The Bible and Slavery - Enslavement

Enslavement

In the Ancient Near East, captives obtained through warfare were often compelled to become slaves, and this was seen by the law code of Deuteronomy as a legitimate form of enslavement, as long as Israelites were not among the victims; the Deuteronomic Code institutes the death penalty for the crime of kidnapping Israelites to enslave them.

Yet the Israelites did not get involved in distant or large scale wars, and apparently capture was not a significant source of slaves. The Holiness Code of Leviticus explicitly allows participation in the slave trade, with non-Israelite residents who had been sold into slavery being regarded as a type of property that could be inherited. Foreign residents were included in this permission, and were allowed to own Israelite slaves.

It was also possible to be born into slavery. If a male Israelite slave had been given a wife by his owner, then the wife and any children which had resulted from the union would remain the property of his former owner, according to the Covenant Code. However, the text does not specify the wife's nationality, and Baptist theologian John Gill (1697–1771), referenced Jarchi (Rashi) as holding that this refers to marriage to a Canaanite woman, as a concubine. 18th century theologian Adam Clarke stated that there was an Israelite law instructing that if an Israelite slave "had children by a Canannitish woman, those children must be considered as Canaanitish only, and might be sold and bought, and serve for ever."