Slavery, Concubines, and War Captives in the Bible: The Christian Double Standard

However, a closer examination of biblical texts, Christian encyclopedias, church law, and historical Christian sources proves otherwise.

Christian sources also admit that concubines were often slave women, bought women, or captives of war.

SEE PROOF HERE
Slave as Second Wife in Christianity

For your info: This scan explains that concubines in biblical usage were commonly taken from enslaved women. It mentions three sources of concubinage: slave ownership, purchase, and war captivity. This is important because it destroys the modern apologetic claim that biblical concubinage was merely normal marriage under another name. The source itself links concubinage to women of reduced status, often acquired through slavery or conquest.

For your info: This scan presents a Christian explanation of concubinage as a recognized lower-ranking marital arrangement. The key point is that the concubine was treated as lawful within the biblical framework but did not possess the same rank as a full wife. The scan is important because it shows that Christian interpreters do not deny the existence of this system; rather, they explain it as part of the social and legal order of the biblical world.

For your info: This scan continues the Christian commentary on concubinage. It reinforces the same point: a concubine could be considered legitimate in the biblical social order while remaining beneath the status of a full wife. The importance of this page is that it confirms the distinction between wife and concubine and shows that the difference was not imaginary; it had real consequences for social status and rights.

For your info: This scan records the statement that the Torah allowed a man to take a concubine or slave woman for the purpose of having children. The significance is obvious: the issue is not just historical practice, but something described as allowed within biblical law. This scan directly supports the article’s argument that concubinage was not outside the biblical system.

For your info: This scan discusses inheritance and children born from wives and slave women. The point being made is that biblical family law recognized children born through such relationships. This matters because it shows that concubinage was not a hidden or marginal practice; it entered the legal and genealogical structure of biblical society.

For your info: This scan states that female slaves could be given as concubines, as in the cases connected to Abraham and Jacob. It also notes that such women remained slaves unless they were freed. This is a crucial detail because it refutes the attempt to sanitize biblical concubinage into ordinary marriage. The woman’s status could remain servile even while she was used in a concubinage arrangement.

For your info: This scan explains that polygamy and concubinage existed in the Old Testament world and that the concubine had a lower status than the wife. It also states that the man had marital access to the concubine. This scan is central because it shows that Christian commentators themselves acknowledge the sexual and legal reality of concubinage in the Bible.

It contains laws and social arrangements in which slave women, captive women, and concubines are treated as part of the legal order.

For your info: This scan introduces the biblical laws of war captivity. It shows that the Bible distinguishes between nearby and distant cities and gives instructions for what happens when a city accepts surrender or resists. The key point is that enslavement is presented as part of the war outcome, not merely as a later human abuse outside scripture.

For your info: This scan continues the discussion of Deuteronomic warfare. The argument supported here is that biblical war law allows conquest, killing of male combatants, and the taking of women, children, and property as spoils. This is a direct counter to claims that the Bible contains no system of captivity or enslavement connected to holy war.

“Have they not found and divided the spoil? To every man a girl or two?”

For your info: This scan discusses women as part of war spoils in biblical texts. It points to the idea that captured women were counted among the spoils distributed after battle. This matters because the objection often raised against Islam is that war captivity existed; this scan shows that the same issue exists explicitly in the Bible.

For your info: This scan continues the discussion of Numbers 31 and the division of captured women. The key point is that the captives were not merely released immediately; they were divided between the warriors and the wider community. This strengthens the article’s claim that biblical law contains a formal system for distributing war captives.

For your info: This scan discusses the captive woman in Deuteronomy 21. It explains the procedure given for a warrior who desires a captive woman: she is brought into his house, given a mourning period, and then becomes his wife. The scan is important because it shows that the Bible regulates sexual access to captive women after war.

For your info: This scan continues the explanation of Deuteronomy’s law concerning captive women. The relevant point is that the woman’s entry into the household follows from military captivity. This is not a romantic modern marriage scenario; it is a legal arrangement created after conquest.

Marriage of free men to their believing slaves.

For your info: This scan is from a Christian personal-status legal source. It mentions marriage between free men and their believing slave women as a disliked but permissible type of marriage. The importance of this page is that the discussion is not only ancient biblical narrative; later Christian legal literature also dealt with slave women as a recognized legal category.

A Christian who has a concubine — a slave — and has given birth to a child from her may not marry another woman except if she has committed adultery.

For your info: This scan from the Coptic Laws of Hippolytus discusses a Christian man who has a concubine or slave woman and has a child from her. The ruling treats that relationship as having legal consequences, including restricting his ability to marry another woman unless adultery occurs. This proves that concubinage was not simply dismissed as irrelevant or impossible in Christian legal memory.

