, these people are too ignorant to know whats good for them. We will save the souls by forcing our will on them and they will be better off. It's a silly argument to begin with because while the was gross mistreatment the truth is those human beings were considered "valuable property" and to mistreat them would be to devalue and make that "tool" less useful. This is going to sound dismissive but I would ask this question to Wes. How many contractors, even ones with money to burn are going to be okay with people throwing tools around and leaving them out in the rain. Calling that a kindness is a bad argument and of course abuse was not uncommon.
I really believe it was "nice slavery", I just do not feel that it makes such a compelling moral argument: "the biblical god was not as bad as other rulers" does not sound like an all loving, all merciful deity to me. If you invite me to dinner, I assume that you will not be taking to a restaurant that is just "not the worst restaurant I have ever eaten in".
"...as if enslaving someone can ever be a kindness." I have read quite a few armchair apologists try to defend slavery as, "It gave people jobs," or, "They would've starved to death otherwise." People who have a NEED to defend the Bible will dummy up *any* excuse.
Isn't Wes supposed to be a historian as well? He couldn't even bother to come up with a new bad defense of biblical slavery? I swear, apologists are all just turning in the same homework over and over again
sadly, the idea that slavery was 'different' and 'not as bad' in the ancient world is a popular one among modern academics, including very woke ones. they give each other a lot of cover.
Regardless of how accurate the actual differences they claim are, I always love when apologists resort to “ancient Hebrew slave customs in the Bible were nothing like barbaric modern Christian slave practices!”
It is true, though. There is a reason why the Sanhedrin could punish you for slave abuse. Your comment is less a "gotcha theists!" and more an important thing we must acknowledge and move forwards as a society beliefs aside. Eventually, and this is me as a Christian, Christianity committed many violent historical abuses (And we need to be reasonable, historical Christians also did good things for the progress of society.) It never is a black and white case. You can understand this if you read "Noah's Curse: The Biblical Justification of American Slavery (Religion in America)"
And ultimately side steps the actual badness of slavery. The problem with slavery is not that some masters were mean to their slaves. The problem is the fundamental dehumanization of the institution.
//Regardless of how accurate the actual differences they claim are, I always love when apologists resort to “ancient Hebrew slave customs in the Bible were nothing like barbaric modern Christian slave practices!”// Who has done that and when?
@@bipolarrambling242 Eh? So which "barbaric modern Christian slave practices" are you referring to, please? I note you have used quotation marks so seem to be quoting (at least almost) verbatim.
The Torah assigns the death penalty to slavers. Indentured servitude and prisoners of war were allowed. Only edgy atheist memelords try to pretend the Bible says something different.
what a coincidence. I watched Wes's slavery content a few days ago and without even popping out my books, was able to catch all the incorrect info. Too bad, I was hoping I could learn something from this new scholar, but an apologist will always be an apologist.
@baonemogomotsi7138 at this time. Hes currently taking his PHD in new testament studies. So that would allow that title to be used to him. But your correct, right now he only has a theological and sociological studies degrees.
@@baonemogomotsi7138 Wes or Dan? Dan has two masters and a Ph.D, I think in the cognitive science of religion. He's also written several papers and a couple of books. He is definitely a scholar. Wes? I have no clue
Well, let’s see. Two masters and a Ph.D. vs. a nameless contributor on the internet claiming to catch incorrect information of a second scholar. Which one should I believe? Hmmm.
Indeed. He most likely went there already knowing these nonsensical failed apologetics. He's just there to dress them up in supposed scholarly knowledge to wow other apologists and laymen like Rogan.
“The Bible condemns slavery because look here, there’s a law that prohibits kidnapping people and selling them into slavery” has the same logical force of “the US law condemns owning horses because there’s a law that prohibits stealing horses.”
No it ain't. It has the same logical force as "the US law condemns owning horses because there’s a law that prohibits taking free horses and selling them into ownership.”
Mmm OP's analogy is a much better analogy. Especially since the Bible does explicitly say the Hebrews may take, buy, trade, slaves from the nations around them and they are to make slaves of nations they conquer. To say the prohibition of kidnapping is proof positive that the Bible condemns slavery is intellectually dishonest much in the same way of OP's analogy
@@moses9647 I disagree, because there are different types of "slavery". So the prohibition of kidnapping is proof positive that the Bible condemns (a certain type of ) slavery.
@@andrejuthe well no, it's proof that the Bible condemns the kidnapping of slaves. Surely, you'd agree that kidnapping was not the only means of acquiring a slave. Which is OP's point. Outlawing the kidnapping of people does not equate to the outlawing of owning people. It's just saying "buy, sell, and trade your slaves." Surely you'd agree that that's hardly a condemnation of the slave trade
When you LITERALLY worship The Bible AS God, you cannot accept that the vast majority of The Bible was written by extremely primitive HUMANS who infused their scriptures with their opinions, prejudices, and societal norms. They WANTED slaves and they WANTED to slaughter their enemies, so they wrote God "approving" of these things. And in Paul's case, he even SAYS (to his credit) that this or that that he is writing to the various churches are his OPINIONS ( which cannot, by definition, be "The Word of God").
@Christian-l8k If Paul gives his opinion on this or that, then how do we know many other things he said weren't just his opinions? For instance, Christ refers to people who choose to remain celibate (or make themselves eunuchs) for the sake of Heaven, but never even remotely suggested that people should be encouraged to be celibate, but Paul taught that EVERYONE who could possibly do so should strive to remain celibate as he was, and that it was better if a man "never touched a woman" (although he did say that if you simply couldn't manage celibacy then, and ONLY then should you marry rather than "burn with lust"). Paul also stated that men with long hair were "a disgrace". These were clearly things which were his OPINIONS, among a number of other things. By definition, the opinions of a Human Being cannot be "The Word of God".
@Dalekzilla in all of his writing we have one instance of Paul saying his teaching is his opinion. If his other teachings in 1 Corinthians or his other letters were also his opinions, why not say that there? We should at least expect him to say in every letter that the teachings are his opinions, no? The simplest reason why Paul qualifies a single teaching as his opinion is because that single teaching and only that teaching were his opinion.
@Christian-l8k So, I take it then that you're one of those people who try to defend biblical references to both slavery and genocide, or the scripture which talks about taking joy in bashing the heads of your enemy's babies against rocks, or the levitical law stating a child that curses their parents should be put to death? As far as Paul, he may well have believed that various kooky things he said were indeed revealed to him by God, but the evidence is against him. Christ (who, unlike Paul, actually WAS God incarnate) taught, for instance, pretty much exactly what his brother, James did, namely that we achieve salvation through Faith PLUS Works (in Matthew 25:32-46 he mandates that we prove our Faith by caring for the poor, the sick, the homeless, the imprisoned, and migrants....and when the rich young man comes to Him and asks to follow Him, Christ tells him to do a good work to prove himself....namely to give all of his riches to the poor), yet Paul says (and it is Paul ALONE where this teaching comes from) that it is through Faith alone that we achieve salvation, and works are ultimately of no real consequence. Paul had some very profound things to say (like Romans 3:23 or Romans 14:10) BUT he was just a Human Being, and he put his opinions, prejudices into what he wrote, just as the scribes and Jewish priests in the Old Testament did. Or do you suggest (as a HUGE number of "Christians" do) that what Paul taught was equal in validity to what Christ taught?
After painting a target on his own forehead with his "word for word" stunt with the Great Isaiah Scroll, it seems poor Wes has become the target du jour. 😁
No he wasn’t. The only thing Dan ever offers is disagreement and uses words like “data” as an appeal. He will never actually debate anyone in a real debate. That’s pretty telling.
What a load of crap. The apologists should just admit that it is indefensible, and that it was likely put in the bible by slave owners for thier own benefit, and stop trying to defend it as something kind and loving. I have never heard one of them say anything about it that isn't morally bankrupt and repugnant.
They cant. The bible is supposed to be perfect and influenced by a perfectly moral being. If they agree that any part of it is immoral they agree that god himself is
@@kvasir8931 the only laws in the Old Testament given by God directly are the Commandments, literally everything else were laws of the land and not even practiced by Roman period. The whole pharisee catch 22 hinged on telling Jesus to either follow the written obsolete law to at T or not break the actual Roman laws (i.e. throw the first stone situation). Anyone claiming that Jews OR Christians are supposed to practice things from i.e. Deuteronomy or Leviticus are disingenuous and are making a strawman argument.
@@KasumiRINAit's less about practicing it today and more about questioning why it was in there in the first place. It's a situation where these three things can't all be true: 1) God is always good; 2) the Bible is the inerrant and inspired Word of God; and 3) slavery is bad. Either God isn't always good, which would turn the religion on its head. Or the Bible isn't the inerrant and inspired Word of God, which would torpedo fundamental sects of Christianity like the evangelicals. Or slavery is good, which is the corner many apologists find themselves backed into and in doing so they paint Biblical slavery as something it's not or they say "slavery wasn't always bad" which then paints God as a moral relativist which feeds back into the first premise.
@@KasumiRINA Except for every other law that was told as if came from god himself. And that is without considering how jebus himslef said "until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished". Anyone claiming we are under a new set of laws (even if is called a new covenant) is disingenuous at best just plainly making a strawman argument.
They didn’t know slavery was terrible lol. Slavery was a constant practice in all human societies until recently with neoslavery being present until recently. The idea slavery is wrong is a new idea. Like Issac newton defined gravity and created calculus before the idea it was amoral even hit the seen.
@nonyobussiness3440 every slaver knows they wouldn't want to be enslaved. But the Bible makes it clear that this is a bad practice, yet fully condones it.
@@Nerobyrne Bible literally says "do to others what you want to be done to you", so you literally hurt yourself in your own confusion. But let's ignore the fact how horrible was modern slavery in modern times done by people worshiped by all America, like George Washington or Benjamin Franklin to make a strawman so you can blame ancient Jews. No amount of mental gymnastics can make you equate trans-Atlantic slavery IN MODERN TIMES PAST ENLIGHTMENT AGE with ancient societies being actually STILL LESS fucked up than modern Americans.
