Looking for passges to justify Abraham having a slave

[Peter_Plato]

I guess I have trouble getting at a “truth” that justifies a man owing a woman for the purpose of forcing her to have sex with him. I think I have a pretty good idea what they did, and why. Just as I understand why some ancient societies practiced human sacrifice. Understanding can mitigate my view of their individual and subjective blame for the society they lived in, but it does not allow me (just me here) to conclude that the practice was moral or justified.

There are modern psychological assumptions about ‘slaveries’ at play in your assessment that likely miss completely a great deal of what I am getting at.

It is not clear to me that an average teenage girl - living in a modern western nation operating under social pressures and powerful media influences regarding the nature of sex and the purview she ought to take regarding its use and fulfillment - is any less a slave to forces beyond her control than Hagar was in the time of Abraham. Yet, surely, given your presumptions regarding what comprises ‘freedom’ for the modern teenager you have great difficulty accounting for the mitigating influence of licence (apparent freedom) in calculations of the ‘good.’

It is not clear to me, at least, that merely having the opportunity to make free decisions in a culture that has its priorities on making sex, and, therefore, any human person capable of it, a commodity, is any more ‘good,’ objectively speaking, than having limited options in a culture that had a far greater concern for individual human well-being. In other words, being a slave girl to Abraham would morally be preferable, in my view, to being Miley Cyrus, today, since in an ontological sense, the slave girl could at least have her integrity intact, despite external circumstances, whereas Miley Cyrus not so much.

It is the underlying values that ground a culture which are more important than the superficial opportunities it affords. I realize this may be a contentious view, but not one arrived at from a lack of experience.

At a personal level, self-discipline and control are much more conducive to the good of the individual than licence and unbridled freedom. At a cultural level, a similar case can be made. Now, self-discipline may appear to be a form of enslavement to some, but, clearly, every human achievement, on any level, involves some form of determined and consistently imposed regimen of control. Often, that control is resisted by a proclivity towards willfulness. In my view, the moral good lies somewhere between absolute control and absolute freedom - a kind of controlled and resolute pursuit of the good.

 

[Amandil]

That is a textbook false dichotomy. You’re ignoring:

1. Other gods besides the judeo-christian god.
2. The fact that different people have different subjective opinions on the judeo-christian god.
3. How the judeo-christian god is not consistent in his morality.
4. That experience and studying history give some basic ideas as to morality.
5. Some morality is built into our DNA. I talk about it briefly below.

1. Non-sequitur. The the so-called actuality of “other gods” does not follow from the belief in “other gods”. “Other gods” also is an irrational concept because “other gods” necessarily implies limitation, which is absurd when considering the definition of a divine Being like God.
   2)Irrelevent. Religion is not based on subjective opinions about God. The failure is those people’s failure to conform their views to the truth.
   3)Circular logic
   4)History is not the science of morality, ethics is.
   5)Morality is built into our nature, therefore it comes from something beyond us, because we did not create ourselves.

What if two christians have different opinions on morality?

If this is your take on “history”, its not only terrible but prejudicial. This conflict was a nationalist conflict with only a religious “coloring”, like the Schmakaldic wars in Germany. It was not based on Religion but rather religion was the excuse.

One thing you do is find points of agreement and work from there. If one party says “I think people should not be allowed to make bargains wherein they sacrifice their children.” If the second party says, “I think people should be allowed to sacrifice their daughters,” then compromise is impossible.

This is tragically laughable. The “moral” of the story has nothing to do with God “sacrificing children”. Jephthah has sworn a foolish oath(not that you have any sense of what oaths are), to sacrifice “anything” which came from his house if he was awarded victory.

God didn’t “make” Jephhah’s daughter come out of the house, she came out to welcome her father in his return(as any family member would do knowing that their loved one is coming back from war).

Jephthah sacrificed his daughter because he was too much of a coward to take upon himself the curse of his rash oath.

The moral of the story is not to swear foolish or rash oaths to God, or even to swear oaths at all.(See Matthew 5:34).

