CHAPTER 21*<\/p>\n
The Book of the Covenant: The Laws (21:1\u201324:18)<\/p>\n
These chapters, containing the first body of Torah legislation, have become known in English as the \u201cBook of the Covenant,\u201d Hebrew sefer ha-berit. This name is based on 24:4, 7, which recount that Moses put the divine commands into writing and then read aloud the covenant document to the people, who gave it their assent. The title is of major importance, for it underscores the outstanding characteristic of the collection: its divine source. Social rules, moral imperatives, ethical injunctions, civil and criminal laws, and cultic prescriptions are all equally conceived to be expressions of divine will; all form the stipulations of the covenant between God and Israel enacted at Sinai. Unlike the ancient Near Eastern corpora of laws, the document here is not a self-contained, independent entity; rather, it is an inseparable part of the Exodus narratives. The narrative context is essential to the meaning and significance of the document.
\nThe Book of the Covenant falls into four distinct parts. The first, 21:2\u201322:16, treats a variety of legal topics that relate to civil and criminal matters. They are mostly couched in the casuistic style that is typical of all ancient Near Eastern collections of laws. The individual topics are presented in the form of specific rulings about hypothetical, concrete contingencies, not as abstract legal principles. The implementation of the rulings is left to the jurisdiction of the courts.
\nIt should also be noted that this body of legislation cannot strictly be called a law code. It is not comprehensive in scope and is silent on important areas of legal practice, such as inheritance, the transfer of property, commerce, and marriage. The gaps must have been filled by orally transmitted customary law that regulated vast areas of human relationships. The items dealt with in the Torah must be regarded as innovations and amendments to existing practice. For the connections with the cuneiform collections, see Excursus 6.
\nThe second part of the legal corpus, 22:17\u201323:19, is quite different. The style is mainly that of the Decalogue, categorical and apodictic. It encompasses a wide variety of discrete topics, with special emphasis on humanitarian considerations. In the main, these laws are not enforced through juridical forms; enforcement is left to the promptings of conscience informed by the conviction that the source and authority of the laws is divine.
\nThe third section, 23:20\u201333, is an appendix that affirms the divine promises to Israel and warns against the dangers of assimilation to paganism.
\nThe fourth section, chapter 24, rounds out the entire pericope of the Book of the Covenant with a ritual of ratification of the document and with Moses receiving the Decalogue incised in stone.<\/p>\n
JUDICIAL RULINGS (21:2\u201322:16)<\/p>\n
Mishpatim<\/p>\n
1. This verse serves as a heading for the entire section.<\/p>\n
These are Hebrew ve-\u02beelleh, literally \u201cAnd these are,\u201d the conjunction indicating continuity. It connects the following laws with the preceding Decalogue, all of which emanated from the same Source at Sinai. This interpretation of Rabbi Ishmael in the Mekhilta1 is supported by the recapitulation of events found in Deuteronomy 4:13\u201314 and 5:28\u20136:17, where it is explicitly stated that in addition to the Decalogue many other laws were promulgated at Sinai. Nehemiah 9:13 similarly features this same tradition: \u201cYou came down on Mount Sinai and spoke to them from heaven; You gave them right rules [mishpatim] and true teachings, good laws and commandments.\u201d<\/p>\n
the rules Hebrew mishpatim originally meant \u201cjudicial rulings,\u201d and then came to be used for legal enactments in general, that is, authoritative standards of conduct. Here they are specifically formulated in the casuistic style.<\/p>\n
you shall set before them Knowledge of the law is to be the privilege and obligation of the entire people, not the prerogative of specialists.<\/p>\n
Laws Concerning Slaves (vv. 2\u201311)<\/p>\n
The list of mishpatim (enactments) begins with ten laws regulating the institution of slavery. None of the other law collections from the ancient Near East opens with this topic. Hammurabi\u2019s, for example, deals with slavery last (pars. 278\u2013282). The priority given to this subject by the Torah doubtless has a historical explanation: Having recently experienced liberation from bondage, the Israelite is enjoined to be especially sensitive to the condition of the slave.
\nThis association of the Exodus with the regulation of slavery already appeared in the opening words of the Decalogue, where God is identified as the One who freed Israel from the thralldom of Egypt. The Decalogue then mandates the right of the slave to enjoy the weekly Sabbath rest.2 The same correlation of the themes of Exodus and slavery is present in the laws of Deuteronomy 15:13\u201315 and in the narrative of Jeremiah 34:13\u201314.
\nAll the law collections of the ancient Near East deal with the topic of slavery. However, there is no evidence that this evil institution, although widespread, persistent, and socially sanctioned, was of major economic importance in the region. Everywhere the attitude to the slave was marked by ambivalence: He was a human being in close daily contact with the master and other members of his family; but he was also an item of property to be assessed in terms of monetary value. Biblical legislation is directed toward enhancing the social and legal status of this human chattel. This humanitarian approach expresses itself in a variety of ways: The slave is termed \u201cyour brother\u201d;3 he possesses an inalienable right to rest on the Sabbath day and on festivals;4 when circumcised, and thus identified with the covenant between God and Israel, he participates in the Passover offering;5 he is to be \u201cavenged\u201d if he dies from a beating by his master;6 and the loss of a limb, even a tooth, at the hands of his master automatically gains him his freedom.7 A fugitive slave may not be extradited and is accorded protection from maltreatment and the right to live wherever he chooses.8 Finally, a six-year limit is set on his term of service. No wonder the rabbis observed in Kiddushin zoa that he who buys a Hebrew slave is like one buying himself a master.<\/p>\n
The Male Slave (vv. 2\u20136)<\/p>\n
2. When you acquire The reduction of an Israelite to slave status could result from poverty or insolvency. By self-sale, the desperately poor could gain a measure of security. The labors of a debtor or a thief could discharge the debt or compensate for the stolen property.
\nThere are scriptural indications that, in practice, defaulting debtors or members of their family would be subject to seizure by a creditor and forced into service.9 Whereas the prophets denounce this practice, Mesopotamian laws actually provide for the seizure of debtors.10 Rabbinic tradition interpreted the present text as referring specifically to an Israelite thief who is legally sentenced to work off the value of stolen goods.11<\/p>\n
a Hebrew slave A fellow Israelite, called a \u201cbrother\u201d in Deuteronomy 15:12 and Jeremiah 34:9, 14.<\/p>\n
six years The slave laws of Leviticus 25:40 rule that this maximum limit on his term of service is shortened should the Jubilee year occur in the meantime. Hammurabi (par. 117) limited a debtor\u2019s service to three years.12<\/p>\n
in the seventh year Rabbinic tradition understood this to mean the seventh year from the commencement of his indentureship. However, Targum Jonathan, representing an earlier stratum of halakhic interpretation, interpreted it as referring to the Sabbatical year. So did Bekhor Shor.13<\/p>\n
free, without payment Emancipation is his by right, and no compensation is due to the master. The parallel law in Deuteronomy 15:12\u201315 requires the master to make generous provision for the slave on leaving his service.<\/p>\n
free Hebrew \u1e25ofshi, on the basis of its Akkadian cognate \u1e2bupshu and Ugaritic \u1e2bpt\u032e, originally seems to have been a technical term for one who belongs to the low social class composed of emancipated slaves. By a shift of meaning in the Bible, it came to mean simply \u201cfree.\u201d<\/p>\n
3. if be bad a wife The master would have been responsible for the maintenance of the slave\u2019s wife and children throughout the period of his service.<\/p>\n
4. In the ancient Near East it was common practice for a master to mate a slave with a foreign bondwoman solely for the purpose of siring \u201chouse born\u201d slaves.14 In such instances, no matrimonial or emotional bond was necessarily involved, and the woman and her offspring remained the property of the master.<\/p>\n
5. It must have been a fairly frequent occurrence that the slave felt comfortable and at home in his master\u2019s household and also formed an emotional attachment to the bondwoman and to the children he had begotten through her. In addition, he did not relish the prospect of freedom in poverty. These considerations might lead him voluntarily to surrender his right to personal freedom. In such a case, he had to make a solemn declaration to that effect.15<\/p>\n
6. A change from temporary to permanent slavery is a step of transcendental human importance. In order to avoid abuse on the part of a master and to safeguard the rights of the slave, it must be carried out according to a procedure fixed by law.<\/p>\n
before God This term appears again in 22:7\u20138, also in a legal context. There, the accompanying verb is in the plural so that \u02beelohim is not likely to have the literal meaning of \u201cGod.\u201d The court records from Nuzi frequently mention the administering of an \u201coath of the gods\u201d taken by a litigant in the presence of, or perhaps by actually holding, the figurines of the gods. The phrase \u201cbefore \u02beelohim,\u201d an echo of pre-Israelite legal terminology, is in the Torah divested of its original association with gods and most likely simply means \u201cin the sanctuary.\u201d Probably the slave had to repeat, in the presence of witnesses or the local authorities, the formal declaration of his intention, uncompelled, to forgo his freedom. Rabbinic tradition understood the phrase in question to mean \u201cin the presence of the judges.\u201d16<\/p>\n
the door or the doorpost Of the sanctuary. This interpretation is supported by an analogy with the laws of Eshnunna, which mandate, in a certain case, \u201can oath in the gate of Tishpak,\u201d the chief god of the city.17<\/p>\n
pierce his ear Rashbam took this as a sign of permanent slave status. Rabbinic tradition specified the right ear.18 It saw in this act a symbolic punishment: \u201cBecause the ear heard on Mount Sinai: \u2018For they are My servants, whom I freed from the land of Egypt; they may not give themselves over into servitude [Lev. 25:42],\u2019 and it divested itself of the yoke of Heaven and accepted the hegemony of a human yoke\u2014let it be pierced!\u201d19<\/p>\n
for life Rashbam took this literally; the rest of his life. But according to rabbinic interpretation, the new term of service ends at the next Jubilee year or at the death of the master, whichever comes first.20<\/p>\n
The Female Slave (vv. 7\u201311)<\/p>\n
The Hebrew term \u02beamah, used here, does not mean a slave girl in the usual sense, since her status is quite different from that of the male slave. The following laws safeguard her rights and protect her from sexual exploitation.
\nIn the ancient world, a father, driven by poverty, might sell his daughter into a well-to-do family in order to ensure her future security. The sale presupposes marriage to the master or his son. Documents recording legal arrangements of this kind have survived from Nuzi. The Torah stipulates that the girl must be treated as a free woman; should the designated husband take an additional wife, he is still obligated to support her. A breach of faith gains her her freedom, and the master receives no compensation for the purchase price.