As Dan says in this video, it’s weird that apologists conflate the *laws* about chattel slavery put forward in the Pentateuch, versus the *treatment* of the victims of the institution in the antebellum South. Those two things are not really comparable.
It's always a bait-and-switch with apologists. They cherry-pick passages, as well as playing semantic games. I'm not certain just how much, if any, with large followings, have had good training in critical or textual analysis. Most have degrees in ministry, theology, or philosophy. Some don't even have that level of education.
And there is the constant parachute, for when they get pressed and need to jump out of the plane: "I have faaaaaiiiiiitttthhhhh" (getting progressively further away). They'll just attribute whatever their claim is to a particular interpretation from this or that theological authority and say they take it as an article of faith. You can't argue someone out of this. You can heap evidence on top of evidence. A person will believe what they want to believe.
4:15 re. slavery practiced in societies around ancient Israel - I've been hearing this one more and more, implying or stating that the Old Testament rules were somehow better than the norm. The opposite is true. I'm no expert in the field but I did read up a bit on the laws surrounding slavery in ancient Egypt and Egyptian slaves had more rights and protections than those described in the Old Testament. Incidentally (or not so incidentally), the same applies to the status of women in ancient Egypt. They had far more rights and protections than those afforded to women in the OT.
I mean, if you compare status of women and slaves in Egypt with westerner-beloved "cradles of democracy" Rome or Greece, it's not even a competition, and Egyptians weren't even progressive, it's that West was so bad in comparison, and since 1933 desperately tries to wiggle out of it by rewriting history to blame the Joooooz.
The Bible itself hints that slaves in Egypt had more rights. The Bible itself states that the enslaved Israelites had their own homes and could marry as they chose. Moses himself is described as a Hebrew slave child that was adopted into the royal family. That never happened in the American South.
The only thing they had "better" was that it was not prohibited to help an escaping slave. For every other rule it was on the worse end of the spectrum.
How hard is it for these people to say “Yes, the people in ancient times were very bad, ill intentioned and practiced horrible things?” Oh that’s right, because the Bible is the golden book, it can do no wrong, so if someone says it does do wrong you then have to bend over backwards to try to claim the other people are misunderstanding and wrong.
@@LOwens-xf8yo because those are two different religions and sets of laws? Like for some reason you can accept that Germany in 1946 was a different country than Germany in 1945, but cannot fathom that jewish laws from 2500 years ago aren't practiced by Jews or Christians in modern times? New Testament is from 1900 years ago. US outlawed slavery like, a few days ago, and now you elected orange muppet and will bring it back.
@@KasumiRINA Yeah, it is not Iike the god of the bible is proposed as having absolute and unchanging morality, and thus should be followed even nowadays... right?
The number of people who defend the biblical slavery as debt slavery only (which it isn’t, but you know…) have a lot of explaining to do why they think debt slavery is morally okay as well.
Most Christians don’t defend it. That being said society and civilization at the time wasn’t capable of doing the right thing. Even the economy and currency and trade wasn’t advanced like today. Jesus told us to forgive our debtors
@Ace-sb4il well, if you had watched the video you would have actually seen Dan explain where and how that the Bible endorses chattel slavery. And any of the ways people pay their debts today without becoming someone’s property or forcing their children to become someone’s property. (Money. Favors. A limited amount of work for a person that still allows the debtor their own freedom and autonomy). The whole idea of lending under the assumption that I completely own you for several years if you can’t repay is immoral.
I like how Christians feel like God had to make concessions with the Israelites to allow for some forms of slavery, but they could easily write into Leviticus that eating shellfish and cutting the hair on your temple without problems
Thank You Sir - especially for the - what is written vs. what is practiced. I hail from the south, Louisiana - being born in a somewhat divided tribe of creole and non-creole “black” peoples and was lucky enough to hear stories from my relatives going back to the late 1800’s. In our tree we have a German Immigrant (Bavaria) who came and took a “black” creole woman as his wife and had 7 children. Which in code noir was clearly “illegal” on paper but on the ground - stuff is like the wild west. We have a long way to go in discerning between what we are told, what we want to believe, and what is.
The act of owning someone else is immoral. It denies someone many of their basic human rights. This wouldn't change if the owner treated a slave relatively well. AND It isn't good for THEM to own other humans.
Would you rather be a slave to someone under the Mosaic law with certain regulations in how they treat you or would you rather be a slave to someone with no law that can treat you however they please? I know you'll say you'd rather not be a slave to anyone, obviously, everyone prefers that. But hypothetically if you had to choose a master, which would you prefer?
@Christian-l8k since these laws include that is OK for the owner to beat me .. just so long as I don't die within 2 days.... no. I wouldn't. Slavery is immoral. Owning another human being is immoral. Stop making excuses for how morally repugnant your Bible is. It was clearly written by slave owning men. The inspiration for much of it is control and commercial.
@@Christian-l8k So the options are either we allow inmorality under inmoral regulations or no regulations at all. And that is without considering the bible was not the only giving laws regulating such practice.
@Julian0101 those were the options in that time period. So what's your choice? If you ever take the time to read a book, pick up Created Equal by Joshua Berman, it studies and compares the Mosaic law to the contemporary law codes and shows how it was a better system than any other of the time. But anyway, do you care to engage in the hypothetical?
@@Christian-l8k Except those were not the only options at that time period. And even if they were ir would still be inmoral regulations vs no regulations at all. Also, i dont put much value in someone who makes the suggestion that "women held for the most part, legally and theologically, an equal place in the inclusive community", which is directly contradicted by exodus and deuteronomy (which is one of the reasons he is considered fringe in scholarship).
@ Whether or not apologists read the bible depends on the individuals but it's not really the issue. They prize their faith above truth and facts and that is the problem.
Queue the apologists - Don't ever listen to scholars because they mostly deal in clearly defined facts. Listen to us for whom facts don't matter and we deal in the currency of lies.
It's "never never never" and it's Britain without an "s". (In the UK it's used as a plural in itself, since a country contains many people, plus there's no single word like "Americans" for the people of Britain; the word "Britains" would be equivalent to "the Americas", i.e., North America & South America.)
Your title reminds me of the fact that some people who say “Biblical slavery is different from American chattel slavery” will probably say towards Harry Potter and Wicked that “witchcraft is witchcraft!”, no matter fantasy or occult.
I never quite understand why apologists bother with these tortured and ultimately doomed defences of what Bible actually says about slavery. Why don't they just use the same argument that they apply to ignore other uncomfortable things from the Old Testament and say "okay, but Jesus changed all that stuff, so let's not talk about it anymore"? If you have complete liberty to make basically anything you want up, why not use that in the case of slavery?
Except that Jesus did not do away with slavery. Paul tells slaves to obey their masters. Jesus’s parables about “servants” were most likely slaves. Jesus never says a word against slavery.
@@OldMotherLogo You're missing the point, which is that Christians, irrespective of what Jesus did or didn't say on a case-by-case basis, feel at liberty to preserve bits of the Old Testament when it suits them but drop others like a hot rock even in the absence of a direct statement by Jesus. For instance, Jesus said nothing specific about circumcision, and yet that was one of the Old Testament obligations that the early Church decided not to maintain. I'm not at all religious and certainly not trying to assert the authority of the Old Testament against the new one or vice versa, but rather making the point that there isn't a logical or evidence-based justification for what Christians maintain from the OT and what they dispense with.
@@GaiusSonofGermanicusThe problem seems to be the culture of Christianity. Only progressive Christians rationalise the Bible to abandon its homophobic and anti LGBT doctrine and this causes every denomination to dislike them because of the longstanding culture of religious supremacy, abuse and dogma engraved in the history of the denominations and the Bible interpretations I.e Christian culture.
What i don’t understand why Christians treat the Bible like the Koran in Islam. We don’t believe it’s perfect or the direct word of God. This is a new idea. The cannon was defined until like 400 and even then it got changed. We never had a standardized source material for manuscripts and are always updating it. The Bible is a collection of a bunch of different books and scripts that are wildly different there isn’t a unifying narrative or message. It’s already known humans fell and were basically pos to the point Jesus had to come and die for us and basically repeat the basics that God already told us.
As far as the legal code of the American South, you have to draw a distinction between a slaveowner that kills a slave for no reason, and a slave owner that's required to punish slaves that have transgressed the law. Lynching, hanging, and even burning people at the stake were legal punishments that free people were subject to in early America, and slave owners, not the slaves, were responsible for the crimes the slaves would commit. That made slave owners responsible for punishing their slaves and correcting their behavior instead of the justice system. If hanging was a punishment for robbery, then if a slave owner hung his own slave as a punishment for theft that wouldn't be the equivalent to outright murdering a slave.
Wow. Poor Wess can't catch a break today. First Paulogia on the authorship of the gospel of John, and now you on slavery. And that's without getting into all the crap he's been catching lately over the "word for word" kerfuffle regarding the Great Isaiah Scroll. 😁
@@jamesduncan3673 Unfortunately for you, Dan has admitted that although he would have worded it differently, Wes was correct when he said "word for word". But you guys only care about "facts" that support your atheism.
@@lizzard13666 The source Wes has stated he was quoting said that the great Isaiah scroll was "word for word identical in 95% of its content" (quote approximate). In other words, he clearly misspoke by leaving off the second half of the quote, which clearly stated it was only a 95% match, not "word for word identical.
Dan, it’s so clear how knowledgeable you are when it comes to biblical scholarship and its context. So I have to ask, HOW are you still a theist? Learning more about the Bible is what destroyed any shred of faith or belief I had.
You certainly do not have to hold to an inerrant view of the Bible to be a Christian, let alone a theist. I’d recommend checking out Dr. Pete Enns. He’s a brilliant Old Testament scholar who’s published some great books and posts videos on UA-cam, TikTok, and Instagram. He has a podcast called “The Bible for Normal People” as well. If you like Dan then you’ll probably like him as well. One thing to note is that the Christian (and theist) world is much bigger than you could imagine, my friend.
Pretty sure he compartmentalizes. It's not as hard as a lot of theists *and* atheists think. Took me until my mid-30's to figure it out, though. Faith and facts are two separate compartments.
