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Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Exodus 21:1

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Now these [are] the judgments which thou shalt set before them.

1. Now ] And introducing a new element in the collection, viz. the ‘judgements’ contained in Exo 21:2 to Exo 22:17.

the judgements ] i.e. legal precedents, intended to have the force of law. The Heb. mishp means a judicial decision, (1) given in an individual case, and then (2) established as a precedent for other similar cases 1 [184] . No doubt, the decisions which Moses gave, when he ‘sat to judge the people’ (Exo 18:13; cf. on Exo 18:15-16), became thus the foundation of Hebrew legislation (cf. p. 161) 2 [185] .

[184] In its original sense, the word is a term belonging to civil and criminal law; but it is sometimes extended so as to include moral and religious injunctions (as Lev 18:4-5; Lev 19:15; Lev 19:35); it is also sometimes in EVV. rendered more clearly by ‘ordinance’ (e.g. Exo 15:25, Jos 24:25, Isa 58:2, Jer 8:7 RV.).

[185] ‘En-Mishp (Gen 14:7), the ‘Spring of judgement,’ as adesh (the ‘sacred’ place) was also called, was doubtless once a sacred spring, at which judicial decisions were obtained (cf. DB. iii. 67 a , v. 616 b ).

set before them ] Exo 19:7, Deu 4:44.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Chapters Exo 20:22 to Exo 23:33

The Book of the Covenant

The ‘Book of the Covenant’ (see Exo 24:7 in explanation of the name) is the oldest piece of Hebrew legislation that we possess. The laws contained in it are spoken of in Exo 24:3 as consisting of two elements, the words (or commands) and the judgements: the judgements (see on Exo 21:1) are the provisions relating to civil and criminal law, prescribing what is to be done when particular cases arise, and comprised in Exo 21:2 to Exo 22:17; the words are positive injunctions of moral, religious, and ceremonial law, introduced mostly by Thou shalt or shalt not, and comprised in Exo 20:23-26, Exo 22:18 to Exo 23:19: Exo 23:20-33 is a hortatory epilogue, consisting chiefly of promises intended to suggest motives for the observance of the preceding laws. The laws themselves were doubtless taken by E from some already existing source: the ‘judgements’ in Exo 21:2 to Exo 22:17 seem to have undergone no alteration of form: but the ‘words’ which follow can hardly be in their original order; moral, religious, and ceremonial injunctions being intermingled sometimes singly, sometimes in groups (see the following summary), without any apparent system (notice also Exo 23:4 f., evidently interrupting the connexion between vv. 1 3 and 6 8); and in parts (as Exo 22:21-22;Exo 22:24, Exo 23:9 b, Exo 23:23-25 a, Exo 23:31-33: see the notes) slight parenetic additions have probably been made by the compiler of J E.

The laws themselves may be grouped as follows:

i. Enactments relating to civil and criminal law:

1. Rights of Hebrew slaves (male and female), Exo 21:2-11.

2. Capital offences, viz. murder (in distinction from manslaughter), striking or cursing a parent, and man-stealing, Exo 21:12-17.

3. Penalties for bodily injuries, caused ( a) by human beings, Exo 21:18-27, ( b) by animals (a vicious ox, for instance), or neglect of reason able precautions (as leaving a pit open), Exo 21:28-36.

4. Theft of ox or sheep, and burglary, Exo 22:1-4.

5. Compensation for damage done by straying cattle [but see note], or fire spreading accidentally to another man’s field, Exo 22:5-6.

6. Compensation for loss or injury in various cases of deposit or loan, Exo 22:7-15.

7. Compensation for seduction, Exo 22:16-17.

ii ( a). Regulations relating to worship and religious observances:

1. Prohibition of images, and regulations for the construction of altars, Exo 20:23-26.

2. Sacrifice to ‘other gods’ to be punished with the ‘ban,’ Exo 22:20.

3. God not to be reviled, nor a ruler cursed, Exo 22:28.

4. Firstfruits, and firstborn males (of men, oxen, and sheep), to be given to Jehovah, Exo 22:29-30.

5. Flesh torn of beasts not to be eaten, Exo 22:31.

6 & 7. The seventh year to be a fallow year, and the seventh day a day of rest (in each case, for a humanitarian motive), Exo 23:10-12.

8. God’s commands to be honoured, and ‘other gods’ not to be invoked, Exo 23:13.

9. The three annual Pilgrimages to be observed (all males to appear before Jehovah at each), Exo Exo 23:14-17.

10. A festal sacrifice not to be offered with leavened bread, nor its fat to remain unburnt till the following morning, Exo 23:18.

11. Firstfruits to be brought to the house of Jehovah, Exo 23:19 a.

12. A kid not to be boiled in its mother’s milk, Exo 23:19 b.

ii ( b). Injunctions of a moral, and, especially, of a humanitarian character:

1. Sorcery and bestiality to be punished with death, Exo 22:18-19.

2. The ‘sojourner,’ the widow, and the orphan, not to be oppressed, Exo 22:21-24.

3. Interest not to be taken from the poor, Exo 22:25.

4. A garment taken in pledge to be returned before sun-down, Exo 22:26-27.

5. Veracity and impartiality, the duties of a witness, Exo 23:1-3.

6. An enemy’s beast to be preserved from harm, Exo 23:4-5.

7. Justice to be administered impartially, and no bribe to be taken, Exo 23:6-9.

These three groups of laws may have been taken originally from distinct collections. The terse form in which many of the laws in ii ( a) and ii ( b) are cast resembles that which prevails in Leviticus 19 (H). The regulations respecting worship contained in Exo 23:10-19, together with the allied ones embedded in Exo 13:3-7; Exo 13:11-13, are repeated in Exo 34:18-26, in the section (Exo 34:10-26) sometimes called the ‘Little Book of the Covenant,’ with slight verbal differences, and with the addition in Exo 34:11-17 of more specific injunctions against idolatry (see the synoptic table, pp. 370 2).

The laws contained in the ‘Book of the Covenant’ are, as has been already said, no doubt older than the narrative (E) in which they are incorporated: they represent, to use Cornill’s expression, the ‘consuetudinary law of the early monarchy,’ and include (cf. the notes on trh, p. 162, and mishp, Exo 22:1) the formulated decisions which, after having been begun by Moses (Exo 18:16; cf. p. 161), had gradually accumulated up to that age. The stage of society for which the Code was designed, and the characteristics of the Code itself, are well indicated by W. R. Smith ( OTJC. 2 [180] p. 340 ff). ‘The society contemplated in it is of very simple structure. The basis of life is agricultural. Cattle and agricultural produce are the main elements wealth; and the laws of property deal almost exclusively with them (see Exo 21:28 to Exo 22:10). The principles of criminal and civil justice are those still current among the Arabs of the desert, viz. retaliation and pecuniary compensation. Murder is dealt with by the law of blood-revenge; but the innocent man-slayer may seek asylum at God’s altar (cf. 1Ki 1:50; 1Ki 2:18; 1Ki 2:29).’ Man-stealing, offences against parents, and witchcraft are also punishable by death. Personal injuries fall mostly, like murder, under the law of retaliation (Exo Exo 21:24 f.). These are the only cases in which a punishment affecting the person is prescribed: in other cases the punishment takes as a rule the form of compensation. ‘Degrading punishments, as imprisonment or the bastinado, are unknown; and loss of liberty is inflicted only on a thief who cannot pay a fine (Exo 22:3 b). The slave retains definite rights. He recovers his freedom after 7 years, unless he prefers to remain a bondman, and to seal his determination by a solemn symbolical act (Exo 21:6).’ He cannot appeal to the lex talionis against his master: to beat one’s own slave to death is not a capital crime; but for minor injuries he can claim his liberty (Exo 21:20 f., 26 f.). ‘Women do not enjoy full social equality with men. The daughter was her father’s property, who received a price for surrendering her to her husband (Exo 21:7); and so a daughter’s dishonour is compensated by law as a pecuniary loss to her father (Exo 22:16 f.).’ A woman slave was a slave for life, except when she had been bought to be her master’s concubine, and he withheld the recognized rights which she thus acquired (Exo 21:11). Concubine-slaves had also other rights (Exo 21:8-10). Various cases of injury to property are specified: the penalty is usually simple compensation, though naturally it is greater, if deliberate purpose (as in the case of theft, Exo 22:1), or culpable negligence, can be proved. Cases of misappropriation of property are settled by a decision given at a sanctuary (Exo 22:9).

[180] W. R. Smith, Old Testament in the Jewish Church, ed. 2, 1892.

From the point of view of ethics and religion, the regard paid in the Code to the claims of humanity and justice is observable. An emphatic voice is raised against those crying vices of Oriental Government, the maladministration of justice, and the oppression of the poor. Even an enemy, in his need, is to receive consideration and help (Exo 23:4-5). ‘The gr, or foreigner living in Israel under the protection of a family or the community, though he has no legal status (cf. on Exo 22:21), is not to be oppressed. The Sabbath is enforced as an ordinance of humanity; and to the same end the produce of every field or vineyard must be left to the poor one year in seven. The precepts of religious worship are simple. He who sacrifices to any god but Jehovah falls under the ‘ban’ (Exo 22:20). The only ordinance of ceremonial sanctity is to abstain from the flesh of animals torn by wild beasts (Exo 22:31). Altar are to be of the simplest possible construction. The sacred dues are the firstlings and firstfruits; and the former must be presented at a sanctuary on the eighth day. This regulation presupposes a plurality of sanctuaries, which also agrees with the terms of Exo 20:24.’ The only sacrifices mentioned are burnt- and peace-offerings. The three pilgrimages, at which every male is to appear before Jehovah with a gift, celebrate three periods of the agricultural year, the beginning and close of harvest, and the end of the vintage. The only points of sacrificial ritual insisted on are the two rules that the blood of a festal sacrifice is not to be offered with leavened bread, and that the fat must be burnt before the next morning. The simplicity of the ceremonial regulations in this Code stands in striking contrast to the detailed and systematic development which they receive in the later legislation of P.

Some of the laws strike us as severe (Exo 21:15-16; Exo 21:21, Exo 22:18; Exo 22:20); but we must remember the stage of civilization for which they were designed: they were adapted, not for people in every stage of society, but for people living as the Israelites were circumstanced at the time when they were drawn up. They also, it is to be observed, are in many cases clearly intended to impose restrictions upon abuse of authority, or arbitrary violence. We may remember also that far severer punishments, such as mutilation and torture, were common not only in many other ancient nations, but even, till comparatively recent times, in Christian Europe; and in England, till 1835, death was the penalty for many trivial forms of theft. Of course some of the laws notably the one about witches have been terribly misapplied in times when the progressive character of revelation and the provisional character of Israel’s laws were not realized. But they were adapted on the whole to make Israel a just, humane, and God-fearing people, and to prepare the way, when the time was ripe, for something better.

The laws of J and E (except the section dealing with the compensations to be paid for various injuries, Exo 21:18 to Exo 22:15), expanded, and, in some cases, modified to suit the requirements of a later age, form a substantial element in the Deuteronomic legislation (Deuteronomy 5-28; see the synoptic table in LOT. p. 73 ff.): to some of the moral and religious injunctions there are also parallels (referred to in the notes) in the ‘Law of Holiness’ (Leviticus 17-26). The ceremonial laws appear in a partially developed form in Dt., and in a more fully developed form, with many minutely defined regulations, in the Priests’ Code (for an example in Exodus itself, contrast Exo 23:15 with Exo 12:14-20). A discussion of the differences between the laws of JE and the later codes belongs more to the commentaries on Lev., Numb., and Dt., than to one on Exodus; and they have been noticed here only in special cases. A detailed comparison of the different regulations will be found in McNeile, pp. xxxix xlvi, li lvi.

The promulgation of a new code of laws was often among ancient nations ascribed to the command of the national deity. Thus among he Cretans, Minos, the ‘companion of great Zeus’ ( , Od.19:179), was said to have held converse with Zeus, and to have received his laws from him in a cave of the Dictaean mountain (cf. [Plato], Minos, 319 b 320 b); his laws and those of Lycurgus are called ‘the laws of Zeus’ and ‘Apollo’ respectively (Plato, Legg. i. 632 D); and Numa’s laws were ascribed to the goddess Egeria (Dion. Hal. ii. 60 f.). The closest parallel is however afforded, on Semitic ground, by Hmmurabi, who expressly speaks of his code as consisting of ‘righteous laws’ delivered to him by Shamash, the sun-god (see below, p. 418 ff.).

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Judgments – i. e. decisions of the law.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Exo 21:1

These are the Judgments.

The judgments

These judgments stood related to the second table of the Law, just as the regulations concerning the worship of the altar stood related to the first. It is to be remembered also that these judgments, and those of the same kind which afterward were added as occasion arose, are to be distinguished from the moral law, not only as applying to the state rather than the individual, but also as local and temporary in their nature, representing not what was ideally best, but only what was then practically possible in the direction of that which was best. Some very superficial people criticise them as if they were intended for the nineteenth century! The Decalogue was, and is, intrinsically perfect; the judgments were adapted to the circumstances and wants of Israel at the time. And it would be a good thing if reformers of modern times would always remember the same wise and necessary distinctions, between that which is ideally perfect and that which alone may be practically possible. Still further it is to be remembered, that these judgments were suitable to the Theocracy of Israel; and hence those are entirely wrong who attempt to use them as precedents for general legislation in the limited monarchies and republican governments, and otherwise entirely altered circumstances, of modern times. Yet if we could only compare these judgments with the laws and customs of the nations around, we should see by force of contrast how exceedingly pure, wise, just, and humane they are; and especially where private relations are dealt with, we have touches which would not shame the New Testament itself, however much they may in another sense shame us, as for instance Exo 23:4-5. The third division of the book of the covenant has to do with matters which relate neither to worship exclusively, nor to civil relations exclusively, but to both. These are the Sabbath year, the Sabbath day, and the yearly festivals (Exo 23:10-19). As for the Sabbath year and the festivals, they will come up again in the fuller details given from the tabernacle and recorded in Leviticus. And as for the Sabbath day, we may simply remark the significance of its presence here in the book of the covenant, as well as in the Decalogue, indicating that while in its principle it belongs to universal and unchangeable law, in its letter it formed part of that national covenant which was merged in the new and better covenant of the later age. (J. M. Gibson, D. D.)

The Hebrew commonwealth founded on religion

There is a very common reflection upon the Hebrew lawgiver, which, though it does not call in question any particular law, is yet designed to vitiate and weaken the impression of the whole–that he was a stern and relentless ruler, who may indeed have understood the principles of justice, but whose justice was seldom tempered with mercy. This impression is derived partly at least from the summary way in which in several instances he dealt with rebellion. To this kind of argument there is one brief and sufficient answer: All bodies of men are acknowledged to have the right to resort to severe penalties when encompassed by extraordinary dangers. The children of Israel were in a position of great peril, and their safety depended on the wisdom and firmness of one man. Never had a ruler a more difficult task. Moses did not legislate for the ideal republic of Plato, a community of perfect beings, but for a people born in slavery, from which they had but just broken away, and that were in danger of becoming ungovernable. Here were two millions and a half who had not even a settled place of abode, mustered in one vast camp, through which rebellion might spread in a day. Moses had to govern them by his single will . . . To preserve order, and to guard against hostile attacks, all the men capable of bearing arms were organized as a military body . . . He suppressed rebellion as Cromwell would have suppressed it: he not only put it down, but stamped it out; and such prompt severity was the truest humanity. But it is not acts of military discipline that provoke the criticism of modern humanitarians, so much as those religious laws which prescribed the God whom the Hebrews should worship, and punished idolatry and blasphemy as the greatest of crimes. This, it is said, transcends the proper sphere of human law; it exalts ceremonies into duties, and denounces as crimes acts which have no moral wrong. Was not, then, the Hebrew law wanting in the first principle of justice–freedom to all religions? Now it is quite absurd to suppose the Hebrews had conscientious scruples against this worship, or seriously doubted whether Jehovah or Baal were the true God. They had been rescued from slavery by a direct interposition of the Almighty, they had been led by an Almighty Deliverer; and it was His voice which they heard from the cliffs of Sinai. But it was not merely because their religion was true, and the only true worship, that they were required to accept it; but because also of the peculiar relation which its Divine Author had assumed towards the Hebrew state as its founder and protector. They had no king but God; He was the only Lord. As such, no act of disobedience or disrespect to His authority could be light or small. Further: the unity of God was a centre of unity for the nation. The state was one because their God was one. The worship of Jehovah alone distinguished the Hebrews from all other people, and preserved their separate nationality. Admit other religions, and the bond which held together the twelve tribes was dissolved. How long could that union have lasted if the prophets of Baal had had the freedom of the camp and been permitted to go from tribe to tribe and from tent to tent, preaching the doctrine of human sacrifices? Hence Moses did not suffer them for an hour. False prophets were to be stoned to death . . . Such was the Hebrew commonwealth, a state founded in religion. Was it therefore founded in fanaticism and folly, or in profound wisdom and far-seeing sagacity? Religion, true or false, says Coleridge, is, and ever has been, the centre of gravity in a realm, to which all other things must and will accommodate themselves. Would it not be well if some of our modern pretenders to statesmanship did not so completely ignore its existence and its power? The religion which Moses gave to the Hebrews was not one merely of abstract ideas; it was incarnated in an outward and visible worship by which it addressed the senses. Even in the desert the tabernacle and the altar were set up, and the daily sacrifice was offered; the smoke and the incense below ascending towards the pillar of cloud above, and the fire on the altar answering to the pillar of fire in the midnight sky. This daily and nightly worship made religion a real because a visible thing; it appealed to the senses and touched the imagination of the people, and held their spirits in awe. The feeling that God dwelt in the midst of them inspired them with courage for great efforts and great sacrifices. (H. M. Field, D. D.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

CHAPTER XXI

Laws concerning servants. They shall serve for only seven

years, 1, 2.

If a servant brought a wife to servitude with him, both should go

out free on the seventh year, 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, 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, 5, 6.

Laws concerning maid-servants, betrothed to their masters or to

the sons of their masters, 7-11.

Laws concerning battery and murder, 12-15.

Concerning men-stealing, 16.

Concerning him that curses his parents, 17.

Of strife between man and man, 18, 19;

between a master and his servants, 20, 21.

Of injuries done to women in pregnancy, 22.

The LEX TALIONIS, or law of like, 23-25.

for injuries done to servants, by which they gain the right of

freedom, 26, 27.

Laws concerning the ox which has gored men, 28-32.

Of the pit left uncovered, into which a man or a beast has

fallen, 33, 34.

Laws concerning the ox that kills another, 35, 36.

NOTES ON CHAP. XXI

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, Ex 20:19, that God should communicate his will to Moses, and that Moses should, as mediator, convey it to them.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

Or, the judicial laws, by which thou and the judges before mentioned shall govern thyself and the people in civil and criminal causes.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

1. judgmentsrules forregulating the procedure of judges and magistrates in the decision ofcases and the trial of criminals. The government of the Israelitesbeing a theocracy, those public authorities were the servants of theDivine Sovereign, and subject to His direction. Most of these lawshere noticed were primitive usages, founded on principles of naturalequity, and incorporated, with modifications and improvements, in theMosaic code.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

Now these are the judgments,…. The judicial laws respecting the civil state of the people of Israel, so called because they are founded on justice and equity, and are according to the judgment of God, whose judgment is according to truth; and because they are such by which the commonwealth of Israel was to be judged or governed, and were to be the rule of their conduct to one another, and a rule of judgment to their judges in the execution of judgment and justice among them:

which thou shall set before them; besides the ten commands before delivered. They were spoken by God himself in the hearing of the people; these were delivered to Moses after he went up to the mount again, at the request of the people, to be their mediator, to be by him set before them as the rule of their behaviour, and to enjoin them the observance of them; in order to which he was not only to rehearse them, but to write them out, and set them in a plain and easy light before them: and though they did not hear these with their own ears from God himself, as the ten commands; yet, as they had the utmost reason to believe they came from him, and it was at their own request that he, and not God, might speak unto them what was further to be said, with a promise they would obey it, as if they had immediately heard it from him; it became them to receive these laws as of God, and yield a cheerful obedience to them; nor do we find they ever questioned the authority of them; and as their government was a Theocracy, and God was more immediately their King than he was of any other people, it was but right, and what might be expected, that they should have their civil laws from him, and which was their privilege, and gave them the preference to all other nations, De 4:5.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

The mishpatim (Exo 21:1) are not the “laws, which were to be in force and serve as rules of action,” as Knobel affirms, but the rights, by which the national life was formed into a civil commonwealth and the political order secured. These rights had reference first of all to the relation in which the individuals stood one towards another. The personal rights of dependants are placed at the head (Exo 21:2-11); and first those of slaves (Exo 21:2-6), which are still more minutely explained in Deu 15:12-18, where the observance of them is urged upon the hearts of the people on subjective grounds.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

Judicial Laws.

B. C. 1491.

1 Now these are the judgments which thou shalt set before them. 2 If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. 3 If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him. 4 If his master have given him a wife, and she have born him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master’s, and he shall go out by himself. 5 And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: 6 Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him for ever. 7 And if a man sell his daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not go out as the menservants do. 8 If she please not her master, who hath betrothed her to himself, then shall he let her be redeemed: to sell her unto a strange nation he shall have no power, seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her. 9 And if he have betrothed her unto his son, he shall deal with her after the manner of daughters. 10 If he take him another wife; her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage, shall he not diminish. 11 And if he do not these three unto her, then shall she go out free without money.

The first verse is the general title of the laws contained in this and the two following chapters, some of them relating to the religious worship of God, but most of them relating to matters between man and man. Their government being purely a Theocracy, that which in other states is to be settled by human prudence was directed among them by a divine appointment, so that the constitution of their government was peculiarly adapted to make them happy. These laws are called judgments, because they are framed in infinite wisdom and equity, and because their magistrates were to give judgment according to the people. In the doubtful cases that had hitherto occurred, Moses had particularly enquired of God for them, as appeared, ch. xviii. 15; but now God gave him statutes in general by which to determine particular cases, which likewise he must apply to other like cases that might happen, which, falling under the same reason, fell under the same rule. He begins with the laws concerning servants, commanding mercy and moderation towards them. The Israelites had lately been servants themselves; and now that they had become, not only their own masters, but masters of servants too, lest they should abuse their servants, as they themselves had been abused and ruled with rigour by the Egyptian task-masters, provision was made by these laws for the mild and gentle usage of servants. Note, If those who have had power over us have been injurious to us this will not in the least excuse us if we be in like manner injurious to those who are under our power, but will rather aggravate our crime, because, in that case, we may the more easily put our souls into their soul’s stead. Here is,

I. A law concerning men-servants, sold, either by themselves or their parents, through poverty, or by the judges, for their crimes; even those of the latter sort (if Hebrews) were to continue in slavery but seven years at the most, in which time it was taken for granted that they would sufficiently have smarted for their folly or offence. At the seven years’ end the servant should either go out free (Exo 21:2; Exo 21:3), or his servitude should thenceforward be his choice, Exo 21:5; Exo 21:6. If he had a wife given him by his master, and children, he might either leave them and go out free himself, or, if he had such a kindness for them that he would rather tarry with them in bondage than go out at liberty without them, he was to have his ear bored through to the doorpost and serve till the death of his master, or the year of jubilee.

1. By this law God taught, (1.) The Hebrew servants generosity, and a noble love of liberty, for they were the Lord’s freemen; a mark of disgrace must be put upon him who refused liberty when he might have it, though he refused it upon considerations otherwise laudable enough. Thus Christians, being bought with a price, and called unto liberty, must not be the servants of men, nor of the lusts of men, 1 Cor. vii. 23. There is a free and princely spirit that much helps to uphold a Christian, Ps. li. 12. He likewise taught, (2.) The Hebrew masters not to trample upon their poor servants, knowing, not only that they had been by birth upon a level with them, but that, in a few years, they would be so again. Thus Christian masters must look with respect on believing servants, Philem. 16.

2. This law will be further useful to us, (1.) To illustrate the right God has to the children of believing parents, as such, and the place they have in his church. They are by baptism enrolled among his servants, because they are born in his house, for they are therefore born unto him, Ezek. xvi. 20. David owns himself God’s servant, as he was the son of his handmaid (Ps. cxvi. 16), and therefore entitled to protection, Ps. lxxxvi. 16. (2.) To explain the obligation which the great Redeemer laid upon himself to prosecute the work of our salvation, for he says (Ps. xl. 6), My ears hast thou opened, which seems to allude to this law. He loved his Father, and his captive spouse, and the children that were given him, and would not go out free from his undertaking, but engaged to serve in it for ever, Isa 42:1; Isa 42:4. Much more reason have we thus to engage ourselves to serve God for ever; we have all the reason in the world to love our Master and his work, and to have our ears bored to his door-posts, as those who desire not to go out free from his service, but to be found more and more free to it, and in it, Ps. lxxxiv. 10.

Concerning maid-servants, whom their parents, through extreme poverty, had sold, when they were very young, to such as they hoped would marry them when they grew up; if they did not, yet they must not sell them to strangers, but rather study how to make them amends for the disappointment; if they did, they must maintain them handsomely, v. 7-11. Thus did God provide for the comfort and reputation of the daughters of Israel, and has taught husbands to give honour to their wives (be their extraction ever so mean) as to the weaker vessels, 1 Pet. iii. 7.

Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary

EXODUS – TWENTY-ONE

Verses 1-6:

This text begins “the judgments” which Jehovah gave to Moses, to determine the civil and social position of Israel in relation to each other (Ex 21:1-23:12), and their religious position in relation to the Lord (Ex 21:13-19). This legislation begins not at the top level of society, but at its lowest: that of the slave. First are provisions dealing with the personal rights of male slaves.

The Law was not given to change existing customs: It was given to regulate these customs, and to prevent abuse of them. One example is that of slavery, an existing institution. The Law did not create slavery; it regulated it and prohibited its abuse. Among the Hebrews, one might become a slave in one of two ways: (1) by poverty (Le 25:35-39; and (2) by crime (Ex 22:3.

A Hebrew slave could be held for only six years. At the beginning of the seventh year, he must be allowed to go free. His master must furnish him with provisions from flock and field (De 15:12-14), so he could begin his life anew. A married man who became a slave could take his wife to freedom with him. But if his master had given him a wife during his servitude, the wife was not allowed to go free with him; and neither were any children born during this time.

If a freed slave did not wish to leave his master or his wife and children, he could declare his intention to remain a slave. The master could present the case before the magistrates; then he would bore a hole in the slave’s ear, affixing him thus to the door or door post of the house. This would indicate that he would be a slave “for ever.”

The “earmarked slave” illustrates the relationship of the saved to the Lord Jesus. One who is saved has been set free from sin’s slavery, Ga 3:13; 4:5; 1Pe 1:18, 19; Joh 8:34-36. He has a new relationship to Christ: that of a voluntary enslavement to Him, as Lord and Master, 2Pe 1:1; Jude 1:1.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

1. Now these are the judgments. Both passages contain the same appointment, viz., that as to the Hebrews slavery must end at the seventh year; for God would have the children of Abraham, although obliged to sell themselves, to differ from heathen and ordinary slaves. Their enfranchisement is, therefore, enjoined, but with an exception, which Moses expresses in the first passage but omits in the latter, i e. , that if the slave had married a bond-woman, and had begotten children, they should remain with the master, and that he should alone be free. Whence it appears how hard was the condition of slaves, since it could not be mitigated without an unnatural exception ( sine prodigio;) for nothing could be more opposed to nature than that a husband, forsaking his wife and children, should remove himself elsewhere. But the tie of slavery could only be loosed by divorce, that is to say, by this impious violation of marriage. There was then gross barbarity in this severance, whereby a man was disunited from half of himself and his own bowels. Yet there was no remedy for it; for if the wife and children had been set free, it would have been a spoliation of their lawful master to take them with him, not only because the woman was his slave, but because he had incurred expense in the bringing up of the young children. The sanctity of marriage therefore gave way in this case to private right; and this defect is to be reckoned amongst the others which God tolerated on account of the people’s hardness of heart, because it could hardly be remedied; yet, if any one were withheld by chaste affection, and unwilling to abandon his wife and offspring, an alternative is presented, viz., that he should give himself up also to perpetual slavery. The form of this is more clearly pointed out in Exodus than in Deuteronomy; for, in the latter, it is only said that the master, in order to assert his perpetual right to the slave, should bore his ear; whereas in Exodus the circumstance is added, that a public process should first take place; for, if each private individual had been his own judge in this matter, the rich men’s houses would have been like slaughterhouses to put their wretched slaves to the torment in. (148) We read in Jeremiah, (Jer 34:11,) that this law fell into contempt, and that the Jews, contrary to all law and justice, retained perpetual dominion over their slaves; nay, that when they were severely reprimanded under King Zedekiah, and liberty was anew proclaimed, the wretched men were immediately dragged back to their yoke of tyranny, as if they had been set free in mockery. Care was therefore to be taken lest, by secret tortures, they should compel the unwilling to continue as their slaves; and the provision against this evil was an open confession of their desire before the judges; whilst the boring of the ear was a kind of stigma upon them. For the Orientals were accustomed to brand slaves, or fugitives, or criminals, or those who were in any wise suspected; and although God did not choose to have this mark of ignominy imprinted on the foreheads of his people, yet, if any one voluntarily consented to endure perpetual slavery, He willed that he should bear this token of his servitude upon his ear. Still we must remember that even this slavery, although it is said to endure for ever, was brought to a close at the jubilee, because then the condition of the land and people was altogether renewed.

(148) “Pour tormenter, et gehener les poures serfs.” — Fr.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

CRITICAL NOTES.

Exo. 21:1. Judgments.] Here begins the second part of The Book of the Covenant (ch. Exo. 24:7), the entire contents of which seem to range themselves thus:

1. Safeguards of worship (ch. Exo. 20:22-26);

2. Safeguards of justice and mercy (ch. Exo. 21:1 to Exo. 23:19);

3. Promises, blended with admonitions (ch. Exo. 23:20-33). Next to the Ten Commandments stands this Book, in importance, as the Divinely-laid foundation of Israels nationality, and as the Magna Charta of the people. Here we see more in detail than in the Ten Commandments, but still in a summary and very comprehensive way, what, sort of a nation Israel was laid under the most solemn obligation to become.

Exo. 21:6. Unto the judges.] Heb. el h elthim. literally unto the gods; but, according to usage, rather, unto God, unto the God, unto the [living and true] God, or unto God Himself. No doubt, however, the judges are intended. Compare especially (Deu. 19:17): Then both the men, between whom the controversy is, shall stand before Jehovah, before the priests and the judges, which shall be in those days. In coming unto the priests and judges, they came unto the judgment seat of God, as the LXX. here renders ( ).

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Exo. 21:1-6

SLAVERY AND SOVEREIGNTY

The most influential factor in the process of human development has been the written revelation of God; and without that we cannot suppose humanity would have risen to glorious heights. These judgments are part of that revelation, and indicate the gradual methods by which the Almighty educates the nations. Gods teachings touch humanity at its lowest point, and are adapted to the state of highest development. These judgments, then, must be considered in their relation to primitive conditions. They are the worlds most ancient and most complete repositories of legal enactments. Their spirit is undying, and proclaims infinite wisdom. These judgments of God are the declarations of human rights. We must, in a teachable and impartial spirit, consider these judgments, as severally set forth to the Jews, in their ethical bearings.

I. These judgments dealt with an existing institution. The word most commonly employed in the Old Testament in this connection was one meaning slavery in our modern sense. We have, then, the fact that slavery was an admitted institution in the Mosaic economy. The circumstances under which a Hebrew might be reduced to servitude were

(1) poverty;
(2) the commission of theft; and
(3) the exercise of paternal authority. We cannot explain the divine methods, and do not know how it was that slavery was not at once abrogated by a divine decree. But we see that divine beneficence was revealed in the regulations.

II. This admitted institution does not sanction modern slavery. The Mosaic sanction of slavery was a strong support of that institution in the Southern States of America. But a candid inquirer will soon, perceive that it had little kinship with that which it claimed for its support. There is in the divine revelation a spirit ever working to the enfranchisement of the race. The letter is for the time then present, but the spirit is for all time; and it shall operate unceasingly and triumphantly till all forms of oppression are banished from the world. More closely consider the conditions of Mosaic slavery.

III. This system asserted the slaves personal sovereignty. Every step in the process will show the absurdity of instituting a comparison between Hebrew slavery and other forms of slavery, in order to make the former sanction human greed and cruelty. In modern systems, the man is a mere chattel, but in the Mosaic system the slaves manhood is declared. He is sovereign over himself, and is allowed the power of choice. The Southern slaveholder would not permit his slave to say, I will not; but the Hebrew slave is permitted to say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free.

IV. This system declared the slaves right to be a man of feeling. The man was not to be separated from the wife he had chosen prior to his days of servitude. The slave is here regarded as one capable of loving, and of feeling distress at separation. Even where the wife was the gift of the master, and there fore she and her children the masters property, the servant was not to be forcibly separated; but, under other systems, slaves have been treated as if they did not possess the feelings common to humanity. This part of the Mosaic regulations would not harmonise with the painful scenes which took place at slave marts.

V. This system proclaimed the slaves right to freedom, and that it is the highest condition. The Hebrew slave worked on to the day of happy release. This term of service was no longer than a modern apprenticeship. The bells of the seventh year rang out the old order of slavery, and rang in the new glorious order of freedom. If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve; and in the seventh year he shall go out free for nothing. The fixing of the seventh year as the year of emancipation is connected with the sabbatical year, but does not coincide with it. The slave might choose to continue in servitude, but he did not choose the highest state. Such an one must have his ear bored before the judges, as setting forth his subject condition, and as sealing the voluntary compact. But no marks are placed on the person of the free man. The boring of the ears was among the Orientals a sign of slavery.Knobel.

VI. This system typically sets forth that the service of love is the highest, and alone enduring. He only was to serve for ever who chose continued servitude on account of love to his master, and love to his wife and his children. The service of love outstrips in dignity and surpasses in duration all other forms of service. Loves bonds are sweet. Its yoke is easy, and its service light. There is a loving service which shall be in the literal sense for evera service which is highest freedom, and from which the slave will never ask to be liberated. The service of Christ reaches beyond death, and is coeval with eternity.W. Burrows, B.A.

In considering generally the judgments of that part of the Book of the Covenant (Exo. 24:3-7) contained in Exodus, chaps. 2123, three things must be borne in mind.

1. That God was legislating for Jews, and had to deal with such materials as existed and to make the best of them. Remember

(1) The Jews were contaminated by their contact with and bondage under the Egyptians, and these were familiar with and contracted those habits which these judgments were intended to abolish or control. And

(2) How needful a special and minute legislation was, their characteristics through many centuries of their history amply show (cf. Mat. 19:8).

2. That this legislation was founded on great moral principles and was referable to them (Exo. 20:1-17).

3. That this legislation as such
(1) was not final. Many of the enactments, e.g., those respecting slavery, contemplated a special state of things and made provision for their removal. And

(2) it had respect to a legislation higher and final to which it was preparatory (Deu. 18:15; Gal. 3:24; Heb. 8:6-13).

(3) With that legislation therefore this must be compared.

Chapter 21. exhibits (i.) Gods care for the slave (111, 16, 26, 27); (ii.) Gods indignation against the unfilial spirit (15, 17); (iii.) Gods disapprobation of the use of brute force (18, 19); (iv.) Gods regard for the safety of man and beast.

GODS CARE FOR THE SLAVE

1. Slavery was an established institution, and thus was only recognised and not established by the Mosaic law.
2. Humanly speaking, its entire abolition at this period was impossible or at least impracticable.
(1.) Subsequent history shows how difficult it was to repress customs far less rooted in the Hebrew mind.
(2.) In the wars in which the Israelites were engaged, it was the only alternative to extermination.

(3.) In a condition of society where a labouring class was unknown, in many cases it was the only alternative to want (Lev. 25:25).

(4.) Under circumstances where imprisonment was impossible, it was the only alternative for a criminal to a harsher fate (Exo. 23:3).

3. conveyed a very different meaning to , or servus or serf or thrall or slave. It implied a position of trust, and dealt rather with the duties of the servant than the right of the master.

4. Those who make a difficulty of Old Testament slavery should remember
(1.) That this is the first, and for centuries the only, attempt to legislate on behalf of the slave.
(2.) That this attempt stands first among those judgments which regulated political and social life. And

(3.) that if fairly carried out it meant the eventual and effectual extinction of slavery, and the establishment of the right of man as man.

5. That bondage could scarcely have been very intolerable from which its subjects should so seldom endeavour to escape (1Sa. 25:10; 1Ki. 2:39).

The other subjects connected with Old Testament slavery will be dealt with in their proper place in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. The present passage deals with Hebrew slaves.

I. With regard to the slave himself we notice

(1.) That his term of service was limited. In the sabbatic year (not literally six years) he was to be free (Exo. 21:2.)

(2.) Then he was to be made free, legally and without cost, for nothing.

(3.) That the service might be of such a character, that, through love of his master or his family, it might be preferable to freedom (Exo. 21:5).

(4.) That so precious and divine was liberty, a special enactment was necessary to enable the slave to forego his right to it (Exo. 21:5-6).

(5.) That fair play might be observed all round, this preference of slavery to freedom must be expressed in the most judicial, public, and solemn manner (Exo. 21:6).

(6.) That with regard to woman (with the exception noted in Deu. 15:12-13) she could only become a slave on the condition of marriage with her master or his son, in which case all the rights and privileges of wedlock under all circumstances must be respected, or else her unconditional freedom must be granted (Exo. 21:7-11).

(7.) That no man could be kidnapped and sold for a slave under penalty of death for the manstealer (Exo. 21:16).

(8.) That the life and limb of the slave must be respected under severe penalties. (a) If he died under chastisement, the master might be indicted for murder (Exo. 21:20, cf. Exo. 21:12). (b) If he was maimed in the slighest degree, he was entitled to freedom (Exo. 21:26-27).

All this minute legislation was for the benefit of the slave.

II. With regard to the slaveholder

(1.) He was entitled at most to six years of service.
(2.) Only by the free consent of the slave, and the authorities, could he retain his services for one moment longer.

(3.) In the case of punishment inflicted on the slave, only unless the victim survived it two days, did the owner escape the charge of murder, and even then the loss of a valuable servant was no small penalty. A great deal has been made of this last case (Exo. 21:20-21). But

(1) it argues a strong public sentiment on behalf of the slave, and implies that indignation might rise so high as to be difficult to repress.
(2) The slave might not die wholly from this cause, and since it might be beyond the power of the master to prove his innocence, the law provides that he should have the benefit of the doubt.
(3) The master was punished if guilty by the loss of valuable service, which was equivalent to money.

(4) Why should He is his money be interpreted more literally than Time is money? In conclusion

I. If God cared for the Hebrew slave He will care for the Christian servant.
II. If it was the duty of the Hebrew slave to serve his master with that diligence and affection which this legislation implies, how much more is it obligatory on the Christian servant?
III. If the Hebrew master were amenable to Gods laws, and if those laws distinctly contemplated his relation to his dependent, how much more should he, who himself serves the Lord Christ, obey His laws who said, One is your master, even Christ, and all ye are brethren?J. W. Burn.

SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES

Exo. 21:1-6. Penalties as well as laws God would have made known to His people.

It concerns all Israel to know the judgments of God as well as His laws.
Notwithstanding all the general laws given to men, God has reserved some special judgments for His Church.
Amongst the judgments given to the Church, God has provided much concerning servants.
Servants in the Church must do faithful service for their time.
God in judgment delivers men to certainty of servitude when they choose it.
Gods judgments, about corporal bondage and freedom, should remindus about our spiritual: to hate slavery and love freedom.

ILLUSTRATIONS

BY
REV. WILLIAM ADAMSON

Moral Law! Exo. 21:1. Travelling some Alpine pass, where the narrow road, cut out of the face of the rock, hangs over a frightful gorge, it is with friendly eyes you look on the wall that restrains your restive steed from backing into the gulf below. Such are the restraints Gods law imposesno other. It is a fence from evilnothing else. Men hate the Divine restrictions as the madman raves against the padded walls which save him from deeds of horror. Thank God, our hearts are not left to themselves.

For wholesome laws preserve us free,

By stinting of our liberty.

Butler.

Slavery-Bias! Exo. 21:2. Martin says that slavery, both Indian and Negro, that blighting upas which has been the curse of the West Indics, has accompanied the white colonistwhether Spaniard, Frenchman, or Britonin his progress, tainting like a plague every incipient association, and blasting the efforts of man, however well disposed, by its demonlike influences over the natural virtues with which the Creator has endowed him; leaving all cold, and dark, and desolate within. But his limitation is unjust to the pale-faces, for black and red and white skins have been alike addicted to enslaving their fellows. In Germany, England, and Russia a modified kind of slavery has existed. In the last-named country it was only a few years ago that the masses of serfs were emancipated. Although the serfs of Russia, the old villeins of England, and the like, could hardly be denominated slaves in the sense in which that word is understood to apply to the Roman slave, or to the modern African slave; yet there is no doubt that these servants of feudal chiefs worked for their masters, and were sold by them, very much as the modern serf.

Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys;
And worse than all, and most to be deplored,
As human natures broadest, foulest blot,
Chains him and tasks him, and exacts his sweat
With stripes.

Cowper.

Slave-Trade! Exo. 21:2. It has been suggested that a great distinction lies between slavery and the slave trade. The primitive domestic slavery which has for ages prevailed in Africa, bears no comparison with the cruel, oppressive bondage under which the poor negroes so long groaned in America. The Portuguese were the first to begin this infamous traffic at Cape Bajedor in 1442. But the first cargo of slaves was conveyed to Jamaica by some Genoese merchants in 1517, to whom the Emperor Charles V. granted a patent for the annual supply of 4000 negroes to his West Indian possessions. England first sullied her hands with the blood of bondage in 1562, when Charles II. sanctioned an expedition of three ships under Captain Hawkins.

I would not have a slave to till my ground,
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep,
And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth
That sinews, bought and sold, have ever earned.

Slave-Sufferings! Exo. 21:2. Little Benome was an African girl. Sent by her mother to one of Africas sunny fountains for water, she saw a slave-hunting party approach. Rushing home, the villagers were alarmed and escaped to the woods. Their village was burnt, and next day themselves pursued. The fugitives were captured by the men-stealers, and Benome with her mother and many others were tied together and marched off to the coast. The way led through a desert and across a river. Here the cruel hunters seized a babe in arms, and flung it alive into the jungle to be devoured by wild beasts. The coast reached, mothers and daughters, brothers and sisters, were sold separately, and shipped to America. Hundreds were imprisoned in the hold of the ship; and there, like bales of goods, kept till the voyage was over. Benomes ship was, however, captured by a British man-of-war, and Benome and the others were taken to the Island of Trinidad for emancipation. Here she learned to love the Lord Jesus Christ.

O England, empires home and head,

First in each art of peace and powr,

Mighty the billow-crest to tread,

Mighty to rule the battle hour,

But mightiest to relieve and save,
Rejoice that thon hast freed the slave.

Carlisle.

Slave-Emancipation! Exo. 21:2-4. One of the grandest results of Christian missions to the West Indies was the emancipation of the slaves in all the British Colonies in 1838. The enemies of freedom had predicted anarchy and rebellion. They loudly averred that the freed-men would at once rise against their former owners, and seek revenge. But it was not so. The utmost quiet prevailed. A Watch-night meeting was held in different places. Thousands of men, women, and children were found upon their bended knees before God to receive the blessing of freedom from heaven. When the clock struck twelve, which was the death-knell of slavery, they rose to their feet, and sung with united heart and voice, as they had never sung before

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow!
Praise Him, all creatures here below!
Praise Him above, ye heavenly host
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

Freewill-Serfdom! Exo. 21:6. As in natures field, says Law, so in Israels story, almost every object reflects Christ. A Hebrew servant is the subject of this verse, but one for whom freedom has no charms. Attachment binds him to his masters home, and a new ordinance is appointed to sanctify this willing offer of perpetual service. It may, perhaps, come as a new thought to some, that in this servants choice and constant love, Jesus reveals Himself. In the 40th Psalm, where faith ascends in heaven-high flight, the Eternal Son, in close communion with the Eternal Father, is heard declaring, Mine ears hast Thou opened, i.e., digged by Thy hand. Thus we see the God-man stooping to the lowest gradeseeking a servants voicesubmitting to a servants toil. Jehovahs fellow is Jehovahs workman in the labour-field of grace. We have, then, in this abject state a speaking portrait of the love of Jesus. Behold My servant, whom I uphold (Isa. 42:1). I am among you as he that serveth (John 13).

To conquer and to save, the Son of God

Came to His own in great humility,

Who wont to ride on cherub wings abroad,

And round Him wrap the mantle of the sky.

Heber.

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

THE TEXT OF EXODUS
TRANSLATION

21 Now these are the ordinances which thou shalt set before them.

(2) If thou buy a Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. (3) If he come in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he be married, then his wife shall go out with him. (4) If his master give him a wife, and she bear him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her masters, and he shall go out by himself. (5) But if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: (6) then his master shall bring him unto God, and shall bring him to the door, or unto the doorpost; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him for ever.
(7) And if a man sell his daughter to be a maid-servant, she shall not go out as the men-servants do. (8) If she please not her master, who hath espoused her to himself, then shall he let her be redeemed: to sell her unto a foreign people he shall have no power, seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her. (9) And if he espouse her unto his son, he shall deal with her after the manner of daughters. (10) If he take him another wife; her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage, shall he not diminish. (11) And if he do not these three things unto her, then shall she go out for nothing, without money.

(12) He that smiteth a man, so that he dieth, shall surely be put to death. (13) And if a man lie not in wait, but God deliver him into his hand; then I will appoint thee a place wither he shall flee. (14) And if a man come presumptuously upon his neighbor, to slay him with guile; thou shalt take him from mine altar, that he may die.

(15) And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death.
(16) And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death.
(17) And he that curseth his father or mother, shall surely be put to death.
(18) And if men contend, and one smite the other with a stone, or with his fist, and he die not, but keep his bed; (19) if he rise again, and walk abroad upon his staff, then shall he that smote him be quit: only he shall pay for the loss of his time, and shall cause him to be thoroughly healed.
(20) And if a man smite his servant, or his maid, with a rod, and he die under his hand; he shall surely be punished. (21) Notwithstanding, if he continue a day or two, he shall not be punished: for he is his money.
(22) And if men strive together, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart, and yet no harm follow; he shall be surely fined, according as the womans husband shall lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. (23) But if any harm follow, then thou shalt give life for life, (24) eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, (25) burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
(26) And if a man smite the eye of his servant, or the eye of his maid, and destroy it; he shall let him go free for his eyes sake. (27) And if he smite out his man-servants tooth, or his maidservants tooth; he shall let him go free for his tooths sake.
(28) And if an ox gore a man or a woman to death, the ox shall be surely stoned, and its flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox shall be quit. (29) But if the ox was wont to gore in time past, and it hath been testified to its owner, and he hath not kept it in, but it hath killed a man or a woman; the ox shall be stoned, and its owner also shall be put to death. (30) If there be laid on him a ransom, then he shall give for the redemption of his life whatsoever is laid upon him. (31) Whether it have gored a son, or have gored a daughter, according to this judgment shall it be done unto him. (32) If the ox gore a man-servant or a maidservant, there shall be given unto their master thirty shekels of silver, and the ox shall be stoned.

(33) And if a man shall open a pit, or if a man shall dig a pit and not cover it, and an ox or an ass fall therein, (34) the owner of the pit shall make it good; he shall give money unto the owner thereof, and the dead beast shall be his.

(35) And if one mans ox hurt anothers, so that it dieth, then they shall sell the live ox, and divide the price of it; and the dead also they shall divide. (36) Or if it be known that the ox was wont to gore in time past, and its owner hath not kept it in; he shall surely pay ox for ox, and the dead beast shall be his own.

EXPLORING EXODUS: CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
QUESTIONS ANSWERABLE FROM THE BIBLE

What does Exo. 21:1 entitle the section that follows it?

