Matthew 28:19-20
19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have
commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen
I. EDUCATION
Several hundred years before Christ, the ancient Greeks had their philosophers
(Thales, Xenophanes (Zee NO Phanes), Par-men-i-des, Zeno, Pythagoras,
Democritus, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle) and their poets (Euripides, Aeschylus,
Aristophanes, and Sophocles). And to a lesser degree, the Romans also had their
gifted thinkers (Seneca, Cicero, Platus, Pliny the Elder, Lucretius, Tacitus, and
others). All were learned men who functioned in the realm of what today is called
higher education. Given this literary orientation, some historians have referred to
the Greeks and Romans as having had the first “universities.” But as Charles Haskins
has noted, these brilliant men developed no permanent institutions. They had no
libraries, they had no guild of scholars or students, and they certified no one. 1.
It can be argued, they tested no theories and engaged in no research; in fact, they
ignored and even spurned the inductive method. Hence, it does not appear correct
to assume, as is sometimes done, that the university of the twentieth century is a
lineal descendant of the ancient Greek philosophers. 2
Obedient to Christ’s command that the disciples and all Christians were to teach
people “all things” that he commanded them, newcomers to the church were
instructed as “catechumens”; that is, they were taught orally by the question-and-
answer method in preparation for baptism and church membership. Both men and
women were catechized, often over a period of two to three years.
Catechetical instruction led to formal catechetical schools with a strong literary
emphasis.
Public Schools
Graded Education
Kindergarten
Deaf
Blind
St. Benedict of Nursia (480–543?), founded the Benedictine order’s first monastery at
Monte Cassino, Italy, in 528, and soon built monasteries in many other locations.
St. Benedict has been called “the godfather of libraries.” 3
The New Testament Gospels Jesus commands his disciples: ““Teaching them” (Matthew
28:20)
The Didache (The Teaching of the Twelve) Author unknown, ca. A.D. 85-110 Catechetical
schools Justin Martyr, ca. A.D. 150
Cathedral/episcopal schools
Founder unknown,
4th cent. Monastery/nunnery schools - Founder unknown, 5th cent.
First university (Bologna, Italy) - Emperor Frederick Barbarossa,
1158 Public schools - Martin Luther,
1530s Universal (education for all) - Martin Luther, 1530s / John Calvin
1550s Tax-supported education - Martin Luther and Philipp Melanchthon
1530s Compulsory education - Martin Luther
1530s Graded education - Johann Sturm,
1530s First American college - (Harvard) New Towne (1636) renamed Harvard College
after John Harvard (a clergyman) in 1639
Kindergarten schools Friedrich Froebel, 1840s
Sunday schools - Robert Raikes, 1780
Deaf education (Europe) - Abbe Charles Michel de l’Epee, 1775
Deaf education (America) - Thomas Gallaudet, 1817
16th cent. Blind education (Braille method) Louis Braille, 1834
COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES
Every collegiate institution founded in the colonies prior to the Revolutionary War—except the
University of Pennsylvania—was established by some branch of the Christian church.” 4
in 1932, when Donald Tewksbury published The Founding of American Colleges and Universities
Before the Civil War, 92 percent of the 182 colleges and universities were founded by Christian
denominations.
Harvard College, established in 1636, now known as Harvard University, was
founded by the Congregational Church as a theological institution
The College of William and Mary started as an Episcopalian school, also primarily
to train clergy
Yale University began mostly as a Congregational institution to “Educate
Ministers in our Own Way.” 5
The Methodists founded Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.
Columbia University (first known as King’s College) began as an Episcopalian
venture.
Princeton University started as a Presbyterian school.
Brown University had Baptist origins.
The University of Kentucky, the University of California (Berkeley), and the
University of Tennessee, started as church schools.
Despite the massive departure of so many formerly Christian colleges from their
original charters, the fact remains that many would not be in existence today had it
not been for their Christian initiators.
Catechetical schools, cathedral schools, episcopal schools, monasteries, medieval
universities, schools for the blind and deaf, Sunday schools, modern grade schools,
secondary schools, modern colleges, universities, and universal education all have
one thing in common: they are the products of Christianity. Thus, Kennedy and
Newcombe are right when they write, “Every school you see—public or private,
religious or secular—is a visible visible reminder of the religion of Jesus Christ. So is
every college and university.” 6
II. HOSPITALS AND COMPASSION
Matthew 25:35-36
For I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a
stranger and you took Me in; 36 I was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you
visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.’