But because you read it according to the colored lense of your bias and prejudice, you interpreted it wrong. You co0mmitted eisegesis, which I’m quite sure that you’re doing with Abraham as well.

I ask myself if I’d like to be denied every human instinct given to me. Then I wonder if I like being beaten and possibly killed. So long as I perform those same tests when judging all other acts then I would not say I’m a “subjectivist”. I’m someone with a sound moral code that calls a wrong a wrong.

Again, you assume that if someone doesn’t believe in your very narrow definition of god that they must be thrill-killing anarchists.

Not at all. Only that they really have no real reason NOT to be. They’re doing what you’re doing, merely limiting your actions according to your subjective ideas.

That still means that your morality is wholly subjective and relative.

Because there is nothing stopping your from chaning it according to your opinion. It wholly depends on your opinion.

The golden rule is not something that christianity has trademarked. Cultures independent of christianity have come to the very simple and very moral conclusion that a person shouldn’t do things to another that they don’t want done to themselves.

Which says nothing about Christianity, only that God has placed the same “natural law” into all of humanity, no matter which false gods they create, or reject the God that gave it to them altogether.(Romans 1:18 and following)

That’s ludicrous. If I say that I’m against rape, but then I put up only very minor roadblocks in telling people when or how they can rape I’m more than just tolerating it. When I tell the victims of rape that they should be pleased that they are being raped and should serve to please their rapists, then I’m allow and encouraging rape. I would be advocating it.

That’s terrible logic. It’s common tactic of subjectivists also to demand that their opponents MUST be absolutists.

Secondly, God never said such things as you assert. It’s simply your prejudices betraying your supposed “objectivity”.

Here’s what dictionary.com has to say for the noun version of “right”:

And what authority does “dictionary.com” have exactly?

Those biblical passages that I’ve quote so many times now spell out the terms to which slavery is moral, legal, and ethical. A “construct of [my] own imagination”? It’s all there in black and white.
{continued}

No. Your idea that “slavery is morally evil” is a construct of your own imaginiation. I’m not saying that you’re necessarily wrong.

What I’m saying is that you have no real objective criteria to base it on, besides your own opinion. And that you have no real moral criteria to impose your morality onto anyone else.

And therefore you have no objective basis for your moral indignation against what you interpret(or rather misinterpret) from the Bible.

 

[livingwordunity]

I agree with much of what you are saying, except that I would point out that only male Isrealite slaves were set free every seventh year - not foreign slaves

Where does it say in OT Hebrew law that only males are to be set free? Because, at least in the following passage below, it makes no difference if the slave is male or female for setting the slave free.

Exodus 21:26-27

When a man strikes the eye of his slave, male or female, and destroys it, he shall let the slave go free for the eye’s sake. If he knocks out the tooth of his slave, male or female, he shall let the slave go free for the tooth’s sake.

 

[Amandil]

You know why I am indignant about slavery? It’s not because it’s in the Bible. It’s because I have a shred of humanity that despises seeing evil deeds done. I don’t look at the thousands – the millions – that have been affected by slavery as a statistic or as something to be whitewashed. It was and is a tragedy.

It’s a good thing to be indignant about slavery.

But your problem is that you have no real moral grounds to say so, other than your own opinion.

To think that being against such crimes against the human state is because I have an opinion on the existance of a higher being is to be sorely mistaken.

I never said that.

If you think that I’m incorrect about what the Bible says about slavery, that’s one thing; but to try and play it off as though my atheism is the sole reason one would hate slavery is a discredit to the many christians who (despite what the Bible said) fought and sometimes died trying to end the practice.

I never said that either. You apparently aren’t comprehending what I’m saying.

Trust me, there are plenty of items that make me hate what is written in the Bible (I don’t hate God as I don’t believe he exists).

You betray yourself with your own words. You are insisting that the bad behavior of humans mentioned in the Bible is directly the result and the responsibility of God, you’re indignance is based on that prejudice, and thus your indignance and hatred is ultimately directed at a Being whom you claim doesn’t exist.

As I’ve mentioned probably the worst is when on another thread there were real live people living in the 21st century who were arguing in favor of a father (Lot) asking a gang of men to rape his daughters. They tried justifying that there as people are doing here with slavery.