@ this isn’t some framework I fell into, my personal belief in atheism has come about from what I would consider a rigorous cross examination of the biblical claims, historicity, and apologetics with current testable scientific consensus and philosophical debate. This all occurring in the last three years with nearly a daily consumption of content from both sides of the aisle. So I am VERY happy to add an additional one to the mix and I thank you for the recommendation. I understand inerrancy isn’t required, just look at the Catholics, but without inherency you’re just as prone to believing a god you’ve been told about but a group of men who know no better than you as opposed to arriving to belief in a god you’ve hand crafted and selected. Both I think miss the mark. The fact the theological world IS so big is actually a reason I adhere to none of them given how so many are irreconcilable.
@ and sorry for the double reply, but if you have any more recommendations I’d love to here them! I just find it so shocking that Dan appears to be very learned and rigorous in his understanding of the historical Bible, but to then agree and personally believe in a religion that can be demonstrated as false in its claims. Ie no Isreal heritage in native Americans and no archaeological evidence of all these battles “revealed” to Joseph Smith. People can and will believe in the most insane things without reason and it’s fascinating to me (and i very much count myself among that number, I just can’t obviously see my “blind spots”)
@@lukepoplawski3230 I’m assuming you probably grew up evangelical of some kind? I find that growing up being taught about a certain kind of inerrancy deeply forms your theistic expectations. When those expectations, in this case, the notion of an infallible book, are let down/proven wrong, it is easy to be dichotomous. E.g., if there is a God, he would have an infallible book to tell us about him. There is no infallible book; therefore, there is no God. This system/framework of thinking is fundamentalist in nature. Many times, even after people deconstruct, they carry their fundamentalist worldview and frameworks with them. Now, I could be wrong about your upbringing and or faith experience. I know nothing about you, other than the fact that you seem like a pleasant guy. I just took a jab based on a phenomenon I have commonly observed. Also, I get your point about crafting a personal God. After all, if there’s no inerrant way to know God, shouldn’t everything just be doubted? Well, life is more complicated than that. We live with the assumption that nothing in life is infallible, but that doesn’t mean nothing can be known or true. It does mean we have to do a lot of thinking and wrestling, though. On this topic, Pete Enns has a book called “The Sin of Certainty,” and I think you might enjoy it. As for how Dan wrestles with Mormonisms challenges, I have no idea. Perhaps he’s a cultural Mormon. It’s entirely possible that he’s only vaguely a theist and just stays in the Mormon tradition because of his loved ones. Only Dan knows.
I would love to hear your reply to "Reading While Black," and how it covers slavery in the Bible. I loved it, but if it makes errors I would like to hear them.
Matthew etc: Did you look for critical responses? I found one the moment I put the title into G g l. It was by a Christian and it was not very positive. I've not read the book, but I guess it's basically apologetics.
Thank you for all these resources I’ve never heard of, especially Thom Stark. Of all the things we disagree about I appreciate the “anti apologetics” guys like you on the internet for going after the slavery issue so much, because I think there’s a lot of bad thinking going on around this issue. I’m really tired of hearing the same arguments trotted out by Christian apologists… I still think that for you in particular this is ultimately performative homophilia but that doesn’t mean you aren’t also pointing out problems and being helpful. So thank you. I do appreciate it despite disagreements.
The guy could of read further into Leviticus 25 to chapter 44 through 46.But he's trying to pretend like that kind of slavery isn't condoned in the bible.
Leviticus 25: 44 Both thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. 45 Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession. 46 And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your bondmen for ever: but over your brethren the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigour. Go ahead, find a context that makes that OK. Good luck
you have no idea how much i appreciate longer form videos from you. thank you thank you, i hope you keep doing this! i love to listen to your videos while i'm doing other stuff, and fussing with shorts is annoying. i listen to data over dogma but sometimes i just want straight up nonstop education sprinkled with a bit of "grow the hell up", etc. :)
Have you ever studied Mormonism? Dan is a Mormon, and whatever he is selling is considered antithetical to the gospel of Jesus Christ. If Dan cannot be objective with his Mormonism, why bother listening to anything he says... Because he still reads the BOM on Sundays 😂
SheepDog, that's an ad hominem, and also untrue. He even has videos pointing out when he's said things that go against LDS doctrine. Wrong on every point
@@SheepDog1974If I thought for one second that the book of Mormon contained even one passage as honest as Dan's assessment of the facts around biblical slavery I might read it myself. I don't think anyone could guess whether Dan was a member of any church based solely on the content of his videos. I think YOUR bias is well demonstrated from the single comment here
This reminds me of the apologist trying to explain why it took less than eight thousand, rather than billions of years, for the light from galaxies to reach earth. They have to do some strenuous gymnastics type moves to get to the answer they prefer. If this is God's word don't you think God has been a little clearer?
LOL. Wes Huff... good Lord. Hey Wes... God gave the Israelites "rules" about slavery because he knew they were going to do it anyway. I wonder why he didn't give them "rules" about eating shrimp because he knew they were going to do it anyway? But instead God said... "NO SHRIMP".... Could have just as easily said "NO SLAVES"... but he didn't.
Another data-point here from the realm of history: European "Feudalism" centered on the domain(usually written in the french spelling, demesne, in the literature), and the domain grew out of the "Villa" of Rome, and the Roman villa was... A Slave Plantation producing for urban commercial markets. The Same Exact Concept as the US Southern Slave Plantation! So THAT'S how cool the christian church was with slavery: post-Roman European society was ltrl BUILT around it, and they never so much as said "boo" to it.
I am currently reading a book on that topic. There were radical abolitionist in the 4th century. Eustathius of Sebaste for example, but the church wouldn't allow that, so they condemned his position on the Synod of Gangra. The popes freed their last slaves around the 1840s.
@@zenosAnalytic Circumcellions are maybe also worth taking a look into. Only found them in the footnotes but they seemed to be pretty based when it comes to abolitionism.
I want to add a comment before watching the video because I think that the apologists have one good point about biblical slavery being different than slavery in the antebellum south, which they never bring up because it reveals that while better biblical slavery is still absurdly, abhorrently bad. In biblical times slaves were a social class that people could fall into or climb out of. If you told people that a slaves grandson would become a king, or the kings grandfather was a slave, they would look at you skeptically but say "it could happen." Do that in the antebellum south and they would probably kill you , through an honor duel, because slavers were a permanent underclass that they could never advance out of. I highly doubt that is what Wes is going for. Also I will note this is actually about Roman not Hebrew slavery but I would expect them to be mostly the same.
for most of the history of american slavery, slaves could be emancipated by their owners. later, around the civil war era, the 'states rights' and 'property rights' defenders made that illegal, of course.
There is another angle Wes could have gone for. In ancient times, the main weapon of war was the people themselves. There was no way to prevent a conflict from flaring up in the near future other than getting rid of people. Disarming an enemy of physical weapons doesn’t work well when the spear was still a dangerous weapon on the battlefield. There would be 2 ways to depopulate an enemy, mass slaughter or forced relocation with minimal rights (aka slavery). A lesser of two evils argument could work here.
@ that sounds good on paper but look at history. The city of Carthage turned over all their weapons over to the Romans in the Third Punic War and still held out for over a year. That couldn’t happen today. Wars at a certain point needed an industry base to complement the soldiers. To disarmed a belligerent nation, we can remove their weapons and the industrial base that makes them. Carthage fought Roman with household items and antiques and was able to make them bleed for every inch against the most powerful army in the world that had no qualms about killing civilians or committing war crimes. Yes, soldiers were and still are needed and extremely important. But war has changed, and with it the importance of the weapons wielded.
Wes made a fundamentally not serious conman in Billy Carson look like the fundamentally not serious conman he is and people treat him like a serious scholar. He’s just a run of the mill dishonest apologist with a degree.
2:20 mark: Thom Stark was nice enough to mention me in his acknowledgements. Also, this video mentions Jacob Wright, Christopher Wright, and David Wright. Surely you could have found a way to mention N.T. Wright in this video.
I have a question. Jewish slaves could be freed after 6 years. While foreigners, who were war slaves, had to be slaves for life. But if the foreigner converted to Judaism, Could he have been released after 6 years? In the Bible there are cases of foreigners who convert to Judaism. If so, it means that while in the Hammurabi Code only debt slaves could be freed after 3 years, while all the others were slaves for life, In Israel virtually all slaves could be freed after 6 years. I would also like to make a point that was not made in the video. Namely, that in Judaism the concept of the Sabbath is central. In all other parts of the world, slaves had to work all the time without stopping. Israel was the only state where The master was forced to let both the slaves and even the animals rest at least once a week.
@@vejekeIn legal matters, when you analyze a law, you don't do it by analyzing a single law but by interpreting it in the general legal context. It is written that foreigners are slaves for life But it is also written that Jews are slaves for a maximum of 6 years and the Bible has clear examples of converts from polytheism to Judaism. If a person converts to judaism, he or she no longer has the status of a foreigner. I am not a biblical scholar, which is also why I wrote this in the form of a question. But from the biblical elements made available, given that a foreigner converted ti judaism acquires all the rights and duties of a Jew, I do not see why this should not apply even to slavery. And then when Dan made this video about The conditions of Jewish slavery compared to others , I don't understand how he didn't mention something as fundamental as the Sabbath. The existence of a weekly day of forced rest for slaves and animals is a very progressive norm. The other slaves in most parts of the world knew no rest, instead, Jewish masters were forced to let the slave and animals rest at least once a week. This alone is a big difference
@@mattia9713 You're forgetting something. The 7 years only applies to Hebrew MEN, and those men could not be made slaves at all. Leviticus 25:39-46. Foreigners were slaves forever, and women were slaves forever. There is no evidence in the bible that a slave could obtain freedom by converting, and you can't justify the bible by just making up things that could have been in it but aren't.
Before I even watch the video: I don't care Wes, slavery in all forms is wrong, and any attempt to defend the Bible in this regard is disgusting. If the Bible doesn't condemn all forms of slavery, it condones it; that is the price of God's omnipotence.