Luke 10:30-37
Then Jesus answered and said: “A certain man went down from Jerusalem to
Jericho, and fell among thieves, who stripped him of his clothing, wounded him, and
departed, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a certain priest came down that
road. And when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32 Likewise a Levite,
when he arrived at the place, came and looked, and passed by on the other side.
33 But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was. And when he saw
him, he had compassion. 34 So he went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on
oil and wine; and he set him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care
of him. 35 On the next day, when he departed, he took out two denarii, gave them to
the innkeeper, and said to him, ‘Take care of him; and whatever more you spend,
when I come again, I will repay you.’ 36 So which of these three do you think was
neighbor to him who fell among the thieves?” 37 And he said, “He who showed mercy
on him.” Then Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”
Matthew 4:23
And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel
of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the
people
Tertullian (d. ca. 220), the Latin church father in northern Africa, informs us that the
early Christians had a common fund to which they gave voluntarily, without any
compulsion, on a given day of the month or whenever they wished to contribute
(Apology 39). This fund supported widows, the physically disabled, needy orphans,
the sick, prisoners incarcerated for their Christian faith, and teachers requiring help;
it provided burials for poor people and sometimes funds for the release of slaves.
Human compassion, especially with regard to the sick and dying, among the ancients
was rare, notably among the Greco-Romans. As with the practice of charity, such
behavior was contrary to their cultural ethos and to the teachings of the pagan
philosophers. For instance, Plato (427– 347 B.C.) said that a poor man (usually a
slave) who was no longer able to work because of sickness should be left to die. He
even praised Aesculapius, the famous Greek physician, for not prescribing medicine
to those he knew were preoccupied with their illness (Republic 3.406d– 410a). The
Roman philosopher Plautus (254–184 B.C.) argued, “You do a beggar bad service by
giving him food and drink; you lose what you give and prolong his life for more
misery” (Trinummus 2.338–39).
John 15:13
Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends
Orphanages
Child Labor Laws
HOSPITALS
The first hospital was built by St. Basil in Caesarea in Cappadocia about A.D. 369. It
was one of “a large number of buildings, with houses for physicians and nurses,
workshops, and industrial schools.” 27
THE RED CROSS FOUNDER
A decade or so before he died, his native country Switzerland allowed him to return
with honor and dignity, and in 1901 he received the first Nobel Peace Prize ever
bestowed. What seemed to matter most to him was his faith in Jesus Christ. This is
apparent from the words he spoke on his deathbed: “I am a disciple of Christ as in
the first century, and nothing more.” 28
III. ABOLITION OF SLAVERY
Slavery was indigenous to African and Arab countries before it made its way to
Europe. 7
Prevalence of Slavery (Not just an American Problem)
By the time of Christ came slaves made up about 75% of the population in ancient
Athens and well over half of the Roman population. Slavery was also widely
practiced by many tribes of the American Indians long before Europeans came to the
New World.
The tragedy of slavery continued in a number of countries for more than a hundred
years after it was outlawed in the United States in 1865. Ethiopia had slavery until
1942, Saudi Arabia until 1962, Peru until 1964, and India until 1976. Moreover, it still
exists to this day in Sudan. 8
SLAVERY
About 25 percent of the Americans in the South had slaves before the Civil War.
According to the United States census of 1830. Also 407 black Americans in
Charleston, South Carolina, alone owned black slaves. 9
Early Christian Opposition to Slavery
Philemon 1:15-16
For perhaps he departed for a while for this purpose, that you might receive him
forever, 16 no longer as a slave but more than a slave—a beloved brother, especially
to me but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord
Gal 3:28
There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male
nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus
Some Christians did not fully heed Paul’s antislavery statements.
But there were changes happening. Christians interacted with slaves as they did with
those free. Slaves communed with Christians at the same altar.
The romans and Greeks had completely different views
The Romans held slaves in contempt 10
The greeks also dismissed slaves. Aristotle argued that “a slave is a living tool, just as
a tool is an inanimate slave. Therefore there can be no friendship with a slave as
slave” (Nichomachean Ethics 8.11).
