Tom Holland vs AC Grayling: The Christians who ended slavery

Tom Holland debates atheist AC Grayling on whether Christians were responsible for the abolition of the slave trade.


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[onionbelly_]

If Christianity truly shaped the Western world to value equality to the extent Holland is suggesting, the transatlantic slave trade shouldn't have happened in the first place.

[chzzyg]

The extreme number of Black Christian churches must've just happened by coincidence.

[colinmatts]

For the 1200 years or so that Europe and the American colonies were Christian theocracies, slavery was practiced with impunity. Once the enlightenment dawned in the eighteenth century, and societies dared to creep out from under the yoke of religion, they suddenly realised slavery was immoral and unconscionable. Sadly, religions still had enough influence to ensure that, even though black people could no longer be enslaved, they would still be segregated and oppressed for another hundred years.

[tofu_golem]

If Christianity caused the end of slavery, why did it take 1800 years?

While I am glad for every abolitionist, anyone who thinks Christianity supports abolitionism has obviously not read the Bible.

[stefandavenport]

*Japan abolished slavery in 1590 CE and **_never heard_** of Allah, Jesus, OR Yahweh* ; christianism had NOTHING to do with emancipation.

[CRAEager]

Alternative title: "Tom Holland DESTROYS A. C. Grayling (on the Enlightenment's fundamentally Christian premises)".


(Edit: I am joking, or at least comically exaggerating, in this comment.)

[woff]

He's wrong. Slavery was outlawed in most of Europe by the year 1, 000!

[karcharias]

Actually Christianity abolished slavery TWICE. The first time Christianity abolished slavery was before the advent of Islam. The ancient world as it Christianized and followed Paul instructions abolished slavery back then. The Apostle Paul laid out a plan that would successfully abolish slavery via an ethic of how to treat each other. He wanted to non-violently abolish slavery and as people converted and followed Paul's instructions slavery was done away with. Islam brought it back and worse then before because where as the old slavery was non-racial and was mostly indentured servitude the new Islamic variety was chattel slavery and introduced a colorization to it that had never existed before.

[cygnusustus]

"It's so clear that the anti-slavery movement was an evangelical one."
Nope. Not at all. It is so clear that those evangelicals who opposed slavery did so based upon humanist values, not biblical values. Nothing in the Bible condemns slavery.
Tom Holland knows this. He is simply being dishonest.

[hjc]

William Wilberforce
Hannah Moore
John Newton

[elvancor]

"Cool, we're getting smarter each generation. Let's check our beliefs! Sun revolves around Earth? Well, that doesn't make sense."
_"I agree. None at all."_
"Slavery? That's a bunch of hogwash."
_"Yup, gotta go."_
"Vampires? Those are a myth I think."
_"The mythiest of myths, yes."_
"Creationism? Nope, we know better now."
_"Obviously not how God works."_
"Oh yeah, that reminds me. Religion? We're growing out of that as well."
_"Now hold on, you can't do that!"_
"...Why not?"
_"The people who abolished slavery were Christians!"_
"Uh... so? I suppose they believed a lot of things we'd deem silly by now."
_"No no no, you don't understand. They came to understand that owning another human as property is wrong because of Christianity!"_
"You mean that book that says it's okay to own people as property?"
_"You're taking that out of context and it's not meant to be taken literally I've decided!"_
"Look, I thought we were just progressively getting rid of silly nonsense our ancestors held on to."
_"Yeah, but I suddenly don't like where this is going!"_

[_reborn]

Damn I thought you got Spider-Man on this

[kevinmcinerney]

I get the sense here that Tom Holland is struggling to stretch the fabric of his thesis a little desperately here, in order to cover the plot holes.

[stefandavenport]

*While the Apostle Paul CONDONED slavery* at Ephesians 6:5 " Slaves, be obedient to your masters.." Emperor Wang Mang of 1st Century China abolished slavery entirely, even if for a short while, till his death.
Other cultures were far more moral than the lowly bible standards.

[bobbyuk]

Don't let your kids attend Greylings university. It's expensive, full of privileged students and was described by one Oxbridge academic as "Jamie's college"
Greyling is a fraud, as we can see by his fundamental lack of historical knowledge.
But he is comical!

[IsaiahSellassie]

Mr. Grayling, in America, around 10% of the Africans have always been free. It absolutely was possible for blacks to achieve manumission, as well as a position of high responsibility. Have you ever heard of Crispus Attucks?

[stefandavenport]

*Solon the Lawgiver abolished debt slavery in 6th Century BCE Greece* while the *Mosaic Law* at Exodus 21:7 allowed a father to sell his own daughter into debt slavery ; again, other NON Abrahamic cultures were superior to bible "values".

[xanderduffy]

The entire point of the Gospel message was explicitly about slavery.

Jesus saw the entire world were slaves. They were in bondage to their own sin and the lusts of their flesh, and the pride of life underpinning mostly everything being done - including ofcourse, slavery as defined in this video.

The gospel was repent, which come from the Greek word metanoia, meaning the changing of the mind.

He came to set the captives free. For we are all of us in bondage to our own wee depravities. Its just his view of slavery is radically different, and of more import than anyone elses.

[godking]

Industrialization. All pre industrialised societies permitted slavery to some degree. No industrialised ones did.

[Frederer]

I'd rather just listen to Tom Holland, thank you very much.