time of the patriarchs, and whatever conclusions may be drawn from the fact that they held slaves, it cannot be held that they originated the system. It was a system which they doubtless found in existence, and they acted only in accordance with the customs of all the surrounding nations. In order now adequately to understand what was the real character of the servitude which existed among the patriarchs, on which so much reliance is placed by those who attempt to sustain the system by an appeal to the Bible, it is of the utmost importance to understand what is the exact sense of the word used to designate this relation in the Scriptures. If the word rendered servant in the Old Testament necessarily means slaves in the modern sense of the term, it will do something to settle the question whether slavery as it now exists is in accordance with the will of God. It must be assumed by those who bring the example of the patriarchs in support of slavery, that the word had the same signification then which it has now; for if the word, as used in their times, meant an essentially different thing from what it does now, it is obvious that its use furnishes no argument in support of slavery. The Greeks, accustomed to exact distinctions, and favoured with a language so refined as to distinguish the nicest shades of thought, discriminated accurately between various kinds of servitude, and designated those relations in a way which is not common in other languages. To serve in general, without reference to the manner in which the obligation to service originated, whether by purchase, by contract, by being made a captive in war, as a subject, a dependent, they expressed by the word dove-douleuo; to serve as a soldier for reward, or to serve the gods, they expressed by the word harpe-latreuo, (Passow); to serve as a domestic or household servant, under whatever manner the obligation arose, they expressed by the word oixɛrevo-oiketeuo; to serve in the capacity of a hired man, or for pay in any capacity, they ex pressed by the word mosów-misthoō; to serve in the capacity of an attendant or waiter, especially at a door, they expressed by the word izazov-hypakouō, (Passow). The proper word to denote a slave, with reference to the master's right of property in him, and without regard to the relations and offices in which he was employed, was not dovros-doulos, but åvdpárodov—andrapodon, defined by Passow, Sklav, Knecht, bes. der durch Kriegsgefangenschaft in Leibeigenschaft Gerathne'a slave, servant, especially one who as a prisoner of war is reduced to bondage.'* Hence the Greeks used the term dovλos-doulos, to express servitude in the most general form, whatever might be the method by which the obligation to service originated. They used the term åvdpárodov—andrapodon, to denote a slave regarded as property; the term duús-dmōs, also, to denote a slave as one conquered, or as primarily made by capture in war;† the terms oixɛús-oikeus, ‡ oixérys—oiketes, to denote a household servant; the term iяŋxоoç-hуpekoos, to denote an attendant, a waiter; the term μíodos―misthios, to denote a hired man, or a labourer in the employ of another; and the word aarpis -latris, to denote one who served for pay, as a soldier. That Sovos-doulos might be a slave, and that the word is most commonly applied to slaves in the classic writers, and frequently in the New Testament, no one can doubt; but its mere use in any case does not of necessity denote the relation sustained, or make it proper to infer that he to whom it is applied was bought with money, or held as property, or even in any way regarded as a slave. It might be true also that the various terms doulos, dmos, andrapodon, oiketes, and possibly hypekoos, might all be applied to persons who had been obtained in the same way-either by purchase, or by being made prisoners in war; but these terms, except those of * Comp. Prof. G. W. Becker, in the Bibliotheca Sacra, vol. ii. p. 569 † Od. i. 398; Ib. xix. 9, 333, (Crusius, Lex.) + Od. xiv. 4, iv. 245. andrapodon and dmōs, would not designate the origin of the relation, or the nature of the tenure by which the servant was bound. The words used in our language-servant, slave, waiter, hired man, though not marking the relations with quite as much accuracy as the Greek words, will indicate somewhat the nature of the distinctions. (It may be proper to add, that the word doulos, as remarked above, is frequently used in the New Testament, being found one hundred and twenty-two times ;* the word oixérys-oiketes, occurs four times, in three places rendered servant-and in one household servant: Luke xvi. 13, "No servant can serve two masters;" Acts x. 7, "He called two of his household servants;" Rom. xiv. 4, "That judgest another man's servant;" and 1 Pet. ii. 18, "Servants, be subject to your masters;" the word uioscos-misthios, occurs in Luke xv. 17, 19, in both places rendered hired servants,-"How many hired servants of my father's," "Make