Saints, siblings, soldiers … and slavery! Philemon, slavery and a way forward
On Sunday we looked at the little treasure that is Paul’s letter to Philemon and the Colossian church that met in his house. Primarily it is indeed a letter about the local church: about the deeply loving, sacrificial and missional people that form it: people Paul effectively describes as being ‘saints, siblings and soldiers’ (v2 & 5). I’m so proud of our church and the way you are seeking to live as these kinds of disciples: saints who look ‘up’ to their Heavenly Father in delight at being set apart and made holy; siblings who look ‘in’ and love each other with the deepest of familial affection; and soldiers who look ‘out’ to the hurting world in front of them and engage courageously in the mission to overcome the kingdom of darkness and advance the Kingdom of light, populating it with yet more saints and siblings in Christ. We have a long way to but we are on the right course.
Yet there is another ‘s’ that stares us in the face in this letter, a far less thrilling one: slaves. As much as we can delight at Paul encouraging Philemon to treat Onesimus ‘no longer as a bondservant [slave] but more than a bondservant, as a beloved brother’ we are still faced with several uncomfortable questions, such as, ‘why is a Christian, a church leader at that, owning slaves?’ ‘Why does Paul not simply rebuke Philemon for owning slaves, instruct him to set Onesimus free immediately and work for the abolition of slavery in the Roman Empire?’ Well, to answer these questions, we need to set the slavery of the Greco Roman world in context. The work of theologian Douglas Moo has been very helpful here and so I offer a summary of his points:
Slavery in the ancient world was not the same as something like the forced transportation and enslavement of African people to the Caribbean and North America in the 17th/18th/19th century.
Some people did become slaves by force (through war, for example) but many others voluntarily sold themselves into slavery as a means of security and employment, even status.
Nor was slavery in the Greco-Roman world racially based: slaves came from all races and ethnic groups.
It is very true that at one end of the spectrum, some Slaves served in appalling conditions like salt mines. However, at the other end, some were trusted and respected household slaves who helped run businesses and raise children
Up to one-third of the people in cities such as Colossae may have been slaves. It was so much a part of the world and socio economic system of that day that it would almost have escaped the notice of early Christians
As a result legal freedom would not, then, have been the obvious good in the first century that we would consider it to be today. It would have left many slaves facing destitution and danger.
The New Testament Christians were a tiny religious group living within an all-powerful, authoritarian empire. They didn’t have any power or even desire to influence governmental policy in a liberal democracy or globalised world!
A change in physical status was no the priority of a Christian. As another commentator states: "If a Christian owned a slave, the highest duty to which that master could be called was not to set the other free but to love the slave with the self-giving love of Christ." (as seen in the the New Testament "household codes," - Eph. 6:9; Col. 4:1; 1 Tim. 6:2).
All that said, although ending slavery is not Paul’s concern in his letter to Philemon, what he is doing is certainly opening the door to that idea. By definition, if Philemon is going to treat Onesimus as a ‘beloved brother’ in Christ in his church, he is going to completely reconfigure their relationship. As I said on Sunday, it was the sweep of Scripture that compelled Wilberforce and the abolitionists to successfully overthrow the transatlantic slave trade. The doctrine of the imago dei (recognising each human is endowed with unique value by their Creator), the prophetic call in Micah 6:8 to ‘carry out justice and love mercy’ and the command of Christ to love our neighbour and much more inspired his tireless and successful campaigning. Indeed it continues to inspire many Christians today to bring a complete end to the horrors of human slavery and people trafficking. One day, in the new heavens and the new arth, there will be no such thing ever again. In the meantime, we are called to pray for - and work for - heaven to come to earth. Perhaps you might wish to do so by supporting International Justice Mission as the bid to do just that? https://www.ijm.org/