From: Thomas and Patti Bond (lpbond@coiinc.com)
Date: Fri Apr 14 2000 - 15:23:07 EDT
<x-charset iso-8859-1>I know there are diffculties that need resolved and so I won't belabor this
any further after this reply. I will just raise just two general issues.
1. Who enslaves who
The most significant difference betwen ancient slavery and the more recent
version was that Greeks and Romans, as far as I can tell, understood slaves
to be human; in US history some argued otherwise. Aristotle, for example,
may have thought of them as "tools," but nevertheless human.
As well, not just anyone could be a slave in Rome. Both Romans and Greeks
were reluctant to enslave their own.
2. Voluntary vs. involuntary service
Making this distinction, it seems to me, only highlights what would have
been considered a good from a bad slave, or as I think the Stoics and early
Christians would have argued, slaves who were "inwardly free" to serve well
as opposed to the more resistant slave.
But whether the service was rendered voluntarily or involuntarily, whatever
inner freedom was achieved, as far as I can tell the DOULOS in the Roman
Empire was always chattel, also in the Republic after the 4th century BCE,
though the life-experiences of slaves were varied. And I don't think that
servant conveys such a meaning in our culture. We have public servants, but
they are not anyone's property.
To translate "slave" as opposed to "servant" conveys the tension that
I think existed in early Christianity and is reflected in Paul's language --
that one's
"brother," by virtue of becoming Christian, could also be one's
property/slave (e.g.,
Philemon). On the one hand, there was an overturning of a social hierarchy
because of Christ. On the other hand, relationships of owner/property still
existed. However one resolves that theolgically, the tension should be
reflected in translation. In Philippians, what was Paul striving to do when
he addressed his letter as a DOULOS and made a moral appeal (I would argue
in Phil 2:5 ff) based on one who assumed the form of a DOULOS? Voluntary
service may have been the focus, which "servant" almost insists. It may
have been a matter of status, which "slave" better conveys. I would argue
for the later.
In Earnest,
Thomas Bond
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