They’re not “justifying” anything. They’re simply saying “this is what happened”. There is a difference.

What you’re doing is you think that you reserve the right to play “god” and judge people in history based upon your biases and prejudices, along with reserving the right to judge God in that same vein.

Any honest history professor would say that that is a foolish position to take. You don’t judge persons in history, that’s not your place, precisely for the reasons I previously laid out. You leanr from it, that’s all.

But my rejecting of the faith came well before I knew all of the parts of the Bible that would turn one off. Bible reading was not encouraged in my CCD classes…

So then you’re proving my words true. 1)You indignation about slavery is merely a smokescreen for something else, more than likely some favored sin. 2) You have no idea of proper hermeneutics. Thus you commonly misinterpret Scripture anyway as protestants often do.

Slavery has everything to do with why I hate slavery. And that goes for all slavery not just the portion of it mentioned in the Bible.

Which is nothing but your subjective opinion…

Again, the golden rule as well as understanding of how people best cooperate. I would like people to value my rights and my dignity and so I will value theirs.

That’s great. But what moral basis do you have to impose that morality onto someone who invades your home and steals all your stuff? Who thinks its perfectly “moral” to make all your things his own, for whatever reason?

And as I noted above, it’s built into our DNA to work together. One of the harshest non-physical punishments is solitary confinement. People have an innate need to connect with other people. Humans as a species would not have survived were it not for our communal instincts. It’s psychological, it’s emotional, and it’s genetic.

If it’s cooperation is “built into our DNA,” how do you explain the existence of slavery? Or any evil? If its “built into our DNA”, then cooperation should be irresistable and undeniable fact of human existence.

You’re two for two on your false dichotomies. Why is there no third option that shows mercy as Jesus preached? And you only speak to conquered peoples. You ignore their children and their children and so on, as well as the children of slaves gotten by other means. You ignore the daughters whose father sold them into slavery.

You ignore Deut 15:
[12] "If your brother, a Hebrew man, or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you, he shall serve you six years, and in the seventh year you shall let him go free from you.
[13] And when you let him go free from you, you shall not let him go empty-handed;
[14] you shall furnish him liberally out of your flock, out of your threshing floor, and out of your wine press; as the LORD your God has blessed you, you shall give to him.
[15] You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God redeemed you; therefore I command you this today.

Because what you conveniently ignore is that if a Israelite took a slave to wife he had to keep her in his home or release her. Therefore her children were his.(Deut 21:10-14)

You ignore the passages where God says he will cast out many nations. Truly he could have cast them out with kindness and without chains. He could have even made it so these other nations wouldn’t be there in the first place, so that he doesn’t have to fix a problem that he himself created.

Now you’re denying human free will. More and more its becoming apparent that your problem is with the world God created. Or rather how He created you.

 

[Amandil]

Study sociology. Study psychology. Study history.

Non of those are the science of morality. Ethics is. Those all tell me THAT something happened, not “why” it ought or ought not to have been they way it happened.

Study the evolution of cooperation. It’s no accident that humans abhor murder, build societies, and protect the children of others that are not even their own.

I know. But that is not the result of your invented idea of “the study of the evolution of cooperation.”

I note the irony in quoting a slaveholder like Thomas Jefferson, but when he wrote, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,” he summed up in thirty plus words what I mean by the basic rights of man.

Jefferson WAS, objectively hypocritical. And He KNEW himself to be such.

The difference between Jefferson and yourself is that He can objectively explain why slavery was evil.

You can not.

The difference is because he recognized where the true value and dignity of all men has its ultimate source.

You don’t.

God – your specific interpretation of him – may be what you believe is the “real source” of morality but few would agree.

It doesn’t matter if “few would agree”(as if morality is based on demographics or popular opinion). In fact more agree on my position than yours, since atheism is absolutely an extreme novelty and minority view.

Mine is a morality that may not be perfect, but it’s borne out of love and not threadbare excuses and embarrassing justifications.

It may be “born out of love”. But you have no real reason, as an atheist, to love anything.