For how many years was a Hebrew servant (slave) obligated to serve his master? (Exo. 21:2)

What did the servant have to pay upon his release? (Exo. 21:2)

Could a Hebrew slave take his wife and children with him when he left free? (Exo. 21:3-4)

Did the Hebrew slave have a choice of going free or remaining as a servant? (Exo. 21:5-6)

To whom did a slaves owner bring a servant who did not want to be freed? (Exo. 21:6)

What act was done to indicate that a slave had bound himself permanently to his master? (Exo. 21:6)

Were maidservants freed in the seventh years as menservants were? (Exo. 21:7)

What was to be done and NOT done with maidservants who were displeasing to their masters? (Exo. 21:8)

10.

To whom might a man arrange for his maidservant to be given? (Exo. 21:9)

11.

From Exo. 21:10 we see that the maidservant was regarded as practically equivalent to what?

12.

What was the penalty for striking a man fatally? (Exo. 21:12)

13.

Can a mans death be an act of God? (Exo. 21:13). How might this occur?

14.

What was to be done by a man who unintentionally killed another? (Exo. 21:13; Compare Num. 35:9-28)

15.

Was a murderer safe while at the altar of God (Exo. 21:14; 1Ki. 2:28-34)

16.

What was the penalty for striking parents? (Exo. 21:15) For cursing parents? (Exo. 21:17)

17.

What was the penalty for kidnapping? (Exo. 21:16)

18.

What was the penalty for wounding a man or disabling him in a fight? (Exo. 21:18-19)

19.

What was the penalty for fatally beating ones own slave? (Exo. 21:20-21)

20.

Who determined the fines upon men who caused a woman to suffer injury and miscarriage? (Exo. 21:22)

21.

Did the laws about eye for eye, etc. entitle people to take revenge for themselves? (Exo. 21:22-25; Compare Mat. 5:43-46)

22.

What was the penalty for destroying the eye or tooth of ones slave? (Exo. 21:26-27)

23.

What was the penalty upon a man-killing ox and upon its owner? (Exo. 21:28)

24.

What intensified the penalty upon the owner of a man-killing ox? (Exo. 21:29). Was any variation allowed in this penalty? (Exo. 21:30)

25.

What penalty was imposed upon an ox and its owner if it killed a slave? (Exo. 21:32)

26.

What rule was given concerning the deaths of animals that fell into pits that were not covered over? (Exo. 21:32-34)

27.

What was the rule about one ox killing another ox? (Exo. 21:35-36)

EXODUS TWENTY-ONE: GODS COVENANT ORDINANCES

The Hebrew servant; Exo. 21:2-11

Capital offenses; Exo. 21:12-17

Injuries to people; Exo. 21:18-27

Injuries by and to oxen; Exo. 21:28-36.

EXODUS TWENTY-ONE: SERVANTS, SECURITY, SAFETY

Servants; Exo. 21:2-11.

II.

Security; Exo. 21:12-22.

Security guaranteed by capital punishment; Exo. 21:12-17.

Security guaranteed by punishment of smiters; Exo. 21:18-27.

III.

Safety; Exo. 21:28-36.

Safety from animals; Exo. 21:28-32.

Safety from hazards; Exo. 21:32-34.

Safety for property; Exo. 21:35-36.

EXODUS TWENTY-ONE: GODS ORDINANCES, A PROTECTION!

Protection for servants; Exo. 21:2-11.

Protection from killers; Exo. 21:12-14.

Protection for parents; Exo. 21:15; Exo. 21:17.

Protection from kidnappers; Exo. 21:16.

Protection from financial loss; Exo. 21:18-19.

Protection for slaves; Exo. 21:20-21; Exo. 21:26-27.

Protection for women; Exo. 21:22-24.

Protection from animals; Exo. 21:28-32.

Protection from negligence; Exo. 21:33-34.

10.

Protection from property loss; Exo. 21:35-36.

GODS CARE FOR THE SLAVE; Exo. 21:2-11

His term of service as strictly limited; Exo. 21:2.

He was set free without charge; Exo. 21:2.

His service was such that it might be preferred to freedom; Exo. 21:5.

Women could be slaves only on condition of marriage; Exo. 21:7-11.

Kidnapping and selling into slavery was a capital offense; Exo. 21:16.

A slaves life and limb were protected by law; Exo. 21:20; Exodus 26-27.

EXODUS TWENTY-ONE: RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

RIGHTS.

Freedom; Exo. 21:2; Exo. 21:11.

Service at the place of ones own choice; Exo. 21:5.

Protection from assault; Exo. 21:12-14.

Protection from kidnapping; Exo. 21:16.

Protection from injuries; Exo. 21:18-19; Exo. 21:22.

Payment for damages; Exo. 21:18-19; Exo. 21:22; Exo. 21:32; Exo. 21:35.

Protection from hazards; Exo. 21:33.

II.

RESPONSIBILITIES.

Respect mens right to freedom; Exo. 21:2; Exo. 21:7-8.

Respect for parents; Exo. 21:15; Exo. 21:17.

Must pay for damages; Exo. 21:18-19; Exo. 21:22-24; Exo. 21:32.

Must practice safety; Exo. 21:22-25.

Must avoid negligence; Exo. 21:29; Exo. 21:33; Exo. 21:36.

CRIMES THAT FORFEITED LIFE!

Smiting and killing a man; Exo. 21:12.

Smiting father or mother; Exo. 21:15.

Stealing and selling a man; Exo. 21:16.

Cursing father or mother; Exo. 21:17.

Neglecting warnings about dangerous animals; Exo. 21:29.

Sorcery (witchcraft); Exo. 22:18.

Lying with a beast; Exo. 22:19.

Sacrificing to other gods; Exo. 22:20.

(Note: God still hates these sins, and they will be punished in hell. But the church does NOT now have authority from God to execute wrongdoers, for example witches!)

GODS INDIGNATION AGAINST ABUSING PARENTS!

Against smiting father or mother; Exo. 21:15.

Against cursing father or mother; Exo. 21:17.

GODS DISAPPROVAL OF BRUTE FORCE!

The smiter who kills must die; Exo. 21:12.

The smiter who injures must pay damages; Exo. 21:18-19; Exo. 21:26.

The fighter may be afflicted as he afflicts others; Exo. 21:23.

The laws protect all victims men, women, even slaves.

NEGLIGENCE! (Exo. 21:28-36)

Examples of Negligence

Not keeping in a goring ox; Exo. 21:29; Exo. 21:36.

Not covering a pit; Exo. 21:33.

II.

Penalties for Negligence

A goring ox must be killed; Exo. 21:28.

A heedless ox-owner slain; Exo. 21:29.

(A ransom might be paid instead.)

Money charged for damages; Exo. 21:32; Exo. 21:34.

THE ORDINANCES OF GOD
(Exodus 21-23)

The ten commandments are simple and comprehensive principles. But human character and life is crooked and complex. Is all killing murder? Are all sexual wrongs of the same seriousness? To bridge the gulf between the simple absolute principles of the ten commandments and everyday life, many ordinances were needed. These are found in the book of the covenant (Exodus 21-23; Exo. 24:7), and in Leviticus, and Deuteronomy. (Adapted from Ramm, op. cit. p. 132)

Many of the ordinances in Exodus 21-23 are extremely attractive to us. Read Exo. 23:1-9 for example! All of these laws derive their force from a personal relationship with God. See Exo. 23:25.

Some of the laws in Exodus 21-23 will seem strange to you at first, perhaps even shocking.

Remember that God revealed His will in many divers portions (Heb. 1:1). Things which we have known as Gods truth for centuries had not all been revealed in Moses time.

Also many of the laws which seem at first glance to be harsh and even sub-Christian served a very beneficial purpose. For example, the laws about slavery, as strange as they seem to us, served a very needful social purpose. See Exo. 21:2-4; Exo. 21:20-21. Every nation must do something about its destitute people, and Israels slavery system cared for this need. And besides this, the Israelites were to carry out these laws in a kind, non-rigorous manner. See Lev. 25:39-55; Deu. 15:12-15.

The laws in Exodus 21-23 dealt with a wide variety of subjects, covering practically all aspects of life. There were laws about servants (Exo. 21:2 ff), criminal laws (Exo. 21:12), property laws (Exo. 21:35), moral laws (Exo. 22:16), laws of personal conduct (Exo. 22:21-27; Exo. 23:1-9), laws about religious ceremonies (Exo. 23:14 ff), etc.

No people can have a functioning society without a culture system of rules and beliefs. The ordinances of God provided an instant, ready-made cultural basis for Israel as a society.

The principles illustrated by these laws have endless applications. For example, the law about releasing your enemys overloaded and fallen donkey (Exo. 23:4-5) establishes a principle of kindness that is applicable in countless situations.

We must not assume that the covenant ordinances in Exodus 21-23 constitute a complete and systematic code of law. Numerous regulations are mentioned without giving enough details to make clear how the commandments were to be carried out. For example, Exo. 22:16 speaks of the dowry of virgins without indicating how much it was. (Compare Deu. 22:28-29). Exo. 23:14-17 mentions the three annual compulsory feasts to be kept by all Israelites. But the text tells very little about how they were to be observed. These details were added later in the laws in Leviticus (Chap. 23) and Deuteronomy.

Unless we realize that the ordinances in Exodus 21-23 are only a sampler of the more complete laws given later, we may be perplexed by their lack of completeness and orderliness.

EXPLORING EXODUS: NOTES ON CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

What is in Exodus chapter twenty-one?

Exodus 21 contains the first group of the judgements (or ordinances) of the LORD. These extend on through chapter 23. This chapter contains laws about slaves, crimes requiring the death penalty, offenses involving injuries, and property losses.

We must keep in mind that as Christians our conduct is to establish the law (Rom. 3:31). We cannot be less concerned about the lives and safety of people than God required people under the law of Moses to be. While we are not under the law, we fulfill the law by loving our neighbor as ourselves (Rom. 13:9-10).

What are ordinances (or judgments)? (Exo. 21:1)

Judgments (Heb., mishpatim) are judicial decisions, decisions at law, legal rulings. The uses of this word in Exo. 21:31 and Deu. 1:17 illustrate this meaning.

But the word judgments implies yet another conception: that of JUSTICE. The Hebrew word for judgment is often translated justice. See Exo. 23:6; Deu. 16:19. This fact implies that perfect justice for all social relationships is found in Gods ordinances. It surely has not been found in mens ordinances!

The word Now (Heb., and) at the start of Exo. 21:1 links the ordinances that follow with the words of God that preceded them in chapter twenty. All are from God and all are part of the same covenant.

Radical critics assume that these judgments presuppose a society settled a long time into the land, and that they were therefore written long after the time of Moses. We cannot accept such a notion. Moses had already judged many cases (Exo. 18:13). He knew the types of questions that would arise and need written precedents to guide future judges. Furthermore, Moses had very probably studied the legal system in Egypt, and he had observed Midianite tribal laws. He was probably acquainted with Near Eastern law codes, such as that of Hammurabi.

But all of these arguments are second-rate evidence of the Mosaic origin and divine authority of these judgments. The plain assertions that GOD gave these ordinances to Moses is the basis of our faith in them. They were revealed words of Jehovah (Exo. 23:3).

How long did a Hebrew servant serve his master? (Exo. 21:2)

He served six years. In the seventh year he went out free, for nothing, without payment of any redemption or ransom price. In fact, he was to be given liberal gifts of food and livestock (Deu. 15:12-15). The same rule applied to women servants (Deu. 15:12).

The word translated servant means a bondservant or slave. But we should not picture in our minds the Hebrew slave as as victim of a harsh cruel system. The slavery actually served the social purpose of caring for the destitute. The service of Hebrew bondmen to their masters was rather mild. Their masters were not to treat them as bondservants, but as hired servants. They were not to rule over them with harshness (Lev. 25:39-43). Servants were to rest on the Sabbath days and be refreshed like the rest of the family (Exo. 23:12).

The year of a servants release was the seventh year of his service, which was not necessarily the Sabbatical year, which occurred every seventh year and was observed by all Israel (Exo. 23:10-11).

Servants were also to be freed in the year of Jubilee, every fiftieth year, even if that occurred one year after they signed on. Lev. 25:10; Lev. 25:39-41.

The Law of Hammurabi (No. 117) said that if because of obligations a citizen sold his wife, or son, or daughter to service to someone else, they would serve three years in the house of their purchaser, and then go free in the fourth year. Hammurabi did not provide for generous gifts to be given to the liberated servant, as the Hebrew law did. Neither did his law ordain the generous loans and credit assistance that were in the Hebrew law (Lev. 25:35-37; Deu. 15:7-11). These provisions probably kept many poor people from having to sell themselves or members of their family into servitude.

Laws like Exo. 21:2 ff that are formulated from cases and are introduced by If, are called casuistic (or case) laws. The law codes of the ancient Near East (like Hammurabis law) have almost all of their laws in this casuistic form: If such and such an event occurs, then this is what the law requires to be done. Casuistic law is distinguished from apodeictic laws, which concisely state principles for conduct, often in negative form. Laws like Thou shalt not kill are apodeictic. The presence of many apodeictic laws in Exodus suggests the intrinsic, divine authority of the laws. The presence of casuistic laws in Exodus shows that God expressed His word and laws to Moses in literary and legal forms familiar to men. Gods word comes to men in mens language!

What was a HEBREW servant? (Exo. 21:2)

We feel that Hebrew is here synonymous with Israelite. Indeed, Jer. 34:9 later equated Hebrew with Jew. This identification is supported by the parallel passage Deu. 15:2, which says, If thy brother, a Hebrew man, or a Hebrew woman, be sold unto thee,. . . . This is further indicated by the fact that Lev. 25:44-46 says that strangers and foreigners bought by Israelites were kept as bondmen for ever, in distinction to the requirement to release a Hebrew in the seventh year.

This question might seem to be a matter of no significance. Our reason for bringing it up is that some interpreters (Cassuto, for example) feel that the word Hebrew is here equivalent to a broader term Habiru (or Apiru, or Khapiru), which is found frequently in writings of Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Canaan prior to Moses time. The Habiri were alien peoples who were employed as servants or took other subordinate service. They existed outside of the normal societal system, something like gypsies. Sometimes they are referred to as predatory conquerors. In the Amarna letters (written by Canaanite city-rulers to the kings of Egypt shortly after the time of Moses), the Habiri are said to be taking over the land. We feel that the Habiri referred to in these letters included the Israelites, but also included other invading settlers.

If the term Hebrew in Exo. 21:2 were equivalent to Habiri, then the command about releasing slaves in the seventh years had a very broad application to peoples of numerous races. However, the evidence cited above makes us think that the term Hebrew here meant only an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham.[309] The Egyptians and Babylonians would have considered the Israelites as Habiri (or Hebrews), while including other racial groups within that term. Thus Joseph was called a Hebrew (Gen. 39:14), as was Abraham (Gen.

[309] In the Hebrew language the name Hebrew seems to come from the verb eber, meaning to cross over. Abraham was presumably a Hebrew because he crossed over the Euphrates to come to Canaan. The name of Abrahams forefather Eber (Gen. 11:16) is probably in some way also linked to this meaning.

Could a liberated Hebrew slave take his family with him? (Exo. 21:3-4)

If he became a servant alone (not married), he was liberated alone. If he was married when he became a slave, his wife went out free with him. If during his slave-service his master gave him a wife and she bore him children, the man went free alone. The wife and children stayed with the master. Note that the slave had no right to contract a marriage for himself. The master had to give him the wife.

This law about not letting the slaves wife go free with him may seem severe to us. But it would have been a very expensive loss to the master when he was already rendering a valuable service to the bondman by providing for him an opportunity to work himself out of debt. Also any woman that the master may have given to him would probably have been a foreign permanent bondwoman. It is improbable that the master would have had authority to give away a Hebrew woman indentured to him for only six years. Certainly marriage to such foreign women by Israelite servants could raise racial difficulties in Israel. Also one other practical effect of keeping slave women as slaves was that the rule prevented the contracting of many marriages which could not well continue after the servant went free. We assume that in the administration of the law about marriages of bondmen that the Israelites were basically kind to their bondmen. (Exo. 22:21; Lev. 19:33-34).

How could a Hebrew slave commit himself to a lifetime of service? (Exo. 21:5-6)

He could do this by having his ear pierced through before the judges (or before God).

The bondmans master brought him unto God (or, unto the judges), and there took him to the door and pierced through his ear with an awl. Compare Deu. 15:16-17.

The very fact that this law is given in the law of Moses is indicative of the fact that slaves would desire permanent servitude frequently enough that a law was needed to tell the procedure for bringing it about. The law indicates that many Hebrew masters were kind. (This is like our service to Christ, our kind master.)

The exact meaning of the expression unto the judges, or unto God (Heb. elohim), is a bit uncertain.

In the Code of Hammurabi (law #120) we are told that a dispute over loss of grain was to be settled in the presence of god, that is, in the court of the local idol. Similarly in the laws of Eshnunna (#s 3637) a disputed property loss was to be settled by an oath taken in the gate of the main god at Eshnunna. These literary examples suggest that the Hebrew bondman went to the tabernacle of God to make his declaration and have his ear bored.

The Greek O.T. says that they were to bring the bondman to the tribunal (kriterion) of God. This strengthens our view that the bondman came before Gods tabernacle for commitment of himself.

On the other hand, the uses of elohim in Exo. 22:28; Exo. 22:8-9 indicate that the word sometimes meant judges, and this idea is as old as the Targum of Onkelos (a paraphrase of the law in the Aramaic language, dated about 400 B.C.). Perhaps the judges were looked upon as Gods agents in this matter.

Commentators disagree on whether the servants ear was bored at the door of his masters house or at the door of Gods house. We feel that the Biblical text says it was at Gods house. We suppose that the boring was done as the ear was placed against the door post.

For ever (Exo. 21:6 ) seems to mean for life, although the Jewish rabbis interpreted it to mean till the year of jubilee.

Psa. 40:6 quotes Gods servant (whoever he may be) as saying, Sacrifice and offering thou hast no delight in. Mine ears hast thou opened.

This passage is applied to Jesus in Heb. 10:5; Heb. 10:8. On the basis of this some interpreters (e.g. Pink) have thought that the servant who pledged himself permanently to his master by having his ear bored is a type of Jesus Christ. We do not think this is a legitimate or true type. We do not see any definite connection between Exo. 21:6 and Psa. 40:6. The word translated opened in Psa. 40:6 is not the same word as the word translated bore in Exo. 21:6. Also the type seems incongruous. Admittedly Jesus committed himself to a master (God) so that he might gain a bride (the church). But when Jesus did this the bride was in no way already in the service of the master, as was the bride in Exo. 21:4-6.

Why were maidservants not released after six years? (Exo. 21:7-8)

They were not released because these women became concubines, or secondary wives, to the master. Note that the master espoused her to himself or to one of his sons.[310]

[310] A.S.V. margin says, Another reading is so that he hath not espoused her. This appears to be the reading of the written Hebrew text (the kethib). But the marginal reading in the Hebrew (the qere) gives to himself, and this definitely seems to be the correct reading. See Cassuto, op. cit., p. 268.

The word maid-servant used here (amah) is applied to the slave woman Hagar (Gen. 21:10; Gen. 21:12-13); to Bilhah, Rachels maid (Gen. 30:3). Both of these women bore children in the house. Gideons son Abimelech was born of a maid-servant (Jdg. 9:18). These examples show one common meaning of the term maid-servant.

However, the term was also employed by such primary wives as Hannah (1Sa. 1:11), Abigail (1Sa. 25:25), Bathsheba (1Ki. 1:13), and Ruth (Rth. 3:9), when speaking of themselves. So the term does not always indicate a servant-concubine.

What did a master do with a maid-servant who displeased him? (Exo. 21:8)

He permitted her to be redeemed (bought back). Probably she was purchased by some Israelite outside of his family because her father was too poor to buy her back. The law forbade the master to sell her to a foreign power. Hertz tells of the Saxons in England, who at the time of the Norman conquest would sell maid servants on their estates into a life of shame or into foreign slavery after associating with them themselves.[311] The Hebrews were forbidden to practice such abominations.

[311] J. H. Hertz. The Pentateuch and Haftorahs (London: Soncino, 1969), p. 307.

What was to be done with maid-servants taken as wives far sons? (Exo. 21:9)

They were to be treated like daughters. Exo. 21:10 seems to say, If he (the father-purchaser) take for him (that is, for his son) another wife, her (the first maid-servants) food, . . .

The old Chinese custom of buying a slave girl as a future wife for a son is an exact parallel. By buying the girl thus, he avoided paying a higher price in the years to come, and guaranteed that she would fit in in the future. Such a system abolished slavery in all except its name.[312]

[312] Cole, op. cit., p. 166.

10.

What rights did the hand-maid have? (Exo. 21:10-11)

She had the right to (1) food, (2) clothing, and (3) participation in family life. If the master did not grant these things, she could go out as a free woman, without anyones paying money for her.
Food is literally flesh, suggesting that she was not to get a mere subsistence diet, but meat and other quality food.

Duty of marriage, or marital rights (as in R.S.V.) probably simply means (1) a place to live and (2) the right to associate with the family like all the other members of it. The Hebrew word onah (unique here) comes from a verb meaning to dwell, suggesting an abode.[313] The Greek O.T. translated it homilia, meaning association or companionship. Later traditions interpreted it to mean times of cohabitation. This seems quite unlikely to us. The Bible does not present sex as a right that women (or men either!) cannot live without. But ostracizing and snubbing a young woman, refusing to talk with her and refusing to treat her as part of the household she dwells in is an intolerable hurt, and is forbidden here.

[313] Cassuto, op. cit., p. 269.

11.

What was the penalty for killing a man? (Exo. 21:12-14)

A person who struck another and caused him to die was to be put to death, unless it happened accidentally and unintentionally. In that case the manslayer had to flee to a place of safety prepared for this situation. But the presumptuous (willful) slayer was to be put to death, even if he fled to the Lords altar for safety from vengeance. The and at the beginning of Exo. 21:14 is better rendered as but.

This law was applied to non-Israelite foreigners, as well as Israelites. (Lev. 24:17; Lev. 24:21-22).

Gen. 9:6 : Whoso sheds mans blood, by man shall his blood be shed. This law goes back to the time of Noah, when it was given to the whole human race.

In ancient times if a man was killed, his close relatives sought to avenge his death by killing the killer.
Human life is sacred according to the Torah (law of Moses). Whoever assails this sanctity forfeits his own life. But the life of the slayer is sacred too, and so his life was not to be taken if the death was accidental. But human life is so sacred that even an accidental killing brings drastic consequences, and the normal life pattern of the manslayer was interrupted.

The place for the manslayer to flee to was called a city of refuge. There were six of these designated to be set up in the land of Israel. See Num. 35:10-34; Deu. 19:1-10; Deu. 4:41-43; Jos. 20:1-9. Perhaps in the wilderness wanderings some temporary place of safety was designated.

But there was no place of security for a murderer! See Num. 35:16-21. Killers have fled to sacred places hoping to escape punishment, both in eastern and western countries. Davids general Joab and Davids son Adonijah both did this, fleeing to the altar and clutching its horns. (1Ki. 1:50; 1Ki. 2:28-34). It did not save Joab.

Exo. 21:13 describes an accidental killing as an act of God: If . . . God deliver him into his hand;. . . . We do not know enough about Gods workings in mens experiences to state positively how far this statement about Gods actions should be applied. Is every mans every misfortune or death under Gods direction? Or do time and chance bring about events without any definite purpose or pattern? (Ecc. 9:11). We understand the scriptures to teach that a [righteous] mans goings are ordered by the LORD (Psa. 37:23), while recognizing that many choices are left up to us. King Saul declared that the Lord had delivered him into Davids hand (1Sa. 24:18).

The idea that calamities (lightnings, windstorms, floods, etc.) are acts of God was widespread in the ancient Near East. Hammurabis law (number 266) spoke about a visitation of god occurring in a sheepfold.

12.

What was the penalty for striking father or mother? (Exo. 21:15)

Those who smote father or mother were to be put to death. This act was a specific breaking of the commandment about honoring father and mother. (Exo. 20:12).

The verb translated smite (nakah) sometimes means to smite hard enough to kill. See Exo. 2:12. This suggests that the beating of parents referred to here was a violent striking and beating. Note that in Exo. 21:12 smiting could lead to death. The Jewish rabbis interpreted Exo. 21:15 to mean that only when a blow left a bruise upon parents was the death penalty to be inflicted. Certainly we do not regard their interpretation as being authoritative like the divine word itself. Neither do we consider that a non-injurious blow struck at parents is less reprehensible to God than a severe blow. It is the attitude of the heart that mattered most.

We must not disregard and dismiss this law about killing a child for smiting its parents as a temporary cultural practice. Certainly in our Christian age we do not execute children for smiting parents. On the contrary, the prodigal son was allowed to live and was received back home with much joy (Luk. 15:11-32). But Gods hatred of smiting and cursing parents still continues. And unless there is a repentance (as in the case of the prodigal son), the smiters punishment in hell will be infinitely worse than killing his body on earth!

Hammurabis law (#195) prescribed that if a son struck his father, his hand should be cut off. God took a more serious view of this offense than even Hammurabi did.

Compare Exo. 21:17 for more information concerning offenses against parents.

13.

What was the penalty for kidnapping? (Exo. 21:16)

The kidnapper was certainly to be put to death. God so hated this crime that He prescribed dire consequences. Men may not execute the kidnapper, but God will recompense him.

Deu. 24:7 : If a man be found stealing any of his brethren of the children of Israel, and he deal with him as a slave, or sell him, then that thief shall die: so shalt thou put away the evil from the midst of thee.

The kidnapper was condemned even if he had not yet collected his ransom and still had his victim.

The kidnapping law, of course, recalls to our minds the case of Josephs brothers selling him (Gen. 37:25-28). God hated this act.

The Jewish rabbis held that this verse (Exo. 21:16) meant that only if a person stole a man AND he was seen by witnesses in possession of the kidnapped one was he to be slain. Admittedly, the Hebrew conjunction is and and not or. Furthermore, criminals were not to be executed without witnesses to prove their guilt (Num. 35:30). Nonetheless, most Commentators and translators think that the man-stealer was to be slain, even if his victim was not found with the abductor, if clear evidence of his guilt could be obtained. Possibly the ransom money or sale price money could be traced. We feel that the translation or in the middle of Exo. 21:16 is correct.

Other law codes in the ancient Near East also forbade kidnapping. Hammurabis law (#14) directed that if a citizen stole the young son of another citizen, that he should be put to death. However, stealing a slave was not looked upon so seriously. Eshnunna law (#49) directed that a man caught with a stolen slave or slave girl was to surrender one slave for each one stolen.

14.

What was the penalty for cursing parents? (Exo. 21:17)

The one cursing father or mother was most certainly to be put to death.

Lev. 20:9 : For every one that curseth his father or his mother shall surely be put to death: he hath cursed his father or his mother; his blood shall be upon him.

What does it mean to CURSE father or mother? The Hebrew verb (qalal) translated curse has several applications. Often it referred to language much like our modern slanderous profanity. See 1Sa. 17:43; 2Sa. 16:5. The dictionaries define it to mean to esteem lightly, hence to revile, curse, or execrate. In Deu. 23:4 to curse refers to a curse of supernatural type, like voodoo or hexing. In 1Sa. 2:30 the word qalal is translated lightly esteem and is set forth as the opposite of honoring. Jesus quoted Exo. 21:17 in Mat. 15:4 and Mar. 7:10 to condemn the Pharisees for neglecting to care for their parents, obviously, therefore, to curse parents had a very broad meaning.

Respect for parents is commanded in the New Testament in Eph. 6:1. God does not feel less strongly now about those who curse their parents than He did in Moses time.

15.

What was the penalty for injuring someone in a fight? (Exo. 21:18-19)

One who inflicted a non-fatal injury upon someone in a fight was to pay for the loss of the injured mans time off from work and to cause him to be completely healed, that is, pay for his medical care. Aside from these requirements, he was quit, that is, clear and free from further penalty. The guilty party had to pay workmans compensation and health benefits, to express it in modern jargon. God cares about injuries and injustices, as well as about the loss of life.

If the smitten man died, then Exo. 21:12 would apply as the rule.

It seems to us that Exo. 21:18 refers to an unplanned, impromptu fight. The use of impromptu weapons like the fist[314] and the stone suggests that the blow was not premeditated.[315] If the smiter had planned the deed he would have carried a knife or a club. Martin Noth[316] does not feel that the text clearly indicates by mentioning fist and stone that there was no evil intent in the smiter. We concede that the evidence is not positive. But the law could be applied, whether the blow was planned or unplanned.

[314] Both the Hebrew and the Greek have a word meaning fist. The Aramaic Targums and some other versions understand it as a stick or cudgel.

[315] Cole, op. cit., p. 168.

[316] Op. cit., p. 181.

Laws about personal injuries were common in ancient Near Eastern law codes. Hammurabis law #206 asserted that if a citizen struck another citizen in a brawl and inflicted an injury upon him, that the citizen was to swear that he had hot struck him deliberately, and should pay for the physician. This stipulation is similar to that in Moses law. Hammurabi added (in laws 207208) that if the smitten one died because of his blow, that the smiter was to swear that it was not deliberate; and if the slain man was a member of the aristocracy, the slayer should pay one-half mina of silver; but if the slain man was a member of the commonality, the slayer was to pay one-third of a mina of silver. Thus Hammurabi made class distinctions which God did not make in the Torah, (Also we wonder how honest some of the oaths were!)

16.

What was the penalty for beating a slave to death? (Exo. 21:20-21)

For beating a slave to death, his master shall certainly be punished. However, if the slave survived the beating for a day or so, the master was not to be punished because the financial loss incurred by the slaves death was considered punishment enough. They are your possession.

We think that this passage refers to foreign slaves. Lev. 25:44-46 declares that Israelite bondmen were not to be made to serve with rigor.

The manner of inflicting the punishment on the slave-killing master is not specified. Some think the master was executed, as Exo. 21:12 directs. But this seems unlikely to us. If the punishment for killing a slave were the same as for killing any other person, there would seem to be no purpose in this distinct law applying to slaves.

The word for punish is a word usually meaning to take vengeance. This might make it appear therefore that some members of the slaves family would punish or kill the master in the usual ways of taking blood vengeance. But we doubt that foreign slaves would have relatives available to take such action.

We suppose that it was left to the Israelite authorities to instigate investigation and determine punishment in such cases.

The rod referred to was probably the instrument customarily used to chasten and impress a slave. See Pro. 10:13; Pro. 13:23. Under his hand means during the act of the beating, or very quickly thereafter.

The fact that a beaten slave lived a day or two was taken as proof that his master had not intended to kill him, and he therefore was exonerated from further penalty.

If all of this seems harsh and sub-Christian to you, consider the additional fact that the law (in Exo. 21:26-27) stated that permanent physical injuries to the slave, like loss of an eye or tooth, brought about his release from slavery. Also this very law in Exo. 21:20-21 hints that a strong public sentiment might arise in behalf of a slain slave and indignation might rise so high as to be difficult to repress without specific rules about the matter. The Israelites were not indifferent to the rights of a slave. Much less was God indifferent!

The protection of slaves afforded by this verse may seem to us a slight one. But it is the earliest trace of such protection known in legislation. God had to educate His people little by little, line upon line. He overlooked many things in olden times of which he now commands all men to repent (Act. 17:30).

Babylonian law was not concerned about the slave at all, but only about the loss to his master. If someone killed another mans slave, he had to pay one-third mina of silver and also forfeit other valuables. (Hammurabis law #116). To the Israelite a slave was a person, a human being created in the divine images, and whoever assaulted this divinely-given life was answerable for it and would surely be punished. This attitude and approach to the matter of slavery could eventually lead only to total emancipation.

17.

What was the penalty for accidentally causing a woman to have a miscarriage? (Exo. 21:22)

If two men were fighting and accidentally injured a woman in the fracas and caused her to have a miscarriage, the one who had caused the miscarriage was to be fined according as the womans husband demanded and the judges gave sentence.[317]

[317] As the judges determine is a permissible but loose translation. Literally the text says only In (or among, amidst) judges. . . .

If, however, harm followed, then the one who injured the woman was punished by being injured in a manner similar to the injury that he had inflicted.
What is this harm that might follow? This word (ason) translated harm is found elsewhere in scripture only in Gen. 42:4; Gen. 42:38; Gen. 44:29. In these passages it seems to signify serious harm, perhaps even death. We assume that it has this meaning here.

Was the harm that done to the mother, or to the unborn child, or both? We feel that it was the harm done to the mother because her violently-aborted fetus probably would die in nearly all such cases. The Jewish rabbis and the Targum of Onkelos understood the harm as referring to the death of the mother.[318] We think that this certainly was one possibility that the verse relates to, and that this is indicated by the life for life judgment in Exo. 21:23. But the other penalties that are suggested (eye for eye, tooth for tooth, etc.) suggest that this law dealt with other possible injuries and effects besides the womans death. The text says that the woman was hurt so as to have a miscarriage. She was not just frightened to the point of losing her baby (something that does indeed happen).

[318] Keil and Delitzsch, op. cit., p. 135.

The law was general enough that it could apply in many different situations, both in cases when the women just happened to be too near men who started fighting; or when as wife of one she interfered with their quarrel. (Compare Deu. 25:11-12.)

The expression that her fruit depart could be literally translated and her children go out (of her womb). The word children is plural because it might be twins.
The word translated fruit is yeled. This word is almost always translated child. (It is rendered that way seventy-two times in the King James Bible. See Gen. 21:8; Exo. 2:3; Exo. 2:10.) Sometimes it is rendered boy (Zec. 8:5), son (Rth. 1:5), or young man (Gen. 4:23; 1Ki. 12:8).

The use in Exo. 21:22 of the word yeled to describe the womans aborted fetus is surely no comfort to the advocates of legalized abortion. Some writers have used Exo. 21:22 to argue that a fetus is not really a child, and that the abortion of a fetus is not regarded in the law as equally serious to the death of a person after birth.[319] (Note Exo. 21:12). But the same term (yeled) describes the unborn child that refers to the child after birth.

[319] Surprisingly even Keil and Delitzsch, ibid, makes this allegation.

The Greek O.T. renders Exo. 21:22, And the child come out not perfectly formed. We do not consider this to be an authoritative translation; but it is worth noting that the Greek-speaking Jews understood the verse to refer to a non-liveable fetus.

Hammurabi (Laws 209212) dictated that if a citizen struck another citizens daughter and caused her to have a miscarriage, he was to pay ten shekels of silver for her fetus. If the woman died they were to put the strikers daughter to death. Hammurabi then decreed that if a citizen caused a commoners daughter to have a miscarriage, he was to pay five shekels of silver; but if that woman died, he was to pay one-half mina of silver. The law of Moses did not make such class distinctions among people.

18.

What was to be done if harm followed a miscarriage? (Exo. 20:23-25)

In such a case, the one who brought on the miscarriage by hurting the woman was punished in a degree according to what he had done life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, etc. This is the so-called lex talionis, a Latin expression meaning law of retaliation. Compare Lev. 24:17-21.

The lex talionis may seem severe, but it is not a bad law. It makes the penalty fit the crime. It prevents extreme harsh retaliations. It was more valuable as a deterrent than as a penalty.

Cassuto[320] thinks that it is very unlikely that accidentally killing a pregnant woman was punishable by life for life, when Exo. 21:13 says that accidental killers were not to be executed. Also Num. 35:31 indicates that a ransom was to be refused only for the life of a murderer. This led Cassuto to hold that the formula life for life is a stereotyped legal saying meaning that the punishment for a crime was to correspond generally to the crime itself, but did not always require exactly the same infliction as punishment. Thus life for life sometimes meant only a fair monetary compensation. We feel that this is probably correct; and that life for life here probably meant that the slayer was to spend his life in a city of refuge working to repay to the husband the loss of the life of the mother and baby.

[320] Op. cit., p. 276.

Although there is no mention of the decision of judges in Exo. 21:23-25, the reference to judges in Exo. 21:22 causes us to think that the penalty to be inflicted was decided upon by judges. The references in Deu. 19:18-21 to judges deciding in another situation how to administer the life for life, eye for eye law strengthens our view that the judges decided the punishments of Exo. 21:23-25.

In ancient times wrongdoings were sometimes punished by the law of unlimited revenge. According to this system a wrongdoers entire family was wiped out for his misdeed (Gen. 34:25-31). In later times the eye for an eye law prevented such extreme punishments, and functioned as a law of limited revenge. While this was progress in human relationships, even it will not solve the fightings and enmities of society. To achieve this, men must accept the law taught by Christ, the law of unlimited forgiveness: If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink. (Rom. 12:20).[321]

[321] The author learned these three laws of human relationship from Dr. Najib Khouri, a gracious, wise, elderly Arab Christian of Beit Hanina, Israel.

Mat. 5:38-39 : Ye have heard that it was said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: but I say unto you, Resist not him that is evil: but whosoever smiteth thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.

The Jewish rabbis regarded eye and tooth as typical of all sorts of injuries, and this is probably true. They enumerated twenty-four bodily organs which come within the operation of this law. Probably that did not exhaust all the possible applications of the law.
Hammurabi gave several laws about personal injuries. He also employed the lex talionis, and decreed that if a citizen destroyed the eye of a member of the aristocracy, they should destroy his eye; and if he broke another citizens bone, they should break his bone. Also if a citizen knocked out a tooth of a citizen of his rank, they were to knock out his tooth. (Laws 196197, 200). Hammurabis application of this law shows it was not always interpreted to mean that one paid the value of a tooth when he knocked one out. His own tooth was knocked out!

19.

What was the penalty for injuring slaves? (Exo. 21:26-27)

If a man inflicted permanent injury upon his slave, like destroying his eye or knocking out a tooth, the slave or slave girl was set free for the sake of the eye or tooth. We presume that other permanent injuries also brought about emancipation. Compare this law with Exo. 21:20-21.

Hammurabi (law 199) decreed that if a citizen destroyed the eye of another citizens slave or broke the bone of another mans slave, he was to pay one-half his value. Hammurabi says nothing about a mans injuring his own slave.

20.

What was the penalty if an ox gored a man to death? (Exo. 21:28-29)

The ox was to be stoned to death, and its flesh was not to be eaten. The owner was then clear of further responsibility. However, if the ox was known to be a gorer in times past, and its owner had not kept it shut up, and it gored a man or woman to death, then the ox was stoned and its owner was also put to death. Probably injuries inflicted by other animals were settled by the example of the law about the ox.

Gen. 9:5-6 : Surely your blood, the blood of your lives, will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it: and at the hand of every mans brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth mans blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.

The ox that killed a man was slain because it had killed a human life, that which is a divine gift and has the image of God. So extreme is the act of taking a life that even the beast, though it has no moral sensibilities, was removed from existence to implant horror for killing. Guilty negligence on the part of the owner was reckoned to be a capital offense, though it could be commuted by a fine.
We suppose that the ox was not eaten because in being stoned it would not be properly bled for slaughtering. Also its carcass would be bruised. Also bloodguiltiness was imputed to the ox.

Law codes in the ancient Near East had several laws similar to Exo. 21:28-29. Hammurabis law (No. 250) said that if an ox, when it was walking along the street, gored a citizen to death, the case was not subject to claim. The law of Moses required the ox to be slain in such cases.

Hammurabi also commanded (laws #251252) that if a citizens ox was a gorer and the city council made it known to him that it was a gorer, but he did not dehorn it or tie up the ox, and that ox gored to death a member of the aristocracy, he should pay one-half mina of silver. (This law resembles Exo. 21:32). Eshnunna law 54 is quite similar. We notice in these laws a somewhat less positive view of the sacredness of human life than the Torah presupposes.

21.

How might the owner of a killing ox escape execution? (Exo. 21:30-31)

The owner of the ox could escape execution if the other people involved (the family of the dead man and the authorities) agreed to lay upon him a ransom for his life. In that case he had to pay whatever was laid upon him as the redemption of his life (soul, Heb. nepesh). The words redemption and ransom are important words for the later teachings about salvation. Note Psa. 49:7-8.

Exo. 21:31 emphasizes the impartiality of the law. The owner of an ox that killed someone after the owner had been warned was either sentenced to death or had a ransom charged for him, regardless of whether the ox gored a son or a daughter. It is barely possible that the law in Exo. 21:31 may reflect an acquaintance with a Babylonain law (Hammurabi #229230). This law sentenced the son of a house builder to death if the builder built a house and it collapsed and killed the son of the house owner; the law sentenced the builder himself to death if the house he built collapsed and killed the house owner. The Babylonian law was a severe deterrent, but it did punish the innocent son for the sins of his father. The Hebrew law put the penalty where it belonged, upon the negligent manslayer. The children were not to be put to death for the sins of the father (Deu. 24:16).

22.

What was the penalty if an ox gored a slave? (Exo. 21:32)

The owner of the ox gave to the master of the slave (whether the slave was male or female) thirty shekels of silver and the ox was stoned.
This law is one of the very few rules in Israels law which shows a differentiation in the evaluation of bond and free men. But the slave was still a person, and the ox that gored the slave was slain.

Exo. 21:32 reveals the price of a dead slave thirty pieces (shekels) of silver! See Zec. 11:12; Mat. 26:15.

Hammurabis law (No. 252) prescribed a payment of one-third of a mina of silver as payment to a slaves owner if he were fatally gored, but the goring ox was not to be destroyed.

23.

What was the penalty for causing an animals death in a pit? (Exo. 21:33-34)

If a man dug a pit and did not cover it adequately, and an animal belonging to someone else fell into it, the owner of the pit had to pay for the dead animal, and the dead beast was given to the pit owner. (A dead ox would probably be more trouble than benefit! Imagine trying to remove a dead ox from a pit!) The text does not indicate what judgment was to be given if the animal in the pit was only injured.

Pits of various types were common in Israel. They were dug into the bed rock (which is often very near the surface), for water cisterns, for grain storage, for traps for animals (2Sa. 23:20), or prisons for men (Jer. 38:6), or military defences (Jer. 41:9).

The principle of personal liability for the physical safety of people and animals is clearly stated in Gods law. We who are Christians do not have in the New Testament all the detailed instructions about safety which are given in the law, such as rules about covering pits or building railings around the edges of flat roof tops. But we who are under the gospel of Christ are more obligated to protect the safety and lives of people than were the people under the law. We can receive guidance from the law and internal motivation from the Holy Spirit within.

Rom. 13:9-10 : If there be any other commandment, it is summed up in this word, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbor; love therefore is the fulfillment of the law.

24.

What was the judgment if one mans ox killed another mans ox? (Exo. 21:35-36)

In such a case the live ox was sold and the money was divided between both men. The dead ox was also divided between them. This provision very probably ended up with both men being losers, but not losers to the degree that they would have been without this protective law.

If the ox that killed the other ox was known to be a gorer in times past and the owner had been warned and had not kept it in, then the owner assuredly paid for the dead ox totally, but the dead beast was to be his (Exo. 21:36).

One of the laws at Eshnunna (No. 53) was very similar to the Hebrew law. It decreed that if an ox gored another ox and caused its death, that both ox owners should divide among themselves the price of the live ox and also the equivalent of the dead ox.

The concern often expressed in the O.T. prophets for fair dealing had its roots in the law of Moses, and, of course, ultimately in the very nature of God. To a struggling Israelite farmer a fair payment for the death of an ox might mean the difference between subsistence and hunger, or between freedom and slavery for debt.[322]

[322] Cole, op, cit., p. 170.

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

XXI.
LAWS CONCERNING THE RIGHTS OF PERSONS.

(1) These are the judgments.The laws (Knobel), the rights (Keil), the rules which shall guide judicial decisions (Pool). The paraphrase alone gives the full meaning.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

1. The judgments which thou shalt set before them As distinguished from the words spoken directly from heaven . Judgments are here to be understood as decisions of law, or judicial statutes and regulations to govern in the administration of justice . These were the rules of judgment by which the rights of individuals were to be maintained and civil order secured .

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT, Exo 20:22 to Exo 23:33.

Here follows a collection of sundry laws which were compiled by Moses, and doubtless represent the oldest written legislation of the Pentateuch. This compilation probably constituted “the book of the covenant” which is mentioned in Exo 24:7. Kalisch classifies the laws under three heads: (1 . ) Those touching the rights of persons, Exo 21:1-32; (2 . ) Those touching the rights of property, Exo 21:33 to Exo 23:14; and (3 . ) General moral laws . Exo 22:15 to Exo 23:19. These are followed by sundry exhortations. Exo 23:20-33. The various precepts, however, are scarcely susceptible of such a classification, or of any systematic arrangement . They take a wide range, and deal with some twenty-eight distinct subjects . Beginning with a prohibition of idolatrous images, (23,) we have laws touching the construction of altars, (24-26,) the relations of servants and masters, (Exo 21:1-11,) personal assaults and injuries, (12-27,) goring oxen, (28-32,) losses of cattle, (33-36,) cattle-stealing, (Exo 22:1-4,) cattle feeding in others’ fields, (5,) kindling destructive fires, (6,) stolen or damaged trusts, (7-15,) seduction, (16-17,) witchcraft, (18,) lying with beasts, (19,) idolatrous sacrifices, (20,) treatment of foreigners, (21,) treatment of widows and the fatherless, (22-24,) loaning money, (25,) pledges, (26-27,) reviling God and rulers, (28,) devotion of firstlings, (29, 30,) abstinence from torn flesh, (31,) perversions of honour and justice, (Exo 23:1-3,) favour toward enemies, (4-5,) judgment of the poor, (6,) maintaining justice, (7, 8,) oppression of strangers, (9,) sabbath laws, (10-12,) other gods, (13,) three annual feasts, (14-17,) sacrifice and offerings, (18, 19 . ) This body of legislation is followed in Exo 23:20-33, by a number of prophetic promises, designed to encourage and strengthen the hearts of the people . Many of the laws and precepts here collected together were doubtless older than the time of Moses, but as Israel was now becoming a body politic, and about to occupy a prominent place among the nations, such a body of laws as was contained in this book of the covenant required formal codification .

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Further Covenant Provisions ( Exo 21:1 to Exo 23:33 ).

Exo 21:1

“Now these are the judgments that you will set before them.”

Having made known His covenant, and having established how they must approach Him, Yahweh now provides detailed treatment on particular cases. These are mainly in the form of case law (casuistic) based on specific examples, with an occasional reference to apodictic law (direct command from God – a rare form of law outside Israel probably mainly restricted to patriarchal societies). The first example is of Hebrew bondmen and Hebrew bondwomen. This demonstrates that a good number of such must have come out of Egypt attached to Israelite families, and it shows Yahweh’s concern for those who were now in bondage as Israel had been in Egypt. Other law codes put slaves well down in the list. They were of little account.

Law codes were fairly common in the Ancient Near East. There were the laws of Ur-nammu of Ur, Lipit Ishtar of Isin (2100 BC), the laws of Eshnunna and of Hammurapi of Babylon (1750 BC) as well as Hittite law codes and considerable written material dealing with casuistic law. They were not comprehensive and by no means dealt with all circumstances, even common ones such as arson. Perhaps some of them reflected rather changes in the law. Thus like Biblical law there were gaps which were covered by custom rather than code. Indeed the law codes were rarely quoted in court. Whether they were for the use of judges or simply a propaganda exercise is a matter of debate. Possibly a little of both. The difference in Israel is that their laws were promulgated by God, and in the end enforceable by Him.

The covenant provisions that follow are carefully gathered into groups, mainly following a chiastic format.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Expansion of the Ten Words of the Covenant ( Exo 20:22 to Exo 23:33 ).

In this section, which is composed of elements put together mainly in chiastic form (see later), Yahweh expands on the Ten Words of the covenant. Notice that it begins with ‘and Yahweh said to Moses’. This proceeds as follows:

a Instructions concerning future worship in obedience to the commandments in Exo 20:3-5, for He will be with them and record His name in places where they go (Exo 20:22-26).

b Instructions concerning bondservants remembering the manservants and maidservants in mentioned in Exo 20:10 (Exo 21:1-11).

c Instructions concerning those who cause death or injury and those who dishonour their parents in obedience to Exo 20:12-13 (Exo 21:12-36).

d Instructions concerning a neighbour’s goods in obedience to Exo 20:15; Exo 20:17 (Exo 22:1-15).

d Instruction concerning the forcing of virgins, who belong to their families, which connects with Exo 20:14; Exo 20:17 (Exo 22:16-17).

c Instructions concerning wrong attitudes which connect with wider implications from the words of the covenant, which include some for which the penalty is death, and the need for avoidance of dishonourable conduct (Exo 22:18 to Exo 23:11).

b Instructions concerning the Sabbath (compareExo 20:8-9) and the regular feasts (Exo 23:12-19).

a Yahweh’s resulting promise that His Angel will go with them until the land is theirs, finishing with a warning against idolatry (Exo 23:20-23).