For your info: This scan states that concubinage or slave-concubinage was known among Christians and that a Spanish synod allowed such a man to receive the sacrament if he remained faithful to the concubine as to a wife. This is significant because it shows church-level accommodation of concubinage rather than a simple universal condemnation.

“Go and lie in wait in the vineyards and watch. When the daughters of Shiloh come out to dance, then come out of the vineyards and catch each of you a wife from the daughters of Shiloh and go to the land of Benjamin.”

For your info: This scan presents Judges 21, where men are instructed to lie in wait and seize women from Shiloh as wives. The argument here is that the Bible contains a narrative in which women are taken through seizure, not through ordinary consent-based marriage. This is used as a counterexample to Christian polemics that act as if biblical marriage law is morally simple and free from such issues.

For your info: This scan continues the Judges 21 passage and its explanation. It reinforces that the daughters of Shiloh were taken in a situation of tribal crisis and used to provide wives. This matters because it shows that biblical narratives themselves include seizure of women as a solution to social and tribal problems.

“If a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the slaves go out.”

For your info: This scan discusses Exodus 21:7, where a father sells his daughter as a slave. The key point is that this female slave does not go out like male slaves, because her case is connected to marriage or concubinage with the master or his son. This is one of the strongest biblical texts showing the legal sale of a girl into a household arrangement involving sexual or marital expectations.

For your info: This scan discusses the taking of captives and spoils as part of biblical warfare. It frames the spoils as something granted after victory. This scan supports the argument that biblical war law includes property, captives, and distribution as part of the divinely regulated aftermath of war.

For your info: This scan continues the discussion of biblical spoils and captives. The relevant point is that the biblical framework does not merely mention spoils in passing; it contains laws and examples where captives, women, children, animals, and goods are counted and distributed. This is central to exposing the double standard of attacking Islamic law while ignoring biblical law.

For your info: This scan introduces examples of concubinage in the Bible. It functions as a reference page collecting biblical cases where concubines appear as part of family, inheritance, or sexual arrangements. The scan helps transition from general legal principles to concrete biblical examples.

For your info: This scan continues listing biblical examples of concubinage. The important point is cumulative: concubinage is not a rare accidental detail in the Bible. It appears repeatedly across patriarchal, royal, and legal contexts, making it impossible to claim that the Bible has no relationship to concubinage.

For your info: This scan discusses Christian theological acceptance of slavery, especially through the idea that slavery resulted from sin and human corruption. It also mentions New Testament commands for slaves to obey their masters. The scan is important because it moves the argument from Old Testament law into Christian reception and interpretation.

A slave must serve his master well with the fear of God even if his master is disobedient or immoral.

For your info: This scan introduces the slavery law in Leviticus. It points to the biblical distinction between Israelite brothers and foreign slaves. This is significant because Leviticus allows the acquisition of male and female slaves from surrounding nations and treats them as inheritable property.

For your info: This scan continues the Leviticus slavery law. The core point is that foreign slaves could be acquired, possessed, and passed down as inheritance to children. This is one of the clearest biblical legal endorsements of permanent slave ownership.

“But you, servants, submit to your masters, as to the Lord, with reverence and fear.”

For your info: This scan discusses the Didache and its instruction to servants or slaves to submit to masters as to the Lord, with fear and reverence. The point is that early Christian literature did not simply command abolition. It often taught obedience within the slave system.

For your info: This scan states that Christianity accepted slavery as a social reality and instructed slaves to obey their masters. It cites several New Testament passages and also mentions Philemon, where a runaway slave is returned. This scan is essential because it shows that the New Testament does not abolish slavery; it regulates behavior within it.

For your info: This scan discusses the Church Fathers and their treatment of slavery as an inevitable result of sin or corrupted human nature. It names major figures such as Augustine, Chrysostom, Ambrose, and Gelasius. The page supports the argument that Christian tradition did not uniformly reject slavery; many influential theologians accepted or regulated it.

For your info: This scan introduces the biblical law of spoils. It discusses the division of captured property and people after battle. The importance of this scan is that it shows the Bible does not merely record spoils as an accidental historical event; it contains instructions for how they are to be divided.

For your info: This scan continues the biblical law of spoil distribution. It supports the point that the captured goods and captives were divided between different groups, including warriors and the wider community. This is part of the article’s argument that biblical holy war includes formalized captivity and distribution.

For your info: This scan adds further evidence on the division of spoils. The cumulative argument is that the biblical system included captives, goods, animals, and women within the spoils of war. It strengthens the response to anyone pretending that such ideas are uniquely Islamic.

