Exodus 21
21
Hebrew Slaves
(Deuteronomy 15.12-18)
1The Lord gave Moses the following laws for his people:
2 #
Lv 25.39-46. If you buy a Hebrew slave, he must remain your slave for six years. But in the seventh year you must set him free, without cost to him. 3If he was single at the time you bought him, he alone must be set free. But if he was married at the time, both he and his wife must be given their freedom. 4If you give him a wife, and they have children, only the man himself must be set free; his wife and children remain the property of his owner.
5But suppose the slave loves his wife and children and his owner so much that he won't leave them. 6Then he must stand beside either the door or the doorpost at the place of worship,#21.6 at the place of worship: The Hebrew text has “in the presence of God,” which probably refers to the place where God was worshiped. while his owner punches a small hole through one of his ears with a sharp metal rod. This makes him a slave for life.
7A young woman who was sold by her father doesn't gain her freedom in the same way that a man does. 8If she doesn't please the man who bought her to be his wife, he must let her be bought back.#21.8 bought back: Either by her family or by another Israelite who wanted to marry her. He cannot sell her to foreigners; this would break the contract he made with her. 9If he selects her as a wife for his son, he must treat her as his own daughter.
10If the man later marries another woman, he must continue to provide food and clothing for the one he bought and to treat her as a wife. 11If he fails to do any of these things, she must be given her freedom without paying for it.
Murder and Other Violent Crimes
The Lord said:
12 #
Lv 24.17. Death is the punishment for murder. 13#Nu 35.10-34; Dt 19.1-13; Js 20.1-9. But if you did not intend to kill someone, and I, the Lord, let it happen anyway, you may run for safety to a place that I have set aside. 14If you plan in advance to murder someone, there's no escape, not even by holding on to my altar.#21.14 altar: As a rule, anyone who ran to the altar was safe from the death penalty, until proven guilty. You will be dragged off and killed.
15Death is the punishment for attacking your father or mother.
16 #
Dt 24.7. Death is the punishment for kidnapping. If you sell the person you kidnapped, or if you are caught with that person, the penalty is death.
17 #
Lv 20.9; Mt 15.4; Mk 7.10. Death is the punishment for cursing your father or mother.
18Suppose two of you are arguing, and you hit the other with either a rock or your fist, without causing a fatal injury. If the victim has to stay in bed, 19and later has to use a stick when walking outside, you must pay for the loss of time and do what you can to help until the injury is completely healed. That's your only responsibility.
20Death is the punishment for beating to death any of your slaves. 21However, if the slave lives a few days after the beating, you are not to be punished. After all, you have already lost the services of that slave who was your property.
22Suppose a pregnant woman suffers a miscarriage#21.22 suffers a miscarriage: Or “gives birth before her time.” as the result of an injury caused by someone who is fighting. If she isn't badly hurt, the one who injured her must pay whatever fine her husband demands and the judges approve. 23But if she is seriously injured, the payment will be life for life, 24#Lv 24.19,20; Dt 19.19-21; Mt 5.38. eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25burn for burn, cut for cut, and bruise for bruise.
26If you hit one of your slaves and cause the loss of an eye, the slave must be set free. 27The same law applies if you knock out a slave's tooth—the slave goes free.
28A bull that kills someone with its horns must be killed and its meat destroyed, but the owner of the bull isn't responsible for the death.
29Suppose you own a bull that has been in the habit of attacking people, but you have refused to keep it fenced in. If that bull kills someone, both you and the bull must be put to death by stoning. 30However, you may save your own life by paying whatever fine is demanded. 31This same law applies if the bull gores someone's son or daughter. 32If the bull kills a slave, you must pay the slave owner 30 pieces of silver for the loss of the slave, and the bull must be killed by stoning.
33Suppose someone's ox or donkey is killed by falling into an open pit that you dug or left uncovered on your property. 34You must pay for the dead animal, and it becomes yours.
35If your bull kills someone else's, yours must be sold. Then the money from your bull and the meat from the dead bull must be divided equally between you and the other owner.