We should note here that in ‘a’ the approach to and worship of Yahweh is in mind, and His recording of His name in places as they go on their way, and they are warned against idolatry, and in the parallel the Angel of Yahweh is to go with them and they are warned against idolatry. In ‘b’ we are instructed concerning bondmen and bondwomen and in the parallel the Sabbath is dealt with which, in the announcing of the covenant, contained reference to the rights of menservants and maidservant (Exo 20:9). The bondmen also had a right to enjoy a seven year sabbath. It may be this connection which decided the positioning of this law prior to those concerning murder and theft. In ‘c’ we have reference to death and violence, while in the parallel death is the sentence for some of the crimes mentioned. In ‘d’ we have reference to misappropriation of people’s goods, and in the parallel misappropriation of their daughters.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

The Covenant Code Exo 21:1 to Exo 23:12 can be called the “Covenant Code.” Sailhamer tells us that the laws listed in the “Covenant Codes” (Exo 21:1 to Exo 23:12) are 42 (7 x 6), which was in intentional multiple of seven. He also notes that there are 611 laws listed in the Pentateuch, which equals the numerical value of the Hebrew word “Torah” ( ). He notes that “the traditional number of laws in the Pentateuch (613) is obtained by treating both Deu 6:4 (the “Shema”) and Exo 20:2 (“I am the Lord your God”) as ‘laws.’” In addition, there are three hundred seventy-five (375) proverbs in Solomon’s First Collection (Exo 10:1 to Exo 22:16), which equals the numerical value of Solomon’s Hebrew name. He says there are His point is that such numerical coincidences reflect deliberate composition by the ancient Jewish scribes, and concludes that the laws, as well as the statutes, were not intended to be exhaustive. [87]

[87] See John H. Sailhammer, Introduction to Old Testament Theology (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, c1995), 257.

Exo 21:10 Scripture References – Note

Isa 4:1, “And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel : only let us be called by thy name, to take away our reproach.”

Exo 21:11 And if he do not these three unto her, then shall she go out free without money.

Exo 21:12 He that smiteth a man, so that he die, shall be surely put to death.

Exo 21:12 Comments – The Mosaic Law considered murder as a capital offence punishable by death. This method of judgment against such a sin is a type and shadow of eternal judgment God will impart unto wicked men.

Exo 21:13 And if a man lie not in wait, but God deliver him into his hand; then I will appoint thee a place whither he shall flee.

Exo 21:13 Comments – This is killing a man accidentally.

Exo 21:14 But if a man come presumptuously upon his neighbour, to slay him with guile; thou shalt take him from mine altar, that he may die.

Exo 21:14 Illustrations:

Deu 19:11-12, “But if any man hate his neighbour, and lie in wait for him, and rise up against him, and smite him mortally that he die, and fleeth into one of these cities: Then the elders of his city shall send and fetch him thence, and deliver him into the hand of the avenger of blood, that he may die.”

1Ki 2:29-30, “And it was told king Solomon that Joab was fled unto the tabernacle of the LORD; and, behold, he is by the altar. Then Solomon sent Benaiah the son of Jehoiada, saying, Go, fall upon him. And Benaiah came to the tabernacle of the LORD, and said unto him, Thus saith the king, Come forth. And he said, Nay; but I will die here. And Benaiah brought the king word again, saying, Thus said Joab, and thus he answered me.”

Exo 21:15 And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death.

Exo 21:16 And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death.

Exo 21:17 And he that curseth his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death.

Exo 21:17 Scripture References – Note:

Mat 15:4, “For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.”

Mar 7:10, “For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death:”

Exo 21:18-19 Comments The Penalty for Smiting a Man – See Luk 10:25-37. The good Samaritan paid the penalty under the Law for those who beat the man. Likewise, Jesus paid our penalty.

Exo 21:21 “if he continue a day or two” – Comments – That is, “If the man live a few days before dying.”

Exo 21:22 If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman’s husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.

Exo 21:22 “No mischief follow” Comments – That is, the woman is not hurt in any way. Note Exo 23:25-26.

Exo 23:25-26, “And ye shall serve the LORD your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee. There shall nothing cast their young , nor be barren, in thy land: the number of thy days I will fulfil.”

Exo 21:23 And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life,

Exo 21:24 Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,

Exo 21:24 Comments – The context of this passage is referring to compensation and not to retribution. It is not about getting even with someone, but about how we are to give a righteous compensation to those who are injured and wronged by others. It is to be an act of love and not an act of vengeance. Evidently, the first-century Jews used it to justify retribution (Mat 5:38).

Mat 5:38, “Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth:”

Exo 21:32 “thirty shekels of silver” Comments – Scholars suggest that thirty shekels of silver was considered the price of a good, healthy slave (see Adam Clarke [88] , Keil [89] ).

[88] Adam Clarke, Exodus, in Adam Clarke’s Commentary, Electronic Database (Seattle, WA: Hendrickson Publishers Inc., 1996), in P.C. Study Bible, v. 3.1 [CD-ROM] (Seattle, WA: Biblesoft Inc., 1993-2000), comments on Exodus 21:32.

[89] C. F. Keil, and F. Delitzsch, Pentateuch, vol. 2, in Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament, trans. James Martin, in P.C. Study Bible, v. 3.1 [CD-ROM] (Seattle, WA: Biblesoft Inc., 1993-2000), comments on Exodus 21:32.

Mat 26:15, “And said unto them, What will ye give me, and I will deliver him unto you? And they covenanted with him for thirty pieces of silver .”

Exo 21:33 Comments – This pit would most commonly be a well. Short walls around a well were required to prevent a person or animal from falling into the pit.

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

Precepts Regulating the Master’s Relation to Slaves

v. 1. Now these are the judgments which thou shalt set before them. These were special ordinances concerning the political commonwealth of the Jews. In the New Testament God’s revelation is no longer confined to one single people, and we no longer have any state under the direct government of God. And yet, also these ordinances were recorded for our learning, especially for the purpose of teaching us various applications of the law of love.

v. 2. If thou buy an Hebrew servant, as a slave, six years he shall serve in this capacity; and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing, the idea being that he has earned his freedom by his six years’ service.

v. 3. If he came in by himself, literally, with his body, that is, unmarried, he shall go out by himself; if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him. Cf Exo 22:3; Lev 25:39; Deu 15:12-15.

v. 4. If his master have given him a wife, and she have born him sons or daughters, the woman, of course, being a slave also, the wife and her children shall be her master’s, and he shall go out by himself. The man could have his freedom, if he chose, but the woman would still remain the master’s property, and her children as well.

v. 5. And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children, I will not go out free, the slave preferring a continuation of his slavery in the company of his family to freedom without his loved ones,

v. 6. then his master shall bring him unto the judges, before the proper officers; he shall also bring him to the door or unto the door-post of his house; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him forever, the opening in the ear marking the slave as such.

v. 7. And if a man sell his daughter to be a maid-servant, her position being that of housekeeper and probable concubine, she shall not go out as the men-servants do, that is, not be released in the seventh year, the purpose being that she meanwhile become the wife or the concubine either of the master or of his son.

v. 8. If she please not her master, who hath betrothed her to himself, that is, who had purchased her with the expectation of making her his wife or concubine, then shall he let her be redeemed by some other man who might desire her for his wife. To sell her unto a strange nation he shall have no power, seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her, he has broken faith with her, for she came to him, although her father sold her for reasons of poverty, Lev 25:39, with the understanding that she was to occupy the position of wife or concubine. Hebrew girls were not to be sold into unconditional slavery to members of other nations.

v. 9. And if he have betrothed her unto his son, if he have purchased the girl with the intention of making her his son’s wife or concubine, he shall deal with her after the manner of daughters, according to the rights of a daughter. That was the second possibility.

v. 10. If he take him another wife, so that he have two or more wives or concubines, her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage, the special duty which marriage implies, shall he not diminish. She was on no account to be neglected also in case of this third possibility; the father was to use his power and authority in upholding the rights of the girl.

v. 11. And if he do not these three unto her, that is, if, in the three given instances, he does not do the right thing by her, then shall she go out free without money. The woman would have her freedom, and her father would have the advantage of the purchase-money. Thus was the Hebrew male or female servant protected, for the Israelites were not to forget that the lowly among their people were likewise members of God’s chosen nation. The principle applies to Christian masters also, inasmuch as they will treat even the least among the believers as brethren and sisters in Christ.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

EXPOSITION

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT.Continued.

I. Laws connected with the rights of persons (Exo 21:1-32). The regulations of this section concern

1. Slavery (Exo 21:2-6);

2. Murder and other kinds of homicide (Exo 21:12-15 and Exo 21:20, Exo 21:21);

3. Man-stealing (Exo 21:16);

4. Striking or cursing of parents (Exo 21:15, Exo 21:17);

5. Assaults and injuries to the person not resulting in death (Exo 21:18, Exo 21:19, and Exo 21:22-27), both in the case of free men and of slaves; and

6. Injuries done by cattle both to free men and to slaves (Exo 21:28-32). The chief bodily injury whereto women are liable is not mentioned. A later enactment (Deu 22:25-29) made it expiable by marriage, or else a capital offence. There are no other remarkable omissions.

Exo 21:1

These are the judgments. The term “judgment” applies most properly to the decisions of courts and the laws founded upon them. No doubt the laws contained in the “Book of the Covenant” were to a large extent old laws, which had been often acted on; but we should do wrong to suppose that there was nothing new in the legislation. The Hebrew mishphat is used with some vagueness.

Exo 21:2-11

Slavery.

Exo 21:2

If thou buy an Hebrew servant. Slavery, it is clear, was an existing institution. The law of Moses did not make it, but found it, and by not forbidding, allowed it. The Divine legislator was content under the circumstances to introduce mitigations and alleviations into the slave condition. Hebrews commonly became slaves through poverty (Le 25:35, 39), but sometimes through crime (Exo 22:3).

In the seventh he shall go out. Not in the Sabbatical year, but at the commencement of the seventh year after he became a slave. If the jubilee year happened to occur, he might be released sooner (Le 25:40); but in any case his servitude must end when the sixth year of it was completed. This was an enormous boon, and had nothing, so far as is known, correspondent to it in the legislation of any other country. Nor was this all. When he went out free, his late master was bound to furnish him with provisions out of his flock, and out of his threshing floor, and out of his winepress (Deu 15:12-14), so that he might have something wherewith to begin the world afresh. The humane spirit of the legislation is strikingly marked in its very first enactment.

Exo 21:3

If he came in by himself, etc. The first clause of this verse is further explained in the next; the second secured to the wife who went into slavery with her husband a participation in his privilege of release at the end of the sixth year.

Exo 21:4

If his master have given him a wife. If the slave was unmarried when he went into servitude, or if his wife died, and his master then gave him a wife from among his female slaves, the master was not to lose his property in his female slave by reason of having permitted the marriage. When the man claimed his freedom at the end of the sixth year, he was to “go out” alone. Should children have been born, they were also to be the property of the master and to remain members of his household. No doubt these provisos, which cannot be regarded as unjust, had the effect of inducing many Hebrew slaves not to claim their release (Exo 21:5, Exo 21:6).

Exo 21:5, Exo 21:6

I love my master, etc. Affection might grow up between the slave and the master, if he were well treated. The Hebrew form of slavery was altogether of a mild kind. Masters are admonished to treat their slaves “not as bond-servants, but as hired servants or sojourners,” and again “not to rule over them with rigour” (Le Exo 25:39, Exo 25:40, 43). Even among the heathen, slaves often bore a true affection to their masters. Or, the slave might be so attached to his wife and children as to be unwilling to separate from them, and might prefer slavery with the solace of their society to freedom without it. For such cases the provision was made, which is contained in Exo 21:6. On the slave declaring to his master his unwillingness to go free, the master might take him before the judges, or magistrates (literally “gods”) as witnesses, and perhaps registrars of the man’ s declaration, and might then reconduct him to his house, and by a significant ceremony mark him as his slave “for ever.” The ceremony consisted in boring through one of his ears with an awl, and driving the awl into the door or doorpost of the house, thereby attaching him physically to the dwelling of which he became thenceforth a permanent inmate. Almost all commentators assert that some such custom was common in the East in connection with slavery, and refer to Xen. Aaab. 3.1, 31; Plant. Poenul. 5.2, 21; Juv. Sat. 1.104; Plutarch. Vit. Cic. 26, etc. But these passages merely show that the Orientals generallynot slaves in particularhad their ears bored for the purpose of wearing earrings, and indicate no usage at all comparable to the Hebrew practice. The Hebrew customprobably a very ancient oneseems to have had two objects

1. The declaring by a significant act, that the man belonged to the house; and

2. The permanent marking of him as a slave, dis-entitled to the rights of freemen, he shall serve him for ever. Josephus (Ant. Jud. 4.8, 20) and the Jewish commentators generally maintain that the law of the jubilee release overruled this enactment; but this must be regarded as very doubtful.

Exo 21:7

If a man sell his daughter to be a maid-servant. Among ancient nations the father’ s rights over his children were generally regarded as including the right to sell them for slaves. In civilised nations the right was seldom exercised; but what restrained men was rather a sentiment of pride than any doubt of such sales being proper. Many barbarous nations, like the Thracians (Herod. 5.6), made a regular practice of selling their daughters. Even at Athens there was a time when sales of children had been common (Plut. Vit. Solon. 13). Existing custom, it is clear, sanctioned such sales among the Hebrews, and what the law now did was to step in and mitigate the evil consequences. (Compare the comment on Exo 21:2.) These were greatest in the case of females. Usually they were bought to be made the concubines, or secondary wives of their masters. If this intention were carried out, then they were to be entitled to their status and maintenance as wives during their lifetime, even though their husband took another (legitimate) wife (Exo 21:10). If the retention was not carried out, either the man was to marry her to one of his sons (Exo 21:9), or he was to sell his rights over her altogether with his obligations to another Hebrew; or he was to send her back at once intact to her father’ s house, without making any claim on him to refund the purchase-money. These provisos may not have furnished a remedy against all the wrongs of a weak, and, no doubt, an oppressed class; but they were important mitigations of the existing usages, and protected the slave-concubine to a considerable extent.

Exo 21:8

If she please not her master. If he decline, i.e; to carry out the contract, and take her for his wife. Then let her be redeemed. Rather, “Then let him cause her to be redeemed.” Let him, i.e; look out for some one who will buy her of him and take his obligation of marriage off his hands To sell her to a strange nation he shall not have power. Only, this purchaser must be a Hebrew, like himself, and not a foreigner, since her father consented to her becoming a slave only on the condition of her being wedded to a Hebrew. Seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her. By professing to take her as a secondary wife, and not carrying out the contract.

Exo 21:9

And if he hath betrothed her unto his son. A man might have bought the maiden for this object, or finding himself not pleased with her (Exo 21:8), might have made his son take his place as her husband. In this case but one course was allowedhe must give her the status of a daughter thenceforth in his family.

Exo 21:10

If he take him another wifei.e; If he marry her himself, and then take another, even a legitimate, wifeher food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage shall he not diminishshe shall retain during her life all the privileges of a married womanhe shall not diminish aught from them. The word translated “duty of marriage” seems to mean “right of cohabitation.”

Exo 21:11

If he do not these three unto her. Not the “three” points of the latter part of Exo 21:10; but one of the three courses laid down in Exo 21:8, Exo 21:9, and Exo 21:10. She shall go out freei.e; she shall not be retained as a drudge, a mere maidservant, but shall return to her father at once, a free woman, capable of contracting another marriage; and without moneyi.e; without the father being called upon to refund any portion of the stun for which he had sold her.

Exo 21:12-14

Homicide. Exo 21:12 reiterates the Sixth Commandment, and adds to it a temporal penalty”he shall surely be put to death.” The substance of this law had already been given to Noah in the words, “Whoso sheddeth man’ s blood, by man shall his blood be shed” (Gen 9:6). Real murder, with deliberate intent, was under no circumstances to be pardoned. The murderer was even to be torn from the altar, if he took refuge there, and relentlessly punished (Exo 21:14). See the case of Joab (1Ki 2:28-34). But, if a man happened suddenly upon his enemy, without having sought the opportunity, and slew him (Exo 21:13), then the case was one not of murder, but at most of manslaughter, or possibly of justifiable homicide. No legal penalty was assigned to such offences. They were left to the rude justice of established custom, which required “the avenger of blood” to visit them with due retribution. According to the general practice of the Eastern nations, he might either insist on life for life or take a money compensation. With this custom, deeply ingrained into the minds of the Oriental people, the law did not meddle. It was content to interpose between the avenger of blood and his victim the chance of reaching an asylum. Places were appointed, whither the shedder of blood might flee, and where he might be safe until his cause was tried before the men of his own city (Num 35:22-25), and afterwards, if the judgment were in his favour. Some particular part of the camp was probably made an asylum in the wilderness.

Exo 21:13

God deliver him into his hand. This does not seem to mean more than, “if he chance upon him without seeking him.” God’ s providence does in fact bring about the meetings which men call accidental. I will appoint thee a place. When we first hear of the actual appointment, the number of the places was sixthree on either side of Jordan. (See Jos 20:7, Jos 20:8; and compare Num 35:10-15, and Deu 19:2.) Thus there was always a city of refuge at a reasonable distance.

Exo 21:14

Presumptuously. Or “proudly,” “arrogantly.” Thou shalt take him from mine altar. See the comment on Exo 21:12.

Exo 21:15-17

Other capital offences. The unsystematic character of the arrangement in this chapter is remarkably shown by this interruption of the consideration of different sorts of homicide, in order to introduce offences of quite a different character, and those not very closely allied to each othere.g.,

1. Striking a parent;

2. Kidnapping;

3. Cursing a parent.

Exo 21:15

He that smiteth his father, etc. To “smite” here is simply to “strike”to offer the indignity of a blownot to kill, which had already been made capital (Exo 21:12), not in the case of parents only, but in every case. The severity of the law is very remarkable, and strongly emphasises the dignity and authority of parents. There is no parallel to it in any other known code, though of course the patria potestas of the Roman father gave him the power of punishing a son who had struck him, capitally.

Exo 21:16

He that stealeth a man. Kidnapping, or stealing men to make them slaves, was a very early and very wide-spread crime. Joseph’ s brothers must be regarded as having committed it (Gen 37:28); and there are many traces of it in the remains of antiquity. Most kidnapping was of foreigners; and this was a practice of which the laws of states took no cognizance, though a certain disrepute may have attached to it. But the kidnapping of a fellow-country-man was generally punished with severity. At Athens it was a capital offence. At Rome it made a man infamous. We may gather from Deu 24:7, that the Mosaic law was especially levelled against this lena of the crime, though the words of the present passage are general, and forbid the crime altogether. Man-stealing, in the general sense, is now regarded as an offence by the chief civilised states of Europe and America, and is punished by confiscation of the stolen goods, and sometimes by imprisonment of the man-stealers.

Exo 21:17

He that curseth his father, etc. Blasphemy against God, and imprecations upon parents, were the only two sins of the tongue which the law expressly required to be punished with death (Le Exo 24:16). In later times analogy was held to require that “cursing the ruler of the people” (Exo 22:28) should be visited with the same penalty (2Sa 19:22; 1Ki 2:8, 1Ki 2:9, 1Ki 2:46). The severity of the sentence indicates that in God’ s sight such sins are of the deepest dye.

Exo 21:18, Exo 21:19

Severe assault. Assault was punishable by the law in two ways. Ordinarily, the rule was that of strict retaliation’ ‘ Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe” (Exo 21:24, Exo 21:25; compare Le 24:20, and Deu 19:21). But where the assault was severe, causing a man to take to his bed, and call in the physician’ s aid, something more was needed. The Rabbinical commentators tell us that in this case he was arrested, and sent to prison until it was ascertained whether the person hurt would die or no. If he died, the man was tried for murder; if he recovered, a fine was imposed. This was axed at such a sum as would at once compensate the injured man for his loss of time and defray the expense of his cure. A similar principle is adopted under our own law in many cases of civil action.

Exo 21:18

If men strive together. If there is a quarrel and a personal encounter. In our own law this would reduce this offence, if death ensued, to manslaughter. With a stone, or with his fist. The use of either would show absence of premeditation, and of any design to kill. A weapon would have to be prepared beforehand: a stone might be readily caught up.

Exo 21:19

If he rise again and walk upon his staff. If he recovered sufficiently to leave his bed, and get about with a stick to lean on, his hurt was not to be brought up against the injurer, though he died soon afterwards. Compensation was to be received, and the score regarded as wiped off.

Exo 21:20, Exo 21:21

Homicide of slaves. In most ancient states the slave was the absolute property of his master, and might be ill-used to any extent, even killed, without the law in any way interfering. It is said that the state of things was different in Egypt (Kalisch); but we have scarcely sufficient evidence on the point to be certain that the slave enjoyed there any real and efficient protection. At Athens, beyond a doubt, the law protected the life of the slave; and a very moderate amount of ill-treatment entitled a slave to bring an action. At Rome, on the contrary, “the master could treat the slave as he pleased, could sell him, punish him, and put him to death”. And this was the ordinary state of the law, particularly in Oriental countries. The Mosaic legislation must be regarded as having greatly ameliorated the condition of the native slave population. Hebrew bondmen it placed nearly upon a par with hired servants (Le Exo 25:40); foreign slaves, whether prisoners taken in war, or persons bought in the market, it protected to a very great extent. By the law given in Exo 21:26, Exo 21:27, it largely controlled the brutality of masters, who had to emancipate their slaves if they did them any serious injury. By the law laid down in Exo 21:20, it gave their lives the same protection, or nearly the same, as the lives of freemen. “Smiting “was allowed as a discipline, without which slavery cannot exist; but such smiting as resulted in death was, as a general rule, punishable like any other homicide. The only exception was, if the slave did not die for some days (Exo 21:21). In that case the master was considered not to have intended the slave’ s death, and to be sufficiently punished by the loss of his property.

Exo 21:20

If a man smite his servant, or his maid. “Maids” would commonly be chastised by their mistress, or by an upper servant acting under the mistress’ s authority. “A man” here means “any one.” With a rod. The rods wherewith Egyptian slaves were chastised appear upon the monuments. They were long canes, like those used by our schoolmasters. Under his hand. Criminals in the East are said often to die under the bastinado; and even in our own country there have been cases of soldiers dying under the lash. A special delicacy of the nervous system will make a punishment of the kind fatal to some, which would have been easily borne by others.

Exo 21:21

If he continue a day or twoi.e; “If the slave does not die till a day or two afterwards.” Compare the provision in Exo 21:19, with respect to persons who were not slaves. No special callousness to the sufferings of slaves is implied. He is his money. The slave had been purchased for a stun of money, or was at any rate money’ s worth; and the master would suffer a pecuniary loss by his death.

Exo 21:22-25

Assault producing miscarriage. Retaliation. Women in all countries are apt to interfere in the quarrels of men, and run the risk of suffering injuries which proceed from accident rather than design, one such injury being of a peculiar character, to which there is nothing correspondent among the injuries which may be done to man. This is abortion, or miscarriage. The Mosaic legislation sought to protect pregnant women from suffering this injury by providing, first, that if death resulted the offender should suffer death (Exo 21:23); and, secondly, that if there were no further ill-result than the miscarriage itself, still a fine should be paid, to be assessed by the husband of the injured woman with the consent of the judges (Exo 21:22). The mention of “life for life,” in Exo 21:23, is followed by an enunciation of the general “law of retaliation,” applied here (it would seem) to the special case in hand, but elsewhere (Le 24:19, 20) extended so as to be a fundamental law, applicable to all cases of personal injury.

Exo 21:22

If men strive and hurt a woman. A chance hurt is clearly intended, not one done on purpose. So that her fruit depart from her. So that she be prematurely delivered of a dead child. And no mischief follow. “Mischief” here means “death,” as in Gen 42:4, Gen 42:38; Gen 45:1-28 :29. He shall pay as the judges determine. He was not to be wholly at the mercy of the injured father. If he thought the sum demanded was excessive, there was to be an appeal to a tribunal.

Exo 21:23

Then thou shalt give life for life. “Life for life” seems an excessive penalty, where the injury was in a great measure accidental, and when there was certainly no design to take life. Probably the law was not now enacted for the first time, but was an old tribal institution, like the law of the “avenger of blood.” There are many things in the Mosaic institutions which Moses tolerated, like “bills of divorce”on account of “the hardness of their hearts.”

Exo 21:23, Exo 21:24

Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, etc. Aristotle says in the Nicomachean Ethics, that this was the rule of justice which Rhadamanthus was supposed to act on in the judgment after death (book 5, see. 3), and that it had the approval of the Pythagoreans. Solon admitted it to a certain extent into the laws of Athens, and at Rome it found its way. into the Twelve Tables. There is a prima facie appearance of exact equality in it, which would captivate rude minds and cause the principle to be widely adopted in a rude state of society. But in practice objections would soon be felt to it. There is no exact measure of the hardness of a blow, or the severity of a wound; and “wound for wound, stripe for stripe,” would open a door for very unequal inflictions “Eye for eye” would be flagrantly unjust in the case of a one-eyed man. Moreover, it is against public policy to augment unnecessarily the number of mutilated and maimed citizens, whose power to serve the state is lessened by their mutilation. Consequently in every society retaliation has at an early date given way to pecuniary compensation; and this was the case even among the Hebrews, as Kalisch has shown satisfactorily. If the literal sense was insisted on in our Lord’ s day (Mat 5:38), it was only by the Sadducees, who declined to give the law a spiritual interpretation.

Exo 21:26, Exo 21:27

Assaults on Slaves. The general law of retaliation was not made to extend to slaves. For ordinary blows the slave was not thought entitled to compensation, any more than the child. They were natural incidents of his condition. In extremer cases, where he was permanently injured in an organ or a member, he was, however, considered to have ground of complaint and to deserve a recompense. But for him to revenge himself upon his master by inflicting the same on him was not to be thought of. It would have put the slave into a false position, have led to his prolonged ill-treatment, and have been an undue degradation of the master. Therefore, compulsory emancipation was made the penalty of all such aggravated assaults, even the slightest (Exo 21:27).

Exo 21:26, Exo 21:27

If a man smite the eye, etc. The “eye” seems to be selected as the most precious of our organs, the “tooth” as that the loss of which is of least consequence. The principle was that any permanent loss of any part of his frame entitled the slave to his liberty. A very considerable check must have been put on the brutality of masters by this enactment.

Exo 21:28-32

Injuries done by cattle to slaves and freemen. For the purpose of inculcating as strongly as possible the principle of the sanctity of human life, the legislator notices the case where mortal injury is done to a person by a domesticated animal. The ox is taken as the example, being the animal most likely to inflict such an injury. In accordance with the declaration already made to Noah (Gen 9:6), it is laid down that the destructive beast must be killed. Further, to mark the abhorrence in which murder ought to be held, the provision is made, that none of the creature’ s flesh must be eaten. The question then arises, is the owner to suffer any punishment? This is answered in the way that natural equity points out”If he had reason to know the savage temper of the animal, he is to he held responsible; if otherwise, he is to go free.” In the former case, the Hebrew law assigned a higher degree of responsibility than accords with modern notions; but practically the result was not very different. The neglectful Hebrew owner was held to have been guilty of a capital offence, but was allowed to “redeem his life” by a fine. His modern counterpart would be held to have been guilty simply of laches or neglect of duty, and would be punished by fine or imprisonment

Exo 21:28

The ox shall be surely stoned. He shall suffer the same death that would have been the portion of a human murderer. His flesh shall not be eaten. The animal was regarded as accursed, and therefore, as a matter of course, no Hebrew might eat of it. According to the Rabbinical commentators, it was not even lawful to sell the carcase to Gentiles. The owner shall be quiti.e; “shall be liable to no punishment.”

Exo 21:29

If the ox were wont to push with his horns. If he were notoriously, and to his owner’ s knowledge, a dangerous animal, which required watching, and no watch was kept on him, then the owner became blame-able, and having by his neglect contributed to a homicide, was “guilty of death.”

Exo 21:30

If there be a fine laid upon him. There can scarcely have been any circumstances under which the penalty of death would have been enforced. No neglect could bring the crime into the category of murder. It is assumed, therefore, that practically the penalty would be a fine, proportioned no doubt to the value of the life taken.

Exo 21:31

Whether he have gored a son or a daughter. If the sufferer were a child, the value of the life, and therefore the amount of the fine, would be less.

Exo 21:32

If the ox shall push a manservant or a maidservant. Hitherto, the case of free persons only has been considered. But the accident might have happened to a slave. Where this was the case, the death of the ox was still made indispensable, and thus far the same sacredness was made to attach to the life of the slave and of the freeman. But, in lieu of a varying fine, the average price of a slave, thirty shekels of silver, was appointed to be paid in all cases, as a compensation to the master

HOMILETICS

Exo 21:2-11; Exo 20:1-26, Exo 21:1-36; Exo 26:1-37, Exo 27:1-21; Exo 32:1-35

The slave laws.

Slave laws belong to all communities, and not to some only, slavery being really a universal and not a partial institution. In the most civilised communities of modern Europe, there are two large classes of slaveslunatics and criminals. The law openly condemns these last to penal servitude, which may be for life; and this “servitude,” as Lord Chief Justice Coleridge has repeatedly pointed out, is simply a form of slavery. Ancient communities differed from modern

1. In the extent to which slavery prevailed;

2. In the grounds upon which men were bound to it; and

3. In the treatment whereto those bound to it were subjected.

I. EXTENT OF ANCIENT SLAVERY. The slaves in ancient states were almost always more numerous than the freemen. At Athens they amounted to more than four-fifths of the community. Every free person was a slave owner, and some owned hundreds of their fellow-creatures. Perpetual insecurity was felt in consequence of the danger of revolt; and this fear reacted on the treatment of slaves, since it was thought necessary to break their spirit by severities. The evil effects of the institution pervaded all classes of the community, fostering pride and selfishness in the masters, dissimulation, servility, and meanness in the slaves.

II. GROUNDS ON WHICH ANCIENT SLAVERY RESTED. Ancient slavery did not necessarily imply any mental or moral fault in the slave. Some reached it through mental defect, as our lunatics; some through crime, as our convicts (see Exo 22:3). But the great majority were either born in the condition, or became slaves through the fortune of war. Thus slavery was not commonly a deserved punishment, but an undeserved misfortune. Men found themselves, without any fault of their own, the goods and chattels of another, with no political and few social rights, bound to one who might be in all respects inferior to themselves, but who was their lord and master. A sense of injustice consequently rankled in the bosom of the slave, and made him in most cases dangerous. Slave revolts were of frequent occurrence.

III. TREATMENT OF SLAVES IS ANCIENT STATES. Some considerable differences may be observed between the treatment of slaves in different communities; but there are certain features which seem to have been universal.

1. Slaves were for the most part the property of individuals, and depended largely on the caprice of individuals, who might be harsh or mild, brutally tyrannical, or foolishly indulgent.

2. Slave families might at any time be broken up, the different members being sold to different masters.

3. Slaves might everywhere be beaten, and unless in case of serious injury, there was no inquiry.

4. Very severe labour might be required of them; they might be confined in workshops, which were little better than prisons, made to toil in mines, or chained to the oar as galley slaves.

5. They might be badly lodged, badly clothed, and badly fed, without the law taking any notice.

6. In most places there was no redress for any injury that a slave might suffer short of death; and in some the law took no cognisance even of his murder. The Mosaic legislation, finding slavery established under these conditions, set itself to introduce ameliorations, without condemning the institution altogether. Compare St. Paul’ s conduct when he sent Onesimus back to Philemon (Phm 1:12, Phm 1:16). It divided slaves into two classes, Hebrew and foreign, changing the slavery of the former into a species of apprenticeship for six years, and guarding, not merely the life, but the members and organs of the latter. It acknowledged the family lie in the case of the slave, and laid down rules tending to check the separation of wives from husbands. It protected slave concubines from the caprice of a sated husband. It absolutely forbade the practice of kidnapping, whereby the slave-market was largely recruited in most countries, putting men-stealers on a par with murderers, and requiring that they should suffer death. We may gather from the Mosaic legislation on the subject

I. THAT THERE ARE CIRCUMSTANCES UNDER WHICH SLAVERY SHOULD BE TEMPORARILY MAINTAINED. Where a whole community is uncivilised, or half-civilised, where slavery is an old-established institution, engrained not only into the laws, but into the habits and manners of the peoplewhere there are no prisons or means of building them, and where the alternative for slavery would he the massacre of prisoners taken in war, and of criminals, it may be well that even Christian legislators should for a time tolerate the institution. The Europeans who obtain political influence in Central Africa, and other similar regions are bound to bear this in mind; and while doing their utmost to put down man-stealing, should carefully consider in each case that comes before them, whether slavery can in the particular community be dispensed with or no. To tolerate it for a while is simply to act on the lines laid down by Moses and St. Paul.

II. THAT IF UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES SLAVERY HAS TO BE MAINTAINED, ALL POSSIBLE AMELIORATIONS OF IT SHOULD BE INTRODUCED WITHOUT DELAY. The slave is entitled to be protected in life and limb, to he decently lodged, fed, and clothed, to have the enjoyment of the Sunday rest, to be undisturbed in his family relations, to have the honor of his wife and daughters respected, to have an appeal from his master if he regards himself as in any way wronged. The efforts of missionaries and other humane men in uncivilised communities, should be directed primarily to the introduction of such reforms as these into the systems which they find established there.

III. THAT, WHERE DOMESTIC SERVICE HAS SUPERSEDED SLAVERY, THERE IS STILL ROOM FOR AMELIORATIONS IN THE CONDITIONS OF SERVICE. It is not the masters of slaves only who are hard and tyrannical. In all service there is room for the exhibition on the part of the master, of indulgence on the one hand, or strictness and severity on the other. We at the present day may either oppress our servants, or deal kindly with them. True, they may leave us if we oppress them; but a good servant will not readily leave a respectable place, and a good deal of tyranny is often borne before warning is given. It is the duty of masters, not only to “give to their servants that which is just and equal” (Col 4:1), but to show them sympathy and kindness, to treat them with consideration, and avoid hurting their feelings. More warmth and friendliness than are at all usual in the present treatment of servants, seem to be required by the fact that they are our brethren in the Lord, joint-heirs of salvation with us, and perhaps to be preferred above us in another world.

Exo 21:12-14 and Exo 21:20, Exo 21:21

Laws on homicide.

Here again, in the time of Moses, a custom, regarded as of absolute obligation upon all, held possession of the ground; and nothing was practicable hut some modification of it. The next-of-kin was “avenger of blood,” and was bound to pursue every homicide to the bitter end, whether it was intentional and premeditated (i.e; murder), or done hastily in a quarrel (i.e; manslaughter), or wholly unintentional (i.e; death by misadventure). Moses distinguished between deliberate murder, which the State was to punish capitally (Exo 21:12-14) and any other sort of homicide, which was left to the avenger of blood. In mitigation of the blood-feud, he interposed the city of refuge, whereto the man who had slain another might flee and be safe until his cause was tried. And in the trial of such persons he introduced the distinction between manslaughter and death by misadventure, allowing the avenger of blood to put the offender to death in the former case, but not in the latter. (Num 35:16-25.) Mercy and truth thus went together in the legislation.

I. TRUTH The primary truth is the sacredness of man’ s life. In rude times, where it is everywhere “a word and a blow,” very severe laws were necessary, if human life was not to be continually sacrificed; and so manslaughter was placed on a par with murder, made a capital offence; the sudden angry blow which caused death, though death might not have been intended, was to receive as its due punishment death at the hands of the “avenger of blood.”

II. MERCY. The “avenger of blood” was not allowed to be judge in his own cause. Cases of unpremeditated homicide were to go before the judges, who were to decide whether the death was intentional or by mischance. Mercy was to be shown to the man who had blood on his hands through accident. He was to be safe within the walls of the “city of refuge.” Cities of refuge were multiplied, that one might be always within easy reach. Legislation should always seek to combine mercy with justice. Draconian enactments defeat their own purpose, since over-severe laws are sure not to be carried out. The moral sense revolts against them. Thus, when in our own country forgery was a capital offence, juries could not be got to convict of forgery. Laws should be in accordance with the conscience of the community, or they will cease to command respect. Good men will infringe them; and even courts will be slow to enforce obedience when they are infringed. Wise legislators will ever aim at embodying in the law the judgments of the more advanced conscience, and making it thus an instrument’ for elevating the moral sentiments of the community.

Exo 21:15-17

Injuries to parents.

The command to honour father and mother (Exo 20:12), which is enough for the conscience, and which, if obeyed, would render all further laws upon the subject unnecessary, is here reinforced by two important enactments, intended to restrain those who do not scruple to disobey mere moral laws. The penalty of death is affixed to two crimes:

1. Smiting a parent;

2. Cursing a parent.

I. SMITING A PARENT. When it is considered that our parents represent God to us, that they are in a real sense authors of our being, that they protect and sustain us for years during which we could do nothing for ourselves, and that nature has implanted in our minds an instinctive reverence for them, the punishment of parent-strikers by death will not seem strange or excessive. A son must have become very hardened in guilt, very reckless, very heartless, very brutal, who can bring himself to lift a hand against a father, not to say a mother. There is as much moral guilt in a light blow dealt to one whom we are bound to love, honour, and protect from hurt, as in the utmost violence done to a stranger. However, according to the Talmud, it was not every light blow that was actually punished with death, but only a blow which caused a wound; and, of course, the punishment was only inflicted upon the complaint of the party aggrieved, who would be unlikely to take proceedings, unless the assault was of grave character. Probably the law had very seldom to be enforced. What it did was to invest parents with a sacred and awful character in their children’ s eyes, and to induce them to submit to chastisement without resistance.

II. CURSING A PARENT. To curse a parent is almost as unnatural as to strike one. ALL cursing is unsuitable to such a being as manso full of faults himself, so liable to misjudge the character and conduct of others; but to curse those to whom we owe our existence is simply horrible. The sin is akin to blasphemy, and is awarded the same punishment. At the present day, when the Mosaic law is no longer in force, and when on this point no echoes of the Mosaic legislation are to be traced in existing codes, it is specially incumbent on conscientious persons to observe the spirit of the Mosaic enactments, and (as it were) make a Christian use of them.

(1) “Smite not a parent,” said the law, “or die the death.” “Grieve not a parent” is the Christian paraphrase. “Grieve him not by disobedience, by idleness, by extravagance, by misconduct of any kind. Do not discredit his bringing up by misbehaviour. Do not stab his. heart by ingratitude. Do not wither up his nature by unkindness.” A child may easily, without lifting a finger, “bring down the grey hairs” of his father “with sorrow to the grave.” He may “smite” him in half-a-dozen ways without touching him. Let Christian men beware of such “smiting” of their parents, and dread the “eternal death” which may follow in the place of Moses’ temporal death.

(2) “Curse not a parent,” said the law again. We do not now, unless we part with religion altogether, curse any one. But we too often break the spirit of this law, notwithstanding. We speak slightingly of our parents; we join in disrespectful comments on their manners or behaviour; we use language to them, face to face, which is wanting in reverence and unsuitable. If we would act in the spirit of the law, “curse not a parent,” we must avoid all disrespectful words, all disrespectful thoughts towards them or concerning them; we must give them the honour due to parents; we must seriously consider their counsels, and as a general rule follow their advice. As temporal death was awarded to those who “cursed” parents by the Jewish law (Exo 21:17), so eternal death will be the portion of such as are determinately “disobedient to parents” under the Christian dispensation.

Exo 21:16

The crime of man-stealing.

To steal the purse of a man is a trivial crime; to filch his good name is a serious one; but the worst robbery of all is to steal his person. Civilised, refined, polished, intellectual men, happy in the enjoyment of freedom, wealth, honour, domestic happiness, have gone to sleep in comfort, peace, and fancied security, to wake up in the grip of lawless man-stealers, who have bound them and carried them into a hopeless captivity, far from any relative or friend, to become familiar with every sort of ill-usage and indignity. Cilician and other pirates did this in the olden time; Norman sea-kings in the middle ages; Algerine corsairs so late as the last century. The blood boils when we think of the sufferings inflicted on thousands of our species by these fiends in human shape, without pity, without conscience, without remorse. Death was certainly a punishment not one whit too severe for this atrocious crime, by which the happiest of the human race might become suddenly one of the most wretched. In modern times, the conscience of mankind, enlightened by eighteen centuries of Christianity, has revolted against the enormity long committed with impunity on the negro races of Western Africa, and the slave-trade has been proclaimed a form of piracy. Yet the accursed traffic still continues in the centre and in the east of the “Dark Continent;” still quiet villagers are awakened in the dead of night by the news that the kidnapper is upon them; harmless, peaceable men, together with their wives and children, are carried off in hundreds by Arab and sometimes by so-called Christian traders, driven to the coast in gangs, shipped in crowded dhows, and sold to the best bidder in the marts of Arabia and Persia. It is a subject well worthy the consideration of Christian governments, whether a revival of the Mosaic enactment is not required, to stop a trade the profits of which are so enormous, that nothing short of death is likely to deter avaricious men from engaging in it.

Exo 21:23-25

The rule of retaliation.

“To suffer that a man has done is strictest, straightest right,” was a line which passed into a proverb in ancient Greece. The administration of justice is rendered very simple and easy by the adoption of the principle, which approves itself to simple minds, and might work well in a simple state of society. The law of “life for life” (Exo 21:23) remains, and must always remain, the basis on which society justifies the execution of the murderer. If “eve for eye, hand for hand, foot for foot” (Exo 21:24), were enforced, the criminal could not complain; but the State would suffer by the mutilation and consequent debilitation of its members. In the administration of “burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe” (Exo 21:25), there would be difficulties, it being almost impossible for the public executioner to inflict a burn, wound, or blow exactly similar to the burn, wound, or blow given by the criminal. These difficulties lead naturally to the substitution of “compensation” for “retaliation,” which we find sanctioned in Exo 21:19, Exo 21:22, Exo 21:30, and Exo 21:32. If the damage caused by a wound, burn, blow, or even by the loss of a slave or wife, can be estimated, and the injurer be made to pay that amount to the injured party, then the original loss is in a certain sense retaliated, and the wrongdoer” suffers what he has done.” In the administration of justice the rule of retaliation has thus still a place. Retaliation is made unlawful by Christianity (Mat 5:38 42), not in the administration of justice, but in the private dealings of man with man. We must not ourselves give blow for blow, “wound for wound, burning for burning;” no, nor gibe for gibe, slight for slight, insult for insult. Firstly, because we are not fair judges in our own case, and should be almost sure to overestimate our own injury; and, secondly, because we should provoke a continuance of strife. We should not even be eager to prosecute those who have injured us, if there be a chance that by patience and forbearance we may bring them to a better mind. We should be content to “suffer wrong,” if by so doing we may win souls to Christ. The Christian law is, “Love your enemies; bless them that curse you; do good to them that hate you; and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you;” and the ground of the law is, that by so doing we may “overcome evil with good” (Rom 12:21).

HOMILIES BY J. ORR

Exo 21:1

The judgments.

The “rights” or “judgments” contained in this and the two following chapters show the manner in which the spirit and principles of the preceding moral legislation were intended to be applied to the regulation of the outward life of the Jewish state.

(1) As respects their origin, not a few of these laws have obviously their root in old customs, while others may have been derived from the decisions of Moses in the wilderness (Exo 18:16). The code, therefore, in its present shape, cannot be supposed to have been verbally dictated by Jehovah to Moses; yet God may have instructed Moses as to the particular laws which were to be embraced in it, and may have revealed his will on special points which were as yet undetermined. The “judgments” were, in any case, given to Israel under express Divine sanction (Exo 21:1).

(2) As respects their nature, the laws relate to the determination of legal rights, and to the ordering of the course of justice; in part, also, to the behaviour of the members of the community to each other in various out ward relations, and to fundamental religious ordinances. The spirit of the code is throughout that of the moral law; the principles embodied in it are those of the commandments. The point of view from which its statutes are to be regarded is, however, a different one from that which was occupied in considering the moral law as such. Moral law speaks with the voice of “the categorical imperative.” It sets up the perfect ethical standard. What falls short of this is wrong, involves sin, and is condemned. It knows nothing of a morality which is merely relative. The practical legislator, on the other handmuch as he might wish to do socannot so mould external institutions as to make them all at once, and at every point, correspond with the requirements of ideal morality. He must, to a large extent, take things as they aremust start with existing conditions and usages, and try to make the best of them. Absolute morality, e.g; would refuse to recgonise such a state as that of war; yet, so long as wars existand to this hour they are of frequent occurrencesome code must be devised, representing such application of ethical maxims as is possible to military life, and to that extent stamping a moral character on the profession of the soldier. The cases of deviation from ideal morality in the laws of Moses are, however, remarkably few, relating chiefly to war, slavery, and marriage. In regard to these subjects, the legislation necessarily partakes of the backward character of the times. The statutes given are not the absolutely best, but the best which the people, at that stage of their moral and social development, could receive; that is, the relatively bestthe best for them. This leads to a third point

(3) The incompleteness of the law. The statutes here given, so far as they partook of the imperfection of the time, were not intended to be final. Within the law itself, as will be readily perceived, there was large room for development; but even the letter of the law was not so fixed, but that, in course of time, large parts of it might, and did, become obsolete; new institutions, adapted to new needs, and introduced, by proper authority, taking the place of the old ones. Mr. Robertson Smith is therefore not fair in his representation of what he calls the “traditional view,” when he affirms”The Divine laws given beyond Jordan were to remain unmodified through all the long centuries of development in Canaan, an absolute and immutable code”. On such a theory, if anyone held it, his criticism would be quite just”I say, with all reverence, that this is impossible. God, no doubt, could have given by Moses’ mouth a law fit for the age of Solomon or Hezekiah, but such a law could not be fit for immediate application in the days of Moses and Joshua God can do all things, but he cannot contradict himself; and he who shaped the eventful development of Israel’ s history must have framed this law to correspond with it.” The reply to this is, that the most conservative defenders of the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch do not deny the necessity for, and admissibility of, great developments of the principles of the law. It may suffice to quote Hengstenberg:” First, it is a gross error, though often repeated, that the Pentateuch embraces the whole civil law of the Israelites. In that portion of the Scriptures there is shown the greatest aversion from all untimely interference with the course of historical development. Only those points are determined which must be so, add in no other way, according to the fundamental maxims of the theocracy,” etc..J.O.

Exo 21:2-12

Hebrew bond-service.