Same goes for Jesus. Since slavery was endemic to his time, the fact that he did not clearly, loudly and explicitly come out against slavery condones it and supports it.
In reality, Christianity allows the old testament laws, and Jesus even encouraged them in the new testament narrative. Only Christians say they are invalid and abrogated, their God disagrees nonetheless.
That's outright false. There's the whole huge deal about Jesus breaking Sabbath and UNLIKE minor human laws, the 10 commandments were written in stone. But sure, Aalewis (14yo) a professional quote maker from r/atheism totally knows practices of 2-3k year old religions better than people actually studying them all this time. Sure!
@@KasumiRINA I appreciate your sarcasm, but you know that all the laws of the old testament are not abolished, they are still to be taught, he himself says it, doesn't he? I understand you are alluding to the division of laws into civil, moral, and ceremonial, but there is no real support of that in the data. Dan created videos refuting this idea explaining that those divisions were made so Christians can pick and choose what suits them. A Christian state should abide by those commandments. If anything, Jesus just emphasised the more spiritual aspect of those laws, like looking at a woman lustfully makes a man comity adultery.
History (and I use that term loosely when talking Biblical History) tends to be written by the victors. Whatever the model of slavery in the Bible, that may have little bearing on what actually happened in “biblical” times. Considering all the slaughtering that seemed to be perfectly ok, I am not convinced that slavery was not as brutal and inhumane as we tend to assume in other periods and regions.
He kinda does, doesn't he? When Rogan mentioned his friend who'd spent like 12 years studying the Hebrew Bible - Wes responds with "well was he trained?", which I understand but Wes is literally the example of someone who was trained and it went right over his head.
Thanks again for the studied scholarship, but yeah, sometimes too easy. Unfair to judge men of the past by standards of the present, but sticking up for biblical slavery in 2025 is not a rationally nor ethically defensible position
Irrelevant. These were supposedly God's chosen people set apart. They got their instructions directly from YHWH. God as depicted in the Bible is a genocidal monster in ANY era. The ONLY reason Christians no longer condone chattel slavery is the rise of humanism. Not the Bible. Not their faith.
It doesn't matter if Biblical slavery was different from other kinds of slavery. Proslavery apologists in the South prior to the US Civil War were not shy about using the Bible to defend the practice. And that is how we must look at it. How were these texts USED?
Thank you for asking! Angelina Grimké: - "The Bible has been used to justify slavery, but let us not twist its meaning. Jesus came to set the captives free, and we must follow His example." Frederick Douglass: - "I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land." - "Between the Christianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference-so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy, is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt, and wicked." William Wilberforce: - "Is it not the glory of the religion we profess that its doctrines and precepts are all favorable to humane liberty, and kindly affection and brotherly love?" - "Let us not despair. It is a blessed cause, and success ere long will crown our exertions." Harriet Beecher Stowe: - "Evil as slavery is, a happy providence has stretched out a means for overthrowing it. Christianity will come in no other shape than she comes now-a homeless wanderer, oppressed and robbed, without a place to lay her head."
@@Christian-l8k This is a useless attempt to try and utilize the words of slaves to circumvent the original question this person asked. And this is undeniable. The Bible was used to justify American slavery. Specifically Genesis 9:18-27. The story of Canaan was justification to argue that African Americans were slaves. And this began based off nothing but prejudice. Canaan shouldn't be black, Ham shouldn't be black, not really, but racist Southerners still used it to their ends. And not just to their ends, white Southerners saw the act of African American slavery as a profound positive for Christianity. These are the words of Bishop Stephen Elliott. “consider whether, by their interference with this institution, they may not be checking and impeding a work which is manifestly Providential. For nearly a hundred years the English and American Churches have been striving to civilize and Christianize Western Africa, and with what result? Around Sierra Leone, and in the neighborhood of Cape Palmas, a few natives have been made Christians, and some nations have been partially civilized; but what a small number in comparison with the thousands, nay, I may say millions, who have learned the way to Heaven and who have been made to know their Savior through the means of African slavery! At this very moment there are from three to four millions of Africans, educating for earth and for Heaven in the so vilified Southern States-learning the very best lessons for a semi-barbarous people-lessons of self-control, of obedience, of perseverance, of adaptation of means to ends; learning, above all, where their weakness lies, and how they may acquire strength for the battle of life. These considerations satisfy me with their condition, and assure me that it is the best relation they can, for the present, be made to occupy.” And why post a quote about how much Frederick Douglas despised American Christianity for it's justification of slavery without properly dissecting it. Right there is something antithetical to your point. Right in all these quotes. You have a man destroyed by it. A man who recognizes white evangelical Protestantism as his own undoing and you act like it's okay. Despite the mistreatment of African Americans for still over a century after, you ignore the past. You ignore how traumatic this must have been and how Christians still used the bible to justify racism...well hell some still do it. You spit in the face of Douglas and others to twist their own words as some pre-Christian doctrine instead of condemning Christianity's role in American slavery.
Apologists point to regulation on how Jews can be enslaved to defend "biblical slavery" as "not so bad." When in reality it shows a knowledge of just how awful slavery was and thus limiting how people like them could be enslaved. It shows the exact opposite of what they argue!
Hey Dan, Are there any good books you (or I suppose anyone reading) would recommend about the methodology or the underlying philosophical principles of critical scholarship?
The Bible itself records prophets (I think Jeremiah) chastising Israelites for not releasing their (Israelite) slaves at the start of the Jubilee Year, so we know of at least one instance where the Bible itself tells us that the slave laws were not being obeyed.
The Bible could straight up say, "Slavery is awesome 👍" and these types of apologists would still try to find a way to say, "Here's why it doesn't actually mean that."
that's both their catchphrase and philosophy
Because it doesn't matter what the Bible says, it matters what the effect of the Bible's laws are historically. Historically, the Biblical Mosaic law made slavery temporary, and the later Christian version eliminated slavery entirely in Christian nations. It doesn't matter what the Bible said, that's not the direct source of doctrine.
@@annaclarafenyo8185This is incorrect, and Dan corrects this poster in another comment to this video.
They would, they dismission the neo-Nazi Elon Musk's fascist Nazi salute, as a "weird gesture," nothing more. NOPE, it was a fascist Nazi salute to his and Trump's white supremacist followers.
But God had already addressed fundamental moral problems like eating shellfish or wearing robes made of two different fibres, so it perfectly understandable that he didn't find time to specifically mention something as trivial as slavery.
I love how the argument is alwasy "but it was Nice Slavery™" as if enslaving someone can ever be a kindness. This entire argument is, effectively, "I'm not as bad to you as I could have been" which is the sort of gaslighting an abuser does.
Yeah, same energy as: _Let me in to save you. _*_From what?_*_ From what I'll do if you don't let me in._
Down hill from that comes, these people are too ignorant to know whats good for them. We will save the souls by forcing our will on them and they will be better off. It's a silly argument to begin with because while the was gross mistreatment the truth is those human beings were considered "valuable property" and to mistreat them would be to devalue and make that "tool" less useful. This is going to sound dismissive but I would ask this question to Wes. How many contractors, even ones with money to burn are going to be okay with people throwing tools around and leaving them out in the rain. Calling that a kindness is a bad argument and of course abuse was not uncommon.
The Bible makes a ton of sense if you assume that it was written by an abusive narcissist
I really believe it was "nice slavery", I just do not feel that it makes such a compelling moral argument: "the biblical god was not as bad as other rulers" does not sound like an all loving, all merciful deity to me. If you invite me to dinner, I assume that you will not be taking to a restaurant that is just "not the worst restaurant I have ever eaten in".
"...as if enslaving someone can ever be a kindness."
I have read quite a few armchair apologists try to defend slavery as, "It gave people jobs," or, "They would've starved to death otherwise." People who have a NEED to defend the Bible will dummy up *any* excuse.
Isn't Wes supposed to be a historian as well? He couldn't even bother to come up with a new bad defense of biblical slavery? I swear, apologists are all just turning in the same homework over and over again
ua-cam.com/play/PLtgkpjnbEbN6oQ0muSXn7z66FQ3bTJPbj.html&si=mB8qXty-pDeuk1r7
sadly, the idea that slavery was 'different' and 'not as bad' in the ancient world is a popular one among modern academics, including very woke ones. they give each other a lot of cover.
They do not have the imagination to come up with new homework. And they are lazy too.
@@joshridinger3407 nobody on the Left thinks ANY kind of slavery was good.
If they do, they're lying about at least one of those things.
@thealex5838 nice posting of the exact same winded arguments that this video disproves
Regardless of how accurate the actual differences they claim are, I always love when apologists resort to “ancient Hebrew slave customs in the Bible were nothing like barbaric modern Christian slave practices!”
It is true, though. There is a reason why the Sanhedrin could punish you for slave abuse. Your comment is less a "gotcha theists!" and more an important thing we must acknowledge and move forwards as a society beliefs aside. Eventually, and this is me as a Christian, Christianity committed many violent historical abuses (And we need to be reasonable, historical Christians also did good things for the progress of society.) It never is a black and white case.
You can understand this if you read "Noah's Curse: The Biblical Justification of American Slavery (Religion in America)"
And ultimately side steps the actual badness of slavery. The problem with slavery is not that some masters were mean to their slaves. The problem is the fundamental dehumanization of the institution.
//Regardless of how accurate the actual differences they claim are, I always love when apologists resort to “ancient Hebrew slave customs in the Bible were nothing like barbaric modern Christian slave practices!”//
Who has done that and when?
@@AlanCossey I have had several people say that to me online.
@@bipolarrambling242 Eh? So which "barbaric modern Christian slave practices" are you referring to, please? I note you have used quotation marks so seem to be quoting (at least almost) verbatim.
"This is not a contested fact."
That may be one of Wes Huff's biggest lies, and I say that knowing it has some STIFF competition.
I suppose you could say it's true because that wasn't a contested fact, it was an easily demonstrated falsehood. 😁
The Torah assigns the death penalty to slavers. Indentured servitude and prisoners of war were allowed. Only edgy atheist memelords try to pretend the Bible says something different.
what a coincidence. I watched Wes's slavery content a few days ago and without even popping out my books, was able to catch all the incorrect info. Too bad, I was hoping I could learn something from this new scholar, but an apologist will always be an apologist.
