I can see where you’re coming from here. I think my problem, personally, is that the OT law on this too closely mimics that of its neighbors. I would expect law composed by an omnibenevolent and omniscient to be more unambiguously superior to that created by a bunch of mere Bronze Age mortals. We are told (not necessarily by you, I will admit) that God’s law is timeless and an “objective morality”, but too often it is ambiguous as to which are the Bronze Age bits and which are the timeless bits, and some of the Bronze Age bits have a nasty habit of sticking around within some circles of Christian thinking until well after the rest of society has rejected them.
Yes, but one cannot help but wonder what might have happened, if instead of making beards, phylacteries, dietary laws, etc, etc the basis for separating Israel from their neighbors, the OT law had made the separation on the basis of more morally weighty matters.
How does OT slavery of non-Israelites compare with standard practice within the Roman Empire (the obvious comparator, although acknowledging that Roman practice changed over time)? Both were a form of chattel (life-long unless freed, inheritable) slavery. Roman slaves could hold property and could save up to buy their freedom.
Maybe I’m in my own scholarly bubble too much, but I don’t see my colleagues (in OT studies, including evangelicals) saying this. No doubt it’s common in the evangelical pop culture, apologetics, and perhaps some in systematic theology.
I don’t know why this would be the natural comparison since ANE and Greco-Roman are two different contexts and time periods. One could look perhaps at early Christianity and the Talmud (2nd-5th c CE) for a better chronological parallel with Rome.
We have so little to go on in the OT concerning non-Hebrew slaves programmatically (like two verses in Lev 25), so it’s really difficult to know what the actual expectations were, and of course how ancient Israel actually behaved is no real indicator of the expectations. I’m not an expert on this particular topic, but I know enough about genre and rhetoric of legal material to be cautious in drawing too many conclusions. This is not an excuse; it continues to be painful to reread those texts!
I often tell my students I’d make a good skeptic. I resonate with your problems; perhaps one day it’ll be enough for me to walk away. I’m not a Christian because I’m satisfied that the intellectual and moral challenges have been answered. This is why I also am weary of mainstream apologetics–sort of runs against intellectual honesty, curiosity, and humility.
Yes, I believe it was more from apologetics. I don’t have so much contact with OT studies.
(i) I suggested it because chronologically the Roman period overlapped with the period of applicability of OT law (which would presumably have extended until the dissolution of the Jewish state as a separate, if subordinate, polity after the First Jewish-Roman War – though I think I read somewhere that the OT practice of slavery for Israelites ended with the the destruction of the First Temple), (ii) Rome was the largest polity of this (later) period, & (iii) Roman practices are well documented.
I think, in context, the issue is more what Biblical precedent can be found for and against the practice of chattel slavery (particularly for out-groups – non-Israelites then, non-Europeans in more modern times), than what the varied practice was over the centuries of the existence of an ancient Jewish state (which may have been highly influenced by the relative strength of that state comparative to its neighbors at various times) might have been.
Yes, I not-uncommonly find myself spending more time fact-checking apologetics than actually reading it. I suspect to an extent I’ve come to subconsciously regard it as a performative art (similar to watching a stage illusionist’s show) than an informative art.
But I’m just watching from the ‘peanut gallery’, and do not see myself in some way responsible for cleaning up their messes after them, as Biblical scholars and scientists at Christian institutions (e.g. @stlyankeefan’s comment here) may.
Addendum: oddball question, how is Apologetics regarded in terms of serious scholarship by the wider Christian academic community? I know that many (most?) atheists regard it as simply a form of propaganda, but I know that some Christian institutions of higher learning have whole departments dedicated to the field.
It’s a mix. Some are overall skeptical (e.g., see the recent series on The Two Cities podcast). Usually, there is a differentiation between the better and worse, with someone like William Lane Craig considered among the better (it is his presence at Biola/Talbot that has put them as a go-to for conservative apologetics). There’s even more respect for true scholars who, from time to time, do some apologetics (e.g., NT Wright, Michael Licona).