The laws relating to this subject are to be found, in addition to those in the present chapter, in Exo 12:43-45; Exo 22:3; Le Exo 25:39 -55; Exo 26:13; Deu 12:12, Deu 12:18; Deu 15:15-19; Deu 16:11, Deu 16:14; Deu 21:10-15; Deu 23:15; Deu 24:7. An impartial examination of these laws will show how fallacious must be every argument attempted to be deduced from them in favour of modern slave-holding. The Mosaic law did not establish slaveryat most it accorded to it a very modified toleration. It accepted it as an existing usage, labouring to the utmost to reduce, and as far as that was practicable, to abolish, the cvils connected with it. It could not well do more, for slavery, under the then existing conditions of society, was in some form or other almost inevitable, and was often the only alternative to a worse evil. Yet the law in its entire spirit and fundamental doctrines was opposed to slavery. Its doctrines of the dignity of man as made in God’ s image, and of the descent of all mankind from one pair, contained in principle the recognition of every human right. As a member of the theocracy, redeemed by Jehovah for himself, every Israelite was free by constitutional right (see the emphatic annunciation of this principle in Le 25:42, 55; Deu 26:13). If from temporary causes, the Hebrew lost the use of his freedom, the right to it was not thereby destroyed. It returned to him at the beginning of the seventh year. A law can hardly be regarded as favourable to slavery which makes man-stealing a crime punishable by death (Deu 24:18), and which enacts that a fugitive slave, taking refuge in Israel from his heathen master, is not to be delivered back to him, but is to be permitted to reside where he will in the land (Deu 23:15, Deu 23:16). Bondsmen (both Hebrew and non-Israelite) were incorporated as part of the nation, had legal rights, sat with the other members of the family at the board of the passover, took part in all religious festivals, and had secured to them the privilege of the Sabbath rest. The master was responsible for the treatment of his slave; and if he injured him, even to the extent of smiting out a tooth, the slave thereby regained his freedom (verses 26, 27). A female slave was to be treated with strictest honour (Deu 24:7-11), and with due consideration for her womanly feelings (Deu 21:10-15). Humanity and kindness are constantly inculcated. When the Hebrew bondsman went out in the seventh year he was to go forth loaded with presents (Deu 15:13-16). The legislation of Moses is thus seen to be studiously directed to the protection of the slave’ s interests and rights. If there is a seeming exception, it is the one precept in Deu 24:20, on which see below. The law as a whole must be admitted to be framed in the spirit of the greatest tenderness and consideration, recognising the servant’ s rights as a man, his privileges as a member of the theocracy, his feelings as a husband and father. As respects the Hebrew bondsman, indeed, his position did not greatly differ from that of one now who sells his labour to a particular person, or engages to work to him on definite terms for a stated period (Fairbairn). He could be reduced to servitude only by debt, or as the penalty for theft. In this latter case (Exo 22:3), liberty was justly forfeitedis forfeited still in the case of those convicted of felony, and doomed to compulsory labours, or to transportation, or lengthened terms of imprisonment. The laws in the present section embrace three eases

1. That of the Hebrew servant who is unmarried (Deu 24:2). He goes out at the beginning of the seventh year.

2. That of the Hebrew servant who is married. In this case, if the wife came in with her husband, she goes out with him in the year of release (Deu 24:3); but if his master has given him a wifepresumably a non-Israelitehe has not the privilege of taking her with him when he leaves. He may, however, elect to remain in his master’ s service, in which case his servitude becomes perpetual (Deu 24:5, Deu 24:6). The retention of the wife may appear oppressive, but it was, as Keil points out, “an equitable consequence of the possession of property of slaves at all.”

3. The third case is that of a Hebrew daughter, sold by her father to be a maidservant, i.e; as the sequel shows, as a housekeeper and concubine (Deu 24:7-12). The master may betroth her to himself, or may give her to his son, but in either case the law strictly guards her honour and her rights. If her full rights are not accorded her, she is entitled to her freedom (Deu 24:11). Lessons.

(1) Deu 24:2.The natural right of mar. to his freedom.

(2) Deu 24:5.Recognition of the slave’ s personality. “In modern systems, the man is a mere chattel, but in the Mosaic system, the slave’ s manhood is declared. He is sovereign over himself, and is allowed the power of choice. The Southern slaveholder would not permit his slave to say, ‘I will not’; but the Hebrew slave is permitted to say, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free'” (Burrows).

(3) Deu 24:5, Deu 24:6.Love, the true reconciler between servitude and freedom. Paul the “slave” of Christ, yet the truest freeman.

(4) Jehovah’ s care for the unfriended. This comes beautifully out in the law for the protection of the woman.J.O.

Exo 21:12-18

Murder and related capital offences.

It is characteristic of the law of Moses that its first care, in the practical ordering of the Hebrew theocracy, is for the rights of the slave. These are dealt with in the opening paragraphs. The next laws relate to murder, to man-stealing, and to smiting and cursing of parents.

I. MURDER (Exo 21:12-15). The same spirit of justice which attaches severe penalties to proved crimes, leads to the drawing of a sound line of distinction between voluntary and involuntary actions. Only for actions of the former class is the individual held responsible. Homicide which is purely accidental is not treated as a crime (Exo 21:13). Not only is the man who kills his neighbour inadvertently not punished with death, but the law interposes to protect him from the fury of such as might unjustly seek his life, by appointing for him a place of refuge. (Cf. Num 35:1-34.; Deu 19:1-21.) The deliberate murderer, on the other hand, was to be taken even from God’ s altar, and put to death (Exo 21:14). Deliberate murder implies “malice aforethought””intent to kill”but it was sufficient to expose a man to the penalty attaching to this crime, that he had been guilty of an act of violence, resulting in another’ s death (Exo 21:12; cf. Exo 21:19, Exo 21:23). Note on this law

1. The recognition of Divine Providence in the so-called accidents of life (Exo 21:13).

2. The sacredness attached to the human person. The religious ground of the enactment is given in Gen 9:6“Whoso sheddeth man’ s blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.” “The true Shechinah is man” (Chrysostom).

3. The ethical character of the Hebrew religion. The altar is to afford no sanctuary to the murderer. The Bible knows nothing of a religion which is in divorce from morality. This law condemns by implication all connivance at, or sheltering of, immorality, under religious sanctions (Romish huckstering of pardons, etc.).

II. MAN–STEALING (Gen 9:16). The statute is perfectly general. There is no evidence that it applied only to Hebrews, though these are specially mentioned in Deu 24:7. The stealing and selling of a Hebrew was a direct offence against Jehovah. (Cf. Le 25:42.) “For they are my servants, which I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: they shall not be sold as bondsmen.” The passage is a direct condemnation of the modern slave trade.

III. SMITING AND CURSING OF PARENTS (Deu 24:15-17). These offences also were to be punished with death. The fact that they are bracketed in the law with murder and manstealing, gives a peculiar impression of their enormity. As if the statute book had said, after laying down the law for murder”And for the purposes of this law, the smiting or cursing of a father or a mother shall be regarded as equivalent to the taking of a life.” And this view of the matter is, in a moral respect, hardly too strong. It would be difficult to say what crime a man is not capable of, who could deliberately smite or curse father or mother. As special reasons for the severity of the law, observe

1. Hebrew society rested largely on a patriarchal basis, and the due maintenance of parental authority was a necessity of its existence. Just as it is found still that, whatever the form of social order, the spread of a spirit of insubordination to parents is the invariable prelude to a universal loosening of ties and obligations.

2. Parents are regarded as standing to their children in the relation of visible representatives of Jehovah (see fifth commandment). This, in the Hebrew theocracy, gave to the crime of cursing or smiting a parent the character of a treasonable act. It was an offence against the majesty of Jehovah, and as such, required to be promptly avenged. On the same ground it was forbidden to revile magistrates, or curse the ruler of the people (Exo 22:28). The law is a standing testimony to the heinousness attaching in the sight of God to the sin of filial disobedience.J.O.

Exo 21:18-36

Bodily injuries.

The laws in this section may be thus classified:

I. INJURIES BY MAN.

1. Strivers (Exo 21:18, Exo 21:19). The man who injured another in strife was required to pay for the loss of his time, and to cause him to be thoroughly healed. Had the man died, the case would have come under the law of Exo 21:12. As it was, blame attached to both parties, and the law waived the right to further satisfaction. Note

(1) One way of atoning for wrong is to seek in every way in our power to undo the mischief we have caused. This, alas! cannot always be accomplished. Not always is “thorough healing”whether bodily, mental, or moralpossible. So far as it is possible we are bound to attempt it.

(2) Justice obtains her highest satisfaction when the wrongdoer can be made to contribute to the undoing of his own wrong. This principle might be more acted on than it is.

2. Servants (Exo 21:20, Exo 21:21; Exo 26:1-37, Exo 27:1-21). A master was not to be allowed to injure with impunity even a slave purchased with his “money.” If the slave was wantonly murdered, the case would come under the law of murder. If he died under chastisement, the master was punished at discretion of the judges. If the slave was in any way maimed, he obtained his freedom. It has been remarked that this is the earliest certain trace of legislation for the protection of the slave. See below.

3. A woman with child (Exo 21:22-26). The injury here is indirect. The woman is hurt in interfering in the strife between two men. Yet the law holds the man who has injured her responsible for his fault, and decrees that he shall pay heavy damages. If evil effects follow, he is to be punished under the jus talionis.

II. INJURIES BY BEASTS. The distinction formerly observed as made by the law between voluntary and involuntary actions (Exo 21:13, Exo 21:14) meets here with fresh illustrations.

1. If an ox gore a man or a woman, and the gored person dies, the ox is to be stoneda testimony to the sacredness of human life (cf. Gen 9:5), but the owner shall be quit (Exo 21:28).

2. If, however, the owner had been previously warned of the dangerous habits of the animal, and had not kept it in, there devolved on him the entire responsibility of the fatal occurrence.

(1) If the person gored was a free Israelite (male or female), the life of the owner of the ox was forfeited; but an opportunity was given him of redeeming it by payment of a ransom (Exo 21:29-32).

(2) If the person gored was a slave, the owner of the ox had to compensate the owner of the slave for the loss of his servant. The price fixed was thirty shekels of silver (Exo 21:32). In either case the ox was to be stoned.

III. INJURIES TO BEASTS. The same principles of equity apply here.

1. If an ox or an ass fall into a pit which has been carelessly left uncovered, the owner of the pit is required to pay in full (Exo 21:33, Exo 21:34).

2. If one man’ s ox kill another’ s, the loss is to fall equally on both owners (Exo 21:35).

3. If the owner of the ox was aware of its propensity to gore, and had not kept it in, he must, as before, bear the whole loss (Exo 21:36). The equity of this series of precepts is not more conspicuous than their humanity. The important lesson taught by these enactments is, that we cannot evade responsibility for our actions. Our actions abide with us. They cleave to us. We cannot shake ourselves rid of them. We are responsible, not only for the actions themselves, but for the consequences which flow from themfor the influences they set in motion. And we are responsible, not only for direct, but for indirect consequences (Exo 21:22). Involuntary acts are not imputed to us, but all voluntary ones are. We are responsible, as well for what we do not do (having the power to do it), as for what we actually perform. We are responsible for the effects of negligence and carelessness. These principles have wide application. They cover the whole range of conduct. They apply to the moral sphere as well as to the physical. They apply, not simply to definite acts, but to the entire influence exerted by our lives. What a responsibility is this! Only grace will enable us to bear its burden.J.O.

Exo 21:20

The servant dying under chastisement.

This law has frequently been seized on as a blot on the Mosaic legislationas inculcating the odious doctrine which lies at the root of modern slave-systems, viz. that the slave is a mere “chattel,” and as such, has no personal rightsis entitled to no protection of life or limb. The interpretation put on this particular clause is the more unfair, that it must be admitted to be opposed to the spirit and enactments of the law as a whole, taking, as this does, so exceptionally humane a view of the slave’ s position (see above); and is, moreover, directly in the teeth of such clauses as those in the immediate context”If a man smite the eye of a servant,” etc. (Exo 21:26, Exo 21:27). The enactment will appear in its right light if we view it with regard to the following considerations:

1. The law deals with slavery, not from the point of view of abstract rightfrom which point of view it could only be condemnedbut as a recognised part of the then existing constitution of society. It takes its existence for granted. It deals with it as statesmen have constantly to deal with institutions and customs which they do not wholly approve of, but which they cannot summarily abolish without entailing on society worse evils than those from which escape is sought. But if the right to hold property in slavesto however limited an extentbe granted, the corollaries of this possession must be granted also. A slave cannot be treated in the eye of the law quite as a free man. His position is relatively a degraded one. The owner of slaves has pecuniary and proprietary rights in his bondservants, which the law must take account of. The slave is the owner’ s “money.”

2. The aim of the law is not to place the slave at the master’ s mercy, but to restrict the master’ s power over him. Ancient law recognised no restriction. The Mosaic law does. It goes at least thus far, that if the slave dies under the rod, the master shall be punished. The drift and bent of the law is for the slave’ s benefit.

3. It is important to remember that the case is treated here, not in its moral aspects, but solely as a question in criminal jurisprudence. The moral law has its own say in the matter, and. pronounces its own judgment, irrespectively of whether the individual is proceeded against under criminal law or not. The master who, by the undue exercise of the large right of chastisement which the usage of the time allowed him, occasioned his slave’ s death, was responsible to God for the excess of passion which led to this catastrophe. The law of Moses gave no sanction to the master to endanger his servant’ s life with the rod. But moral offences do not always admit of being dealt with as crimes. To convict of murder, e.g; there is proof required of malice prepense, and this, in the case before us, was precisely what was not forthcoming. The legal tribunals had. authority to punish the master, if the slave died under his hand; if immediate death did not take place, the master was to have the benefit of the doubt, and in view of the heavy money loss sustained in the death of the slave (on the average, “thirty shekels of silver,” Exo 21:32), was not to be further proceeded against.

4. The law in this versetaken in conjunction with otherswas really a powerful deterrent from the misuse of authority on the part of the master.

(1) It relates only to chastisement with the rod. If the master assaulted his slave with any lethal weapon, the case came under other laws, and might involve his being tried for murder.

(2) The case supposed is that of a slave dying under bona fide chastisement. If murderous intent could be proved against the masterwhether the slave lingered a day or two or notthere is no reason to doubt but that the law of Exo 21:14 would have been applied, and the master would have been put to death.

(3) Involving, as the death of the slave did, criminal proceedings, and, on conviction, severe punishment, the mere danger of a fatal result ensuing would be a powerful deterrent from exceptional violence. The punishment appears to have been left to the discretion of the judges, and probably ranged from the death penalty (if deliberate murder could be proved), to a simple money fine. The mere risk of incurring such a penalty would inspire salutary caution.

(4) The master also knew that if, by his temporary violence, the slave should suffer serious bodily injury, he would be entitled, if he did not die, to claim his freedom (Exo 21:26, Exo 21:27). The fear of losing a valuable property, whether by death, or, if the slave did not die, in the way last mentioned, would infallibly co-operate with other motives in the direction of restraint. The case, therefore, stood thus, that failing proof of direct intent to murder, the probabilities were in favour of the theory that the death of the slave to whom severe chastisement had been administered, was a result not designed; and the money loss involved in the death of the slave being regarded as equivalent to a heavy fine, the law, in ordinary cases, did not see it necessary to go further. But if the case was so serious that the slave had actually died under his master’ s hand, or within a short space of time, then, whether the death was designed or not, the law took the matter up, and inflicted punishment according to discretion. Criminal law could scarcely have done more. The amelioration of the condition of the slave was to be looked for mainly from moral influences, which, under the Mosaic system, were assuredly not wanting.J.O.

Exo 21:23-26

An eye for an eye,

etc. (cf. Mat 5:38-43). The principle here enunciated is that of the jus talionis. Stripped of its concrete form, it is simply the assertion of the dictate of justice, that when a wrong has been done to anyone, and through him to society, an adequate compensation ought to be rendered. So rendered, it is the principle underlying every system of criminal jurisprudence. We need not suppose that (in Jewish society) it was ever literally acted upon. Commutations of various kinds would be admitted (cf. Exo 21:30). As a rule for courts of justice, therefore, this principle must remain. Bat error arises when this rule, intended for the regulation of public justice, is transferred into private life, and is applied there to sanction the spirit of revenge. This is to pervert it from its proper purpose. So far from sanctioning private retaliation, the object of this law is to set limits to the passion for revenge, by taking the right to avenge out of the hands of private individuals altogether, and committing it to public officers. In contrast with the retaliatory disposition, our Lord inculcates on his disciples a forbearing and forgiving spirit; a spirit which seeks to overcome by love; a spirit, even, which is willing to forego legal rights, whenever by doing so, it can promote the good of a fellow man.J.O.

HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG

Exo 21:1-11

Regulations for the treatment of slaves.

I. THE CONDITIONAL ELEMENT RUNNING THROUGH THESE REGULATIONS. What a difference there is here from the strong, uncompromising imperatives of Exo 20:1-26! There we feel that we have to do with man, not only as he is at the time, a Hebrew in the wilderness, but with every man, in every age, and in all sorts of social circumstances. The ten commandments simply assume humanity and society. But the regulations now to be considered abound in the word “if.” If certain things are done, then certain other things must be done. But then these things need not to be done at all. A man need not buy a servant; a man need not take a woman to be his companion in servitude, knowing that thereby he runs the risk of being separated from her and his offspring afterwards. These regulations have to be made for free agents, acting often thoughtlessly, or in a matter-of-fact compliance with the customs of their country. There was no real need for any of these “ifs” to pass into action. Consider how ludicrous such regulations would appear if propounded as possibilities in modern English society. The actions which they assume would be scouted as scarcely conceivable. Our notions of property, of service, and of the position of woman are quite different. And yet how many things there are even now, commonly accepted indeed as right and proper, which are no more defensible on the highest grounds than these practices of Israel in the wilderness. There are practices among Christians now, considered proper enough according to the present notions of society, and yet the day is assuredly coming when they too will seem as strange and abhorrent as the practice of a man selling his daughter to be a maid-servant. Things done without scruple, even by enlightened Christians, are far enough from what Christ would have them be. And all that can be reached is to regulate and mitigate what there is not sufficient enlightenment of conscience to abolish.

II. THE EVIDENT DESIRE TO BE JUST TO ALL THE INDIVIDUALS CONCERNED IN THESE REGULATIONS. The purchased individual must have his benefit by liberation in the seventh year; and yet the master is to be treated justly too by the recognition of the woman whom, as it were, he had lent to be a companion to the slave. So also if the slave has a notion of staying, he is compelled to treat it as a serious matter, and not play fast or loose either with master or companion. She who had been, as it were, a concubine, becomes by his desire to stay, lifted to the full privileges of a wife; and to leave then would be a wrong to her as well as the master. The principle holds good all through human societywhatsoever we want in the way of temporal advantages we must take with certain limitations. Whatever benefit there might be in buying a slave must be taken along with the limitation of the seventh year. If the slave chose to have a companion, he must make up his mind how to treat her at the six years’ end; either to have liberty and lose her or keep her with life-long bondage. We should choose our position in this world, looking steadily for the guidance of infinite wisdom in our choice. If we be sure of that, then all advantages will be golden to us, and we shall not for a moment think of grumbling because of the disadvantages that must inevitably accompany them.

III. Still though there is a desire here to be just to all, IT IS EVIDENTLY THE WEAK AND UNFORTUNATE WHO ARE CHIEFLY THOUGHT OF. It is for the sake of the slave and the despised woman that these regulations are here specified. The strong in such circumstances are as a rule well ableonly too well ableto look after themselves. It is the glorious mark, again and again appearing in God’ s dealings, that he loves to bring the enslaved nearer to liberty, the degraded nearer to the normal elevation of humanity.Y.

Exo 21:12-17

Capital offences.

As we look through the penalties specified for wrong-doing in chaps, 21; 22; we notice that they are divisible into two great classes. Some offences are punished by death, and others by some sort of compensation for the injury done. The graduated terms of imprisonment with which we are familiar, were not of course possible to the Israelites, and if possible, perhaps would not have seemed desirable. We notice that in this chapter five capital offences are specified; there were doubtless many besides; but these are enough to show the principles on which Jehovah acted in taking away the life of the offender.

I. THE MURDERER PROPER. In Exo 20:1-26. we find the general command not to kill; and here is the instruction for the Israelites what to do with the man who deliberately and maliciously took away the life of a fellow-man. This, it is plain, was done under special authority and for special reasons. It was Jehovah’ s regulation for his people in their then circumstances; but we must not quote it as applicable to the punishment of the murderer generally. If on the authority of this passage we are bound to punish the murderer by death, obviously we are bound to punish him who reviles his parents, in the same way. There were reasons then for putting the murderer to death which do not now apply. The principle underlying the enactment seems to be that murder is cue of the crimes which must be followed by the severest penalty man is disposed to inflict. So long as the infliction of a death penalty at all harmonises with the general consciousness of men, it is plain that any lesser penalty for murder is inadequate. But if once we get to the positionand it is to be hoped we are ever getting nearer to itthat only the sternest necessity justifies taking human life away, we shall then substitute perpetual imprisonment as the extreme penalty. We shall all feel then that murder is assuredly a crime which should condemn the perpetrator to life-long seclusion from the society of his fellow-men.

II. THE SMITER OF FATHER OR MOTHER. Here we see how different are the principles underlying Divine law from those underlying human law. In a modern English court of justice the smiting of a parent might perhaps receive the highest penalty incurred for the commission of an assault; but it would never be exalted into a special offence. But God in his government of Israel makes an offence against a parent to be one of the first magnitude. The severe penalty specified here corresponds with the position occupied in the Decalogue by the commandment to honour parents. God we see is ever saying and doing things to set great honour on the family, and indicate great expectations from it. It has been a boldly proclaimed principle in all ages, never more proclaimed than now, and often with great arrogance and intolerance, that individuals and families exist for the State. But here in the state that is under God’ s special governance provision is made that, in its punishments, that state shall honour parental authority and dignity. And of course when once smiting a parent was made into such a serious offence, it was but carrying the principle out to a logical and necessary conclusion to make the curse as great an offence. Generally, indeed, the rebellious reviling word of the lips would do more injury, inflict more pain, and be more promotive of insubordination than the blow of the hand. In the light of this enactment we see how much God expects from the parental relation. One, who in the Divine order of things, stood so high that smiting or cursing him was made a capital offence, must have been a man to whom Jehovah looked for great services, great contributions to the Divine glory, and to the prosperity of Israel.

III. THE MAN–STEALER. Within the compass of the same chapter we find provision made for recognised and openly practised customs of servitude, and also for a kind of slavery which by the penalty attached to the procuring of it is indicated as one of the worst of crimes. There was slavery and slavery. There was the buying of men in such sort as is indicated in Exo 20:2; there was also such stealing and selling as we find an actual instance of in Gen 37:28. Such crimes were evidently only too possible, and once committed, it might be very hard to discover the criminal or restore the captive to liberty. There was perhaps many a Josephand when we consider his sufferings, and the sufferings of his father, we shall not wonder at the penalty attached to the crime. Then suppose an Israelite were to sell a brother Israelite to some band of Midian merchantmen, who would take him into a far country, what would the upshot be? Not only would he be lost to loving kindred, and shut out from the sight, of his dear native land, but excluded from religious privileges. God had brought out Israel from, the house of bondage, that in freedom, necessary freedom, they might find him their God, and become, in many privileges, his people. What a monstrous thing then for an Israelite, through cupidity or revenge, to sell away his brother from peculiar, from unique possibilities! He would not find in any other land the things which God intended him to have at home.

IV. THE KNOWING OWNER OF A DANGEROUS BEAST. (Gen 37:29.) Here is the sound principlea principle which goes deep in its applicationthat a man is responsible for all foreseen consequences of an act which it is in his power to prevent. Examine the illustrative instances mentioned. A man is the owner of a pushing ox, well known to be a brute of vicious and uncertain temper. The owner indeed has been made specially acquainted with the fact. He can then take one of the two courses, either put sufficient watch over the beast, as not knowing when it may be dangerous to human life and limb, or else in sheer recklessness determine to take the chance of all keeping right. How plain it is that a man of such a heedless spirit is not fit to have free course among his fellow-men! A human life, be it that of the veriest stranger, a mere waif and stray, or say that of an old man on the very verge of the grave, is of much more account than the life of an ox, though it be in the very prime of its strength and usefulness. The property even of a millionaire must perish sooner than the life of the poorest be imperilled. The owner of the ox is looked to here, just because the brute itself cannot be looked to. The master would not be held responsible for the action of a human servant as for that of a brute beast. And is it not plain that the announcement of this penalty here has a very stringent application to all self indulgence? When a man is told that his course of action, however profitable, however pleasant to himself, has been actually injurious to some and is likely to be injurious to others, what is he to do? If he would do as Christ wishes himthe Christ who came to fulfil the law and the prophetshe would straightway refrain from that course of action. Commercial profits and temporal pleasures will be dearly purchased by us, if one day we have to stand before the throne of him who judges righteous judgment, to answer for selfish, reckless trifling with the best interests of our neighbours The owner of the ox may say, “Let people keep out of my animal’ s way and guard themselves.” God, we see, did not admit that principle with regard to the pushing ox; nor will he with regard to our pushing business habits or our pushing pleasuresour reckless resolution to get all we can for ourselves, at whatever risk of loss to those who may come in our way.

V. From the instances given, we may easily infer WHAT OTHER OFFENCES OF THE SAME KIND WOULD BE PUNISHED IN THE SAME WAY. Wherever there was anything peculiarly presumptuous or daring, there the occasion for death seems to have been found. That which most deeply affects the constitution of society is to be treated with the greatest severity. One man might kill another; but because it was misadventure, he would escape with temporary inconvenience. Another man, for no more than the utterance of the tongue, has to die the death. Thus, even in a scheme of government which had so much to do with outward acts as had God’ s government of Israel, we have regulations which got their severity almost entirely from the evidenced state of heart on the part of the transgressor. In purely human laws the magnitude of the actual offence is always taken into account; there must be some tangible injury to person or property. But it is the very glory of these illustrative penalties here, that cursing father or mother is punished with as much severity as the actual taking away of life. How true it is from these five instances that God’ s thoughts are not as our thoughts, nor his ways as our ways!Y.

Exo 21:22-25

The requirement of strict equivalents in making compensation for injuries.

The particular illustration here is confessedly obscure; but there can hardly be a mistake as to the principle illustrated, viz; that when injury is inflicted on the person, the very best should be done that can be done to make an adequate compensation. When property is taken it can often be restored or things put practically as they were before; but when the person is seriously injured, there is then no possibility of exact restoration. Hence the injurer might be inclined to say that because he could not do everything by way of compensation he was at liberty to do nothing. But the requirement comes in to stop him from such easy-going reflections. Eve for eye is wanted. You must do your best to restore what you have destroyed. Obviously the purpose of the regulation is, not to justify or aid in anything like revenge, but to make men be contented with the best they can get in substitution for the injury that has been done. The regulation of course was never meant to be interpreted literally, any more than our Lord’ s counsel that he who had been smitten on the right cheek, should turn the other to the smiter. What good would it do literally to render an eye for an eye? That would be great loss to the person injuring and not the slightest gain to the person injured. Persistent requirement of compensation is to be distinguished from a passionate seeking for revenge. And be it noted that this requirement of compensation is not to be omitted under any erroneous notions of what weakness and self-denial may compel from us as Christians. We must keep to the principle underlying the regulation here, as well as to that other glorious and beautiful principle which our Lord ]aid down in quoting this regulation (Mat 5:39). He spoke to stop revenge. But surely he would have been the first to say, on needful occasion, that reckless men must not be suffered to inflict injury on the supposition that Christians would not resent it. Certainly we are not to seek compensation for injuries or punishment of those who injure simply to gratify private feelings, or get a private advantage. But if conscience is clear as to its being for the public good, we must be very urgent and pertinacious in demanding compensation. We may be sure our Master would ever have us contend with all meekness and gentleness, but also with all bravery and stedfastness for all that is right. But the thing of most importance to be learnt from this regulation is, that the most precious things attainable by us are beyond human malice or carelessness to spoil in the slightest degree. The treasures God loves to make the peculiar possession of his children are such as eye has not seen. The eye may be lost, and yet the enjoyment of these treasures remainnay more, the very loss of the natural may increase the susceptibility of the spiritual in us. The very crippling of the body may help us to make wonderful advances towards the perfect man in Christ Jesus.Y.

HOMILIES BY G. A. GOODHART

Exo 21:5, Exo 21:6

Mine ears hast thou opened.

Slavery not usually considered a desirable condition. The Israelites as a people were just casting the slough of it, and God helps them in their social ordinances by emphasising the value of freedom. None the less, even here, a higher state than mere freedom is suggested; voluntary servitude may be preferred to liberty, and is very near akin to sonship. Consider:

I. THE PREFERENCE. Naturally, to a slave freedom is an object. Slavery was a misfortune or a punishment resulting from debt or misconduct (cf. Le Exo 25:39; Exo 22:3). Thus viewed God only permitted it to continue at most for six years. Every Hebrew had been redeemed by him; and therefore permanent slavery to man would have been an infringement of his rights of ownership. Temporary serfdom under the conditions which he imposed secured his rights and the privileges of those whom he had redeemed [cf. the right of a tenant to sublet a house by arrangement with the actual owner]. The relation between a serf and his employer was thus carefully defined and limited; in so far as they were linked together by a purely external bond, that bond ceased to exist at the close of six years’ servitude. During six years, however, a firmer bond might have been formed and strengthened. Possession of the slave’ s body does not carry with it the possession of his affections; they cannot be bought and sold, but they may be won. If the owner during six years could find bands to bind the heart (Hos 11:4); in such case, the serf desiring it, a permanent relation might be established. It is not the abnegation of freedom, it is the exercise of freedom to choose for oneself; if a man was so bound to his employer that he preferred continuing in his service, God was willing to endorse such a preference with his consent. Nowadays, the relation of servant and employer is still more temporary than of old. At the same time, now as ever, love can prevail to win the affections and so weave by means of them a permanent and enduring bond. Love transmutes the conditions of servitude. It changes them into something which is preferable to freedom. The cords of a man bind more firmly than any other cords; but they do not confine or fetter.

II. THE SIGN OF THE PREFERENCE. The servant who wished to remain a servant was to be brought before the judges (Elohim), the representatives of God. As God’ s ministers they were empowered to permit the satisfaction of his desire. The ear pierced against the door post was the outward sign of this sacrament of servitude. Henceforth the man by his own desire was permanently united to the family of his employer. The pierced ear testified to the pierced heart. The sign of slavery was the badge of love.

III. SERVANTS OF GOD. The relation of the slave to his employer is analogous to the relation between the natural man and God. All men are his servantsdebtors who cannot pay their debts. The relation however may be of a temporary character; God seeks to make it permanent by winning our hearts and our affections. Work for him in this world we must, willingly or unwillingly. He would have us willing servants; compulsory service has no moral value. “The ears opened” (Psa 40:6), in token of the heart won, are of more value than sacrifice and offering. Are we such willing servants? (Isa 1:5). He is willing to “open our ears,” to take us as his own for ever, but we must also ourselves be willing:”He hath opened mine ears and I was not rebellious.” Slavery is a state of imperfection; but so also is the miscalled liberty of independence; the only perfect state for man is that “service which is perfect freedom.”G.

Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary

Exo 21:1. Now these are the judgments The subsequent divine laws are delivered in an irregular and interrupted method; most probably, because they were written down by Moses one after another, and delivered by him to the people of Israel just as he received them from Jehovah himself; and perhaps also, because a perfectly methodical manner would have favoured too much of human wisdom. “As to the frequent repetition of them,” observe the authors of the Universal History, “the reader will find sufficient occasion for it; since it will appear by the sequel, that neither that, nor the grievous punishments which befel the Israelites almost upon every disobedience, proved effectual to bend their stubborn necks, or cure them of their untractable disposition. Some [of these laws and ordinances] related to the immediate worship of GOD; such as were the building of the tabernacle, with all its grand apparatus of utensils for use and ornament; their sacrifices of all sorts; the consecration of their priests and Levites; the holy oil to anoint them; their habit, office, privileges, revenue, and the like; the festivals, offerings, tythes, vows, purifications, laws concerning clean and unclean things, diseases, meats, &c. some of which are generally looked upon as typical: others, as topical, or confined to that climate; and others as political; but all of them calculated with a wise design of preserving them both in their obedience to GOD, and from all intermixture with other nations; and from adopting any part of their religious worship into their own: all which were delivered at several times, and upon divers exigencies, by GOD to Moses, and by him committed to writing in the same order in which he received them.” See the note at the beginning of the last chapter. By judgments here, it is generally thought, are meant such judicial or political laws as respected the civil government, and the rights between man and man. It has been generally believed, that many of the most ancient and wisest lawgivers and states have much availed themselves of the Mosaic system.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

c.First form of the law of the political commonwealth

Exo 21:1 to Exo 23:33

a. Right of Personal Freedom (according to Bertheau, ten in number)

1Now these are the judgments [ordinances] which thou shalt set before them. 2If [when] thou buy [buyest] an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. 3If he came [come] in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he were [be] married, then his wife shall go out with him. 4If his master have given [give] him a wife, and she have borne [bear] him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her masters, and he shall go out by himself. 5And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: 6then his master shall bring him unto the judges [God]; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door-post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him foreExo Exo 21:7 And if [when] a man sell [selleth] his daughter to be a maid-servant, she shall not go out as the men-servants do. 8If she please not her master who hath betrothed her to himself,1 then shall he let her be redeemed: to sell her unto a strange nation he shall have no power, seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her. 9And if he have betrothed [betroth] her unto his son, he shall deal with her after the manner of daughters. 10If he take him another wife; her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage [marriage due] shall he not diminish. 11And if he do not these three unto her, then shall she go out free [for nothing], without money.

b. On Murder and Bodily Injuries. Sins against the Life of ones Neighbor. (Ten in number, according to Bertheau.)

12He that smiteth a man, so that he die [dieth], shall be surely put to death. 13And if a man lie not in wait, but God deliver him into his hand [make it happen14to his hand2]; then I will appoint thee a place whither he shall flee. But [And] if [when] a man come [cometh] presumptuously upon his neighbor, to slay him with guile; thou shalt take him from mine altar, that he may die. 15And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death. 16And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death. 17And he that curseth [revileth]3 his father, or his mother, shall surely be 18put to death. And if [when] men strive together, and one smite [smiteth] another [the other] with a stone, or with his fist, and he die [dieth] not, but keepeth his bed: 19If he rise again, and walk abroad upon his staff, then shall he that smote him be quit: only he shall pay for the loss of his time, and shall cause him to be 20thoroughly healed. And if [when] a man smite [smiteth] his servant, or his maid, with a rod, and he die [dieth] under his hand; he shall be surely punished. 21Notwithstanding, if he continue a day or two, he shall not be punished: for he Isaiah 22 his money. If [And when] men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her [depart], and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished [fined], according as the womans husband will [shall] lay upon him: 23and he shall pay as the judges determine.4 And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life, 24Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25, 26Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. And if [when] a man smite [smiteth] the eye of his servant, or the eye of his maid, that it perish 27[and destroyeth it]: he shall let him go free for his eyes sake. And if he smite out his man-servants tooth, or his maid-servants tooth; he shall let him go free for his tooths sake.

c. Injuries resulting from Relations of Property. Through Property and of Property. Acts of Carelessness and Theft. (Ten, according to Bertheau.)

28If [And when] an ox gore [goreth] a man or a woman, that they die, then the ox shall be surely stoned, and his flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox shall be quit. 29But if the ox were [hath been] wont to push with his horn [to gore] in time past, and it hath been testified to his owner, and he hath not kept him in [keepeth him not in], but that he hath killed [and he killeth] a man or a woman; the ox shall be stoned, and his owner also shall be put to death. 30If there be laid on him a sum of money [ransom], then he shall give for the ransom [redemption] of his life whatsoever is laid upon him. 31Whether he have gored a son, or have gored a daughter, according to this judgment shall it be done unto him. 32If the ox shall push [gore] a man-servant or maid-servant, he shall give unto their master 33thirty shekels of silver, and the ox shall be stoned. And if [when] a man shall open a pit, or if [when] a man shall dig a pit, and not cover it, and an ox or an ass fall therein; 34The owner of the pit shall make it good, and [good; he shall] give 35money unto the owner of them; and the dead beast shall be his. And if [when] one mans ox hurt [hurteth] anothers, that he die [dieth]; then they shall sell the live ox, 36and divide the money [price] of it; and the dead ox also they shall divide. Or if it be known that the ox hath used to push [hath been wont to gore] in time past, and his owner hath not kept him in; he shall surely pay ox for ox; and the dead shall be his own.

Chap. Exo 22:1 If [When] a man shall steal [stealeth] an ox, or a sheep, and kill [killeth] it, or sell [selleth] it; he shall restore [pay] fiveoxen for an ox, and four sheep 2for a sheep. If a [the] thief be found breaking up [in], and be smitten that he die 3[so that he dieth], there shall no blood be shed [no blood-guiltiness] for him. If the sun be risen upon him, there shall be blood shed [blood-guiltiness] for him; for he [him; he] should make full restitution; if he have nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft. 4If the theft be certainly found in his hand alive, whether it be ox, 5or ass, or sheep; he shall restore [pay] double. If [When] a man shall cause [causeth] a field or vineyard to be eaten [fed upon], and shall put in his beast [letteth his beast loose], and shall feed [and it feedeth] in another mans field; of the best 6of his own field, and of the best of his own vineyard, shall he make restitution. If [When] fire break [breaketh] out, and catch [catcheth] in thorns, so that the stacks of corn [grain], or the standing corn [grain], or the field, be [is] consumed therewith; he [consumed; he] that kindled the fire shall surely make [make full] restitution.

d. Things Entrusted and Things Lost

7If [When] a man shall deliver unto his neighbor money or stuff to keep, and it be [is] stolen out of the mans house; if the thief be found, let him pay double. 8If the thief be not found, then the master of the house shall be brought unto the judges [unto God], to see whether he have put [have not put] his hand unto his neighbors goods. 9For all manner of trespass [In every case of trespass], whether it be for ox, for ass, for sheep, for raiment, or for any manner of lost [any lost] thing, which another challengeth to be his [of which one saith, This is it], the cause of both parties shall come before the judges [God]; and [he] whom the Judges 10[God] shall condemn, he [condemn] shall pay double unto his neighbor. If [When] a man deliver [delivereth] unto his neighbor an ass, or an ox, or a sheep, or any beast, to keep; and it die [dieth], or be [is] hurt, or driven away, no man seeing 11it: Then shall an [the] oath of Jehovah be between them both, that [whether] he hath not put his hand unto his neighbors goods; and the owner of it shall accept thereof [it], and he shall not make it good [make restitution]. 12And if it be stolen from him, he shall make restitution unto the owner thereof. 13If it be torn in pieces, then let him bring it for witness; and [witness;] he shall not make good that which was 14torn. And if [when] a man borrow [borroweth] aught of his neighbor, and it be [is] hurt, or die [dieth], the owner thereof being not with it, he shall surely make 15it good [shall make full restitution]. But if [If] the owner thereof be with it, he 16shall not make it good: if it be an hired thing, it came for his [its] hire. And if [when] a man entice [enticeth] a maid [virgin] that is not betrothed, and lie [lieth] with her, he shall surely endow her to be his wife. 17If her father utterly refuse to give her unto him, he shall pay money according to the dowry of virgins.

e. Unnatural Crimes. Religious and Inhumane Abominations. (Arranged according to Bertheau.)

(1) 18Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live. (2) 19Whosoever lieth with a beast shall surely be put to death. (3) 20He that sacrificeth unto any god, save unto Jehovah only, he [only,] shall be utterly destroyed [devoted to destruction]. (4) 21Thou shalt neither vex [wrong] a stranger, nor oppress him: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. (5) 22Ye shall not afflict any widow, or fatherless child. 23If thou afflict them in any wise, and they cry at all unto me, I will surely hear their cry; 24And my wrath shall wax hot, and I will kill you with the sword; and your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless. (6) 25If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee [with thee that is poor], thou shalt not be to him as an usurer; neither shalt thou [shall ye] lay upon him usury [interest]. (7) 26If thou at all take thy neighbors raiment to pledge, thou shalt deliver [restore] 27it unto him by that the sun goeth down: For that is his covering only [only covering], it is his raiment for his skin: wherein shall he sleep? And it shall come to pass, when he crieth unto me, that I will hear; for I am gracious. (8) 28Thou shalt not revile the gods [God], nor curse the [a] ruler of [among] thy people. (9) 29Thou shalt not delay to offer [not keep back] the first of thy ripe fruits and of thy liquors [the first-fruits of thy threshing-floor and of thy press]:5 the first-born of thy sons shalt thou give unto me. 30Likewise shalt thou do with thine oxen, and with thy sheep: seven days it shall be with his [its] dam; on the eighth day thou shalt give it me. (10) 31And ye shall be holy men unto me; neither shall ye [and ye shall not] eat any flesh that is torn of beasts in the field; ye shall cast it to the dogs.

f. Judicial Proceedings

Exo 23:1(1) Thou shalt raise [carry] a false report: (2) put not thine [thy] hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness. (3) 2Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil; neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline [turn aside] after many [a multitude] to wrest judgment: (4) 3Neither shalt thou countenance [be4partial to] a poor man in his cause. (5) If [When] thou meet [meetest] thine enemys ox or his ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back to him again 5[to him]. (6) If [When] thou see [seest] the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden, and wouldest forbear to help him [thou shalt forbear to leavehim], thou shalt surely help [release it] with him.6 (7) 6Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of thy poor in his cause. (8) 7Keep thee far from a false matter; and the innocent and righteous slay them not: for I will not justify the wicked. (9) 8And thou shalt take no gift [bribe]: for the gift [a bribe] blindeth the wise [theseeing], and perverteth the words of the righteous. (10) 9Also thou shalt not oppress a stranger: for ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.

g. Rules for Holidays and Festivals

(1) 10And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof: 11But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still [fallow]; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy olive-yard. (2) 12Six days thou shalt do thy work, and on the seventh day thou shalt rest: that thine ox and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid, and the stranger may be refreshed. 13And in [unto] all things that I have said unto you be circumspect [take heed]: and make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard [gods; let itnot be heard] out of thy mouth. (3) 14Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year. (4) 15Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed [at the set time] of [in] the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty: (5) 16And the feast of harvest, the [of the] first fruits of thy labors, which thou hast sown [sowest] in the field: (6) and the feast of ingathering, which is in [ingathering, at] the end of the year, when thou hast gathered [thou gatherest] in thy labors out of the field. (7) 17Three times in the year all thy males shall appear before the Lord God [Jehovah]. (8) 18Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leavened bread; neither shall the fat of my sacrifice [feast] remain until the morning. (9) 19The first of the first-fruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of Jehovah, thy God. (10) Thou shalt not seethe [boil] a kid in his [its] mothers milk.

h. The Promises

(1) 20Behold, I send an angel before thee, to keep thee, in [by] the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. 21Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not: for he will not pardon your trangressions: for my name 22is in him. But [For] if thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak; then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversary unto thine adversaries. (2) 23For mine angel shall go before thee, and bring thee in unto the Amorites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites: and I will cut them off. 24Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works: but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images. (3) 25And ye shall serve Jehovah your God, and he shall [will] bless thy bread and thy water; (4) and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee. (5) 26There shall nothing [no one] cast their [her] young, nor be barren, in thy land; (6) the number of thy days I will fulfil. (7) 27I will send my fear [terror] before thee, and will destroy [discomfit] all the people to whom thou shalt come, 28and I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee. (8) And I will send [send the] hornets before thee, which [and they] shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee. (9) 29I will not drive them out from before thee in one year; lest the land become desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee. 30By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land. (10) 31And I will set thy bounds from the Red Sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee. 32Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods. 33They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee.

TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL

[Exo 21:8. The Hebrew here, according to the Kthibh, is , and if this were followed, we should have to translate with Geddes, Rosenmller and others: so that he hath not betrothed (or will not betroth) her. The Kri reads , unto him or unto himself. This yields much the easiest sense, and is especially confirmed by the consideration that of itself means, not betroth, but appoint, destine. Followed by the Dative, it may in the connection convey the notion of betrothal; but used absolutely, it cannot convey it.Tr.]

[Exo 21:13. cannot mean deliver, and no object is expressed. It is therefore unwarrantable to render, with A. V., deliver him, or even with Lange, let him accidentally fall into his hand. The object to be supplied is the indefinite one suggested by the preceding sentence, viz. homicide.Tr.]

[Exo 21:17. , though generally rendered curse in A. V., yet differs unmistakably from in being used not merely of cursing, but of evil speaking in general, e.g. Jdg 9:27 and 2Sa 16:9. The LXX. render it correctly by . And this word, where the passage is quoted in the New Testament, is rendered by the same Greek word, viz. Mat 15:4.Tr.]

[Exo 21:23. The Heb. reads , lit. with judges or among judges. Some render unto the judges; others before the judges; but the preposition does not naturally convey either of these senses. The A. V. probably expresses the true meaning: with judges, i.e. the line being judicially imposed.Tr.]

[Exo 22:29. Literally: thy fullness and thy tear. The phrase ripe fruits is objectionable as including too much; liquors as suggesting a wrong conception. The first refers to the crops generally, exclusive of the olive and the grape, from which oil and wine, the liquid products (tear), were derived. Cranmers Bible renders, not inaptly: thy fruits, whether they be dry or moist.Tr.]

[Exo 23:5. The rendering of A. V.: and wouldest forbear, is utterly untenable. Not less so is the rendering of by help. The simplest explanation assumes a double meaning of , viz. to loose, and to leave. We might borrow a vulgar phrase, and read: Thou shalt forbear to cut loose from him, thou shalt cut loose with him. De Wette and Murphy attempt to avoid the double meaning by emphasizing with. Thus: Thou shalt forbear to leave it to him: thou shalt leave it with him. But this is a nicety quite alien from the Hebrew.Tr.]

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

This section is very clearly to be distinguished from the two preceding, so that after the purely religious and ethical legislation, and after the ritual, now the social and political legislation is instituted. The genuinely theocratic character of this legislation here at once appears. It is not a criminal law in the first instance, but a system of legal regulations for a people that is to be trained for freedom. Hence these ordinances begin at once very significantly with the regulating of the laws concerning emancipation; and indirectly all the main points of this law point to the rights of freedom. Just as the sacrificial usages were found already existing, and were thenceforth theocratically regulated, so now the relations of slavery, found as an existing fact, were regulated in the spirit of the typical people of God. So Keil entitles the section: The fundamental rights of the Israelites in their civil and social relations. Less satisfactorily Knobel: The further rights, i.e. laws, etc. But the parallels which he draws between the Jewish legislation and that of other ancient people, and of heathen people in general, as also of the modern Mohammedan Arabs, are excellent. We divide thus: (a) The law of personal freedom. That this may correspond with the first commandment of the decalogue, the duty of holding sacred the divine personality, is obvious. (b) The second division, on murder and bodily injuries, quite as unmistakably aims to secure the human form from abuse or disfigurement, as the second commandment to keep the divine image from being deformed; but it is also connected with the commandment: Thou shalt not kill, (c) The third division, on injuries which result from the relations of property, points to the commandment: Thou shalt not steal, (d) Akin to the foregoing, and yet different, are the regulations concerning goods put in anothers care, and goods lost, (e) The regulations concerning unnatural crimes, offences against religion and humanity are more specially connected with the first and with the fifth and tenth commandments. (f) The section on judicial processes reminds us of the prohibition of false witness. (g) The division relating to holidays and feast-days reminds us of the third commandment, but is more especially an unfolding of the law of the Sabbath. (h) Also the promises which are annexed to the fifth and second commandments are in the last division expanded into a fuller form.

Here must be noticed one more circumstance. When regulations of similar import are found in different sections of the law, this is not to be regarded as mere repetition, still less as confusion. The moral law of the Sabbath, e.g., comes here (Exo 23:12) under consideration again, from a social point of view; in Leviticus still again as connected with the ceremonial law. For the Sabbath, there are moral and ritual reasons, and likewise social or civil reasons, the latter uniting the two former. In like manner the great festivals of the Israelites are here regarded from a national, or civil, point of view: in Leviticus they are associated with the idea of worship. The occasional precepts concerning purification and sacrifice in the book of Numbers relate to the keeping pure of the social commonwealth of Jehovah, and are therefore not primarily ceremonial. The tabernacle is found in Exodus, not in Leviticus, because it is primarily the house of the theocratic lawgiver, and is the repository of the decalogue; only secondarily the place of worship, the place where the lawgiver meets his people.

a. Law of Personal Freedom

(1) The Hebrew man-servant, Exo 21:1-6; (2) The Hebrew maid-servant, Exo 21:7-11. The further development of, and reasons for, the law of emancipation, vid. in Deu 15:12-18. The Hebrew man-servant after six years of service is to receive his freedom gratis. According to Deu 15:12 this holds also of the Hebrew maidservant. The attributive designates the servant as an Israelite (comp. in Deut.) in distinction from the slaves derived from non-Israelitish foreign nations, to whom this law does not apply (Keil). The law evidently tends towards securing the universality of personal freedom. But it also knows that within the theocracy, in the servitude which is mitigated by it, there is an element susceptible of education. Therefore the servant is not compelled to become free in the seventh year. We are to consider that the sons of the household also then stood in the relation of strict subjection, so that a dutiful servant became more and more like them. Vid. Exo 23:12, Lev 25:6, etc. The servant might also be led by devotion to his wife, given to him by his master during his servitude, and to her children, to remain a servant. With reference to this the three cases in Exo 21:3-4 were to be distinguished. The fixing of the seventh year as the year of emancipation is connected with the sabbatical year, but does not coincide with it. How one could become a slave among the Israelites is told in Exo 22:3, Lev 25:39. But how the emancipation was to be beautified and enriched is seen in the parallel passage in Deuteronomy [Exo 15:12-15]. On the manner of emancipation vid. Keil p. 130. Unto God.Not to the priests, but to the court of the assembly, which passed judgment in the name of God, and whose sentence was a divine dispensation. Similar expressions vid. in Knobel, p. 214. There had therefore to be a public declaration that the servant voluntarily remained a servant. The boring of the ears was among the Orientals a sign of slavery (Knobel). The ear-rings among the Carthaginians from being a symbol of slavery came to be an ornament, like the cross among Christians. The case mentioned in Lev 25:39 is probably a modification, but according to Knobel is a contradiction, of the law before us.

