American Slavery Was Satanic

There is a dark secret that almost no Christian talks about today. American slavery was satanic. Slavery is talked about with a degree of anger and shame by African Americans. Too many white Christians see it as a part of history that has precedence in the Bible. After all, there were slaves in the Bible. However, there is something that almost no one deals with. At the heart of slavery was not just economics, culture and tradition. At the heart of slavery was the hand of Satan poisoning our ancestors. Slavery poisoned all that it came in contact with whether they were African or European, free or bound.

For many years I believed and taught that the first sin was committed by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. I taught that the sin was disobedience. That was the first sin that was committed by man however according to the Bible it was preceded by another sin that unfortunately is still with us. In Isaiah 14:14 Satan is seen as deciding that he would exalt himself over God and as result he was tossed out of heaven. Absolute power in heaven and earth is reserved to God alone. When a man takes that power for himself, he is, in fact, saying that he would be a god. This ultimate arrogance was the heart of the sin that caused Satan’s fall. This arrogance caused judgment on Jewish and pagan kings such as David, Nebudcanezer, and Herod. This demonstration of ultimate power over another was at the heart of American slavery and was satanic.

In American slavery, slaves were not considered human. Even the godly divines who framed the U.S. Constitution declared them only to be two-thirds human when it came to the census. The master had total control of the slave including the decision whether the slave would live or die. The female slaves had no right to modesty. They were sold nude so that the purchasers could examine their bodies. Their children were not their own. Their master could sell their children or even kill their children if it pleased them. Anytime the master wished to have sex with a female no matter her age or his marital status he was free to do so without social stigma. The children of these unions were slaves as they took their status from their mothers and not their fathers.

There are well-documented cases of decent human being becoming sadistically cruel caricatures of humanity when put in positions of absolute power over others. Whether it is a prison in Iraq, a college experiment with half of the class becoming prison guards and the other half make believe prisoners or American slavery, we don’t do too well in those kinds of situations. A scenario suggested if not actually mentioned in Frederick Douglas’ writing graphically painted the picture of the depravity bred by the evil not just a peculiar institution. A masters’ daughter by a slave mother was a misbehaving teenager. The punishment for her crime was to be whipped.   The master’s white son had the task of administering the punishment under his father’s watchful eye. The girl was stripped and whipped by her brother in front of the approving eyes of her father. Now, the fact that a slave girl was whipped for an infraction real or imagined is not news. However, I am a father of two daughters. I know the special bond that God creates between a father and his daughters. I love my son but there is something special about the bond I have with my daughters. I cannot imagine the level of debauchery that I would have to have descended into to willingly participate in the scenario that I just mentioned. I cannot imagine selling my children and grandchildren off to another plantation. Worse yet I cannot imagine selling my daughter for use as a sex slave because she was half white and would bring a higher price than a full blooded African. Only a plan hatched in the pits of hell could have that kind of effect on ostensibly good men.

It’s time that America faces the fact that we don’t just have a glorious past full of men of honor. We have a past full of men that were involved in some of the most inhumane activities that man has conceived. Acknowledging this is not an excuse to hate their descendants but it should open all of up the need to call sin, sin. It should open all of us to recognize that we wage war not against slaveholders and their descendants but the spiritual forces in high places that used racists to implement a scheme from hell.