I don't think he's a biblical scholar. Correct me if I'm wrong, ain't he a scholar of apologetics?
You spelled “preacher” wrong!
@baonemogomotsi7138 at this time. Hes currently taking his PHD in new testament studies. So that would allow that title to be used to him. But your correct, right now he only has a theological and sociological studies degrees.
@@baonemogomotsi7138 Wes or Dan? Dan has two masters and a Ph.D, I think in the cognitive science of religion. He's also written several papers and a couple of books. He is definitely a scholar.
Wes? I have no clue
Well, let’s see. Two masters and a Ph.D. vs. a nameless contributor on the internet claiming to catch incorrect information of a second scholar. Which one should I believe? Hmmm.
I’m a big fan of these longer and better explanations
So Huff went to school to add authority to his apologetics not to learn.
That is exactly the point of bible colleges. It's the reason they were created.
YES
I will quote you
Indeed. He most likely went there already knowing these nonsensical failed apologetics. He's just there to dress them up in supposed scholarly knowledge to wow other apologists and laymen like Rogan.
Why do you think Dan went to BYU?
“The Bible condemns slavery because look here, there’s a law that prohibits kidnapping people and selling them into slavery”
has the same logical force of
“the US law condemns owning horses because there’s a law that prohibits stealing horses.”
No it ain't. It has the same logical force as "the US law condemns owning horses because there’s a law that prohibits taking free horses and selling them into ownership.”
Mmm OP's analogy is a much better analogy. Especially since the Bible does explicitly say the Hebrews may take, buy, trade, slaves from the nations around them and they are to make slaves of nations they conquer. To say the prohibition of kidnapping is proof positive that the Bible condemns slavery is intellectually dishonest much in the same way of OP's analogy
@@moses9647 I disagree, because there are different types of "slavery". So the prohibition of kidnapping is proof positive that the Bible condemns (a certain type of ) slavery.
@@andrejuthe well no, it's proof that the Bible condemns the kidnapping of slaves. Surely, you'd agree that kidnapping was not the only means of acquiring a slave. Which is OP's point. Outlawing the kidnapping of people does not equate to the outlawing of owning people. It's just saying "buy, sell, and trade your slaves." Surely you'd agree that that's hardly a condemnation of the slave trade
@@moses9647 Where does the text says that it is about the kidnapping of _slaves_?
Dude you're channel is amazing. I feel like it's about to really take off. Thank you for this work
When you LITERALLY worship The Bible AS God, you cannot accept that the vast majority of The Bible was written by extremely primitive HUMANS who infused their scriptures with their opinions, prejudices, and societal norms. They WANTED slaves and they WANTED to slaughter their enemies, so they wrote God "approving" of these things. And in Paul's case, he even SAYS (to his credit) that this or that that he is writing to the various churches are his OPINIONS ( which cannot, by definition, be "The Word of God").
Apologists will just say Paul was inspired by gawd. 🙄
You mean 1 Corinthians 7? That's one time in reference to one teaching about marriage.
@Christian-l8k If Paul gives his opinion on this or that, then how do we know many other things he said weren't just his opinions? For instance, Christ refers to people who choose to remain celibate (or make themselves eunuchs) for the sake of Heaven, but never even remotely suggested that people should be encouraged to be celibate, but Paul taught that EVERYONE who could possibly do so should strive to remain celibate as he was, and that it was better if a man "never touched a woman" (although he did say that if you simply couldn't manage celibacy then, and ONLY then should you marry rather than "burn with lust"). Paul also stated that men with long hair were "a disgrace". These were clearly things which were his OPINIONS, among a number of other things. By definition, the opinions of a Human Being cannot be "The Word of God".
@Dalekzilla in all of his writing we have one instance of Paul saying his teaching is his opinion. If his other teachings in 1 Corinthians or his other letters were also his opinions, why not say that there? We should at least expect him to say in every letter that the teachings are his opinions, no?
The simplest reason why Paul qualifies a single teaching as his opinion is because that single teaching and only that teaching were his opinion.
@Christian-l8k So, I take it then that you're one of those people who try to defend biblical references to both slavery and genocide, or the scripture which talks about taking joy in bashing the heads of your enemy's babies against rocks, or the levitical law stating a child that curses their parents should be put to death? As far as Paul, he may well have believed that various kooky things he said were indeed revealed to him by God, but the evidence is against him. Christ (who, unlike Paul, actually WAS God incarnate) taught, for instance, pretty much exactly what his brother, James did, namely that we achieve salvation through Faith PLUS Works (in Matthew 25:32-46 he mandates that we prove our Faith by caring for the poor, the sick, the homeless, the imprisoned, and migrants....and when the rich young man comes to Him and asks to follow Him, Christ tells him to do a good work to prove himself....namely to give all of his riches to the poor), yet Paul says (and it is Paul ALONE where this teaching comes from) that it is through Faith alone that we achieve salvation, and works are ultimately of no real consequence. Paul had some very profound things to say (like Romans 3:23 or Romans 14:10) BUT he was just a Human Being, and he put his opinions, prejudices into what he wrote, just as the scribes and Jewish priests in the Old Testament did. Or do you suggest (as a HUGE number of "Christians" do) that what Paul taught was equal in validity to what Christ taught?
Another Wes line bites the dust. Good work.
Really enjoy watching your videos. I have learned a lot from you
I love the way you put the page over your body- it’s like the text has come to life! 😂
Another day, another time little Wes is “McClellaned” 😊
Massive McClellanization incoming!
Yet again, Dan Billy Carsons Wes Huff. 🤣
After painting a target on his own forehead with his "word for word" stunt with the Great Isaiah Scroll, it seems poor Wes has become the target du jour. 😁
@@jamesduncan3673 Couldn't have happened to a more deserving person. 😆
No he wasn’t. The only thing Dan ever offers is disagreement and uses words like “data” as an appeal. He will never actually debate anyone in a real debate. That’s pretty telling.
Just wanted to drop in and say that I’m enjoying the higher production values and more in depth explanations lately. Keep up the good work, Dan.
Production quality is great. Thumbnail game is strong.
What a load of crap. The apologists should just admit that it is indefensible, and that it was likely put in the bible by slave owners for thier own benefit, and stop trying to defend it as something kind and loving. I have never heard one of them say anything about it that isn't morally bankrupt and repugnant.
They cant. The bible is supposed to be perfect and influenced by a perfectly moral being. If they agree that any part of it is immoral they agree that god himself is
@@kvasir8931 the only laws in the Old Testament given by God directly are the Commandments, literally everything else were laws of the land and not even practiced by Roman period. The whole pharisee catch 22 hinged on telling Jesus to either follow the written obsolete law to at T or not break the actual Roman laws (i.e. throw the first stone situation). Anyone claiming that Jews OR Christians are supposed to practice things from i.e. Deuteronomy or Leviticus are disingenuous and are making a strawman argument.
@@KasumiRINAit's less about practicing it today and more about questioning why it was in there in the first place.
It's a situation where these three things can't all be true: 1) God is always good; 2) the Bible is the inerrant and inspired Word of God; and 3) slavery is bad.
Either God isn't always good, which would turn the religion on its head. Or the Bible isn't the inerrant and inspired Word of God, which would torpedo fundamental sects of Christianity like the evangelicals. Or slavery is good, which is the corner many apologists find themselves backed into and in doing so they paint Biblical slavery as something it's not or they say "slavery wasn't always bad" which then paints God as a moral relativist which feeds back into the first premise.
@@KasumiRINA Except for every other law that was told as if came from god himself. And that is without considering how jebus himslef said "until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished".
Anyone claiming we are under a new set of laws (even if is called a new covenant) is disingenuous at best just plainly making a strawman argument.
@@kvasir8931it is... who the hell are you or anyone else in the last 200 years going to try to demonize people from 2000 years ago
Thom Stark's "is god a moral compromiser" was a refreshing read after read Copan.
Love it when your videos contain reading suggestions, thank you!
Pretty scary that they KNEW slavery was terrible, but they did it anyway, both to each other and other cultures.
They didn’t know slavery was terrible lol. Slavery was a constant practice in all human societies until recently with neoslavery being present until recently. The idea slavery is wrong is a new idea. Like Issac newton defined gravity and created calculus before the idea it was amoral even hit the seen.
@nonyobussiness3440 every slaver knows they wouldn't want to be enslaved.
But the Bible makes it clear that this is a bad practice, yet fully condones it.
@@Nerobyrne Bible literally says "do to others what you want to be done to you", so you literally hurt yourself in your own confusion. But let's ignore the fact how horrible was modern slavery in modern times done by people worshiped by all America, like George Washington or Benjamin Franklin to make a strawman so you can blame ancient Jews. No amount of mental gymnastics can make you equate trans-Atlantic slavery IN MODERN TIMES PAST ENLIGHTMENT AGE with ancient societies being actually STILL LESS fucked up than modern Americans.
@KasumiRINA which is why Hebrews can't complain when they get enslaved, since they're literally asking for it
@@nonyobussiness3440Slavery is evil and always has been.
Fascinating video, Dan!
As Dan says in this video, it’s weird that apologists conflate the *laws* about chattel slavery put forward in the Pentateuch, versus the *treatment* of the victims of the institution in the antebellum South.
Those two things are not really comparable.
Yeah and the antebellum South laws were often directly lifted from Leviticus
@@oliviawilliams6204
And were usually "better" for the enslaved person.
Right. If all we had left of slavery in that time was the laws in place, people could defend it in the same dishonest way.
@@oliviawilliams6204that's a lie
Thank you for this
To answer the question of the title: no
I'm shocked. Shocked. 😂
It's always a bait-and-switch with apologists. They cherry-pick passages, as well as playing semantic games. I'm not certain just how much, if any, with large followings, have had good training in critical or textual analysis. Most have degrees in ministry, theology, or philosophy. Some don't even have that level of education.
