"Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are harsh". (1 Peter 2:18). Slave holders used versus like this from the Bible to justify the cruel and terrible actions that they did to their slaves. Many preached to other slave holders about the Bible, and how it is just to beat and torture their slaves because the Bible supposedly says that they can. They misinterpreted the scripture and bent them to work with what they wanted to do. Many actions in people 's lifestyle are purposefully bent to fit around popular beliefs and anything, up to and including the Holy Bible, can be changed to benefit our actions. These kind of people are …show more content…
The biggest reason for their actions was that it said in both the Old and New Testament that it gave permission to hold others as slaves. Religion was something driving slavery further, white Christian slaveholders said that slavery was a necessary evil because it would control the sinful, less humane, african american race. Henry Brinton, was a pastor at Fairfax Presbyterian Church, writes that the Bible was used by both the North and the South to back up their views. Slaveholders justified the practice by quoting the Bible, Brinton says." They asked who could question the Word of God when it said", "slaves, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling" (Ephesians 6:5), or "tell slaves to be submissive to their masters and to give satisfaction in every respect" (Titus 2:9). Slave owners constantly quoted the bible to make the view seem justified. They were all fooled by their own self-righteousness that they didn 't even realize the pain and suffering that they brought upon their slaves. Mr. Covey, a former master of Fredrick Douglass, is a great example of this. Mr. Covey was the person who would attend church, pray night and day, and spread the word. While seen as this holy man by the population, Mr. Covey was breaking many of the Ten Commandments while treating his slaves they way he did. Many people just like Mr. Covey were blinded by their religion from seen the truth, the …show more content…
This one thought cause the suffer of so many and people then were okay with that. They thought that what they were doing was the "right" thing to do and that there actions were justified. Fredrick Douglass was on the wrong end of this and slowly started to watch it play out through his life as a slave. He saw these people act the way they did because they have been told for so long that it was okay. They never questioned it for a second and some joined the slaveowners because family and friends convinced them it was