> Even at the height of slavery, there were those disagreed with it and fought against it. What was their reading of the Bible?
The Bible was used by both sides in the slavery debate. The Old Testament says nothing bad about slavery, while mentioning it fairly often; the New Testament says virtually nothing about slavery at all.
> we have the case of Nazi Germany, which enslaved people and used them as slave labor...
Yes, because it made economic sense to do so, thus flippign morality around again. It didn't hurt that they could simply declare the slaves "non-humans." A terribly effective way of bypassing many moral codes.
> And they were Christian/Lutheran.
Much of Germany was, yes. But the leadership... not so much. Hitler was just plain nuts, and bought into late 19th/early 20th century theosophical Madame Blavatsky wackiness about ascended masters and Golden Ages and Atlantis and whatnot. Nevertheless, whiel the Nazi leadership was not Christian by any reasonable definition, it wasn't Hitler and Goering out there running the ovens.
> and what do you do when you get a better tools to replace the older one? Chainsaw vs. axe.
I have an axe (several, actually) but no chain saw. "Better" is often subjective.
As to the specifics of slavery: you get a wide range of results. In some places, when slavery stopped making economic + moral sense, it simply ended with the passage ofa few laws and the freeing of the slaves (the slave states in the North, frex). But in other places, you got things like The War Of Southern Aggression. And had Hitler won WWII... most of the slaves, once their utility in the war industry ended, they'd likely been turned into fertilizer or ash.
But it's never a good idea to try to get a good grasp on concepts of reality by looking at the Third Reich. Them boys was *nuts.*
You're right there. I hesitated to use them as an example because they are so often used as an example of evil, it has become cliche. And you touched on something else I thought of in the mean time. We probably have to look at individual societies and their individual circumstances separately to determine why they practised slavery (or didn't). It could be economic (empire expansion for large societies, or resource competition for small ones), or it is simply what was done after a conquest (tribe overuns another tribe), or genetic (Mars needs women...(sorry)), or population control. All I can say is I'm glad we live in era and land where generally, slavery is no longer acceptable.
Aleister Crowley, who openly supported the National Socialists, was affiliated with Ordo Templi Orientis, A.A. (Order of the Silver Star) and such occult lodges all across Germany. Crowley engaged in all manner of deviancy, homoeroticism, sadomasochism and murder. Much of the occultism in National Socialism is derived directly from there. Crowley envisioned himself as the Great Beast (To Mega Therion), just as der Fuhrer made himself in that image. Hitler's life as a struggling, inept artist was where that association blossomed.
Crowley's creed, “Do what thou wilt, shall be the whole of the Law,” (which is actually from Francois Rabelais) and used by Neo-Pagan nutcases without attribution for obvious politically correct reasons, is with certainty no different than the National Socialist “will to power,” or their ubermensch mentality.
It is also no accident Nietzsche's “over-man” and nihilist philosophy and resulting insanity from venereal disease closely mirrors the insanity of der Fuhrer.
These occult orders, sex and drug cults still survive today, as do the Neo-pagan, Neo-Nazi groups, black supremacist Rastafarian potheads, prison gangs and other related filth.
Crowley occultism is also from where L. Ron Hubbard emerges with Scientology. Note the NAZI symbolism of that kooky cult of weirdos and their deviant adherents who advocate homoeroticism and other perversions. Hollywood Cultural Marxists love Scientology.
Ah, Hollywood! The fountain of fantastical images, perverts and hypocrisies! It is by no accident the Cultural Marxists of Hollywood are flaming haters of America, Israel and Christendom, who advocate the most bizarre and psychotic.