section_path: Modern theories/Abduction reinterpreted
section_name: Abduction reinterpreted
paragraph_text: Abduction reinterpreted
  
  According to Patrick's own account, it was Irish raiders who brought him to Ireland where he was enslaved and held captive for six years. However, a recent alternative interpretation by Roy Flechner of Patrick's departure to Ireland suggests that, as the son of a decurion, he would have been obliged by Roman law to serve on the town council (curia), but chose instead to abscond from the onerous obligations of this office by fleeing abroad, as many others in his position had done in what has become known as the 'flight of the curiales '. Flechner also asserts the improbability of an escape from servitude and a journey of the kind that Patrick purports to have undertaken. He also interprets the biblical allusions in Patrick's account (e.g. the theme of freedom after six years of servitude in Exod. 21:2 or Jer. 34:14), as implying parts of the account may not have been intended to be understood literally.
  
  According to Patrick's own account, it was Irish raiders who brought him to Ireland where he was enslaved and held captive for six years. However, a recent alternative interpretation by Roy Flechner of Patrick's departure to Ireland suggests that, as the son of a decurion, he would have been obliged by Roman law to serve on the town council (curia), but chose instead to abscond from the onerous obligations of this office by fleeing abroad, as many others in his position had done in what has become known as the 'flight of the curiales '. Flechner also asserts the improbability of an escape from servitude and a journey of the kind that Patrick purports to have undertaken. He also interprets the biblical allusions in Patrick's account (e.g. the theme of freedom after six years of servitude in Exod. 21:2 or Jer. 34:14), as implying parts of the account may not have been intended to be understood literally.