\nRabbinic interpretation restricted the power of the father to dispose of his daughter in this way. He could do so only so long as she was a minor, that is, below the age of twelve years and a day, and then only if he was utterly destitute. She could not sell herself into slavery nor could she be sold by a court as an insolvent thief, as could a male, in order to make restitution for the stolen articles. Further, she could not be designated to be the wife of the master or his son without her knowledge.21
\nThe status of the \u02beamah in biblical times is demonstrated in practice through the discovery of a preexilic epitaph of a royal steward from the village of Siloam outside Jerusalem. The inscription mentions his \u02beamah, and it is clear that he arranged to be buried next to her. Another discovery is the seal of \u201cAlyah the \u02beamah of Hananel,\u201d who obviously enjoyed superior social rank. In like vein, an extant Babylonian document mentions a slave girl of a married couple who is described as both the a\u0161\u0161, \u201cwife,\u201d of the husband and the \u02beamat of the wife.<\/p>\n
8. outsiders Hebrew \u02bfam nokhri means one outside the nuclear family.22 This ancient technical term preserves the original meaning of \u02bfam, \u201ckin\u201d; it has survived vestigially in the expression \u201cto be gathered into one\u2019s kin.\u201d23<\/p>\n
broke faith That is, the master has repudiated the presumption that accompanied his acquisition of the girl.24<\/p>\n
9. the practice with free maidens The girl is to be raised within the family and given the status of a daughter. As such, she would normally be protected from sexual abuse.<\/p>\n
10. The laws of Lipit-Ishtar similarly stipulate that if a man takes a second wife, now his favorite, he must continue to support his first wife.25 The Torah extends this protection to the slave girl and here specifies three basic necessities of life to which she is entitled. The formulation once again gives every appearance of being ancient technical legal language. It is generally agreed (1) that Hebrew she\u02beer, literally \u201cflesh,\u201d is an ancient word for \u201cmeat,\u201d26 perhaps, like le\u1e25em, extended to cover food in general, and (2) that kesut is certainly \u201cclothing.\u201d27 It is the unique word \u02bfonah that has generated debate. The Septuagint, Peshitta, and Targums all understood it to refer to the woman\u2019s conjugal rights. This interpretation, which has no philological support, is also found in rabbinic sources.28 If correct, it would reflect a singular recognition in the laws of the ancient Near East that a wife is legally entitled to sexual gratification.
\nRashbam and Bekhor Shor favor another rendering of \u02bfonah as \u201cdwelling,\u201d \u201cshelter,\u201d which is supported etymologically by the Hebrew noun ma\u02bfon, me\u02bfonah, \u201cdwelling, habitation.\u201d29
\nA persuasive, although as yet philologically unsustained, argument has been made for understanding the term to mean \u201coil, ointment.\u201d In many ancient Near Eastern texts there are clauses that make provision for \u201cfood, clothing, and ointment.\u201d This same triad of commodities is found in Hosea 2:7 and Ecclesiastes 9:7\u20139. Likewise, the Egyptian wisdom text known as \u201cThe Instruction of the Vizier Ptah-hotep\u201d advises \u201ca man of standing\u201d to fill his wife\u2019s belly, clothe her back, and provide ointment for her body.30<\/p>\n
11. in these three ways Any of the aforementioned possibilities: marriage to the master, or to his son, or allowing her to be redeemed.<\/p>\n
Three Capital Offenses (vv. 21:12\u201317)<\/p>\n
This section elaborates on three of the topics of the Decalogue: murder, dishonoring parents, and kidnapping. Violation of each law, under specific conditions, incurs the death penalty.<\/p>\n
Murder (vv. 12\u201314)
\nThe reference here is to criminal homicide where malice aforethought has been established beyond question. The same law appears again in Leviticus 24:17, 21. Deuteronomy 17:6 and 19:15 stipulate that capital punishment is to be carried out only on the evidence of two witnesses. Numbers 35:30\u201331 add that monetary compensation cannot substitute for the murderer\u2019s execution. This last provision has no parallel in other ancient Near Eastern law collections, which view murder only in terms of economic loss to the family or clan. For the rationale behind the biblical approach, see Comment to 20:13. Although the text does not prescribe the mode of execution, rabbinic sources specify decapitation.31
\nASYLUM (vv. 13\u201314) Unintentional homicide is treated differently from murder. Here the implicit issue is the ancient and widespread phenomenon of the blood feud. In the absence of centralized authority, family and clan solidarity led people to administer private justice. The \u201cavenger of blood,\u201d Hebrew go\u02beel ha-dam\u2014generally the nearest relative of the victim of homicide\u2014would be duty-bound to seek revenge. With the development of the concept that crime should be punished by the state, and not by means of private vengeance, it became imperative to eliminate the blood feud. The present measures are designed to protect the innocent manslayer and allow established legal procedure to take its course. The law of asylum, which also covers the prevention of its abuse, is therefore set forth. The considerable attention given to the blood feud in the legal texts of the Torah and the attempts to exert social control over it are indicative of the tenacity of the institution.32<\/p>\n
13. by design With premeditation.33<\/p>\n
by an act of God The theological assumption is that the death of the victim occurred by the intervention of Providence; thus, the manslayer was the unwitting agent.<\/p>\n
I will assign you The manslayer is to be guaranteed temporary asylum pending judicial disposition of the case. This is the only instance in the enactments (mishpatim) of God that addresses Israel directly. The anomaly emphasizes the high degree of concern for the protection of life.<\/p>\n
a place Hebrew makom, like its Arabic cognate maqam, probably means here \u201csacred site,\u201d a sanctuary.34 Its precincts are inviolable. The other biblical sources dealing with this topic specifically provide for \u201ccities of refuge.\u201d<\/p>\n
14. Even the sacred area of the altar loses its inviolable, extraterritorial status if abused by the willful murderer. Rabbinic exegesis derives from this text the rule that a priest who is a convicted murderer is to be summarily interrupted and removed from the Temple even if he is engaged in the act of performing his sacred duties.35<\/p>\n
altar The narratives about Adonijah in 1 Kings 1:50\u201353 and Joab in 1 Kings 2:28\u201334 illustrate in practice the custom of claiming asylum by seizing \u201cthe horns of the altar,\u201d that is, the four corner projections. In these two cases, however, the particular circumstances rendered the claim ineffective.<\/p>\n
Abuse of Parents (vv. 15, 17)<\/p>\n
Although separated by the law of the kidnapper, these two verses belong together and, in fact, are so placed in the Septuagint. Verse 15 concerns violent assault on a parent by a son or daughter; verse 17 deals with verbal abuse. The extreme severity with which both offenses are treated clearly indicates the importance that biblical religion attached to the integrity of the family as the indispensable prerequisite for a wholesome society. There is also here the unassailable conviction that the dissolution of the family unit must inevitably rend to shreds the entire social fabric. See Comment to 20:12.
\nThe corresponding law in Hammurabi\u2019s collection (par. 195) prescribes the amputation of the hand of a son who strikes his father. The mother as the victim is not mentioned there.36<\/p>\n
15. strikes According to rabbinic exegesis, only the actual infliction of physical injury by an adult son or daughter entails the death penalty.37<\/p>\n
17. insults This law is repeated even more forcefully in Leviticus 20:9.38 For several reasons, \u201cinsult\u201d is too weak a rendering for the Hebrew stem k-l-l. First, its frequent antonym is b-r-k, \u201cto bless,\u201d39 and second, it is used with God as the object, as in Leviticus 24:11, 15. The kind of behavior understood here includes uttering a curse. The horrendous nature of this offense is intensified in a culture that believed the malediction to possess potent force and to take on a devastating life of its own, especially if uttered in the name of God.40 The stem k-l-l is also used in both Hebrew41 and Akkadian42 as an antonym of k-b-d, \u201cto honor.\u201d It denotes \u201ctreating with contempt and humiliating\u201d; in other words, the flagrant violation of the Decalogue\u2019s imperative in Exodus 20:12. It also encompasses the kind of misdeeds described in Deuteronomy 21:18\u201319 in the case of the \u201cwayward and defiant son\u201d who is disobedient, incorrigible, disloyal, a glutton, and a drunkard.<\/p>\n
Kidnapping (v. 16)<\/p>\n
The prevalence of the slave trade clearly spurred this item of legislation. The principal motive for kidnapping was to coerce the victim into servitude, either to the kidnapper himself or to another master who is willing to pay for the human merchandise. The sale of Joseph, as reported in Genesis 37:25\u201328, 36 and 39:1, vividly illustrates this type of traffic in human misery.
\nHammurabi\u2019s laws (par. 14) also prescribe the death penalty for kidnapping but define the victim as \u201cthe young son of a [free] man.\u201d The context in which the law appears shows that it was considered an economic crime. The Hittite laws (pars. 19\u201324) also treat kidnapping as an economic offense, the penalty for which is restitution not execution.
\nThe law in Exodus is formulated comprehensively; it applies whoever is the victim. The parallel in Deuteronomy 24:7 is more restrictive. According to Mishnah Sanhedrin 11:1 the mode of execution for assaulting parents and for kidnapping is strangulation. Ramban explains the close association of two such different laws in the Hebrew text as a function of their common penalty. For the offense of verse 17, the punishment is death by stoning, according to the rabbis.<\/p>\n
Bodily Injury Inflicted by Persons (vv. 18\u201327)<\/p>\n
These laws deal with the redress of personal injuries caused by the physical attack of one human being upon another. The basic principle here centers on intention\u2014whether or not the assailant intended to inflict the injury. The section is famous for its formulation of the lex talionis, or \u201ceye for an eye,\u201d system of justice.<\/p>\n
Injury Resulting from a Quarrel (vv. 18\u201319)<\/p>\n
quarrel The Hebrew stem r-y-v essentially denotes an exchange of words. What starts out as a verbal quarrel degenerates into a brawl, as one strikes a blow that temporarily incapacitates the other. The aggressor must indemnify the victim for loss of income, here called \u201cidleness,\u201d and for medical expenses as well. This text is curiously silent on the law governing the infliction of permanent injury.<\/p>\n
unpunished Presumably, if a fatality ensues, then the laws set forth in verses 12\u201314 are operative. Rabbinic tradition required the assailant to be held in custody pending the victim\u2019s full and certain recovery.43 The extenuating circumstances in the present case are the clear absence of unlawful or prior intention to cause bodily injury. The corresponding laws in Hammurabi\u2019s collection (pars. 206\u2013208) deal not with a verbal dispute but with a brawl; the assailant must swear that he did not \u201cstrike wittingly,\u201d and he then pays only the medical expenses. Should the victim die from the blow, monetary compensation must be paid, the amount determined in accordance with the social status of the victim.<\/p>\n
Injury to a Slave (vv. 20\u201321)<\/p>\n
This law\u2014the protection of slaves from maltreatment by their masters\u2014is found nowhere else in the entire existing corpus of ancient Near Eastern legislation. It represents a qualitative transformation in social and human values and expresses itself once again in the provisions of verses 26\u201327. The underlying issue, as before, is the determination of intent on the part of the assailant at the time the act was committed.<\/p>\n
his slave The final clause of verse 21 seems to indicate that the slave in question is a foreigner. Otherwise the terminology would be inappropriate, given the conditions under which an Israelite might become enslaved.44<\/p>\n
a rod Hebrew shevet, the customary instrument of discipline.45 The right of a master to discipline his slave within reason is recognized. But according to rabbinic exegesis, it is restricted to the use of an implement that does not normally have lethal potentiality, and it may not be applied to a part of the body considered to be particularly vulnerable.46<\/p>\n
there and then Literally, \u201cunder his hand,\u201d in contrast to \u201ca day or two\u201d in verse 21. The direct, immediate, causal relationship between the master\u2019s act and the death of the slave is undisputed. The master has unlawfully used deadly force, and homicidal intent is assumed.<\/p>\n
he must be avenged The master is criminally liable and faces execution, in keeping with the law of verse 12.
