Path: utzoo!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: mls@sfsup.att.com (Mike Siemon) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: questions about slavery. Message-ID: Date: 9 Mar 91 06:11:57 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories Lines: 22 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article , sacg1198@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Scott Cattanach) writes: > The Oxford Illustrated History of Christianity points out when discussing > slavery and early Christianity that the difference between slaves and > "free" people was more a matter of degree than of kind at that time. Well, the Oxford Illustrated History of Christianity is wrong. There was, indeed, a range of possibilities including relatively good treatement of slaves as fully integrated family memebers. But Roman latifundias, which were a major part of the slave population, were much the same as plantations in the American South. And some kinds of slave usage, as in the Athenian silver mines, were as abominable as any mistreatment ever meted out by man against man. The only dimension in which ancient slavery tended to be much different from our own past experience was that it did not involve the utter degradation of a racist categorization of the slave as subhuman -- but the Greek view of some men as "by nature" slaves was not all THAT much better than American racism. -- Michael L. Siemon "O stand, stand at the window, m.siemon@ATT.COM As the tears scald and start; ...!att!attunix!mls You shall love your crooked neighbor standard disclaimer With your crooked heart."