Overview: Why slavery wasn’t and couldn’t be outlawed by the Torah. The treatment of Hebrew and Gentile slaves in the Israelite home.
The Torah is regarded as the de-facto code of morality given by God Himself. Yet modern thinkers have challenged this notion by the Torah’s embracement of institutionalized slavery in which one human being is regarded as the property of another.[i] The Torah which places every human being under the category of “created in the Image of God”[ii] surely should have rejected all forms of slavery. We will attempt to reconcile Torah’s morality with its acceptance of slavery by providing historical context to these Torah laws.
Perhaps the word “slave” should be replaced with “servant” in our discussion, as servant resembles more loyally the character of a “slave” in the Israelite home. The word eved referred to in the Torah translates to both a slave and a servant (e.g., Moses is called a servant of God[iii]).
Two points can be made to help us understand why slavery/servitude wasn’t prohibited in the Torah:
(1) It’s a known principle in law and regulation enforcement that you don’t demand what will not be kept. Sometimes, there’s the need to sort of negotiate for the sake of preserving at least some element of law and order. What do I mean? Slavery back in the days, was a part of regular society who couldn’t comprehend life without it. The Jewish people were no angels and often even compromised their monotheistic beliefs adapting idol-worship from their neighbors. If the Torah would have forbade slavery, there’s no doubt that it would have been violated—nationally. In addition, the very livelihood of everyone back then was highly depended on slavery, making it highly unlikely that the Israelites would abandon it. The Torah recognized this and settled to at least regulate and enforce many laws and rights for the slaves, rights unheard of in any other nation at the time (as we shall soon discuss).
This is similar to the law of a captured woman in Deuteronomy 21:10-14.
“If you go out to war against your enemies, and the Lord, your God, will deliver him into your hands, and you take his captives, and you see among the captives a beautiful woman and you desire her, you may take [her] for yourself as a wife. You shall bring her into your home, and she shall shave her head and let her nails grow. And she shall remove the garment of her captivity from upon herself, and stay in your house, and weep for her father and her mother for a full month. After that, you may be intimate with her and possess her, and she will be a wife for you. And it will be, if you do not desire her, then you shall send her away wherever she wishes, but you shall not sell her for money. You shall not keep her as a servant, because you have afflicted her.”
The Talmud[iv] explains that it was permitted as a compromise to the robust lust and desire of a man who would either-way have taken this woman even if the Torah would outlaw it. Torah therefore pushes for some good treatment of this captive. First of all, she must be his legal wife and not merely a sex-slave (as was the custom for female captives in ancient society). Second, he should provide her a month to mourn over her lost parents (who died at the war). Thirdly, if after some time she is no more desirable to the man, she must not be used for labor or be sold to another; rather she must be let free.
(2) Slavery in the Israelite’s house was not so scary. We will now lay out the rules and guidelines put forth in the Torah for treatment of a slave and his rights. While this doesn’t totally answer the full extreme of the question, it does help somewhat and certainly supports the previous answer.
Let’s take a brief glimpse into slavery before the modern world developed: The slave, in the ancient world, was regarded as subhuman, treated like an animal, and killed like flies. They had absolutely zero rights.[v] Now, let’s compare this with what the Torah tells us:
The Hebrew slave/servant was granted, in the Torah, more rights than the Gentile slave/servant. The reason for the distinction is found in verse 42 of Leviticus 25: “For they are My servants (says the Lord), whom I freed from the land of Egypt; they may not give themselves over into servitude.” Moreover, a more obvious reason is that one should not be permitted to enslave his own brothers. This is not racism but priorities. For example, a citizen of a country is defended by the country and prioritized even when abroad. If a dangerous crisis were to develop in a foreign land, the citizen of that country visiting would be defended by his people before others.
Here are the basic principles for all slaves/servants, whether Jew or Gentile:
> Kidnapping people for slavery was forbidden and punishable by death.[vi]
> This would follow that all slaves gave themselves into servitude consensually (to the exception of a thief who couldn’t pay the owner back and prisoners of war).
Why would a person give themselves up to slavery? Well back in ancient times, there was little to no social benefits from the government (to the exception of biblical institutions like masser ani, peah, and leket in Israel). As a result, many people were left starving in the streets and would opt to give themselves up for slavery so that their master would provide them with bread to eat and a roof to live under.[1]
Since kidnapping slaves was forbidden, it is also forbidden to buy from a slave owner who acquired the slaves via forced abduction. It is unclear whether or not the children of slaves were kept as slaves or not.[2]
> Beating a slave to death was an offense and resulted in Capital Punishment.[vii] [3]
> A beating that caused permanent damage to a limb granted release of the slave.[viii]
> A slave was privileged to participate in the religious ceremonies of God’s people. The Gentile slave partially joins the Chosen Nation of God.[ix]
> A slave who has escaped his master’s home (implying that he was mistreated), is not to be returned to his master. Rather he can dwell in any city in Israel as he desires without being abused.[x] This was certainly an incentive for them to treat their slaves properly.
> The slave was not to work on the Shabbat. It was his off-day just like his master’s.[xi] Similarly, the enjoyed a sabbatical free from field labor every seventh year on Shemitah.
No specific guidelines were addressed in the Torah regarding the financial treatment and provision of a Gentile-slave. But as the Torah as a whole encourages morality and compassion it was probable that the slave in an observant Israelite’s home would be treated respectfully and with dignity.[xii]
If we were to escape our secular humanistic mindset for a moment into the true religious mindset, we would appreciate the great privilege the Gentile slave actually had to be in an Israelite’s household. Economic freedom (or “rights”) is regarded as the epitome of freedom in the secular mind, but from a religious point of view (and thus the deeper truth) economic freedom is only a means to serving God better. Now we can ask the daring question: would those Gentiles be better off as slaves and participants in the Jewish home, amongst God’s people or would they be better off with economic freedom amongst the God’less, idol-worshipping nations of the world? I think the uncomfortable true answer is clear to the objective thinker.