And there is the constant parachute, for when they get pressed and need to jump out of the plane: "I have faaaaaiiiiiitttthhhhh" (getting progressively further away). They'll just attribute whatever their claim is to a particular interpretation from this or that theological authority and say they take it as an article of faith. You can't argue someone out of this. You can heap evidence on top of evidence. A person will believe what they want to believe.
What if my ox is super chill and just doesn't like my neighbor? Now I gotta suffer talionic justice? WHO'S GONNA TAKE CARE OF MY OX DAN?!
I love how you put the books directly over your head, classic!
4:15 re. slavery practiced in societies around ancient Israel - I've been hearing this one more and more, implying or stating that the Old Testament rules were somehow better than the norm. The opposite is true. I'm no expert in the field but I did read up a bit on the laws surrounding slavery in ancient Egypt and Egyptian slaves had more rights and protections than those described in the Old Testament.
Incidentally (or not so incidentally), the same applies to the status of women in ancient Egypt. They had far more rights and protections than those afforded to women in the OT.
I mean, if you compare status of women and slaves in Egypt with westerner-beloved "cradles of democracy" Rome or Greece, it's not even a competition, and Egyptians weren't even progressive, it's that West was so bad in comparison, and since 1933 desperately tries to wiggle out of it by rewriting history to blame the Joooooz.
The Bible itself hints that slaves in Egypt had more rights. The Bible itself states that the enslaved Israelites had their own homes and could marry as they chose. Moses himself is described as a Hebrew slave child that was adopted into the royal family. That never happened in the American South.
@@avishevin3353 thats because slavery isnt based on religion lmao you guys are brain dead
The only thing they had "better" was that it was not prohibited to help an escaping slave. For every other rule it was on the worse end of the spectrum.
“McClellaned” is my new favorite term and I couldn’t love this video more. ❤
How hard is it for these people to say “Yes, the people in ancient times were very bad, ill intentioned and practiced horrible things?”
Oh that’s right, because the Bible is the golden book, it can do no wrong, so if someone says it does do wrong you then have to bend over backwards to try to claim the other people are misunderstanding and wrong.
Idk, many Xians will wave their hands & say “oh that’s the Old Testament…”, then change the subject.
At least that’s what my mom did.
@@LOwens-xf8yo because those are two different religions and sets of laws? Like for some reason you can accept that Germany in 1946 was a different country than Germany in 1945, but cannot fathom that jewish laws from 2500 years ago aren't practiced by Jews or Christians in modern times? New Testament is from 1900 years ago. US outlawed slavery like, a few days ago, and now you elected orange muppet and will bring it back.
@@KasumiRINA Yeah, it is not Iike the god of the bible is proposed as having absolute and unchanging morality, and thus should be followed even nowadays... right?
Loving the new setup Dan.
The number of people who defend the biblical slavery as debt slavery only (which it isn’t, but you know…) have a lot of explaining to do why they think debt slavery is morally okay as well.
Most Christians don’t defend it. That being said society and civilization at the time wasn’t capable of doing the right thing. Even the economy and currency and trade wasn’t advanced like today.
Jesus told us to forgive our debtors
@@nonyobussiness3440 Your gods were encouraging slavery all along. 🤦♂️
What other kinda slavery was it? And how else would a man pay his debt in those days?
@Ace-sb4il well, if you had watched the video you would have actually seen Dan explain where and how that the Bible endorses chattel slavery. And any of the ways people pay their debts today without becoming someone’s property or forcing their children to become someone’s property. (Money. Favors. A limited amount of work for a person that still allows the debtor their own freedom and autonomy). The whole idea of lending under the assumption that I completely own you for several years if you can’t repay is immoral.
@chadkent327 and he described it wrong. Tell me ...what jobs were available in those times? Could Jews go and apply at Walmart at that time?
new set up looks great btw
Poor Wes Huff. He's been the apologists saviour for 5 minutes and he's already defending the indefensible.
Wes and Dan doing a podcast would be awesome. Dan is at a different level.
This new golden boy savior of Christiandom has crashed much quicker than i thought
I like the new format, Dan.
I like how Christians feel like God had to make concessions with the Israelites to allow for some forms of slavery, but they could easily write into Leviticus that eating shellfish and cutting the hair on your temple without problems
When Dan flashes the books in front of his face he just made it easy to turn them into meme. Let's have some fun on bluesky with them 😁
King David, famously deserving of the death penalty but losing his child instead as if that's fair.
❤❤❤❤❤❤thanks Dan!!!
the mental gymnastics needed to claim Leviticus 25:44-46 isn't chattel slavery is mind boggling
Thank You Sir - especially for the - what is written vs. what is practiced. I hail from the south, Louisiana - being born in a somewhat divided tribe of creole and non-creole “black” peoples and was lucky enough to hear stories from my relatives going back to the late 1800’s. In our tree we have a German Immigrant (Bavaria) who came and took a “black” creole woman as his wife and had 7 children. Which in code noir was clearly “illegal” on paper but on the ground - stuff is like the wild west. We have a long way to go in discerning between what we are told, what we want to believe, and what is.
The act of owning someone else is immoral. It denies someone many of their basic human rights.
This wouldn't change if the owner treated a slave relatively well. AND It isn't good for THEM to own other humans.
Would you rather be a slave to someone under the Mosaic law with certain regulations in how they treat you or would you rather be a slave to someone with no law that can treat you however they please? I know you'll say you'd rather not be a slave to anyone, obviously, everyone prefers that. But hypothetically if you had to choose a master, which would you prefer?
@Christian-l8k since these laws include that is OK for the owner to beat me .. just so long as I don't die within 2 days.... no. I wouldn't.
Slavery is immoral. Owning another human being is immoral. Stop making excuses for how morally repugnant your Bible is.
It was clearly written by slave owning men. The inspiration for much of it is control and commercial.
@@Christian-l8k So the options are either we allow inmorality under inmoral regulations or no regulations at all.
And that is without considering the bible was not the only giving laws regulating such practice.
@Julian0101 those were the options in that time period. So what's your choice? If you ever take the time to read a book, pick up Created Equal by Joshua Berman, it studies and compares the Mosaic law to the contemporary law codes and shows how it was a better system than any other of the time. But anyway, do you care to engage in the hypothetical?
@@Christian-l8k Except those were not the only options at that time period. And even if they were ir would still be inmoral regulations vs no regulations at all.
Also, i dont put much value in someone who makes the suggestion that "women held for the most part, legally and theologically, an equal place in the inclusive community", which is directly contradicted by exodus and deuteronomy (which is one of the reasons he is considered fringe in scholarship).
"This is not a contested fact"
*Drs Josh Bowen and Kipp Davis have entered the chat*
Ya God always gave "non-ideal" solutions to problems. Remember when he commanded "Just the tip, and only for a minute"?
Wes Huff seems to be next gen of apologists but he really needs training. his arguments are weak and he frequently gets things fundamentally wrong.
Because they are not reading the Bible for themselves?
The actual leader is Tom Holland he literally lieing then been quoted in apologetic channels as a reliable historian
@ Whether or not apologists read the bible depends on the individuals but it's not really the issue. They prize their faith above truth and facts and that is the problem.
Which apologist doesn't have weak arguments and get things fundamentally wrong?
Training to do what?
Queue the apologists - Don't ever listen to scholars because they mostly deal in clearly defined facts. Listen to us for whom facts don't matter and we deal in the currency of lies.
Israelites' attitude reminds me of The song "Rule Brittania"
"Britains never ever ever shall be slaves."
It's "never never never" and it's Britain without an "s".
(In the UK it's used as a plural in itself, since a country contains many people, plus there's no single word like "Americans" for the people of Britain; the word "Britains" would be equivalent to "the Americas", i.e., North America & South America.)
Your title reminds me of the fact that some people who say “Biblical slavery is different from American chattel slavery” will probably say towards Harry Potter and Wicked that “witchcraft is witchcraft!”, no matter fantasy or occult.
I wonder how would they explain COVID?
Thank you!!
I never quite understand why apologists bother with these tortured and ultimately doomed defences of what Bible actually says about slavery. Why don't they just use the same argument that they apply to ignore other uncomfortable things from the Old Testament and say "okay, but Jesus changed all that stuff, so let's not talk about it anymore"? If you have complete liberty to make basically anything you want up, why not use that in the case of slavery?
Except that Jesus did not do away with slavery. Paul tells slaves to obey their masters. Jesus’s parables about “servants” were most likely slaves. Jesus never says a word against slavery.
@@OldMotherLogo You're missing the point, which is that Christians, irrespective of what Jesus did or didn't say on a case-by-case basis, feel at liberty to preserve bits of the Old Testament when it suits them but drop others like a hot rock even in the absence of a direct statement by Jesus. For instance, Jesus said nothing specific about circumcision, and yet that was one of the Old Testament obligations that the early Church decided not to maintain. I'm not at all religious and certainly not trying to assert the authority of the Old Testament against the new one or vice versa, but rather making the point that there isn't a logical or evidence-based justification for what Christians maintain from the OT and what they dispense with.
@@GaiusSonofGermanicusThe problem seems to be the culture of Christianity. Only progressive Christians rationalise the Bible to abandon its homophobic and anti LGBT doctrine and this causes every denomination to dislike them because of the longstanding culture of religious supremacy, abuse and dogma engraved in the history of the denominations and the Bible interpretations I.e Christian culture.
What i don’t understand why Christians treat the Bible like the Koran in Islam. We don’t believe it’s perfect or the direct word of God. This is a new idea. The cannon was defined until like 400 and even then it got changed. We never had a standardized source material for manuscripts and are always updating it. The Bible is a collection of a bunch of different books and scripts that are wildly different there isn’t a unifying narrative or message.
It’s already known humans fell and were basically pos to the point Jesus had to come and die for us and basically repeat the basics that God already told us.
