Exodus 21:1-11

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;

3 if 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;

4 if 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;

6 then 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;

8 if 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;

11 and if these three he do not to her, then she hath gone out for nought, without money.

Exodus 21:1-11 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO EXODUS 21

In this, and the two following chapters, are delivered various laws and precepts, partly of a moral, and partly of a religious, but chiefly of a civil nature, respecting the commonwealth of Israel, and its political good. This chapter treats of servants, and laws relating to them; to menservants, how long they shall serve, and what is to be done to those who are desirous of staying with their masters after their time is up, Ex 21:1-6, to maidservants, and especially betrothed ones, either to a father or a son, Ex 21:7-11, likewise it contains laws concerning the slaughter of men, whether with design or unawares, Ex 21:12-14, and concerning the ill usage of parents, Ex 21:15,17, and man stealing, Ex 21:16 and of mischief that comes by men's quarrelling and fighting, Ex 21:18,19 and by smiting a man or maidservant, Ex 21:20,21,26,27, to a woman with child, that is, by means of men's striving and contending with each other, Ex 21:22-25 and of damages that come by oxen, or to them, Ex 21:28-36.