[thinktwice]

I wonder how many people know that the third commandment condones slavery.

Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day. Six days you may labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord, your God. No work may be done then either by you, or your son or daughter, or your male or female slave, or your beast, or by the alien who lives with you ... -- Exodus 20-8

[Cold Heat]

Horsefeces!

[Bobby777]

what version of the Bible are you quoting there? ... I'd have to look up the Hebrew root (or those that know it here) ... servant and "slave" can have two different connotations ...

Exodus 20:8-10 KJV

8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

it was a common practice of those times (see: The Egyptians or The Babylonians) ...

but I don't care for slavery either ... regardless of the culture ...

[TFMcGuire]

It doesn't condone it it regulates a practice universally accepted at the time.

Wherever Christianity has gone, slavery has died.

Egg sucking liberals are the slavers. They would make everyone the chattels of the state.

[evangmlw]

Da? That would be the Fourth Commandment, not the third. Also, please be advised that the Sabbath Commandment was the only of the ten to not be renumerated by Jesus in the New Testament - it was voided. Biblical Christianity was very instrumental in freeing slaves, not placing man into bondage. Christ can also set you free from spiritual slavery, of which you seem to be a victim of.

[CapandBall]

Who are you to judge someone else's servant? To his own master he stands or falls. And he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand.

One man considers one day more sacred than another; another man considers every day alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.

[MEGoody]

"I wonder how many people know that the third commandment condones slavery."

Condones? Sounds like it is mere acknowledgement of a social reality.

A cursory study of scripture (and other historical documents) would show that the 'slavery' practiced by Israel was not like the slavery practiced by America (or like that still being practiced in the Sudan).

In Israel, an individual could sell themselves into 'slavery' (also called bondservanthood) to solve debt problems or to have a way to obtain the necessities of life if there were no other income options. (There was no bankruptcy court or unemployment insurance back then.)

In addition, there were slaves who were prisoners of war. We in America would think that harsh, but compared to how prisoner's of war are treated by most countries throughout the world, even today, making them slaves was a cakewalk.

And by the way, scripture also says that slaves are freed every 7 years (even if their debt was not paid).