The next example of the word "servant" brings us to that epoch in
relation to which the Harmony Presbytery of South Carolina says,
"Slavery has existed from the days of those good old slaveholders
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, (who are now in the kingdom of heaven,) to
the time when the apostle Paul sent a runaway home to his master
Philemon, and wrote a Christian and paternal letter to this slaveholder,
which we find still stands in the canon of the Scriptures."
The account we have of Abraham's servants is briefly as follows: That
he had men-servants and maid-servants, Gen. 12:16; 14:14; 17:27, (not
_slaves_, for we have shown above by numerous passages that to give such
a definition to the term "servant" is false and absurd, unless sustained
by the context or the usage of the times;) that they numbered some two
thousand persons, (reckoning by the number of fighting men among them,
generally one in five of the population,) were trained and accustomed to
arms, Gen. 14:14; could inherit property, Gen. 15:3, 4; in religious
ordinances were perfectly equal with the master, Gen. 17:10-14; had
entire control not only over the property, but also the heirs of the
household, Gen. 24:2-10; lastly, they were invariably considered as
_men_, not slaves or chattels. Gen. 24:30, 32. "And the _man_ (servant
of Abraham) came into the house, and he ungirded his camels, and gave
straw and provender for the camels, and water to wash his feet and the
_men's_ feet that were with him."
"But," it is objected, "some of these servants were 'bought with money;'
therefore they must have been possessed as 'chattel slaves.'" This
conclusion depends partly on the meaning of the Hebrew verb #KAUNAU#
_kaunau_, "to buy;" and asserts that whenever this term is applied to
persons, it implies the relation of chattel slavery. The primary
definition of the verb, given by Gesenius, is, to erect; then, 1. To
found or create; 2. To get, gain, obtain, acquire, possess; 3. To get by
purchase, to buy.
Let us see the meaning of this term, applied to persons in other
passages. In Gen. 31:15, Rachel and Leah say of their father, "He hath
_sold_ us, and quite devoured also our money," referring to Jacob's long
service for them; were they chattels? Gen. 47:23, Joseph _bought_ the
Egyptians; were they chattels? Ex. 21:2, "If thou _buy_ a Hebrew
servant, six years shall he serve, and in the seventh he shall go out
free, for nothing;" was he a chattel? Ruth 4:10, "Ruth the Moabitess
have I _purchased_ this day to be my _wife_;" was she a chattel? These
passages clearly show that the simple application of the term "bought
with money" does _not_ imply property and possession as a chattel.
The phrase "bought with money" relates, in the case of wives, to the
dowry usual in Eastern countries; in the case of servants, to the ransom
paid for captives in war, and paid by the individual on adoption into
the tribe; or to an equivalent paid as hire of time and labor for a
limited period, either to parents for their children as apprentices,
&c., or to the individual himself, as Jacob to Laban. Gen. 31:41, "Thus
have I been twenty years _in thy house_; I served thee fourteen years
for thy two daughters, and six years for thy cattle, and thou hast
changed my wages ten times." Thus Abraham could acquire a claim on the
service of a man during life by purchase from himself; could acquire the
allegiance of a man and his family, and all born in it, by contract, not
to be broken but by mutual agreement; and in a few years have a vast
household under his authority, "born in his house," and "bought with
money," yet not one of them a slave.
Another general proof already alluded to is, that the terms #EVEDH#,
"servant," and #NAAR#, _naar_, "young man," are applied synonymously
and equally to servants and free persons. Gen. 14:24, Abraham calls his
servants young men, and again in Gen. 17:23, 27. So in Job 1:15-19, the
term #NAAR# is applied alike to Job's servants and sons. Also in
Judg. 7:10; 19:3, 11, 19; 1 Sam. 9:3, 5, 10, 22, and numerous other
places, these terms are applied indiscriminately to servants, showing
that they were always regarded as men, never as chattels.
But we are not left to conjecture in regard to the status or condition
of Abraham's servants; we will bring proofs showing that it could not
have been chattel slavery.
Two of the fundamental characteristics of chattelism are, The status of
the mother decides that of the child, and The slave, being property, can
not inherit or possess property. Was this the condition of "servants" in
patriarchal society? If so, then these characteristics brand them as
chattels; but on the contrary, if no record is found of their being
sold, (the buying we have already reasonably accounted for;) if the
children of these servants were reckoned free, if they and their
children could inherit property, then even American slave law and custom
declare them free persons, and not chattels personal.
