Segment · Episode 101
What Is That? — Slave Bible
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Slave Bible
The Slave Bible is the colloquial name for an 1807 publication formally titled Select Parts of the Holy Bible for the Use of the Negro Slaves in the British West India Islands. It was a heavily abridged selection of biblical material designed to support Christian instruction among enslaved people while excluding many passages about liberation, deliverance, and resistance.
Why this topic matters
The Slave Bible matters on the show because it exposes how biblical texts were selectively curated to stabilize slavery while suppressing passages that could nourish hopes of freedom. It becomes a concrete case study in how interpretation, omission, and institutional power can shape what counts as ’the Bible’ for a particular audience.
It also keeps resurfacing because the discussion does not end with a single disturbing artifact. The topic opens into larger arguments about whether slavery-supporting readings were aberrations or historically well grounded, how later Christians re-read scripture once moral consensus shifted, and how communities negotiate biblical authority when their ethical convictions outgrow inherited interpretations.
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Top mention · Episode 101
10 mentionsThe Slave Bible
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- Slave Bible
- Decalogue
- Eschatology
- +14
Quotes from the Data
“This is a name that's been given, a colloquial name that's been given to a publication that was published in 1807. And its actual title is Select Parts of the Holy Bible for the Use of the Negro Slaves in the British West India Islands.”
“It was intended to allow enslavers to preach the Gospel to their enslaved folks without them getting their heads filled with ideas about freedom and about escape or deliverance or redemption or anything like that related to enslavement.”
“The way a lot of folks are talking about the Slave Bible today, and particularly the Museum of the Bible, is as this kind of aberrant perversion of the Bible.”
“The pro-slavery spokesmen were defending the more defensible position from the perspective of historical criticism.”
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