The Hebrew slave/servant serving his brother had additional rights than a Gentile slave, for the reasons mentioned above. Those rights include:
> Slavery would only be the decision of the slave who cannot make it financially on his own and therefore sells himself to a household to get fed while performing duties.[xiii]
> A master cannot force the slave to do laborious or embarrassing activity (i.e. slave-like activity).[xiv]
> He is to be released after 6 years or at Jubilee. (Permission is granted for the slave to stay longer if the slave wishes to do so).[xv]
> Upon freedom, the slave is to be supplied with food, money, gifts, and supplies from the master.[xvi]
> Sometimes the slave was able to earn a salary.[xvii]
The Torah was actually (from) the first to set some moral standards for the slavery—in sharp contrast with all other religions and societies.[4]
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[1] This can explain why the Torah hasn’t at least discouraged slavery. Since it was a good institution overall for its time, being that it fed and sheltered those who would otherwise have been homeless or dead.
[2] Since kidnapping slaves is prohibited it would come to reason that we may not keep the children of slaves as slaves against their will. Therefore, as children they can certainly stay in the master’s house along with their parents (see Ex. 21:4) and are required to do house duties just like all the children of the household. However, once they get married off, they will merit freedom, unless they desire to continue being a slave. According to (some) rabbinic authorities though (see Mishne Torah laws of slaves 9:1), the children of Canaanite slaves were kept as slaves forever. However, this is unclear especially from a biblical perspective.
[3] As for why the verse “pardons” the owner if the slave dies after a day or two (Exodus 21:21), it is nothing relating to inferior slave treatment. It is just a specific instance of the larger qualifications for Capital Punishment. No, he is not pardoned; he is merely spared from the death penalty. This is identical to one who murders another human—something that is unquestionably wrong—but does not do so in the presence of two witnesses who warned him explicitly. His law is not the death penalty. But that does not mean he didn’t do anything wrong; it’s just that he didn’t do something wrong enough (i.e. because he wasn’t warned about the prohibition) to get the death penalty. So too this slave-owner. Of course he did something very wrong, but because he owns the slave (or even if in his eyes he thinks he owns the slave), to some extent or another, he is spared from the harsh death penalty. The term “because he is your possession” is the reason why he was permitted to hit him in the first place for disciplinary reasons (which makes the killing much less “intentional”).
There’s no specific punishment given for sinners who bypassed the death penalty. It seems that it was the flexible decision of the court that dealt with each case individually without any principle law such as when the death penalty is implemented.
It should be noted here that disciplining with a rod was the widespread practice by all patriarchs in those days. They even did so to their children. Teachers as well, up until the twentieth century, would hit their little students to put them into shape.
[4] There’s an opinion in the Talmud (Berachos 47b) that we are obligated to keep a Canaanite slave forever. How is this considered moral? For starters, it would seem that although the obligation is linked to the verse, it is still only a rabbinic obligation (and the verse is only used as a “hint”). As a matter of fact, it can be argued that this Gentile slave is far better off in the Israelites home. The pious Jews would treat their Gentile slaves with great compassion to the point that they would provide food for them before giving themselves (Gittin 62a, Ramabam Hilchos Avadim 9:8). The Canaanite slaves were required to serve the One True God and keep many of the Mitzvos. This made him a part of the Chosen Nation. If he was to return to his homeland, he would have continued to serve idols made of stone and wood. So, while physically speaking a free man is obviously better off than a slave; spiritually speaking, being a part of the Chosen Nation—being a household member in the Israelite home—is better than being a part of an immoral pagan culture. While the Western Culture mind might have a hard time digesting this idea, it is clear that spiritual advantages are more significant and valuable that physical ones. If this still doesn’t satisfy you, then you’re probably better off siding with the diverging opinion that does not require (or encourage) keeping a Canaanite slave forever.
[i] Exodus 21:2.
[ii] Genesis 1:27, 5:1, 9:6.
[iii] Exodus 14:31; Numbers 12:7; Deuteronomy 34:5; Joshua 1:1, 15; 8:21, 23; 18:7; 1 Chronicles 6:49; 2 Chronicles 1:3; 24:6; Nehemiah 1:7; 10:29.
[iv] Kiddushin 21b.
[v] http://www.tribunesandtriumphs.org/roman-life/slave-punishment.htm, https://mises.org/library/brutality-slavery, Conceived in Liberty, volume 1, chapter 6, “The Social Structure of Virginia: Bondservants and Slaves.”
[vi] Exodus 21:16.
[vii] Exodus 21:20.
[viii] Exodus 21:26, 27.
[ix] Exodus 12:44, 20:10, Deuteronomy 16:11. rabbinic law says that they are responsible/privileged in performing all Mitzvos that aren’t time-limited, to the exception of Shabbat which although is time-limited they are still obligated to keep.
[x] Deuteronomy 23:16, 17.
[xi] Exodus 20:10, Deuteronomy 5:14.
[xii] Cf Rambam Hilchos Avadim 9:8.
[xiii] Leviticus 23:39, Exodus 22:3.
[xiv] Leviticus 23:39, 40.
[xv] Deuteronomy 15:12-18, Leviticus 25:40, 41.
[xvi] Deuteronomy 15:12-14.
[xvii] Leviticus 25:49.
