1 “These are the judgments which you shall place before them: 2 If you buy a Hebrew servant, six years shall he serve you; in the seventh, he shall depart freely, without charge. 3 With whatever clothing he arrived, with the like let him depart. If he has a wife, his wife also shall depart, at the same time. 4 But if his lord gave him a wife, and she has borne sons and daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her lord. Yet still, he himself will go out with his clothing. 5 And if the servant will say, ‘I love my lord, and my wife and children, I will not depart freely,’ 6 then his lord shall make an offering for him to the heavens, and it shall be applied to the door and the posts, and he will pierce his ear with an awl. And he shall be his servant in perpetuity. 7 If anyone sells his daughter to be a servant, she shall not depart as a female servant is accustomed to go out. 8 If she displeases the eyes of her lord, to whom she had been delivered, he shall dismiss her. But he shall have no authority to sell her to a foreign people, even if he despises her. 9 But if he has betrothed her to his son, he shall treat her according to the custom with daughters. 10 And if he takes another for him, he shall provide to the maiden a marriage, and clothing, and he shall not refuse the price of her chastity. 11 If he does not do these three things, she shall depart freely, without money. 12 Whoever strikes a man, intending to murder, shall be put to death. 13 But if he did not lie in wait for him, but God delivered him into his hands, then I will appoint for you a place to which he must flee. 14 If someone murders his neighbor with deliberation, by lying in wait, you shall tear him away from my altar, so that he may die. 15 Whoever strikes his father or mother shall die a death. 16 Whoever will have stolen a man and sold him, having been convicted of the crime, shall be put to death. 17 Whoever speaks evil of his father or mother shall die a death. 18 If men will have quarreled, and one of them has struck his neighbor with a stone or a fist, and he does not die, but lies in bed, 19 if he gets up again and can walk outside on his staff, he who struck him will be innocent, but only if he makes sufficient restitution for his deeds and for the cost of the physicians. 20 Whoever strikes his male or female servant with a staff, and if they have died by his hands, he shall be guilty of a crime. 21 But if he survives for one day or two, he shall not be subject to punishment, because it is his money. 22 If men will have quarreled, and one of them has struck a pregnant woman, and as a result she miscarries, but she herself survives, he shall be subject to as much damage as the husband of the woman shall petition from him, or as arbitrators shall judge. 23 But if her death will have followed, he will repay a life for a life, 24 an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand, a foot for a foot, 25 a scrape for a scrape, a wound for a wound, a bruise for a bruise. 26 If anyone will have struck the eye of his male or female servant, having left them with one eye, he shall release them freely, because of the eye that he has put out. 27 Likewise, if he knocks out a tooth of his male or female servant, he shall similarly release them freely. 28 If an ox has struck a man or a woman with his horn, and if they die, it shall be stoned. And its flesh shall not be eaten; also, the owner of the ox will be innocent. 29 But if the ox had been pushing with his horn, from yesterday and the day before, and they warned his owner, but he did not confine it, and it will have killed a man or a woman, then the ox shall be stoned, and his owner shall be killed. 30 But if they have imposed a price on him, he shall give, in exchange for his life, whatever is asked. 31 Likewise, if it has struck a son or a daughter with its horns, it shall be subject to a similar verdict. 32 If it attacks a male or female servant, he shall give thirty shekels of silver to their lord, yet truly the ox shall be stoned. 33 If a man digs or opens a cistern, and does not cover it, and an ox or a donkey falls into it, 34 then the owner of the cistern shall repay the price of the beasts, and what is dead will belong to him. 35 If the ox of a stranger wounds the ox of another, and it has died, then they shall sell the live ox and divide the price, but the carcass of the dead one they shall distribute between them. 36 But if he knew that his ox had pushed with its horns, yesterday and the day before, and its owner did not confine it, then he shall repay an ox for an ox, and he will receive the whole carcass.”
Exodus · Catholic Public Domain Version
Exodus 21 Catholic Public Domain Version
Audio: World English Bible (WEB), read by Winfred W. Henson · About the recordings
Notes on this text (3)
- Esther and Daniel are the Vulgate books (Esther 1–16 with the Greek additions as chapters 10:4–16; Daniel 1–14 with the Song of the Three, Susanna and Bel). Baruch 6 is the Letter of Jeremiah.
- The translator's footnotes, cross-references, chapter summaries and book introductions in the CrossWire module are not shown.
- No imprimatur; single translator.
