(May 17, 2011 at 3:19 am)Girlysprite Wrote: I think you referred to this post when saying I didn't reply to it right?Yes you got the right post GS.
As for slavery - it wasn't just the secular morality of the time. The bible is very clear in that slavery is accepted and normal. Some rules on tratment of slaves come across as quite ok. Others...not so very much. For example - you can't beat a slave to death. The rule goes on to explain that that just means that the slave shouldn't die within 2 days of the beating. If he dies after that, you're cool. It's also ok to have sex with female slaves. When it comes to treatment of all females in general, you'll find that their treatment is more akin to cattle and slaves then human beings. They are property.
I think that the morals of the bible were actually based on the general society rules and morality of that time. In that time, women were a possession of the men. In that time, slavery was totally ok. In that time, you could stone a woman to death if there is even a bit of doubt if she was raped or had sex with another man voluntarily. In that time it was ok to to wipe out complete villages that didn't belong to your tribe and take the little girls as slaves.
But that doesn't make it allright now. I think it didn't even make it allright in retrospect, but I guess that was just the culture of that time.
I don't think you're challenging my view there. The bible is adjudicating on something that was very normal for the time yes. It was unique in promoting the view that slaves were humans to be treated as such. Remember people volunteered themselves to be slaves rather than face the alternatives... starvation etc.. Some businesses today would be better if they showed the same compassion for their workers. Same with morality. You'll notice that God is advocating fairness amid the seemingly terrible deeds.