\nRabbinic tradition prescribes decapitation.47 This interpretation\u2014that the Hebrew stem n-k-m means the death penalty\u2014is supported by the early tradition behind the Samaritan version, which, in place of our received Hebrew text, actually reads here, \u201cHe must be put to death\u201d (mot yumat). Ibn Ezra notes that the verb n-k-m, as used in the Bible, principally involves meting out the death penalty. In the absence of the office of public executioner, it would generally be the victim\u2019s next of kin who would administer the supreme penalty, as provided for in Numbers 35:19 and Deuteronomy 19:12. This would hardly be the situation in the case of a slave, who would be unlikely to have local relatives. Hence, the obligation to exact the penalty falls on the community, which is probably why n-k-m is used here and not the usual yumat.
\nThe verb n-k-m is popularly taken to signify \u201crevenge.\u201d Actually, it means \u201cto avenge,\u201d that is, to vindicate, or redress, the imbalance of justice. Its use in the Bible is overwhelmingly with God as the subject, and in such cases it always serves the ends of justice. It is employed in particular in situations in which normal judicial procedures are not effective or cannot be implemented. It does not focus on the desire to get even or to retaliate; indeed, Leviticus 19:18 forbids private vengeance.<\/p>\n
21. Should the beaten slave linger more than a day before succumbing, certain new and mitigating circumstances arise. The direct, causal relationship between the master\u2019s conduct and the slave\u2019s death is now in doubt, for there may have been some unknown intermediate cause. The intent of the master appears less likely to have been homicidal and more likely to have been disciplinary. He is given the benefit of the doubt, especially since he is losing his financial investment, the price of the slave.<\/p>\n
Unintended Harm to a Pregnant Woman (vv. 22\u201325)<\/p>\n
The legal issues in this case are complicated by several additional factors. Unlike the earlier instance of a verbal quarrel that was initially not unlawful (vv. 18\u201319), the present one involves physical violence from the beginning. There was prior intent on the part of each antagonist to cause bodily harm to the other, and thus their activity was intrinsically unlawful and hazardous. Since the possibility of indirect damage was foreseeable, the antagonists are liable for injury caused to an innocent bystander, in this case, a pregnant woman. Restitution is to be made, but there is no retaliation if death does not ensue.
\nUnfortunately, the Hebrew text is replete with difficulties, which are further compounded by the attachment of the law of talion (vv. 23\u201325). For example, it is not clear why the phrase expressing expulsion of the fetus should speak of \u201cchildren\u201d in the plural; nor do we know whether stillbirth, premature birth, or term delivery is intended. Nor is it certain to what and to whom the Hebrew \u02beason, here rendered \u201cother damage,\u201d refers.
\nThe legal consequences of causing a woman to miscarry are treated also in the Sumerian law fragments,48 in Hammurabi\u2019s collection,49 in the Middle Assyrian Laws,50 and in the Hittite laws.51 All call for monetary compensation for the loss of the fetus. Only the Sumerian laws distinguish between accidental and intentional assault. Hammurabi\u2019s provide for vicarious punishment: Should the parties involved belong to the upper class, the assailant\u2019s daughter is put to death if the victim dies. The Middle Assyrian laws are particularly harsh. They too mandate vicarious punishment and vary the penalty according to social status, but, in addition, they inflict multiple torments on the aggressor. The Hittite laws, alone, take into account the age of the fetus in estimating the fine imposed on the assailant. In none of the cuneiform parallels do the particulars correspond exactly to the details of the case presented here in the Torah, so they shed little light on the complexities of our text.<\/p>\n
fight The Hebrew stem n-ts-h implies the use of physical force.52<\/p>\n
a miscarriage remits Literally, \u201cher children emerge.\u201d The common Hebrew stem y-ts-\u02be, \u201cto go out, emerge,\u201d is used of parturition.53<\/p>\n
damage Hebrew \u02beason elsewhere always signifies a major calamity;54 therefore, the most likely issue here is whether or not death ensues. Rabbinic tradition construes the phrase in this way and understands it as referring to the mother.55<\/p>\n
based on reckoning Hebrew pelilim means \u201cestimation,\u201d \u201cassessment,\u201d56 the idea being that the husband makes a claim based on some recognized system. Rabbinic interpretation takes pelilim to mean \u201cthe judges,\u201d that is, those who are to approve the sum demanded by the husband.57<\/p>\n
23. other damage Presumably, the death of the mother, in which case the principle of life for life is invoked, as opposed to monetary fine. This accords with the rule that the killing of a human being cannot be compensated for by the payment of money (Num. 35:31).<\/p>\n
Lex Talionis (vv. 23\u201325)<\/p>\n
These verses formulate the law of talion, or exact equivalence for injury, usually understood to mean identical physical injury inflicted in retaliation for physical injury suffered. This legal principle was first introduced by Hammurabi and finds expression in such laws as these:<\/p>\n
If a seignior has destroyed the eye of a member of the aristocracy, they shall destroy his eye.
\nIf he has broken a(nother) seignior\u2019s bone, they shall break his bone.
\nIf a seignior has knocked out a tooth of a seignior of his own rank, they shall knock out his tooth.58<\/p>\n
Another law of this type decrees that if a house collapsed and killed its owner as a result of faulty construction, then the builder is put to death. If the casualty was the owner\u2019s son, then the builder\u2019s son is put to death.59
\nPrior to Hammurabi, monetary compensation, not physical retaliation, was the rule for inflicting bodily injury. This principle is operative in the laws of Ur-nammu,60 Eshnunna,61 and the Hittites,62 as well as in the Middle Assyrian laws.63
\nIt is now recognized by legal anthropologists that before the time of Hammurabi, assault and battery was considered a private wrong to be settled between the families of the assailant and the victim. As a result of the socially disruptive effects of the cycle of violence and counterviolence, it became acceptable to take monetary compensation for the wrong committed. With the growth of urbanization and centralized government as well as the increased importance of maintaining domestic tranquillity, the state more and more tended to encroach upon the private domain. Physical violence became an issue of public welfare, and the state began to regulate the payments for various types of injuries. In a revolutionary development, Hammurabi categorized assault and battery as criminal conduct to be prosecuted by the state. The central government took on the responsibility of protecting the public and preserving the security of its citizens. The lex talionis strove to achieve exact justice: only one life for one life, only one eye for one eye, and so forth. In pursuit of this goal, however, the laws allowed physical retaliation and vicarious punishment and did not accept the principle of equal justice for all but, rather, adjusted penalties according to social class.
\nThe same legal principles that underlie the lex talionis of Hammurabi are present in biblical law. The formulation appears three times in the legal texts of the Torah: here, in Leviticus 24:17\u201322, and in Deuteronomy 19:18\u201319, 21. The list found here, the most comprehensive of the three, begins with the maximum penalty, loss of life, and then cites four instances of loss of limb, arranged in anatomical order from head to foot. These are followed by three types of painful surface wounds.
\nRabbinic tradition understood the biblical formulation to mean monetary payment and not physical retaliation.64 The present Exodus passage exhibits several strange features indicating that such was indeed the original intent. The section is introduced in the Hebrew text by a verb in the second person\u2014\u201cyou shall pay.\u201d That this stylistic formulation is unique in these otherwise impersonally and casuistically formulated laws indicates that the passage in question is not an organic part of the wider text. Another peculiarity lies in the fact that the list of damages is singularly inappropriate to the circumstances described. Other than \u201clife for life,\u201d none of the injuries listed can be included under the rubric of the term \u02beason used in verses 22 and 23. Nor can loss of limb be relevant to the case in hand. If the mother who carries the fetus is killed, any other injuries would be irrelevant. If she only suffers loss of limb but survives, then the fact of her pregnancy is immaterial.
\nRemarkably, the two other citations of the talion formula in the Torah are also inapplicable to the legal context in which they are embedded. The Leviticus passage deals with blasphemy, and talion is extraneous to it. The passage in Deuteronomy concerns false witnesses, and the law states that they are subject to the very penalty that would have been inflicted on the accused had their falsehood not been exposed. Since, with the singular exception of Deuteronomy 25:12, mutilation is not a penalty in biblical law, the entire list, other than \u201clife for life,\u201d is again irrelevant.
\nThe most reasonable conclusion to be drawn from the foregoing is that the talion list is a citation from some extrabiblical compendium of laws and has been incorporated intact into the Torah. That is why the stylistic variant \u201cyou shall pay,\u201d noted above, appears in our Exodus text. The list is actually a general statement of legal policy that formulates the abstract principle of equivalence and restitution in concrete terms.
\nOf all the equivalency items in the list, it is obvious that only \u201clife for life\u201d can be implemented literally because all human beings are created equal. But exact equivalency in respect of bodily injury is inherently unattainable. Therefore, the only available avenue of redress is monetary compensation.
\nAdditional evidence in support of the nonliteral interpretation of the biblical \u201ceye for eye\u201d phraseology lies in Leviticus 24:18: \u201cOne who kills a beast shall make restitution for it [lit. \u201cshall pay for it\u201d]: life for life.\u201d Here the legal prose can be sensibly construed only in terms of monetary compensation. Further, in Judges 15:11, when Samson butchered the Philistines because they had burnt alive his wife and her father, he justified his act by saying, \u201cAs they did to me, so I did to them,\u201d even though the punishment he inflicted did not correspond exactly to the crime they had committed. Finally, there is the law in Numbers 35:31 forbidding ransom for the life of a murderer and insisting on his death. The clear implication is that monetary compensation was the usual practice in respect of other, nonfatal physical assaults.
\nTo sum up: Biblical law accepted the principle that assault and battery are public crimes and not simply private wrongs. However, it instituted monetary compensation not retaliation for bodily injury. It also insisted on equal justice for all citizens (for the slave, see vv. 20, 26\u201327). And it outlawed vicarious punishment.
\nHow was the amount of restitution calculated? The Torah information itself provides no answer. According to rabbinic tradition, however, it was to be based on the diminution in value of a slave who sustained a similar injury.65<\/p>\n
Injury by a Master to his Slave (vv. 26\u201327)<\/p>\n
Verse 20 established the culpability of one who kills his own slave. These clauses deal with the case of a master who causes his slave irreparable bodily injury. The biblical law does not give the master the benefit of the doubt that only disciplinary chastisement was intended; were that the case, it would indeed have been cruel and unusual punishment. Intent to cause injury is assumed, and the master is guilty of aggravated assault. He has robbed his slave of his humanity and dignity, and for this the slave, male or female, gains freedom. As Ibn Ezra points out, the prospect of losing his financial investment [not to mention the services performed] must inevitably in such circumstances act as a deterrent to cruel treatment on the part of the master.
\nThis biblical law, like that of verses 20\u201321, is without parallel in other ancient Near Eastern legislation; the latter simply does not concern itself with the well-being of the slave.<\/p>\n
his slave According to rabbinic tradition,66 a non-Israelite.<\/p>\n
eye \u2026 tooth Or any other of the chief external organs of the body. Rabbinic law lists twenty-four such, including the fingers, toes, tips of the ears, and the tip of the nose.67 Should the master injure any of these, the slave is given his freedom.<\/p>\n
The Homicidal Beast (vv. 28\u201332)<\/p>\n
This section contains three cases involving the attack of a homicidal beast\u2014here exemplified by an ox68\u2014upon human beings. They are the cases of (1) the beast that has no previous record of viciousness; (2) the beast that has such a previous history and whose owner has been so warned; and (3) the beast that gores a slave.
