Exo 21:1-6 | Clarke | STEP | Laws concerning servants. They shall serve for only seven years, , . If a servant brought a wife to servitude with him, both should go out free on the seventh year, . If his master had given him a wife, and she bore him children, he might go out free an the seventh year, but his wife and children must remain, as the property of the master, . If, through love to his master, wife, and children, he did not choose to avail himself of the privilege granted by the law, of going out free on the seventh year, his ear was to be bored to the door post with an awl, as an emblem of his being attached to the family for ever, , . Laws concerning maid-servants, betrothed to their masters or to the sons of their masters, . Laws concerning battery and murder, . Concerning men-stealing, . Concerning him that curses his parents, . Of strife between man and man, , ; between a master and his servants, , . Of injuries done to women in pregnancy, . The Lex Talionis, or law of like, . Of injuries done to servants, by which they gain the right of freedom, , . Laws concerning the ox which has gored men, . Of the pit left uncovered, into which a man or a beast has fallen, , . Laws concerning the ox that kills another, , . Verse 1 Now these are the judgments - There is so much good sense, feeling, humanity, equity, and justice in the following laws, that they cannot but be admired by every intelligent reader; and they are so very plain as to require very little comment. The laws in this chapter are termed political, those in the succeeding chapter judicial, laws; and are supposed to have been delivered to Moses alone, in consequence of the request of the people, , that God should communicate his will to Moses, and that Moses should, as mediator, convey it to them.

Exodus 21:1-6

Introduction

Laws concerning servants. They shall serve for only seven years, Exo 21:1, Exo 21:2. If a servant brought a wife to servitude with him, both should go out free on the seventh year, Exo 21:3. If his master had given him a wife, and she bore him children, he might go out free an the seventh year, but his wife and children must remain, as the property of the master, Exo 21:4. If, through love to his master, wife, and children, he did not choose to avail himself of the privilege granted by the law, of going out free on the seventh year, his ear was to be bored to the door post with an awl, as an emblem of his being attached to the family for ever, Exo 21:5, Exo 21:6. Laws concerning maid-servants, betrothed to their masters or to the sons of their masters, Exo 21:7-11. Laws concerning battery and murder, Exo 21:12-15. Concerning men-stealing, Exo 21:16. Concerning him that curses his parents, Exo 21:17. Of strife between man and man, Exo 21:18, Exo 21:19; between a master and his servants, Exo 21:20, Exo 21:21. Of injuries done to women in pregnancy, Exo 21:22. The Lex Talionis, or law of like, Exo 21:23-25. Of injuries done to servants, by which they gain the right of freedom, Exo 21:26, Exo 21:27. Laws concerning the ox which has gored men, Exo 21:28-32. Of the pit left uncovered, into which a man or a beast has fallen, Exo 21:33, Exo 21:34. Laws concerning the ox that kills another, Exo 21:35, Exo 21:36.

Verse 1

Now these are the judgments - There is so much good sense, feeling, humanity, equity, and justice in the following laws, that they cannot but be admired by every intelligent reader; and they are so very plain as to require very little comment. The laws in this chapter are termed political, those in the succeeding chapter judicial, laws; and are supposed to have been delivered to Moses alone, in consequence of the request of the people, Exo 20:19, that God should communicate his will to Moses, and that Moses should, as mediator, convey it to them. Verse 2

If thou buy a Hebrew servant - Calmet enumerates six different ways in which a Hebrew might lose his liberty:

1. In extreme poverty they might sell their liberty. Lev 25:39 : If thy brother be waxen poor, and be sold unto thee, etc.

2. A father might sell his children. If a man sell his daughter to be a maidservant; see Exo 21:7.

3. Insolvent debtors became the slaves of their creditors. My husband is dead - and the creditor is come to take unto him my two sons to be bondmen, 2Kgs 4:1.

4. A thief, if he had not money to pay the fine laid on him by the law, was to be sold for his profit whom he had robbed. If he have nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft; Exo 22:3, Exo 22:4.

5. A Hebrew was liable to be taken prisoner in war, and so sold for a slave.

6. A Hebrew slave who had been ransomed from a Gentile by a Hebrew might be sold by him who ransomed him, to one of his own nation.

Six years he shall serve - It was an excellent provision in these laws, that no man could finally injure himself by any rash, foolish, or precipitate act. No man could make himself a servant or slave for more than seven years; and if he mortgaged the family inheritance, it must return to the family at the jubilee, which returned every fiftieth year.

It is supposed that the term six years is to be understood as referring to the sabbatical years; for let a man come into servitude at whatever part of the interim between two sabbatical years, he could not be detained in bondage beyond a sabbatical year; so that if he fell into bondage the third year after a sabbatical year, he had but three years to serve; if the fifth, but one. See Clarke's note on Exo 23:11, etc. Others suppose that this privilege belonged only to the year of jubilee, beyond which no man could be detained in bondage, though he had been sold only one year before. Verse 3

If he came in by himself - If he and his wife came in together, they were to go out together: in all respects as he entered, so should he go out. This consideration seems to have induced St. Jerome to translate the passage thus: Cum quali veste intraverat, cum tali exeat. "He shall have the same coat in going out, as he had when he came in," i.e., if he came in with a new one, he shall go out with a new one, which was perfectly just, as the former coat must have been worn out in his master's service, and not his own. Verse 4

The wife and her children shall be her master's - It was a law among the Hebrews, that if a Hebrew had children by a Canannitish woman, those children must be considered as Canaanitish only, and might be sold and bought, and serve for ever. The law here refers to such a case only. Verse 6

Shall bring him unto the judges - אל האלהים el haelohim, literally, to God; or, as the Septuagint have it, προς το κριτηριον Θεου, to the judgment of God; who condescended to dwell among his people; who determined all their differences till he had given them laws for all cases, and who, by his omniscience, brought to light the hidden things of dishonesty. See Exo 22:8.

Bore his ear through with an awl - This was a ceremony sufficiently significant, as it implied,

1. That he was closely attached to that house and family.

2. That he was bound to hear all his master's orders, and to obey them punctually. Boring of the ear was an ancient custom in the east. It is referred to by Juvenal: -

Prior, inquit, ego adsum.

Cur timeam, dubitemve locum defendere? Quamvis

Natus ad Euphraten, Molles quod in Aure Fenestrae

Arguerint, licet ipse negem.

Sat. i. 102. "First come, first served, he cries; and I, in spite

Of your great lordships, will maintain my right:

Though born a slave, though my torn Ears are Bored, 'Tis not the birth, 'tis money makes the lord."

Dryden.

Calmet quotes a saying from Petronius as attesting the same thing; and one from Cicero, in which he rallies a Libyan who pretended he did not hear him: "It is not," said he, "because your ears are not sufficiently bored;" alluding to his having been a slave.