Is slavery part of religion or religion part of slavery ?

[Major Nikon]

2. Religion has been used throughout history to control the weak

If we think of god as being created in man's image rather than the other way around, religion becomes a hugely effective tool for controlling the masses and is unquestionably the greatest invention ever created for that purpose.

Unsurprisingly slave populations were almost universally indoctrinated into the religion of their captors. This was done for a few different reasons. First of all, you could claim you were actually saving the "souls" of your slaves and doing them the favor of saving them from eternal damnation and offering them the opportunity for eternal bliss, which conveniently can't be verified. This helped tremendously with marketing the idea of slavery. Forget all the forced servitude, torture, and murder. We are doing them a huge favor by rescuing them from their paganism. Then there's the consolation that the enslaved get from religion. Rebelling against the society that enslaves them is no different than rebelling against slavery itself and imperils one's position in that eternal happy place (unverified) which is one's reward for working hard all your life and not questioning authority. This is the opium such a society feeds its slaves so their crushing oppression is hardly felt at all.

Regardless of which way you look at it, religion and slavery are part and parcel to each other.