\nThe legal topic of the goring ox is treated in the laws of both Eshnunna69 and Hammurabi.70 The former deal only with cases 2 and 3, but the latter include all three and in the same sequence as the Torah. All three collections share in common the general principle that the owner who has been duly warned about his vicious ox is responsible for guarding it. Beyond this, there are considerable differences between the Mesopotamian and biblical approaches. Eshnunna and Hammurabi interest themselves exclusively in the economic aspects of the case. The incident itself is treated as a relatively minor affair. Eshnunna, for instance, imposes the same penalty on the forewarned owner of the ox that kills a man as it does for the offense of cutting off someone\u2019s finger. Neither law collection recommends any action against the ox, and Hammurabi explicitly disavows as an actionable offense the first-time killing of a man by an ox.
\nBy contrast, the entire treatment of the case in the Torah is grounded in religious and moral considerations. Thus, legislation here demands the destruction of an ox that has fatally gored a human being, whatever the past history of the beast, and it proscribes the eating of its flesh. If the owner had been forewarned, it regards him as being worthy of the death penalty. The gender of the victim is immaterial. The two Mesopotamian law collections mention only the goring of a male.<\/p>\n
28. the ox shall be stoned The killer ox is not destroyed solely because it is dangerous. This is clear from the fact that it is not destroyed when the victim is another ox and from the prescribed mode of destruction\u2014not ordinary slaughter but stoning. The execution of the ox was carried out in the presence, and with the participation, of the entire community\u2014implying that the killing of a human being is a source of mass pollution and that the proceedings had an expiatory function.71 The killing of a homicidal beast is ordained in Genesis 9:5\u20136: \u201cFor your own life-blood I will require a reckoning: I will require it of every beast.\u2026 Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in His image did God make man.\u201d The sanctity of human life is such as to make bloodshed the consummate offense, one viewed with unspeakable horror. Both man and beast that destroy human life are thereafter tainted by bloodguilt.<\/p>\n
its flesh This hardly needs mention since the stoning would in any case render the flesh of the animal inedible. The proscription rests on the notion that a beast tainted by the taking of human life cannot be fit for human consumption.<\/p>\n
not to be punished In contrast to the next case. Here there is no implicit negligence.<\/p>\n
29. This is a case of unmistakable criminal negligence. The owner is guilty of reckless disregard of the safety and rights of others. His liability is therefore great.<\/p>\n
has failed to guard it Hebrew ve-lo\u02be yishmerennu; the Septuagint reads, \u201che did not destroy it,\u201d apparently based on a Hebrew text: ve-lo\u02be yashmidennu. This accords with the interpretation of Rabbi Eliezer, who understood the term \u201cguarding\u201d to mean putting the knife to the ox.72<\/p>\n
30. ransom Numbers 35:31 forbids the acceptance of ransom for the life of one found guilty of murder. This man is not, strictly speaking, a murderer since he did not directly cause the homicide and did not have such intent; the sentence is therefore mitigated. Rabbinic exegesis interprets the death penalty mentioned in verse 29 to mean \u201cdeath by the hand of Heaven,\u201d not by a human court.73<\/p>\n
whatever is laid upon him Presumably by the family of the victim (cf. v. 22). Targum Jonathan preserves a tradition that it is the court that fixes the amount of the ransom.<\/p>\n
31. Such an amplification of a law is unparalleled in the Torah legislation. It is thought to emend or polemicize against some earlier Semitic law that stipulated vicarious punishment. Although such practice is indeed attested in Hammurabi (pars. 116, 210, 230), it is not applied there in the present case, which enjoins a fine for the owner only in the case of an ox that kills a man.<\/p>\n
32. thirty shekels This is the evaluation, for purposes of vows, of a woman between the ages of twenty and sixty, as given in Leviticus 27:4. It is also the fine imposed by Hammurabi\u2019s laws (par. 251) on the owner of an ox that gored to death a member of the aristocracy. The same laws (par. 252) impose only twenty shekels if the victim was the aristocrat\u2019s slave. The laws of Eshnunna (par. 55) exact fifteen shekels. In the law of the Torah, the stoning of the ox means that it was regarded as having incurred bloodguilt, just as it had for killing a free person.<\/p>\n
Damage to Livestock (vv. 33\u201336)<\/p>\n
33\u201334. The presumption is that the pit or cistern was located on public property or that there was unobstructed access to it from public property.74 Behavioral norms would expect the individual to exercise reasonable prudence and not leave such hazards exposed. For this act of omission, which constitutes negligence, the offender must make restitution for the value of the animal.
\nThe last phrase of the Hebrew text, which literally translates \u201cand the carcass shall be his,\u201d is ambiguous. As noted by Rashbam, the straightforward meaning favors the present translation. Rabbinic exegesis awards the carcass to the claimant, but its value is deducted from the compensation paid for the loss of the animal.75 The carcass would be valued for its hide.<\/p>\n
35\u201336. Here, one ox kills another of presumed equal worth.76 The amount of compensation will depend on whether or not the attacking ox had a history of viciousness. If it had none, then, because neither party was at fault, they share the loss. If it had such a history, then its owner was negligent and must make full restitution for the dead ox.
\nParagraph 53 of the laws of Eshnunna is almost identical with verse 35 here but lacks the circumstance of verse 36.<\/p>\n
The Law of Theft (21:37\u201322:3)<\/p>\n
37. This verse, in some editions of the Bible numbered 22:1, must be taken together with 22:2b(3b) and 3(4). The operative principle here is that the slaughter or sale of the stolen animal constitutes unmistakable evidence of mens rea, that is, evil intent on the part of the thief. The theft cannot be interpreted as merely an impulsive act. The thief must pay back in kind fivefold for the ox and fourfold for the sheep. Rabbinic tradition understood this to mean replacing the animal plus four more or three more animals respectively.77
\nThe reason for the difference in compensation for the two animals has been a matter of conjecture. Targum Jonathan and Rabbi Meir maintain that since the ox, unlike the sheep, is a draft animal, its comparative worth, and hence the loss, is greater. Rabbi Johanan ben Zakkai argues that the Torah is sensitive to human dignity, even in the case of a thief. Since the miscreant had to carry the sheep\u2014a very humiliating experience\u2014a lesser penalty is imposed.78 Bekhor Shor explains that the owner is compensated for his considerable investment of effort and toil in training the ox, as well as for the loss of its labors. In the case of the stolen sheep, it may be added that the owner has been deprived of the potential value of its fleece, milk, flesh, and hide. Doubtless, the multiple restitution also takes into account the benefit derived by the thief from slaughtering or selling the animal. It also functions punitively as a deterrent to crime. Mishnah Ketubbot 3:9 rules that a thief who voluntarily confesses his crime before the court makes restitution only for the stolen item and is exempt from the penalties.
\nVerse 2b(3b) stipulates that the aforementioned restitution must be made and that an insolvent thief is to be indentured by the court to work off the value of his debt. Hammurabi79 sentences an insolvent thief to death.
\nVerse 3(4) specifies that should the animals be discovered unharmed and still in the possession of the rustler, then only double restitution is to be made. In this instance, the loss to the owner has been minimal and temporary. From 22:6, 8 it is clear that, apart from the case of 21:37, the standard penalty was double restitution. Mishnah Bava Kamma 7:1 applies this penalty uniformly to all goods and effects.
\nViolations of property rights occupy much attention in the laws of Hammurabi, Assyria, and the Hittites. Hammurabi\u2019s laws show that in the earlier period the penalty for theft was death; later, the penalty became multiple restitution, which might be ten times the value of the stolen article and, in the case of theft from a temple or the royal palace, as high as thirty times.80 The Middle Assyrian laws deal with women thieves and inflict mutilation as a punishment.81 The Hittite laws are disproportionately preoccupied with issues of property violations. In all cases, multiple restitution is enforced. In the Torah, by contrast, theft, while a serious offence and a sin, is not particularly emphasized. As the following verses show, the humanity even of the thief is of concern.<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 22<\/p>\n
22:1\u20132a. The particular case of a thief who is surprised in the act of breaking and entering is parenthetically injected into the law dealing with theft. The contrast between the phrases, \u201cIf the sun has risen\u201d and \u201cwhile tunneling\u201d shows the latter to presuppose a nighttime setting. This is confirmed by Job 24:16, as well as by the fact that the presence of bystanders outside would discourage such a laborious mode of entry by day. Because the burglar is likely to encounter the occupants and must anticipate that they will use force, his nocturnal timing creates a presumption of homicidal intent. The condition of imminent threat, necessary to satisfy lawful self-defense by the householder, is thus fulfilled. Hence, no bloodguilt is incurred should the intruder be killed. The operative moral principle, as formulated in Bava Metsia 62a, is that \u201cyour life takes precedence\u201d over his. For this reason, as Sanhedrin 72a puts it, \u201cIf one comes to slay you, you forestall by slaying him.\u201d
\nIf the break-in occurred in broad daylight, however, it is not presumed to present imminent danger to life; the use of deadly force is therefore deemed to be unwarranted, and bloodguilt would ensue. Here the issue is the hierarchy of values. The biblical scale gives priority to the protection of life\u2014even the life of the burglar\u2014over the protection of property.
\nAccording to the Mekhilta,1 Rabbi Ishmael understood the phrase \u201cIf the sun has risen\u201d to be figurative for absolute certainty. In other words, he eliminates the distinction between the nighttime and daytime slaying of the burglar and restricts the privileged killing to the circumstance in which the murderous intent of the intruder is absolutely beyond doubt.
\nThe laws of Eshnunna2 also deal with the topic of theft and likewise distinguish between daytime and nighttime offenses, but they are concerned solely with the protection of property and ignore the humanitarian issue. Hammurabi3 simply prescribes the death penalty for the thief who made a breach in a house or committed robbery.<\/p>\n
Damage to Crops (vv. 4\u20135)<\/p>\n
Two cases are under consideration: the destruction of crops (1) by livestock or (2) by fire. The first is treated more severely\u2014the cattle owner must compensate for the choice crops of the yield\u2014because he carelessly, although without malicious intent, allowed his beast to stray into another\u2019s field. In the second case restitution of choice produce is not required because the damage was wholly accidental. These two cases are wedged between laws relating to theft because all are viewed under the broad heading of damage to property.
\nThe Hittite laws similarly feature and juxtapose the same two legal topics although in reverse order, and they likewise insert them among laws of theft.
\nThe Hebrew text contains several obscurities, discussed below.<\/p>\n
4. lets \u2026 loose to graze The two Hebrew clauses are complementary, the second (ve-shilla\u1e25) accounting for the action of the first, with the connecting vav being explanatory.4 The Hebrew stem b-\u02bf-r most frequently means \u201cto set fire, burn,\u201d as in verse 5. But it can also mean \u201cto ravage,\u201d5 which is the action of a beast (Heb. be\u02bfir). Isaiah 5:5 illustrates the present case: \u201cNow I am going to tell you\/What I will do to My vineyard:\/I will remove its hedge,\/That it may be ravaged [le-va\u02bfer];\/I will break down its wall,\/That it may be trampled.\u201d The Septuagint similarly understood the verb b-\u02bf-r in the Hebrew text in the sense of \u201cgraze over.\u201d<\/p>\n
for the impairment Hebrew meitav, literally \u201cthe best.\u201d In tannaitic sources there is a difference of opinion as to the intent of this law. It is unclear whether the compensation imposed on the owner of the beast is calculated according to the best property of the defendant or of the plaintiff.6 Both the Septuagint and the Samaritan texts interpolate a clause making the normal crop the criterion of compensation when the crop was only partly destroyed, and the top of the crop the standard when the entire field was grazed over.<\/p>\n
5. When a fire is started For legitimate purposes, but the flames spread by the wind to someone else\u2019s property.<\/p>\n
thorns These would be collected and used as fuel by the poor and for building hedges.<\/p>\n
growing grain Literally, \u201cthe field.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Law of Bailment (vv. 6\u201314)<\/p>\n
With the exception of verse 8, this section deals with the stipulations governing various types of guardianship of another\u2019s movables or livestock, and the degree of each bailee\u2019s responsibility. The general principle is that liability increases with the benefit that the bailee receives or expects for his services or that he gains from the entrusted property.
