If the message of Jesus was the key to the abolition of slavery, why did it take nearly 2000 years to achieve that goal? I would argue that the teaching and practice of Jesus on the treatment of others was truly revolutionary. But the early church was powerless in human terms. Many Christians were in hiding and they had little influence on the laws and actions of the Empire. When the Roman Empire turned toward Christianity in the early fourth century, it could have not only abolished the branding of slaves, but abolished the institution of slavery itself, along with abortion, the gladiatorial games, infanticide and crucifixion. But whenever the church is melded with the state, politics and economics enter into the calculation and doing the right thing can be very difficult. Slavery was so embedded into the social order that many feared its abolition would destroy the economy and the whole social order.
But the foundations upon which slavery was built had been shaken. A powerful theological voice arose in central Asia Minor (Cappadocia), Gregory of Nyssa (ca. 335-395). In AD 379 Gregory articulated a power argument for the abolitions of slavery as an institution. He condemned institutional slavery on three biblical grounds. 1) Since God owns everything, owning slaves robs God. That is a very serious charge. 2) Every human being is made in the image of God. When you mistreat another human being, you are mistreating God. 3) Every human being was given dominion over the earth at creation. So when you buy a slave, there is a sense that you are buying the whole world, and the richest person on earth cannot afford to do that. While the third argument may seem a stretch to us today, the first two eviscerate the whole argument for slavery for anyone who accepts the inspiration of Scripture.
So in the big picture of Christian history, something crucial had changed with the coming of Jesus. In the Greco-Roman world slavery was the norm and was to be accepted as such. But in the early church, slavery was now seen as evil, contrary to both God and Scripture. But given the realities in the world most felt that this evil must be tolerated until Jesus comes and wipes the institution of slavery away. This set the context for people like Pastorius and the Quakers in colonial America. They felt the call of God to eradicate slavery NOW. The teachings of Jesus propelled them not to wait for the Second Coming but to follow Jesus in the present and carry out the principles he taught and lived.
But if the anti-slavery movement arose in Seventeenth Century America, why did it take nearly 200 years to finally abolish the institution? It has to do with deep political divisions within the territory from the first. New England was settled by conservative Christians from the lower classes in England. Virginia and the South were settled more by the upper classes, who were used to letting other people do the work. Slavery began in Virginia as a form of indentured servitude, new settlers working for a time to pay off debts. But the Deep South instituted a harsher form of slavery imported from the British territory of Barbados.
When the thirteen American colonies won their independence from Great Britain, they were deeply divided over the issue of slavery. There would have been no union between the states if the northern states tried to abolish slavery, as Massachusetts and Pennsylvania would have been happy for the new nation to do. So a series of political compromises left the slave system in place, even though roughly half the country was against it. It seems, however, that the Civil War became inevitable when the union was created without truly settling the issue. So while America was the place where abolition of slavery was conceived in modern times, it was slower than England to actually carry it out.
ADDENDUM ON THOMAS JEFFERSON
A note on the fascinating role of Thomas Jefferson on all this. Abolition might never have happened in America or England were it not for his powerful words “all men are created equal”, which inspired many. Yet he was a slaveholder all his life. He freed some of his slaves while he was still alive and all of them in his will. Why was he so slow to act to act on his convictions? He believed that sudden freedom would be harmful to them. They needed life skills in order to survive. So he hesitated, at the expense of his own legacy. But his convictions were not a sham. On one occasion he said: “I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just. The Almighty has no attribute which can take side with us (the slavemasters) in such a contest.@ He advocated no slavery in any new territory (this motion lost in Congress by one vote—the country was so evenly divided). When the Northwest Territory (today’s Midwestern states from Ohio through Wisconsin and Michigan) was established in the 1780s, he successfully supported establishing it slave free. So Jefferson’s words inspired freedom for the slaves, but his actions feel short of his ideals. I can relate to that myself.
