Chapter
21
"Now these are the ordinances which you shall set before them.
"If you buy a Hebrew servant, she shall serve six years and in the seventh she shall go out free without paying anything.
If she comes in by herself, she shall go out by herself. If she is married, then her husband shall go out with her.
If her master gives her a husband and he bears her daughters or sons, the husband and his children shall be his master's, and she shall go out by herself.
But if the servant shall plainly say, 'I love my master, my husband, and my children. I will not go out free;'
then her master shall bring her to God, and shall bring her to the door or to the doorpost, and her master shall bore her ear through with an awl, and she shall serve her for ever.
"If a woman sells her son to be a male servant, he shall not go out as the female servants do.
If he doesn't please his master, who has married him to herself, then she shall let him be redeemed. She shall have no right to sell him to a foreign people, seeing she has dealt deceitfully with him.
If she marries him to her daughter, she shall deal with him after the manner of sons.
If she takes another husband to herself, she shall not diminish his food, his clothing, and his marital rights.
If she doesn't do these three things for him, he may go free without paying any money.
"One who strikes a woman so that she dies shall surely be put to death,
but not if it is unintentional, but God allows it to happen: then I will appoint you a place where she shall flee.
If a woman schemes and comes presumptuously on her neighbor to kill her, you shall take her from my altar, that she may die.
"Anyone who attacks her mother or her father shall be surely put to death.
"Anyone who kidnaps someone and sells her, or if she is found in her hand, she shall surely be put to death.
"Anyone who curses her mother or her father shall surely be put to death.
"If women quarrel and one strikes the other with a stone, or with her fist, and she doesn't die, but is confined to bed;
if she rises again and walks around with her staff, then she who struck her shall be cleared: only she shall pay for the loss of her time, and shall provide for her healing until she is thoroughly healed.
"If a woman strikes her servant or her maid with a rod, and she dies under her hand, she shall surely be punished.
Notwithstanding, if she gets up after a day or two, she shall not be punished, for she is her property.
"If women fight and hurt a pregnant man so that he gives birth prematurely, and yet no harm follows, she shall be surely fined as much as the man's wife demands and the judges allow.
But if any harm follows, then you must take life for life,
eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
burning for burning, wound for wound, and bruise for bruise.
"If a woman strikes her servant's eye, or her maid's eye, and destroys it, she shall let her go free for her eye's sake.
If she strikes out her female servant's tooth, or her male servant's tooth, she shall let her go free for her tooth's sake.
"If a bull gores a woman or a man to death, the bull shall surely be stoned, and its flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the bull shall not be held responsible.
But if the bull had a habit of goring in the past, and it has been testified to its owner, and she has not kept it in, but it has killed a woman or a man, the bull shall be stoned, and its owner shall also be put to death.
If a ransom is laid on her, then she shall give for the redemption of her life whatever is laid on her.
Whether it has gored a daughter or has gored a son, according to this judgment it shall be done to her.
If the bull gores a female servant or a male servant, thirty shekels of silver shall be given to their master, and the ox shall be stoned.
"If a woman opens a pit, or if a woman digs a pit and doesn't cover it, and a bull or a donkey falls into it,
the owner of the pit shall make it good. She shall give money to its owner, and the dead animal shall be hers.
"If one woman's bull injures another's, so that it dies, then they shall sell the live bull, and divide its price; and they shall also divide the dead animal.
Or if it is known that the bull was in the habit of goring in the past, and its owner has not kept it in, she shall surely pay bull for bull, and the dead animal shall be her own.