\nMishnah Bava Metsia 7:8 (= Shevu. 8:1) distinguishes the following four categories: (1) a gratuitous bailee (Heb. shomer \u1e25innam), (2) a borrower (sho\u02beel), (3) one who takes a fee (nose\u02be sakhar), and (4) a hirer (sokher). \u201cThe gratuitous bailee must swear [to innocence of negligence] in all cases [of loss of the deposit, and is then freed from liability]; the borrower must make restitution in all cases; both the paid bailee and the hirer take the oath [in a case] pertaining to an animal that was injured, carried off, or died, but must make restitution if it was lost or stolen.\u201d<\/p>\n
Movable Goods (vv. 6\u20137)<\/p>\n
A bailee claims that movable goods entrusted to him for safekeeping have been stolen. If the thief is not caught, the bailee must clear himself of suspicion of misappropriation by taking an oath before the proper authorities.
\nSince \u201cmoney or goods\u201d are kept in the house together with the bailee\u2019s own possessions, they require no special attention or effort, and there is no expectation of benefit or consideration. As a gratuitous bailee (shomer \u1e25innam), he is not liable for loss or theft that does not result from his own negligence.7
\nSimilar cases are dealt with in the other law collections of the ancient Near East. The laws of Eshnunna8 rule that where a deposit disappears, and there is no evidence of a break-in, the bailee must replace the property. However, if the house collapses or is burglarized and the bailee\u2019s own property is also lost, he takes an exculpatory oath to that effect before the chief god of the city and is then free of all liability.
\nHammurabi\u2019s laws contain several clauses relating to issues of this kind;9 they reflect a highly developed commercial society in which witnesses and written contracts govern such transactions. They are not, however, strictly analogous to those detailed in the Torah.<\/p>\n
6. they are stolen So the bailee claims.<\/p>\n
pay double In accordance with the rule of verse 3.<\/p>\n
7. shall depose Literally, \u201cshall draw near.\u201d The Hebrew stem k-r-v often has legal force in the sense of applying for a judicial determination.10 In the present instance the term means to make a statement under oath, which becomes determinative.<\/p>\n
before God See Comment to 21:6.<\/p>\n
laid hands on That is, misappropriated. If he made use of the deposit for his own benefit, he has become a paid bailee and thus liable for theft or loss.<\/p>\n
property Hebrew mela\u02bekhah, \u201clabor, the product or fruit of labor,\u201d covers both money and goods.11<\/p>\n
A Claim of Tortious Conversion (v. 8)<\/p>\n
This is a general, comprehensive formulation that deals with an allegation that another has wrongfully taken possession of the claimant\u2019s chattel and has contested his right of ownership.
\nAs was recognized by Rabbi \u1e24iyya bar Joseph, recorded in Bava Kamma 107a, \u201can interweaving of sections\u201d (\u02bferuv parashiyyot) has occurred here. This observation is explained by Rashi to mean that the verse is an interpolation and is extraneous to its immediate context. We may conjecture that it has been wedged in between the two types of bailment because, like them, the dispute involves a claim of illegal assumption of ownership, and because it shares legal phraseology in common with them both: \u201cbefore God,\u201d \u201cshall pay double,\u201d \u201cox, an ass, and a sheep.\u201d<\/p>\n
charges of misappropriation Hebrew devar pesha\u02bf. Davar frequently carries the legal denotation of \u201ccase, suit, action, controversy at law.\u201d12 Pesha\u02bf basically connotes the denial or repudiation of the right of another to exercise dominion and control. Hence, it is used in the political context of renunciation of the status of vassalage, an act of treachery in the ancient world; and it is used in a religious sense of violating God\u2019s covenant,13 transgressing His law.14 Here pesha\u02bf bears a legal nuance: a breach of trust, a case of lawbreaking.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is it\u201d The plaintiff claims to identify his property. Alternatively, the phrase might be rendered \u201cThis is he,\u201d referring to the alleged offender.<\/p>\n
shall pay double The livestock or movable property has remained intact in the possession of the guilty party, so the rule of 22:3 applies.<\/p>\n
Livestock (vv. 9\u201312)<\/p>\n
Unlike the case of \u201cmoney or goods,\u201d the safeguarding of animals is complicated by their being out in the fields and requiring much attention and labor. It may be assumed, therefore, that the bailee is paid for his services (nose\u02be\/shomer sakhar), and this fact alone affects the degree of responsibility that is expected of him. Three contingencies are presented: (1) The bailee claims that the loss to the owner was caused by an \u201cact of God,\u201d an unforeseeable and unpreventable natural phenomenon. In the absence of corroborating witnesses, an oath of innocence is required to free him from liability (vv. 9\u201310). (2) The loss is blamed on theft. A measure of negligence is presumed, and the bailee must make restitution (v. 11). (3) The entrusted animal was savaged by a wild beast. The burden of proof is on the bailee; if he can prove his claim, he is exempt from liability.
\nHammurabi\u2019s laws similarly discuss the case of the entrusted animal. They stipulate that the shepherd is free of liability if the beast was killed in the sheepfold by an \u201cact of god\u201d or by a lion\u2014provided that he prove himself innocent \u201cin the presence of the god.\u201d In that case, the owner receives the dead animal. If, however, the animal be lamed in the fold due to negligence, the shepherd must make good the loss.15<\/p>\n
carried off A case of cattle rustling, as in Job 1:15, 17, not the same as ordinary theft mentioned in verse 11.16<\/p>\n
10. an oath before the LORD Rather, \u201can oath by the Lord.\u201d The use of YHVH here in place of \u201cGod\u201d (\u02beelohim) reflects the actual wording of the Israelite oath, just as in the regular oath-formula \u1e25ai YHVH, \u201cas the Lord lives.\u201d17<\/p>\n
between the two of them It is uncertain whether both parties have to swear.18<\/p>\n
must acquiesce Literally, \u201caccept\u201d\u2014the oath as incontestable.19<\/p>\n
12. he shall bring it as evidence He would be expected to attempt to save at least some part of the animal, as David notes in 1 Samuel 17:34\u201335.20 Amos 3:12 illustrates this custom: \u201cAs a shepherd rescues from the lion\u2019s jaws\/Two shank bones or the tip of an ear \u2026\u201d The material circumstantial evidence suffices to exempt him from responsibility.
\nIn place of \u02bfed, \u201cwitness, evidence,\u201d some ancient versions read the preposition \u02bfad, \u201cup to\u201d: \u201cHe shall bring him [i.e., the owner] to the savaged animal.\u201d21<\/p>\n
Borrowing (and Hiring?) (vv. 13\u201314)<\/p>\n
The act of borrowing falls within the category of bailment. Since the use of the object is obtained gratis, entirely for the borrower\u2019s benefit, his degree of responsibility and liability exceeds that in the previous cases, unless certain conditions are fulfilled.
\nAs will be shown below, it is not entirely clear whether the contingency of hiring actually appears in the Torah\u2019s legislation. The preserved fragments of the laws of Lipit-Ishtar22 deal with the various payments to be made for different kinds of injuries caused by the hirer. Hammurabi23 absolves the hirer if a rented ox or ass is killed by a lion in the open, but he requires full restitution if the death of the animal was caused by negligence or maltreatment; a tariff of payments for various types of injuries is also included.<\/p>\n
13. borrows The verb has no object.24 The theme of verses 9\u201312 and the phrase \u201cit dies or is injured\u201d make it certain that an animal, most likely a work animal, is meant.<\/p>\n
14. If its owner was with it This provision may presuppose the borrowing of the services of the owner together with his animal.25 At any rate, the presence of the owner at the time of the mishap absolves the borrower from liability. The reason may be that the owner has the responsibility of supervision and is expected to save his own animal.<\/p>\n
if it was hired This rendering presupposes that Hebrew sakhir has adjectival force and refers back to the unmentioned but posited animal, thus creating a fourth category of bailment. However, other than the poetic phrase in Isaiah 7:20, \u201cthe razor that is hired,\u201d sakhir is always a noun meaning \u201ca hired man, a day laborer,\u201d26 so that the translation could well be, \u201cIf he [the borrower] was a hired laborer,\u201d implying that the latter borrowed the animal from his employer.<\/p>\n
he is entitled to the hire Hebrew ba\u02be bi-skharo is puzzling. The present rendering means that the owner who hired out his animal\u2014which then suffered misfortune\u2014is not compensated for it but is entitled to receive only the hiring fee. Another possible rendering is \u201cIt came with his hiring fee\u201d; that is, the owner is assumed to have taken the risk into account when he rented out the animal and therefore receives no restitution. Still a third translation could be \u201cIt comes out of his pay\u201d;27 that is, the restitution is deducted from the wages of the hired laborer, who is fully responsible.
\nIn the times of the Mishnah the responsibility of the hirer was a matter of dispute. Rabbi Meir classed him with the gratuitous bailee; Rabbi Judah, with the paid bailee.28<\/p>\n
The Law of Seduction (vv. 15\u201316)<\/p>\n
The Book of the Covenant does not regulate the laws of marriage. Long established by custom in Israel, they were transmitted orally over the generations. The present law must be an amendment to existing practice. The extant corpora of laws from the ancient Near East devote much attention to the case of rape but none to the specific issue dealt with here.
\nIbn Ezra points out that the sequence of legal topics is \u201cfrom the case of stolen property to that of a stolen heart.\u201d Both are offenses that occasion economic loss and entail payment of compensation.
\nA man has seduced an unattached virgin. Ordinarily, her father would receive the mohar, or bride-price, customarily paid him by the husband-to-be. This is in compensation for the loss of the daughter\u2019s services and potential value to the family. But the mohar was predicated on the woman\u2019s premarital virginity, which was expected on moral and social grounds and was essential to the marriage contract.29 Thus, the deflowering of the girl caused her a loss of social status and resulted in her father\u2019s forfeiture of the mohar. Consequently, the seducer had to make good the lost sum, regardless of whether the father permitted him to marry his daughter.
\nThe origin of the technical term mohar is uncertain. Since it is common to Hebrew, Ugaritic, Aramaic, and Arabic, the practice must have been widespread. A similar institution, known as tir\u1e25atum in Akkadian, is regulated in the cuneiform law collections. From the story of Dinah and Shechem, as told in Genesis 34, it is clear that the mohar was in force in pre-Israelite Canaan (v. 12).
