Hard Sayings: Slavery, Women, and the OT
Are OT laws about slavery, women, and punishment evidence of a primitive morality?
How to use this guide
This guide is built for a 45-60 minute small-group conversation about "Hard Sayings: Slavery, Women, and the OT." Open with prayer, read the framing aloud, and use the questions below to surface what people actually think before you walk through the case. Aim for honest engagement over consensus.
Facilitator tips
- Read the lesson before the meeting; you do not need to be an expert, just a guide.
- Resist the urge to fill silence. The best discussions follow long pauses.
- When someone raises an objection you cannot answer, write it down and follow up next week.
- Close with a single takeaway from each member, not a doctrinal summary.
What we're studying
The "OT is a moral monster" critique, popularized by the New Atheists, has wide cultural traction. Paul Copan's work shows the question often misreads the genre and the historical trajectory: the laws regulate and limit an existing ANE practice rather than endorsing it as ideal, and the biblical trajectory moves consistently toward human dignity and eventual abolition.
The case in brief
Three interpretive moves matter: (1) Regulation vs. endorsement. Many OT laws are concessions to a fallen context (Jesus' explicit reading of divorce in Matt 19:8: "because of your hardness of heart"). They regulate and limit practices already existing in the ANE; they do not prescribe them as ideal. (2) Comparative context. Compared to Hammurabi, Hittite, and Assyrian law codes, the OT treats women and slaves far more humanely — Sabbath rest for servants, cities of refuge, year of Jubilee. (3) Trajectory. The NT seeds that dismantle these institutions (Gal 3:28, Philemon). Abolitionists like Wilberforce argued explicitly from biblical premises. The OT's moral vision is developmental, not flat.
What if someone says...
"Even regulated slavery is slavery."
Granted. The argument is not that OT institutions were ideal — it is that they were concessive and trajectory-pointing. The question is whether the OT commends slavery as good or regulates a broken situation toward something better.
"If the trajectory is so clear, why did Christian civilizations keep slaves for 1,800 years?"
Deep moral change is slow, and Christians often failed to apply their own Scriptures. The moral logic of imago Dei eventually won — which itself is evidence of the trajectory.
Discussion questions
- What is the difference between God commanding an act and God regulating an existing practice?
- Does a developmental morality undermine or reflect God's character?
- Which texts do you find hardest to read charitably, and why?
- [Small group] Where in your own life does this question feel most pressing?
- [Small group] Who do you know that wrestles with this — and how could you talk with them about it this week?
Going deeper
- Is God a Moral Monster? Making Sense of the Old Testament GodPaul Copan · 2011 · OT ethics
- Did God Really Command Genocide?Paul Copan & Matt Flannagan · 2014 · OT ethics
- The Reason for GodTimothy Keller · 2008 · Worldview / objections