The Immorality of God - Slavery in the Old Testament

[Angrboda]

Moral standards for slavery in the ancient world were all over the map.  Hebrew slavery standards weren't so much a step forward as a lateral move into more of the same.  

Can you document this, Jorm? Cause it sounds like puffery to me.

Status of slaves

The Greeks had many degrees of enslavement. There was a multitude of categories, ranging from free citizen to chattel slave, and including Penestae or helots, disenfranchised citizens, freedmen, bastards, and metics.[85] The common ground was the deprivation of civic rights.

Slavery in India is evidenced since ancient times.[1] Manu the Lawgiver, in his Manu Smriti lists seven different kinds of slaves.[1] The nature of slavery in India was extremely complex and cut across boundaries of caste, gender, kin, religion, and role.[

Slavery throughout pre-modern Chinese history has repeatedly come in and out of favor. Due to the enormous population and relatively high development of the region throughout most of its history, China has always had a large workforce.

Slaves, like anywhere else in the world, were war prisoners or inherited through their parents. But in ancient Egypt, (David 1998 Pg. 91) 80% of the population were slaves or servants, people could become slaves if they fail to pay their debts; other people sold themselves to slavery because they were unable to have a shelter or to eat. Some slaves were better off than being freemen, since they had food and shelter. They only attempted escape if they were treated harshly. Unlike the rest of the world, "slaves" or what people think they were, in ancient Egypt had some right, for example, young boys should not have been put in harsh jobs and were brought up by mistresses.

Tell you what, you do your homework...come up with some examples of how other ANE civilizations had laws pertaining to slavery that were so similar to those of the Mosaic Law as to be virtually indistinguishable, and I will concede that the Hebrews were simply making a "lateral move".

You squirrely little fuck.  Look at you move the goalposts.  I said ancient civilizations, not ancient near eastern.  What does it matter whether the standard of slavery from the period came from the near east or elsewhere?  Is your god restricted to the middle east?  Whether the laws were identical to those of the Israelites is immaterial to the question of whether they were better, worse, or about the same.  This demand that I find a "virtually indistinguishable" set of slavery standards is nothing but you grabbing the goalposts and running away as fast as you can.

And you here are trying to sidestep the immorality of your god by claiming that a little immorality isn't a bad thing so long as its justified by a small amount of progress.  You haven't stepped between the horns.  You've just stepped in the shit. Teaching the Israelites a slightly immoral set of slavery practices is still immoral.   What 'progress' the Israelites made does not morally offset the cost to foreign slaves as well as Hebrew ones.  If that isn't clear to you, I don't think you grasp the nature of morals.  A good done to one set of people does not make a harm to another set of people moral.

If you had been what Ex-Lax insists was a SEX-slave in the ANE, Jorm, would you have preferred to be the wife of an Israelite who was bound by Law to treat you well or that of a pagan Canaanite who might offer your children as burnt offerings to his false gods?

(I am seriously hoping you have the courage to answer truthfully with all of your forum buddies watching.)

What on earth does that have to do with the point?  Can't face the truth, can we?  Go back and bury your head in Copan's book.  Your rationalizations for preserving slavery in the ANE are as chuckleheaded and empty as his were.  If you had understood my point at all, the preference would be to live with a people who did not practice slavery.  Are you really that morally clueless? "Oh, but it's just a little bit of evil...." Something has rotted your mind. Would you care to actually answer the point, or are red herrings more your style?