\nThe mohar was occasionally paid in services or heroic deeds instead of in money, as was the case with David\u2019s marriage to Saul\u2019s daughter,30 Othniel\u2019s betrothal to Achsah, daughter of Caleb,31 and Jacob\u2019s many years of service in return for Laban\u2019s two daughters.32
\nThe mohar was paid to the bride\u2019s father, who in most cases would only enjoy the usufruct, that is, the profit and utility it produced. The original sum would eventually be turned over to the daughter. This practice seems to underlie the complaint of Laban\u2019s two daughters in Genesis 31:15 that their father \u201chad used up [the] purchase price,\u201d that is, the original capital. In the Aramaic legal documents of the Jewish colony in Elephantine, in Egypt, deriving from the second half of the fifth century B.C.E., the mohar was paid to the father but counted among the wife\u2019s possessions.33<\/p>\n
15. seduces By persuasion34 or deception35 but not by coercion. There is a presumption of consent on the part of the girl. For the law of rape, see Deuteronomy 22:22\u201329.<\/p>\n
the bride-price has not been paid Hebrew \u02beasher lo\u02be \u02beorasah means that she had never been betrothed; that is, she has not previously had a fianc\u00e9, one who paid the mohar for her but had not yet consummated the marriage.
\nBiblical marriage comprised two separate stages. The first is expressed through the stem \u02be-r-s used here. The origin of the term is uncertain, but it may mean \u201cto ask\u201d36\u2014for the girl\u2019s hand in marriage. Once the mohar was paid, the girl was considered betrothed (Heb. me\u02beorasah) and had the legal status of a married woman even though she was still entirely under the care and authority of her father.37 This status explains Hosea\u2019s (2:21\u201322) figurative use of this verb to describe the binding love relationship between God and Israel.<\/p>\n
He must make her his wife Hebrew mahor yimbarennah are verbs formed from the noun mohar.<\/p>\n
16. the bride-price The amount is not specified, it being assumed that the existing practice was well known. Based upon Deuteronomy 22:29, rabbinic tradition understood fifty shekels to be the average amount.38<\/p>\n
CATEGORICAL COMMANDS (22:17\u201323:19)<\/p>\n
The second section of the Book of the Covenant now opens. It comprises a miscellany of social, ethical, moral and religious stipulations that fall under the rubric of devarim, divine commands. These are overwhelmingly formulated in the categorical, apodictic style characteristic of the Decalogue, rather than in the casuistic, hypothetical style of the preceding laws. Most of the proscriptions and prescriptions are of the sort that do not come within the scope of the judicial powers of the court. Their enforcement is left to the human conscience, conditioned and quickened by the knowledge and conviction that they are standards of behavior imposed by a transcendent divine will, not salutary maxims born of human experience and wisdom.<\/p>\n
17\u201319. Three offenses are grouped together for several reasons: Each is a foreign importation alien to and subversive of the religion of Israel; each incurs the death penalty; each is regarded as an abomination and so designated elsewhere in the Bible\u2014described by the Hebrew term to\u02bfevah, something utterly abhorrent.39<\/p>\n
The Prohibition of Sorcery (v. 17)<\/p>\n
The belief in and practice of magic was universal in the ancient world. It was an inevitable by-product of polytheism. The multiplicity of divine forces limited the power of any one of them; and since gods were but the divinization of nature\u2019s powers and phenomena, gods and humans were thought to share the same world. Like humans, gods were thought to be born, grow old, and die. Hence, within the intellectual system of polytheism, the reality of a realm of existence independent of the gods and ultimately in control of them was a logical inference. The attempt to activate and manipulate to one\u2019s advantage the mysterious supernatural forces inherent in this realm constituted the essence of magic. Elaborate techniques were developed to this end, and magic became an indispensable ingredient of religion. Apart from the practical and verbal procedures, and the personnel who specialized in them, there were also individuals who were thought to possess inherent mystical powers capable of exploiting the occult properties of the extramundane realm. Like all productions of the human mind, magic could be put to benevolent or malevolent use. The latter was outlawed in all societies.
\nBiblical monotheism, with its uncompromising insistence on the absolute omnipotence of one universal, sovereign, creator God, was totally irreconcilable with the underlying postulates of magic. The religion of Israel ruthlessly and relentlessly fought to extirpate such beliefs and practices. The classic statement on the subject appears in Deuteronomy 18:9\u201314:<\/p>\n
When you enter the land that the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not learn to imitate the abhorrent practices of those nations. Let no one be found among you who consigns his son or daughter to the fire, or who is an augur, a soothsayer, a diviner, a sorcerer, one who casts spells, or one who consults ghosts or familiar spirits, or one who inquires of the dead. For anyone who does such things is abhorrent to the LORD, and it is because of these abhorrent things that the LORD your God is dispossessing them before you. You must be wholehearted with the LORD your God. Those nations that you are about to dispossess do indeed resort to soothsayers and augurs; to you, however, the LORD your God has not assigned the like.<\/p>\n
The non-Israelite seer Balaam noted this distinctiveness of Israel: \u201cLo, there is no augury in Jacob,\/No divining in Israel\u201d (Num. 23:23). Yet the frequency with which magical practices are mentioned in the Bible is sure testimony to their hold on the popular imagination and to the difficulty encountered in combating them.40<\/p>\n
not tolerate Literally, \u201cnot let live,\u201d a unique legal expression in place of the usual \u201cshall be put to death.\u201d Ramban regards the phrasing as indicative of the exceptional severity with which this antisocial offense is viewed.41<\/p>\n
a sorceress The same penalty certainly applies to the male practitioner. The feminine specification here probably reflects a historical reality that the clandestine operators of this officially outlawed cult were mostly women.42 This phenomenon, together with the fact that sorcery and witchcraft are forms of deception, most likely accounts for the association of this law with the preceding rule about the seducer.<\/p>\n
The Prohibition of Bestiality (v. 18)<\/p>\n
This particular perversion is again prohibited in Leviticus 18:23 and 20:15\u201316, where it is presented as one of the abominations of the pre-Israelite inhabitants of Canaan. Deuteronomy 27:21 also includes its perpetrators in its list of the accursed. It is not known to what extent the biblical allusions are representational of Syro-Palestinian culture. Quite possibly, they are aimed at idolatrous practices, otherwise unrecorded, of the official pagan religious or popular cults. Of the law collections of the ancient Near East, only the Hittite legislates against bestiality, imposing the death penalty\u2014except for copulation between a human and a horse or mule, which, inexplicably, is not an offense!43 Hittite ritual texts dating back to the second half of the thirteenth century B.C.E. describe the purificatory rites for the removal of the impurity of bestiality (and incest) from a man. Otherwise, references to this abomination are restricted to mythological literature and to records of dream experience. Mishnah Avodah Zarah 2:1 mentions that contemporary heathens in the Greco-Roman world were suspected of copulating with animals.<\/p>\n
The Prohibition of Apostasy (v. 19)<\/p>\n
The generalized prohibition of idolatry in the Decalogue (Exod. 20:3) is now specifically directed against sacrifice, here designated by the verb z-v-\u1e25 which means \u201cto slaughter.\u201d The sacrifice called zeva\u1e25 was essentially a sacrificial feast shared by the worshiper and the deity. It was widespread throughout the religions of the ancient Near East.<\/p>\n
to a god Rather, \u201cto the gods\u201d\u2014of other nations. This understanding is indicated by the vocalization of the Hebrew: la-\u02beelohim, as distinct from le\u02belohim, which refers to the one God.44 The last Hebrew clause of the verse acts as an explanatory gloss to clarify the possible ambiguity in the consonantal text; to the same end, the Samaritan recension adds \u02bea\u1e25erim, \u201cother\u201d gods, while omitting that clause.<\/p>\n
proscribed The Hebrew verb, formed from the noun \u1e25erem, implies a greater stringency than does the simple death penalty formula. It implies total annihilation and includes the destruction of the criminal\u2019s property, as Targum Jonathan was careful to note.45<\/p>\n
Concern for the Disadvantaged of Society (vv. 20\u201326)<\/p>\n
Four social groups especially vulnerable to exploitation are now singled out as being the object of God\u2019s special concern. These are the stranger, the widow, the orphan, and the poor. The Torah here enjoins sensitivity to their condition not simply out of humanitarian considerations but as a divine imperative. Insensitivity is consequently sinful, a violation of a commandment that expresses God\u2019s will. A striking feature of the Hebrew legal formulation is the manner in which the audience is addressed in the singular and the plural, following the pattern of the Decalogue. It recognizes both the individual and society as equally responsible and accountable for the terms of the covenantal relationship between God and Israel. Social evil is thus a sin against humanity and God.
\nThe seminal importance of these laws in the religion of Israel is apparent from their frequent reiteration in the biblical literature,46 as well as by the twin motives that actuate them: Israel\u2019s empathetic regard for the disadvantaged of society should be stimulated by her own historical experience (v. 20); God\u2019s concern arises out of His essential nature, His intolerance of injustice, and His compassionate qualities (vv. 22\u201323, 26).47
\nThese humanitarian stipulations may have been set down after the preceding cultic laws in order to establish a contrast between the moral corruption of paganism (vv. 17\u201319) and the moral nature of the God of Israel. In addition, they serve to inculcate the idea that the rejection of the non-Israelite religious practices (v. 19) has no bearing on the inalienable right of the alien to civilized treatment free of victimization (v. 20).<\/p>\n
The Stranger (v. 20)<\/p>\n
The Hebrew term ger, \u201cstranger,\u201d denotes a foreign-born permanent resident whose status was intermediate between the native-born citizen (\u02beezra\u1e25) and the foreigner temporarily residing outside his community (nokhri). Because he could not fall back upon local family and clan ties, he lacked the social and legal protection that these ordinarily afforded. Being dependent on the goodwill of others, he could easily fall victim to discrimination and exploitation.
\nThe numerous biblical prohibitions against the maltreatment of strangers are supplemented in the legislation by positive injunctions to love them,48 even as God does,49 which entails supplying their basic needs and extending to them the same social services and amenities to which disadvantaged Israelites were entitled.50 It was inevitable that over time strangers would be absorbed into the body politic of Israel and take upon themselves the obligations and duties that devolved upon a member of the covenantal society. Hence, in postbiblical Hebrew the term ger (fem. giyyoret) eventually came to be synonymous with \u201cproselyte.\u201d See The JPS Torah Commentary, Numbers, Excursus 34, p. 398.<\/p>\n
wrong \u2026 oppress The two verbs heighten the stringency of the prohibition. Rabbinic exegesis interprets the first, honah, to mean verbal and emotional abuse, and the second, l-\u1e25-ts, to connote defrauding.51 However, as Mishnah Bava Metsia 4:10 makes clear, honah can also encompass victimizing and defrauding.52<\/p>\n
The Widow and the Orphan (vv. 21\u201323)<\/p>\n
The exploitation of these unfortunates was so tempting, and apparently so widespread and seemingly beyond the reach of the law, that the Torah amplifies the ordinary apodictic formulation with a passionate emphasis on the gravity of the sin in the eyes of God. The absence of a human protector of the widow and the orphan should not delude the unscrupulous or the society that tolerates them. God Himself champions the cause of the downtrodden. The same conviction is expressed in Proverbs 22:22\u201323: \u201cDo not rob the wretched because he is wretched;\/Do not crush the poor in the gate;\/For the LORD will take up their cause\/And despoil those who despoil them of life.\u201d Proverbs 23:10\u201311 puts it this way: \u201cDo not encroach upon the field of the orphans,\/For they have a mighty Kinsman,\/And He will surely take up their cause with you.\u201d<\/p>\n
21. widow or orphan Rabbi Ishmael,53 followed by Rashi, adds, \u201cor any other human being.\u201d<\/p>\n
22. mistreat \u2026 heed \u2026 cry out54<\/p>\n
23. the sword That is, in warfare. Social injustice leads to social disaster.<\/p>\n
The Poor and Loans (vv. 24\u201326)<\/p>\n
These laws are aimed at protecting the desperate poor from exploitation by the more fortunate. They are the first of several such examples in the Torah that regulate loans and forbid the taking of interest. The others are Leviticus 25:35\u201338, Deuteronomy 23:20\u201321, and 24:10\u201313. The association of loan giving with the poor provides the social background to the prohibition. Prior to Solomon\u2019s time, Israelite society was composed overwhelmingly of peasants in villages operating in an agrarian economy. Tribal affiliation carried with it the obligation of mutual cooperation and support. In these circumstances, the need for a loan would be occasioned not by business and commerce but by dire poverty. Those who habitually lived at little more than subsistence level would need to borrow either money or grain if disaster struck. The taking of interest was therefore a moral not an economic issue\u2014to do so was to shirk responsibility to one\u2019s fellow Israelite and to profit from another\u2019s misery. It also opened the door to the eventual enslavement of the borrower and his family, since in most instances the payment of the interest, let alone repayment of the loan, was unfeasible. The story in 2 Kings 4:1 illustrates the case.
