Evolution denial as the legacy of slavery

You're probably going to get more than you bargained for with this one by bringing up the civil war.

However, I think you've largely ignored the periods of religious revival in the US, also known as the Great Awakenings. Much of the literalism we see today is a twenty-century product, begun by the Seventh-Day Adventists, and later adopted by the fundamentalist movement. This is also connected to the Pentecostal movement, which is also a twenty-century product.

Your thesis would also not explain why literalism is popular with African-American churches or why it is popular in rural areas outside of the South. It seems to me that you are depending much on the sterotypes of popular culture reflecting the complexities of reality.

This is a not-too-terribly well-thought-out post conflating creationism with being ok with slavery. This is something that a creationist would do, but not a rational person. If there is a true conection, I have yet to see it. This is no better than a creationist conflating Darwin with eugenics and nazis.

I expect much more from thepandasthumb than this.

BTW, the US is not a European country.

Much of the literalism we see today is a twenty-century product, begun by the Seventh-Day Adventists

— Reed A. Cartwright

Brazil had slavery until 1888. I don't see much creationism here at Brazil.

BTW, the US is not a European country.

— Jason

...the US is unique among the European nations and their cultural descendants...

I think the view of evolution denial in the context of religious fundamentalism is right on target.

As far as the relationship between slavery and the Civil War to religious fundamentalism, however, I agree with other commenters that you are being far too glib. I was searching through google and amazon, it seems like George Marsden's Understanding Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism might be a good place to start for fleshing out this idea. The second part of that book apparently tackles creation science.

Please, people, let's not get into the endless debate and subsequent flamefest of what started the civil war. That is not the point of Matt's post. I suggest that you take up the issue After the Bar Closes.

Arguing over the civil war will get posts dumped to the bathroom wall.

Our country has the dubious distinction of giving its name to the dual Genesis theory, the creationist notion that blacks were among the animals brought before Adam to be named in the Garden of Eden.

It's called "The American School of Anthropology."

(white) Southerners cannibalised their culture and even their religion to justify an economic institution that most weren't wealthy enough to benefit from. Their descendents maintain the southern tradition of suffering for their betters' prosperity by voting Republican.

No wonder they don't believe in evolution.

Reed Cartwright: considering the geographic location of the roots of African-American Christianity, I don't see how you could have missed the reason "why literalism is popular with African-American churches". If Christianity weren't so mobile a religion it would be lucky to still survive among the peoples of the Levant.
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You should read the complete sentence:

You don't think the persistence of Creationism in the US is merely the result of the US being colonized by religious fanatics?

Arguing over the civil war will get posts dumped to the bathroom wall.

— Reed A. Cartwright

The religious revival in the early 2oth century is certainly relevant. I do not know whether it would have happened if people had not been ready for it. I am not entirely defending the thesis but throwing it out for discussion.

Literalism is indeed found outside the old South and also among Black people. I do not see a contradiction.

I did not imply that creationists today are "OK with slavery." I merely question whether the origin of biblical literalism is related to slavery in the US. If it is not, then why is it so prevalent here? That is a serious, not a rhetorical question.

Nor do I think that slavery necessarily causes literalism, but I think it may have helped to do so in the United States. It did not in Brazil.

The Civil War was technically fought over states' rights and probably other issues as well. But would the question of states' rights have arisen if not for the strains over slavery? Why did Lincoln credit Harriet Beecher Stowe with causing the Civil War if slavery was not the principal underlying question?

The phrase regarding the European nations and their cultural descendants was unchanged.

Judging by Mr. Cartwright's comment 109054, I must have missed something. I want to thank all the commenters for their civility, even in disagreement.

You don't think the persistence of Creationism in the US is merely the result of the US being colonized by religious fanatics?

The religious fanatics who colonized New England ultimately gave us some of our most liberal Protestant churches.

If someone can explain that, I will be most grateful.

Matt, I dumped three comments because it looked like the thread was going to derail into an argument over the origin of the civil war. As someone who has participated in that argument several times, I feel that our forum is a better place for it than your thread.

But if you want the majority of your comments to be about the civil war and not about your thesis, I'll back off.

...if it was a request for opinions rather than an argument it could have been more clearly stated as such.

It would be an exaggeration to say that the growing literalism was caused by the need to justify slavery alone, but the fact remains that what we call the Bible belt corresponds very closely with the slave-holding states of the antebellum South. Arguably, then, the US differs from Europe, Canada, and Australia because biblical literalism and hence evolution denial are the continuing legacy of slavery and racism. I would be most interested in hearing substantive comments concerning this thesis [italics added].

I think the strength of creationism in the US is directly related to the level of education; or, to put it another way, to the level of ignorance. I also think the strength of fundamentalist religion is directly related to the same thing. I doubt that slavery has much to do with it. Southerners used their religion to justify slavery, but religious people today use their religion to justify lots of different types of behavior.

I dumped three comments because it looked like the thread was going to derail into an argument over the origin of the civil war.

But if you want the majority of your comments to be about the civil war and not about your thesis, I'll back off.

Our country has the dubious distinction of giving its name to the dual Genesis theory, the creationist notion that blacks were among the animals brought before Adam to be named in the Garden of Eden. It's called "The American School of Anthropology."

I looked up slavery in the 2003 edition of Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Sorry, Spotted a typo: The father of American anthropology was Franz Boas, not Boaz.

Encyclopaedia Britannica as a primary source?

Delta Pi Gamma (Scientia et Fermentum)

Certainly Southern fundies did use the Bible to justify slavery. But I think the whole Biblical racism thing really took off in the 20's, when the Klan ( a self-avowedly "Christian organization") virtually ran much of the South (and much of the North, too). And it appeared again in the 50's with the Brown v Board of Ed decision (many private "Christian schools" in the South were founded in the immediate aftermath of the Brown decision, so that the "good white Christians" could evade integration), and expanded further in the 60's during the civil rights movement.

If anyone is interested, I have a short history of Christian fundamentalism in America, at:

http://www.geocities.com/lflank/fundiehistory.htm

Lenny, there's a thread at ATBC ('Chameleonic snake') awaiting your herpetological insights.

An interesting idea, at least, but I'd say frankly far too specific. There's many kinds of religious fundamentalisms, many different ways things happen, and slavery really is only one aspect of this. In fact, targeting it specifically ignores much of the other issues going on at the times - and after, and before.

I think however, it would be interesting to study the reasons for religious fundamentalism in our country in more detail.

