400 Years of African Slavery in America

[Josh]

Anything that happened 7 generations ago is completely irrelevant to someone’s situation today.

One might as well trace their lineage back to Adam, and then complain about Eve.

[Szdfan]

It’s time of move past being bitter about deeds done in the past by people who are dead now.

Problem solved because Josh said so!!! Thank you Josh!!

Well, what’s better? Complaining about what happened in 1619? Is this what the Bible says to do?

I see nowhere in the Bible that it says a fruit of the spirit is to dredge up grievances for how someone may have been offended or hurt in the past... hundreds of years ago... who is now dead.

If you can point me to modern day Christians who are slaveholders, I’d very strongly agree they should repent and set their slaves free.

Are you talking about the Bible where the liberation from slavery in Egypt served as a foundational experience between God and the Hebrews? The one where the divine uses the phrase, "I'm the Lord your God who brought you out of the Egypt" repeatedly? The Bible that has passages like Deuteronomy 6 which makes it clear that one purpose of the Law is to remember slavery?

In the future, when your son asks you, “What is the meaning of the stipulations, decrees and laws the Lord our God has commanded you?” tell him: “We were slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt, but the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. Before our eyes the Lord sent signs and wonders—great and terrible—on Egypt and Pharaoh and his whole household.

Are you talking about the Bible (written over 2,000 years ago) that constantly focuses on the past to say that the past doesn't matter?

[Ken]

Anything that happened 7 generations ago is completely irrelevant to someone’s situation today.

One might as well trace their lineage back to Adam, and then complain about Eve.

Both the US Constitution and every word in the Bible were written well outside of Josh's arbitrary 7-generation statute of limitations. By people long dead. I guess they are both completely irrelevant to our "situations today."

[Neto]

Anything that happened 7 generations ago is completely irrelevant to someone’s situation today.

One might as well trace their lineage back to Adam, and then complain about Eve.

Both the US Constitution and every word in the Bible were written well outside of Josh's arbitrary 7-generation statute of limitations. By people long dead. I guess they are both completely irrelevant to our "situations today."

He said that in the context of my last post, that's where the "7 generations" came from.

[Josh]

Anything that happened 7 generations ago is completely irrelevant to someone’s situation today.

One might as well trace their lineage back to Adam, and then complain about Eve.

Both the US Constitution and every word in the Bible were written well outside of Josh's arbitrary 7-generation statute of limitations. By people long dead. I guess they are both completely irrelevant to our "situations today."

Whatever my ancestors were doing in the 1700s or 2,000 years ago is irrelevant to today. Whether they were "good" people, "bad" people, "oppressed", or "oppressors".

The Bible is not relevant to us today because it is old, but because it is the Bible - inspired by God, who lives outside of time - given to us for today. The Bible is relevant to every time and place.

Most old texts are not relevant to anybody anymore.

[Szdfan]

Anything that happened 7 generations ago is completely irrelevant to someone’s situation today.

One might as well trace their lineage back to Adam, and then complain about Eve.

Both the US Constitution and every word in the Bible were written well outside of Josh's arbitrary 7-generation statute of limitations. By people long dead. I guess they are both completely irrelevant to our "situations today."

Whatever my ancestors were doing in the 1700s or 2,000 years ago is irrelevant to today. Whether they were "good" people, "bad" people, "oppressed", or "oppressors".

So segregation, Jim Crow and the Holocaust happened within living memory. The Armenian genocide and the Tulsa massacre happened less than seven generations ago (which is about 140 years). Are people allowed to be upset about those things?

[Only an Anz]

The history of slavery is mostly people being sold into debt bondage or as war spoils (including the trans-Atlantic slave grade).

American slavery was unique in being chattels slavery, but was a mere blip in the context of human history.

We would do well more to focus on present day debt bondage and problems with spoils of war and other forced labour than spend too much time ruminating on the past, particularly when much of our country is descended from people who migrated here in the 20th century. American slavey truly is a footnote, and was also eradicated - unlike much of the rest of the world.

"American slavey [sic] truly is a footnote"

....not for all of us. Yours truly is descended from Quakers on one side and slaveowners on the other. I've in fact met a woman who is my relative BECAUSE OF slavery and accompanying r*ape. Please do not speak for all of us...for some, it is something that still weighs on them often.

Exactly how relevant is what our ancestors did, who are all dead, to us today?

Slavery was still practiced in the Ottoman Empire until the the 1910s. Yet do we constantly hear sour Hutterites, Armenians, Greeks, and Cypriots needing to put their history of being enslaved front and centre?

You have already stated that your family came to the US after the Civil War. All I am saying is that you do not speak for those of us (non-black) contributors whose families DID come to the US in the 1600's and 1700's.

[Only an Anz]

Both the US Constitution and every word in the Bible were written well outside of Josh's arbitrary 7-generation statute of limitations. By people long dead. I guess they are both completely irrelevant to our "situations today."

Whatever my ancestors were doing in the 1700s or 2,000 years ago is irrelevant to today. Whether they were "good" people, "bad" people, "oppressed", or "oppressors".

So segregation, Jim Crow and the Holocaust happened within living memory. The Armenian genocide and the Tulsa massacre happened less than seven generations ago (which is about 140 years). Are people allowed to be upset about those things?

Interesting you should mention Tulsa - I live in OK and the current excavation and DNA research are very much in the news here.

[Only an Anz]

Anything that happened 7 generations ago is completely irrelevant to someone’s situation today.

One might as well trace their lineage back to Adam, and then complain about Eve.

Both the US Constitution and every word in the Bible were written well outside of Josh's arbitrary 7-generation statute of limitations. By people long dead. I guess they are both completely irrelevant to our "situations today."

Whatever my ancestors were doing in the 1700s or 2,000 years ago is irrelevant to today. Whether they were "good" people, "bad" people, "oppressed", or "oppressors".

The Bible is not relevant to us today because it is old, but because it is the Bible - inspired by God, who lives outside of time - given to us for today. The Bible is relevant to every time and place.

Most old texts are not relevant to anybody anymore.

"Most old texts are not relevant to anybody anymore."....I would love to hear you explain why so many of our Plain friends still read the KJV (and old TRANSLATION), or to see you justify that in Shakespeare class, for example.

[Szdfan]

Interesting you should mention Tulsa - I live in OK and the current excavation and DNA research are very much in the news here.

I’m next door in SE Colorado. My in-laws have Oklahoma accents.