Take the case of Hagar. We read, Gen. 16:1, she was an Egyptian
"handmaid, maid-servant," perhaps one of those referred to in Gen.
12:16. Abraham, at Sarah's instigation, makes her his concubine. The
usual bickering of Eastern harems ensues. Hagar leaves the tribe, is
sent back by the angel, Ishmael is born, and this son of a slave (?) is
regarded not only as free, but heir of the house of Abraham. Years pass,
and the wild, reckless Ishmael is seen ridiculing Isaac, his puny
brother and coheir. At the sight, all the mother and the aristocrat
again rise up in Sarah, and she cries out to Abraham, "Cast out this
bondwoman and her son, for he shall not be heir with my son, even
Isaac;" and Abraham, so far from regarding them as chattels personal,
and selling them south, sends off the wild boy to be the wild, free
Arab, "whose hand will be against every man, and every man's hand
against his."
Take the case of Bilhah and Zilpah, given by Laban (Gen. 29:24, 29,) as
handmaids (#AUMAU#) to his daughters Leah and Rachel. Gen. 30:4-14.
They become Jacob's concubines, and bear him four sons--Dan, Naphtali,
Gad, and Asher. Here the case is plain; the mothers are "servants," they
have children, and these, instead of being (as in similar cases daily at
the South) "reputed and adjudged in law to be chattels personal," are
recognized as free and equal with the other sons, Reuben, Judah, &c.,
and become, like them, heads of tribes in Israel. In these cases,--and
they are all which relate to the point at issue,--either the status of
these servants _did_ or _did not_ decide that of their children. If it
_did_, then, by the laws of chattelism, the children being free prove
the mother (though servant) to be free; if it _did not_, then the mother
was held only by feudal allegiance, while the children were always free.
In either case the conditions of chattelism did not exist; they were not
slaves, but free persons in the same condition as members of wandering
Arab and Tartar tribes to this day.
Did the second fundamental condition of chattelism mentioned above
exist? The slave, being property, can not possess or inherit property.
In Gen. 15:3 we find Abraham complaining to the Lord, "Behold, to me
thou hast given no seed, and lo, _one born in my house_ is my heir!" The
same term is used here as in speaking of Abraham's other servants; and
yet this "servant" is declared by Abraham his acknowledged heir. Here
there is a manifest contradiction of the conditions of a chattel slave.
They can not inherit property; this man could; therefore he was not a
slave. It is an entirely gratuitous assumption to assert that Abraham's
dependents were slaves; for similar cases occur daily in nomadic tribes,
as formerly they did in Scottish clans. If the chief has no child
capable of succeeding him in office, he chooses from his dependents some
tried and trusty warrior, and adopts him as lieutenant or henchman, to
succeed him as heir or chief. Just so Abraham, then nearly eighty years
old, despairing of a son to take his place as chief of the tribe,
adopted some young warrior (perhaps a leader in the battle of Hobah) as
his heir, with the proviso of resigning in favor of a son if any be
born. But in the case of Jacob's four sons the conclusion is
self-evident--children of "servants" or "handmaids," yet recognized as
free like the other sons, sharing the property of the father equally
with them;--the conditions of a state of chattelism did not exist.
These things prove conclusively that the term "servant" never meant
_slave_ in patriarchal families; that the term "bought with money"
referred only to feudal allegiance or service for a time agreed on by
both parties. These servants could possess and inherit property; their
children were free; they were trained to the use of arms; in religious
matters master and servant were alike and equal; and they were always
considered and called _men_, never slaves or chattels,--all which are
directly contrary to the principles and express enactments of American
slave law, and are the characteristics of free persons even at the
South. Add to this the significant fact that not one word is said in the
patriarchal records of _selling_ any of these servants, (the only act
mentioned of selling a human being is that of Joseph by his brethren, so
bitterly reprobated and repented of by them soon after,) though
frequently bought; that no fugitive law existed, in fact could not exist
in a wandering tribe,--and the natural conclusion is, that they were not
slaves, but free men and women; and therefore the records of patriarchal
society conclusively deny the existence of chattel slaves or slavery as
one of its institutions.
Years pass, and we find the Israelites reduced to a servile condition as
the serfs of the Egyptians. God, in his purposes, allowed them to remain
thus for a time, and then, instead of sanctioning even this modified
form of slavery, demanded their instant release; and on refusal, with
terrible judgments on their oppressors, he led forth that army of
fugitive slaves, and drowned their pursuers in the Red Sea.