How can I trust a Bible that contains slavery and commands to kill?
By Will Bourne · Question 10
The direct answer
Those passages are real, and some are morally disturbing. Historical context can help explain them. It does not automatically make the conduct good or remove the difficulty of a text presenting a command as coming from God.
Fuller explanation
Two distinct problems need attention. Some passages regulate the ownership of human beings. Other passages describe the destruction of populations, including children. Explaining one does not resolve the other. Each needs its own close reading.
Leviticus 25:44–46 permits Israelites to acquire people from surrounding nations and pass them on as inherited property. It would be misleading to describe every form of biblical slavery as ordinary employment. First Samuel 15:3 includes children in a command to destroy. Describing the setting as ancient warfare does not make those words disappear.
Christians interpret these passages in different ways. Some understand them as limited divine permissions or judgments within an unfolding history. Others emphasize ancient war rhetoric. Others argue that the biblical writers’ understanding of God is being corrected or brought to fullness through Christ. These approaches make different claims about Scripture and divine action. None should be presented as an effortless solution.
The approach proposed here is to keep Jesus central while reading the difficult text honestly. That gives a Christian a reason to resist cruelty and domination. It does not, by itself, settle why an earlier text attributes a troubling command to God. That remaining question needs further work, not a demand that the reader stop noticing it.
The objection we still need to face
Is reading through Jesus simply choosing the parts of the Bible you like?
It can become that if no reasons are given. A Christian reading needs to explain how Jesus, covenant, genre, and the wider biblical story shape interpretation, and what authority remains with the difficult passage. This answer identifies the problem and the proposed starting point; passage-specific conclusions still need to be developed.
Scripture and its use
Leviticus 25:44–46; 1 Samuel 15:1–3; Luke 4:16–21; Hebrews 1:1–3
Read these passages in their surrounding chapters alongside the explanation.