CHRISTAIN INFLUENCE BEGAN TO FREE SLAVES
W. E. H. Lecky, who says,
“St. Melania was said to have emancipated 8,000 slaves;
St. Ovidius, a rich martyr of Gaul, 5,000;
Chromatius, a Roman prefect under Diocletian, 1,400;
Hermes, a prefect under Trajan,
1,200. [And] many of the Christian clergy at Hippo under the rule of St.
Augustine, as well as great numbers of private individuals, freed their slaves as
an act of piety.” 11
3 RD CENTURY
Constantine in A.D. 315, only two years after he issued the Edict of Milan, imposed
the death penalty on those who stole children to bring them up as slaves. 12
4 TH CENTURY
In the fourth century Lactantius (the “Christian Cicero”) in his Divine Institutes
said that in God’s eyes there were no slaves.
St. Augustine (354–430) saw slavery as the product of sin and as contrary to
God’s divine plan (The City of God 19.15).
St. Chrysostom, in the fourth century, preached that when Christ came, he
annulled slavery. He proclaimed that “in Christ Jesus there is no slave. . .
.Therefore it is not necessary to have a slave. . . .Buy them, and after you have
taught them some skill by which they can maintain themselves, set them free”
(Homily 40 on 1 Corinthians 10).
5 th CENTURY
St. Patrick in Ireland condemned slavery in the 5 th century.
For several centuries bishops and councils recommended the redemption of captive
slaves, and for five centuries the Christian monks redeemed Christian slaves from
Moorish servitude.
12 th CENTURY
By the twelfth century slaves in Europe were rare, and by the fourteenth century
slavery was almost unknown on the Continent of Europe.
BRITISH SLAVERY
William Wilberforce (1759– 1833),
In 1823, two years before he had to relinquish his seat in the House of Commons
because of ill health, he presented a petition to the House of Commons to abolish
slavery, a petition that a close associate of his, Thomas Fowell Buxton, moved “as a
resolution declaring slavery repugnant to Christianity and the Constitution.” 14
A few days before he died on July 26, 1833, he received word that Parliament had
passed the Abolition Act. This act resulted in freeing 700,000 slaves by England in its
West Indies colonies. 15
Wilberforce is a magnificent example of fighting the sin of slavery in the name of
Christ. By 1840 Slavery was totally outlawed in the British Empire making it the first
modern country to outlaw slavery.
Ex. Amazing Grace
SLAVERY IN NORTH AND SOUTH AMERICA
Even after slavery came to an end in the British Empire in the 1830s, it continued in the
north and south in the British West Indies, the United States, Brazil, and Mexico. In the
United States it grew till 25% of the Southerners owned slaves.
The United States received a relatively low percentage of the ten million African slaves
imported to the New World between 1502 and the 1860s. It had received about 7%;
Brazil, 41%; the British and French colonies in the Caribbean, along with the Spanish
settlements, 47%; and the Dutch, Danish, and Swedish colonies, 5%. 16
Christian Pioneers of Abolition
Elijah Lovejoy - killed by rioting pro-slavery radicals in his printing office in Alton,
Illinois, in November 1837, is often cited as the abolitionists’ first martyr. He was
a Presbyterian clergyman who had attended Princeton Theological Seminary. His
strong stand against slavery, prompted by his Christian convictions, cost him his
life.
Edward Beecher, president of Illinois College, was also a strong promoter of the
abolitionist cause, largely through the auspices of the college. Black students, for
instance, were welcomed as students, a rare phenomenon in those days. The
college, a Christian institution, was labeled by the Illinois State Register of
Springfield, Illinois, as a “freedom-shrieking tool of abolitionism.” 18
Christ’s teachings definitely have to be credited with having moved Christian clergy
like Lovejoy, the Beechers (Harriet, Henry, and Edward), Mahan, Shipperd, Finney,
Weld, Torrey, and others too numerous to mention. That is also how Lyman Beecher
saw it. One researcher cites him as saying that abolitionism was the offspring of the
Great Revival that preceded it in the eastern states. 19
Harriet Beecher Stowe
Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852) depicts the misery of America’s enslavement of the Negro. It
brought the tragedy of American slavery to the attention of the entire world.
