The fact that slavery was not condemned in the New Testament has disturbed many sincere Christians. I for one wish, for our benefit, that first century Christianity had specifically condemned that vile institution. However, by all historical accounts, slavery was an accepted and ingrained element of the economy and social structure of that day and former times. People even sold themselves into slavery to pay off debts. And though the Bible does have some rules regarding slavery, such as Jews could not enslave fellow Jews, it primarily deals with slave holding in an indirect way. In Paul's letters regarding the way a Christian is to live, he stresses a fair treatment of slaves and that Christian slave owners practice their faith in managing slaves as well as every other aspect of their lives. And in early Churches slaves and masters worshiped as equals. I would like to see more verification of this but supposedly there were churches where the slave may hold a higher position in the local congregation that the master.

Although the early Christian church did not specifically forbid the ownership of slaves it did present teaching that become a basis for Christians and other honorable and intelligent people to reject the principle of one human being claiming ownership of another.