If you read Hofstadter's book on "Social Darwinism in America," he has extensive notes and peiod-era cartoons from the early 20th century showing evolution from ape to African American to white. There is certainly some truth in your analysis. The south as you recall, brought us such terms as quadroons (1/4 black) and octaroon (1/8 black), etc. Descent from common ancestors (particularly with the earliest ancestors found by Leakey et al. in Africa) strengthens the racism argument you are making.

Descent from common ancestors (particularly with the earliest ancestors found by Leakey et al. in Africa) strengthens the racism argument you are making.

I don't know if I quite buy it. I don't think the modern founders of creationism can be tied to any kind of pro-slavery feelings at all -- it's so indirect. If you wanted to argue that it was in part a residue of the resentment, isolation, racism, and poverty that were a legacy of the civil war, maybe. Perhaps the recovery from the conflict forced greater reliance on the church as a social institution, making religious dogma a more potent force in people's lives...but that's still all guesswork.

Regarding Mr. Myers's comment: I am afraid it had not occurred to me that someone might think I was trying to tie modern creationism or biblical literalism to modern racism. I am not. Nor am I saying that biblical literalism must be bunk because it has roots (if it does) in slavery and racism. That would be the genetic fallacy, and I am willing to let evolution deniers have a corner on that market.

I want to explore the hypothesis, not original to me, that the defense of slavery (obviously among other factors) led to biblical literalism. That fact, if indeed a fact, would, however, have no bearing on the truth or falsity of literalist claims.

Jason: This is a not-too-terribly well-thought-out post conflating creationism with being ok with slavery. This is something that a creationist would do, but not a rational person. If there is a true conection, I have yet to see it. This is no better than a creationist conflating Darwin with eugenics and nazis.

"Yet the prophecy had an obverse side as well. The Hamites [which are according to Morris: Black Africans, Asians, Polynesians, Native Americans and Australians --- T.B.] have usually been able to go only so far with their explorations and inventions, and no further. The Japhethites [Europeans --- T.B.] and Semites [Jews & Arabs --- T.B.] have, sooner or later, taken over their territories and their inventions, then developed and utilized them to their own advantage in accomplishing their own "service" to mankind. Sometimes the Hamites, especially the Negroes, have even become actual slaves to the others. Possessed of a genetic character concerned mainly with mundane, practical matters, they have often eventually been displaced by the intellectual and philosophical acumen of the Japhethites [Europeans] and the religious zeal of the Semites." - Henry M. Morris The Genesis Record (1976), p.241 ](emphasis mine)

Yeah, I don't buy it. Biblical literalism is a creed that contributed both to slavery and creationism, in the same way that a common ancestor led to both apes and monkeys. Creationism did not stem from slavery, just as apes did not stem directly from monkeys. Slavery and creationism are both bad, of course, but your logic is flawed. It seems to me you make a common either in conflating correlation with causation.

Uh, I meant "error," not "either."

...this shift in attitude is very possibly the result of secular, Enlightenment thinking, not religious thinking. If religions have changed their positions on slavery, they have done so in part because of the influence of secular philosophy.

As far as slavery persisting in America, I think it had more to do with cotton, indigo & tobacco, three very labor intensive cash-crops, than anything else. It wasn't until the cotton picker became practical in the 1950's, did slavery's step-daughter - the cotton share cropper - get put to rest.

You've got to remember, until recently, the US was an agricultural/extractive economy. It's only after Europe got blown up in WWII did we really become a first-rate industrial economy. Yet, even now, compared to Europe, we're far more agricultural/extractive in our mix. I think sometimes things are what the are and getting caught up in rationalizations and philosophical arguments that are too complex hides what happened.

Back then, people were bastards so they could make money. Just like they do in the Marianna's, China or any other sweat-shop economy today using slavery, company stores or whatever it takes to get cheap, forced labor. And, by-and-large the local preachers generally support the local culture/philosophy/social order that's dictated by the men with the money. Because that's what preachers tend to do.

I think one of the things that's relevant here is that slavery led to separate black and white churches in the South--so as much as there are differences between Baptists and Southern Baptists, there are also differences between Black Southern Baptists and White Southern Baptists. This leads to two groups that both seem to favor Biblical literalism, but often with very different values.

I think the frequency with which one finds Biblical literalism in the South and in African-American communities lends some anecdotal evidence to your ideas, but it doesn't show causality. Because this is largely a scientific site, I'm not sure how you'd design an experiment.

You may be on to something, though. I know it has been theorized before that racists tend, if you'll pardon the pun, to think in black and white. You might want to check out Anti-Semite and Jew by J.P. Sartre. There's also a more modern psychology treatise on the topic, but I don't recall title or author.

yea, correlation isn't causation. Divorce rates, belief in biblical literalism, racism, etc. are all pretty high in the Bible Belt. It's possible that the different standards on education are involved, or maybe it's economics? (or both?)

Either way, if you look at the trend society has been heading in for the past 100 years, the South is always a generation or two behind. It would be interesting to understand why that is.

Matt,

"Steve Allen (in the book Steve Allen on the Bible, Religion, and Morality) claims that not a single religion in the world condemned slavery until recently"

Well, Steve Allen is a pedestrian ignaramus who just doesn't know what he is talking about. This is pure, unmitigated ignorance which I suspect you share, Matt. Too bad.

The Hebrew Bible makes it abundantly clear in Deuteronomy, three thousand years ago, that a slave, including one not of your own people, cannot be held against his will. If he escapes from his master you must NOT return him, instead he shall live with you under your protection. This at a time when the Code of Hammarabi and later Roman law a THOUSAND YEARS later prescribed the death penalty for anyone protecting an escaped slave.

The Hebrew EVED is unfortunately mistranslated (by those ignorant Christians, of course) as "slave". It really means "worker" or "servant" from the word AVODA which means "to work". It refers to the TEMPORARY sale by the court of one's services in order to pay long overdue debts or to compensate for the act of stealing when other means of restitution are not available. Legal restrictions spelled out in the Hebrew Bible on the treatment of such people make it very clear that they are not owned by anyone and therefore are NOT slaves.

We can discuss whether this is a fair and effective deterrent, but slavery it is not. It does contrast starkly with our unfair bankruptcy laws.

re Sepulveda and 16 Cent debates on Native Americans.

I believe that Sepulveda lost the debate, and the Emperor Charles V decided in favour of his opponent, Bartolome de las Casas.

In America, though, it was another matter.

