LECTURE IV.

HOW DID OUR SAVIOUR AND HIS APOSTLES, TREAT THE SUBJECT OF SLAVERY?

JOHN xviii. 36.

“Jesus answered my kingdom is not of this world.”

It is a remarkable fact, and one that deserves serious consideration, that though our blessed Saviour, lived amidst the institutions of slavery, yet from any thing that he said on the subject during the whole course of his personal ministry, had he not frequently alluded to it for illustration, we never would have learned that slavery existed among the Jews. He alludes to it as an existing civil institution with which, the minds of the people were perfectly familiar, just in the manner and for a similar purpose that he alludes to the known practice of warfare. "What king saith he, going to war against another king, sitteth not down first and counteth

whether he be able with ten thousand men to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thousand, or else while the other is yet a great way off he sendeth an ambassage, and desireth conditions of peace." Here for the purpose of illustrating truth, he refers to warfare as a well known usage among the nations of the earth. Neither when the allusion is made to slavery or war, does he say a word either for or against them as existing usages. He simply refers to them for purposes of illustration. No unprejudiced mind can doubt for a moment that our Saviour alludes to slavery in the New Testament. The pictures there drawn, are the pictures of slave establishments, and of no other. No man in his sober senses, can entertain the belief for a single instant, that any great man, lord or noble has a right to call before him a number of freemen, distribute his property among them, order them authoratively to employ it for his benefit during a specified season, and at the end of that term render him a strict account of the manner in which they had employed it not only, but to render back to him the original sum together with all that had been acquired by

the use of it. Much less, if any one of them choose to pursue his own business, neglect to employ the money given him, and return it again at the end of the specified term just as he had received it: I say much less would that lord in this case have a right to inflict a severe punishment upon the supposed delinquent. The whole representation is entirely at variance with all our ideas of freedom. But if these servants were slaves, the property of their lord, then they were according to existing laws, under obligation to receive just what money he was pleased to distribute among them, to employ it just as he directed, and to render him a strict account of their conduct in the whole matter. And in case of delinquency they were liable to just such punishment as he saw fit to inflict. The picture is clearly that of a slave establishment and of no other. The Saviour not only draws these pictures which found their counterpart in society around him, but he makes other allusions to the subject more brief in their character. Thus in Luke xvi. 13, he says, no slave oíxsrns can serve two masters. There are two terms, as already noted in relation to this subject,

the one significant of condition, the other of service. In all slaveholding communities the term, which is indicative of service is

the one more commonly used. They are both employed in the New Testament but the term significant of service more frequently than the one significant of condition. But the term Aouλos when used to signify the service of a slave is usually connected with such adjuncts as to render the meaning quite evident. In many instances the term indicative of service just as clearly points out slave service as if the term were used which is significant of the slave's condition. From the frequent allusions by our Saviour to the subject of slavery, and from the manner, in which those allusions are made it must be quite evident that he lived among a slaveholding people. Yet in all the four Gospels there is not a record made that he spake a word against the institution of sla. very as such. This is singular, if slavery is the greatest sin of which men can be guilty, and if it is necessary as some think, to turn the world up side down to eradicate the evil. How shall we account for our blessed Saviour's silence on this subject? We have