Tag Archives: the impact of Jesus on history
What If Jesus Had Never Been Born? The Dark Side of Christian History II
When listening to atheists and other opponents of Christian faith, one would think that Christianity is the worst invention of human history. That viewpoint is certainly an exaggeration, but it will not do to completely ignore the dark side of Christian history. That story often begins with the Crusades to rescue Jerusalem and the surrounding territories from the Muslim Empire. While a certain leeway tends to be given for “just war,” the massacre which occurred in Jerusalem in 1099 seems excessive even by ancient, pagan standards. On July 15, 1099 the Crusader armies entered Jerusalem, breaching the walls in the Tower of David area, and quickly spread over the Old City. After defeating the defenders of the city, they slaughtered both Jews and Muslims, men, women and children in numbers estimated as high as 40,000. While such actions were not uncommon in more ancient times, the slaughter of innocent civilians is certainly contrary to Christian principles, whether or not done in the name of God. As the Crusades wore on, the quality of the Crusader armies decreased even further. They were often made up of the criminal elements of Europe. Bernard of Clairvaux, leading medieval cleric, commented that it was better for Europe to be rid of these elements. While they fought in the name of Christ, many or most Crusaders were Christians in name only.
A second major blot on the history of Christianity is anti-semitism, which reached its peak in supposedly Protestant Germany during World War II. It is odd that so much anti-semitism arose within Christianity, since Jesus Himself was a Jew. But the worst persecutions of Jews through the centuries have almost always been in AChristian@ Europe. Until recently, Jews treated much better in the Muslim lands than the Christian ones. Muslim leaders during World War II were politically sympathetic to the Axis powers and learned anti-semitism from the Nazis. That legacy remains in the Middle East to this day.
Another blot on the history of Christianity was the Spanish Inquisition (15th to 17th Century). If the church is necessary for salvation, as the medieval church taught, all disagreement with the church is dangerous and must be stamped out. The concept of an inquisition originated in the church’s wars against the Waldensees and the Albigenses in the 12th Century and beyond. But it reached its full flower during the reigns of the famous Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, the same era as the voyages of Columbus to the New World. The purpose of the Inquisition was to identify “heretics” in Spain who had converted from Judaism and Islam to Christianity, particularly after such conversions became mandatory around 1500 AD. Over the centuries, hundreds of thousands were prosecuted and imprisoned, thousands were executed for various “heresies”.
A particular stain on Christian history is the numerous times when wars of religion were fought between so-called “Christian” powers. The first of these was the war between Catholics and the Huguenots in 16th Century France. It climaxed in the St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre (August 23-24, 1572), when a combination of targeted assassinations and mob violence massacred tens of thousands of Protestant. Not long after, one of the longest and most brutal wars in human history was the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648). The war began as a battle between Catholic and Protestant states in central Europe, when the Holy Roman Emperor tried to enforce Catholicism on all states under his rule. The Emperor was supported by Spain and some smaller territories, but the Scandinavian countries entered the war on the Protestant side. When it seemed that Protestantism was about to be overthrown in central Europe, Catholic France, ironically, entered the war on the Protestant side. Including the military engagements and the resulting famine and disease, there were between five and ten million casualties.
More recently, the religious conflicts in the former Yugoslavia pitted Catholics, Orthodox and Muslims against each other, with massive brutality and cruelty perpetrated by all sides, particularly the two Christian sides. But lest one think that evangelical Protestantism is immune to such things, Rwanda, is not only a Protestant country (with a high percentage of Seventh-day Adventists), it is an evangelical Protestant countries. Yet neighbor on neighbor massacres claimed the lives of some 800,000 people in 1994 and many of these massacres occurred in the very churches where many sought refuge.
Those seeking evidence of Christian misdeeds do not have to look very hard in the annals of the history of the last two millennia. But the issues summarized here are not alone. There are many other evidences of Christianity’s “dark side.” To be continued.