I'm from South Africa where apartheid was probably just another form of institutionalised slavery. There, too, the biblical fanatics who instituted apartheid under their warped religious views opposed any kind of evolutionary thinking. In many schools, it was only after the country's first multiracial elections and the new government of national unity that evolution was allowed to be taught.

So that probably supports your argument.

Here's a thought (for comments - I'm not wedded to it):

Creationism, not just the 20th century "literalist" type, but any type that deliberately misrepresents science (and y'all know that I think ID is most obnoxious in that respect), and defense of slavery, share a common "ancestor" of authoritarianism. IOW, thinking of it more in terms of political ideology rather than religion, it's not conservatives, but the "authoritarian right" that mostly defends anti-evolution pseudoscience. I don't mean that all current authoritarians would defend slavery, but I bet that more than a few would if it weren't "political suicide".

Interesting thesis Matt. If true, I wonder why Creationism seems to be as rampant in the non-slave Northeast, Midwest, and California and it is in Texas and the South?

The Hebrew Bible makes it abundantly clear in Deuteronomy, three thousand years ago, that a slave, including one not of your own people, cannot be held against his will. If he escapes from his master you must NOT return him, instead he shall live with you under your protection [...] The Hebrew EVED is unfortunately mistranslated (by those ignorant Christians, of course) as "slave". It really means "worker" or "servant" from the word AVODA which means "to work".

— Carol Clouser

The nation where there is much "evolution denial" is also "the country with the greatest scientific establishment the world has ever seen" (Darwinist Michael Ruse's words).

Seems like Darwinism (NS+RM) is irrelevant for science.

I'll go along with the people that pointed to econ/education here. Not only does the "Bible Belt" have a southern droop, it also girds some of the poorest states with the worst education. It seems to me that it's nearly always useful to consider political and "moral" developments in light of economics..and the south certainly got stepped on.

I think most people would agree that economic change and concurrent educational investment would go a long way towards easing the fanaticism in the Middle East. With that in mind, if I look at the U.S., I think I can safely say that the south and plains states--combine weakened economies and fundamentalism. Oregon and Michigan..I think I can make a case there...and California has some hard-core fundamentalists, but ...more than a few of these are the descendants of dust bowl migrants from the Bible Belt, per Steinbeck. Especially in (central) Northern Calif.

There's certainly other historical factors that come into play, but my view remains that the ideology of fundamentalism simply masks a drive for politico-economic power. Nothing new there, but the odd thing to me is that in the States, fundamentalism is being driven in new ways by religious alliances and new modes of communicating and enforcing agreed-on standards of thought and strategies that draw in large numbers of believers in economically stable regions. That's my two cents worth.

The nation where there is much "evolution denial" is also "the country with the greatest scientific establishment the world has ever seen" (Darwinist Michael Ruse's words). Seems like Darwinism (NS+RM) is irrelevant for science.

The other reason why the US gave rise to both fundamentalism and "liberal churches" is because both were antiestablishment wrt where they came from in Europe.

Seems like you have trouble connecting the dots in the arguments you make. What's your point?

— ben

Comment #109203 Posted by Fuchsia Popper on June 29, 2006 06:38 AM (e) So what you mean is that the Hebrew Bible makes it clear in Deuteronomy that a servant (including one not of your own people), cannot be held against his will. In which case Steve Allen would be quite right to claim that not a single religion in the world condemned slavery until recently, no? Perhaps I'm an ignoramus who has missed your point...

GuyeFaux, I wasn't talking about American Anthropology, I was talking about a 19th century vogue in the US for an admittedly old idea that came to be called The American School of Anthropology. Outside of Bob Jones University, I don't think it's taught much any more, so I'm not casting aspersions on anthropologists. Some of my best friends, etc.

Yes, I know it's old, but most of the rest of the world had given up on it by the 1800's. This thread is about precisely such kinds of (unfortunate) American exceptionalism.
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Pierre Yardin: IIRC, there was a radical branch of the Dutch Church that taught a radical form of predestination in which skin-color indicated whether or not you were saved. This may or may not have influenced the early Mormons, who taught the same thing until some time in the 20th c.
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... I was talking about a 19th century vogue in the US for an admittedly old idea that came to be called The American School of Anthropology.

Can you please provide a link? I'm curious.

... I was talking about a 19th century vogue in the US for an admittedly old idea that came to be called The American School of Anthropology.

It would be an exaggeration to say that the growing literalism was caused by the need to justify slavery alone, but the fact remains that what we call the Bible belt corresponds very closely with the slave-holding states of the antebellum South. Arguably, then, the US differs from Europe, Canada, and Australia because biblical literalism and hence evolution denial are the continuing legacy of slavery and racism.

Heyrman concludes that evangelicals initially stood outside and often in opposition to white southern culture. They were often served by a new generation of peoples' preachers--young males, burdened by spiritual zeal and testosterone, who challenged the power structures of both church and society. These preachers appealed to a predominately female constituency, Heyrman says, and initially offered women an expanded voice in religious affairs. Evangelical commitments often divided families, setting nonevangelical members against the newly converted. A concern for spiritual liberation led many evangelicals to oppose slavery. But with the Revolutionary War and the expansion of the frontier, evangelicalism made itself more palatable to southerners, modifying its position on women's roles, slavery and religious institutions. By the early 1800s, evangelicalism was adapting itself institutionally and theologically to southern society....

Amazon.com It seems almost a given in the South these days that Christian conservatism is the rule rather than the exception. This part of the United States is, after all, the "buckle" of the Bible Belt. In her surprising history, Southern Cross, Professor Christine Leigh Heyrman shows that Evangelical Christianity was not always as popular in the South as it is today. In fact, the whole face of Evangelicalism has changed radically since its introduction in the 18th century. For example, early teaching and practice resoundingly opposed slavery, class privilege, and the traditional roles of men and women. Evangelicals encouraged women's involvement in church affairs and--even worse--spiritual intimacy with other races. These unpopular political and social stands combined with their unbending view of hellfire and damnation placed Evangelicals on the margins of Southern religious practice until they themselves were "converted" to a different set of traditional values. Heyrman's book traces the evolution of Southern Evangelism from fringe movement to possessor of the Southern soul. In the span of a century, Evangelicalism began adopting Southern values, and a sect that had earlier preached against slavery and violence began defending both slaveholding and succession from the Union and the use of force in these ends, if necessary. The story of Christianity in the South is a fascinating one, and Southern Cross tells it well. From Library Journal Heyrman (history, Univ. of Delaware) traces the development of evangelical Christianity in early Southern history, from Colonial days to the early 19th century. The author shows how the primarily Methodist and Baptist evangelicals were able to overcome strong resistance to become a predominant force in Southern culture. Young and inspired preachers, fear of the devil, signs and wonders, and an appeal to the most disadvantaged members of society brought initial success. Later, a movement toward patriarchal church and family structures and racial separatism helped the radical movement establish a permanent niche for itself. Both strands of this heritage continue to have influence. The author points out the importance of understanding this powerful heritage when analyzing modern trends in conservative Protestantism. A fascinating work; recommended for public and academic libraries.

