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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - 1 Peter 2:18 - 2:18
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18. The duty of Servants to Masters (cf. Camb. Gk. Test. Col. p. lxviii.; Lightfoot Col. 317 ff.)
Slavery was interwoven with the texture of society under the Roman Empire. To prohibit slavery would have been to tear society into shreds, and bring about a servile war with its certain horrors and doubtful issues. The Gospel therefore nowhere directly attacks slavery as an institution. It lays down universal principles which were ultimately to undermine the evil, but there is not a syllable which could appeal to the spirit of political revolution. Yet the numbers of the slave population were enormous, and their lot was often intensely hard. The slave had no recognized relationships, no conjugal rights. He was absolutely at his master’s disposal; for the smallest offence he might be scourged, mutilated, crucified or thrown to the beasts. When men in such a position were for the first time taught that “there is no respect of persons with God, that in Christ Jesus there is neither bond nor free,” that masters and slaves are brothers in Christ, they might easily have been excited to assert their liberty in a spirit of open rebellion or sullen discontent. St Peter therefore, like St Paul in Eph 6:5; Col 3:22; 1Ti 6:1, instructs Christian slaves to regard service to earthly masters as part of their service to God.