She was one of a few members of the church in Jerusalem to be recorded by name (Acts 12.12–15). Rhoda, a slave, knew Peter well enough to recognize him immediately when he unexpectedly came to the door. Funerary inscriptions also indicate enduring relationships between slaves and slave owners. In funerary inscriptions, slaves referred to each other as family members and friends. Slaves who were part of the same household lived, worked and relaxed together. For instance, how did the earliest Christians experience the unity of slaves and free people in Christ? How did they understand the exhortations for Christians to humble themselves and serve (or ‘be enslaved to’) each other? What did freedom in Christ mean for Christians who were enslaved to human owners?Ĭaryn sets out the social reality of slavery in the Empire, and then gives a whole chapter to exploring the experience of slavery. Therefore, we do not wonder what the gospel message meant for slaves, freed slaves and slave owners. When a story or letter does not identify a person as ‘slave’ or ‘free,’ we do not ask about their status, or how that status affected their daily life. A person’s status determined their legal rights (or lack of rights), their ability to protect their own bodies against abuse and their capacity for social honour.Īlthough slavery was pervasive in the world of the New Testament, it is often invisible to us. ‘Slave,’ ‘freed slave’ and ‘freeborn’ were fundamental categories of identity. According to Gaius, a second-century Roman lawyer, ‘The principal distinction made by the law of nature is this, that all human beings are either free people or slaves’ (Institutes 1.9). These references help us see just how common slavery was in the world of the earliest Christians. The imagery of slavery described a person’s relationship to sin and to God (John 8.33–36 Rom 6.16–20). Slaves, freed slaves and slave owners worshipped together in early church communities (1 Cor 7.21–23 1 Tim 6.1–2 Philemon 15–16). In the New Testament, slaves guarded doors (Acts 12.13–14), managed their owners’ wealth (Matt 25.14–30), prepared feasts and more (Luke 15.23).
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