The Treatment of Servants
21
📚✭“Now these are the laws which you are to set before them.2 📚✭“If you buy a Hebrew slave, he is to serve you for six years, and in the seventh he is to go out free, paying nothing. 3 📚If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself; if he was married, then his wife shall go out with him. 4 If his master has given him a wife, and she has borne him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall belong to her master, and he shall go out by himself.
5 📚“But if the slave plainly says, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free’, 6 📚✭then his master shall bring him to the judges✭, then 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 permanently.
7 📚“And if a man sells his daughter as a female slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. 8 📚If she does not please her master, who has assigned her to himself, then he is to let her be redeemed. He shall have no authority to sell her to a foreign people, since he has dealt unfairly with her. 9 And if he has assigned her to his son, he shall deal with her according to the custom with daughters. 10 📚If he takes another woman, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, and her conjugal rights. 11 And if he does not do these three things for her, then she shall go out free without payment.
12 📚“Whoever strikes a man, so that he dies, shall surely be put to death. 13 📚However if a man did not lie in wait, but God delivered him into his hands, then I will appoint you a place where he is to flee. 14 📚But if a man deals arrogantly with his neighbour so as to murder him treacherously, you shall take him from my altar to be put to death.
15 📚“And whoever strikes his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death.
16 📚“And whoever kidnaps a man and sells him, or if he is found in his hands, he shall surely be put to death.
17 📚“And whoever curses his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death.
18 📚“And if men fight together, and one strikes the other with a stone or with his fist, and he does not die, but is confined to his bed, 19 📚if he gets up again and walks around with his staff, then the one who struck him will be in the clear. But he shall pay for the loss of his time, and shall see that he is completely healed.
20 📚“And if a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod, and the slave dies at his hand, he shall surely be punished. 21 ✭However, if the slave survives a day or two, he shall not be punished, for he is his property.
22 📚“If men fight, and one of them harms a pregnant woman so that she has a miscarriage, yet there is no further injury, he shall surely be fined, just as the woman’s husband may demand, and he must pay as the judges determine. 23 📚✭And if there is any further injury, then you shall 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 strikes the eye of his male slave, or the eye of his female slave so that it is lost, he shall let him go free for his eye’s sake. 27 And if he knocks out his male slave’s tooth, or his female slave’s tooth, he shall let him go free for his tooth’s sake.
28 📚“If an ox gores a man or a woman and they die, then the ox shall surely be stoned, and its meat shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox shall be in the clear. 29 📚✭But if the ox was previously in the habit of goring, and its owner has been warned, and he has not confined it, and it has killed a man or a woman, the ox shall be stoned, and its owner also shall be put to death. 30 📚If payment is demanded of him, then he shall give whatever is demanded for the ransom of his life. 31 Whether it has gored a son, or has gored a daughter, it is to be done to him according to this law. 32 📚If the ox gores a male slave or a female slave, he shall give to their master thirty shekels✭ of silver, and the ox shall be stoned.
33 📚“And if a man uncovers a pit, or if a man digs a pit, and does not cover it, and an ox or a donkey falls in it, 34 📚the owner of the pit shall make it good, and give money to their owner; and the dead animal shall be his.
35 “And if one man’s ox hurts another’s, and it dies, then they shall sell the live ox, and divide the money from it, and also divide the dead ox. 36 Or if it is known that the ox was previously in the habit of goring, and his owner has not confined it, he shall surely pay ox for ox, and the dead one will be his.