Here’s my(and Jefferson’s), position in syllogistic form;

1. God exists.
2. God created all humans in His image and likeness, with eternal dignity and worth.
3. Therefore anything with degrades or perverts this dignity is an offense to humans and thus to God.
   Conclusion: therefore any evil(slavery) which deprives man of that dignity and worth is morally illicit.

Here’s your position syllogistically:

1. I believe in the “golden rule”(that means that I follow the morality that I would not do to others what I would not done to me).
2. Slavery violates the “golden rule” because I would never want to be a slave.
   Conclusion: Therefore slavery is immoral.

The problem is that your conclusion is implicit in your premise, thus you are arguing in a circle.

Secondly, is your morality always consistent?

Are you of the position that you would never want to be murdered or that no matter what you prefer your existence to non-existence?

If so, then are you in favor of abortion? If you are in favor of abortion, then you are in favor of treating others contrary to how you would want to be treated. Because you are in fact favoring the non-existence of others through the act of abortion(you yourself admitted to this “leeway” in regards to your moral relativisim).

Without God, the criteria for any morality crumbles, even the “golden rule”, because(as I already said) you are like a prisoner holding the key to your own cell.

The “morality” you lock yourself into is a “morality” which you can free yourself from at any time.

Your “golden rule” becomes what YOU say it is, thus it is subjective and relative.

And thus you are imposing your subjective and relative morality onto Abraham as well, without any real moral foundation to do so.

 

[livingwordunity]

P.S. it is also unhelpful to associate modern atheists with ancient pagans, there is no real connection there, certainly less connection than that between modern Christians and ancient Jews.

I compare atheists to pagans because, whether people realize it or not, we are all made by God for worshiping Him. So, if we aren’t worshiping the one true God then we are going to be worshiping false gods and idols. Money, sex, celebrity worship, and self-worship are the most common false god defaults today. Also, I’ve never heard an atheist complain about any pagan god.

 

[Amandil]

I compare atheists to pagans because, whether people realize it or not, we are all made by God for worshiping Him. So, if we aren’t worshiping the one true God then we are going to be worshiping false gods and idols. Money, sex, celebrity worship, and self-worship are the most common false god defaults today. Also, I’ve never heard an atheist complain about any pagan god.

Although technically true they don’t see it that way. And it really doesn’t do anything to advance the discussion.

 

[TMC]

There are modern psychological assumptions about ‘slaveries’ at play in your assessment that likely miss completely a great deal of what I am getting at.

It is not clear to me that an average teenage girl - living in a modern western nation operating under social pressures and powerful media influences regarding the nature of sex and the purview she ought to take regarding its use and fulfillment - is any less a slave to forces beyond her control than Hagar was in the time of Abraham. Yet, surely, given your presumptions regarding what comprises ‘freedom’ for the modern teenager you have great difficulty accounting for the mitigating influence of licence (apparent freedom) in calculations of the ‘good.’

It is not clear to me, at least, that merely having the opportunity to make free decisions in a culture that has its priorities on making sex, and, therefore, any human person capable of it, a commodity, is any more ‘good,’ objectively speaking, than having limited options in a culture that had a far greater concern for individual human well-being. In other words, being a slave girl to Abraham would morally be preferable, in my view, to being Miley Cyrus, today, since in an ontological sense, the slave girl could at least have her integrity intact, despite external circumstances, whereas Miley Cyrus not so much.

It is the underlying values that ground a culture which are more important than the superficial opportunities it affords. I realize this may be a contentious view, but not one arrived at from a lack of experience.

At a personal level, self-discipline and control are much more conducive to the good of the individual than licence and unbridled freedom. At a cultural level, a similar case can be made. Now, self-discipline may appear to be a form of enslavement to some, but, clearly, every human achievement, on any level, involves some form of determined and consistently imposed regimen of control. Often, that control is resisted by a proclivity towards willfulness. In my view, the moral good lies somewhere between absolute control and absolute freedom - a kind of controlled and resolute pursuit of the good.

If you seriously suggesting that being enslaved and raped is a better outcome for young girls than being exposed to pop music, then I am not sure we can have a meaningful conversation about this topic.