5:11 this feels like some sort of meme material right here
As far as the legal code of the American South, you have to draw a distinction between a slaveowner that kills a slave for no reason, and a slave owner that's required to punish slaves that have transgressed the law. Lynching, hanging, and even burning people at the stake were legal punishments that free people were subject to in early America, and slave owners, not the slaves, were responsible for the crimes the slaves would commit. That made slave owners responsible for punishing their slaves and correcting their behavior instead of the justice system. If hanging was a punishment for robbery, then if a slave owner hung his own slave as a punishment for theft that wouldn't be the equivalent to outright murdering a slave.
So much mental gymnastics for Americans to justify murder in extremely recent history.
"Toy box full of Lego pieces . . . " and "Scrabble" games. I _LOVE it!_
I guess videos are horizontal now huh.
Alright let's see it.
What a clever strategy. Hit 'em with data they are sure to deny, while wearing graphic tees they can't.
Wow. Poor Wess can't catch a break today. First Paulogia on the authorship of the gospel of John, and now you on slavery.
And that's without getting into all the crap he's been catching lately over the "word for word" kerfuffle regarding the Great Isaiah Scroll. 😁
@@jamesduncan3673 Unfortunately for you, Dan has admitted that although he would have worded it differently, Wes was correct when he said "word for word". But you guys only care about "facts" that support your atheism.
@@lizzard13666 The source Wes has stated he was quoting said that the great Isaiah scroll was "word for word identical in 95% of its content" (quote approximate).
In other words, he clearly misspoke by leaving off the second half of the quote, which clearly stated it was only a 95% match, not "word for word identical.
Long form Dan content? Very well🔥
Dan, it’s so clear how knowledgeable you are when it comes to biblical scholarship and its context. So I have to ask, HOW are you still a theist? Learning more about the Bible is what destroyed any shred of faith or belief I had.
You certainly do not have to hold to an inerrant view of the Bible to be a Christian, let alone a theist. I’d recommend checking out Dr. Pete Enns. He’s a brilliant Old Testament scholar who’s published some great books and posts videos on UA-cam, TikTok, and Instagram. He has a podcast called “The Bible for Normal People” as well. If you like Dan then you’ll probably like him as well. One thing to note is that the Christian (and theist) world is much bigger than you could imagine, my friend.
Pretty sure he compartmentalizes. It's not as hard as a lot of theists *and* atheists think. Took me until my mid-30's to figure it out, though. Faith and facts are two separate compartments.
@ this isn’t some framework I fell into, my personal belief in atheism has come about from what I would consider a rigorous cross examination of the biblical claims, historicity, and apologetics with current testable scientific consensus and philosophical debate. This all occurring in the last three years with nearly a daily consumption of content from both sides of the aisle. So I am VERY happy to add an additional one to the mix and I thank you for the recommendation. I understand inerrancy isn’t required, just look at the Catholics, but without inherency you’re just as prone to believing a god you’ve been told about but a group of men who know no better than you as opposed to arriving to belief in a god you’ve hand crafted and selected. Both I think miss the mark. The fact the theological world IS so big is actually a reason I adhere to none of them given how so many are irreconcilable.
@ and sorry for the double reply, but if you have any more recommendations I’d love to here them! I just find it so shocking that Dan appears to be very learned and rigorous in his understanding of the historical Bible, but to then agree and personally believe in a religion that can be demonstrated as false in its claims. Ie no Isreal heritage in native Americans and no archaeological evidence of all these battles “revealed” to Joseph Smith. People can and will believe in the most insane things without reason and it’s fascinating to me (and i very much count myself among that number, I just can’t obviously see my “blind spots”)
@@lukepoplawski3230 I’m assuming you probably grew up evangelical of some kind? I find that growing up being taught about a certain kind of inerrancy deeply forms your theistic expectations. When those expectations, in this case, the notion of an infallible book, are let down/proven wrong, it is easy to be dichotomous. E.g., if there is a God, he would have an infallible book to tell us about him. There is no infallible book; therefore, there is no God. This system/framework of thinking is fundamentalist in nature. Many times, even after people deconstruct, they carry their fundamentalist worldview and frameworks with them.
Now, I could be wrong about your upbringing and or faith experience. I know nothing about you, other than the fact that you seem like a pleasant guy. I just took a jab based on a phenomenon I have commonly observed. Also, I get your point about crafting a personal God. After all, if there’s no inerrant way to know God, shouldn’t everything just be doubted? Well, life is more complicated than that. We live with the assumption that nothing in life is infallible, but that doesn’t mean nothing can be known or true. It does mean we have to do a lot of thinking and wrestling, though. On this topic, Pete Enns has a book called “The Sin of Certainty,” and I think you might enjoy it.
As for how Dan wrestles with Mormonisms challenges, I have no idea. Perhaps he’s a cultural Mormon. It’s entirely possible that he’s only vaguely a theist and just stays in the Mormon tradition because of his loved ones. Only Dan knows.
I would love to hear your reply to "Reading While Black," and how it covers slavery in the Bible. I loved it, but if it makes errors I would like to hear them.
Matthew etc: Did you look for critical responses? I found one the moment I put the title into G g l. It was by a Christian and it was not very positive.
I've not read the book, but I guess it's basically apologetics.
At this point I’m almost convinced that Wes is lying on purpose
Thank you for all these resources I’ve never heard of, especially Thom Stark. Of all the things we disagree about I appreciate the “anti apologetics” guys like you on the internet for going after the slavery issue so much, because I think there’s a lot of bad thinking going on around this issue. I’m really tired of hearing the same arguments trotted out by Christian apologists…
I still think that for you in particular this is ultimately performative homophilia but that doesn’t mean you aren’t also pointing out problems and being helpful. So thank you. I do appreciate it despite disagreements.
The guy could of read further into Leviticus 25 to chapter 44 through 46.But he's trying to pretend like that kind of slavery isn't condoned in the bible.
The fact that A kind isnt is argument enough
Context! Always up for debate.
There's a nice video about Context! By NonStampCollector.
Leviticus 25:
44 Both thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids.
45 Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession.
46 And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your bondmen for ever: but over your brethren the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigour.
Go ahead, find a context that makes that OK. Good luck
you have no idea how much i appreciate longer form videos from you. thank you thank you, i hope you keep doing this! i love to listen to your videos while i'm doing other stuff, and fussing with shorts is annoying. i listen to data over dogma but sometimes i just want straight up nonstop education sprinkled with a bit of "grow the hell up", etc. :)
Have you ever studied Mormonism? Dan is a Mormon, and whatever he is selling is considered antithetical to the gospel of Jesus Christ.
If Dan cannot be objective with his Mormonism, why bother listening to anything he says... Because he still reads the BOM on Sundays 😂
@@SheepDog1974 Ad hominim
SheepDog, that's an ad hominem, and also untrue. He even has videos pointing out when he's said things that go against LDS doctrine. Wrong on every point
@@SheepDog1974If I thought for one second that the book of Mormon contained even one passage as honest as Dan's assessment of the facts around biblical slavery I might read it myself. I don't think anyone could guess whether Dan was a member of any church based solely on the content of his videos.
I think YOUR bias is well demonstrated from the single comment here
@SheepDog1974 Grow up.
Didn’t god put them into slavery in the first place because he was annoyed with them?
Wes has an audience, they, like him, aren't interested in seeking the truth as much as they are seeking confirmation of their opinions.
"and if you'll look here folks you'll see our exhibit of a pot calling a kettle black"
They read something, it doesn’t match their modern narrative, they reinterpret it to meet their modern narrative.
This reminds me of the apologist trying to explain why it took less than eight thousand, rather than billions of years, for the light from galaxies to reach earth. They have to do some strenuous gymnastics type moves to get to the answer they prefer. If this is God's word don't you think God has been a little clearer?
Keep ‘em honest. No spin to support an immoral position.
LOL. Wes Huff... good Lord. Hey Wes... God gave the Israelites "rules" about slavery because he knew they were going to do it anyway. I wonder why he didn't give them "rules" about eating shrimp because he knew they were going to do it anyway? But instead God said... "NO SHRIMP".... Could have just as easily said "NO SLAVES"... but he didn't.
Another data-point here from the realm of history: European "Feudalism" centered on the domain(usually written in the french spelling, demesne, in the literature), and the domain grew out of the "Villa" of Rome, and the Roman villa was... A Slave Plantation producing for urban commercial markets. The Same Exact Concept as the US Southern Slave Plantation!
So THAT'S how cool the christian church was with slavery: post-Roman European society was ltrl BUILT around it, and they never so much as said "boo" to it.
I am currently reading a book on that topic. There were radical abolitionist in the 4th century. Eustathius of Sebaste for example, but the church wouldn't allow that, so they condemned his position on the Synod of Gangra. The popes freed their last slaves around the 1840s.
@CafeteriaCatholic I wasn't aware of Eustathius of Sebaste; thanks for giving me a New Thing to Read Up On ^v^ ^v^
@@zenosAnalytic Circumcellions are maybe also worth taking a look into. Only found them in the footnotes but they seemed to be pretty based when it comes to abolitionism.
I want to add a comment before watching the video because I think that the apologists have one good point about biblical slavery being different than slavery in the antebellum south, which they never bring up because it reveals that while better biblical slavery is still absurdly, abhorrently bad.
In biblical times slaves were a social class that people could fall into or climb out of. If you told people that a slaves grandson would become a king, or the kings grandfather was a slave, they would look at you skeptically but say "it could happen." Do that in the antebellum south and they would probably kill you , through an honor duel, because slavers were a permanent underclass that they could never advance out of.
I highly doubt that is what Wes is going for. Also I will note this is actually about Roman not Hebrew slavery but I would expect them to be mostly the same.
for most of the history of american slavery, slaves could be emancipated by their owners. later, around the civil war era, the 'states rights' and 'property rights' defenders made that illegal, of course.
There is another angle Wes could have gone for.
In ancient times, the main weapon of war was the people themselves. There was no way to prevent a conflict from flaring up in the near future other than getting rid of people. Disarming an enemy of physical weapons doesn’t work well when the spear was still a dangerous weapon on the battlefield.
There would be 2 ways to depopulate an enemy, mass slaughter or forced relocation with minimal rights (aka slavery). A lesser of two evils argument could work here.
@@CaptianAwesome nothing has changed in that regard. conflict is driven by people. if that ever justified slavery or genocide, it still does.