Unfortunately, one rarely hears about the Christian motivation that moved Harriet
Beecher Stowe to write her revealing, antislavery novel. Harriet casts Uncle Tom in the
role of the suffering servant as he suffers physically under the hands of his last slave
master. Christlike, he refuses to take revenge despite powerful urgings from his fellow
slaves; he clings to the promises of Christ up to his death, which was caused by the
beatings his slave owner inflicted on him.
As one analyst has well observed, “Uncle Tom [the book] takes a Christian approach that
suffering is redemptive, and that evil will be atoned for.” 20
On one occasion, a sea captain who met her said that he was pleased to shake the hand
that wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin. She responded that she did not write the book. “God
wrote it,” she said, “I merely did his dictation .” 21
The Black Church
In all of the pain and suffering that the American blacks endured during slavery, they
were greatly aided by Christianity’s presence in their lives through the vehicle of black
churches. The Negro church was virtually the only place where slaves were allowed to
congregate, to experience a spiritual union with other slaves, and to feel equal to the
white man, especially in the eyes of God.
Even Eugene Genovese, once a Marxist, credits Christianity as the institution that
enabled the black slaves in America to survive the prolonged dehumanization process. 22
In the North during the antebellum era, numerous black churches functioned as
“stations” “stations” of the Underground Railroad as well as centers of abolitionist
activities.
(1) opportunities for emotional release where individuals could express their oppression
(2) social interaction with other slaves
(3) educational opportunities so that many individuals learned to read and write
(4) socioeconomic assistance to the sick and bereaved
(5) social cohesion that gave a sense of belonging
(6) solace and comfort
(7) leadership opportunities
AMERICAS FIRST PROCLAMATION AGAINST SLAVERY
America’s first formal proclamation against slavery in 1688. He was Franz Daniel
Pastorius, a Mennonite. He brought 5000 acres and started Germantown Pennsylvania.
In 1688 Pastorius approached his Quaker friends in the Germantown area with a protest
against slavery. The formally written protest, which was signed by Pastorius and several
other German immigrants, invoked the Golden Rule, among other arguments. In part it
read, “There is a saying that we shall doe [sic] to all men, like as we will be done
ourselves, making no difference of what generation, Descent or Colour they are, and
those who steal or rob men, and those who buy or purchase them, are they not all
alike?” 23
The Quakers resisted him but in 1705 they did take a public stand against slavery.
AMERICAN CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT
Slavery ended officially in 1865 but racial segregation, which was formally legitimated by
the United States Supreme Court in 1896 in its Plessy v. Ferguson established the
“separate but equal” principle. The Supreme Court overturned the 1896 ruling in its
Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954.
Three years later, in 1957, Martin Luther King Jr. helped found the Southern Christian
Leadership Conference (SCLC), It’s nonviolent practices came from Christian roots. He
wanted the organization’s members and eventually all Americans to imitate the early
Christians, who, he said, “were small in number but big in commitment. They were too
God-intoxicated to be ‘astronomically intimidated.’ They brought an end to such ancient
evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contests.” 26
One reporter summed up the Selma event by saying, “In the age of Martin Luther,
churches discovered the individual conscience. In the age of Martin Luther King, the
churches may be discovering how to put the individual conscience to work.” 24
CHRISTIAN DENOMINATIONS AGAINST DISCRIMINATION
In 1949 the Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS) issued a lengthy
document in support of civil rights for American blacks,
The Southern Baptist Convention denounced the Ku Klux Klan and its use of the
Christian cross, calling the Klan’s practice “a presumptuous sacrilege.” 25
Also in 1949, the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ, composed of twenty-
seven denominations, moved toward supporting racial integration .
Conclusion
Both the abolition of slavery and rejection of racial segregation have their roots
in the earliest teachings of Christianity.
CHRISTIANS WHO WERE PRO-SLAVERY
In spite of St. Paul’s words to Philemon and to the Galatians, for more than a
thousand years many Christians owned slaves. This included even prominent church
leaders such as:
Polycarp, a second-century bishop of Smyrna
Athenagoras, a second-century Christian philosopher.