 

[TMC]

Where does it say in OT Hebrew law that only males are to be set free? Because, at least in the following passage below, it makes no difference if the slave is male or female for setting the slave free.

Exodus 21:26-27

When a man strikes the eye of his slave, male or female, and destroys it, he shall let the slave go free for the eye’s sake. If he knocks out the tooth of his slave, male or female, he shall let the slave go free for the tooth’s sake.

Certainly there were circumstances when a slave would be set free, but I was referring to the law that slaves could only be held for seven years, as opposed to life-long slavery. That law only applied to Israelite slaves, and I believe only male slaves.

When you purchase a Hebrew slave,* he is to serve you for six years, but in the seventh year he shall leave as a free person without any payment.
3
If he comes into service alone, he shall leave alone; if he comes with a wife, his wife shall leave with him.
4
But if his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children belong to her master and the man shall leave alone.

Exodus 21:2-4

There is an argument that this applied to Israelites of both sexes, but it is definitely limited to Israelites - foreign slaves were slaves for life, as were their children.

 

[Peter_Plato]

If you seriously suggesting that being enslaved and raped is a better outcome for young girls than being exposed to pop music, then I am not sure we can have a meaningful conversation about this topic.

At least portray what I said with some resemblance to what I actually did say. What I claimed was that I would doubt very much that Miley Cyrus could claim to be a “better specimen” of humanity than Hagar. Any neutral, but competent, moral agent would, I submit, choose Hagar’s life over that of Cyrus.

To cast a wider net over the issue. If we were in the business of crafting lifestyles that would more likely lead to the outcome of “good human person,” it seems to me, at least, that Hagar’s life would, far and away, bring about the desired end of “good person.”

I am not merely speaking of opportunity over constraint, but of the entire situation - the people close to her, the community at large, the mores in play, etc. The point being that ‘slavery’ given some situations is preferable to absolute freedom given others.

If you want to refuse to go deeper than a mere superficial treatment, no one is restraining you, you are free to depart, but at least have the decency to accurately portray the argument from which you are fleeing.

On a very real level, Miley Cyrus is being enslaved and raped to a degree far beyond what Hagar experienced. The problem is that many in our culture can’t see the reality for the words.

 

[TMC]

At least portray what I said with some resemblance to what I actually did say. What I claimed was that I would doubt very much that Miley Cyrus could claim to be a “better specimen” of humanity than Hagar. Any neutral, but competent, moral agent would, I submit, choose Hagar’s life over that of Cyrus.

To cast a wider net over the issue. If we were in the business of crafting lifestyles that would more likely lead to the outcome of “good human person,” it seems to me, at least, that Hagar’s life would, far and away, bring about the desired end of “good person.”

I am not merely speaking of opportunity over constraint, but of the entire situation - the people close to her, the community at large, the mores in play, etc. The point being that ‘slavery’ given some situations is preferable to absolute freedom given others.

If you want to refuse to go deeper than a mere superficial treatment, no one is restraining you, you are free to depart, but at least have the decency to accurately portray the argument from which you are fleeing.

On a very real level, Miley Cyrus is being enslaved and raped to a degree far beyond what Hagar experienced. The problem is that many in our culture can’t see the reality for the words.

To be perfectly frank, I think you are using pseudo-intellectual nonsense in a bizarre attempt to defend historical slavery. That is, it is you who are obscuring the reality of the inherently brutal nature of slavery with words.

I certainly do not agree that Hagar’s situation - being owned by another person and repeatedly raped - is likely to lead her to be a better person. Even if it did, that would not justify the institution of slavery. This is the argument used in the 19th Century to justify American slavery - that the slaves became Christians as a result. Do you agree with the 19th Century slaveholders that their actions were justified on that basis?

Also, I seriously doubt that either Miley Cyrus or Hagar would agree with you that Miley has been “raped” to a larger degree than Hagar. Remember Hagar was actually raped, while you are merely positing that allowing Miley to live as she does is some metaphorical rape (which is a dubious claim at the outset).

