Shemoth (Exodus) 21

¹“These are the right-rulings which you are to set before them:

²“When you buy a Hebrew servant, he serves six years, and in the seventh he goes out free, for naught.

³“If he comes in by himself, he goes out by himself; if he comes in 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 are her master’s, and he goes out by himself.

⁵“And if the servant truly says, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children, let me not go out free,’

⁶then his master shall bring him before Elohim, and shall bring him to the door, or to the doorpost, and his master shall pierce his ear with an awl. And he shall serve him forever.

⁷“And when a man sells his daughter to be a female servant, she does not go out as the male servants do.

⁸“If she is displeasing in the eyes of her master who has engaged her to himself, then he shall let her be ransomed. He shall have no authority to sell her to a foreign people, because of him deceiving her.

⁹“And if he has engaged her to his son, he is to do to her as is the right of daughters.

¹⁰“If he takes another wife , her food, her covering, and her marriage rights are not to be diminished.

¹¹“And if he does not do these three for her, then she shall go out for naught, without silver.

¹²“He who strikes a man so that he dies shall certainly be put to death.

¹³“But if he did not lie in wait, but Elohim delivered him into his hand, then I shall appoint for you a place where he is to flee.

¹⁴“But when a man acts presumptuously against his neighbour, to kill him by treachery, you are to take him even from My slaughter-place to die.

¹⁵“And he who strikes his father or his mother shall certainly be put to death.

¹⁶“And he who kidnaps a man and sells him, or if he is found in his hand, shall certainly be put to death.

¹⁷“And he who curses his father or his mother shall certainly be put to death.

¹⁸“And when men strive together, and one strikes the other with a stone or with his fist, and he does not die but is confined to his bed,

¹⁹if he rises again and walks about outside with his staff, then he who struck him shall be innocent. He only pays for lost time and sees to it that he is completely healed.

²⁰“And when a man strikes his male or female servant with a rod, so that he dies under his hand, he shall certainly be punished.

²¹“But if he remains alive a day or two, he is not punished; for he is his property.

²²“And when men strive and they shall smite a pregnant woman, and her children come out, yet there is no injury, he shall certainly be punished accordingly as the woman’s husband lays upon him. And he shall give through the judges.

²³“But if there is injury, then you shall give life for life,

²⁴eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,

²⁵burn for burn, wound for wound, lash for lash.

²⁶“And when a man strikes the eye of his male or female servant, and destroys it, he is to let him go free for the sake of his eye.

²⁷“And if he knocks out the tooth of his male or female servant, he is to let him go free for the sake of his tooth.

²⁸“And when an ox gores a man or a woman to death, then the ox shall certainly be stoned, and its flesh is not eaten, and the owner of the ox is innocent.

²⁹“However, if the ox was previously in the habit of goring, and its owner has been warned, and he has not kept it confined, so that it has killed a man or a woman, the ox is stoned and its owner also is put to death.

³⁰If a sin -covering is laid upon him, then he shall give the ransom of his life, whatever is laid on him.

³¹“Whether it has gored a son or gored a daughter, according to this right-ruling it is done to him.

³²“If the ox gores a male or female servant, he is to give to their master thirty sheqels of silver, and the ox is stoned.

³³“And when a man opens 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 is to repay, he is to give silver to their owner, and the dead beast is his.

³⁵“And when the ox of a man smites the ox of his neighbour and it dies, then they shall sell the live ox and divide the silver from it, and also divide the dead ox.

³⁶“Or if it was known that the ox was previously in the habit of goring, and its owner has not kept it confined, he shall certainly repay ox for ox, while the dead beast is his.