Sylvester Johnson's Analysis

Sylvester Johnson examined the two factors incorporated within the Bible, which shaped the nature of American debates over slavery (Johnson 231). The first factor consisted of the Bible cultivating the ideology of slavery. The Bible was able to cultivate this ideology due to its writings that were composed of authors who confirmed, and even advocated a society to embrace slavery as a legitimate practice (Johnson 231). The second factor examined how the Bible had an effect on abolitionists challenging the legitimacy of slavery. Since the Bible was a tremendous symbol of authority, it made it difficult for abolitionists to utilize the Bible as a source to challenge the notion of slavery as a legitimate practice.
Johnson further examined the

The bible was supportive about the slavery institution, however, it did not outwardly express its justification for the race-based slavery within American society; this was presented as a challenge for both pro-slavery Americans and Abolitionists (Johnson 231). Neither of these individuals was able to support their argument on the basis of the Bible alone; the Bible did not have specific passages advocating for African American slavery nor against it. In other words, the Bible's support of African American slavery was left to open interpretation. This allowed individuals who were pro-slavery and abolitionists to manipulate passages within the bible to favor their argument. For instance, American society utilized the story of Noah and his sons in Genesis 9 and 10 (in which Noah curses the descendants of his son, Ham, with slavery) to explain racial identities and race based slavery (Johnson 232). This resulted in the interpretation that African American individuals were of the lowest variety of human beings, whilst Europeans appointed themselves as the supreme race (Ibid). By appointing themselves as the supreme race, it allowed white individuals to easily create definitive boundaries between themselves and other races, which would eventually lead to their justification

The first argument that was used to advocate for slavery incorporated the Biblical passage which stated that Noah claimed that African Americans were descendants of the Ham, and therefore cursed to suffer slavery (Johnson 232). Sewall immediately backlashed this statement, by indicating that how exactly does one know that this curse is still intact or not. Therefore, stating this defense is completely invalid and even if the curse was intact, what gave the Puritan settlers any right to enslave these individuals (Johnson 232). The most legalistic defense claim incorporated the concept that the trans-Atlantic slave trade was lawful because of the wars among African nations produced legitimate captives who could be legally bought and sold during the war (Johnson 232). However, Sewell responded by indicating that every war was morally unlawful, and therefore their captives were unlawful as well (Ibid). He proceeds to indicate that there is a double standard, he poses the idea that if a New England settler were taken as a captive and sold into slavery, they would protest for their freedom, so why is that when an African American individual begins to fight for their freedom it is deemed as an irrational act. There is an underlying tone that the reason why African American calls for freedom are deemed as irrational is because American society has