Exo 21:7-11 : The Israelitish daughter as servant and concubine. Knobel makes no distinction between concubinage as it is found among the patriarchs, and the usual custom of the Jews. But in reply see the Commentary on Genesis, p. 80. She shall not go out as the men-servants do.It follows from the nature of her position that it is a benefit to her if she can remain in the house of her master, provided that the rights of the concubine are respected. It is therefore presupposed either that he takes her for himself, or gives her to his son, or maintains her honor by the side of his sons wife. In the first case, he must let her be redeemed; in the second case, he must accord to her the domestic rights of an associate wife. If he is not willing to give her this protection, he must let her go free for nothing. In this connection the precepts of Deu 15:12 are also to be considered. Exo 21:8-9. Who hath betrothed her to himself.The before belongs to the 15 passages designated by the Massorah in which stands for (Keil; compare Knobel). To sell her unto a strange people.Knobel: The Greek, too, did not sell a Greek slave to go beyond the boundary of the land. Seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her.It would certainly create a difficulty to translate, on account of his infidelity towards her, as if this unfaithfulness were the only reason why an Israelitess might not be sold to heathen. Therefore the emphasis probably lies on the thought that his injustice would be doubly great if even in this case, in which he has gone so far as to send her away, he should also in his treachery to her violate the theocratic law. That the word has a specially important meaning, is seen from Psa 73:15. Comp. Deu 21:14, and the account of the Arabian customs in Knobel, p. 216. If he betroth her unto his son.Comp. Knobel also on a Persian or Arabian custom of a similar sort. As his sons concubine she is to be regarded by him as a daughter. Exo 21:9. If he take him another wife.That is, the father for his son. So Keil; but Knobel understands it to mean: If he takes another for himself. Keil well disposes of the views, according to which either the son is the subject, or the father takes for himself.7 Her food, etc.All of her domestic rights are to remain secure. , meat, as the chief article of food, because the lawgiver has men of wealth in mind. (Keil). To understand , which properly means lying, of cohabitation, yields no tolerable sense. How could the father in this thing control the son? Or how could the son be obliged to conduct himself towards several wives in the same way as towards one. Either, therefore, the expression has in it something figurative, meaning: She must not as wife be neglected; or it refers to a seat, a resting-place (see the meaning of ), which would well harmonize with the reference to food and raiment. It is therefore assumed that under the conditions imposed she has in the house of her servitude a much better position than if she should be dismissed, especially if she has borne children who belong to the permanent members of the household.

b. On Murder, Homicide, and Bodily Injuries

(1) Homicide proper, Exo 21:12-14. (a) Simple homicide in consequence of beating; (b) unintentional, resulting from misfortune and mistake; (c) murder proper. (2) Spiritual homicide, (a) Smiting of parents; (b) deprivation of freedom (as spiritual fratricide); (c) cursing of parents (spiritual suicide). (3) Bodily injuries, (a) Of uncertain, perhaps fatal result; (i) to a free man; (ii) a man-servant or maid-servant; (iii) a pregnant woman, in which connection is to be noticed that the jus talionis is laid down in close connection with an extremely humane law of protection, Exo 21:22-25; (b) local injuries to men-servants or maid-servants.

Exo 21:12. He that smiteth a man.Says Keil: Higher than personal freedom stands life. It may then be asked, why is capital punishment prescribed (Exo 21:16) for the violent taking away of freedom? The slavery treated of in the preceding section was no innovation, but as a traditional custom it was restricted, and moreover in great part was based on guilt or voluntary assent; it had besides an educational end. It is true, the law of retaliation, as instituted in Gen 9:6, underlies all this section; but it is noticeable that this law is expressly prescribed just where the protection of a pregnant woman is involved. It is repeated (Lev 24:17) in connection with the ordinance that the blasphemer shall be stoned. The reason for the repetition is the principle that in respect to these points perfect equality of rights should be accorded to the stranger and the Israelite; and it was occasioned by the fact that the blasphemer was a Jew on his mothers side, but an Egyptian on his fathers side. So that he dieth.Three cases are specified: first, the severe blow which in fact, but not in intention, proves mortal; secondly, the unfortunate killing through mistake, a providential homicide; thirdly, intentional, and hence criminal and guileful, murder.

Exo 21:13. And if a man lie not in wait.When, therefore not only the murderous blow, but any blow, was unintentional, so that the case is one of severe divine dispensation. I will appoint thee a place.A place of refuge, with reference to the avengers of blood who pursue him. A check, therefore, upon the custom, prevalent in the East, of avenging murder. It is worthy of notice, from a critical point of view, that no place is now fixed; this was done later, vid. Num 35:11; Deu 19:1-10. Here too the innocent homicide is expressly distinguished from the violent one, Num 35:22 sqq. Together with the prescribed place of refuge for the one who kills by mistake is found the stern provision that a real murderer, who has committed his murder with criminal and guileful intent, cannot be protected even by fleeing to the altar of the sanctuary, as it was customary in ancient times for those to do whom vengeance rightly or wrongly pursued, because, as some would say, the altar was a place of expiation. Even from the altar of God he is to be torn away. The expression is not adequately represented by behave viciously, or arrogantly. It denotes the act of breaking through, in ebullient rage, the sacred restraints which protect ones neighbor as Gods image. Particular cases, Num 35:16, Deu 19:11. Murder could be expiated only with death, Num 35:31. Examples of fleeing to the altar, 1Ki 1:50; 1Ki 2:28. This was also customary among the Greeks.

Exo 21:15. Smiteth his father.The simple act of smiting, committed on a father or mother, is made equivalent to man-slaughter committed on ones neighbor. Parricide, as not occurring and not conceivable, is not at all mentioned (Keil). Similar ordinances among the Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians are mentioned by Knobel, p. 217. The two following provisions rest on the same ground. The parents are Gods vicegerents for the children; the neighbor is Gods image; hence a violent abuse of his person is equivalent to murder, vid. Deu 24:7. We explain the insertion of the prohibition of man-stealing between verses 15 and 17 by the fact that in cursing his parents the curser morally destroys himself, vid. Lev 20:9, Deu 27:16. The order is: undutifulness, man-stealing, self-destruction.8 See various views of Exo 21:16 in Keil, p. 133.

Exo 21:18 sq. And when men strive.The section concerning bodily injuries as such is distiuguished from the section beginning with Exo 21:12 in that there injuries are spoken of which result in death. The injuries here mentioned would accordingly also be punished with death if they resulted in death. This is shown especially by Exo 21:20. Here, then, an injury is contemplated which only confines the injured one to his bed. The penalty is twofold: First, the offender must make good his sitting still, i.e. what he might have earned during this time; secondly, he must pay the expenses of his cure, Exo 21:19. In the case of a man-servant or maidservant a different custom prevailed. If manslaughter took place, the manhood of the slain one is fully recognized, i.e. the penal retribution takes place. Probably sentence was to be rendered by the court, which was to decide according to the circumstances. According to Jewish interpretations capital punishment was to be inflicted with the sword; but vid. Knobel for a different view.9 On the one hand, the danger of a fatal blow was greater than in other relations, for it was lawful for a master to smite his slave (vid. Pro 10:13; the rod was also used on children); but on the other hand an intention to kill could not easily be assumed, because the slave had a pecuniary value. Furthermore, the owner is exempted from punishment, if the beaten one survives a day or two; and the punishment then consists in the fact that the slave was his money, i.e. that in injuring the slave he has lost his own money. The Rabbins hold that this applied only to slaves of a foreign race, according to Lev 25:44. This is not likely, if at the same time, in case of death, execution by the sword was to be prescribed; also according to this view there would have been a great gap in the law as regards Hebrew slaves. It is true, reference is here had only to injuries inflicted by the rod. When one was killed with an iron instrument, an intention to kill was assumed, and then capital punishment was inflicted unconditionally, Num 35:16, Lev 24:17; Lev 24:21, Deu 19:11 sqq. On the Egyptian, Greek, and Roman legislation, see Knobel, p. 219.10

Exo 21:22-25. Special legal protection of pregnant women. It might often happen that in quarrelling men would injure a pregnant woman, since wives on such occasions instinctively interpose, Deu 25:11. In the latter passage the rudenesses which the woman, protected by law, might indulge in are guarded against.So that her fruit depart. Literally: so that her children come out; i.e., so that abortion takes place. According to Keil, the expression designates only the case of her bearing real children, not a fetus imperfectly developed; i.e., a premature birth, not an abortion, is meant. The expression is used for the sake of indefiniteness, since possibly there might be more than one child in her body. Strange interpretation of the precept, according to which the plural in individual cases denotes indefiniteness! According to this view, the most, and perhaps the worst cases, would not be provided for, since women far advanced in pregnancy are most apt to guard against the danger of such injuries. The plural may also indicate that the capacity for bearing was injured. If no other injury results from the quarrel, reparation is to be made, according as the husband of the woman imposes it on the perpetrator, and the latter is to give it with judges, i.e., in company with, on application to them, in order that excessive demands may be suitably reduced. The amount of indemnity demanded doubtless was determined by the consideration, whether the injured man had many or few children, was poor or rich, etc. The law stands appropriately at the end of the cases which relate to life and the inviolability of the person. The unborn child is reckoned as belonging to, and, as it were, a part of, the mother (Knobel).

Exo 21:23. And if any mischief follow. It is to the credit of the legislation that the law of retaliation (vid. Lev 24:19, Deu 19:21) is here so particularly laid down. In its connection it reads: The injury of such a woman must be most sternly expiated according to the degree of it. But even this explication of the law of retaliation must be guarded from a lifeless literalism, as is shown by the provisions in Exo 21:26-27. It would surely have been contrary to nature to put out the eye of a master who had put out his servants eye, or to make him lose tooth for tooth. Keil says, The principle of retaliation, however, is good only for the free Israelite, not for the slave. In the latter case, he adds, emancipation takes place. Emancipation, even on account of a tooth knocked out, has nevertheless the force of retaliation, which, even in the relations of free Israelites, could not have been everywhere literally applied, e.g., in the case of burns. On the jus talionis in the ancient heathen world, and generally in the Orient, vid. Knobel, p. 220.

c. Injuries resulting from Property relations. Specially from acts of Carelessness. Chs. Exo 21:28 to Exo 22:6.

We follow in general Bertheaus classification, which makes property the determining thought. Keil and Knobel divide otherwise. Keil with the words, Also against danger from cattle is mans life secured. The conflict between life and property, and the subordination of property is here certainly everywhere observed. In a critical respect it may not be without significance that there is here no trace of horses; also the dog is not mentioned. At the time of Solomon and Ahab the case was quite different. First are to be considered the accidents occasioned by oxen that hook, Exo 21:28-32. But this list is connected with the following one, which treats of the misfortunes which men may suffer in respect to their oxen or asses through the fault of neighbors, in which case a distinction is made between the injuries resulting from carelessness and those resulting from theft, Exo 21:33 to Exo 22:4. Then follow injuries done to fields or estates through carelessness in the use of cattle or of fire, Exo 21:5-6. Then the criminal misuse of goods held in trust constitute a separate section, Exo 21:7-17, which we do not, like Bertheau, make a subdivision of the division (c), but must distinguish from it.

Exo 21:28. First case. And if an ox.The instinct of oxen to hook is so general that every accident of this sort could not be foreseen and prevented. Therefore when an ox has not been described to the owner as properly a goring ox, the owner is essentially innocent. Yet for a possible want of carefulness he is punished by the loss of his animal. But the ox is stoned to death. Legally it would involve physical un-cleanness to eat of the flesh. But the stoning of the ox does not mean that the ox is tainted with capital crime (Keil), but that he has become the symbol of a homicide, and so the victim of a curse (). It is therefore an application of Gen 9:6 in a symbolical sense, on account of the connection of cattle with men. Comp. also Lev 20:15. Similar provisions among the Persians and Greeks vid. in Knobel, p. 220.

Exo 21:29. Second case. The owner has been cautioned that his ox is given to hooking. In this case he himself is put to death as well as his ox. This is the rule. But as there may be mitigating considerations, especially in the case of the injured family; as in general the guilt was only that of carelessness, not of evil intention, the owner might save his life by means of a ransom imposed on him by the relatives of the man that had been killed. Probably with the mediation of the judges, as in Exo 21:22. Reference to the Salic law made by Knobel. Ransom., covering, expiation.

Exo 21:31. Third case. The son or the daughter of a freeman are treated in the same manner as, according to the foregoing, he himself is treated.

Exo 21:32. Fourth case. The ox gores a manservant or a maid-servant to death. The stoning of the ox is still enjoined, but the owner in this case is not doomed to death. He must pay the master of the slave 30 shekels of silver. Probably the usual market price of a slave, since the ransom money of a free Israelite amounted to 50 shekels, Lev 27:3. (Keil). On the value of the shekel ( ) vid. Winer, Realwrterbuch, p. 433 sqq.11 The result of the perplexing investigation is that its value Isaiah 25 or 26 silver groschen.12 The shekel afterwards used for the revenue of the temple and of the king was different from that used in common life. This legal inequality [between the slave and the freeman] is to be explained by the consideration that the capital punishment inflicted on the owner formed an offset, to the revenge to which otherwise the relatives of the murdered man might resort. But this revenge for bloodshed was in no danger of being exercised in the case of a murdered slave, since he was removed from the circle of his relations. The seemingly great difference in the penalty amounts finally to this, that the ransom money for a free man was 50 shekels, and that for a slave 30 shekels. On the estimate of the Attic slave, vid. Knobel; but the great difference in the period of time must be taken into account. In the legal codes of other ancient nations also are found laws concerning the punishment of beasts that have killed or injured a man. Coop. Clericus and Knobel on this passage. But no nation had a law which made the owner of such a beast responsible, because none of them had recognized the divine image in human life (Keil). The responsibility of the owner could certainly be grounded only on the mysterious solidarity of the Hebrew household (thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle), a unity which was not taken into account where a more atomistic view of liberty prevailed.

Exo 21:33-34. Fifth case. And when a man shall open a pit (cistern). This is connected with the foregoing cases as coming under the head of punishable carelessness. The ox or ass are named as examples of domestic animals in general. In this case only property is destroyed; and the careless man has to pay for it, but receives the dead beast, of which he could only use the skin and other such parts, since the flesh was unclean.

Exo 21:35. Sixth case. A specially fine provision. In the ox that has killed another ox there is nothing abominable, but yet a stain; the sight of him is obnoxious. He is therefore sold and comes into another place where his fault is not known. But the two owners share the price of sale and the dead animal. This is an alleviation of a misfortune that is common to both parties. Without doubt the dead ox also must have hooked.

Exo 21:36. Seventh case. But here too is to be considered the special circumstance that the ox may have been a notorious hooker. In this case the owner must make full compensation for the loss with a live ox, in return for which he receives the dead beast.

Exo 22:1-4. Eighth case. The cattle-thief. Five-fold indemnity for the stolen ox; four-fold for the stolen sheep or goat. In the case of the five-fold indemnity any kind of large animal may be delivered over. The difference of five-fold and four-fold points to the greater guilt of the greater theft. The four-fold restitution is also mentioned in 2Sa 12:6 : the seven-fold, Pro 6:31, is not to be understood literally, but only in a general way as manifold (Knobel). From the five-fold and four-fold restitution is distinguished the two-fold, which is prescribed in case the thief has not yet slaughtered or sold the animal, but is able to return it alive. The reasons for this distinction are differently given; vid. Keil; also his note, II. p. 137.13 In the latter case the thief had not carried out his purpose to the full extent, especially as he has not put the object of his theft out of the way. The case differed therefore materially from the other. Vid. Knobel on the Roman laws. Others indicating the value set on ploughing oxen, Knobel. p. 222.

Exo 22:2-3. If the thief be found breaking in.This is obviously an incidental interpolation, which properly belongs to the class (b). There shall be no blood to him; i.e. no blood-guiltiness is incurred by the homicide; vid. Num 35:27; Deu 19:10; Job 24:16. One might understand this chiefly of an attack on the fold, since the topic is the stealing of cattle; at all events a nocturnal irruption is meant, vid. Exo 22:3. Accordingly the watchman, or the one who is awaked, is in a condition of defense. He must protect his property, and therefore fight; and the thief is liable to become a robber and murderer. If the sun be risen upon him.It might be thought that this refers to the early dawn or early day, when he might recognize the thief, or frighten him away unrecognized, or with the help of others capture him. But inasmuch as further on it is assumed that the thief has really accomplished his theft, the expression probably means: If some time has elapsed. If in this case the owner kills the thief, he incurs blood-guiltiness; but on account of the great variety in the cases the sentence of death is not here immediately pronounced upon him. Since the life of the thief is under the protection of the law, the case comes before the criminal court, vid. Exo 21:20. For Calvin on the ratio disparitatis inter furem nocturnum et diurnum, vid. Keil, p. 137. The real punishment for the thief is determined by the law concerning restitution, Exo 22:1; Exo 22:3. But in case the thief can restore nothing, he is sold for the theft, for that which is stolen, i.e. for the value of it. This can mean only a sale for a period of time. The buyer reckoned the restitution which the thief was to render, and used the thief as a slave until the whole loss was made good (Knobel). Similar arrangements among the Romans vid. in Knobel, p. 223. Likewise laws concerning theft, p. 224. The thief could not be sold to a foreigner, according to Josephus, Ant. XVI. 1, 1.

Exo 22:5. Ninth case. A field or a vineyard to be fed upon.There are various views of this. (1) Si lserit quispiam agrum vel vineam, etc. (Vulg.). Luther: When any one injures a field or vineyard, so that he lets his cattle do damage. (2) Knobel: When one pastures a field or a vineyard by sending his cattle to it. (3) Keil: When any one pastures a field or a vineyard, and lets his cattle loose. bears either meaning, to send away, or to let go free; but according to the connection only the latter can be meant here. The sense given to it by the Vulgate might accordingly be accepted: he injures the field or vineyard of his neighbor so that, (in that) etc. But it is more obvious to assume an incidental carelessness to be meant. The beast feeds on his field (perhaps also on the grass between the grape-vines); from this pasture ground he lets him pass over so that he does damage to his neighbor. Knobel even affirms that an intentional damage is meant. And yet only a simple, though ample, indemnity is to be rendered from the best of his field and of his vineyard. Keil rightly contends against Knobels theory. Talmudic provisions on this point are found in Saalschtz, Mosaisches Recht, p. 875 sq.

Exo 22:6. Tenth case. This is about, a fire in a field, which might the more readily sweep over into the neighbors field, inasmuch as it was likely to be kindled at the edge of the field, in the thorn-hedge. Clearly an act of carelessness is meant; comp. Isa 5:5. He that hath kindled the fire.The carelessness is imputed to him as a virtual incendiary, because he did not guard the fire.

d. Things entrusted and lost.

Exo 22:7. First case. The money or articles or stuff (on see Deu 22:5) left for safe keeping are stolen from the keeper, but the thief is discovered. The affair is settled by the thief being required to pay back double, vid. Exo 22:4.

Exo 22:8. Second case. The thief is not discovered. In this case suspicion falls on the keeper; he may have embezzled the property entrusted to him. Therefore such a case must come before the court, which was esteemed a divine court, hence the expression, . The penalty is paid according to the decision of the case. The man under suspicion must approach unto God. Such an approach produced an excitement of conscience. The true high-priest is the one who may approach unto God. In case the keeper is adjudged guilty, he has to pay double.

Exo 22:9. The foregoing provision is designated as an example for a general rule. The cleansing of the suspected man was probably often effected by an oath of purification. The LXX. and Vulgate interpolate , et jurabit. In all cases in which the concealer made a confession, an oath was unnecessary. Also dishonesty respecting objects found is placed under this rule. On the oath among the Arabs and Egyptians, see Knobel, p. 225. Knobel seems to assume without reason that the plaintiff also is meant in the words, whom God shall condemn, etc.14

Exo 22:10-11. Third case. This is about beasts put in others care, which die in their possession, or are mutilated in the pasture, or injure themselves, or are driven away by robbers. Here the oath is positively required, in case the guardian alone has seen the thing; but it is also decisive. On a similar Indian law vid. Knobel.

Exo 22:12. Fourth case. Stolen from him.It is assumed that the thief is not found. Here, says Knobel, restitution is prescribed, but not in Exo 22:8, because he who has an animal in charge is the guardian of it, whereas he who has things in charge cannot be regarded as exactly a watchman. But according to Exo 22:9 the judges could even adjudge a double restitution, while here only simple restitution is spoken of. There a complication was referred to, in which the approach of the master of the household to God and the attitude of his conscience formed the main ground for the judicial sentence. In the case described in Exo 22:10-11 the oath determines the main decision; in the present case the simple restitution is prescribed upon the simple declaration: stolen.

Exo 22:13. Fifth case. The production of the animal torn by a beast of prey (not, or a part of it, as Keil says) proved not only the fact itself, but also that the guardian had watched, and had driven off the beast of prey by a violent exertion. From this we see the severity of Laban who, according to Gen 31:39, required his son-in-law in such cases to make the loss good. Comp. 1Sa 17:34, Amo 3:12. On the Indian law, vid. Knobel, p. 227.

Exo 22:14. Sixth case. A hired beast is injured, or dies, when the owner is not present. The sentence requires restitution, because neglect may be presumed.

Exo 22:15. Seventh case. The owner is present when the accident occurs. In that case it belonged especially to himself to prevent the accident, if prevention was possible.

Eighth case. The borrower is in the hired service of the owner of the beast. In this case he gets the dead beast instead of his pay; it is subtracted from his pay. For the owner as a hired laborer would have had to do only with himself; and a hired servant with a hired beast cannot be meant. It is therefore a day-laborer to whom the animal of the owner has been entrusted. can hardly (with Stier and Keil) be referred to the hired beast. Knobel has a forced explanation, in which the hired servant becomes the one who lets the beast.15

Exo 22:16. Ninth case. The seducer of an unbetrothed virgin (the case is different with the seduction of a betrothed one (Deu 22:23), who has entrusted to him the wealth of her virginity, valuable not only in a moral, but in a civil point of view, must make restitution to her by marrying her, and to her father by giving a dowry.

Exo 22:17. Tenth case. The seducer himself cannot refuse the settlement; but the father of the seduced maiden may have reasons for refusing it. In this case the seducer must pay him the dowry (vid. Gen 34:12), with which she is, in a sort, reinstated as a virgin, and as afterwards a legally divorced woman. The case is not differently provided for in Deu 22:28, as Knobel affirms. There only the price of sale is fixed, viz., at 50 shekels; the right of the father to refuse his daughter to the seducer is simply not repeated. The dowry was not properly a price of sale.

The precepts in Exo 22:18 and onwards, says Keil, differ in form and contents from the foregoing laws; in form, by the omission of [when], with which the foregoing are almost without exception introduced; in substance, by the fact that they impose on the Israelites, on the ground of their election to be the holy people of Jehovah, requirements which transcend the sphere of natural law. Yet the two divisions are not to be distinguished as natural and supernatural. But Keil has correctly found a new section here, whilst Knobel begins a new section, poorly defined, with Exo 22:16.

e. Unnatural Crimes. Abominations committed against Religion and Humanity.

Exo 22:18. First offence. The sorceress is condemned to death. This term is not to be made synonymous with witch, as Knobel makes it. The medival witch may practice, or wish to practice, sorcery; but she may also be a calumniated woman. She gets her name from the popular conception, whereas the sorceress gets her name from the real practice of a lying, dark art. She operates on the assumption that demoniacal powers co-operate with her, and so she promotes radical irreligion. She injures her neighbor in body and life, as being the instrument of hostile passions, which she nourishes; or, when she enters into the mood of the questioner, she nourishes ruinous hopes (Macbeth) or despair (the soothsayer of Endor), and often from being a mixer of herbs becomes a mixer of poisons (Gesina). The sorceress is named instead of the sorcerer, as Calovius says, not because the same thing is not punishable in men, but because the female sex is more addicted to this crime (Keil). According to Knobel the expression, not suffer to live, intimates that perhaps a foreign sorceress might be punished with banishment; but Keil supposes that she may have been allowed to live, if she gave up her occupation. Sorcery was connected not only with simple idolatry, but in many ways with the worship of demons, and the sorceress was regarded as seducing to such things.

Exo 22:19. Second offence. Sexual intercourse with a beast. Comp. Lev 18:23; Lev 20:15; Deu 27:21. This unnatural thing also was punished with death, like the kindred one of sodomy, a prominent vice of the Canaanites, Lev 20:13.

Exo 22:20. Third offence. Idolatry. Keils explanation, Israel must not sacrifice to foreign gods, but must not only tolerate foreigners in the midst of them, etc., almost seems intended to intimate that the heathen in Israel had an edict of tolerance for their offerings. Opposed to this conception is the Sabbath law, and the ordinance in Exo 23:24. In both cases, however, the explanation is that a public worship of strange gods was not tolerated in Israel; but an inquisition to ferret out such worship secretly carried on is not countenanced by the Mosaic law. The words are: whosoever sacrificeth unto any god. The addition, save unto Jehovah only (as likewise Exo 20:24), is a mild expression also as regards the theocratic offerings, and also secures a right understanding of the word Elohim.He is to be devoted, i.e., to the judgment of Jehovah sentencing him to death. Here the notion of (hherem, ban) comes out distinctly. Every capital punishment was essentially a hherem; but here is found the root of the notion: an idolater by his offering has withdrawn from Jehovah the offering due to Him alone; he has, so to speak, removed the offering away from the true divine idea, and perverted it into its opposite. He is to be devoted by death to the Lord, to whom in life he would not devote himself (Keil). It may be that a sort of irony lies in the notion of the hherem; as being consecration reversed, it secures to God the glory belonging to Him alone; but it does this also as being consecration to the judging God in His judgment. No living thing, says Knobel, devoted to Jehovah could be redeemed, but had to be destroyed. Lev 27:28 sq.; 1Sa 15:3. But only when it was a case of hherem, vid. Deu 13:12 sqq.

Exo 22:21. Fourth offence. A beautiful contrast to the foregoing is formed by the statement, of offences against humanity. Maltreatment of the foreigner is put first of all. He must not be wronged, for ye were strangers, etc. A moral principle which re-appears in the N. T. (Mat 7:12). as also in Kant. The particular rules concerning the treatment of aliens are given by Knobel. p. 228, who also gives the appropriate references to Michaelis and Saalschtz. Vid. Exo 3:9, Deu 26:7. Knobel says, The persons meant are the Canaanitish and non-Canaanitish strangers who staid as individuals among the Israelites; the Canaanites as a whole are, according to this lawgiver also, to be extirpated (vid. Exo 23:33). It belongs to the definition of the stranger, that he is dissociated from his own nationality, and has become subject to another, i.e. here, to the national laws of the Israelites. The failure to affix a penalty to this law implies that the noble emotion of gratitude was probably depended on to secure its fulfilment.

Exo 22:22-24. Fifth offence. Against widows and orphans. On this point see Knobels collection of the various passages, p. 229. God takes the place of the deceased fathers and husbands by His special protection; whence follows that they on their part when living are to exercise a divine protection in the house over wife and children. And because, through the selfishness of the strong, widows and orphans were so liable to be oppressed, being easily despoiled on account of their impotence, chief prominence is given to the significance of their crying. This need not always be a conscious prayer uttered in ones extremity, for crying, on the part of living things and before God, has a special meaning, even down to the crying of the young ravens. The threatened punishment, in the first place, is connected with the guilt, and in the second place corresponds with it. Despotism begins with the oppression of the weak (widows and orphans), and reaches its consummation in unrighteous wars and military catastrophes, out of which again widows and orphans are made. Vid. Isa 9:17.

Exo 22:25. Sixth offence. Prohibition of usury, by which the exigency of the poor is abused, Lev 25:36. Two grounds: the poor man belongs to the people of God as a free man, and has lost his freedom through his troubles. By usury he is burdened.

Exo 22:26-27. Seventh offence. Excessive taking of pawn. The lender may require a pledge of the creditor, but his covering (outer garment) he must return to him before sunset, lest he suffer from the nocturnal cold. The mantle marks the extreme of poverty in general, vid. Deu 24:6 sqq. The compassion which Jehovah here promises to the helpless ones that cry has an obverse side for the pitiless. The expression in Exo 22:27 becomes even a rhetorical plea for the poor. Mat 5:7, Jam 2:13. The indigent Oriental covers himself at night in his outer garment. Shaw, Travels, p. 224, Niebuhr, Arabien, p. 64 (Knobel). On the pawning of clothes, see Amo 2:8, Job 22:6, Pro 20:16; Pro 27:13.

Exo 22:28. Eighth offence. Contempt, of the Deity and of princely magistrates. Keil says, Elohim means neither the gods of the other nations, as Josephus (Ant. IV. 8, 10, contra Apionem II. 33), Philo (vita Mos. III. 864) and others explain the word in their dead and Pharisaic monotheism; nor the magistrates, as Onkelos, Jonathan, Aben Ezra and others think; but God, the Deity in general, whose majesty is despised in every transgression of Jehovahs commands, and should be honored in the person of the prince. Comp. Pro 24:21; 1Pe 2:17, etc. So Knobel. This explanation is certainly favored by the context, particularly the following; especially also by the fact that the prince (the exalted, the high one) is mentioned next to God. Yet this is to be observed in the line of Josephus and Philos opinion, that the theocracy does not reject the divine element in the religions themselves, but the false ideal images of the gods (Elilim), and the actual idols, and that even in this sphere there are reservations in reference to Satan (Epistle of Jude). There are two reasons for it: first, the element of truth which underlies the errors; secondly, the moral injury of the religious feelings of the neighbor who is in error. We prefer to render, the Deity; at all events the reviling of the Deity, which may have many degrees, is sharply distinguished from the positive reviling of Jehovah (Lev 24:15-16). The world of to-day would perhaps invert the order of guilt in this relation. Luthers translation transposes the meanings of the verbs [Den Gttern. nicht fluchen, und den Obersten nicht lstern, not curse the gods, and not revile the magistrates]. The princes are under God as His vicegerents. Passages relative to the defamation of princes are given by Knobel. The word comprehends all forms of evil-speaking of God.

Exo 22:29-30. Ninth offence. Holding back of the natural products due to the sanctuary. means the produce of grain (Deu 22:9), and the word , which occurs only here, properly tear, something flowing, liquor stillans, is a poetic designation of the produce of the wine-vat, the wine and the oil, comp. . Theoph.: arborum lacrym; Pliny XI. 6. (Keil.) Vid. Exo 23:19; Deu 26:2-11; Num 18:12. These gifts to the temple retained their festal character and their value only as they were freely and joyfully presented. The first-born of thy sons.Repetition of the precept to sanctify the first-born to Jehovah, Exo 13:2; Exo 13:12. In the passage before us, however, the precept is put under the point of view of the civil commonwealth. This needs religious institutions in order to its perpetuity. Knobel attempts in vain to make out a difference between this passage and others which prescribe the redemption of the first-born. A week of existence with the dam must also be secured to the sacrificial victims taken from the cattle and from the sheep or goats.

Exo 22:31. Tenth offence. Use of unclean meat. As men of holiness consecrated to the sanctuary, they must refrain from the use of unclean meat, especially of that which is torn of beasts. The carcass is to be given to the dogs, whose characteristic here appears. Comp. Exo 19:6; Lev 17:15.

f. Legal Proceedings

Exo 23:1. First precept. Against rashness in cherishing and uttering suspicions. Comp. Lev 19:16; Deu 22:13 sqq. Vid. the references to Michaelis and Saalschtz in Knobel.

Second precept. No one shall allow himself to be misled by wicked men into the utterance of false witness.

Exo 23:2. Third precept. Base compliance with the judgment of the multitude.

Exo 23:3. Fourth precept. Not to favor the poor man in his suit. Affectation in sympathy with the lowly. The error of many modern minds. Against Knobels conjecture, vid. Keil.16

Exo 23:4. Fifth precept. To keep even an enemy from suffering loss. Ones enemy is in this case a brother, according to Deu 22:1. Neglect of this duty is positive and culpable violation of law.

Exo 23:5. Sixth precept. It is still harder to labor in company with the enemy (the hater), in order to help him in his extremity. In this case the inclination to avoid the enemy must be overcome. On the pun see Gesenius under . Comp. Bertheau, p. 41. The neglect of this difficult self-denial also comes into the category of violation of law.

Exo 23:6. Seventh precept. Of thy poor.The poor must be the proteg of the rich. But the temptations to violate his rights, to pervert it this way and that, is strong, since he is defenceless. Hence Moses puts him specially under the protection of the law. Comp. Deu 27:19; 1Sa 8:3; Lam 3:35.

Exo 23:7. Eighth precept. This looks like the first. But there the subject is false testimonyhere, the false judge; because his conduct may possibly bring death to the innocent man. Here, therefore, judicial murder is specifically treated of, with the declaration that God will not acquit the wicked one, i.e., will judge him; and the wicked judge is probably meant. Bertheau, dividing this one precept into two, fails to make out the tenthwherefore Keil is led to pronounce his hypothesis of decades to be arbitrary throughout.

Exo 23:8. Ninth precept. Prohibition of the taking of presents in law-suits. Out of such presents corruption grows. They pervert the cause of the righteousmake right wrong.

Exo 23:9. Tenth precept. This is not identical with the general precept in Exo 22:21, since here the question is about law-suits. It should be considered especially in courts of law how a stranger feels. He is timid, faint-hearted, and readily surrenders a part or the whole of his just claim before the mighty judge. Israel is to learn this from his experience in Egypt. Vid. Deu 24:17; Deu 27:19.

g. Ordinances concerning Feast-days and Days of Rest

Exo 23:10-11. First ordinance. The land must rest the seventh year. It is the Sabbath of the years, the continuation of the Sabbath of the months, as of the Sabbath of the days, while they all look back to the Sabbath of Gods creation, and look forward to the Sabbath of the generation, the great year of jubilee, the type of the future foundation and completion of the Sabbath by Christ. The civil side of the religious ordinances here made should not be overlooked, as is done by Keil and Knobel. In Leviticus 25 the ordinance bears a predominantly religious aspect. What the land produces of itself, without culture, belongs to all as a common possession to be freely enjoyed; likewise to the stranger and to the cattle, and even to the wild beasts. Thus this festal year forms a reflex of Paradise. And if this festal year in point of fact, was poorly observed in Israel, critics may well infer that this law was written long before the time of the later national life of the Israelites. In its ideal significance, however, it belongs to all times: not only the field, but also the forest, the river, and the mine, may be spoiled by unintermittent labor.

Exo 23:12-13. Second ordinance. Man and beast must rest on the seventh day. The humane object of the Sabbath in its civil aspect comes out prominently in the text. Mention is first made even of the rest needed by the ox and the ass, then of the hand-maids son, i.e., the one born a slave, and the stranger; they must on the Sabbath have a breathing-spell, as the verb properly means. Exo 23:13 enjoins the proper celebration for this sacred list of feast-days, strictly excluding the names of all heathen deities, and containing a suggestion for the revision of the Christian calendar in view of the medieval deifications. Says Knobel: The most important point is the exclusive adoration of Jehovah. The Hebrew is not even to mentioni.e., utterthe name of another god; not to take it into his mouth, still less recognize or reverence such a god. So, too, the strict worshippers of Jehovah did (Psa 16:4; Hos 2:17; Zec 13:2). Accordingly the Hebrew was to swear only by Jehovah (Deu 6:13; Deu 10:20; Jer 12:16). So the Phenician could not swear (Josephus c. Apionem I. 22). But we must distinguish between the proper meaning of this command and the superstitious Jewish interpretation of it, which has even imposed a penalty on the utterance of the name of Jehovah. The so-called killing by silence [Todtschweigen], generally a sin, has therefore here, too, its moral side.

Exo 23:14. Third ordinance. Three annual festivals are to be celebrated in accordance with the wants of Gods people in their civil capacity. At the head stands the feast of unleavened bread, as the festival of freedom; then follow the two principal harvest festivals, of which the second at the same time marks the close of the year with reference to the notion of the civil year. Vid. Exo 34:23; Deu 16:16; 2Ch 8:13. Otherwise, says Knobel, the Elohist, on which point see Leviticus 23. But it must be observed that there the festivals are spoken of in their relation to religion and religious rites. Therefore, at that place special prominence is given to the Passover and the day of atonement. The arrangement of the three festivals, however, was, for the most part, prophetic, since in the wilderness there could be no harvesting, nor even sacrifices, vid. Lev 23:10.

Exo 23:15. Fourth ordinance. The feast of unleavened bread as the birth-day festival of the people and of their freedom; whereas the Passover stands at the head of their religious offerings, vid. Exo 12:40 sqq. On Hitzigs view in his Ostern und Pfingsten, vid. Knobel,17 p. 233; Bertheau, p. 57.Not empty, i.e., not with empty hands, but with sacrificial gifts. Even the general festival offerings had to come from the sacrificial gifts of the peoplea fact which Knobel seems to overlook; to these were added the peace-offerings made by individuals. So the Oriental never came before his king without presents; vid. the citations from lian and Paulsen in Keil. The offering is the surplus of the gain which God has blessed, and by the effort to secure this surplus a barrier is built against want in civil life. While the offerings serve to maintain the religious rites, they also serve indirectly to maintain the common weal. The same holds of the true church and of its wants.

Exo 23:16. Fifth ordinance. The feast of harvest.Here named for the first time, as also the third feast, vid. Lev 23:15 : Num 28:26. Also called the feast of weeks, because it was celebrated seven weeks after the feast of unleavened bread; or the feast of the first fruits of the wheat-harvest, because the loaves offered as first-fruits at that time were to be made of wheat flour, Exo 34:22. On the Pentecost, see the lexicons.

Sixth ordinance.The feast of ingathering.Gathering or plucking characterizes this harvest: the fruit-harvest and vintage. Further particulars, as that it is to be held on the 15th day of the 7th month, seven days like that of unleavened bread, a feast of rich abundance in contrast with that of great privation, see in Lev 23:34, Num 29:12, Winer, Realwrterbuch, Art. Laubhttenfest, [Smiths Bible Dictionary, Art. Tabernacles, Feast of]. In the end of the year.Knobel, on account of this passage, assumes that the Hebrews had two new-years, the one in autumn, when the agricultural season of the year ended with the harvesting of the fruits, and the following one, beginning with the ploughing and sowing of the fields. The former, he says, seems to have been the usual mode of reckoning in the East; and he cites many proofs, p. 235. His view that this is a contradiction of the Elohist, who puts the beginning of the year in the spring (Exo 12:2), is not perspicuous; neither, on the other hand, is Keilsthat reference is here made only to the agricultural year, by which he must mean the natural seasons, II. p. 148. We find here a new proof that the Mosaic law distinguishes the civil from the religious ordinances. But because the civil is subordinate to the religious, the determinative regulation proceeds from the feast of Passover, as is seen especially from Num 29:12. That in Lev 23:34 the date is religious, is self-evident.

Exo 23:17. Seventh ordinance. Three times in the year;i.e. of course at the three above mentioned feasts. The place where the Israelites are to appear before Jehovah, i.e. in the place where He reveals Himself, is not yet fixed, an omission explained by the fact that they were still wandering. That only the males are held obliged to do this, shows the civil side of this legislation. for , thy males. Probably, says Keil, from the twentieth year and upwards, those who were included in the census. Num 1:3. But this does not prohibit the admission of the women (comp. 1Sa 1:3 sqq.) and boys (Luk 2:41 sqq.). More exactly: by the side of the civil ordinance the religious custom was developed in a natural way. Knobel thinks he finds here another discrepancy, p. 235.

Exo 23:18. Eighth ordinance. Not offer with leavened bread.The duty of keeping sacred things pure is enjoined especially by references to the feast of the Passover. The connection of the feast of unleavened bread with the Passover is here assumed. Backwards and forwards the paschal feast is to be kept pure in view of the fact that the blood of the offering (i.e. of the offering emphatically so called, the Passover offering) belongs to Jehovah, that therefore the surrender must be unmixed. In reference to the past, therefore, everything leavened must be removed (Exo 12:15; Exo 12:20). In reference to the future, the fatty parts of the paschal offering, which also belong to Jehovah, must not remain over night, and so serve for ordinary food. They must therefore be burned in the night. That cannot mean, as Knobel understands it, that the fatty pieces are to be at the outset separated from the paschal lamb, as was done with other offerings, since the lamb was to remain whole; but it was natural that the fatty parts would be for the most part left over; and then they were to be burned with the other things left over. Thus these fatty remains, which, however, were not burnt on the altar, became a type of the fatty pieces which were from the first designed for the altar. So then this regulation is made to refer to the more detailed laws of the festivals as found in Lev 2:11, etc. As the Passover was to be contrasted with the ordinary mode of life, so also with the feast of unleavened bread. The three stages are: (1) the old life (leaven); (2) the offering of life (Passover); (3) the beginning of the new life (unleavened bread).

Exo 23:19. Ninth ordinance. Precept in reference chiefly to the feast of weeks, or the first feast of harvest, but with a more general significance. The pentecostal loaves (Lev 23:17) are meant, says Knobel. Keil with reason understands the precept of a bringing of firstlings in general, vid. Num 18:12, Deu 26:2 sqq. The sheaf of barley which was to be offered on the second day of the feast of unleavened bread (Lev 23:10) belongs to the same [Keil]. It may be asked how the expression is to be understood; whether, according to the LXX., followed by Keil, as the first of the first fruits, the first gathering of the first fruits; or, according to Aben Ezra and others, including Knobel (p. 236), as the best, the choicest, of the first fruits. Inasmuch as not the very first that came to hand was also the best, the latter explanation is to be taken as a more precise statement of the other: the first, provided it was the best, or the first-fruits, properly so called (for not even every first-born beast was a true firstling). The chronological element in the term first, however, takes precedence, and forbids every delay and sequestration, according to Exo 22:29. The meaning of these offerings is seen from the liturgical forms prescribed for them in Deu 26:3 sqq., 13 sqq. Everything is a gift from Jehovah; therefore the first fruits are brought back to Him, and their acceptance is effected by the priest, who, however, represents also the Levites, the widows and orphans, and the stranger. As in the N. T. Christ pictures Himself to His church as poor, in the person of the poor and the little ones, so Jehovah in the O. T. symbolically pictures Himself as in a human state of want, in the priests under whose protection all, especially all needy ones stand. So then the church ought continually to care for the poor, as a religious duty.

Exo 23:19. Tenth ordinance. Not boil a kid.This precept seems strange, probably for the reason that it may be in a high degree symbolical. First, we must pronounce incorrect Luthers translation: Not boil the kid while it is at its mothers milk (vid. 1Sa 7:9). Other incorrect interpretations see in Knobel: (1) not to cook and eat meat and milk together; (2) injunction not to use butter instead of the oil of trees; (3) prohibition of an odious barbarity and cruelty. According to Knobel there is a reference to a custom of heathen religions which is to be kept away from the worship of Jehovah. Vid. his commentary, p. 237, where are accounts of Jewish opinions and Arabian usages. Aben Ezra and Abarbanel, he says, mention, the boiling of the kid in milk by the Arabs of their time: and they are right. Up to the present day the Arabs generally boil the flesh of lambs in sour milk, thus giving to it a peculiar relish (Berggren, Reisen, etc.). Further on Knobel, following Spencer, professes to give proofs that a peculiar superstition underlay the custom. But the heathen element, if there was one in the practice, might have been excluded without prohibiting the practice itself. If we assume that the precept in Exo 23:18 referred to the first feast, and was designed to prevent the profanation of the offering, and that the one in Exo 23:19 referred to the second one, and was designed to prevent the neglect of the peace-offering and the priesthood with its family of Levites and of the poor, it is natural, with Abarbanel and others, to refer this precept especially to the third feast; and because this was in the highest degree the joyous feast of the Israelites, it is furthermore probable that this prohibition was designed to prevent a luxury which was inconsistent with simple comfort, and which moreover was hideous in a symbolical point of view, the kid here being, as it were, tortured even in death by the milk of the dam. The same precept condemns all the heathen refinements of festive gormandizing, such as are still practiced (e.g. roasting live animals). This epicurism might also pitch upon the eating of unclean animals or other haut got; vid. Deu 14:21, where the same prohibition is connected with the one before us. Keils explanation, that the practice marked a reversal of the divine order of things in regard to the relation between old and young, is less intelligible than that the kids were a very favorite article of food, according to Gen 27:9; Gen 27:14; Jdg 6:19; Jdg 13:15; 1Sa 16:20. To be sure, the usage considered in its symbolical aspect was a sort of unnature such as the keen sense of natural fitness which characterized the Mosaic laws rejected in every form, so that it even denounced the production of hybrid animals and grains, the mixing of different materials in cloth, as well as human misalliances, Lev 19:19-20.

h. The Promises. Exo 23:20-33

That this last division also of the religio-civil legislation relates to the political commonwealth, is seen from the whole contents of it, especially from Exo 23:22; Exo 23:24 sqq., 27, 33. Knobel calls them Some more promises; Keil, The conduct of Jehovah towards Israel. The promises here given are not some, but a whole; not, however, the whole of Jehovahs promises, but the sum of the civil and political blessings conditioned on good behavior. (1) Protection of angelic guidance, of the religion of revelation; and invincibility founded on religious obedience. (2) Victory over the Canaanites. Possession of the holy land on condition of their purifying the land from idolatry. (3) Abundance of food. (4) Blessing of health. (5) Fertility of man and beast, (6) Long life. (7) The respect and fear of all neighboring peoples. (8) Mysterious control of natural forces in favor of Israel, ver 28. (9) The subjected Canaanites themselves made to serve for the protection of the growth of Israel. (10) Wide extent of territory and sure possession of it on condition of not mingling with the Canaanites and their idolatry.

Exo 23:20-22. First promise. I send an angel.That which the people, as the religious congregation of God, afterwards have imposed upon them as a check on account of their misbehavior (chap. 33), is here promised to the civil congregation as a protection. This cannot well be an anticipation, and cannot, with Knobel, be accounted for on the theory of another narrator who calls this angel . For in Exo 33:2-3 two forms of revelation are clearly distinguished. In Exo 33:18-19 this distinction is between the glory of Jehovah and the goodness of Jehovah. Further on it is said that no one can see the glory in its full display, i.e. Jehovahs face, but can see its reflected splendor as it passes by in sacred obscurity (Exo 23:23). It is therefore a private relation between Jehovah and Moses, when Jehovah speaks with him face to face (Exo 33:11), and hence in Moses consciousness the two degrees of revelation go together. The prophet Moses stands as Abrahams son higher than Moses the lawgiver. So Paul (in Galatians 3) distinguishes positively between the form of revelation which Abraham received and the form of revelation by which the people of Israel received the law (Exo 23:16; Exo 23:19). This difference in degree is presented antithetically as early as in Jer 31:32-34. It harmonizes entirely with this distinction, when the angel of Jehovah first appears to Hagar, Gen 16:7; also in the circumstance that he directs her to return to the household to which she legitimately belonged. Comp. Gen 21:17. Later also the immediate revelations made by God to Abraham are distinguished from the appearance of the angel of Jehovah in a legal aspect, Gen 22:1; Gen 22:11. The difference resembles that between inspiration and manifestation, as these two through ecstatic vision are made to assume forms different in degree. The angel of Jehovah is therefore the revelation of Jehovah for the people of Israel in a predominantly legal relation; hence also the form of the political theocracy as it is instituted through the mediation of Moses and Aaron, chiefly of Moses. The salvation of the people will depend on their obedience to the theocratic religion, as shaped by the higher form of the ceremonial revelation. This angel prepares the way for the Israelites, and conducts them to their goal. His countenance in the theocratic legal institutions is turned towards Israel; Jehovahs name, the revelation of His essential being, is within him, under the cover of this angelic form. He requires awe; he can be easily offended; he punishes acts of disloyalty, for he is legal; hence he goes before Israel as the terror of God to intimidate the enemies. Knobel identifies this Angel of the Lord with the pillar of cloud and fire; and in fact this was a sign of the hidden presence of the angel, Exo 33:9.