I disagree that I am only superficially dealing with these issues. I understand the differences in the cultures and time. I have agreed that difference mitigates to some extent the subjective individual culpability of those involved. But you appear eager to transform slavery into a historical good, or at least neutral, practice. In fact, your suggestion that “'slavery given some situations is preferable to absolute freedom given others” suggests that you believe slavery may remain a good idea in “some situations” even today - is that what you are really saying?

 

[Amandil]

I’d say that it begs the question to say that Hagar was raped at all.

How do you know that she was dim or simple not to think that laying down with this very powerful chieftan would be the be an opportunity to better her lot. That to have a son by him, which would be a “first born”(which would legally be entitled to all that he had), would do just that.

She probably went so far to imagine that if she did this, and then both Sarah and Abraham died, her son would get everything AND she’d freed AND would have all of Abraham’s wealth.

 

[pnewton]

Some people have an absolute total lack of historical perspective. Five hundred years from now, what practices are going to be seen as abhorrent from the ignorant? Forty hours work week? Having to work at all to get wages? People being locked up for breaking the law? People having to pay for education?

It is always futile to read Twenty-first Century sensibilities into society four thousand years ago. Is slavery bad? That should not even be the question. Slavery is imperfect. It is not worse than starvation. No, slavery back then was nothing like the slave trade of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries. Obviously anti-Catholics and atheist will use any and every argument, regardless of how illogical to evangelize. Ironically, there also weren’t atheist either back then.

 

[Peter_Plato]

To be perfectly frank, I think you are using pseudo-intellectual nonsense in a bizarre attempt to defend historical slavery. That is, it is you who are obscuring the reality of the inherently brutal nature of slavery with words.

I certainly do not agree that Hagar’s situation - being owned by another person and repeatedly raped - is likely to lead her to be a better person.

It is interesting that you want to portray the situation in as bad a light as possible to make a point. Where is the evidence that Hagar was raped at all, let alone repeatedly. Your entire premise here is based upon a reading of the text that YOU want to be there instead of what is there. Your argument simply falls apart on this insistence.

Even if it did, that would not justify the institution of slavery. This is the argument used in the 19th Century to justify American slavery - that the slaves became Christians as a result. Do you agree with the 19th Century slaveholders that their actions were justified on that basis?

Recall that I did not claim to “justify the institution of slavery” on the basis of my argument, let alone 19th Century forms of it.

I would, however, claim that the endemic psychological and social slavery suffered by children and teenagers at the hands of powerful commercial interests far exceeds the harm that Hagar would have suffered at the hands of Abraham. My reason for making this claim is that Hagar, from details in the story, remained self-possessed. She retained integrity with herself and made judgements in accord with her true self-interest and well-being.

This is not true for Miley Cyrus and for many of the young who have succumbed to the rabid interests of her (their) abusers. She couldn’t distill - to save her life - her true “well-being” from the menagerie of representations of it that dog her. Nor could she extract herself from the clutches of those who will get every last drop of her life blood.

Pseudo-intellectual nonsense? Well, we’ll see how things turn out for her. Hagar “found a friend” and, no doubt, her eternal destiny, in God. We can hope and pray that Miley will, too.

 

[TMC]

It is interesting that you want to portray the situation in as bad a light as possible to make a point. Where is the evidence that Hagar was raped at all, let alone repeatedly. Your entire premise here is based upon a reading of the text that YOU want to be there instead of what is there. Your argument simply falls apart on this insistence.

What do you call it when someone is made to have sex against their will? I think the text is clear that Sarai “took” Hagar and “gave” her to her husband to have sex with. I suppose you could argue that she was willing in all of that, but nothing in the text suggests that. The fact is that rape has always been a feature of slavery from ancient times until now, and Hagar is no exception.

Recall that I did not claim to “justify the institution of slavery” on the basis of my argument, let alone 19th Century forms of it.

I would, however, claim that the endemic psychological and social slavery suffered by children and teenagers at the hands of powerful commercial interests far exceeds the harm that Hagar would have suffered at the hands of Abraham. My reason for making this claim is that Hagar, from details in the story, remained self-possessed. She retained integrity with herself and made judgements in accord with her true self-interest and well-being.