Can you please provide a link? I'm curious.

The American School of Anthropology -- a school of thought which used morphology as the basis for distinguishing racial types and argued for a polygenetic theory of racial origins -- was centered in Philadelphia, and there is a considerable number of Samuel Morton's manuscripts and correspondence in the Library's collections.

Thanks for the link; interesting.

So the American School of Anthropology was based on unilinial evolution, which lasted up until Boas et al, at the end of the 19th c.

I wonder then, if social darwinism is what the fundies objected to. This would imply that they were cultural descendents of their African slaves; I suppose this was unpallatable.

I suppose it's not a far stretch to go from:

"I refuse to accept that I am the cultural descendent of a slave race"

to

"I refuse to accept that I am descended from monkeys."

In which case I would agree with this post.

Moses, regarding Steve Allen and "religions" that did or did not condemn slavery -- various sects of christianity are not "religions." The religion is christianity; there are sects within that religion. I doubt that Allen meant to imply that no individuals of any religion condemned slavery, or even that no groups within a given religion did so. I am not quite in agreement that early judaism "condemned" slavery, despite your reading of the text. Not returning a slave is not the same thing as condemning slavery. I also suspect that the translation of slave, serf, servant or other related terms is not as clearcut as you indicate.

I have always enjoyed Panda's Thumb, but I am really starting to think that the site could use a historian. The original point that Mr. Young made -- that the strength of the biblical literalist movement "may well be traced to the legacy of slavery" -- is breathtaking in its scope and in its inattention to historical sources and debates.

Rather than submit a tome, I would simply point out that George Marsden, Ferenc Szasz, and others have shown the degree to which Fundamentalism (as opposed to conservative Protestantism and evangelicalism) grew among the educated middle-classes of the urban and suburban northeast, west, and midwest in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Some examples: Dwight Moody, who served as an inspiration for many of the men and women who engaged in this movement, established the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago. Aimee Semple McPherson worked out of Los Angeles, and _The Fundamentals_ were bankrolled by an industrialist based in California.

Slavery and racism existed hand-in-hand, and it is no accident that the region of the country where racism proved most virulent, even in the wake of emancipation, also saw dominant social institutions support institutionalized racism. Christianity was conservative in the South, true, but our sense that Fundamentalism is primarily a rural, Southern movement emerged as a result of the Scopes trial in 1925; it was not its cause.

I think you may be looking at two effects -- slavery and conservative religious belief in biblical inerrancy -- and hypothesizing a relationship that frankly ignores most historical evidence.

I am enjoying the comments, though.

In the new book, "American Theocracy", Kevin Phillips develops a strong case for something very similar to what Matt posted. But his claim is that the South's emotional and spiritual recovery process after losing the Civil War caused a general religious, intellectual and cultural polarization between the North and the South that has never been reconciled. It's what happened after the Civil War that is pertinent to this topic, not what happened before or during. He feels that the polarization effect of the healing process was so strong as to create an actual ethnic group out of the South as compared to the North.

He traces the history of Evangelism from colonial times to the present and shows how the two Great Awakenings along with the South's postbellum attempt to redefine itself has led to such things as the present day Southern Baptist Convention, which is the axis on which the Southern culture revolves. There is a very strong anti-intellectualist component that along with Biblical Literalism in the SBC (and related denominations) and its influence is growing rapidly northward.

Phillips is an ex-Republican strategists and has written a number of prescient books in the past about the rise of Conservative politics. He has had it right each time. This time, however, he has gone from being a conservative republican strategist, insider, and supporter, to being a fierce critic and alarmist about the direction conservative forces are taking the country. The book is both scholarly and chilling.

Matt Young is on to something very important here in identifying the Civil War as a major factor in the uniqueness of the Creationist movement in the US. Don't shoot the messenger. I strongly recommend anyone who is interested in this notion to read this extremely well researched book by Kevin Phillips.

A question to pique your interest: "From what region of the country have the last four presidents come from?"

I also have to throw my weight on the eduction side - specifically literacy. The whole concept of a "literal" reading of any book, especially one from a different era and culture which has been translated multiple times, requires a fairly low level of literacy. Literate people know that reading is always interpretive.

I believe the civil war is connected to modern biblical literalism. This is not to say that literalism began in the south or is due to slavery. Biblical literalism evolved, and the south proved to be a natural breeding ground.

Literalism is a standard mutation of the theology, it continues to pop-up from time to time. In most environments it does not a beneficial mutation(enhanced survivability/acceptance of the theology) because it is opposed by several forces:

-The main branch of the religion: any change to the religion is opposed.
-Education: More educated individuals are more likely to question or analyze the literal interpretations and find contradictions they are unable to resolve.
-Diversity: General exposure to different ideas tends to question the absolute certainty demanded by literalists.

Leading up to and following the civil war there are a number of forces which made the environment more favorable to literalism allowing it to thrive:

-Slavery: Slavery had become an essential part of the economy. Literalism was used to justify slavery and was therefore more acceptable.
-Racism: Racism which was almost a necessary corollary to slavery and was thriving. Literalism was used to justify racism as well.
-Separatism: As the south was seeking to secede from the union, religious separatism was more viable mitigating any influence from the main stream of the church which did not favor literalism.
-Poverty: Post civil war the southern economy was severely depressed (from the loss of slavery, the cost of the war, and reparations demanded by the north). Poverty is a natural suppressor of education and diversity (population tends to avoid moving to depressed regions). Poverty also acts to promote religion in the general sense (people are more susceptible to promises for the afterlife, when there present lives are unpleasant).

I suppose the views of the LDS Church on the subject might be instructive, given that a certain amount of racial inequality seems to be written into their scriptures. If they are equally vehement about opposition to evolution, it might be a point in your favor.

That said, as a Sociologist, I get the shudders whenever people make these sorts of cultural arguments.

A question to pique your interest: "From what region of the country have the last four presidents come from?"

GuyeFaux, I didn't learn about it on the web. In fact, I remember reading about it under a Jamaican anthro prof back before I even had an email address!

