Читать книгу The Craft of Innovative Theology. Argument and Process онлайн
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In the eighteenth century, for example, John Woolman offered one of the earliest arguments against slavery based on the Golden Rule. Woolman believed all humans and nations were of one blood, subject to the same afflictions, infirmities, and heavenly judgment. He also believed that all persons should place themselves in the situation of others in order to understand that slavery was unjust. According to Woolman, one should ask, “How should I approve of this conduct were I in their Circumstances, and they in mine?”3 During the same period, Quakers Anthony Benezet and David Cooper also argued that one must put themselves in the position of being slaves and imagine having their wives and children as slaves.4
Many nineteenth-century antislavery arguments utilized similar teachings from the Sermon on the Mount and the Golden Rule. Charles Elliott, a prominent minister, argued that slavery is contrary to justice and righteousness; it also robs the slave of his or her personhood.5 As important, slavery is contrary to “the great law of love.” He wrote, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself: I am the Lord,” Lev. 19:18. By neighbor every man is meant for the same injunction is given in regard to strangers.”6 All are to act justly toward others as if they were our own children whom we “would never enslave from birth or refuse full liberty when they are grown.”7 To practice the Golden Rule is to acknowledge gratitude for God’s goodness by imagining the plight of others as if you were in their circumstances and they in yours.8 Since nothing could cause a slaveholder to take the place of his or her slave, that slaveholder does not practice the Golden Rule because “No man desires slavery.”9