Clement of Alexandria and Origen,
In the thirteenth century St. Bonaventure saw slavery as a divine institution
In 1548 Pope Paul III granted to all men, and to the clergy, the right to keep
slaves.
Many Americans who defended slavery, called themselves Christians. Every state had
preachers who argued that slavery was compatible with Christianity. But the abolitionist
movement had a considerably higher percentage of Christian clergy than did the pro-
slavery defenders. Two-thirds of the abolitionists in the mid– 1830s were Christian
clergy. 17
I see this as the evil use and abuse of good tools. Throughout history you have had cults
who use the word of God to deceive many, there have been false prophets who use the
word to ensnare many etc. People using the words of life to enslave people is evil and
demonic. But it doesn’t subtract from the validity of the word.
NOTES
1. Charles H. Haskins, The Rise of Universities (New York: Henry Holt, 1923), 3.
2. A. B. Cobban, The Medieval Universities: Their Development and Organization
(Chatham, England: Methuen, 1975), 22.
3. Daniel J. Boorstin, The Discoverers (New York: Vintage Books, 1983), 491.
4. Paul Lee Tan, Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations: Signs of the Times (Rockville,
Md.: Assurance Publishers, 1984), 157.
5. Thomas Clap: cited in Donald Tewksbury, The Founding of American Colleges and
Universities Before the Civil War (New York: Teachers College Columbia
University, 1932), 82.
6. 74. D. James Kennedy and Jerry Newcombe, What If Jesus Had Never Been Born?
(Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1994), 40.
7. David R. James, “Slavery and Involuntary Servitude,” in Encyclopedia of
Sociology, ed. Edgar F. Borgatta and Marie L. Borgatta (New York: Macmillan,
1992), 4:1792.
8. Brian Eads, “Slavery’s Shameful Return to Africa,” Reader’s Digest (March 1996):
77–81.
9. United States census data for 1830, cited in Larry Koger, Black Slaveowners: Free
Black Slave Masters in South Carolina, 1790–1860 (Columbia: University of South
Carolina Press, 1995), 20.
10. W. E. H. Lecky, History of European Morals (New York: Vanguard Press, 1926),
77.
11. W. E. H. Lecky, History of European Morals: From Augustus to Charlemagne
(New York: D. Appleton, 1927), 2:69.
12. C. Schmidt, The Social Results of Early Christianity, trans. R. W. Dale (London:
Wm. Isbister Limited, 1889), 430.
13. Lecky, History of European Morals, 2:71.
14. John Stoughton, William Wilberforce (New York: A. C. Armstrong and Son, 1880),
78
15. D. James Kennedy and Jerry Newcombe, What If Jesus Had Never Been Born?
(Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1994), 21.
16. Robert William Fogel, Without Consent and Without Contract: The Rise and Fall
of American Slavery (New York: W. W. Norton, 1991), 18.
17. Sherwood E. Wirt, The Social Consequences of the Evangelical (New York: Harper
and Row, 1968), 39.
18. Donald Mundinger, “Statement by President Mundinger,” in Sesquicentennial
Papers : Illinois College, ed. Iver F. Yaeger (Carbondale: Southern Illinois
University Press, 1982), 156.
19. Ibid, 72.
20. 42. Josephine Donovan, Uncle Tom’s Cabin: Evil, Affliction and Redemptive Love
(Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1991), 12.
21. On one occasion, a sea captain who met her said that he was pleased to shake
the hand that wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin. She responded that she did not write
the book. “God wrote it,” she said, “I merely did his dictation.”
22. Eugene Genovese, Roll, Jordan, Roll (New York: Pantheon Books, 1974), 161–68.
23. Albert Bernhardt Faust, The German Element in the United States (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin, 1909), 1:46. The original copy of this protest is housed in the
library of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
24. “Selma, Civil Rights, and the Church Militant,” Newsweek, 29 March 1965, 78.
25. “Southern Baptists Denounce Klan,” Christian Century, 14 September 1949,
1059.
26. Martin Luther King Jr., “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” in A Testament of Hope:
The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King Jr., ed. James Melvin
Washington (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1991), 300.
27. Fielding H. Garrison, An Introduction to the History of Medicine (Philadelphia: W.
B. Saunders, 1914), 118.
28. Cited in Gumpert, Dunant, 300.
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