It would be interesting to see what materials have graduated to the web.
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Oops, Coulter was born in NYC and grew up in New Canaan, not New Haven.

I am not sure if you can blame "Biblical literalism" entirely for slavery in the US, although cf. Dagobert Runes, as you point out not all religious folk opposed slavery -- many religious folk supported slavery and religious opposition to slavery seems to be a consequence of the secularization of religion. If Biblical literalism were responsible for slavery wouldn't the slaves be freed every so often as per the requirements of the Bible. And how did they get that Hamite = Black = should be enslaved? Miriam was stricken with "leprosy" (not Hansen's disease, FWIW) in part for criticizing Moses' marrying of a Black woman. Wouldn't a Biblical literalist using the Bible to justify slavery of Blacks be a bit afraid of being also so stricken?

There is a link between opposition to evolution and slavery, though. The issue, as Michael Lind points out in Made in Texas is that the confederacy is a lost cause and opposition to evolution is also a lost cause and a certain kind of conservative with a martyr complex has come to dominate American political discourse -- and believes in all sorts of such lost causes (including not believing in global warming). Biblical literalism was not caused by the need to justify slavery much at all -- but both had a common cause (and hence their co-occurance): the tendancy of a dying culture to embrace lost causes in the hopes of returning to a past which never really did exist (the hallmark of both Southern and today's Southern-dominated Conservativism). I don't agree with Lind entirely, but I think that Son of the South has the cultural dynamics correct.

So the American School of Anthropology was based on unilinial evolution, which lasted up until Boas et al, at the end of the 19th c.

The scientific racism movement of the mid-nineteenth century provided a number of important legacies to the eugenics movement. American scientific racism was primarily preoccupied with the attempt to establish that blacks, Orientals, and other races were in fact entirely different species of "man," which the scientific racists claimed should be seen as a genus, rather than a species. The theory that the integrity of the human species derived from the creation of one Adam and one Eve was called monogenism or specific unity; monogenists believed that the races arose as a result of the degeneration of human beings since creation. The separate races were essentially the same human material, but different races had degenerated to different extents. Polygenists, by contrast, believed that the races were created separately in a series of different creations. The separate races were entirely different animals. The mid-century theory of polygenism, or specific diversity, was one of the first scientific theories largely developed in the US and was approvingly called "the American School of anthropology" by European scientists.

I am not sure if you can blame "Biblical literalism" entirely for slavery in the US

religious opposition to slavery seems to be a consequence of the secularization of religion

Uh, did you not notice that creationism is also running rampant in places where slavery never existed? Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Kansas were all free states, in some cases militantly so.

Mark Paris,

"I am not quite in agreement that early judaism "condemned" slavery, despite your reading of the text. Not returning a slave is not the same thing as condemning slavery. I also suspect that the translation of slave, serf, servant or other related terms is not as clearcut as you indicate."

The Hebrew Bible goes much further than "condemn" slavery, it actually forbade it. You see, condemnation is cheap and easy, it is lip service, and the Bible is not a polemical document designed to issue proclamations. It is a guide for living to those who adhere to it. And the fact is that the ancient Israelites did not practice slavery.

Not returning a slave is far greater an act of rebellion against the perceived property rights of the person claiming the escapee than condemnation. It in fact abrogates the claim to those property rights.

If you find words and definitions confusing, you have no right to abuse them to make a claim. A servant is not a slave. But the real test is not in definitions but in the rules of behavior. The Biblical rules for EVED (one who works) in no way even remotely imply ownership.

According to Josephus (who was there), the Israelites were absolutely horrified on the lack of humanity and civilization demonstrated by their Roman rulers. The slaves and their treatment was one major sore point. Another was the public entertainment provided by the spectacle of watching gladiators knife each other to death or prisoners fighting animals. The Israelites pleaded with the Romans to take these practices back home, to no avail.

Make no mistake about it. History and the objective facts demonstrate the great ability of the Bible to humanize and civilize its adherents, the abuses of those who hijacked the document nonwithstanding.

Noah's curse was never interpreted by Jews (the creators and owners of the Bible) as providing a license for anyone's enslavement. First, a curse is not a license. Second, Noah is no great model of lofty behavior for anyone to emulate. Third, any such interpretation flies in the face of the Biblical statements against slavery.

Jews (the creators and owners of the Bible)

So when fundies twist the Bible around in weird ways that have nothing to do with its clear intent, can we Jews sue them for copywrite infringement?

Uh, did you not notice that creationism is also running rampant in places where slavery never existed? Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Kansas were all free states, in some cases militantly so.

— Adam

This is somewhat off task, and I will not allow an extended discussion, but I do not want to leave unrefuted the contention that the Hebrew Bible does not permit slavery. Wikipedia gives several biblical passages that refer to slavery. I looked up the first three in a Hebrew Bible: Leviticus 25:44 and Exodus 21:2,7. The first two refer to buying an 'eved or an 'amah, and the third to selling your daughter as an 'amah. 'Eved is usually rendered servant or slave, and 'amah as maidservant. The key words, however, are buy and sell: people you buy and sell are slaves.

According to these passages, slaves are inheritable; Hebrew slaves must be freed after 6 years; under certain conditions, a freed slave's wife and children may remain slaves; if he wants to keep them, a man must elect to remain a slave for life; and more.

You can read it for yourself here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bible-based_advocacy_of_slavery

Carol Clouser,

Perhaps you are the one who is confused about words; if you read my comment, you will see that I am saying that the translation of ancient Hebrew words to modern English words is not as straightforward as you seem to think. Perhaps you are not aware of the difficulty of translating words from an entirely different and essentially unrelated language from several thousand years ago into modern English.

Also, it is odd that I have to point out that the Hebrew bible was written far, far earlier than the period of the Roman Empire.

I think perhaps you and I are coming to this discussion from different perspectives. Yours appears to be one of religious evangelism. Mine is not.

So the American School of Anthropology was based on unilinial evolution, which lasted up until Boas et al, at the end of the 19th c.

— Popper's Ghost

No; perhaps you meant to say multilineal, but even then your statement isn't accurate because proponents of monogenic and polygenic views were contemporaries.

Carol writes "the Bible is not a polemical document designed to issue proclamations." I suppose her next contribution will point out that the handful who really, really understand Hebrew know that the proper translation is the "Ten Suggestions."

Sorry, I just couldn't resist.