Cross references (28)
Related passages for each verse, from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge as collected and ranked by readers at OpenBible.info.
- 1 Deuteronomy 4:14; Deuteronomy 6:20; Exodus 24:3–4; Psalm 147:19; Matthew 28:20
- 2 Deuteronomy 15:12–15; Exodus 12:44; Deuteronomy 15:18; Nehemiah 5:1–5; Deuteronomy 15:1
- 3 Deuteronomy 15:12–14
- 5 2 Corinthians 5:14–15; Deuteronomy 15:16–17; Isaiah 26:13
- 6 Deuteronomy 15:17; Leviticus 25:40; Deuteronomy 19:17–18; 1 Samuel 28:2; 1 Samuel 27:12
- 7 Nehemiah 5:5; Exodus 21:2–3
- 8 Judges 14:3; Judges 9:19; Malachi 2:11–15; Genesis 28:8; Deuteronomy 21:11–14
- 10 1 Corinthians 7:1–6
- 12 Genesis 9:6; Matthew 26:52; Leviticus 24:17; Numbers 35:30–31; Numbers 35:16–24
- 13 Joshua 20:2–9; 1 Samuel 24:18; Deuteronomy 19:1–13; Deuteronomy 4:41–43; 1 Samuel 24:10
- 14 1 Kings 2:28–34; Hebrews 10:26; Deuteronomy 1:43; 1 Kings 1:50–51; Numbers 15:30–31
- 15 Proverbs 30:11; Deuteronomy 21:18–21; 1 Timothy 1:9; Deuteronomy 27:24; Proverbs 30:17
- 16 Deuteronomy 24:7; 1 Timothy 1:10; Exodus 22:4; Genesis 37:28; Genesis 40:15
- 17 Proverbs 20:20; Mark 7:10–11; Matthew 15:3–6; Deuteronomy 27:16; Proverbs 30:11
- 18 Exodus 21:20; Exodus 2:13; Deuteronomy 25:11; 2 Samuel 14:6; Numbers 35:16–24
- 19 2 Samuel 3:29; Zechariah 8:4
- 20 Proverbs 29:19; Deuteronomy 19:21; Isaiah 58:3–4; Numbers 35:30–33; Romans 13:4
- 21 Leviticus 25:44–46
- 22 Deuteronomy 22:18–19; Exodus 21:30; Deuteronomy 16:18
- 23 Deuteronomy 19:21; Numbers 35:31; Leviticus 24:19
- 24 Deuteronomy 19:21; Matthew 7:2; Matthew 5:38–40; Leviticus 24:19–20; Revelation 16:6
- 26 Nehemiah 5:5; Job 31:13–15; Colossians 4:1; Psalm 72:12–14; Exodus 21:20
- 28 Exodus 21:32; Genesis 9:5–6; Leviticus 20:15–16
- 29 Deuteronomy 21:1–9
- 30 Exodus 21:22; Exodus 30:12; Numbers 35:31–33; Proverbs 13:8
- 32 Zechariah 11:12–13; Matthew 26:15; Matthew 27:3–9; Genesis 37:28; Philippians 2:7
- 33 Jeremiah 18:22; Proverbs 28:10; Psalm 9:15; Ecclesiastes 10:8; Jeremiah 18:20
- 34 Exodus 21:29–30; Exodus 22:6; Exodus 22:14
Cross references: OpenBible.info (CC BY), drawn mainly from the public-domain Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. · Sources & licences
What the Fathers said
Passages from the Church Fathers that expound or quote this chapter, verbatim from the public-domain Schaff edition (19th-century English translations).
How these were chosen
“Commentary” is the opening of a homily or exposition on this chapter (John Chrysostom’s homilies, Augustine’s tractates, sermons and expositions of the Psalms). “Quotes” are sentences where the edition’s own footnotes identify a quotation of a verse here, kept only when the wording matches the verse. Only works whose authorship is not in doubt are used. Psalms follow the Hebrew/English numbering (Augustine numbers them as the Septuagint does: his Psalm 50 is Psalm 51 here).
For, "honor," saith He, "thy father and thy mother, that thou mayest live long upon the earth." And again, "He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death." But He, omitting the first, the reward appointed for them that honor their parents, states that which is more awful, the punishment, I mean, threatened to such as dishonor them; …
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 10 (1888)
… put no obstacle to godliness in our way, if we are ever carried away by ingratitude, and, forgetting their benefits to us, hold them in contempt, then the oracle will have place which says, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 7 (1894)