Exo 23:23-24. Vid. Gen 15:18 sqq. Annihilation of the public heathen worship in Canaan after its conquest by Israel. That the system of worship was connected with the morals, which were horrible and criminal, is even thus early made prominent. Vid. the parallel passages in Knobel, p. 238.

Exo 23:25. The pure service of Jehovah is the condition of well-being and health; vid. Exo 15:26 : comp. Lev 26:16; Lev 26:25; Deu 28:20. Bread and water, the most important articles of nutrition, symbols of all kinds of welfare.

Exo 23:26. Prevention of miscarriages. Only one item in a whole category: diminution of the population through miscarriages, unchastity, conjugal sins against procreation, exposure of children, etc.; comp. Lev 26:9; Deu 28:11; Deu 30:9; vid. Isa 25:8; Isa 65:23. Respecting the blessing of long life, vid. chap, 20; Deuteronomy 5; 1Co 15:51.

Exo 23:27. My fear.This marks the sphere of intimidating influences exerted by the religious power of Israel on the heathen in general; whereas the hornets (Exo 23:28) represent the terrifying or destructive effects of this power in particular. Vid. Gen 35:5; Exo 15:14; Psa 18:41 (40); Exo 21:13 (12); Jos 7:8; Jos 7:12.

Exo 23:28. Hornets.Vid. Deu 7:20; Wisdom of Solomon Exo 12:8. Says Knobel: According to Joshua 24 the kings of the Amorites, Sihon and Og, were driven out not by Israels weapons, but by the . Elsewhere neither the word nor the thing occurs in the O. T. Different explanations: (1) The promise is literally meant. So Jarchi, Clericus, and others. (2) Plagues in general. So Saadias, Michaelis, and others. (3) The expression is figurative. So most modern interpreters. Yet the text evidently does not mean to identify the hornets with the great general terror of God, as Knobel holds, but distinguishes them from it as small, isolated, but very powerful evils, as Keil, following Augustine, has correctly observed. It is a question even whether the hornets are not meant to represent the same thing as the bees, Deu 1:44; Psa 118:12; Isa 7:18. The bee frightens by the multitude of the irresistible swarm; the hornets by the frightful attack and sting of the individual insect. In the petty religious and moral conflicts between Judaism and heathenism, civilized Christian nations and barbarians, Indians, and other savages, it is just these hornets, these thousand-fold particular sources of terror, moral thorns, and even physical stings, under which the enemies gradually succumb. The three Canaanitish nations which are here named denote the totality; perhaps, however, in the heathen trinity may be found a reference to the spiritual impotence of heathenism.

Exo 23:29. Not in one year.Comp. Deu 7:22; Lev 26:22; Eze 14:15; Eze 14:21; 2Ki 17:25; Jos 13:1-7. From this it appears that the destruction denounced by Jehovah on the Canaanites was intended primarily for them in their collective and public capacity, not for the individuals. The individuals, in so far as they submit, Jehovah will allow, as individuals, to live; and to live, in so far as they remain heathen and enemies, for the purpose of preventing the wild beasts from getting the upper hand and diminishing the number of the people of Israel, which as yet is far too small to subdue the wild beasts, and the wildness of nature in general. The higher races of mankind are still indebted for this service to the lowest races throughout the five continents. Even savages constitute still a sort of barrier against what is monstrous in nature, which without them would lapse into wildness. These Canaanites serve this purpose only as being incorrigible. In proportion as nature is reclaimed, they sink away. It was therefore not the fact that these individuals continued to live in Israel, but that the Israelites mingled with them, which led to ruinous consequences. Comp. Judges 1, 2.

Exo 23:31. Set thy bounds.Vid. Gen 15:18. The Red Sea on the souththe sea of the Philistines, or Mediterranean Sea, on the westthe Arabian desert on the east (Deu 11:24), the Euphrates on the north. These ideal boundaries are assured to the Israelites, in so far as they conduct themselves in relation to the heathen according to the ideal standard. Forming alliances with the heathen and recognizing their political existence would not of itself be actual apostasy, but it would be a snare to the Israelites through which they would be drawn into idolatry by way of false consistency in the policy of toleration. The lesson is to be applied even at the present day. The several precepts are given by Knobel, p. 241.

Footnotes:

[1][Exo 21:8. The Hebrew here, according to the Kthibh, is , and if this were followed, we should have to translate with Geddes, Rosenmller and others: so that he hath not betrothed (or will not betroth) her. The Kri reads , unto him or unto himself. This yields much the easiest sense, and is especially confirmed by the consideration that of itself means, not betroth, but appoint, destine. Followed by the Dative, it may in the connection convey the notion of betrothal; but used absolutely, it cannot convey it.Tr.]

[2][Exo 21:13. cannot mean deliver, and no object is expressed. It is therefore unwarrantable to render, with A. V., deliver him, or even with Lange, let him accidentally fall into his hand. The object to be supplied is the indefinite one suggested by the preceding sentence, viz. homicide.Tr.]

[3][Exo 21:17. , though generally rendered curse in A. V., yet differs unmistakably from in being used not merely of cursing, but of evil speaking in general, e.g. Jdg 9:27 and 2Sa 16:9. The LXX. render it correctly by . And this word, where the passage is quoted in the New Testament, is rendered by the same Greek word, viz. Mat 15:4.Tr.]

[4][Exo 21:23. The Heb. reads , lit. with judges or among judges. Some render unto the judges; others before the judges; but the preposition does not naturally convey either of these senses. The A. V. probably expresses the true meaning: with judges, i.e. the line being judicially imposed.Tr.]

[5][Exo 22:29. Literally: thy fullness and thy tear. The phrase ripe fruits is objectionable as including too much; liquors as suggesting a wrong conception. The first refers to the crops generally, exclusive of the olive and the grape, from which oil and wine, the liquid products (tear), were derived. Cranmers Bible renders, not inaptly: thy fruits, whether they be dry or moist.Tr.]

[6][Exo 23:5. The rendering of A. V.: and wouldest forbear, is utterly untenable. Not less so is the rendering of by help. The simplest explanation assumes a double meaning of , viz. to loose, and to leave. We might borrow a vulgar phrase, and read: Thou shalt forbear to cut loose from him, thou shalt cut loose with him. De Wette and Murphy attempt to avoid the double meaning by emphasizing with. Thus: Thou shalt forbear to leave it to him: thou shalt leave it with him. But this is a nicety quite alien from the Hebrew.Tr.]

[7][The reasons are thus stated by Keil: If the language in Exo 21:9 is referred to the son, so as to mean, when he takes to himself another wife, then there must be assumed a change of subject of which there is no indication; but if we understand the language to mean that the father (the purchaser) takes to himself another wife, then this precept ought to have been given before Exo 21:9.Tr.]

[8][This explanation of the order of the verses can hardly he regarded as satisfactory. In fact, any attempt to discover deep metaphysical or psychological reasons for the order and number of these laws is open to suspicion as implying a degree of subtlety and regard for logical order which was quite alien from the Hebrew spirit.Tr.]

[9][Viz. that the omission of the direction, he shall surely be put to death, implies that his punishment was something milder; as does also the spirit of the precept in Exo 21:21.Tr.]

[10][According to whom, the Egyptians punished all murders with death; the Greeks punished all murders, but punished the murder of a slave only by requiring certain expiatory rites; the Roman law, however, until the time of the emperors, allowed masters to treat their slaves as they pleased.Tr.]

[11][See also Smiths Bible Dictionary, Art. Weights and Measures.Tr.]

[12][I.e., about 60 or 62 cents. Mr. Poole, in the article above referred to, makes the silver shekel = 220 grains, i.e., about 53 cents, or 2 shillings and 2 pence.Tr.]

[13][The difference, says Keil, l. c., cannot be explained by the consideration that the animal slaughtered or sold was lost to its owner, while yet it may have had for him a special individual value (Knobel), for such regard for personal feelings is foreign to the law, to say nothing of the fact that an animal when sold might have been regained by purchase; nor by the consideration that the thief in that case has carried his crime to a higher point (Baumgarten), for the main thing was the stealing, not the disposition or consumption of the stolen object. The reason can have lain only in the educational aim of the law, viz., to induce the thief to think of himself, recognize his sin, and restore what he has stolen.Tr.]

[14][This is a mistake. Knobel translates: If God makes (one) a malefactor, (i.e. if the court decides that a misdemeanor has been committed), then he shall restore double to his neighbor. And in opposition to the translation. whichever one God condemns, he shall restore double, he says, How could the plaintiff be condemned to make restitution, if he, even though the complaint was ungrounded, had yet taken nothing from the other?Tr.]

[15][The majority of interpreters (like the A. V.) regard as referring to the beast, not the borrower. Knobel explains thus: If the beast was not merely lent out of kindness, but let for pay, the loss comes upon the hire by the receipt of which the owner is paid. In fixing the hire he had regard to the danger of the loss, and, when the loss takes place, must content himself with the hire. So Keil. The explanation of Knobels above referred to by Lange, is a second one, evidently not preferred by Knobel, but merely stated as possible, especially in view of the fact that everywhere else is used of men.Tr.]

[16][Knobels conjecture is that instead of (and a poor man) we should read (a great man)since in Lev 19:15 it is the mighty who is not to be honored, and partiality to the poor was not to be anticipated, and needed not to be forbidden. Keil replies that this is sufficiently answered by the fact that the same passage has a command not to respect the person of the poor.Tr.]

[17][Hitzig l. c. holds that means the new moon of the month of green earsto which Knobel replies that in that case the phrase time appointed would be superfluous; that the Hebrew expression, if means new moon, would have to be rendered new moon of the green earsa very improbable translation; and that according to Lev 23:6 the festival was to begin on the fifteenth day of the month, i.e., at the time of the full moon.Tr.]

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

CONTENTS

For the better apprehension of the moral law before given in the second table of it, Moses enlargeth in this Chapter upon the particular precepts, in relation to the duty to be shown to servants, and the regulation of conduct, in many circumstances of social life.

Exo 21:1

We shall find but little occasion, to enlarge on the several parts of the Chapter; the statutes here appointed by God, and which of themselves arise out of our duties to him, plainly comprise all the secondary, and subordinate obligations we owe to one another. That maxim of the apostle’s is an universal maxim. 1Jn 4:20-21 .

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Exo 21:1

The Maker’s Laws, whether they are promulgated in Sinai thunder, to the ear or imagination, or quite otherwise promulgated, are the Laws of God; transcendent, everlasting, demanding obedience from all men. The Universe is made by Law; the great Soul of the World is just and not unjust. Look then, if thou have eyes or soul left, into this Shoreless Incomprehensible; into the heart of its tumultuous Appearances, Embroilments and mad Time-Vortexes, is there not, silent, eternal, an All-just, an All-beautiful; sole Reality and ultimate controlling power of the Whole? This is not a figure of speech; this is a fact.

Carlyle, Past and Present.

The Egyptians were the first people upon the earth who emerged into what is now called civilization. How they lived, how they were governed during the tens of hundreds of generations which intervened between their earliest and latest monuments, there is little evidence to say. At the date when they become distinctly visible they present the usual features of effete Oriental societies; the labour executed by slave gangs, and a rich luxurious minority spending their time in feasting and revelry. Wealth accumulated, Art flourished. Enormous engineering works illustrated the talent or ministered to the vanity of the priestly and military classes. The favoured of fortune basked in perpetual sunshine. The millions sweated in the heat under the lash of the taskmaster and were paid with just so much of the leeks and onions and flesh-pots as would continue them in a condition to work. Of these despised wretches some hundreds of thousands were enabled by Providence to shake off the yoke, to escape over the Red Sea into the Arabian desert, and there receive a code of laws under which they were to be governed in the land where they were to be planted.

What were these laws? A revelation of the true God was bestowed on them, from which, as from a fountain, a deeper knowledge of the Divine Nature was to flow out over the earth; and the central thought of it was the realization of the Divine government not in a vague hereafter, but in the living present. The unpractical prospective justice which had become an excuse for tyranny was superseded by an immediate justice in time. They were to reap the harvest of their deeds, not in heaven, but on earth. There was no life in the grave whither they were going. The future state was withdrawn from their sight till the mischief which it had wrought was forgotten. It was not denied, but it was veiled in a cloud. It was left to private opinion to hope or to fear; but it was no longer held out either as an excitement to piety or a terror to evildoers. The God of Israel was a living God, and His power was displayed visibly and immediately in rewarding the good and punishing the wicked while they remained in the flesh.

It would be unbecoming to press the parallel, but phenomena are showing themselves which indicate that an analogous suspension of belief provoked by the same causes may possibly be awaiting ourselves. It may be that we require once more to have the living certainties of the Divine government brought home to us more palpably; that a doctrine which has been the consolation of the heavy-laden for eighteen hundred years may have generated once more a practical infidelity; and that by natural and intelligent agencies, in the furtherance of the everlasting purposes of our Father in heaven, the belief in a life beyond the grave may again be about to be withdrawn.

Froude, Short Studies, vol. II.

References. XXI. 5, 6. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xx. No. 1174. XXII. 21, 22. H. Adler, The Orphan and the Helpless, Sermons, 1855-84. XXII. 29. R. B. Brindley, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xl. p. 41.

Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson

Minor Legislation

Exodus 21-22

We have just heard the ten words. They deafened us For a time we could not sufficiently discriminate between the accompaniments and the words themselves, for they were all blended in a most majestic and solemn music. Immediately following the ten words we find the almost endless details relating to human conduct and society which fill these chapters. The details are called “judgments,” and they were spoken by the Lord whose voice was heard in the great thunders of Sinai. It is the same Lord; but how different is the voice! What a quiet tone pervades the utterance of the judgments! Was it really so quiet? or quiet only by contrast? What voice would not seem to be quietness itself after the reverberations of the thunder that shook the mount of God? In the one case, we have what we may term a very agony of legislation; in the second, a tranquil conversation or a private instruction. The figure which suggests itself instantly to the mind upon reading the twentieth chapter of Exodus and those chapters immediately following, is the figure of a torrent succeeded by a river. In the commandments we have a cataract rushing with infinite force; in the judgments we have that same cataract softened and quieted down into deep fluent water. If in the commandments, distinctively so called, we see the Sovereignty and Majesty of God, in the judgments we see the Fatherhood and gentleness of the Lord. In the commandments he stands far away from us, and drops upon the staggering earth syllables of lightning that make men afraid, hence the people said unto Moses, “Speak thou with us, and we will hear; but let not God speak with us lest we die.”

Some voices need to be accommodated to the hearing that is infirm. The great thunder cannot be borne seven days a week. To hear it now and again is a sacred and memorable event; but we were not made so frail are we constantly to be addressed by thunder and tempest. As if God had heard the request, he gave Moses the instruction which fills these two chapters. The tone of this minor legislation, if it may be so called, is full of Divine care for Divine work. The provisions of this code relate specifically to life. They are, as it were, commandments which God addresses to himself and which he then remits to the people. He will take care of everything he has made; nothing escapes his attention. He did not make the eye for nothing, or the ear as an exercise of his power for the gratification of his vanity. Every hair of the head is claimed by him who made it. “If a man smite the eye of his servant, or the eye of his maid, that it perish; he shall let him go free for his eye’s sake.” We can trust this legislator, he cares for the serving man, for the serving woman. What price does he put upon the smitten and perished eye? Liberty! In truth, he values his creatures highly. Not one day’s rest, not one week’s remission from labour, not one year’s holiday; but liberty! “And if he smite out his manservant’s tooth, or his maidservant’s tooth, he shall let him go free for his tooth’s sake.” What a singular balance! In the one scale a tooth, wickedly struck out, cruelly injured; in the other scale liberty! Surely, the injured man has in some sense the best of it. Yet only in a local and narrow way: for truly interpreted, nothing can compare in value with anything the Lord God has made. The Maker charges highly for all his works. You must not trifle with your own eye, with your own tooth, with your own fingers, they are God’s. “Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost?” Are you still under the narrow baptism that teaches that a man’s eye is his own, or his tooth, or his hand, or his ear? Into what baptism have you been baptised? Not into the baptism of Christ, if you are trusting to these base sophisms. “Whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord.” We have nothing that we have not received. We are not our own; we are bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body, which is Christ’s. Whilst men are careless about the body, they cannot be careful about the soul. You cannot be careful about one part of God’s work and careless about another. A great argument sets in here. We must watch its majestic construction and prepare for its gracious and solemn application. In these two chapters everything goes down before manhood. The master has a writing by which he claims some property in the servant, but that covenant goes down before the manhood of the person who is held in temporary servitude. Man first, institutions next. “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.” Nothing you can build up around man is so precious as the man himself. This is the central truth of Divine revelation. In fact this explains everything which makes up the mystery and the singular characteristic of the Bible. Philosophers endeavour to render in some brief and memorable formula the result of all investigations, here is one which will serve our purpose in the meantime. The value which God sets upon man is the key-thought of the Scriptures. He begins now with some solicitude about the eye, and the tooth, and the limb, by-and-by, who can tell what he will say? These are but alphabetic signs, symbols, suggestions, who knows what literature he will work out of these few initial signs? We must watch critically and religiously the outgoing and whole issue of these, comparatively speaking, insignificant and trivial beginnings. There is nothing trivial in heaven. All little laws are ruled by laws greater than themselves. This also is a principle in the Biblical philosophy, if we neglect it we shall come speedily and hopelessly into great moral confusion. You may be narrowly right and broadly wrong. You may be operating by a little and temporary law at the expense of an eternal and irreversible statute or judgment Divine. Said the tempter to Christ, “All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.” It is right to have the “things”; there is nothing whatsoever wrong in the temporary proprietorship of the things of earth and time. The law quoted “All these things will I give thee” is right enough within given limits. What is the greater law that over-reaches this, swallows it up? That greater law is, “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.” All gifts, all possessions, all rights, interests, institutions, expedients, understandings, covenants, must be held in obedience to that sovereign and all-absorbing law.

The Divine care of the body is the beginning of a still wider and grander care. In the Old Testament the Lord could only begin with the body; any other speech would have been out of time, and, being out of season, would not have been understood. Its utterance would have created a perplexing mystery in the mind of man, and therefore would have led to all manner of misconception and misadventure. So the Lord begins by promising men land, and if the term land is not enough, he adds, the land is “flowing with milk and honey.” The ancient man heard these words and understood them. Had he been promised a new realm of thought, a new imagination, a higher universe of dreams, he would not have understood the appeal. God promised his ancient ones length of days, the only promise of the kind they could have understood. The world was not then prepared for the great word Immortality, Eternal Life. So the Lord must begin according to the infancy of his pupils. They were but children; they would be pleased with milk and honey, and broad lands, long long life. That was not the Divine meaning. The Lord could only rest for a moment in such a tabernacle as that. He never puts up a tabernacle without meaning a temple; he never offers land without meaning heaven, or length of days without meaning immortality. Blessed are they who have the inner eyes to see, in the little covenant written with ink, the beginning of a greater covenant which cannot be written, for no sea could hold ink enough nor would the firmament be broad enough to write the amazing stipulation.

If we could read these judgments regarding the body and society aright, we should feel that the Legislator must go farther into spiritual regions and into the most profoundly solemn religious issues. Reading along this line, given in these chapters, we become prepared for further communication. There is a spirit in man, and that spirit says we cannot rest in such judgments as these; we feel that these judgments must of necessity he but beginnings. The Atonement is in the very protoplasm of things; the Cross is in creation. We have too sharply and narrowly cut things into pieces as if they were not related to one another. Hear, oh Israel! the Lord our God is one Lord, and the law is one, and creation is one, and the ox, and the ass, and the bird, and the dog, and the wolf, and the worm, all these are parts of an infinite quantity. The Atonement is not an after-thought, an arrangement which the infinite Mind made to meet a temporary necessity. This is the meaning of “foreknowledge,” and “predestination,” and “election,” and all the words which to some minds have been so grim and terrible. The very first thing that God did contains in suggestion and possibility everything he can ever do. Could we seize that thought we should be at rest! God can do but one thing. Had we the eyes to see and the ears to hear things innermost and eternal, we should know that God’s first word was also his last. “I am Alpha and Omega.” When God said, “Let there be light,” he said all he has ever said or can ever say! The rest is detail; the rest is explanation given to infantile and backward minds. Constituted as we are, we require bulk as well as quality. God must not be too concise for our dense minds: he must put his word into a thousand shapes and utter it in a thousand tones before some of us can begin to understand that he has actually spoken at all. How lost we have become in the bulk, in the quantitive department of revelation, not knowing that when God said, in the first chapter of Genesis, “Let there be light,” he had no more to say. Everything is in light. It chases the darkness, it shows things as they are, it develops capacities and completes actions and uses; it is the revealer, it is as the Spirit of God amongst us. Men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil. When light comes and the darkness flees away, we shall be in God’s bright heaven.

There is an undoubted law of evolution in what may be called the Bible view of Providence. Find out that God cares for any one thing he has made, and all the rest of his Fatherhood is involved in that one act. Such is the argument of Jesus Christ; he said: “God cares for oxen.” That involves the whole evolution of the Fatherhood. Said Christ: “Not a sparrow falleth to the ground without your Father,” if so the Atonement is there; the whole mystery of the Cross is in that vigilance of God. Said the Saviour: “The very hairs of your head are all numbered,” if so, the Atonement is the culmination of that elementary principle, care, ministry on the part of God. Grand is the view of evolution from a scientific point. It is a noble and majestic thought. Say that God created molecule or germ, requiring the most powerful microscope which man can construct or detect; or say that it is too minute to be brought within the power of any microscope yet constructed; say that out of that all the rest came by persistence of force by what law you please it fills the mind with a nobler wonder, it constrains from the enlightened soul a higher yet profounder adoration. You but increase the mystery of the Godhead and the majesty of his government.

It is so with the great question of Providence, law, and care for man. Given, that God cares for the least thing he ever made that he asks for it, claims it and you have in that assumption all the sphering out of ministries of care, and watchfulness, and love; yea, in God’s claiming any leaf of the forest he ever made, any insect of the air he ever created, or brought into being by processes we cannot describe having assumed that, you have involved in that assumption Atonement, Providence, Resurrection all the mysteries of the gospel. God does not stop at points. The Lord’s system of things is not incoherent and unrelated. The mystery is beyond all words. Yet when we say “God over all, blessed for evermore,” we use a form of expression which relieves the heart which is burdened with holy gratitude. Man is puzzled by details yet man will persist in plunging into the very middle of the Bible as if he could read it in that way. Man seems but in rare instances to have the power of setting himself right back at a proper point of view and seeing the movement of God, so far as the human family is concerned, in its totality.

So we read the commandments one by one, and ask if we have obeyed this or that. We have just seen men priding themselves upon pet virtues and upon special commandments which have never been violated; we have endeavoured to expose that sophism. The commandments are one; if we have broken one, we have broken all. Thus condensed may all things be, yet out of that condensation may all things rise as universes out of molecules, constellations out of quantities too small for microscopic recognition. This is the abbreviation of the judgment; this is bringing things back to the single point by which everything must be criticised and determined. We cannot be profound scholars in this book if we are reading it verse by verse, if we are building our life upon chapters and verses. The very breaking up of the Bible into this form is only for preliminary and infantile purposes. The Bible is one, a line, a flash of light, a tone, a spirit; it is not to be quoted in the last result; it is to be breathed; it is to be lived. Oppose the Bible! They do so who do not know it. Revelation is the indestructible fact, could we but come into the sanctuary of things and weigh them with the golden balances of the Divine appointment. Follow not those who, having found isolated texts or curious discrepancies, suppose that they are in a position to assail the citadel of revelation and overthrow the temple of faith, blind leaders of the blind! “they will fall into the ditch”!

How bold a book is the Bible! What other book cares thus for man? God always looks after his child. He will have such arrangements made as never to allow the supreme value of man as a Divine creation to be ignored. Given that sublime conviction and acknowledgment, then you may have your temporary arrangements of high low, employer employed, master servant, and the like. But all these little laws, necessary for a society in a process of education, must submit themselves for periodical criticism and judgment to the supreme law. One is your Master, One is your Judge. What book, let us ask again and again, cares so much for man as the Bible does? Not one. Keep it in your families, it will keep the father in his place, and the child in his place, and give a blessing to each. Keep it in your politics, it will teach men to do unto others as they would have others to do unto them. Keep it in your business, it will burn your false measuring rod and destroy your unequal balances, and be just to persons on both sides of the commercial counter. Hold up the Bible; read it in the right tone; distribute the emphases with the inspiration wrought in the soul by the Holy Ghost; let the Bible itself in its own language, in its own way, in its own spirit, be heard, circulated, understood; and even yet we may rescue it from the hands of the conjuror, tear it away from the hands of the priest, and make it God’s own word to God’s own children.

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

Bye-laws

Exodus 21-23

Amongst these bye-laws there are some sayings which may be considered hard, and on reading them we may ask in almost plaintive and despairing tones, “Who is sufficient for these things?” There are also some out-of-the-way responsibilities, which only Divine wisdom and justice could in the then state of society have imposed. We must not permit ourselves to lose the religious philosophy and the religious beneficence of the Mosaic legislation by going back upon it with our Christian instincts and culture. We must forget all we have ever learned in the Christian school, and think ourselves back into the comparative barbarism of the age. Then we shall see a light above the brightness of the sun, and feel round about us an influence which cannot be satisfactorily explained without taking into account the possibility of supernatural existence and Divine sovereignty. We shall lose the whole meaning of ancient writings, so far as their religious philosophy is concerned, if we compare them to their disadvantage with Christian standards and the advanced civilisation of the day in which we live. Critically examined, fibre by fibre as it were, this is not crude legislation; there is nothing rough and ready in this distribution of offices, duties, and obligations. This legislation is, on the contrary, highly spiritual in its assumptions, and full of sublime tribute to the nature which is addressed. The dignity of law pre-supposes the dignity of man. Little laws for little creatures, great laws for great beings that is the philosophy of the Bible system. Looked at, therefore, narrowly and critically, we shall find that, however crude in appearance may be some of these bye-laws, the substance under them, and of which they may be said to be the mere phenomena, is a holy quantity, a Divine substratum, nothing less than God, the Eternal Creator and Sovereign.

Without attempting to go through all the bye-laws, we can touch them here and there with sufficient distinctness and sympathy to understand the whole scheme of which some parts are here quoted.

“And if men strive together, and one smite another with a stone, or with his fist, and he die not, but keepeth his bed: if he rise again, and walk abroad upon his staff, then shall he that smote him be quit: only he shall pay for the loss of his time, and shall cause him to be thoroughly healed” ( Exo 21:18-19 ).

Are our little personal strifes noted in heaven? The answer is: Yes, every one of them. But can men strive together? Properly looked at, that would seem to be the harder question of the two. Coming suddenly upon a line of this kind, we should exclaim, in surprise, “The assumption is impossible. We must begin our criticism of a statement of this kind by rejecting its probability, and, that being done, there is no case left. How can men strive together? Men are brothers, men are rational creatures, men recognise one another’s rights, and interests, and welfare; society is not a competition, but a fraternal and sacred emulation; therefore, the assumption that men can strive together is a false one, and, the foundation being false, the whole edifice totters down.” That would be fine theory, that would be sweet poetry, it might almost be thrown into rhyme, but there are the facts staring us in the face. What are those facts? That all life is a strife, that every man in some way or degree, or at some time, begrudges the room which every other man takes up. The tragedy of Cain and Abel has never ceased, and can never cease until we become children of the Second Adam. Great degrees of modification may, of course, take effect. The vulgarity of smiting may be left to those who are in a low state of life who are, in fact, in barbarous conditions; but they who smite with the fist are not the cruellest of men. There is a refined smiting a daily, bitter, malignant opposition; there is a process of mutual undermining, or outreaching, or outrunning, in the very spirit of which is found the purpose of murder. But mark how beneficence enters into the arrangement here laid down. Not only is the man who smote his brother to pay for the loss of his brother’s time; that would be a mere cash transaction. There are men ready enough to buy themselves out of any obligation; a handful of gold is nothing. Their language is, “Take it, and let us be free.” That would be poor legislation in some cases, though heavy enough in others. To some men money has no meaning; they have outlived all its influences; they are so rich that they can bribe and pay, and secure silence or liberty by a mere outputting of the hand. But the beneficence is in the next clause, “and shall cause him to be thoroughly healed.” The man must be made as good as he was before, therefore he must be inquired about; he must be taken an interest in; he must become a quantity in the life of the man who injured him, and, however impatient the man who inflicted the injury may become under such chafing, the impatience itself may be turned to good account. Some men can be taught philanthropy by only such rough and urgent schoolmasters.

“If an ox gore a man or a woman, that they die: then the ox shall be surely stoned, and his flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox shall be quit. But if the ox were wont to push with his horn in time past, and it hath been testified to his owner, and he hath not kept him in, but that he hath killed a man or a woman; the ox shall be stoned, and his owner also shall be put to death” ( Exo 21:28-29 ).

In the one case provision is made against what we term an accident, and accidents are treated within their own narrow limits; but from accident we pass to purpose. The ox was “wont to push with his horn in time past,” the ox was known to the owner to be an unmanageable ox; notice had been given to the owner of the temper of the ox; the ox, in short, had won for itself a bad character and reputation. If the owner allowed such an ox to go where danger and injury were possible, the owner was not released on the plea that an accident had occurred: he was held guilty of manslaughter. Is that ox still living? Yes. Is it possible that there are men to day who have oxen “wont to push with their horns,” and who have killed ten thousand men, and are yet permitted to live and carry on this work of devastation? Do not fritter away the meaning of the injunction by fixing on the literal term, ox. The meaning is not to be confined within any one definition; the great solemn meaning is this: If your trade, occupation, method of life, is inflicting injury anywhere, and you have been made aware of it, you are responsible for the injury that has been done, and you cannot throw off that responsibility. It was not the ox that did it, it was the owner of the ox. Guilt comes home to man. How stands the case? Each must answer for himself. The case applies to ministers of the Gospel, and teachers of every kind of doctrine. If a man preach any doctrine that poisons the life of the hearer, that degrades his best ambition, that narrows and diminishes his life’s quantity, that fills him with discontent, peevishness, distrust, and jealousy; and if that preacher has been made aware of the effects of his doctrine, he is responsible for all the heart-ache, for all the up-breaking of life, for all the poisoning of health, and, at the last, hell will be too good a lot for so huge a murderer. The same applies to all men who lecture upon platforms, or who issue vicious books or other literature from the press. Whoever is guilty of the propagation of ideas that injure life, that impair its majesty, and that crush its best endeavours, is a murderer, and he must be held liable for the consequences of his deed. I fix the charge thus particularly upon those who are in the spiritual and intellectual function, that I may the more broadly and pungently suggest the lesson to every man in every other sphere and line of life that he may apply the doctrine to himself. This is the Divine doctrine: it is the rational doctrine, it is the right doctrine. There is nothing so supernatural about this as to cause us to resent it on the ground of its being supermundane, too lofty for us to realise. Reason is satisfied; conscience says “Amen”; the just heart rises up and says, “The judgment is true and righteous; let it stand.” But what a revolution would be created in all teaching, in all commerce, in all social relations, if this one bye-law, respecting the “ox wont to push with his horn,” were carried out this day!

“If a man shall steal an ox, or a sheep, and kill it, or sell it; he shall restore five oxen for an ox, and four sheep for a sheep” ( Exo 22:1 ).

That is the only way of getting at a thief. You cannot reason with him. He dismissed his reason before he committed his felony. He had first to strangle his reason; he committed murder in the sanctuary of his soul before he committed theft in the fields of his neighbour. What then is to be done with him? He must be made to feel the folly of theft; he must be made to feel that theft is a bad investment; he must be made to feel that he has played the fool even in the excess of his cleverness. The thief would be made to know what dishonesty is, when for the one ox he must pay five in its place. He could have evaded an argument; he could have doubled upon a covenant, and have quibbled about the ambiguity of its terms; but he could not shuffle out of this four-square arithmetical arrangement. Five oxen for an ox, four sheep for a sheep; and by the time the thief had played at that game two or three days, he would have put on the garb, at least, of an honest man!

“If fire break out, and catch in thorns, so that the stacks of corn, or the standing corn, or the field, be consumed therewith; he that kindled the fire shall surely make restitution” ( Exo 22:6 ).

This is right. The Bible really builds upon granite bases; there is nothing merely fanciful in this legislation. This is sound common-sense, and common-sense in the long run wins the esteem and confidence of the world. No man may trifle with bread. Bad enough to burn down any kind of property; but to consume stacks of corn is to commit murder with both hands; to light the standing corn when it waves in the fields is to thrust a knife, not into one heart, but into the very life of society. How can restitution be made? It cannot be made. You cannot replace corn; money bears no relation to corn; corn is not an arithmetical quantity. Destroyed bread is destroyed life. Who destroys bread? He who makes poison of it; he who turns it into a drink that takes away the reason and deposes the conscience of men. He who holds back the bread-stuff until the time of famine that he may increase his own riches by an enhanced market value is not a political economist, unless, under such circumstances, a political economist is a heartless murderer. And if it is wicked to set fire to corn, is it a light or frivolous matter to set fire to convictions, faiths the bread-stuff of the soul? Is he guiltless who takes away the bread of life, the bread sent down from heaven? Is he a pardonable incendiary who burns down the altar which was a stairway to the light, or reduces to ashes the Church which was a refuge in the day of storm?

“If thou meet thine enemy’s ox or his ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back to him again. If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden, and wouldest forbear to help him, thou shalt surely help with him” ( Exo 23:4-5 ).

Man never imposed that law. That is not a trick of human wisdom. It is too profound, too exacting, too full of implications of the noblest kind to have been invented by human nature. Who would not take vengeance upon his enemy’s ox? Who would not hamstring the bullock? Who would not be pleased to see his enemy’s ox going astray, running furiously mayhap along the wrong road? Who would not felicitate himself on such an occurrence, and think with cruel gladness about his enemy’s disappointment and loss? But the other picture is more vivid still: “If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden.”. The enemy himself would be present personally or representatively, because the ass is not unburdened but burdened; he is, therefore, upon an appointed road and journey. Who would not rather taunt his enemy with the petty disaster and tell him to send for his friends to help him, and not to his hated and hating ones? “Who is sufficient for these things?”

But this is Judaism? It is humanism. But this old law is abolished? No, never can be abolished. It is one of the very laws which Jesus Christ came to “fulfil.” Who can do it? To help the cause of a friend would be a pleasure, but to lift up the burden from the back of the ass of an enemy tears us in pieces: tests our quality. Nor can we do it in a mere law-keeping spirit. We know that to keep this law we must be above the law; grace must have begun its redeeming and inspiring ministry in our hearts before we can keep this law in the perfectness of its meaning. We have all opportunities of doing honour to this law. Our enemies need help to day. The man who spoke basely about us may need bread at our hand at this moment; his trade is in a bad way, though a good trade in itself. We could bring custom to his hand, and help him out of his embarrassments. If we hesitate to do so we must no longer bear the Christian name. Do release Jesus Christ from the responsibility involved in such reluctance, or in such disobedience. First let him go! We cannot love Christ and hate an enemy.

But is not sentiment now supplanting law? Have we not left the marble halls of justice, and entered a chamber decked with coverings of tapestry? Certainly not. Read on:

“Neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause” ( Exo 23:3 ).

There is no mere sentiment in that. The meaning is: A man is not to be excused because he is poor. The effect of the law is, that a man is not to be treated with mere pity on the ground of his poverty; the judge is not to say “If you had been a rich man you would have been punished, but being a poor man we take pity upon you.” When a man stands before the law, he stands neither rich nor poor; he stands as one who appeals to the law of right; he is there as a criminal: let him prove his innocence. So the Bible is not softly sentimental. It has not one law for the great, and another for the small, one ordinance for the rich, and another for the poor; it is exceeding broad, it is impartial, it has in it the elements and the guarantees of complete security.

And is it all law hard, iron, pitiless law? Is all life reduced to a schedule of regulations an infinite placard of times, seasons, appointments of a merely hireling kind, so much equivalent for so much labour? Read on:

“Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year. Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou earnest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty): and the feast of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in thy field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field” ( Exo 23:14-16 ).

There is to be feasting as well as law-keeping; there is to be a recognition of the Lawgiver as well as a continual attempt to obey the letter of the law. There was to be a feast of memory the liberation from Egypt there was to be a feast of firstfruits, and there was to be a feast of ingathering. When men put the sickle into the wheatfield there was to be a feast unto the Lord. Fifty days were supposed to elapse between the putting in of the sickle and the full ingathering of the harvest. At the end of the fifty days, there was to be a feast of ingathering, a looking up into heaven, a recognition of the Divine and supernatural element in life. They whose faces had been towards the earth, and whose hands had been put out in daily labour, were to look up to heaven and stretch out the hands to the skies, and to say by attitude and by voice, “We are not the hirelings of men: we are the servants of the living God.” We need these festivals; we need the holy day; we are better for touching one another in Christian companionship and worship. We ought to be the more righteous, the more lofty, for spending one hour in the house consecrated to Jehovah’s praise. We cannot keep the law in all the fulness of Christian obedience until we have been with Christ, and learned of him. It is not our enemy’s ox that is in distress, but our enemy himself. We are not called upon to study the mere framework of regulated society, and to attend to enactments and stipulations which will keep that society in skeleton-outline together; we have not come into a political society, but into a Christian brotherhood. We are not to be kept back from smiting only that we have outlived long ago but we have to come into the spirit of forgiveness, largest pardon, multiplied, heaped up, forgiveness and pardon yea, here we may resort to all tautology of expression, if in the infinite redundance of our speech we do but give some feeble hint of the passion of love that has been created in our hearts by the Spirit of the Cross of Christ.

Thus the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ, and Christ came not to abolish the law, even about ox, and ass, and theft, and burning of standing corn, but to fulfil it, to glorify it, to carry it up to higher meaning, and thus to consolidate the New Society his Church and make it infinitely precious and secure.

We look with some curiosity upon all these endless laws and exactions, and think ourselves well quit of a mechanism so detailed and vexatious. Herein we rejoice before the time. We are not quit of one of them. Is not our life also set in a marvellous network of law? If all the laws which are continually operating upon us and impoverishing us by their taxation could be set down in a book, we should marvel with exceeding astonishment at the mechanism under which our own boasted liberty is breathing. We call ourselves free, and rejoice that all the exactions of the past are done away, and that now it lies very much with our own will to say when life’s work shall begin and end and of what it shall exactly consist. We enjoy no such liberty. We cannot put our foot down upon any point of the earth that is not throbbing with the energy of law. Not a hand can be put out that is not entangled in the meshes of never-ceasing ordinances of life and nature. Cause and effect proceed eternally. The seedtime and the harvest are still linked by bonds that cannot be sundered. The evil-doer finds a thorn in his pillow every night. The oppressor is made to feel that he himself is under domination. Every morning has its duty, every night its sacrifice; the whole year round is but one unceasing opportunity for self-expenditure and self-control. Our liberty consists in our being able to do all the law requires with a steadier hand and a loftier purpose. The law itself is not susponded. Not one moment less of time does God demand; not one penny less of gold, not one thought less of spiritual consecration and intensity of mind; only by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ we have come to such complete devotion of soul that what aforetime was grievous is now pleasant, and what at the beginning was almost impossible has now become the chief delight of life. Never suppose that law has been lessened in its force or in its details; the effort is wholly on the other side, that we ourselves have been blessed with greater power and have been brought into sweet consent with the Divine purpose.

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

XII

THE COVENANT AT SINAI ITS GENERAL FEATURES

Exo 19:1-24:11

The covenant at Sinai is the central part of the Old Testament. There is no more important part than the giving of the law on Mount Sinai, coupled with all of the transactions that took place while the children of Israel remained there. We first discuss, in catechetical form, the covenant in its general features.

1. Describe the place of the covenant.

Ans. The name of the place is sometimes called Sinai and sometimes Horeb. Moses himself calls it each one. Horeb is the range of mountains of which Sinai is the chief peak. So you speak truly when you say that the law was given at Horeb and at Sinai. But that there is a distinction between the two, you have only to see that at Rephidim, where the rock was smitten, it was a part of the high range, and is called, in Exo 17:6 , the rock in Horeb; and yet the succeeding chapters show that they had not yet gotten to Sinai. In describing the place, then, the first thing is to give its name, which is the range of mountains called Horeb, whose chief peak is Sinai. The second idea of the place is that this range of mountains, including Sinai, is situated in Southern Arabia between two arms of the sea, and the triangular district between those two arms of the sea is called the Sianitic peninsula. The third part of the answer in describing the place is this: The immediate place has a valley two and one half miles long by one and one-half miles wide, perfectly level and right under Sinai. Sinai goes up like a precipice for a considerable distance, then slopes toward the peak, and Overlooks a valley and a plain, for it is a long way above the level of the sea. This valley is the only place in all tin country where the people could be brought together in one body for such purposes as were transacted here. Modern re- search has made it perfectly clear that this valley right under Sinai is the place for the camp, and you can put three millions of people there, and then up the gorges on the mountain sides there is abundant range for their flocks and herds.

2. What are the historical associations of this place, before and since?

Ans. It was called the Mount of God before Moses ever saw it, and there was a good road into these mountains prepared by the Egyptians in order to get to certain mines which they had in the mountains of Horeb. Since that time we associate Horeb with Elijah when he got scared and ran a the way from Samaria to Mount Sinai a big run; he was very badly scared; and what he was scared at was more terrible than a man; a woman was after him. He was not afraid of Ahab, but he was afraid of Jezebel. Now, Sinai is associated with Elijah; and I believe that Jesus went to Sinai, an I am sure Paul did. He says when he was called to preach, “I did not go to Jerusalem for the people there to tell me now to preach, but I went into Arabia.” He stayed there three years, and, as I think, he came down to this place when the Law was given, in order to catch the spirit of the occasion of the giving of the Law from looking at the mountain itself and there received the revelations of the new covenant which was to supersede the covenant given upon Mount Sinai. Long after Paul’s time the historical associations of Sinai are abundant. Many of the books that teach about the Crusades have remarkable incidents in connection with the Sinaitic Peninsula and particularly this mountain. If you were there today, you would see buildings perpetuating Mosaic incidents, and on this mountain is a convent belonging to the Eastern, the Greek church, rather than to the Roman church; and in that convent Tischendorf found the famous Sinaitic manuscript of the New Testament, which is the oldest, the best and the most complete. There are associations in connection with Sinai which extend to the fifteenth century and even after.

3. What was the time of the arrival of these people at this mountain?

Ans. The record says, “In the third month after the children of Israel were gone forth out of the land of Egypt, the game day came they into the wilderness of Sinai.” In chapter 16 it says: “And they took their journey from Elim, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came unto the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departing out of the land of Egypt.” They left Egypt on the fifteenth and were in the wilderness of Sin on the fifteenth of the next month, one month’s time; but while it is only one month in time, it covered parts of two months. “Now in the third month”, but just where in it the record does not say they reached Sinai. Another question on that directly.

In discussing this subject, I shall have the following general heads: (1) The Preparation for the Covenant; (2) The Covenant Itself; (3) The Stipulations of the Covenant; (4) The Covenant Accepted; (5) The Covenant Ratified; (6) The Feast of the Covenant. That will be the order of this chapter.

4. What was the proposition and reply?

Ans. In chapter 19 the proposition for the covenant comes from God in these words: “And Moses went up unto God, and Jehovah called unto him out of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel [here’s the proposition]: Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto myself. Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be mine own possession from among all peoples: For all the earth is mine: and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.” On those terms God proposes a covenant. Now, let us see if the people agree to enter into covenant with God: “And Moses came and called for the elders of the people, and set before them all these words which Jehovah commanded him. And all the people answered together and said, All that Jehovah hath spoken we will do.” Moses then reported back to God what the people said here was a mutual agreement on the part of the people enter into a covenant (Exo 19:7-8 ).

5. What was the method of Jehovah’s approach in order enter the covenant?

Ans. The theophanv. “Theonhany” means an appearance of God. God says to Moses, in describing how he will come, that he will come in a cloud; that they won’t see him; but they will see the cloud and hear his voice; an appearance of God, some of it visible, a cloud that envelops God, and voice Heard.

6. What was the preparation for this covenant they se to enter into?

Ans. The first part of it was to sanctify the mountain “Sanctify” means to set apart, or to make holy; to sanctify a mountain is to set it apart. That mountain which was to be the scene and place of this great covenant between God and the people was set apart, things set upon it, fenced about’, with the prohibitions of God: “Don’t you come too close I it; don’t touch it.” Just as God fenced the burning bush when he said to Moses “Don’t, draw nigh; stop, you are enough; take the shoes off your feet; this is holy ground.” The next part of the preparation was to sanctify the people. This was done ceremonially. They were ceremonially purified, as is expressed in these words: “Go down, charge the people, lest they break through unto Jehovah to gaze, and many of them perish. And let the priests also that come near to Jehovah, sanctify themselves, lest Jehovah break forth upon them.”

7. What was to be the signal which would bring the people close to that mountain and put them into the presence of God?

Ans. It was a trumpet sound, described on this occasion in such a way as to thrill the people hearing the sound. This sound was prolonged, and thus it waxed louder and louder and louder a fearful, unearthly sound. No human lips blew that trumpet earth never heard it before; the earth will hear it again only one more time, and that when Christ comes to judge the world; he will then come with the sound of a trumpet.

8. What was to be the time when God and the people, after this preparation, should come together?

Ans. On the third day.

9. Describe Jehovah’s coming on the third day and compare Deu 4:10-12 .

Ans. The record says, “And it came to pass on the third day, when it was morning, that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud; and all the people that were in the camp trembled. And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet God; and they stood at the nether part of the mount. And Mount Sinai) the whole of it, smoked, because Jehovah descended upon it in fire; and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly. And when the voice of the trumpet waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice” (Exo 19:16-19 ). In Deu 4:10-12 , Moses describes it again, referring to that great occasion, the theophany, and he uses this language: “The day that thou stoodest before Jehovah thy God in Horeb, when Jehovah said unto me, Assemble me the people, and I will make them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days that they live upon the earth, and that they may teach their children. And ye came near and stood under the mountain; and the mountain burned with fire unto the heart of heaven, with darkness, cloud, and thick darkness. And Jehovah spake unto you out of the midst of the fire: ye heard the voice of words but ye saw no form; only ye heard a voice.” “Form” or similitude is a likeness; “you heard a voice, but saw no likeness or similitude of God.”

10. Who was the mediator of this covenant between God: and the people?

Ans. You will notice that the people and God do not come together directly. In the book of Job he says, “There is no daysman who shall stand between me and God, touching God, touching me.” If God had revealed himself visibly to the people and directly, the sight would have killed them, for they were a sinful people. In order to get to them, then, there was a necessity for a middleman, a mediator; one who should approach God for the people and approach the people for God. Now who was this mediator? Moses.

11. What part did the angels take, and how signified?

Ans. In the later books of the Bible we learn that this law was given by the disposition of angels and was signified by that trumpet, the trumpet served to summon the whole army of God’s angels.

12. When again will it sound, and why?

Ans. When the judgment day comes: “He shall come with the sound of the trumpet”; and when that trumpet sounds, its object is not to wake the dead, according to the Negro theology, but to marshal the angels, to bring them back with him.

13. What are the great lessons of this preparation?

Ans. Let us get these clearly in our minds:

(1) That this is to be a theocratic covenant. I want you to get the idea of this, viz.: The difference between a democratic covenant (made with all the people), an aristocratic covenant (made with the nobles, the best of the people) and a theocratic covenant, one in which God alone makes the stipulation. The people don’t prescribe anything. God tells everything that is to be done, either on his part or on their part. All the people have to do in a theocratic covenant is to say “yes” or “no”; to accept or reject.

(2) That it was a mediatorial covenant) not a covenant directly between God and the people, but a covenant in which a daysman goes between, a mediator to transmit from God to the people, and from the people to God.