As younger I once read one popular (astronomy?) book that claimed (from my memory)~"It has been speculated that The Leonid Meteor shower in 1866 has caused strong religiousness of citizens of USA". Beside that was a drawing where american people were stairing at falling stars (60 000 / hour!). That was predicted in Bible in couple verses as mark of end of world so that many people in US got frightened.. ?

Some googling gives: "Ellen G. White claimed that the falling stars November 13, 1833, was a fulfillment of Bible prophecy of Matthew 24:29 and Revelation 6:12,13."
I might remember wrong or both 1833 and 1866 were spectacular Leonid showers in US. Didn't Ellen G. White started 7th day adventist movement and so creationist (certain flood interpretation) movement too, did she ?

It "YES"and "YES" then this might be also another extra peculiar factor of creationism/fundamentalism origin quite unrelated to slavery or social factors..

Carol writes "the Bible is not a polemical document designed to issue proclamations." I suppose her next contribution will point out that the handful who really, really understand Hebrew know that the proper translation is the "Ten Suggestions." - Jim Harrison

Actually, from a certain Christian perspective it is not designed to issue proclamations. While for some Christians, this leads to an attitude of tolerance, this actually causes a lot of confusion in certain corners of Dominionist type Christianity: on the one hand, they want to legislate morality based on the Hebrew Bible but on the other hand they don't treat the practical aspects of Biblical law seriously, e.g. because they believe Jesus supercedes Biblical law anyway, they don't put too much effort into figuring out how to impliment Biblical law in a reasonable manner. And it's bad enough to try and, e.g., prescribe jail time for breaking religious laws in the manner of the Taliban. But at least the Taliban believe their law can be followed -- the Dominionist types want to legislate something they think no-one can actually follow! They think that it would be A-OK if everyone were a law breaker and we were all in prison!

OTOH, those who really, really understand Hebrew know that the proper translation for what is typically called "the 10 commandments" is "the 10 sayings" ... so your tongue-in-cheek remark really isn't that far off. We Jews actually believe that Jews are obligated to follow not 10 but 613 commandments (with myriad implications and details of implimentation) while the morality that everyone should follow regardless of creed may be encapsulated in the 7 categories that constitute the Noachide laws -- and not all of the 10 sayings are included in the Noachide laws which include other aspects of morality not in the 10 sayings.

The Hebrew Bible makes it abundantly clear in Deuteronomy, three thousand years ago, that a slave, including one not of your own people, cannot be held against his will.

Matt,

"This is somewhat off task, and I will not allow an extended discussion, but I do not want to leave unrefuted the contention that the Hebrew Bible does not permit slavery. Wikipedia gives several biblical passages that refer to slavery. I looked up the first three in a Hebrew Bible: Leviticus 25:44 and Exodus 21:2,7. The first two refer to buying an 'eved or an 'amah, and the third to selling your daughter as an 'amah. 'Eved is usually rendered servant or slave, and 'amah as maidservant. The key words, however, are buy and sell: people you buy and sell are slaves. According to these passages, slaves are inheritable; Hebrew slaves must be freed after 6 years; under certain conditions, a freed slave's wife and children may remain slaves; if he wants to keep them, a man must elect to remain a slave for life; and more."

Well, I cannot leave unrefuted your baseless "refutation". Perhaps the best YOU can do is consult wikipedia, but I am expert in Hebrew. First, Eved and Amah are not slaves, but servants. The Hebrew word "tikneh" does NOT mean buy but "obtain", as in "aquire the services of". Yimkor does mean "sell" but again it refers to selling services. As soon as she reaches 12 years of age, the girl can walk out on the deal as an adult. These Eveds and Amahs are not inherited against their will and if the Eved wishes to stay with his boss after the six years are up, he can stay only UP TO THE JUBILEE YEAR when he must leave, irrespective of his wishes. This is done to assure that no defacto slave-like relationships are perpetuated. No Eved can ever elect to remain for life. The previous (prior to becoming an Eved) wife and children of Eveds are not themselves in service, ever. The boss could however arrange for the Eved to get married while in service, with his consent. When the six years are over they ALL get out of service. These are the rules as derived from the Hebrew Bible thousands of years ago and as explicitely recorded by the Mishna, Talmud and Midrash.

Lenny,

If you use the Bible as a reliable source of history, then you cannot be selective about it. So you certainly know that the escaped Israelite slaves (to the Egyptians) were repeatedly attacked without provocation by various surrounding city-states. The midianites were merely one of many declared mortal enemies and this is the way they were dealt with. They perhaps over-reacted, but neither you or I were there to have a good understanding of the tensions, fears and threats. If you declare your intensions to kill, you cannot bitch when the threatened party rises up and kills or enslaves you first. But even captured-in-war virgins must be treated humanely, as specified in Deuteronomy. Go read.

They perhaps over-reacted

My refernce to common descent referred to numerous editorial cartoons cited by Hofstadter that showed a progression of mankind from ape to slave to white man. This was a common motif in early 20th century views of evolution. The modern day fact that our earliest human fossils are from Africa can only increase racist fears.

I find this thesis intriguing. More and more historians are realizing so much of what makes us unique is our history of slavery (and the mess that followed). A racialized slave class that was a minority of our population but vital to our economy has ended up with long repercussions in so many things. Our religion(s) and our slavery were linked in so many ways it makes sense to look towards this history when seeing things are also unusually American in our beliefs.

Mr. Harrison's comment was witty; Mr. Flank's was puerile. This discussion has been on a fairly high level until about now. I will delete puerile or insulting comments if necessary.

Two people (maybe 3) have disparaged encyclopedias. I love encyclopedias - where else can you get instant and generally authoritative information?

I will not argue further with Ms. Clouser, except to note that I used Wikipedia as my card catalog and then looked up the 3 passages in the Hebrew Bible (in Hebrew, not a translation, in case that was not clear in my earlier comment). To be safe, I have just looked up kanah in 2 of my Hebrew dictionaries. According to a modern Hebrew dictionary, kanah means "buy, purchase; acquire, gain (lit.)." A somewhat more archaic dictionary says, "to buy, purchase, procure; to possess, own; to create." I stand by my claim that the Hebrew Bible allows ownership of slaves. And I would add that it is not indentured servitude if you buy a slave from a third party.

May I suggest, however, that we drop this topic, since it will lead nowhere and cast no further light on the original thesis?

Ah, thanks, Terry.

I was pretty sure it was something like that, but I was having difficulty parsing.

Two people (maybe 3) have disparaged encyclopedias. I love encyclopedias - where else can you get instant and generally authoritative information?