This is not true for Miley Cyrus and for many of the young who have succumbed to the rabid interests of her (their) abusers. She couldn’t distill - to save her life - her true “well-being” from the menagerie of representations of it that dog her. Nor could she extract herself from the clutches of those who will get every last drop of her life blood.

Pseudo-intellectual nonsense? Well, we’ll see how things turn out for her. Hagar “found a friend” and, no doubt, her eternal destiny, in God. We can hope and pray that Miley will, too.

OK, so you are not endorsing or justifying slavery, just saying its better than being a modern-day pop star? And you reach this conclusion by making completely unsupported guesses as to the relative psychological states of two women you have never met, based on your theory that being “raped” with adulation and millions of dollars is worse than being actually physically raped and abused. I guess we disagree on that.

As to how things “turn out” for Hagar, Genesis tells us that Hagar found God only after “Sarai then mistreated her so much that Hagar ran away from her.” Seems to me that the text is clear - Hagar was badly mistreated. Many oppressed and mistreated people find that God is their only friend, but that certainly does not excuse the oppression and mistreatment.

 

[Amandil]

What do you call it when someone is made to have sex against their will? I think text is clear that Sarai “took” Hagar and “gave” her to her husband to have sex with. I suppose you could argue that she was willing in all of that, but nothing in the text suggests that. The fact is that rape has always been a feature of slavery from ancient times until now, and Hagar is no exception.

There’s nothing in the context to suggest that she was forced against her will. You’re reading that idea into the text.

Also your “fact” is merely your assumption, which again, you are reading into the passage. You’re approaching the passage with that assumption, not taking that “fact” from the text.

As to how things “turn out” for Hagar, Genesis tells us that Hagar found God only after “Sarai then mistreated her so much that Hagar ran away from her.” Seems to me that the text is clear - Hagar was badly mistreated. Many oppressed and mistreated people find that God is their only friend, but that certainly does not excuse the oppression and mistreatment.

What you fail to see is that it was Sarah who GAVE Hagar to her husband because of her own pride and fear because of her own barrenness.

Then Sarah mistreated Hagar because Abraham was favoring her because she was bearing his child. It was due to jealousy, not slavery.

The event was the creation of Sarah’s own lack of faith.

That’s the problem with the eisegesis that those like you commit in regards to Scripture. You’re not reading and interpreting it objectively.

 

[Peter_Plato]

What do you call it when someone is made to have sex against their will? I think the text is clear that Sarai “took” Hagar and “gave” her to her husband to have sex with. I suppose you could argue that she was willing in all of that, but nothing in the text suggests that.

Nothing in the text suggests it was rape either. In particular, if the situation was simply understood as part of the reality of being a concubine. You have to do a great of assuming to bend the text in your direction.

A prostitute, for example, would view giving herself to men as simply part of the trade. Something along that line of thinking could have been an aspect of the life of a concubine. Or would you call what occurs frequently in the life of a prostitute, “rape?”

The fact is that rape has always been a feature of slavery from ancient times until now, and Hagar is no exception.

It seems to me that you are reading into the situation what you want to see there.

OK, so you are not endorsing or justifying slavery, just saying its better than being a modern-day pop star? And you reach this conclusion by making completely unsupported guesses as to the relative psychological states of two women you have never met, based on your theory that being “raped” with adulation and millions of dollars is worse than being actually physically raped and abused. I guess we disagree on that.

Of course we do.

As to how things “turn out” for Hagar, Genesis tells us that Hagar found God only after “Sarai then mistreated her so much that Hagar ran away from her.” Seems to me that the text is clear - Hagar was badly mistreated. Many oppressed and mistreated people find that God is their only friend, but that certainly does not excuse the oppression and mistreatment.

Hagar didn’t “run away” because of mistreatment by Abraham, which, according to your “rape” theory, would have been a much stronger motive to run. She specifically said, “I’m running away from my mistress Sarai,” she answered.(Gen 16:8)

In fact, if it was so easy for a slave to bolt, that would seem to put into jeopardy your whole theory about the horrific bondage that slaves of Abraham’s day were subject to. If Hagar could remove herself so easily from the grasp of Sarah and Abraham, it is difficult to comprehend why she would not have done so sooner if things were so difficult.