36If you refuse to fence in a bull that is known to attack others, you must replace any animal it kills, but the dead animal will belong to you.
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Exodus 21: CEV
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Contemporary English Version, Second Edition (CEV®)
© 2006 American Bible Society. All rights reserved.
Exodus 21
21
1‘And these [are] the judgments which thou dost set before them:
2‘When thou buyest a Hebrew servant — six years he doth serve, and in the seventh he goeth out as a freeman for nought;
3if by himself he cometh in, by himself he goeth out; if he [is] owner of a wife, then his wife hath gone out with him;
4if his lord give to him a wife, and she hath borne to him sons or daughters — the wife and her children are her lord's, and he goeth out by himself.
5‘And if the servant really say: I have loved my lord, my wife, and my sons — I do not go out free;
6then hath his lord brought him nigh unto God, and hath brought him nigh unto the door, or unto the side-post, and his lord hath bored his ear with an awl, and he hath served him — to the age.
7‘And when a man selleth his daughter for a handmaid, she doth not go out according to the going out of the men-servants;
8if evil in the eyes of her lord, so that he hath not betrothed her, then he hath let her be ransomed; to a strange people he hath not power to sell her, in his dealing treacherously with her.
9‘And if to his son he betroth her, according to the right of daughters he doth to her.
10‘If another [woman] he take for him, her food, her covering, and her habitation, he doth not withdraw;
11and if these three he do not to her, then she hath gone out for nought, without money.
12‘He who smiteth a man so that he hath died, is certainly put to death;
13as to him who hath not laid wait, and God hath brought to his hand, I have even set for thee a place whither he doth flee.
14‘And when a man doth presume against his neighbour to slay him with subtilty, from Mine altar thou dost take him to die.
15‘And he who smiteth his father or his mother is certainly put to death.
16‘And he who stealeth a man, and hath sold him, and he hath been found in his hand, is certainly put to death.
17‘And he who is reviling his father or his mother is certainly put to death.
18‘And when men contend, and a man hath smitten his neighbour with a stone, or with the fist, and he die not, but hath fallen on the bed;
19if he rise, and hath gone up and down without on his staff, then hath the smiter been acquitted; only his cessation he giveth, and he is thoroughly healed.
20‘And when a man smiteth his man-servant or his handmaid, with a rod, and he hath died under his hand — he is certainly avenged;
21only if he remain a day, or two days, he is not avenged, for he [is] his money.
22‘And when men strive, and have smitten a pregnant woman, and her children have come out, and there is no mischief, he is certainly fined, as the husband of the woman doth lay upon him, and he hath given through the judges;
23and if there is mischief, then thou hast given life for life,
24eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
25burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
26‘And when a man smiteth the eye of his man-servant, or the eye of his handmaid, and hath destroyed it, as a freeman he doth send him away for his eye;
27and if a tooth of his man-servant or a tooth of his handmaid he knock out, as a freeman he doth send him away for his tooth.
28‘And when an ox doth gore man or woman, and they have died, the ox is certainly stoned, and his flesh is not eaten, and the owner of the ox [is] acquitted;
29and if the ox is [one] accustomed to gore heretofore, and it hath been testified to its owner, and he doth not watch it, and it hath put to death a man or woman, the ox is stoned, and its owner also is put to death.
30‘If atonement is laid upon him, then he hath given the ransom of his life, according to all that is laid upon him;
31whether it gore a son or gore a daughter, according to this judgment it is done to him.
32‘If the ox gore a man-servant or a handmaid, thirty silver shekels he doth give to their lord, and the ox is stoned.
33‘And when a man doth open a pit, or when a man doth dig a pit, and doth not cover it, and an ox or ass hath fallen thither, —
34the owner of the pit doth repay, money he doth give back to its owner, and the dead is his.
35‘And when a man's ox doth smite the ox of his neighbour, and it hath died, then they have sold the living ox, and halved its money, and also the dead one they do halve;
36or, it hath been known that the ox is [one] accustomed to gore heretofore, and its owner doth not watch it, he certainly repayeth ox for ox, and the dead is his.
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