Albert Barnes Commentary Colossians 4:1

"Masters, render unto your servants that which is just and equal; knowing that ye also have a Master in heaven." — Colossians 4:1 (ASV)

Masters, give to your servants, etc. (See Barnes on Ephesians 6:9).

That which is just and equal means what they ought to have, what is fairly their due. The apostle here probably refers to slaves, and the appropriateness of this rule is apparent. Such persons were subject to their masters' control; their time and services were at their disposal, and they could not enforce their just and equal claims by an appeal to the laws.

They were, therefore, dependent on the equity and kindness of their masters. There can be no doubt that many who were converted to the Christian faith were held in involuntary servitude (1 Corinthians 7); and it is just as clear that the apostles did not design to cause a violent disruption of these bonds, or to lead the slaves to rise and murder their masters (See Barnes on 1 Timothy 6:1; also 1 Timothy 6:2–4).

But it is equally clear that they meant to represent slavery as a hard and undesirable condition. They intended to instruct the slaves to embrace the earliest opportunity to be free that was presented (1 Corinthians 7:21). Furthermore, they meant to suggest such considerations and to lay down such principles as would lead masters to emancipate their slaves, and thus ultimately to abolish slavery. Among these principles are the following:

1. That all men were of one and the same blood (Acts 17:26).

2. That they were all redeemed by the same Savior and were brothers (1 Timothy 6:2; Philemon 1:16). If redeemed, if they were brothers, if they were heirs of glory, they were not chattels or things. How then could a Christian conscientiously hold or regard them as property?

3. That they were to render them that which is just and equal. What would follow from this if fairly applied? What would be just and equal to a man in those circumstances? Would it not be:

   1. To compensate him fairly for his labor—to furnish him an adequate remuneration for what he had earned? But this would strike a blow at the root of slavery, for one of its elementary principles is that there must be "unrequited labor." That is, the slave must earn as much more than he receives as will do his part in maintaining the master in idleness.

      For it is of the very essence of the system that the master is to be maintained in indolence by the slaves he owns—or precisely to the extent that he owns a slave. If he were disposed to earn his own living, he would not need the labor of slaves.

      No man ever yet became the permanent owner of a slave from benevolence to him, or because he desired to pay him fully for his work, or because he himself meant to work in order to maintain his slave in indolence.

   2. If a man should in fact render to his slaves that which is just and equal, would he not restore them to freedom? Have they not been deprived of their liberty by injustice, and would not justice restore it? What has the slave done to forfeit his liberty?

      If he should make him "equal" in rights to himself, or to what he is by nature, would he not emancipate him? Has he not been reduced to his present condition by withholding that which is "equal"? Has he "equal" rights and "equal" privileges with other men? Has he not been cut off from them by denying him the equality to which he is entitled in the arrangements of God's government? Can he be held at all without violating all the just notions of equality?

Though, therefore, it may be true that this passage only enjoins the rendering of that which was "just" and "equal" in their condition as slaves, yet it contains a principle which would "lay the axe at the root" of slavery and would lead a conscientious Christian to the feeling that his slaves ought to be free.

These principles actually brought about the freedom of slaves in the Roman Empire a few centuries after Christianity was introduced, and they are destined to bring it about all over the world.

Knowing that you also have a Master in heaven (See Barnes on Ephesians 6:9).