As to the other question: The last four Presidents have been considered "Southern" presidents even though they attended Northern universities.

Just as slavery created racism, and not the other way around, it may be that it contributed to rejection of evolution. The southern whites may not have wanted to admit that they were the same as the black.

The Catholics though also supported slavery.

http://lachlan.bluehaze.com.au/books/albon_man/church_ny_irish/index.html

http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/317749.html

These are accounts of Catholic Irish race riots in NY City in 1863.

Carol, you're a true creationist. You read what agrees with you and pass it on, misinterpret what doesn't and ignore the rest. If anybody out there actually bothers to read the Bible to see what it actually says about slavery (and you don't need Hebrew for that - we have lots of translations), here's what they will find:

There are three master slave relationships described in the Old Testament:

1) A foreigner who owns a Hebrew.
2) A Hebrew who owns a Hebrew.
3) A Hebrew who owns a foreigner.

Generally, Hebrews who are owned by foreigners or fellow Hebrews get the clean end of the stick. Those are the people who have to be released during Jubilee years:

EXODUS 21:2 "If you [a Hebrew] buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve for six years; but on the seventh he shall go out as a free man without payment.

and

LEVITICUS 25:39 'And if a countryman of yours becomes so poor with regard to you that he sells himself to you, you shall not subject him to a slave's service.
40 'He shall be with you as a hired man, as if he were a sojourner with you, until the year of jubilee.
41 'He shall then go out from you, he and his sons with him(*), and shall go back to his family, that he may return to the property of his forefathers. (*) But see Exodus 21:4 below about letting him take his sons.

but that's only if he wants to go:

EXODUS 21:5 "But if the slave plainly says, 'I love my master, my wife and my children; I will not go out as a free man.'

EXODUS 21:6 then his master shall bring him to God, then he shall bring him to the door or the door post. And his master shall pierce his ear with an awl; and he shall serve him permanently.

Why would a slave "want" to stay a slave?

EXODUS 21:3 "If he comes alone, he shall go out alone; if he is the husband of a wife, then his wife shall go out with him.

EXODUS 21:4 "If his master gives him a wife, and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall belong to his master, and he shall go out alone.

So a slave whose wife and children are owned by a Hebrew has two choices: abandon his family or live as a slave forever (and get his ear pierced). Great family values! Defend marriage!

Of course, there are separate rules for female slaves:

EXODUS 21:7 "And if a man sells his daughter as a female slave, she is not to go free as the male slaves do.

EXODUS 21:8 "If she is displeasing in the eyes of her master who designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed. He does not have authority to sell her to a foreign people because of his unfairness to her.

So the female Hebrew slave is a slave for life - or until the man who bought her finds that "she is displeasing in [his] eyes" and lets her go - and, luckily for her, he can't sell her to a foreigner just because he's displeased with her.

What kind of treatment can a Biblical slave expect?

EXODUS 21:20 "And if a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod and he dies at his hand, he shall be punished.
EXODUS 21:21 "If, however, he survives a day or two, no vengeance shall be taken; for he is his property.

If you own a slave, you can beat him to death at your pleasure - so long as he "survives a day or two" after the beating. And why not? After all, he's your property! Just make sure he survives a day or two before death or you'll receive some sort of unspecified "vengeance".

On a slightly more positive note:

EXODUS 21:26 "And if a man strikes the eye of his male or female slave, and destroys it, he shall let him go free on account of his eye.

EXODUS 21:27 "And if he knocks out a tooth of his male or female slave, he shall let him go free on account of his tooth.

So you can beat your slave to death, providing he or she survives the beating by a day or two, but if you put out an eye or a tooth, you have to let them go. Biblical morality, you just can't beat it.

Now when it comes to a Hebrew who owns a foreigner, everything comes up dirty end of the stick for the foreigner:

LEVITICUS 25:44 'As for your male and female slaves whom you may have - you may acquire male and female slaves from the pagan nations that are around you.
45 'Then too, it is out of the sons of the sojourners who live as aliens among you that you may gain acquisition, and out of their families who are with you, whom they will have produced in your land; they also may become your possession.
46 'You may even bequeath them to your sons after you, to receive as a possession; you can use them as permanent slaves. But in respect to your countrymen, the sons of Israel, you shall not rule with severity over one another.

So you never have to let foreign slaves go, you own them forever, and you can bequeath them to your sons. Presumably not to your daughters, of course. And, you are specifically ordered to "not rule with severity" over your Hebrew slaves, but not a word is said about the poor foreigners. I presume they are covered by the "day or two" rule and the putting out an eye or a tooth rule, but I'd hate to be a foreign slave depending on that interpretation.

Leviticus 25:47-55 covers Hebrews purchased by foreigners:

LEVITICUS 25:47 'Now if the means of a stranger or of a sojourner with you becomes sufficient, and a countryman of yours becomes so poor with regard to him as to sell himself to a stranger who is sojourning with you, or to the descendants of a stranger's family,
48 then he shall have redemption right after he has been sold. One of his brothers may redeem him,
49 or one of his blood relatives from his family may redeem him; or if he prospers, he may redeem himself.
50 'He then with his purchaser shall calculate from the year when he sold himself to him up to the year of jubilee; and the price of his sale shall correspond to the number of years. It is like the days of a hired man that he shall be with him.
51 'If there are still many years, he shall refund part of his purchase price in proportion to them for his own redemption;
52 and if few years remain until the year of jubilee, he shall so calculate with him. In proportion to his years he is to refund the amount for his redemption.
53 'Like a man hired year by year he shall be with him; he shall not rule over him with severity in your sight.
54 'Even if he is not redeemed by these means, he shall still go out in the year of jubilee, he and his sons with him.
55 "For the sons of Israel are My servants; they are My servants whom I brought out from the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.

The Hebrew slave can be bought back by his family or himself if he can raise the money at any time, the sale price is reduced according to how long till the jubilee year when he has to be released, regardless, with his sons. Nothing is said of what happens if his sons are owned by his foreign master.

But the New Testament reverses all of this, right? Of course not! Here's the New Testament on slavery:

1 CORINTHIANS 7:21 Were you called while a slave? Do not worry about it; but if you are able also to become free, rather do that.

If you're a slave, "Do not worry about it", but if you can become free, do so. If not:

EPHESIANS 6:5 Slaves, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ;
6 not by way of eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart.

Kiss your master's backside in every possible way, "in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ".

And we mean it, too:

COLOSSIANS 3:22 Slaves, in all things obey those who are your masters on earth, not with external service, as those who merely please men, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord.