@ that sounds good on paper but look at history.
The city of Carthage turned over all their weapons over to the Romans in the Third Punic War and still held out for over a year.
That couldn’t happen today. Wars at a certain point needed an industry base to complement the soldiers. To disarmed a belligerent nation, we can remove their weapons and the industrial base that makes them.
Carthage fought Roman with household items and antiques and was able to make them bleed for every inch against the most powerful army in the world that had no qualms about killing civilians or committing war crimes.
Yes, soldiers were and still are needed and extremely important. But war has changed, and with it the importance of the weapons wielded.
Lego blocks! I see you, Dan. So awesome 😎
Wes made a fundamentally not serious conman in Billy Carson look like the fundamentally not serious conman he is and people treat him like a serious scholar. He’s just a run of the mill dishonest apologist with a degree.
The irony is so far over your head
2:20 mark: Thom Stark was nice enough to mention me in his acknowledgements. Also, this video mentions Jacob Wright, Christopher Wright, and David Wright. Surely you could have found a way to mention N.T. Wright in this video.
Wess huff just overhyped apologist not biblical scholar
I have a question. Jewish slaves could be freed after 6 years. While foreigners, who were war slaves, had to be slaves for life. But if the foreigner converted to Judaism, Could he have been released after 6 years?
In the Bible there are cases of foreigners who convert to Judaism.
If so, it means that while in the Hammurabi Code only debt slaves could be freed after 3 years, while all the others were slaves for life, In Israel virtually all slaves could be freed after 6 years.
I would also like to make a point that was not made in the video. Namely, that in Judaism the concept of the Sabbath is central.
In all other parts of the world, slaves had to work all the time without stopping.
Israel was the only state where The master was forced to let both the slaves and even the animals rest at least once a week.
The text is explicit they will be slaves for life and said nothing about the conversion of slaves.
@@vejekeIn legal matters, when you analyze a law, you don't do it by analyzing a single law but by interpreting it in the general legal context. It is written that foreigners are slaves for life But it is also written that Jews are slaves for a maximum of 6 years and the Bible has clear examples of converts from polytheism to Judaism.
If a person converts to judaism, he or she no longer has the status of a foreigner.
I am not a biblical scholar, which is also why I wrote this in the form of a question.
But from the biblical elements made available, given that a foreigner converted ti judaism acquires all the rights and duties of a Jew, I do not see why this should not apply even to slavery.
And then when Dan made this video about The conditions of Jewish slavery compared to others , I don't understand how he didn't mention something as fundamental as the Sabbath.
The existence of a weekly day of forced rest for slaves and animals is a very progressive norm. The other slaves in most parts of the world knew no rest, instead, Jewish masters were forced to let the slave and animals rest at least once a week. This alone is a big difference
I doubt you'll get a reply simply because you aren't glazing Dan
@@mattia9713 You're forgetting something. The 7 years only applies to Hebrew MEN, and those men could not be made slaves at all. Leviticus 25:39-46.
Foreigners were slaves forever, and women were slaves forever. There is no evidence in the bible that a slave could obtain freedom by converting, and you can't justify the bible by just making up things that could have been in it but aren't.
Dunk after dunk 🫡
Me, reading the card, knowing that bear trap was opening😂😂
Before I even watch the video:
I don't care Wes, slavery in all forms is wrong, and any attempt to defend the Bible in this regard is disgusting. If the Bible doesn't condemn all forms of slavery, it condones it; that is the price of God's omnipotence.
Same goes for Jesus. Since slavery was endemic to his time, the fact that he did not clearly, loudly and explicitly come out against slavery condones it and supports it.
Would an explicit condemnation of slavery have any impact on a person going to heaven?
For more general public book i recommend Dr Joshua Bowen book Did the Old Testament endorse Slavery second edition.
In reality, Christianity allows the old testament laws, and Jesus even encouraged them in the new testament narrative. Only Christians say they are invalid and abrogated, their God disagrees nonetheless.
Not one letter of one word shall go away (something like that) is a little stronger than encouraging
That's outright false. There's the whole huge deal about Jesus breaking Sabbath and UNLIKE minor human laws, the 10 commandments were written in stone. But sure, Aalewis (14yo) a professional quote maker from r/atheism totally knows practices of 2-3k year old religions better than people actually studying them all this time. Sure!
@@KasumiRINA I appreciate your sarcasm, but you know that all the laws of the old testament are not abolished, they are still to be taught, he himself says it, doesn't he? I understand you are alluding to the division of laws into civil, moral, and ceremonial, but there is no real support of that in the data. Dan created videos refuting this idea explaining that those divisions were made so Christians can pick and choose what suits them. A Christian state should abide by those commandments. If anything, Jesus just emphasised the more spiritual aspect of those laws, like looking at a woman lustfully makes a man comity adultery.
@@KasumiRINA Which set of ten commandments was written on stone?
History (and I use that term loosely when talking Biblical History) tends to be written by the victors. Whatever the model of slavery in the Bible, that may have little bearing on what actually happened in “biblical” times. Considering all the slaughtering that seemed to be perfectly ok, I am not convinced that slavery was not as brutal and inhumane as we tend to assume in other periods and regions.
Thank you for adding thumbnails. UA-cam had you put there looking like you had buried your 6th body.
Damn Dan! Remind me to never challenge you.
Wes has some sliminess to him
He kinda does, doesn't he? When Rogan mentioned his friend who'd spent like 12 years studying the Hebrew Bible - Wes responds with "well was he trained?", which I understand but Wes is literally the example of someone who was trained and it went right over his head.
i was stupidly willing to give him the benefit of some doubt but if he's just gonna cite paul copan then he's just speaking in bad faith
@@azhaz578It didn't go over his head. "Sliminess" is part of the trade of apologetics.
full YT thumbnail era has begun
Thanks again for the studied scholarship, but yeah, sometimes too easy. Unfair to judge men of the past by standards of the present, but sticking up for biblical slavery in 2025 is not a rationally nor ethically defensible position
Irrelevant. These were supposedly God's chosen people set apart. They got their instructions directly from YHWH.
God as depicted in the Bible is a genocidal monster in ANY era.
The ONLY reason Christians no longer condone chattel slavery is the rise of humanism. Not the Bible. Not their faith.
Let's see it
It doesn't matter if Biblical slavery was different from other kinds of slavery. Proslavery apologists in the South prior to the US Civil War were not shy about using the Bible to defend the practice. And that is how we must look at it. How were these texts USED?
Thank you for asking!
Angelina Grimké:
- "The Bible has been used to justify slavery, but let us not twist its meaning. Jesus came to set the captives free, and we must follow His example."
Frederick Douglass:
- "I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land."
- "Between the Christianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference-so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy, is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt, and wicked."
William Wilberforce:
- "Is it not the glory of the religion we profess that its doctrines and precepts are all favorable to humane liberty, and kindly affection and brotherly love?"
- "Let us not despair. It is a blessed cause, and success ere long will crown our exertions."
Harriet Beecher Stowe:
- "Evil as slavery is, a happy providence has stretched out a means for overthrowing it. Christianity will come in no other shape than she comes now-a homeless wanderer, oppressed and robbed, without a place to lay her head."
@@Christian-l8k This is a useless attempt to try and utilize the words of slaves to circumvent the original question this person asked. And this is undeniable. The Bible was used to justify American slavery. Specifically Genesis 9:18-27. The story of Canaan was justification to argue that African Americans were slaves. And this began based off nothing but prejudice. Canaan shouldn't be black, Ham shouldn't be black, not really, but racist Southerners still used it to their ends. And not just to their ends, white Southerners saw the act of African American slavery as a profound positive for Christianity. These are the words of Bishop Stephen Elliott.
“consider whether, by their interference with this institution, they may not be checking and impeding a work which is manifestly Providential. For nearly a hundred years the English and American Churches have been striving to civilize and Christianize Western Africa, and with what result? Around Sierra Leone, and in the neighborhood of Cape Palmas, a few natives have been made Christians, and some nations have been partially civilized; but what a small number in comparison with the thousands, nay, I may say millions, who have learned the way to Heaven and who have been made to know their Savior through the means of African slavery! At this very moment there are from three to four millions of Africans, educating for earth and for Heaven in the so vilified Southern States-learning the very best lessons for a semi-barbarous people-lessons of self-control, of obedience, of perseverance, of adaptation of means to ends; learning, above all, where their weakness lies, and how they may acquire strength for the battle of life. These considerations satisfy me with their condition, and assure me that it is the best relation they can, for the present, be made to occupy.”
And why post a quote about how much Frederick Douglas despised American Christianity for it's justification of slavery without properly dissecting it. Right there is something antithetical to your point. Right in all these quotes. You have a man destroyed by it. A man who recognizes white evangelical Protestantism as his own undoing and you act like it's okay. Despite the mistreatment of African Americans for still over a century after, you ignore the past. You ignore how traumatic this must have been and how Christians still used the bible to justify racism...well hell some still do it. You spit in the face of Douglas and others to twist their own words as some pre-Christian doctrine instead of condemning Christianity's role in American slavery.
Apologists point to regulation on how Jews can be enslaved to defend "biblical slavery" as "not so bad."
When in reality it shows a knowledge of just how awful slavery was and thus limiting how people like them could be enslaved. It shows the exact opposite of what they argue!
Hey Dan, Are there any good books you (or I suppose anyone reading) would recommend about the methodology or the underlying philosophical principles of critical scholarship?
Slavery is always bad. Some things really are that simple.
The Bible itself records prophets (I think Jeremiah) chastising Israelites for not releasing their (Israelite) slaves at the start of the Jubilee Year, so we know of at least one instance where the Bible itself tells us that the slave laws were not being obeyed.
They also had a habit of not taking slaves if they felt it was too close to the next jubilee
Leviticus 25:39-47 (even up to verse 55) does address slaves, but doesn't address kidnapping nor proscribe death for "man stealing."
Another source is Roy Gane's "OT Law for Christians," chapter 14.
I just noticed the Lego man to the back right (our right). Is he holding a bible?