Whilst abolitionist ideas of brotherhood, liberty, benevolence and judgement were rooted in Scripture, the Bible also presented them with a problem, since both OT Israel and the NT church seemed to accept (or at least tolerate) the institution of slavery. As the former slave
Cugoano admitted, the claim that the Old Testament sanctioned slavery was "the greatest bulwark of defence which the advocates and favourers of slavery can advance". Cugoano thought that this was "an inconsistent and diabolical use of the sacred writings". How ironic it was to see slave-traders ransacking the Pentateuch to legitimate slavery while blithely ignoring texts which made slave trading a capital crime: "He that stealeth a man and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death" (Exodus 21:16; also Deuteronomy 24:7).
Abolitionists usually admitted that the Law of Moses did sanction a form of slavery, and that this was legitimate in its time and place. But they distinguished between the perpetual enslavement of Gentiles, and the highly qualified servitude of fellow Jews. The enslavement of other Jews was to be dissolved at the year of Jubilee, and abolitionists often argued that it was "not, properly speaking, slavery" – which by definition involved permanent rights of ownership. The enslavement of the Gentiles, they maintained, was a unique punishment for exceptional wickedness, and formed no precedent for other nations. In any case, even these slaves were guaranteed better treatment than modern Africans. The Israelites, as one writer noted, were "exhorted to remember their own bondage in the land of Israel, and to treat their servants with the same lenity they wished to experience themselves" (see Deuteronomy 15:12–15; 24:14–22). OT law regulated slavery in a manner that was unique in the ancient world.
Abolitionists also maintained that "the laws of brotherly love are infinitely enlarged" by the Gospel, which proclaims "goodwill towards men without distinction". Since all men were now to be treated as brethren, the Mosaic ban on perpetual enslavement of fellow Israelites was universalised. Of course, pro-slavery Christians emphasised that neither Christ nor the apostles demanded the abolition of slavery. But abolitionists responded that slavery was tolerated as an evil by the early church, just like "the sanguinary despotism of Nero" and "the sports of gladiators", neither of which was expressly condemned in the New Testament. Despotism and slavery were contrary to the "spirit" of Christianity, whose "merciful operations", though "gradual and slow", eventually undermined both institutions. Abolition could not happen in the first centuries, when the church was too weak and slavery was integral to the Roman economy. As
Equiano observed, if Paul [of Tarsus] "had absolutely declared the iniquity of slavery … he would have occasioned more tumult than reformation". Yet his
letter to Philemon plainly showed "that he thought it derogatory to the honour of Christianity, that men who are bought with the inestimable price of Christ's blood, shall be esteemed slaves, and the private property of their fellow-men". Paul had pointed the way; it was for later Christians to complete the journey.
I mean, it isn't hard to see that what he really wants with all that he is saying is to convert the atheist, or at least make the atheist admit he/she is evil and damned. But he must have realized by now that it is quite a hopeless mission he is on. Or does it get more noble the more impossible it is? 