But masters, you'd better be nice to your slaves:

COLOSSIANS 4:1 Masters, grant to your slaves justice and fairness, knowing that you too have a Master in heaven.

The "survive a day or two" and "eye and tooth" rules will presumably be strictly enforced.

First Timothy underlines the "respect your masters" rule:

1 TIMOTHY 6:1 Let all who are under the yoke as slaves regard their own masters as worthy of all honor so that the name of God and our doctrine may not be spoken against.
2 And let those who have believers as their masters not be disrespectful to them because they are brethren, but let them serve them all the more, because those who partake of the benefit are
believers and beloved. Teach and preach these principles.

So if you're a Christian, you can own slaves and they had better treat you with respect or they'll be letting Christianity down. And watch that "day or two" rule!

And here's some more pro-slavery remarks from the New Testament:

TITUS 2:9 Urge bondslaves to be subject to their own masters in everything, to be well-pleasing, not argumentative,
10 not pilfering, but showing all good faith that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in every respect.

That's just about all of the pro-slavery passages from the New Testament, except for the short book of Philemon, which is a letter that Paul sends to Philemon, along with his escaped slave, whom Paul is returning to his master. Give Paul some credit, though, he includes a strong lecture on treating slaves with respect.

So Carol, any thought to why the American South became the Bible Belt. Just how did what was once the least religious part of the US turn into the Bible belt? For a big hint, try to find anything in chattel slavery, as practiced in the Old South, that is prohibited in the Bible. And do you think that just maybe, "Urge bondslaves to be subject to their own masters in everything, to be well-pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, but showing all good faith that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in every respect." and "Let all who are under the yoke as slaves regard their own masters as worthy of all honor so that the name of God and our doctrine may not be spoken against. And let those who have believers as their masters not be disrespectful to them because they are brethren, but let them serve them all the more, because those who partake of the benefit are believers and beloved." might have sounded mighty good to a slave owner?

What category do you think that African slaves in America would have fallen under? That's right, "you may acquire male and female slaves from the pagan nations that are around you." And 'Then too, it is out of the sons of the sojourners who live as aliens among you that you may gain acquisition, and out of their families who are with you, whom they will have produced in your land; they also may become your possession."

They're foreigners owned by an American. They get the dirty end of the stick.

Here's the facts: from the earliest days of colonization until the early 1800s, the American South was the least religious part of our nation. All the religious fanatics settled up north, very few settled in the South. (Or lived, if they did - the climate was hell.) This is born out by records of the number of churches per capita, church attendance, number of pastors, etc.

Slave owners were adamantly opposed to any form of education, religious or secular, for their slaves. They especially didn't want them to all get converted to the same religion, which would have been a serious force in uniting them, so they refused all requests from preachers to proselytize their slaves.

Then, in the early 1800s, there were a series of nasty, violent slave revolts. Nat Turner's was one of them most people have heard of. Needless to say, this scared the living hell out of the slave owners. The revolts were quite violent and the slaves certainly had plenty of reasons to passionately hate their masters.

So when the preachers came around again, and showed the slave owners the Bible passages I've quoted above (and many more in the same vein) and how those passages justify slavery and give God's blessing to the institutions and specifically command slaves to obey their Christian masters, the slave owners relented and turned the preachers loose on their slaves, to great success. Pretty soon, all of the slaves were at least nominally Christian.

But that brought up a new problem - the slaves couldn't help noticing that the slave owners were seldom seen to darken a church door - and the Bible isn't so clear on respecting non-Christian slave owners. The preachers went to work on the slave owners and within a decade or two, the slave owners were regular church attendees and their preachers had plenty of pleasing Bible verses to read to them, telling them just how much God approved of slavery and of slave owners. And by the time a hand full of northern Christians started arguing against slavery, the Southern (and most of the Northern, for that matter) Christians were ready to fight, armed with God's True Word that slavery was 100% Biblical and completely approved by God.

So I would say that the opening post was even more accurate than Matt Young suspected. Creationism (and it's ID variant) is Christian and Fundamentalist in nature and the Bible Belt is Fundamentalist and Christian because of slavery. So there is a very direct connection between slavery and creationism - probably even more than Matt suspected when he wrote the opening post.

By the way, if anybody is wondering why I wrote this much in response to Carol's post, it's because one of the things that really, really, really gets my goat is when someone comes along who claims to believe the Bible is the Word Of God, but what they say and write makes it very clear that they either haven't got the foggiest notion of what's actually in it - even if they can read Hebrew - or they're lying through their teeth. When I see one of those people, I assume that either they are 1)Total hypocrites or 2)Trying to scam us. Either way, I like to take the Bible and rub it in their faces. It feels good and it educates others who might have been fooled by them.

Bernarda, you probably have a point about southern whites who wouldn't want to accept the fact that blacks are the same as they are.

djmullen, you chose the nuclear option. Perhaps it was the only option left. Nice.

Cue up Carol Clouser trolling along to inform us that she and Judah Landa are the only two people on earth who are qualified to tell us what the bible really says...

People who are utterly committed to the preservation and replication of ancient memes frequently have the problem that those ideas conflict with modern beliefs about cruelty, justice, politics, and human worth.

The simplest way to deal with the resulting dissonance is to redefine the plain text of the religious beliefs, preserving their content while altering what that content is understood to mean. This permits the memes to perpetuate without forcing their holders to acknowledge their faults.

This pattern recurs in the same general way regardless of what the ancient beliefs are about -- or in some cases, new beliefs, if they conflict with overall cultural beliefs.

There is a distinct similiarity between Evolution deniers, Holocaust deniers, Biblical literalists (whether Christian or Jewish), and racial supremacists. All need to insulate their followers from noticing the quite serious conflicts between their doctrines and generally-accepted facts.

Caledonian;

You forgot:-

Global warming(meltdown) deniers.
AIDS deniers.
Imperial Oil hegemonists.
Foreskin Collectors.

Nice post, djmullen. I think that pretty much puts the hammer down on the Bible and slavery.

Nit-picking about the slave/servant distinction is moot. A servant who's your property is a called a slave.

Please no more comments on slavery in the Bible and no more wisecracks. Let us keep on task.

What happened to Kevin from NYC's comments about Lenny? I thought they were accurate and insightfull.

That said, as a Sociologist, I get the shudders whenever people make these sorts of cultural arguments.

Well, Steve Allen is a pedestrian ignaramus [sic] who just doesn't know what he is talking about. This is pure, unmitigated ignorance which I suspect you share, Matt.