For your info: This scan continues the same discussion. It reinforces that biblical spoils were treated with legal precision, including distribution shares. This matters because a structured distribution system means the practice was not merely tolerated chaos; it was regulated as part of biblical war law.

“And you shall eat the spoil of your enemies which the Lord your God has given you.”

For your info: This scan discusses Deuteronomy’s statement about consuming the spoil of enemies that God gives. The page is used to show that the Bible presents spoils as something divinely granted after warfare. This includes the broader context of property and captives taken from defeated enemies.

For your info: This scan continues the discussion of Moses ordering the division of spoils. It supports the claim that biblical law distributed captured goods and captives between soldiers and the people. The point is direct: the Bible has its own laws of war spoils.

Sarai gave Hagar her handmaid to her husband, and it was permitted at this time of polygamy and concubinage.

For your info: This scan from an Orthodox Christian source discusses Sarah giving Hagar to Abraham and explains that polygamy and concubinage were permitted at that time. The scan is important because it is not an Islamic claim imposed on the Bible; it is a Christian explanation acknowledging biblical concubinage.

For your info: This scan discusses Saint Augustine’s view of slavery. It presents slavery as connected to sin, conquest, and the right of victors over the defeated. The scan is used to show that one of Christianity’s most influential theologians did not treat slavery as inherently impossible under Christian thought; he explained it through the doctrine of sin and social punishment.

I came to Ibn Umar and he had freed a slave.

He said: So he took a stick or something from the ground and said:

“There is no reward in it that is worth this, except that I heard the Messenger of God, may God bless him and grant him peace, say:

Whoever slaps his slave, or hits him, then his expiation is to free him.”

Narrated by Abdullah ibn Umar
Sahih Muslim 1657
Authentic

For your info: This scan contrasts Christian statements about disciplining slaves with the Islamic narration in Sahih Muslim that expiation for striking or slapping a slave is to free him. The point is that Islam built manumission into the response to mistreatment, while many Christian texts focused on obedience and discipline within slavery.

For your info: This scan continues the comparison between Christian treatments of slavery and Islamic manumission ethics. It supports the argument that Islamic law created multiple paths to freeing slaves and attached religious reward or expiation to emancipation.

For your info: This scan further supports the contrast between systems that normalize slave obedience and Islamic reports encouraging emancipation, especially when a slave is wronged. It belongs in the article as evidence that the Islamic moral trajectory cannot be reduced to the same framework as biblical slave inheritance and Christian slave obedience.

For your info: This scan discusses Saint Isidore of Seville and his defense of slavery. It states that he saw slavery as legitimate and necessary and even advised slaves not to seek freedom. This is a devastating citation against the idea that Christian tradition was always abolitionist or morally opposed to slavery.

For your info: This scan gives a broad summary of the Church Fathers’ acceptance of slavery. It argues that slavery was treated as legitimate, necessary, and rooted in the consequences of sin. The significance is that the problem is not just a few isolated biblical verses; it extends into Christian theological tradition.

For your info: This scan discusses Christian involvement in colonial enslavement, especially in South America. It mentions papal authorization, war against those who refused conversion, and Christian defenses of slavery through biblical texts. The scan is used to show that Christian support for slavery was not merely theoretical; it had historical and colonial consequences.

For your info: This scan discusses Saint Anselm’s reasoning concerning unbaptized children and compares it to inherited slavery. The point being made is that some Christian theological arguments treated inherited suffering and inherited servile status as rationally acceptable. This scan is used to show how deeply slavery could be justified within certain Christian theological frameworks.

For your info: This scan discusses Saint Thomas Aquinas and the idea that the simple or weak may naturally serve the strong. It links slavery to corrupted human nature and original sin. The scan closes the theological argument: major Christian thinkers did not simply condemn slavery as immoral in itself, but often explained or justified it as part of the fallen social order.

Christian sources themselves define concubines as lower-ranking women, often slaves, bought women, or captives of war.

Biblical law allows the acquisition of slaves, the inheritance of foreign slaves, the selling of daughters, the taking of captive women, and the division of spoils after war.

Christian legal and historical sources show that concubinage and slavery continued to be discussed, regulated, and accepted in Christian societies.

The New Testament does not abolish slavery. It commands slaves to obey their masters.

The Church Fathers often treated slavery as a consequence of sin, a social necessity, or a divinely tolerated order.

Therefore, the Christian polemicist who attacks Islam over slavery or concubinage while pretending the Bible is innocent has not made an argument.

He has exposed his own double standard.