(3) The third great lesson is that the people, in order to enter into a covenant with God, even through a mediator, must have the following requirements:

(a) They must make a great voluntary decision (Exo 24:8 ). You remember when Elijah summoned all the people to meet him on the mountain with the prophets of Baal, and had the test as to who was God, and the prophets of Baal were to try to bring proof that they represented God, and he was to prove that he represented God; that he proposed to them that day to make a great decision: “How long halt ye?” “Halt” does not mean to “linger,” but to “limp”; a halting man in the Bible is a “limping” man. “How long hobble ye as a limping man between two opinions? If the Lord be God, follow him; if Baal be God, follow him” (1Ki 18:21-40 ). This is the lesson: That what the people must do was to make this great decision. Moses could not make it for them. They were brought up there; they had plenty of ground on which to stand; that valley was two and a half miles long and one and a half miles wide; and God could speak loud enough for them to hear him, and anything they said he could hear. “Now, you people, will you make this decision?” And they said, “We will.”

(b) The people must have fear toward Jehovah. “You are not entering into a covenant with a dumb idol, but with the living God.”

(c) “And you must have reverence. Don’t get too close to the divine presence; don’t try to break through that fence; don’t touch the mountain; do not presume to be intimate with Jehovah. You must have reverence.”

(d) The next requirement was holiness; and that holiness is a sanctifying by the ceremonial purification. The last requirement

(e) is obedience. “Will you obey? Will you do it.?” Suppose now, to give you, the idea perfectly, I ask again: What are the great lesson from this preparation? Theocratic covenant; lessons of the mediatorial covenant; What the people must do: decide, fear God, have reverence, be purified, obey God. That discusses the first part of the preparation for the covenant. We will now discuss, in general terms, the covenant itself.

14. Give proofs that what we call the giving of the law of Mount Sinai is a covenant as well as a law.

Ans. The evidence of its being a covenant is presented by the meaning of the word “covenant,” viz.: agreement between two, under stipulations binding either party. That is a covenant; and the ratification takes place by the sacrifice of a victim. All the covenants of the Old Testament are of that kind. As a proof that this is a covenant, God, the party of the first part, makes the proposition to enter into the covenant; then the people agree to it; and next, God prescribes, what he will do, and what they must do. These are the stipulations of the covenant. Then the people must accept formally after they have heard all the stipulations, and then comes the ratification. In Exo 24:1-8 , we have an account of the ratification. In this chapter I shall speak of it more as a covenant than as a law.

15. What are its three constituent parts, binding the people?

Ans. Whatever mistakes you make, do not make a mistake in answering this question. It is just as clear as a sunbeam that this covenant entered into on Mount Sinai has three distinctive, constituent parts:

(1) The moral law (Exo 20:17 ), the Ten Commandments, the first part of the covenant.

(2) The altar, or law of approach to God (Exo 20:24-26 ; Exo 23:14-19 ). In case you cannot keep the moral law, the law of the altar comes in.

(3) The civil or national law, (Exodus 1-23:13). Now, what are the constituent parts of the covenant? Moral law, law of the altar, or way of approach to God, also the civil, or national law. The civil law of judgments covers several chapters: they are all a part of this covenant. Now, let us separate those ideas:

(1) Relates to the character of the person;

(2) to the way you can approach God, if you fail in character;

(3) to the civil, or national affairs. Israel was a nation. This is not Abraham making a covenant; it is not Moses making one; it is a nation entering into a covenant with God, to be his treasure, his peculiar people. And I venture to say that everything else in the Pentateuch, whether in the rest of the book of Exodus, in Leviticus, in Numbers, or in Deuteronomy, everything is developed from one or other of these three things. All Leviticus is developed from the law of the altar; it is just simply an elaboration of that part of this covenant they entered into with God, and was enacted when they were at Sinai. All that part of Numbers up to the time they left Sinai (first ten chapters) is a development of one or another of these three parts. Every new enactment which comes in Numbers, every restatement occurring in Deuteronomy must be collocated there with the moral law and with the altar law, or with the national law. I had the pleasure at Brownwood, Texas, at the request of the school, the churches, and the people there, to deliver a lecture on Leviticus, so as in one lecture to give those people an idea of the book. And the first thing I wrote on the blackboard was: “Everything in the book of Leviticus is developed from that part of the covenant given on Mount Sinai which relates to the law of the altar, or the way of approach to God.”

16. In what prophecy is it shown that this covenant given on Mount Sinai shall be superseded by a new covenant with different terms?

Ans. Jeremiah is the prophet. The passage commences: “In the last days, saith the Lord, I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, not like the covenant I made with them when I led them out of Egypt.” Jeremiah then shows how different the terms of the new covenant shall be from those of the covenant given at Sinai (Jer 31:31-34 ).

17. Where in the New Testament are the terms of the two covenants contrasted in this form: “Do and thou shalt live,” and “Live and (thou shalt) do”?

Ans. You are bound to see that there is a sharp contrast between the new and the old covenants. If this old covenant says, “Do in order to live,” and the new one says, “Live in order to do,” you must be alive before you can do; and they then start in different directions, keep going away from each other, one going up, the other going down. Where in the New Testament is that thought brought out? (Rom 10:5 ff.)

18. Where in the New Testament is the contrast between the two covenants expressed in allegory?

Ans. Gal 4:24 ff.

19. What three books of the New Testament best expound the covenants as contrasted?

Ans. Galatians, Romans, and Hebrews (in that order), particularly, Hebrews. And now comes a question of chronology.

20. What is the support for the Jewish tradition that this covenant was enacted the fiftieth day after the Passover sacrifice in Exo 12 ?

Ans. You know the Jews always have maintained that the law given on Mount Sinai was on the fiftieth day after the Passover was celebrated; just as in the New Testament the Holy Spirit was given on the fiftieth day after the sacrifice of Christ on the cross. Alexander Campbell makes a great point of that: The giving of the new covenant law must be on the fiftieth day after Christ’s crucifixion. You could make it a proof this way: Exo 12 says that this month Abib, later called Nisan, i.e., after the captivity it was so called, shall be the beginning of the year to you, and on the fifteenth day of that month they left Egypt, not on the first day of the month, but on the fifteenth, which was the beginning of the new year. The Passover was slain on the night of the fourteenth, and hurriedly eaten. On the fifteenth they marched out. Chapter 16 tells us that on the fifteenth day of the next month, which would be about a month after they left Egypt, they were then in the wilderness of Sin, not very far from Mount Sinai, but only one month gone. Now, there are several stations at which they stopped before reaching Sinai, and they could be at Sinai and waiting three days, devoting the time to preparation, and making the giving of the law on the fiftieth day. The argument can be made out so that the time covered from the leaving of Rameses in Egypt to the arrival at Sinai would be less than two months, as fifty days does not equal two lunar months; there must be fifty-six days to get two lunar months, even.

21. The next question bears on the stipulations of the covenant. Where do we find the stipulations of what God would do for his part?

Ans. What God proposes to do is expressed in Exo 19:5 : “Ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people, and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation.” Then in Exo 23:20 he enumerates what he will do. “I send an angel before thee, to keep thee by the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. . . . Mine angel shall go before thee . . . and I will cut off the opposing nations . . . and ye shall serve Jehovah your God, and he will bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee . . . I will drive these nations out from before thee. . . . And I will set thy border from the Red Sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the wilderness unto the river [i.e., Euphrates].” In other words, he will do what he promised to Abraham he would do, as to their boundary. That is what he proposes to do.

22. What must the people do?

Aug. Keep those three parts of that covenant, having fear and reverence toward God, and toward his angels and toward Moses, the mediator. That is their part of the covenant.

23. Cite the passage to prove that the people agreed to enter into the covenant when proposed, and cite the passage showing their acceptance of it when stated. Pause Key (Key: Enter!)

Ans. – The covenant having been stated in all of its parts, God propounds to the people the plain question: “Will you accept it?” thus: “Moses told the people all the words of the law,” i.e., the Decalogue, with the judgments, or the civil law, and the law of the altar, or the way of approach to God. And Moses wrote these words and said to the people, “Will you do them?” They said, “We will.” It is very plain that after they had heard they accepted. And the next thing is the ratification.

24. Describe the ratification.

Ans. – I quote it: “Moses rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the mount, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. And he sent young men of the children of Israel, who offered burnt offerings, and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen unto Jehovah. And Moses took half of the blood, and put it in basins; and half of the blood he sprinkled on the altar. And he took the book of the covenant [wrote those in a book; what both parties had obligated themselves to observe] and read in the audience of the people; and they said, All that Jehovah hath spoken will we do, and be obedient. And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which Jehovah hath made with you concerning all these words” (Exo 24:4-8 ). That was the ratification.

25. What are the developments in the rest of the Pentateuch from each of the three parts of the covenant?

Ans. – The last chapter of Exodus, all of Leviticus, a large part of Numbers are devoted to the development of the Law of the Altar, Deuteronomy, to the Ten Commandments; a large part of Exodus and some of Deuteronomy, to the Civil Code.

26. In what part was the gospel germ?

Ans. – In the Altar, or Law of Approach to God.

27. What three books are specially commended?

Ans. – Boardman’s Lectures on the Ten Commandments; Butler’s Bible on the Giving of the Law at Sinai; and the) Presbyterian Catechism on the Ten Commandments.

28. What is the sign, or token of the covenant? Cite scripture.

Ans. — Circumcision. Gal 5:2 .

29. How long after the call of Abraham and the promise to him, was this?

Ans. – Paul says, “Four hundred and thirty years.” See Gal 3:17 .

XIII

THE COVENANT AT SINAI (Continued)

Scripture: Same as in preceding chapter

1. The first question is based on Exo 24:7 : “And he took the book of the covenant.” What is this book of the covenant?

Ans. All that part of Exodus 19-24-11. Moses wrote it then.

2. How may this book be regarded and what is its relation to all subsequent legislation in the Pentateuch?

Ans. You may regard the book of the covenant as a constitution and all subsequent legislation as statutes evolved from that constitution. The United States adopted a constitution of principles and the revised statutes of the United States are all evolved from the principles contained in that constitution. So that this book of the covenant may be regarded as a national constitution.

3. Why, then, is the whole of the Pentateuch called the law?

Ans. Because every part of the Pentateuch is essential to the understanding of the law. The historical part is just as necessary to the understanding of the law as any particular provision in the constitution, or any particular statute evolved from the constitution. The history must commence back at creation and go down to the passage over into the Promised Land. Very appropriately, then, do the Jews call the Pentateuch the torah, the law.

4. What other Pentateuchs?

Ans. The five books of the Psalter. When you come to study the psalms, I will show you just where each book of the psalms commences and where it ends. They are just as distinct as the five books of Moses. Another Pentateuch is the fivefold Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Paul; and as Moses’ Pentateuch is followed by Joshua the man of deeds, the Gospel Pentateuch is followed by Acts, which means deeds.

5. Where and when was a restatement and renewal of this covenant at Sinai?

Ans. In the book of Deuteronomy. There not only had been a breach of the covenant in the case of the golden calf, which was forgiven, but there came a more permanent breach at Kadesh-barnea when the people refused, after God brought them to the border, to go over into the Promised Land, and they wandered until all that generation died. Their children are brought where their fathers would have been brought, and it became necessary to renew that covenant. You find the Ten Commandments in Deuteronomy just as you find them here.

6. State again exactly the three parts of the covenant.

Ans. (1) The Ten Commandments, or moral law (Exo 20:1-17 ); (2) the law of the altar, or the way of approach to God, in case the Ten Commandments were violated; (3) The judgments, or the civil law. Now from those three parts, the constituent elements of the covenant, are evolved everything, you might say, in all the rest of the books of the Bible. Leviticus is all evolved from the law of the altar; very much of Numbers and Deuteronomy is evolved from the civil law. Now before I consider Part I, that is, the Decalogue, I want to make a brief restatement of some things in the preceding chapter. The first is the covenant. A covenant is an agreement or compact between two or more parties with expressed stipulations showing what the two parties are to do. The parties to this Sinai covenant are: God upon the first part, and the people on the second part, with Moses as the daysman or mediator. In the preceding chapter we had the following outline:

A proposition upon God’s part for a covenant and the people’s acceptance of that proposition; A preparation for entering into that covenant; The covenant itself as expressed in three parts; The stipulations of the covenant as shown in the last chapter; The covenant ratified; The Feast of the Covenant.

Now we take up Part (1) the moral law; and we are to consider that moral law first, generally, then specifically. I can, in this chapter, get into only a part of the specifics of it.

7. What do we call Part I of this Covenant?

Ans. We call it the moral law; or, using a Greek word, the Decalogue.

8. What are the three scriptural names?

Ans. The Bible gives (1) “the ten words”; that is what “decalogue” means, “the ten words spoken.” God spake all these words. (2) “The tables” or “tablets,” whereon these words were written, and (3) “the tables of the testimony.” When this written form was deposited in the ark of the covenant, from that time on they are called “the tables of the testimony.”

9. Give the history of these tablets.

Ans. They were written on tables of stone by the finger of God; that was the original copy. Moses broke them when the people made a breach of the covenant in the matter of the golden calf. God called him up into the mountain again and rewrote these Ten Commandments; that was the second copy. Both of these God wrote. These two tables that God wrote on were deposited in the ark when it was constructed, and that, too, before they left this Mount Sinai. The last time they were seen, you learn from 1Ki 8 , was when Solomon moved that ark out of the tabernacle into the Temple which he had built. He had it opened and in there were the two tables of atone on which God had written. The probable fate of them is this, that when Jerusalem was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, he may have taken the ark of the covenant with the things in it as memorials of his victory, just as when Titus destroyed the Temple he took away the sacred things of the Temple; the seven-branched golden candlestick was carried in triumph into the city of Rome.

10. Divide these ten words first into grand divisions, and then into subdivisions.

Ans. The grand divisions were two tables, one of them were the commandments relating to God, i.e., man’s duty to God, and the other were the commandments expressing man’s relation to his fellowman. The subdivisions are these: all that part of Exodus from Exo 20:2-17 is divided into ten parts. Those are the subdivisions of the two tables. We will note them precisely a little further on in the comments for Exo 20:1-6 .

11. What is the Romanist method of subdivision and what are the objections thereto?

Ans. The Romanists make one out of the first two commandments, and two out of the last. We say that the First Commandment is, “Thou shall have no other gods before me,” and they say the first command is: “I am the Lord thy God which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage, etc.,” to the end of the Second Commandment.

12. What other ten words and how do you compare them?

Ans. The ten words of creation and the ten Beatitudes spoken by our Lord. We compare them by a responsive reading.

13. How and where does Moses compress the ten into two?

Ans. I will give the compression. In one place Moses says, “Thou shall love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength.” In another place Moses says, “Thou shalt love their neighbour as thyself,” compressing the first table into one and the second table into one (Deu 6:4 f; Lev 19:18 ).

14. What was the occasion of Christ’s quotation of Moses compression?

Ans. An inquirer came to him propounding this question: “Which is the great commandment in the law?” Jesus, quoting Moses, says, “This is the great and first commandment, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul and with all thy mind. And a second like unto it is this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments the whole law hangeth, and the prophets.”

15. What New Testament scripture shows the solidarity of the law?

Ans. The solidarity of a thing means the inability to touch any part without touching it all; and if you violate one commandment you violate all the Decalogue, and if you are guilty of one you are guilty of all. The place in the New Testament where it is said, “He that is guilty of one point in the law is guilty of all,” is Jas 2:10 . That passage expresses the solidarity of the law.

16. How does the New Testament compress the ten into one?

Ans. This passage is: “All the law is fulfilled in this one word, love,” (Gal 5:14 ).

17. Is this giving of the law, orally or in writing, the origin of the law? That is, was there no law before? Was it the origin of the law; and if not, what is it, and why is it?

Ans. This is not the origin of the law, but it is an addition. The Scriptures say, “The law was added because of trans-gression.”

18. Then, what is law?

Ans. Law is that intent or purpose in the mind of the Creator, concerning any being or thing that he causes to be. Now, the intent that he had in his mind, the purpose, when he made man, is the law of man. The intent or purpose that he had in mind when he created the tree is the law of the tree. That law may not be expressed. It inheres: it is there in the nature of the thing. It may be expressed in the spoken commandment or in the written one. But you do not have to wait until the word is spoken or till the spoken word is written in order to have law. For example, Paul says, “Death reigned from Adam to Moses.” But death is the penalty of the law, and “where there is no law there is no transgression.” Now, if law didn’t exist before given on Mount Sinai, why did those people die?

19. If the spoken or written law at Sinai was added because of transgression, show more particularly and illustrate its purpose, both negatively and positively. Now, if a law exists in God’s mind and in the nature of the things that he creates, why did he afterward speak that law and have it written?

Ans. (1) Because of transgression. We now show the mean ing of that, and illustrate it. We have the answer in this form: The purpose of speaking this law and of having it written negatively, was not to save men by it. They were lost when it was developed. But first it was to discover sin. Sin is hidden and there was a law, but it was not written or spoken. Now, God put that law in writing so that it could be held up by the side of a man, and his life, and his deeds to discover sin in him. Paul says, “I had not known sin except by the law.” (2) This sin by the law is discovered to the man in order to convict him of this sin. Paul says, ” I was alive without the law once [that is, before I knew it I felt like I was all right], but when the commandment came sin revived and I died. I saw myself to be a dead man.” In the next place, (3) it was to make the sin, which looked like something else before the man had the law, appear to be sin, as Paul says in his letter to the Romans, and also, to make it appear to be “exceedingly sinful.” Now to illustrate: Suppose on a blackboard we were to trace a zigzag turning line. That is the path a man walks; he is in the woods and thinks he is going straight, and he feels all right. Now you put a rule there, which is exactly straight, and just watch how that zigzag walk of his is sometimes on one side and sometimes on the other. The rule discovers the variations; it makes it known. Now here is (4) another purpose of the, Law: To incite to sin in order that the heinousness of the exceeding sinfulness of sin may be made manifest. Now, maybe you don’t believe that. Paul says it is so, and I can give you an illustration that will enable you to see just how it is so. I never saw one of the Baylor University boys put his foot on top of the mail box at the street corner, but if the faculty should pass a law that no boy should put his foot on that mail box, some boy’s foot would go on top of it, certainly. Now, that boy may have imagined all along that he was law abiding. But put a standard there and he wants to test it right away. I illustrate again: A little boy once saw a baldheaded man going along up the side of a hill, and the boy said, “Go up, thou bald head! Now trot out your bears.” He had been told that if he was irreverent toward an old, baldheaded man, as the boys were toward Elisha, the bears would tear him to pieces.

20. Explain carefully the Christian’s relation to this law.

Ans. It is a part of the old covenant, you say, and we have a new covenant now. Then is a Christian under obligations to keep this law? Is the law binding on you not to kill, not to lie, not to steal, not to commit adultery? We certainly would be extreme antinomians if we were to say that as an obligation that does not rest on us. It does rest on us, but it does not rest on us as a way to eternal life. You see the distinction? The time never will come when it will be right for a man to kill, to steal, to commit adultery, to covet, and no matter who does any one of these things, whether saint or sinner, it is sin. But the keeping of the Decalogue is an obligation upon the Christian because it is in the nature of his being, as when it was spoken at Sinai, yet that is not the Christian’s way to obtain eternal life.

21. What is the form of the statement of the ten words?

Ans. Negative and positive. For some of them: “Thou shalt not”; for others, positive: “Honour thy father,” etc.; but whether the form be positive or negative if it is negative, it has a positive idea attached, and if it is positive it has a negative idea. If it is an affirmation, it is also a prohibition. No matter what the form, it does prescribe certain things and it does proscribe certain things.

Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible

XXIV

GOD AND THE STATE, THE STATE AND THE CITIZEN, THE PROMISES, AND THE RATIFICATION OF THE COVENANT Exo 21:1-24:8

1. What are the lesson and the themes?

Ans. Lesson: Exo 21:1-24:8 . Themes: (1) God and the state; and the state and the citizen, 21:1-23:19.

(2) The promises of the covenant, Exo 23:20-33 .

(3) The ratification of the covenant, Exo 24:1-8 . Having considered Part I of the covenant, the Decalogue, or God and the normal man, and Part II, the altar, or God and the sinner, we now consider Part III, the judgments, or God and the state, and the state and the citizen. This lesson is contained in Exodus 21-23.

2. What is the name of section Exo 21:1-23:19 ?

Ans. This section is called the judgments, or decrees.

3. What is the book of the covenant, and what may it be called?

Ans. The whole book of the covenant, i.e., from Exo 19:1-24:8 , in its three parts and in its ratification, may well be called the constitution of the nation of Israel; and all subsequent legislation in the Pentateuch is but statutes developed from this constitution. The United States has a written Constitution; all the legislation of Congress must be simply enlargements or developments of the fundamental principles contained in that Constitution.

4. How is God recognized in this section?

Ans. He is the author of the state, as he is the author of its antecedents, the family and the tribe.

5. What results from this origin of the state?

Ans. God’s providential government over the nations, counted as units, and their responsibility to him.

6. How does Paul put it?

Ans. In Rom 13:1-7 , he says: “The powers that be are ordained of God. Therefore he that resisteth the power, withstandeth the ordinance of God: and they that withstand shall receive to themselves judgment. For rulers are not a terror to the good work, but to the evil. And wouldest thou have no fear of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise from the same: for he is a minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is a minister of God, an avenger for wrath to him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be in subjection not only because of the wrath, but also for conscience’ sake. For for this cause ye pay tribute also; for they are ministers of God’s service, attending continually upon this very thing. Render to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour.”

In I Timothy Paul puts it this way: “I exhort therefore, first of all, that supplications, prayers, intercessions, thanksgivings, be made for all men; for kings and all that are in high places; that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and gravity. This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; who would have all men to be saved, and come to the knowledge of the truth.” The powers, then, must be respected and honoured, and must be prayed for by those having the good of society at heart (1Ti 2:1-4 ).

7. What is extent of God’s government over the nations and the proof from Paul and Daniel?

Ans. It is absolute in authority and universal in scope; so that the ruler or state must perish that despises God, as Paul says in Act 17:24-31 : “God hath determined . . . the bounds of their habitation and decreed that they should seek after him.” Daniel puts it more strongly in Dan 4:10-37 , especially Dan 4:17 ; Dan 4:25 ; Dan 4:34-35 ; Dan 4:37 , where it is affirmed that God holds a nation responsible just as he holds an individual responsible, and that the ruler who does not know God puts himself on a level with the beast, and that he must be disciplined until he does know that the Most High ruleth over the nations of the world, and that the inhabitants of the earth are but as grasshoppers in his sight.

8. From what additional source arises the state’s jurisdiction over the citizen?

Ans. We have just discussed the authority of God over the state. Now the authority of the state over the citizen, apart from God’s having ordained it, arises also from the social nature of man. He is not independent of other men but codependent with them. The ties which bind him to his fellow men are natural, inherent, indissoluble, and cannot be despised with impunity; so that he cannot be self-centered and apart.

9. What was the particular form of state government organized at Sinai and its subsequent changes?

Ans. This particular Jewish state was theocratic in form, God himself was the king of the nation, and in visible symbol dwelt among them. But keep the etymology of certain words in your mind, viz.: theocracy, aristocracy, democracy. That form of government established over the Jewish nation at Sinai was theocratic, i.e., God was the ruler. There were changes in the form of this national government in subsequent ages. The first change took place in the days of Samuel, when the people rejected God as governor and selected, after the manner of the nations, a man to be their ruler (1Sa 8:4-22 Joshua was priest, and the heads of the tribes were the rulers.). This was the establishment of a monarchial form of government, not theocratic; it was thus changed from a theocracy to a monarchy. Subsequently it perished (2Ki 25 ) and the form of government became in the days of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Zechariah, a mixture of democratic, aristocratic, and the priestly. That is to say, Zerubbabel was governor, Joshua was priest, and the heads of the tribes were the rulers. This mixture continued until under Herod the Great it again became a kingdom, a monarchy, and from that time, it passed into a provincial government under Roman procurators. Those were the changes in the government; then upon the destruction of Jerusalem they were a scattered people without a king, without an ephod, without a priest, without a temple, without sacrifices, and with no national government; and they continue so until this day.

10. Our present section (Exo 21:1-22:10 ) establishes the general principles on which the state shall deal with what matters?

Ans. – (1) With property in slaves, Exo 21:1-11 ; (2) The sanctity of human life, or criminal law, Exo 21:12-36 ; (3) With other kinds of property, Exo 22:1-15 ; (4) With the stranger, the widow, the orphan, and the poor, Exo 22:21-27 ; Exo 23:5 ; Exo 23:11 ; (5) With cases of seduction, Exo 22:16-17 ; (6) With sins against nature, Exo 22:19 , that mate man with the brute, disregarding the distinction between man and beast; (7) With the rights of neighbor or enemy in the matter of his domestic animals going astray, or found in suffering, Exo 23:4-5 ; (8) With false testimony and bribery, Exo 23:1-3 ; Exo 23:7-9 ; (9) With sins against the first commandments, i.e., making sacrifices to others than Jehovah, Exo 22:20 ; Exo 23:13 ; (10) Sins of necromancy, Exo 22:18 , i.e., wizards or witches ‘that seek to find out the future from the dead or from other sources, and not depending on God for revelation; (II) Sins against rulers, Exo 22:28 : “Thou shalt not curse the rulers of the people,” Exo 23:10-11 , and of the weekly sabbaths, Exo 23:12 ; (12) With God’s rights to his firstfruits of the family, the harvest, the herd, and the flock, Exo 22:29-31 ; (13) The three annual festivals, Exo 23:14-19 ; (14) With cases of eating blood, Exo 22:31 . Man was not allowed to eat meat with blood in it, for the blood is the life thereof. He could eat no meat from which the blood had not first been drained; if an animal died and the blood was still in him, he must not eat of that animal; if a wild beast had killed an animal and the blood remained in it he could not eat that which was slain of the beasts. This section shows that God gives the state power to deal with these fourteen questions; it is not God but the state dealing with them. If one violated the sabbath law, the state could put him to death; if he made a sacrifice to another god, the state could put him to death; if he stole a man and put him into slavery, the state could put him to death.

11. What is evident from the scope and variety of these’ cases?

Ans. From the scope and variety of these judgments it is evident that a theocratic state is a union of church and state, the state having jurisdiction over religious matters, as well &a civil, its magistrates and courts being charged with the responsibility of enforcing under penalties duties toward God as well as duties toward man and beast.

12. What are the conditions of success in a theocratic government?

Ans. These are evident as follows: (1) God alone must legislate; (2) God must be present as an oracle to settle vexing questions; as an interpreter of law; as omniscient to read the heart back of the overt act; as omnipotent to enforce the law; and as infinitely holy, just, and merciful to insure the right legislation and right administration of the legislation; (3) The people must have the heart and will to obey every requirement of his law. If you take away these conditions, a theocratic government is a failure.

13. What are the hazards under present conditions?

Ans. The priest may assume the functions of deity, the legislator to define religion, the oracle to interpret it and then call on the state to enforce it. Since he has not the holiness, justice, and mercy of God, nor his wisdom and omniscience, the state may thus become the slave of superstition, priestcraft and irreligion, and the people the victims of its tyranny. These conditions are when the people’s heart are not right toward God and when they are not disposed to obey him.

14. Cite instances where these hazards have been realized.

Ans. History records many instances of just such priestly usurpation of powers with ruinous results to the people. The whole Romanist hierarchy from its establishment down to the present time is an illustration. The Pope claims to be God’s vicar, in the place of the Holy Spirit; he claims the power to interpret the law; to change the law; he claims to have the two keys and two swords; to keep you out of the church on earth and out of heaven hereafter; to inflict upon you ecclesiastical and state punishment. Those are the instruments, the swords and the keys; the result is that they have determined what is religion, and what they have defined to be religion is not God’s religion. They claim to be the oracles of God; to have sole power to interpret that law, and if you vary a hair’s breadth from what they have said is religion, off goes your head; and in their search for evidence they have established the Inquisition that makes domiciliary visits, investigating family life, putting spies over the most thoughtless expressions, and they claim to arrest and try them, and when they have tried them to call upon the state to execute. The bloodiest pages of history are those of the Romanist usurpation in Spain, in France, in Italy, in Bohemia, in the low countries, in the days of Alva, in all the South American states and in Mexico. Not only is that true, but there ‘were other denominations expressing a union of church and state and with the same powers somewhat modified. When the Puritans came over in the May flower they established a theocracy; their preachers prescribed everything they should do; and according to a statements which has been current, a man was punishable by a fine and by imprisonment if he was found kissing his wife on Sunday. And they pushed their jurisdiction to such an extent that they destroyed the liberty of conscience, whipped Baptist preachers, banished Roger Williams, sold out under forced sale or hasty auction the choice acres of Baptist farms and property in order to get money to build meetinghouses for another denomination, and when that Baptist father, Isaac Backus, went to John Adams, President of the United States Continental Congress, and asked him to use his influence to force Massachusetts to allow liberty of conscience, he said, “You might as well expect rivers to run upstream, and the ocean to dry up and the sun to quit shining as to expect to repeal Massachusetts’ law on that subject.”

15. How does the New Testament hedge against these hazards?

Ans. In two ways: (1) By clearly distinguishing between what belongs to God and what belongs to Caesar, rendering unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and unto God those that are his; (2) Especially by its form of church government. There was to be no provincial church government, no district, county, state, national church government; no hierarchy, but each particular congregation was the church of Jesus Christ and having final jurisdiction over its own matters. While there might be district associations, conventions, state or national, for voluntary co-operation, they were not appellate courts over the churches, and hence it would be impossible for the union of church and state with the Baptist church involved. But this New Testament hedging was evaded: (1) By establishing a papal form of government, an autocracy; (2) A prelatical form; as, the Church of England; (3) A federal form of government, like the Presbyterian.

16. What offenses in this section called for capital punishments?

Ans. They say that you may determine the civilization of a people by its code as to blood. If they put people to death for every kind of offense it is a bloody code; if only for a few great offenses, it is not a bloody code. Note in this lesson that there are six causes for which capital punishment would be administered:

(1) For sacrificing to another God; as long as the theocratic government was in vogue a man must be put to death for sacrificing to other gods than Jehovah, because it was treason treason against the state because it belongs to somebody else;

(2) Necromancy; that is a sin against God, in that it seeks to get at the secrets of the future from another source than God’s revelation: “Thou shalt not suffer a wizard or a witch to live”;

(3) Bestial crimes; sins against nature, where the man would mate with a brute;

(4) Stealing a man for slavery; stealing a man’s very life away from him that he may make a slave of him. Now, there are ways discussed in this section by which you could be enslaved. I have not space to go into their details; but they could not steal a man and make a slave of him. The death penalty would always be administered in the case of what is called “slave-stealing,” so largely carried on by the New England States, where as many as 250 ships from a New England town were engaged in the slave trade, and the wealth of a great many of those people up there today was derived from stealing slaves from Africa and selling them to the West Indies and to the United States.

(5) Murder or homicide that resulted from criminal negligence;

(6) In Exo 21:17 , it says, “He that curseth his father or his mother, shall surely be put to death.” So here is another offense calling for capital punishment; and a very remarkable piece of legislation comes into development of that principle. I remember once telling it to Judge Harrison in Waco, my father-in-law. It provides that if a father or mother shall bring a child to the magistrate and say that he is incorrigible; that they cannot do anything with him; he has no respect for them; does not obey them; that he is going to be a terror; he will be awful to the state; they thus bringing him before the magistrate, making that affidavit, that child must be stoned to death by the state. I read that to General Harrison and he said, “Dr. Carroll, you know you would never take your boy there.” While I do not think I would, I certainly have seen some specimens in my time that would have been brought up with great advantage by the state.

(7) Later on we will come to another which is not in this section. A man went out on a sabbath day to get sticks to make a fire to cook some breakfast, and he was put to death. “Thou shalt do no labour on the sabbath day.” “You must make provision for that day beforehand.” There are no exceptions but those of mercy, or necessity, and of worship.

17. In what judgments do the elements of mercy and love to man and beast appear?

Ans. Consideration shown (1) to a stranger; (2) to a widow; (3) to an orphan; (4) to the poor; (5) to animals. They might charge interest for money lent to any Hebrew brother that was well-to-do, but if he was poor they could not charge interest lending him money. Then this reference to the poor in connection with the land, which was to lie every seventh year idle, and, of course, where land was devoted to the culture of cereals like wheat and barley there would be a voluntary crop that year. They were not allowed to harvest that crop at all, but the poor people had the right under this law to enter that field and use that seventh-year voluntary crop. It also applies to the poor in this, viz.: that if he had pawned his cloak, or outer garment, which constituted his bed by night, the pawnbroker was not allowed to keep that garments in pawn overnight, or that man would not have a bed to sleep on; it must be restored to him when night came.

18. What are the promises of the covenant?

Ans. In Exo 23:20-33 are three: (1) That the angel of God’s presence should be with them, and would be their guide to show them how to go and to be their guard to preserve them and to discomfit their enemies on the way to and in the land where they were going. That was one of the great promises of the covenant. The presence of the angel of the Lord was manifest in the pillar of cloud by day and the fire by night, and by his speaking as an oracle when any trouble was brought up to him, and a solution asked.

(2) That God would bless their bread and drink, that is he would give them food and he would give them life: “You shall not be exposed to hunger nor to sickness.” This angel would see to it that a table was set before them; that in the wilderness their shoes should not wear out; that their clothes should not wax old; that there should be no sick people in the camp. What a tremendous blessing that was!

(3) That he would give them all the territory set forth in the original promises to Abraham, extending from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates, and from Gilead on the left bank of the Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea. Those are the three elements of the great promises of the covenant. He had to drive their enemies the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jehusites, and the others that held the land all out, but not all at once, for they would not be able to occupy the land, but, mark you, just as they were able to develop the resources of the country.

19. Describe step by step the ratification of the covenant.

Ans. In Exo 24:1-8 , it is treated. Here are the statutes: (1) All the words of the book of the covenant, that is, the moral law, the altar law, and the state law, were repeated very carefully to the people. (2) Then a copy of them was reduced to writing (3) An altar and pillars were erected according to the requirements given in the twentieth chapter. (4) Two kinds of offerings were offered on the altar, (a) burnt offerings, expiatory’, of blood and fire, and (b) the peace offerings, or the eucharist, thank offerings thus were made. (5) The disposition of the blood, one half of the blood flowing from these victims sacrificed was put into basing and set aside; the other half was to be sprinkled upon that altar, and thus the blood of the covenant was put upon the altar. (6) This covenant which has been spoken and written is now carefully read by Moses, item by item, all of them in the hearing of all the people, and they again solemnly agree to make every obligation prescribed for them in that covenant. (7) The sprinkling of the blood on the people. That half that had been set aside in basins, the priests and the Levites took charge of, and with bunches of hyssop moved among the people in every direction (all the Levites engaged in it, as they were afterward established) , and sprinkled that blood on all the people. That was the ratification of the covenant.

I have tried to make the reader see clearly this book of the covenant, beginning at Exo 29 , where was the introduction, the proposition made to have a covenant, and the people’s agreement to go into it, then the preparation for entering it by ratification; next the three parts of the covenant: (a) The Decalogue, or ten words, God’s relation to the normal man; (b) the law of the altar, or approach to God on the part of the sinner; (c) The state and God, and then the state and the citizen. I have tried to make you see these points very clearly. Then the promises bound up in that covenant, and Just exactly with what solemnity step by step that covenant was ratified; and that this was peculiarly a covenant made with the nation regarded as a unit.

Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible

Exo 21:1 Now these [are] the judgments which thou shalt set before them.

Ver. 1. Now these are the judgments, ] i.e., The judicial laws, fitly annexed to the Decalogue, whereof the civil magistrate is the lord-keeper. It was written upon the sword of Charles the Great, Decem praeceptorum custos Carolus.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Chapters 21-23 are an expansion of chapter 20.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Exodus chapter twenty-one, God said to Moses,
Now these are the judgments which thou shalt set before them ( Exo 21:1 ).
Now the judgments are really for the judges. You remember they appointed seventy to rule over the lesser, or they appointed “men over the thousands, men over the hundreds, men over the fifties, men over the tens”, to judge in the smaller matters. So that they would only bring the major cases to Adam-I mean to Moses, so that Moses wouldn’t be bogged down. Jethro said, “Hey, you know, you’re gonna kill yourself standing here all day long, judging the matters of the people.”
So these are the judgments or the guidelines for the judges who are judging in these matters that are brought before them. These are the judgments, the guidelines for the judges. These are not an individual kind of a retaliation-kind of thing that you’re supposed to take, but these are the standards that have been set for the judges. The term “judgments” referred to the standards set for the judges.
Now you read of God’s statutes, of His ordinances, of His law, and of His judgments. These are one of the things you read about. The judgments of God are different from the statutes. The statutes are different from the ordinances. The ordinances are different from the basic law. So all is comprised in the law, but these are now the guidelines for those men who were chosen to be judges.
Now it is interesting that here in verse six, and then in chapter twenty-two, verse eight and verse nine, the word “judges” in these verses is the Hebrew word “Elohim” which is the word for “gods”. The judges are called gods because they are acting in the place of God in bringing God’s judgment upon man and enforcing God’s judgment upon the particular situations. They were acting in the place of God, and thus, the term for the judges was “gods”, “Elohim”.
Thus, in the New Testament when the Pharisees were arguing with Jesus in the gospel of John, and when He declared the fact that “before Abraham was I am”, and they took up stones to stone Him. Jesus said, “I’ve done many good works among you for which of the works are you going to stone me?”. They said, “Not for the works that you have done, but because you’re a man, and continually insisting that you are equal with God.” He said, “Did I not say”, or, “Did I not say, or the Word of God say that ye are gods? Then why are you gonna stone me because I say I’m the Son of God?”( Joh 10:32-36 ).
Now in the Word it said, “Ye are gods”. In other words, here in Exodus these men are called gods, those who were to judge and to enact God’s judgment on men. It doesn’t mean in anywise that they were as the eternal God, the Creator of heaven and earth. It just meant that they were acting as gods and in the place of God, in the fact that they had been given this responsibility of judging men, and thus, men’s lives were in their hands. Thus acting for God, they were called “Elohim”, gods. The word “Elohim” refers in the Old Testament to many different gods. It is not a term used exclusively for the God who created the heaven and the earth.
The Bible recognizes that man can have many different gods that are not true gods; that is, they are not the true God. They are god as far as they are the ruling master passion of a person’s life. David says, “The gods of the heathen are vain”, ( 1Sa 12:21 ) “Elohim”, recognizing that heathen had gods but they weren’t true gods. God challenged, “If you be gods, if you be Elohim, then prove it by telling us something that is going to happen before it ever happens.” Thus the term “Elohim” refers to that which is the master guiding principle, or passion of a person’s life.
Now I went into that to give you just a background to the scripture that Jesus referred to in the gospel of John because the Mormons, because of that one reference of Christ to this scripture, “Ye are gods”, have built the whole doctrine of man’s progression into gods. That if you are a faithful Mormon and your marriage has been sealed in the Mormon temple, and you’ve gone through the rites, and you wear your underwear, and the whole thing; what that has to do with making you a god, I don’t know, but you can be one.
“You will be gods.” That’s their teaching. You and your wife, who has been sealed to you in marriage, will be able to go to a planet. You will be able to start your own little world on that planet. Other Mormons and good people, Christians and all, who weren’t faithful true Mormons all the way, who didn’t quite make it to the god stature, will be your angels and will serve you in your own system that you inaugurate. You will be god over that planet, and you will watch over that planet and develop and so forth, a whole life form and style, and all, from your offspring there in some planet in the universe. Now that is the acknowledged, recognized goal of the Mormon.
Now Brigham Young did something that has upset a lot of Mormons, in that he has carried this particular concept back one step instead of forward one step. If you carry it forward one step, every Mormon will acknowledge that that is the goal, and that is the purpose, and that is their desire, to be god and they’re ascending the scale in progression into godhood; to have their own planet, and take their wife and begin their own little experiment on a planet someplace. Brigham Young carried it back one step. He said that Adam was a good Mormon who progressed into god. He brought to the earth one of his celestial wives Eve, and they began to have their children and that they began to populate the earth. That Adam is our god and the only god with whom we have to do.
Now Mormons get very upset about that and they say, “Oh you’ve taken what he said out of context.” But I challenge you to read the whole context of that sermon, and you’ll find that it isn’t taken out of context, it is actually consistent with the Mormon doctrine, but it takes it back one step instead of forward one step. Why not? If you and your wife can be god on a planet someplace and start the whole thing off, why wasn’t Adam a man somewhere in another planet within the universe, and became faithful and true and all, and ascended into the godhood, and of course brought one of his celestial wives Eve and started the whole thing?
Now that whole system of thought and idea taken from one little verse in the New Testament where Jesus said, “Did I not say in the law, Ye are gods?” From that one little verse, this whole system of thought and doctrine that you’re gonna be god, providing you are a faithful Mormon and so forth, has come out of that one verse of scripture, rather than researching and finding out what that scripture was referring to. Not at all a progression into the godhood, as such; it’s not what that was teaching.
In fact, that desire to be god is the thing that has started the whole problem with the human race and with the angels prior. You read of Satan’s fall in Isaiah fourteen, “How art thou fallen from heaven O Lucifer son of the morning?” ( Isa 14:12 ). He goes on to tell of his will against the will of God. The fifth statement of Satan was, “I will be like the most High” ( Isa 14:14 ). Shakespeare has someone saying “Oh Cromwell flee ambition, for by this sin did the angels fall.” “I will be like God.”
When Adam and Eve were in the garden and Satan came to Eve to tempt her to eat of the fruit that God had forbidden, what was the enticement that Adam held out to her? “The day that you eat of it, you will be wise as God”( Gen 3:5 ). So that desire to be wise, as God is the thing that he used to trip Eve up in the garden. “Be like God, be as God.” So it is the same thing that is being held out to people today.
But the word judges, “Elohim”, does not refer at all to the living, eternal God who created the heavens and the earth, but men who are appointed to judge in the cases that are brought before them. And in judging are representing God and are acting for God, holding the lives and the destiny of these men in their hands. It is so that the judges will realize the awesome responsibility they have as a judge.
There is one occupation I would never want, and that is to be a judge. To me, I could not live with myself if I were a judge. I would have too much difficulty in worrying about making a wrong decision, making a wrong judgment, realizing the awesome responsibility that here’s a man, his life, his future, is in my hands. It would absolutely destroy me to think that I had sent a man to prison for five years for a crime he did not commit. That’s one occupation I would never want.
But unfortunately those men who have that occupation have more or less taken, I think, from judges the concept of gods. And so many of them act as though they are God and want to be treated as God. When they walk into the courtroom they want you to all stand and bow and so forth, and come before them and offer your pleas. The attitude that many of them have is reprehensible. They need to realize the awesome, awesome responsibility that they have. Rather than making them proud, it should humble them, and they should come in, I feel, in a very humble way to sit in judgment, realizing the awesome responsibility that is theirs.
Now this whole chapter twenty-one deals with the judges and deals with their judgments, as it does on into chapter twenty-two. So this is addressed basically to those men who were to occupy the position of a judge in Israel, and they were to judge over the various matters. So He starts laying out certain basic laws that will govern first of all, the position of a servant.
If you buy a Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him ( Exo 21:2-3 ).
So here we find again the six-and-one pattern. “Six days shalt thou labor, do thy work, the seventh day is the day of rest”( Exo 20:9-10 ) “If you buy a Hebrew slave, six years shall he serve.” If you were a Hebrew sold into slavery, six years you would have to serve, but the seventh year you’d go free.
I believe that this six-and-one pattern is significant not only in a day, but God established it in a year also. He established the months. The seventh month of the Jewish calendar was to be a sacred month; the day of atonement, and so forth came in the seventh month along with the feast. It was a sacred month in their calendar. Then the six years they were to sow their land. The seventh year the land was to just grow of itself. They were just to eat of that which came from the land; they weren’t to sow it. They give the land a rest in the seventh year.
They failed to do this and God got after them later for their failure to do that. Inasmuch as for four hundred and ninety years that they were in the land, they didn’t give the land the rest. God said, “You owe the land seventy years of rest, so you can stay in Babylon for seventy years and the land will get its Sabbaths that you robbed it of the whole time you were living there”( Jer 29:10 ). So God gave the land its rest, its Sabbath, as He shut them up in Babylonian captivity for four hundred and ninety years.
But I believe that the pattern will also carry out that for six, and this is in a thousand-year cycles, for six millennia the earth will go on in the bondage to Satan, sold out by Adam. But the seventh millennia will be a restoration, the freedom, the return to God. Thus, it makes the age in which we are living extremely exciting because we’re getting very, very, very close to the beginning of the seven thousandth year.
Now how long before Christ Adam fell in the garden, we don’t know for certain. Somewhere around four thousand years before Christ, Adam turned this whole system over to Satan. Living now in nineteen seventy-nine, we realize that we are coming very, very close to the seventh millennia. Satan has ruled. We’ve been in bondage for just about six thousand years. But we look forward to that glorious seven thousandth year when man has been delivered, when the earth has been delivered. We’ll be restored, and we will live and reign with Christ upon the earth for a thousand years in the glorious kingdom age.
So this six-and-one pattern has been established by God. I am convinced that it will also follow in thousand year cycles, and that we are coming extremely close to the end of Satan’s reign and dominion and rulership over the earth and over man, that the day of redemption is very close. That’s what Revelation chapter five is all about, as Jesus takes the seven sealed books, the title deed of the earth, and lays claim to that which He redeemed with His own blood. Then in chapter nineteen of Revelation, returns to establish God’s kingdom upon the earth. So it’s a very interesting law.
“Now if he came, if he was sold as a slave, and he came by himself, he will go out by himself. If he were married and his wife came with him, then his wife can go out with him.”
But if his master has given him a wife, and she has borne him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master’s, and he shall go out by himself ( Exo 21:4 ).
The slave had no rights at all, no rights of possession. Therefore, if you were sold as a slave, and while you were a slave your master gave you one of the other slave girls for your wife, and you’ve had a couple of children, now the seventh year is come; it’s time for you to go free. You can go free, but you can’t take your wife and children because she belongs to your master. And thus, the fruit that has come from your relationship also belongs to him, because you had no rights of your own of possession while you were working for him. You say, “Well, that seems very hard and cruel.” Yes, it does. It’s hard for us to even imagine such a thing.
But if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: Then his master shall bring him unto the [gods, the Elohim, translated,] judges; [Correctly so.] he shall also bring him to the door, or to the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him for ever ( Exo 21:5-6 ).
So you’ve had your wife and your children, say, “Hey I love this, I love my master, he’s treating me good. I love my wife; I love my children. I don’t want to go free, I want to serve him.” Then he brings you before the judges and there your master takes an awl, and he runs the awl through the lobe of your ear, and he pins you to a post with that awl. Then you would put a gold ring, as a rule, in the pierced ear, which was the sign of a slave by choice. It indicated that you, it was a slave by choice. You had willingly submitted to this life of slavery.
Now there is an interesting prophecy concerning Jesus Christ that declares, “My ear hath He pierced.” So Christ in a figurative sense had a pierced ear, inasmuch as He by choice submitted to the will of the Father. “Who, being in the form of God, and thought it not robbery to be equal with God, yet emptied Himself, became of no reputation, humbled Himself and became as a servant”( Php 2:6-7 ). The pierced ear servant, it was service by willingness. He willingly submitted Himself to the Father’s will, to serve. Thus the prophecy, “Mine ear hath He pierced”, referring to Jesus Christ, and His serving of God.
Now in a figurative sense I have a pierced ear, in that I am glad to take the title of, “Chuck, a bondslave of Jesus Christ.” It’s slavery by choice. I don’t have to serve Him, I don’t have to be His slave; I want to be His servant. I want to be His slave. I really want everything that I possess and am to belong to Him. Not to lay claims to things for myself, but what I am, and what I have are His. The pierced ear. All of the New Testament writers beginning their epistles would write, “Paul, a bondslave of Jesus Christ.” “Peter a bondslave of Jesus Christ.” “Jude, a bondservant of Jesus Christ.” They loved the title.
I know of nothing better that could happen to any of us than just to be a bondservant of Jesus Christ, a servant by choice. Oh, that He would bring us to the post, and run the awl through our ears that we might demonstrate that we are servants by choice. It isn’t forced upon us. We don’t have to be, but I love Him. I love my Master. No one’s ever treated me so good. I’ve never had it so well. I love serving Him.
Thus it is the choice of life, and the choice of being a bondslave was irrevocable, that was it. Once your ear was pierced, that was a choice of life, an irrevocable choice.
So the law of the servant,
And if a man sell his daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not go out as the menservants do. And if she please not her master, who hath betrothed her to himself, then shall he let her be redeemed: but to sell her to a strange nation he shall nave no power, seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her ( Exo 21:7-8 ).
So it’s the idea of-actually, men bought their wives in those days when they became like a servant, or like a slave practically; you bought her, she belonged to you. So they had this form of dowry. If you took a wife, you paid the dowry.
Now a dowry wasn’t such a bad deal. Actually, what a dowry was, was alimony in advance. The father would figure how much it would take for her to live, if you should decide you don’t want her after you’re married, because divorce was quite easy. Find out once I’ve purchased her, I don’t like her, then let her be redeemed. She doesn’t have to stay there and take my guff forever. But I don’t have any right to sell her to a strange nation, but she should have the right of her dowry. She can live off of what I paid to get her in the beginning. “If she please not her master who has betrothed her to himself, then let her be redeemed.”
Verse nine,
And if he have betrothed her unto his son, he shall deal with her after the manner of daughters. And if he take him another wife; her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage, shall he not diminish. [In other words, he’s got to go ahead and pay her alimony, and take care of her and so forth.] And if he do not these three unto her, then she shall go out free without money ( Exo 21:9-10 ).
So it was tragic, but that’s the way their customs were in those days. Women had very little rights; so you’ve come a long way. Why have you come a long way? Because of Jesus Christ. Hey, women still have it tough in a lot of cultures. If you don’t believe it, you just go to some of these other areas, New Guinea, Guatemala, even, close by. Look at the lot of the Bedouin women; man, they have it tough. You women can be thankful for what the Lord has done in liberating you.
It is actually because of Jesus Christ, and His declaring that we are, all of us, children of God, and in Christ “there is neither male nor female”. The distinctions are broken down. It is Christ that has put us all on an equal footing, and an equal plain and has taken away any concept or idea of a superior sex. That God favors men over women, or vice a versa; it doesn’t exist. “We are all one in Christ Jesus” ( Gal 3:28 ). It is the Christian ethic that has done so much to give the woman the rightful place of equality with a man but such does not exist in cultures where the Christian gospel has not had a strong influence.
Be glad women, you’re not a Moslem. If you don’t believe that, just read what Khomeini is doing to the women there in Iran, and you’ll find out that being a Moslem woman wouldn’t be so easy. Many of you wouldn’t last long under his reign.
Now we deal with assault and battery, and murder, manslaughter, first and second degree in manslaughter.
Now he that smites a man, so that he dies, shall surely be put to death. And if a man lie not in wait, but God delivers him into his hand; then I will appoint thee a place whither he shall flee ( Exo 21:12-13 ).
So if you first of all are guilty of just plain murder, capital punishment. But if it was accidental or just not a premeditated thing, then God was going to appoint a place where you could flee and be safe; they were called cities of refuge that they established. You could flee to a city of refuge and there you would be safe from the avenger.
Now if you would kill my brother, then I would be obligated to kill you because you killed my brother. So if it were an accident and yet I’m mad at you because you were foolish in doing it, and I’m wanting to get retribution and kill you, you could flee to a city of refuge, and there you would be safe as long as you stayed in the city of refuge. But if you came out and I caught you, then I could kill you. But you had to stay in that city of refuge. So God appointed these cities of refuges at strategic points in the land when they came into the land. So God is promising that these cities of refuge would be appointed.
Now if a man come presumptuously upon his neighbour, [This would be premeditated, your purpose for coming was] to slay him with guile; [deceitfulness] thou shalt take him from mine altar, that he may die ( Exo 21:14 ).
In other words, you may even flee to the altar of God, but they can take you right from the altar of God and kill you, because yours was a premeditated action.
Now several things for which capital punishment was to be given:
He that smites his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death. [The law said, “Honor thy father and thy mother.”] He that stealeth a man, and sells him, [or kidnappers] or if it be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death. He that curses his father, or mother, shall surely be put to death. [They didn’t have nearly the problem with juvenile delinquency in those days that we have today.] And if men are fighting together, and one smites another with a stone, or with his fist, and he did not die, but he laid up for awhile: And he’s able finally to get out of bed, and walk on a crutch, he that smote him will be acquitted: only he shall pay for his loss of time, until he is thoroughly healed. Now if a man smite his servant, or his maid, [Shows you what little rights the maids and servants had, if it’s your servant or maid,] you smite him with a rod, and he dies under his hand; he shall be punished. [But it wasn’t capital punishment.] Notwithstanding, if he continues a day or two, he shall not be punished: for he is his money. [In other words if he, if he lingers before he dies than you won’t be punished because actually you’ve lost your own money, he belongs to you.] If men are striving, and hurt a woman that is pregnant, so that she aborts [actually] the child, [miscarriages, has a miscarriage] and yet no further danger, or mischief follow: he shall surely be punished, according as the woman’s husband will lay upon him; and he must pay whatever the judges determine. But if any further mischief follow, then you are to give life for life. Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. And if a man smite the eye of his servant, or the eye of his maid, that it perish; then he shall let him go free for his eye’s sake ( Exo 21:15-26 ).
But this “eye for eye, tooth for tooth, burning for burning”, and so forth, now men had begun to misinterpret this law. As if someone had struck you in the eye, that you have a right, not only a right, you’ve got an obligation to smack him in the eye. In other words, they made it an obligatory thing. “You knocked out my tooth, all right man you’ve had it. I gotta knock out your tooth.” Tooth for tooth.
Jesus said, “You’ve heard that it hath been said” ( Mat 5:38 ). Now really what the Lord is doing here is limiting because there is a perversity about our human nature that doesn’t want to just get even. We want to more than get even.
It used to be when my brothers and I were growing up, scuffling with each other, you know we’d be sort of boxing and all, and maybe he would catch you one. What do you want to do? You want to catch him one back just a little harder. So many times when we started out just playing, boy, we ended up in a full-fledged fight cause you keep getting harder, and harder, and harder, and wanting to get back at him a little more. You’d start out with just sort of a game, and playing, but boy you end up just really going at it. That is human nature.
So this was to put a limitation. “An eye for an eye”, not two eyes for an eye. “A tooth for a tooth”, not three tooth, three teeth for one tooth, three tooths. So the purpose of the law was so that it would not exceed, but they had begun to interpret it as an obligation.
So Jesus said, “Hey look, I say unto you if a man smites you on one cheek, turn the other. You know, don’t seek retribution, don’t seek to get even”( Mat 5:39 ). So Christ gave a whole new concept to this. It isn’t, “I’m not under an obligation to blacken your eye cause you blacked mine. Better to forgive, better to pass it over.” So Christ was showing actually that the law was intended to curb man’s spirit, and to curb that spirit of retaliation, that desire to retaliate, but it had become misinterpreted by the Pharisees.
Now we deal with the person dealing with his servant. “If he hits his servant in the eye, and the servant loses the eye, the servant goes free for the eye’s sake.”
If you knock out a tooth of your servant, or your maidservant; then they get to go free for the tooth’s sake. If an ox gore a man or a woman, that they die: then the ox shall be surely stoned, and his flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox will be acquitted. But if the ox were known to push with his horn in times past, and it has been testified to his owner, and he did not keep him corralled, but that he has killed a man or a woman; the ox shall be stoned, and his owner also will be put to death. [You’ve been told that your ox is bad, that it’s out there goring people, or trying to gore people, and you’ve been told about it and you do nothing to corral it or to restrain it, then you are responsible for what your ox did.] If there be laid on him a sum of money, then he shall give for ransom for his life whatever is laid upon him. [So you could buy your way out of that one.] Whether he have a gored son, or a gored daughter, according to the judgment it shall be done unto him. Now if the ox shall push a manservant or a maidservant; he shall give unto their master thirty shekels of silver, and the ox shall be stoned ( Exo 21:27-32 ).
So it is interesting that Jesus was sold by Judas Iscariot for the price of a slave that had been gored by an ox. That was the amount if a slave was gored by an ox, you were to pay the master thirty pieces of silver.
If a man shall open a pit, if you dig a pit and you don’t cover it, and an ox or an ass falls in; Then you’ve got to pay for the ox or the ass to the owner of the beast that was slain. If one man’s ox hurt another that it die; then they will sell the live ox, and divide the money; and the dead ox also they can divide. [And barbecue.] So if it be know that the ox has been used to push in the times past, and the owner did not keep him in; then he shall pay for the ox; and the dead one shall be his own ( Exo 21:33-36 ).
In other words, you get the whole thing. He kills your ox, he has to pay you, and then you get the dead carcass also.
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Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary

At this point we have certain laws which apply the principles of the Decalogue to life. The first movement has to do with the laws of the person. This begins with the relation of slaves to their masters. By these laws slavery was changed into covenant relationship. Henceforward the condition of slaves among the Hebrew people would be in marked distinction to slavery as existing among other peoples. It was the beginning of a great moral movement. The right of a master to service by a definite bond was recognized, but the right of the servant to freedom on fulfilment of the bond was also recognized.
Then followed laws dealing with possible injury of man by man. Life was to be held so sacred that he who took it must forfeit his own. If a killing were premeditated there must be no escape. If the act were unpremeditated, provision was made for a place of refuge. Every detail emphasized the sanctity of human life.
Finally, this sanctity is still in mind in the laws dealing with injury and death wrought by cattle.
It is impossible to read these laws carefully without being impressed with their absolute equity and righteousness and at the same time with their thoroughness. Here, as in other cases, carelessness was never to be an excuse.
Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible

CHAPTER 21 Different Judgments
1. Master and servant (Exo 21:1-11)
2. Concerning injury to the person (Exo 21:12-32)
3. Concerning property (Exo 21:33-36)
The Three Chapters which follow the giving of the Ten Commandments give the practical application of the Decalogue in the daily life. The duties towards the fellowman are demonstrated in part. There are seven sections to these three chapters; each section contains ten precepts.
The servant occupies the first place. He was to obtain his freedom for nothing after serving six years. In Deuteronomy we read that the master is commanded not to let him go empty-handed, but give him of his flock, his threshing floor and his winepress. In this Israel was to remember their own deliverance from the house of bondage (Deu 15:12-18). If the servant chose to remain with his master forever, his ear was to be bored through as the sign of perpetual servitude. This was a custom in other nations as well and signified that the servant was, as it were, fastened by the awl to the house (Deu 15:17).
The Hebrew servant is put so prominently in the foreground because the Son of God became a servant and has chosen the perpetual service. Psa 40:6 and Heb 10:5 show that it is typical of the Lord Jesus Christ. Notice what it says in our chapter: And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife and my children, I will not go out free. It was love which decided the Hebrew servant to be a servant forever. And it was love which brought Him to this earth to do the Fathers will, and love for the church. He loved the church and gave Himself for it. And He loves us as individuals. This corresponds to the love of the servant to his wife and his children. Christ was a servant on earth; He is serving in glory now as the priest and advocate of His people, and in glory He will gird Himself … and will come forth and serve them (Luk 12:37).
This is followed by judgments concerning the injury of a person. Injury of a person had to be punished in a manner corresponding to the injury. The principle of retribution is marked throughout these laws. Smiting father or mother, man-stealing, and cursing the parents was punishable with death. Many pages might be written to follow these laws in detail. Read Exo 21:23-27, and compare with Mat 5:38-48.
Notice again the mention of the servant in Exo 21:32. The price of a servant was thirty shekels of silver. The redemption price of a free Israelite was fifty shekels (Lev 27:3); that of a slave, thirty shekels. How it reminds us again of Him who was sold for thirty pieces of silver (Deu 11:12).
Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)

the judgments: Lev 18:5, Lev 18:26, Lev 19:37, Lev 20:22, Num 35:24, Num 36:13, Deu 5:1, Deu 5:31, Deu 6:20, 1Ki 6:12, 2Ch 19:10, Neh 9:13, Neh 9:14, Neh 10:29, Psa 147:19, Eze 20:11, Eze 20:25, Mal 4:4
which: Exo 19:7, Exo 24:3, Exo 24:4, Deu 4:5, Deu 4:8, Deu 4:14, Deu 4:45, Deu 6:20, Mat 28:20, 1Th 4:1
Reciprocal: Exo 34:32 – he gave Ezr 7:26 – whether it be Neh 5:5 – we Psa 19:9 – judgments Jer 34:14 – At the Act 7:38 – who
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

THE CIVIL CODE
The ten commandments constitute the moral law, a perfect rule of duty for all men and everywhere. But the judgments (Exo 21:1) that follow are an application of those commandments to Israel in the peculiar circumstances of their history at that time and when they should inhabit Canaan. The ten commandments, let us say, represent the constitution of the United States, and the judgments the legislative enactments based thereon by Congress.
The three chapters now entered upon have certain natural divisions, corresponding, though not in exact order, with the last seven commandments of the decalogue:
LAWS OF SERVITUDE (Exo 21:1-11)
This division refers to the duties of masters and servants, and is a natural expansion of the fifth commandment, master being substituted for parent.
It is slavery of a certain kind that is here dealt with, for it was common in those days when for centuries the rights of man had been beclouded by sin, and in the absence of a divine revelation. Heavenly reforms sometimes move slowly, and it was not Gods purpose to immediately do away with this feature of social life, but to regulate, elevate in any other way. (Compare Lev 25:33 and Deu 15:12.) Exo 21:4-6. We can see the advantage of the wife and children remaining with the master in this case, since he doubtless was best able to support them. However, he had rights in the case which should not be violated. But what provision is made for a happy solution of the problem? Behold in this servant whose ear is bored an affecting type of the willing obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ (Psa 40:6-8)!
Exo 21:7-11. If the maid-servant should not please her master in the sense that he espouse her, in what two ways are her rights guarded (Exo 21:8)? What acknowledged position would she have if she became the espoused of his son (Exo 21:9)? And how are the rights of this poor maiden guarded in this case as well (v. 10-11)? We are not to suppose that this law instituted either polygamy or concubinage, but finding it in existence they were permitted until the period was ripe for its extermination (Mat 19:1-9).
LAWS OF PERSONAL SECURITY (Exo 21:12-32)
This section is an expansion of the sixth commandment.
Exo 21:12-14. What distinction is made between premeditated and unpremeditated murder? See Num 35:9-32.
Exo 21:23-25. This law of retaliation has been misunderstood as though it encouraged revenge, but it refers to the administration of justice at the hand of the magistrate (v. 6).
LAWS OF PROPERTY (Exo 21:33 to Exo 22:15)
This section is an expansion of the 8th commandment.
Breaking up (Exo 22:2) should read as in the Revised Version breaking in, which makes the sense plain.
Judge all through these chapters is translated God in the Revised Version. Israel is a theocracy. Its supreme ruler is God. The magistrates represent and speak directly for Him. Thus will it be again in the millennium.
LAWS OF CONJUGAL FIDELITY (Exo 22:16-31)
This is an expansion of the seventh commandment, and yet its subject matter is miscellaneous. Murphy gives a unity to the verse by supposing the relation between God and His people to be symbolized by that of husband and wife, God being the avowed guardian and representative of the stranger, the widow and the orphan.
Exo 22:28. The word gods should be God, and it will be seen from the context that reviling rulers is regarded as reviling God (compare Rom 13:1-7).
Exo 22:29. Liquors has been rendered the trickling juice of the vine. Some things in this section are more fully explained in later Scriptures.
LAWS OF VERACITY (Exo 23:1-9)
This corresponds to the ninth commandment.
Exo 23:3 means that one is not to countenance or favor a poor man in his cause just because he is poor, if the cause is unrighteous. (Compare to Lev 19:15.)
LAWS OF SET TIMES (Exo 23:10-19)
This corresponds to the fourth commandment.
What was the law for the land in the seventh year (Exo 23:11)? For what purpose was the spontaneous growth of that year to be used? How did the divine Legislator provide against an emergency of famine (Lev 25:20-22)?
Note the moral advantages resulting from the observance of this law: (1) a check on avarice, (2) a stimulant to brotherly kindness and compassion, (3) a demonstration of human equality, (4) a cultivation of prudence and economy, and (5) a sense of constant dependence upon God.
What are the three annual feasts (Exo 23:14-16)? Murphy compares them with the three elements of salvation: the Passover with the atonement, Pentecost with the new birth, the ingathering with pardon and its accompanying plenitude of blessing. What obligation is attached to these festivals?
Exo 23:19, last sentence, is difficult, although the command itself is plain. It is in connection with sacrifice (Exo 23:18) has it therefore a symbolic meaning? Or was it to prevent the slaying and eating of the kid at too early a period? Or does the application bear simply on a barbarous and cruel action?
LAWS OF PITY (Exo 23:20-33)
This is allied to the tenth commandment because of its reference to the service of Jehovah alone, who estimates the motive of men.
Whom have we seen to be meant by the Angel (Exo 23:20)? In what way have we seen His presence hitherto displayed? On what commission is He now sent? What shows His authority? Power? Dignity (Exo 23:21)? What are the blessings of obedience (Exo 23:22-27)? What precaution would God take in bringing them into possession of the land (Exo 23:28-30)? What final warning is given (Exo 23:32-33)?
RATIFYING THE COVENANT (Exodus 24)
At the beginning of this chapter we are introduced to the two sons of Aaron, soon to be associated with him in the priesthood and to have a sad ending nevertheless. With what words do the people accept the obligations imposed upon them (Exo 24:3)? What kind of an altar presumably did Moses build (compare Exo 24:4 with Exo 20:24-26)?
What provision is made for the careful transmission of the law (Exo 24:4)? What name is given to the book thus written (Exo 24:7)? By what solemn act is the covenant ratified (Exo 24:8)? Compare the marginal reference.
What sublime experience was granted to these representatives of Israel on the mount (Exo 24:10)? What this means, in the absence of further record, who can say! Why may we judge that they did not see the face of God (Exo 33:20-23) or any similitude of Him (Deu 4:15)? What is the description of what they did see?
How was Gods mercy shown to them on this occasion (Exo 24:11)? How is their escape from death expressed in the last clause? Is not this escape explained by the covenant relationship with God into which they had now come? Was this relationship grounded on their keeping of the law or on the blood of propitiation that had been shed and sprinkled upon the people? What did this typify (Rom 3:19-25)? Compare also Heb 10:16-20.
What final seal to the authority of the law is now given (Exo 24:12)? What two individuals are seen for a second time with Moses (Exo 24:13-14)? What grandeur on the mount is described (Exo 24:15-17)? What new event in Moses experience (Exo 24:18)? The reason for this new event shows in the next lesson.
QUESTIONS
1. What distinction is suggested between commandments and judgments?
2. What beautiful type of our Lord Jesus Christ does this lesson contain?
3. What testimony to Israels theocratic status?
4. How are the rights of the rich guarded as well as of the poor?
5. What witness have we here to an early written revelation?
Fuente: James Gray’s Concise Bible Commentary

Exo 21:1. The first verse is the general title of the laws contained in this and the two following chapters. Their government being purely a theocracy, that which in other states is to be settled by human prudence, was directed among them by a divine appointment. These laws are called judgments; because their magistrates were to give judgment according to them. In the doubtful cases that had hitherto occurred, Moses had particularly inquired of God, but now God gave him statutes in general, by which to determine particular cases. He begins with the laws concerning servants, commanding mercy and moderation toward them. The Israelites had lately been servants themselves, and now they were become not only their own masters, but masters of servants too; lest they should abuse their servants as they themselves had been abused, provision was made for the mild and gentle usage of servants.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Exo 21:1. These are the judgments. In this chapter we enter upon the fifty seven precepts of the civil law of the Hebrew nation. They are the laws of patriarchal society; and are here arranged and modified so as to promote order, purity and justice, in the whole community. The American Indians are found to have had many of these laws, as will be cited under the particular precept. Theodore Beza has left us a Latin work entitled Mosaycarum & Romanorum Legum Collatio, the Mosaic code collated with the Roman laws, in which many of the statutes are striking coincidents.
Exo 21:2. Buy a Hebrew servant. In criminal cases, and in cases of debt, the magistrates had of course the power to inflict this punishment. It was allowed also in cases of insolvency. 1Ki 4:1. Mat 18:25. And seven years servitude was milder than long imprisonment.
Exo 21:4. The wifeher masters. The Jews affirm that this law respected aliens only.
Exo 21:6. Bore his ear: a frequent custom among the gentiles as well as the Jews.
Exo 21:7. If a man sell his daughter, not for , a slave, but , for a domestic, and under a promise of marriage. In all Shems race, as in the tribes of Ham and Japhet, a man had the power of a husband over a maid that he had bought. From the beginning, as our Saviour says on cases of divorce, it was not so. Moses therefore mitigates what he could not supersede, by guarding the spotless honour of a poor virgin.
Exo 21:13. God delivered him into his hand. That is, he proved the stronger in the fight, and his opponent died of his bruises. But neither refuge nor satisfaction was allowed for wilful murder. Num 35:31.
Exo 21:24. Eye for an eye. The judges might in some cases mitigate this. If a man with one eye should do this, the punishment would exceed the crime.
REFLECTIONS.
The political laws given to the Jews are worthy the serious attention, not only of judges and magistrates, that they may conform to them as much as possible in all things that are not peculiar to the Israelites, to the land of Canaan, and to those times, but of every other person; as they contain very excellent precepts of justice and charity, and many other duties. Upon the laws concerning slaves it must be observed, that slavery is prohibited among christians; and therefore that these laws do not respect us directly. However, we may conclude from them that the will of God is, that servants should be faithful to their masters, and that masters should treat their servants with tenderness and humanity. We learn likewise in this chapter, that murderers, men stealers, and those that curse father or mother, are guilty of very enormous crimes, which the magistrates ought to punish severely; and we may judge from thence, that God will not leave them unpunished. These are crimes which ought not to be so much as known among christians, any more than several others mentioned in the laws of Moses.
From this chapter, says Ostervald, we learnthat those who smite or wound their neighbour ought not to go unpunishedthat those who occasion any evil to their neighbour, whether wilfully or accidentally and without any evil intention, should suffer for it, and ought to repair the damage as far as possiblethat although slavery obtained amongst the Jews, God did not intend that they should treat their slaves cruelly or inhumanly as other nations did; from whence it appears that christians should behave with still greater meekness and gentleness towards their servants. It must also be observed, that these words, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, do not authorize private revenge, but only denote the punishment that judges were to inflict upon such as assaulted and wounded their neighbour; otherwise, we should be so far from returning evil for evil, that we ought, (as our Saviour observes, Matthew 5. where this law is mentioned) to bear injuries patiently: not to avenge ourselves, nor always insist upon what is strictly our right; but to imitate that meekness and patience which Jesus Christ our Redeemer has given us an example of.
Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Exodus 21 – 23
The study of this section of our book is eminently calculated to impress the heart with a sense d God’s unsearchable wisdom and infinite goodness. It enables one to form some idea of the character of a kingdom governed by laws of divine appointment. Here, too, we may see the amazing condescension of Him who, though He is the great God of heaven and earth, can, nevertheless, stoop to adjudicate between man and man in reference to the death of an ox, the loan of a garment, or the loss of a servant’s tooth. “Who is like unto the Lord our God, who humbleth himself to behold the things that are in heaven and on earth?” He governs the universe, and yet He can occupy Himself with the provision of a covering for one of His creatures. He guides the angel’s flight and takes notice of a crawling worm. He humbles Himself to regulate the movements of those countless orbs that roll through infinite space and to record the fall of a sparrow.
As to the character of the judgement set forth in the chapters before us, we may learn a double lesson. These judgements and ordinances bear a twofold witness: they convey to the ear a twofold message, and present to the eye two sides of a picture. They tell of God and they tell of man.
In the first place, on God’s part, we find Him enacting laws which exhibit strict, even-handed, perfect justice. “Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.” Such was the character of the laws, the statutes, and the judgements by which God governed His earthly kingdom of Israel. Everything was provided for, every interest was maintained, and every claim was met. There was no partiality – no distinction made between the rich and the poor. The balance in which each man’s claim was weighed was adjusted with divine accuracy, so that no one could justly complain of a decision. The pure robe of justice was not to be tarnished with the foul stains of bribery, corruption and partiality. The eye and the hand of a divine Legislator provided for everything; and a divine Executive inflexibly dealt with every defaulter. The stroke of justice fell only on the head of the guilty, while every obedient soul was protected in the enjoyment of all his rights and privileges.
Then, as regards man, it is impossible to read over these laws and not be struck with the disclosure which they indirectly, but really, make of his desperate depravity. The fact of Jehovah’s having to enact laws against certain crimes, proves the capability, on man’s part, of committing those crimes. Were the capability and the tendency not there, there would be no need of the enactments. Now, there are many who, if the gross Abominations forbidden in these chapters were named to them, might feel disposed to adopt the language of Hazael and say, “Is thy servant a dog that he should do this thing?” Such persons have not yet travelled down into the deep abyss of their own hearts. For albeit there are crimes here forbidden which would seem to place man, as regards his habits and tendencies, below the level of a “dog,” yet do those very statutes prove, beyond all question, that the most refined and cultivated member of the human family carries above, in his bosom, the seeds of the very darkest and most horrifying abominations. For whom were those statutes enacted? For man. Were they needful? Unquestionably. But they would have been quite superfluous if man were incapable of committing the sins referred to. But man is capable; and hence we see that man is sunk to the very lowest possible level – that his nature is wholly corrupt – that, from the crown of his head to the sole of his foot, there is not so much as a speck of moral soundness.
How can such a being ever stand, without an emotion of fear, in the full blaze of the throne of God? How can he stand within the holiest? How can he stand on the sea of glass? How can he enter in by the pearly gates and tread the golden streets? The reply to these inquiries unfolds the amazing depths of redeeming love and the eternal efficacy of the blood of the Lamb. Deep as is man’s ruin, the love of God is deeper still. Black as is his guilt, the blood of Jesus can wash it all away. Wide as is the chasm separating man from God, the cross has bridged it. God has come down to the very lowest point of the sinner’s condition, in order that He might lift him up into a position of infinite favour, in eternal association with His own Son. Well may we exclaim, “Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed on us, that we should be called the sons of God.” (1 John 3: l) Nothing could fathom man’s ruin but God’s love, and nothing could equal man’s guilt but the blood of Christ. But now the very depth of the ruin only magnifies the love that has fathomed it, and the intensity of the guilt only celebrates the efficacy of the blood that can cleanse it. The very vilest sinner who believes in Jesus can rejoice in the assurance that God sees him and pronounces him “clean every whit.”
Such, then, is the double character of instruction to be gleaned from the laws and ordinances in this section, looked at as a whole; and the more minutely we look at them, in detail, the more impressed we shall be with a sense of their fullness and beauty. Take, for instance, the very first ordinance that presents itself, namely, that of the Hebrew Servant.
“Now these are the judgements which thou shalt set before them. If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master have given him a wife, and she have borne him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall he her master’s, and he shall go out by himself. And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free; then his master shall bring him unto the judges: he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him for ever.” (Ex. 21: 1-6) The servant was perfectly free to go out, so far as he was personally concerned. He had discharged every claim, and could, therefore, walk abroad in unquestioned freedom; but because of his love to his master, his wife, and his children, he voluntarily bound himself to perpetual servitude; and not only so, but he was also willing to bear, in his own person, the marks of that servitude.
The application of this to the Lord Jesus Christ will be obvious to the intelligent reader. In Him we behold the One who dwelt in the bosom of the Father before all worlds – the object of His eternal delight – who might have occupied, throughout eternity, this His personal and entirely peculiar place, inasmuch as there lay upon Him no obligation (save that which ineffable love created and ineffable love incurred) to abandon that place. Such, however, was His love to the Father whose counsels were involved, and for the Church collectively, and each individual member thereof, whose salvation was involved, that He, voluntarily, came down to earth, emptied Himself, and made Himself of no reputation, took upon Him the form of a servant and the marks of perpetual service. To these marks we probably have a striking allusion in the Psalms. “Mine ears hast thou digged.” (Ps. 40: 6, marg.) This psalm is the expression of Christ’s devotedness to God. “Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea thy law is within my heart.” He came to do the will of God, whatever that will might be. He never once did His own will, not even in the reception and salvation of sinners, though surely His loving heart, with all its affections, was most fully in that glorious work. Still He receives and saves only as the servant of the Father’s counsels. “All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me. And this is the Father’s will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.” (John 6: 37-39)
Here we have a most interesting view of the servant character of the Lord Jesus Christ. He, in perfect grace, holds Himself responsible to receive all who come within the range of the divine counsels; and not only to receive them, but to preserve them through all the difficulties and trials of their devious path down here, yea, in the article of death itself, should it come, and to raise them all up in the last day. Oh! how secure is the very feeblest member of the Church of God! He is the subject of God’s eternal counsels, which counsels the Lord Jesus Christ is pledged to carry out. Jesus loves the Father, and, in proportion to the intensity of that love, is the security of each member of the redeemed family. The salvation of any sinner who believes on the name of the Son of God is, in one aspect of it, but the expression of Christ’s love to the Father. If one such could perish, through any cause whatsoever, it would argue that the Lord Jesus Christ was unable to carry out the will of God, which were nothing short of positive blasphemy against His sacred name, to whom be all honour and majesty throughout the everlasting ages.
Thus we have, in the Hebrew servant, a type of Christ in His pure devotedness to the Father. But there is more than this: “I love my wife and my children.” “Christ loved the church and gave himself for it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing ; but that it should be holy and without blemish.” (Eph. 5: 25-27) There are various other passages of Scripture presenting Christ as the antitype of the Hebrew servant, both in His love for the Church, as a body, and for all believers personally. In Matthew 13, John 10 and 13, and Hebrews 2, my reader will find special teaching on the point.
The apprehension of this love of the heart of Jesus cannot fail to produce a spirit of fervent devotedness to the One who could exhibit such pure, such perfect, such disinterested love. How could the wife and children of the Hebrew servant fail to love one who had voluntarily surrendered his liberty in order that he and they might be together? And what is the love presented in the type, when compared with that which shines in the antitype? It is as nothing. “The love of Christ passeth knowledge.” It led Him to think of us before all worlds – to visit us in the fullness of time – to walk deliberately to the door post – to suffer for us on the cross, in order that He might raise us to companionship with himself, in His everlasting kingdom and glory.
Were I to enter into a full exposition of the remaining statutes and judgements of this portion of the Book of Exodus, it would carry me much further than I feel, at present, led to go.* I will merely observe, in conclusion, that it is impossible to read the section and not have the heart drawn out in adoration of the profound wisdom, well-balanced justice, and yet tender considerateness which breathe throughout the whole. We rise up from the study of it with this conviction deeply wrought into the soul, that the One who speaks here is “the only true,” “the only wise,” and the infinitely gracious God.
{*I would here observe, once for all, that the feasts referred to in Ex. 23: 14-19 and the offerings in Ex. 29 being brought out in all their fullness and detail, in the book of Leviticus, I shall reserve them until we come to dwell upon the contents of that singularly rich and interesting book.}
May all our meditations on His eternal word have the effect of prostrating our souls in worship before Him whose perfect ways and glorious attributes shine there, in all their blessedness and brightness, for the refreshment, the delight, and the edification of His blood-bought people.
Fuente: Mackintosh’s Notes on the Pentateuch

Exo 21:1 E. The Judgments.This is best taken as the heading of a fresh collection, The Judgments (p. 184), consisting of case-law, mainly about property, and containing some striking parallels with the Code of Hammurab (see p. 51, HDB, vol. 5, pp. 584612, and Johns Babylonian and Assyrian Laws, Contracts, and Letters, pp. 4468). The Bab. code was much longer, containing 248 laws, and is represented as given by the seated sun-god Shamash to the king standing before him. The Code deals only with civil and criminal laws, not with morals and religion, and the chief parallels are with the Judgments (see Driver, CB, 420ff.). The Judgments do not borrow from the Code, but they are often too like it to be independent (e.g. in the case of the vicious ox, Exo 21:28 f.). Either both rest on ancient Semitic custom, or the Hebrew law is based on a survival in Canaan of Bab. civilisation from the time of the Tell el-Amarna letters. Parallels are found in Exo 21:2; Exo 21:11; Exo 21:15-16; Exo 21:18 f., Exo 21:22, Exo 21:23-25, Exo 21:26; Exo 21:28, Exo 21:29-32, Exo 22:1-4 (two cases), Exo 22:5; Exo 22:7; Exo 22:9-10 f., Exo 22:12; Exo 22:14 f., Exo 22:26.
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

RESPONSIBILITIES OF MASTERS
(vs.1-11)
Moses is now given an expanded view of the law on Chapters 21-23. Special duties of masters are first considered. They may think they have full authority over their slaves, but they must first remember God’s authority over themselves. For God decidedly limits their authority over slaves. It was permissible to buy a Hebrew slave. Sometimes one would become so poor as to sell himself to another (Lev 25:39), but his master was to strictly observe God’s orders in this matter. After six years the slave was to be fully freed, and the master was required to “furnish him liberally out of the flock” and out of all the provisions he had (Deu 15:14). This was a gracious provisions of God so that people would not just be driven out on the street when they became poor.
If he was alone in becoming a slave, he should be freed alone: if his wife was with him, then both should be freed (v.3). However, if the master had given him a wife, then both the wife and any children she bore would still belong to the master, while he could be freed alone. This does not correspond to the grace of God today, but it illustrates the hardness of law alone.
However, what follows is a beautiful contrast. If the slave plainly says that he loves his master, his wife and his children, and does not want to go out free, then the master should present him to God, then bring him to the door or doorpost, and pierce his ear, which would indicate that the man was his servant for life (vs.5-6). The typical significance of this is by all means the most wonderful consideration. The servant is the Lord Jesus, who has willingly taken this place in coming into the world (Php 2:7). Now He has willingly decided to be a servant forever because He loves His Master (God the Father), He loves his wife (the church of God, the assembly), He loves His children (every individual who has been born again). The ear being bored is instructive too. A hearing ear is the major characteristic of a true servant, and its being bored in this case reminds us of the death of the Lord Jesus in obedience to His Father’s will, that death confirming the fact that He is a servant forever.
The law did not forbid the sale of one’s daughter to another man as a female slave (v.7). She would not however be set free in the year of jubilee, for she might actually be her purchaser’s wife before that time, or the wife of his Son (vs.8-9). Yet the law did protect her. If the buyer was not pleased with her, he should allow her to be redeemed by her father or other relative. But he must not sell her to a foreigner.
VIOLENCE AMONG PEOPLE
(vs.12-27)
One guilty of murder was himself to be put to death. Whatever people may say in opposing the death penalty today, in cases of proven murder, at least they cannot say it is unjust. However, if the case was not that of deliberate murder, but of manslaughter, there was a provision made for a guilty man to go to a city of refuge for his protection.
As to this, see Deu 19:1-2. But in a case of premeditated murder, the penalty was death (v.14)
The law’s exactions were most stern, as verse 15 shows. The death penalty was to be pronounced against one who struck his father or his mother. This is solemn guilt in the eyes of God. A kidnapper also was put to death, whether he had sold his victim or whether he held him as a captive (v.16). Again, death was the penalty for one who cursed his father or his mother (v.17). This of course is a great contrast to honoring one’s parents.
Verses 18 and 19 deal with the question of a physical quarrel and one striking another with his fist or other weapon, so that he is injured. If death did not ensue, then there was not a death penalty, but the injurer must pay for the loss of time suffered by the injured party and also any medical expenses that might arise from this, till the person was fully healed.
One striking his servant and causing death would incur the death penalty himself, yet if the servant continued even only a day or two before dying, the penalty would not be effective. The only explanation given for this is, “for he is his money” (v.21).
If through physical striving a woman is caused an abortion, the person responsible must pay some recompense, as the woman’s husband demands, or as was to be determined by a judge. If however there were bad results for the woman, the guilty party would be held responsible for this, the judgment would be commensurate with the injury, — “eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe” (vs.24-25). Of course, to literally pluck out one’s eye because he had blinded another’s eye, would not help the injured party. But he is entitled to a fair recompense.
This is intimated in verse 26. If a man blinded the eye of his slave, he must let him go free for his eye’s sake, and similarly, if he knocked out his tooth (v.27).
An ox that gored anyone to death was to be stoned to death, and the meat of the ox not eaten. The owner of the ox would not be held responsible unless he had been warned that his ox was dangerous. In this case, if he had not kept the ox penned in and the ox killed anyone, the owner as well as the ox was to be put to death (v.29). This penalty could however be relaxed if the nearest relative of the victim would agree to accept ransom money instead (vs.30-31). If it were a matter of the ox only pushing a servant, the owner of the ox must pay thirty shekels of silver to the owner, and the ox must be stoned.
Fuente: Grant’s Commentary on the Bible

The fundamental rights of the Israelites 21:1-23:12
It is very important to note that various law codes already existed in the ancient Near East before the giving of the Mosaic Covenant. These included laws in the Akkadian civilization located in Mesopotamia in the twentieth century B.C. (e.g., the Laws of Esnunna). [Note: Pritchard, pp. 161-63.] There were also the laws in the Sumerian civilization in the nineteenth century (e.g., the Code of Lipit-Istar). [Note: Ibid., pp. 159-61.] Moreover laws in the Babylonian civilization that followed in the eighteenth century (e.g., the Code of Hammurabi) [Note: Ibid., pp. 163-80.] existed, as did others. People living in the Near East at the time of the Exodus (fifteenth century) knew these laws and lived by them more or less. The Mosaic Covenant presupposes this body of legal literature. It was not given as a comprehensive legal system to a people living without any laws. Rather it was a series of instructions God gave as Israel’s king for His people to govern their behavior in certain specific matters. This fact explains why the Torah (lit. instruction, i.e., the Law of Moses) does not contain fundamental instruction in many basic areas of law, such as monogamy. The instructions in the Law of Moses confirmed certain existing laws, cancelled other laws, and changed still others for the Israelites as the will of God for them. [Note: For further explanation, see Cassuto, pp. 257-64.]
Moses revealed the laws that follow analogically (i.e., on the basis of the association of ideas). Analogical thinking has been more characteristic of eastern cultures and rational thinking more typical of western cultures throughout history generally speaking.
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

Introduction 21:1
The "ordinances" were not laws in the usual sense of that word but the rights of those living within Israel. The Book of the Covenant (Exo 20:22 to Exo 23:33) was Israel’s "Bill of Rights."
"A selection of ’judgments’ is provided as a sample of the divine judgments which Moses gave the people. A total of forty-two ’judgments’ is given. [The 42 judgments appear in the following passages in Exodus: Exo 21:2-36; Exo 22:1-31; Exo 23:1-7 a, Exo 23:7 b, Exo 23:8-12.] The number forty-two apparently stems from the fact that the Hebrew letters in the first word of the section, ’and these’ (w’lh), add up precisely to the number forty-two (7 x 6). (There may also be a desire to have seven laws for each of the six days of work [cf. Exo 20:11]). This suggests that the laws in Exo 21:1 to Exo 23:12 are to be understood merely as a representative selection of the whole Mosaic Law. It is not an attempt at a complete listing of all the laws. The purpose of the selection was to provide a basis for teaching the nature of divine justice. By studying specific cases of the application of God’s will in concrete situations, the reader of the Pentateuch could learn the basic principles undergirding the covenant relationship. Whereas the ’ten words’ provided a general statement of the basic principles of justice which God demanded of his people, the examples selected here further demonstrated how those principles, or ideals, were to be applied to real life situations." [Note: Sailhamer, The Pentateuch . . ., p. 290.]
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

CHAPTER XXI.
THE LESSER LAW (continued).
PART II.–RIGHTS OF THE PERSON.
Exo 21:1-32.
The first words of God from Sinai had declared that He was Jehovah Who brought them out of slavery. And in this remarkable code, the first person whose rights are dealt with is the slave. We saw that a denunciation of all slavery would have been premature, and therefore unwise; but assuredly the germs of emancipation were already planted by this giving of the foremost place to the rights of the least of all and the servant of all.
As regards the Hebrew slave, the effect was to reduce his utmost bondage to a comparatively mild apprenticeship. At the worst he should go free in the seventh year; and if the year of jubilee intervened, it brought a still speedier emancipation. If his debt or misconduct had involved a family in his disgrace, they should also share his emancipation, but if while in bondage his master had provided for his marriage with a slave, then his family must await their own appointed period of release. It followed that if he had contracted a degrading alliance with a foreign slave, his freedom would inflict upon him the pang of final severance from his dear ones. He might, indeed, escape this pain, but only by a deliberate and humiliating act, by formally renouncing before the judges his liberty, the birthright of his nation (“they are My servants, whom I brought forth out of Egypt, they shall not be sold as bondservants”– Lev 25:42), and submitting to have his ear pierced, at the doorpost of his master’s house, as if, like that, his body were become his master’s property. It is uncertain, after this decisive step, whether even the year of jubilee brought him release; and the contrary seems to be implied in his always bearing about in his body an indelible and degrading mark. It will be remembered that St. Paul rejoiced to think that his choice of Christ was practically beyond recall, for the scars on his body marked the tenacity of his decision (Gal 6:17). He wrote this to Gentiles, and used the Gentile phrase for the branding of a slave. But beyond question this Hebrew of Hebrews remembered, as he wrote, that one of his race could incur lifelong subjection only by a voluntary wound, endured because he loved his master, such as he had received for love of Jesus.
When the law came to deal with assaults it was impossible to place the slave upon quite the same level as the freeman. But Moses excelled the legislators of Greece and Rome, by making an assault or chastisement which killed him upon the spot as worthy of death as if a freeman had been slain. It was only the victim who lingered that died comparatively unavenged (Exo 21:20-21). After all, chastisement was a natural right of the master, because he owned him (“he is his money”); and it would be hard to treat an excess of what was permissible, inflicted perhaps under provocation which made some punishment necessary, on the same lines with an assault that was entirely lawless. But there was this grave restraint upon bad temper,–that the loss of any member, and even of the tooth of a slave, involved his instant manumission. And this carried with it the principle of moral responsibility for every hurt (Exo 21:26-27).
It was not quite plain that these enactments extended to the Gentile slave. But in accordance with the assertion that the whole spirit of the statutes was elevating, the conclusion arrived at by the later authorities was the generous one.
When it is added that man-stealing (upon which all our modern systems of slavery were founded) was a capital offence, without power of commutation for a fine (Exo 21:16), it becomes clear that the advocates of slavery appeal to Moses against the outraged conscience of humanity without any shadow of warrant either from the letter or the spirit of the code.
There remains to be considered a remarkable and melancholy sub-section of the law of slavery.
In every age degraded beings have made gain of the attractions of their daughters. With them, the law attempted nothing of moral influence. But it protected their children, and brought pressure to bear upon the tempter, by a series of firm provisions, as bold as the age could bear, and much in advance of the conscience of too many among ourselves today.
The seduction of any unbetrothed maiden involved marriage, or the payment of a dowry. And thus one door to evil was firmly closed (Exo 22:16).
But when a man purchased a female slave, with the intention of making her an inferior wife, whether for himself or for his son (such only are the purchases here dealt with, and an ordinary female slave was treated upon the same principles as a man), she was far from being the sport of his caprice. If indeed he repented at once, he might send her back, or transfer her to another of her countrymen upon the same terms, but when once they were united she was protected against his fickleness. He might not treat her as a servant or domestic, but must, even if he married another and probably a chief wife, continue to her all the rights and privileges of a wife. Nor was her position a temporary one, to her damage, as that of an ordinary slave was, to his benefit.
And if there was any failure to observe these honourable terms, she could return with unblemished reputation to her father’s home, without forfeiture of the money which had been paid for her (Exo 21:7-11).
Does any one seriously believe that a system like the African slave trade could have existed in such a humane and genial atmosphere as these enactments breathed? Does any one who knows the plague spot and disgrace of our modern civilisation suppose for a moment that more could have been attempted, in that age, for the great cause of purity? Would to God that the spirit of these enactments were even now respected! They would make of us, as they have made of the Hebrew nation unto this day, models of domestic tenderness, and of the blessings in health and physical vigour which an untainted life bestows upon communities.
By such checks upon the degradation of slavery, the Jew began to learn the great lesson of the sanctity of manhood. The next step was to teach him the value of life, not only in the avenging of murder, but also in the mitigation of such revenge. The blood-feud was too old, too natural a practice to be suppressed at once; but it was so controlled and regulated as to become little more than a part of the machinery of justice.
A premeditated murder was inexpiable, not to be ransomed; the murderer must surely die. Even if he fled to the altar of God, intending to escape thence to a city of refuge when the avenger ceased to watch, he should be torn from that holy place: to shelter him would not be an honour, but a desecration to the shrine (Exo 21:12, Exo 21:14). According to this provision Joab and Adonijah suffered. For the slayer by accident or in hasty quarrel, “a place whither he shall flee” would be provided, and the vague phrase indicates the antiquity of the edict (Exo 21:13). This arrangement at once respected his life, which did not merit forfeiture, and provided a penalty for his rashness or his passion.
It is because the question in hand is the sanctity of man, that the capital punishment of a son who strikes or curses a parent, the vicegerent of God, and of a kidnapper, is interposed between these provisions and minor offences against the person (Exo 21:15-17).
Of these latter, the first is when lingering illness results from a blow received in a quarrel. This was not a case for the stern rule, eye for eye and tooth for tooth,–for how could that rule be applied to it?–but the violent man should pay for his victim’s loss of time, and for medical treatment until he was thoroughly recovered (Exo 21:18-19).
But what is to be said to the general law of retribution in kind? Our Lord has forbidden a Christian, in his own case, to exact it. But it does not follow that it was unjust, since Christ plainly means to instruct private persons not to exact their rights, whereas the magistrate continues to be “a revenger to execute justice.” And, as St. Augustine argued shrewdly, “this command was not given for exciting the fires of hatred, but to restrain them. For who would easily be satisfied with repaying as much injury as he received? Do we not see men slightly hurt athirst for slaughter and blood?… Upon this immoderate and unjust vengeance, the law imposed a just limit, not that what was quenched might be kindled, but that what was burning might not spread.” (Cont. Faust, xix. 25.)
It is also to be observed that by no other precept were the Jews more clearly led to a morality still higher than it prescribed. Their attention was first drawn to the fact that a compensation in money was nowhere forbidden, as in the case of murder (Num 35:31). Then they went on to argue that such compensation must have been intended, because its literal observance teemed with difficulties. If an eye were injured but not destroyed, who would undertake to inflict an equivalent hurt? What if a blind man destroyed an eye? Would it be reasonable to quench utterly the sight of a one-eyed man who had only destroyed one-half of the vision of his neighbour? Should the right hand of a painter, by which he maintains his family, be forfeited for that of a singer who lives by his voice? Would not the cold and premeditated operation inflict far greater mental and even physical suffering than a sudden wound received in a moment of excitement? By all these considerations, drawn from the very principle which underlay the precept, they learned to relax its pressure in actual life. The law was already their schoolmaster, to lead them beyond itself (vide Kalisch in loco).
Lastly, there is the question of injury to the person, wrought by cattle.
It is clearly to deepen the sense of reverence for human life, that not only must the ox which kills a man be slain, but his flesh may not be eaten; thus carrying further the early aphorism “at the hand of every beast will I require … your blood” (Gen 9:5). This motive, however, does not betray the lawgiver into injustice: “the owner of the ox shall be quit”; the loss of his beast is his sufficient penalty.
But if its evil temper has been previously observed, and he has been warned, then his recklessness amounts to blood-guiltiness, and he must die, or else pay whatever ransom is laid upon him. This last clause recognises the distinction between his guilt and that of a deliberate man-slayer, for whose crime the law distinctly prohibited a composition (Num 35:31).
And it is expressly provided, according to the honourable position of woman in the Hebrew state, that the penalty for a daughter’s life shall be the same as for that of a son.
As a slave was exposed to especial risk, and his position was an ignoble one, a fixed composition was appointed, and the amount was memorable. The ransom of a common slave, killed by the horns of the wild oxen, was thirty pieces of silver, the goodly price that Messiah was prized at of them (Zec 11:13).
Fuente: Expositors Bible Commentary

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