Secondly, she returned without much convincing. Again showing that life could not have been that difficult for her. In particular nothing like the chattel slavery of more modern times.

Third, she claimed to have seen God “You are the God who sees me,” for she said, “I have now seen the One who sees me.” (Gen 16:13) If you study the Scriptures carefully, no one except a very privileged few (Adam, Moses and Elijah, perhaps not even Abraham,) were allowed to “see” God. In fact a translation for Hagar’s “seen” could be “seen the back of” which is very close to Elijah’s experience of God. That says something about the view that God has towards slaves, perhaps?

 

[livingwordunity]

Certainly there were circumstances when a slave would be set free, but I was referring to the law that slaves could only be held for seven years, as opposed to life-long slavery. That law only applied to Israelite slaves, and I believe only male slaves.

There is an argument that this applied to Israelites of both sexes, but it is definitely limited to Israelites - foreign slaves were slaves for life, as were their children.

You are reading into the text what it does not say and basing your conclusion on an assumption. The point is that the Hebrew laws on slavery were revolutionary compared to how the pagans did it.

 

[TMC]

Nothing in the text suggests it was rape either. In particular, if the situation was simply understood as part of the reality of being a concubine. You have to do a great of assuming to bend the text in your direction.

A prostitute, for example, would view giving herself to men as simply part of the trade. Something along that line of thinking could have been an aspect of the life of a concubine. Or would you call what occurs frequently in the life of a prostitute, “rape?”

It seems to me that you are reading into the situation what you want to see there.

Of course we do.

Hagar didn’t “run away” because of mistreatment by Abraham, which, according to your “rape” theory, would have been a much stronger motive to run. She specifically said, “I’m running away from my mistress Sarai,” she answered.(Gen 16:8)

In fact, if it was so easy for a slave to bolt, that would seem to put into jeopardy your whole theory about the horrific bondage that slaves of Abraham’s day were subject to. If Hagar could remove herself so easily from the grasp of Sarah and Abraham, it is difficult to comprehend why she would not have done so sooner if things were so difficult.

Secondly, she returned without much convincing. Again showing that life could not have been that difficult for her. In particular nothing like the chattel slavery of more modern times.

Third, she claimed to have seen God “You are the God who sees me,” for she said, “I have now seen the One who sees me.” (Gen 16:13) If you study the Scriptures carefully, no one except a very privileged few (Adam, Moses and Elijah, perhaps not even Abraham,) were allowed to “see” God. In fact a translation for Hagar’s “seen” could be “seen the back of” which is very close to Elijah’s experience of God. That says something about the view that God has towards slaves, perhaps?

It appears that the only thing we will agree on is that we disagree. For myself, I cannot justify, excuse or minimize the evils of slavery, whether in ancient times or more modern times.

 

[Peter_Plato]

It appears that the only thing we will agree on is that we disagree. For myself, I cannot justify, excuse or minimize the evils of slavery, whether in ancient times or more modern times.

My guess is that you subscribe, at least on this issue, to a very rigid deontic form of ethics and likely have difficulty understanding concepts like mercy and forgiveness, along with the role of teleology in ethical considerations.

You need to understand that in Catholic ethical thinking, moral acts have three dimensions or aspects to be considered in order to fully assess the “wrongness” of such acts.

1. The nature of the act itself
2. The circumstances within which the act takes place
3. The motives or intentions of the agent

Thus, for example, someone, like Abraham who “kept slaves” may not necessarily be condemned for such an act if ‘keeping’ the individuals actually promoted their welfare (2 above) and his reasons for doing so was out of deep concern for doing so (3).

This is quite different from an 18th century plantation owner who kept slaves merely for his own profit, abused them regularly and had convinced himself that slaves were no better than vermin.

If you cannot see any difference at all between the two cases, then, you are correct, that we will just have to disagree on the issue.