\nThe present laws, like similar ones found elsewhere in the Torah, are designed to safeguard the dignity and protect the means of subsistence of the impoverished debtor. True, several biblical texts indicate that there were times when the ideal was ignored in practice.55 Nevertheless, biblical law is unique in the ancient Near East in imposing an absolute ban on lending and borrowing with interest.
\nIn the urbanized and commercialized society of Mesopotamia, loans on interest were commonplace and regulated by both law and custom. Loan contracts from Nuzi show that rates of interest at times reached 50 percent per annum. The laws of Eshnunna and Hammurabi pay much attention to loans. Generally, interest rates specify 33\u2153 percent per annum on loans of grain and 20\u201325 percent on loans of silver. The system resulted in the granting of legal sanction to the practice of seizing the nonpaying debtor or members of his family and depriving them of their freedom.<\/p>\n
24. if you lend The hypothetical, or casuistic, formulation is only apparent. No penalties are specified, the direct address in the second person is employed, and there is a concluding apodictic prohibition\u2014none of which is characteristic of the true type of casuistic law. Hence, Rabbi Ishmael could construe the opening Hebrew \u02beim not as a voluntary act but as implying an obligation.56<\/p>\n
to My people Deuteronomy 23:20\u201321 expressly permits the exaction of interest on loans made to a foreigner (Heb. nokhri), that is, to one who resides in an Israelite locality only temporarily. Likewise, debts incurred by a foreigner are not canceled in the Sabbatical year (Deut. 15:3). These distinctions are drawn because the foreigner referred to would most likely be a traveling trader who takes a loan for commercial and business reasons. Because of his mobility, such an individual would constitute a high risk. This situation is well documented in the ramified and far-flung trading operations carried on in the Assyrian Empire, which were financed through private enterprise. A further consideration is reciprocity; an Israelite abroad would certainly be subject to local business practices and be required to pay the exorbitant interest rates.<\/p>\n
act \u2026 as a creditor That is, do not harass the borrower.57<\/p>\n
interest Hebrew neshekh derives from the stem n-sh-k, \u201cto bite,\u201d Here, it is a general term for interest on a loan.58 In other texts59 it is used in association with tarbit\/marbit, literally \u201cincrease.\u201d Babylonian Talmud Bava Metsia 60b understands neshekh to be advance interest that is initially \u201cbitten off\u201d or deducted from the amount of the loan. Some understand marbit to mean accrued interest. Bava Metsia 60a takes them all to be synonymous.<\/p>\n
25. garment Hebrew salmah (also simlah) was a large piece of cloth wrapped around the body. For the poor it also served as a blanket at night and might have been their only possession. Texts such as Amos 2:8, Proverbs 20:16, 27:13, and Job 22:6 testify to the practice of taking the garment as a pledge. An interesting light is shed on this custom by a seventh century B.C.E. Hebrew inscription from an Israelite fortress uncovered near Yavneh-yam. It registers the complaint of an agricultural laborer that the officer in charge was holding his garment pending satisfaction of a disputed claim that the worker had not fulfilled his obligations.60<\/p>\n
in pledge While the exaction of interest is prohibited, the taking of a pledge to secure repayment of the loan is permitted. In the case set forth here the pledge would largely serve a symbolic purpose. Elsewhere in the Torah the creditor is forbidden to take in pledge the garment of a widow or, more generally, anything that would deprive a person of the basic necessities of life. Furthermore, he may not invade the privacy of the debtor in order to obtain the pledge, for the dignity and freedom of the poor may not be violated.61<\/p>\n
before the sun sets Deuteronomy 24:12\u201313 repeats this obligation and adds: \u201cthat he may sleep in his cloth and bless you; and it will be to your merit before the LORD your God.\u201d<\/p>\n
26. for I am compassionate Hebrew \u1e25annun is one of God\u2019s essential traits. It is invariably included in the numerous formulaic listings of the qualities that characterize God\u2019s actions in relation to humankind.62
\nThe extraordinary omission of the term ra(\u1e25)\u1e25um, \u201cmerciful,\u201d which always accompanies God\u2019s attribute \u1e25annun, perhaps underscores the point that the poor man is entitled to the return of his garment by right, not as an act of mercy. The outcry of the poor at their deprivation is a plea for justice to which God responds because the poor are His special concern.<\/p>\n
Duties to God (vv. 27\u201330)<\/p>\n
The characterization of God in verse 26 is followed by laws that regulate the proper attitude toward Him.<\/p>\n
27. revile God Bekhor Shor and Ibn Ezra explain the sequence of topics in verses 20\u201326 and in this verse on the basis of Isaiah 8:21, which tells of the wretched and the hungry who, in desperation, rage and utter curses against God. Implicit in the juxtaposition may also be the idea that to ignore the misery of the disadvantaged of society is to revile God.
\nReviling God as a judicial issue is mentioned in Leviticus 24:10\u201323, where the penalty is death by stoning. That was the fate of Naboth, who was falsely convicted of the same offense through perjured testimony, as told in 1 Kings 21:1\u201316.
\nRabbi Ishmael,63 as well as the Targums, interpreted \u02beelohim here as meaning \u201cjudges\u201d (see Comment to 21:6). This rendering is most likely conditioned by the parallel Hebrew term for \u201cchieftain\u201d and by the fact that, although God is the speaker, the first person is not used, in contrast to verses 28\u201330.<\/p>\n
chieftain Hebrew nasi\u02be is the title given to the chief of a clan or tribe in the period before the monarchy.64<\/p>\n
28\u201329. These verses deal in a general way with the requirement to donate to God the firstling of the produce of the soil, of the human womb, and of domesticated animals. The laws are formulated in a terse, absolute manner without further definition or specification. This style presupposes a background on the part of the reader as to the proper procedures. Several other texts supply such details.65<\/p>\n
28. You shall not put off Tardiness in presenting God with what is rightfully His is an act of disrespect; it deprives the offering of its value as an expression of religious inwardness. Rabbinic exegesis understands the phrase to mean that the various offerings must be made in their proper sequence.66<\/p>\n
the skimming of the first yield of your vats The meaning of the two Hebrew agricultural terms mele\u02beah and dema\u02bf is uncertain. The first noun, literally \u201cfullness,\u201d appears again in Numbers 18:27 in connection with the vat and in association with \u201cthe new grain from the threshing floor.\u201d It is also mentioned in Deuteronomy 22:9 in relation to the sowing of seed and \u201cthe yield of the vineyard.\u201d The term is ambiguous and does not yield a precise definition; nor do we know if it is specific to grain and cereals or to wine and oil, or whether it can include both categories. Moreover, dema\u02bf is a unique word; it may contrast with mele\u02beah or form a compound with it (a hendiadys) to express a single idea: \u201cyour abundant harvest.\u201d Many scholars, ancient and modern, connect dema\u02bf with dim\u02bfah, \u201ctear\u201d and take it as a figurative use for liquid products, wine and oil.67 Indeed, Arabic damm\u0101\u02bf means liquor oozing from the vine, and Ibn Jana\u1e25 points to the Arabic phrase \u201ctear of the vineyard\u201d as a poetic epithet for wine. In the mishnaic period dema\u02bf was still in use in the spoken language with the general meaning of terumah, or gifts, to the Temple priesthood.68 It even had a verbal form and could refer to both cereals and liquids.69 Still, a good case has been made for separating dema\u02bf in the present verse from dim\u02bfah, \u201ctear.\u201d The Samaritan Targum renders \u1e25elev, \u201cfat, best portion of\u201d in Genesis 45:18 and Deuteronomy 32:14 by dm\u02bf, which has a cognate in Arabic dima\u1e21 and is applied to cereals. On this basis, our Hebrew phrase would be rendered, \u201cyour crop in full bloom, namely, the best part of it.\u201d70<\/p>\n
You shall give Me This phrase is not explained. The following clause would appear to indicate that, as with animals, the human first-born was to be sacrificed to God. But such an interpretation is impossible in Israel. Hence, the unqualified, categorical prescription must be an archaic, fossilized, legal formulary from pre-Israelite times. In Israel it was understood to mean that the first-born had sacral status and performed sacral duties as is proved by 1 Samuel 1:11. Once the hereditary priesthood was established, his sacerdotal functions ceased. See Comment to 13:2, 11\u201315.<\/p>\n
29. You shall do the same That is, dedicate the first-born animals for sacral purposes (cf. Deut. 15:19).<\/p>\n
seven days The dedication of the first fruits of the soil is not to be delayed, but for the first-born of animals there is a minimum waiting period of seven days. Leviticus 22:27 prescribes that no animal is fit to be offered to the Lord until it is eight days old. Like the rite of human circumcision on the eighth day,71 the present ruling may reflect the notion that the newborn has completed a seven-day unit of time corresponding to the process of Creation. This law may also reflect the desire to avoid cruelty to animals and, more broadly, to foster humane feelings in human beings. These ideas are suggested by mention of the mother and by the extension of the Levitical law to include a prohibition on slaughtering both the young and its mother on the same day. Similar notions are expressed by the proscriptions against taking a fledgling or eggs from a nest in which the mother bird is present (Deut. 22:6\u20137), yoking together an ox and an ass (Deut. 22:10)\u2014two animals of unequal strength; and muzzling an ox while it is threshing (Deut. 25:4).<\/p>\n
30. The preceding law enjoined the dedication of certain animals to God. The present law forbids the human consumption of animals that are in a loathsome state.<\/p>\n
holy people This is the ideal for Israel set forth at Sinai (19:6). In the pursuit of this end, one must, among other things, avoid polluting substances and defiling actions, for these disturb the relationship with God. Strict adherence to the dietary laws (kashrut) as an essential ingredient of holy living is reiterated in both Leviticus 11:44\u201345 and Deuteronomy 14:21; they serve to elevate, spiritualize, and hallow the animalistic act of eating.<\/p>\n
flesh torn by beasts Hebrew terefah in rabbinic texts refers to a clean animal inflicted with an organic defect, a mortal injury, or a fatal disease. In modern Jewish parlance, the term is popularly used for food that does not meet the requirements of the laws of kashrut.72 According to Leviticus 17:15 the eating of terefah renders the eater ritually impure.<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 23<\/p>\n
In the Mekhilta verse 30 of chapter 22 opens the following section instead of closing the preceding one, as it does in the traditional Hebrew text. This variant may be intended to teach that the definition of holiness encompasses not only the culinary and the cultic but also the ethical and the moral\u2014as in the classic presentation of holy living set forth in Leviticus 19.<\/p>\n
Judicial Integrity (vv. 1\u20133)<\/p>\n
1\u20133. Five prohibitions outlaw behavior in courts of law that would jeopardize the integrity and impartiality of the judicial process.<\/p>\n
1. The first clause addresses the litigants, the witnesses, and, by implication, also the judge.1 Giving unfounded hearsay testimony in judicial proceedings is prohibited and inadmissible. The second clause outlaws collusion on the part of a witness with one of the parties for a fraudulent or deceitful purpose.<\/p>\n
2. In the interest of impartial justice, no consideration is to be given to the social standing of the litigants.2 The verse has also been taken to express a warning not to pervert justice by deferring to the majority view if one is convinced that it is erroneous. Tannaitic exegesis utilized this text to support the rule that two different judicial procedures are to be adopted for acquittal and conviction, the former requiring only a simple majority, the latter a majority of two.3<\/p>\n
3. The frequency with which the Torah enjoins compassion for the poor dictates the need for caution against allowing one\u2019s emotions, however desirable and noble, to color one\u2019s judgment.4 The same warning appears in Leviticus 19:15 and Deuteronomy 1:17.<\/p>\n
Humane Treatment of the Enemy (vv. 4\u20135)<\/p>\n
4\u20135. A prohibition against permitting one\u2019s hostile and vindictive emotions to overcome one\u2019s humanity. The moral duty to show concern for the plight of one\u2019s enemy is stressed in Proverbs 25:21: \u201cIf your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat;\/If he is thirsty, give him water to drink.\u201d These injunctions intuit the psychological truth that such civilized conduct must inevitably disarm mutual animosity. It is taken for granted that one would naturally help a friend or acquaintance in difficulty; therefore, only the imperative of assisting one\u2019s enemy needs to be stressed here. The more general obligation of returning lost property\u2014known in Hebrew as hashavat \u02beavedah\u2014is explicated in Deuteronomy 22:1\u20133.<\/p>\n
4. enemy\u2019s Four different definitions of the \u201cenemy\u201d in this context are suggested in the Mekhilta:5 a gentile idolater, a relapsed convert to Judaism, a Jewish apostate, and a Jew who exhibits enmity toward another.<\/p>\n
5. This case involves humanitarian considerations and the prevention of cruelty to animals. The latter, an important biblical and rabbinic principle, is known in Hebrew as tsa\u02bfar ba\u02bfalei \u1e25ayyim, literally \u201c[prevention of] pain to living things.\u201d6<\/p>\n
raising \u2026 raise The Hebrew stem \u02bf-z-v here, as in Nehemiah 3:8, 34, corresponds to Ugaritic \u02bfdb, \u201cto make, prepare, set.\u201d7<\/p>\n
A Series of Miscellaneous Laws (vv. 6\u20139)<\/p>\n
6. your needy Those who depend on you for justice.<\/p>\n
7. a false charge Hebrew davar here, as in 18:16\u201322, means a cause or case for judicial investigation. A judge should have nothing to do with a claim he knows to be fraudulent.<\/p>\n
do not bring death The final clause, which affirms that God brings the guilty to account, suggests that the legal topic here is the fear that excessive concern on the part of judges that a criminal not go unpunished might lead to a miscarriage of justice and the wrongful execution of an innocent person.