me as one of thy hired servants;" the word ixxoos-hypekoos, occurs in Acts vii. 39, 2 Cor. ii. 9, Phil. ii. 8, in each case rendered obedient; the word aárpis-latris, does not occur, though the word harpeía-latreia, service, and harpɛvw-latreuo, to serve, frequently occur, applied in all cases to religious service; and "According to Greenfield's Schmidius, the word doulos occurs 122 times in the New Testament. Of these, 19 are parallel; and the remaining 103 may be classed as follows: 1. Applied to servants of men; [1] Of Jewish masters, [2] Of masters generally without distinction, [3] Of a Gentile master, [Mat. viii. 9,] [4] To Christians as servants of each other, [Mat. xx. 27, 2 Cor. iv. 5,] 2. To the servants of God and Christ, 3. To Christ as the servant of God, [Phil. ii. 7,] 4. To the servants of sin and Satan, 5. Used indefinitely, [Rom. vi. 16,] 6. To those under the elements of the world.' [Gal. iv.,] the word årdpárodov―andrapodon, which peculiarly denotes slavery, does not occur at all, though the correlative word årdpanodiorǹs—andrapodistes, occurs once (1 Tim. i. 10) with the most marked disapprobation of the thing denoted by it :— "The law is made for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, for whoremongers, for men-stealers, for liars," &c. The Hebrews made no such minute distinctions as the Greeks did. Their language was less cultivated, and much less adapted to express nice discriminations of thought. They used but one word, y ebědh, to express all the relations of servitude-somewhat as the word servant is used in the slaveholding states of our own country. Among the Hebrews, however, the word was used as expressing, with propriety, the relations sustained; in a slaveholding community it is adopted as a mild term to avoid the use of the odious and offensive term slave. Осса The Hebrew words ay ebědh, my abōdhâ, and ăbăddá, rendered commonly servant, service, and servants, (Job i. 3,) are derived from a ábădh, meaning to labour, to work, to do work. It occurs in the Hebrew Scriptures some hundreds of times in various forms of the word, and is never rendered slaves, but commonly servants, and serve. sionally the words derived from the verb are rendered bondman, or bond-servant, Lev. xxv. 39, 42, 44; Josh. ix. 23; 1 Kings ix. 22. The verb and the nouns derived from it are applied to any and every kind of service or servitude which one can render to another. The ideas of working for another, ministering to another, being bound to another, being tributary to another, offering homage to another, will all be found embraced in this word. The essential significations in the use of the word are (1.) to labour or work, without respect to the question who it is for, and (2.) to render service to another; that is, to be subject to him, and to act with reference to his will. In accordance with this, the word, in various forms, is used to denote the following kinds of service: (1.) To work for another, Gen. xxix. 20, xxvii. 40, xxix. 15, xxx. 26, 1 Sam. iv. 9. (2.) To serve or be servants of a king, 2 Sam. xvi. 19, Gen. xl. 20, xli. 10, 37, 38, 1. 7, Ex. v. 21, vii. 10, x. 7. (3) To serve as a soldier, 2 Sam. ii. 12, 13, 15, 30, 31, iii. 22, viii. 7, et saepe. (4.) To serve as an ambassador, 2 Sam. x. 2-4. (5.) To serve as a people; that is, when one people were subject to another, or tributary to another, Gen. xiv. 4, xv. 14, xxv. 23, Isa. xix. 23, Gen. xv. 13, ix. 26, 27, xxvii. 37. (6.) To serve God, or idols, Ex. iii. 12, ix. 1, 13, Deut. iv. 19, viii. 19. Under this head the word is often used in the sense of the servant of JEHOVAH,' applied (a) to a worshipper of the true God, Neh. i. 10, Ezra v. 11, Dan. vi. 21, et saepe; (b) a minister, or ambassador of God, Isa. xlix. 6, Jer. xxv. 9, xxvii. 6, xliii. 10, Deut. xxxiv. 5, Josh. i. 1, Ps. cv. 26, Isa. xx. 3. (7) The word is often employed to denote a servant, whether hired, bought, or inherited,—one who was involuntarily held to service to another. In this sense it is frequently used in the laws of Moses; for all the kinds of servitude which are referred to there, are designated by this term. As already observed, the Hebrews did not make distinctions between the various kinds of service with the accuracy of the Greeks. So far as I have been able to ascertain, they made no distinctions of that kind, except that in later times they made use of one other term besides y ebědh, which was T sâkir, one hired; a hired labourer; one to whom wages was paid, Ex. xii. 45, xxii. 14, Lev. xix. 13, Isa. xvi. 14, Job vii. 1. In one passage in Job (vii. 2, 3) the two words occur in the same verse, where the distinction is marked, and yet so as, by the parallelism, to show that the persons referred to were regarded as in some respects on a level. “As a servant—y ēbědh-earnestly desireth the shadow, “And as an hireling— sákir-looketh for the reward of his work, "So am I made to possess vanity, "And wearisome nights are appointed to me.' |