FATHER FRANK’S RANTS - Slavery: a Defence

Rant Number 418 3 November 2010

Selling yoursef into slavery is fundamental human right. Also, a practical and socially useful action, whose time has come. Don’t scoff – I mean business. To show it, I must set an example. Thereby the priest offers himself for purchase as a slave. No kidding. I intend to put my sale on E-bay, if they

will allow me. Pray, read on.

First, a clarification. I will mean through voluntary slavery, one which the person undergoes deliberately and willingly. Not the forced, involuntary kind you are familiar with through history, like the abominable chattel slavery of American plantations. Similarly, forget race. Reading the Revd Dr Richard Furman, who in 1838 defended slavery in an exposition to the Baptist Convention of South Carolina, might make your blood boil. Because he infamously upheld the servitude of Africans. But race and ethic considerations are irrelevant to the slavery I argue for. My voluntary salves can be as pink-skinned, blond and as Aryan as most Swedes and Danes. So race does not come into my proposal at all.

Now, servitude is generally regarded as the antithesis of freedom, the most precious of human goods. Hence affirming your sale into slavery as a fundamental right seems incoherent, the height of irrationality. But there is an intellectual case for it. As Aristotle argues in Book 5 of the Nichomachean Ethics, ‘no injustice is done to the person who wishes it so’. A stunningly simple and self-evident moral point. You cannot be injured by something you have deliberately decided to accept. For instance, giving all your properties and money away to the poor, indeed to the first passer-by in the street. Even if it pauperise you, if it causes you to sleep rough in the street. Let people pity you and treat you an eccentric as much as they like, it is your right to do so. Christian saints and hermits provide plenty of examples. St Francis was treated as a madman when he did that - today you think better of him. Or take a man who willingly embraces becoming a cuckold. Sir William Hamilton, Lady Hamilton’s learned husband, did not resent at all his Emma’s relationship with Lord Nelson. On the contrary, he was rather proud of his wife being the mistress of such great hero. Call Sir William peculiar, it still remains that no injury was done to his marriage bond, which he happily chose to be infringed.

There is of course the objection that he people who would sell themselves into slavery would be prompted to do that by poverty or extreme deprivation. Hence the burden of such servitude would inevitably fall unto the marginalised, less well-off sections of the population. In a sense, that’s right. You would not wish to become a slave if you lived in clover. But that is my point. Take the priest’s case. I have reached the stage in life where I have no financial security whatsoever. Not do I posses a house of my own. The Pensions Board of the Church of England now threatens to put up my rent, to the degree to which I would hardly have any money left to live on. The prospect gives me sleepless nights. On the other hand, I daresay I am a learned, erudite chap. I could be a tutor in the household of business persons who wished to have their offspring looked after and educated by such a qualified teacher as myself. References galore can be provided. It would really similar to the situation in the ancient world. Slaves were not all house servants or gladiators (aargh! That really would not suit me – a natural pussycat.) Many Greek slaves were better educated than their masters. They were an asset and so they were well treated, accordingly. To me the prospect of becoming a slave in a wealthy, civilised household – say David Beckam’s or Madonnas’s? - is rather attractive. In exchange for board and lodging and some pocket money, sounds terrific.

I do not wish, however, to universalise my own situation. The stronger point is that we are entering an age of austerity and insecurity. More and more people are being made redundant, lose their jobs. In many cases, they will lose a roof over their heads. Real hardships, real despair are abroad They stalk your towns and cities. Is it irrational to imagine some people might seriously entertain the possibility of taking up a slavery contract? The need for security might well override any other squeamish consideration. And it would perform a useful function in society. I must let David Cameron know...

In the ancient world, that’s exactly what often happened. The ruthless fiscal and financial reforms of Emperors Diocletian saved the crumbling Roman Empire. But they were so severe from the human and social points of view that many people chose to run away to the barbarians, or sold themselves into slavery. They were not ill-treated, or dealt with harshly. Generally, they fared much better than when they were ‘free’. Am I the only one to see an analogy between that time and ours?

The Holy Scriptures might be held to constitute an impediment to my idea. The law of God in the Old Testament never outlawed slavery, anyway. Jesus never did nor does the New Testament. St Paul described himself as a slave (doulos) of Christ. He advised a runaways slave, his ‘beloved Son’ Onesimus, to go back to his master. We know that Prophet Muhammad owned slaves himself, although the Quran makes statements in mitigation of the condition. Abd, slave of God, like in the name Abdallah, is a highly commended status.

There is however, I admit, a legal impediment to my idea, I admit. British courts would be unlikely to enforce slavery contracts. But the law can never be ultimate in these moral matters. Today EU law legalises abortion and other abominations. Believers will never accept that the deliberate killing of the innocent is morally justified. Hence the debate about these wicked iniquitous laws must continue. And the law sometimes changes. What was illegal yesterday can be legal and approved tomorrow.

Voluntary slavery. A moral proposition whose time has come. Denying it is mere prejudice.The priest will prove it. He will be a slave.

Revd Frank Julian Gelli