\nRabbinic exegesis utilized this admonition to outlaw double jeopardy by taking \u201cinnocent and in the right\u201d to mean that a defendant who has already been so judged is not to be given a second trial for the same offense.8<\/p>\n
8. The Hebrew syntax highlights the severity of the offense by placing \u201cbribe\u201d in the emphatic initial position. The text apparently cites some well-known proverb\u2014repeated almost verbatim in Deuteronomy 16:19.
\nThe corruption of the judicial process by bribery is frequently mentioned in the Bible.9 It is emphasized that God \u201cshows no favor and takes no bribe,\u201d10 and the one who takes bribes is included in the list of those who are under a divine curse.11 Rabbinic bribery legislation extended the crime to include \u201cverbal bribery\u201d; even a perfunctory courtesy proffered by a litigant to a judge immediately disqualifies the latter.12 A judge who accepts a bribe in violation of the biblical prohibition is subject to the penalty of flogging.<\/p>\n
9. This is a repetition of the substance of 22:20 with an expansion of the motive clause. Whereas the earlier injunction was aimed at each individual Israelite, the present one is directed at the judge.13 As Shadal points out, in verse 8 the perversion of justice resulted from familiarity between litigant and judge; here it issues from estrangement.<\/p>\n
THE AGRICULTURAL PRESCRIPTIONS (vv. 10\u201313)<\/p>\n
10\u201319. These are seasonal and calendrical observances that relate to the rhythms of nature. Unlike the preceding laws, they apply to the entire community.<\/p>\n
10\u201311. The concern for the underprivileged and unfortunates of society determines immediate association with the topics of verses 6\u20139 and 12\u201313.14
\nVerses 10\u201311 deal solely with the prohibition on sowing the land in the seventh year of the Sabbatical cycle. This same law is repeated with greater emphasis on its humanitarian purpose in Leviticus 25:1\u20137, 18\u201322, while Deuteronomy 15:1\u201310 extends the provisions of the Sabbatical year to include remission of debts.
\nContinuous cultivation of arable land leads to serious depletion of its nutrients and consequent loss of productivity. Hence, the effect of the Torah\u2019s seventh-year fallow system is conservationist. It preserves the fertility of the soil and enhances future productivity. The economic benefit is fully recognized in Leviticus 25:18\u201322, Here, however, the motivation of the Sabbatical institution, like that for the Sabbath day itself, is expressed in purely social and humanitarian terms.<\/p>\n
11. let it rest That is, lie unworked. The Hebrew verbal stem used here, sh-m-t, is at the base of the noun shemittah, \u201cSabbatical year.\u201d<\/p>\n
12. On the weekly Sabbath, see Comment to 20:8\u201312. The obvious thematic connection with the seven-year cycle is enhanced by the parallel formulaic style,15 as well as by the chiasmic arrangement:<\/p>\n
Radak notes that two different verbs are employed to describe the benefit of the Sabbath for man and beast. The beast \u201crests\u201d physically; man is \u201crefreshed\u201d spiritually.<\/p>\n
13. The first clause closes the preceding legislation,16 which concentrates on human relationships; the second clause opens the final section of the Book of the Covenant, which focuses on obligations to God.
\nThe prohibition on mentioning the names of pagan gods, although seemingly intrusive, is actually quite relevant since the rest of the section deals with the celebrations of the seasonal cycle, which in the pagan world were invariably accompanied by magical rites aimed at propitiating divine powers and enlisting their aid in the regeneration of the soil, the ripening of the crops, and the fecundity of the herds and flocks. Such cults must have been very attractive to the Israelites. Hence the need to commence the section by outlawing the invocation of pagan gods. Note the emphatic \u201cfestival for Me\u201d in the next verse, meaning \u201cfor Me exclusively.\u201d This is further explicated in verse 17, \u201cthe Sovereign, the LORD [YHVH].\u201d<\/p>\n
The Religious Calendar (vv. 14\u201317)<\/p>\n
14\u201317. These verses present the triad of agricultural festivals that form the core of Israel\u2019s sacral calendar. Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, and the Passover day are omitted because they are not rooted in the life of the soil, which is the encompassing topic of the larger section of verses 10\u201319. The smaller unit is framed by parallel introductory and concluding statements. A shorter version appears in Exodus 34:18\u201324. The three agricultural festivals are again listed in Deuteronomy 16:1\u201317; the complete annual cycle of the sacred days is given in Leviticus 23; and the calendrical sacrificial rituals that accompany those occasions are featured in Numbers 28\u201329.17
\nThe absence of fixed dates in the present verses for any of the festivals is striking, although in the case of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the phrase \u201cat the set time\u201d undoubtedly refers back to Exodus 12:6, 14\u201320. The name of each festival bears the definite article and suggests that these institutions are well known; indeed, they are by their very essence universal in character, reflecting as they do the rhythms of nature. The distinctive quality of Israel\u2019s festivals lies both in their being grateful acknowledgments of God\u2019s bounty, wholly divested of mythological accretions and magical fertility rites, and in their becoming historicized, so that the theme of commemoration of the Exodus is interwoven with the agrarian strands.18 Each of the three festivals is called a \u1e25ag. This term indicates that the festival entails an obligatory pilgrimage to a sanctuary, a meaning that endures in the Muslim institution of the haj, the religious duty to undertake a pilgrimage to Mecca. See Comment to 5:1.
\nThe sequence of festivals listed here conforms to the rule of 12:2 that the religious year is to commence with the spring.<\/p>\n
14. Three times Hebrew shalosh regalim, synonymous with shalosh pe\u02bfamim in verse 17, still has this original meaning in Numbers 22:28, 32, 33. In postbiblical Hebrew the phrase came to signify the three pilgrimage festivals; the singular regel became interchangeable with \u1e25ag and was used for a pilgrimage in general, for which the rabbinic term is \u02bfaliyah le-regel.<\/p>\n
for Me Exlusively.<\/p>\n
15. the Feast of Unleavened Bread That is, the beginning of the barley harvest. As noted above, Passover day, strictly speaking the holiday of the paschal lamb, is not mentioned here because it was not originally established as a farmers\u2019 festival.<\/p>\n
as I have commanded you In Exodus 12:14\u201320.<\/p>\n
Abib Renamed Nisan in postexilic times. See Comment to 13:4.<\/p>\n
you went forth The agricultural festival is invested with new historical significance.19<\/p>\n
shall appear before Me Hebrew yera\u02beu panai, literally \u201cMy face shall be seen,\u201d is a technical term for making a pilgrimage to a sanctuary.20<\/p>\n
empty-handed Without bringing the appropriate offerings.21 In the period of the Second Temple these were the pilgrim\u2019s burnt offering (Heb. \u02bfolat re\u02beiyyah), the festal offering (shalmei \u1e25agigah), and the offering of rejoicing (shalmei sim\u1e25ah).<\/p>\n
16. the Feast of the Harvest This, the second of the three great festivals, is better known as \u201cthe Feast of Weeks\u201d\u2014Shavuot.22 It is also called \u201cthe day of the first fruits.\u201d23 The Greek-speaking Jews knew it as \u201cPentecoste\u201d (fiftieth), whence the English name \u201cPentecost,\u201d because the festival falls, as Leviticus 23:15\u201316 prescribes, on \u201cthe day after the seventh week\u2014fifty days\u201d from \u201cthe day after the Sabbath\u201d of Passover. This has traditionally been interpreted to mean counting from the second day of Passover; thus, Shavuot is celebrated on the sixth of Sivan.
\nIn rabbinic literature the festival is known as \u02bfatseret, which seems to mean \u201cconcluding feast\u201d\u2014of Passover.24 This close connection between the two festivals functions on two levels. Shavuot marks the completion of the wheat harvest even as Passover registers the beginning of barley harvesting. Shavuot also traditionally celebrates the revelation on Mount Sinai, \u201cthe time of the giving of our Torah\u201d (zeman mattan toratenu), thereby expressing some of the fundamental ideas of Judaism: that liberation and freedom must be grounded in and controlled by law and that \u201cman does not live by bread alone\u201d\u2014that there is also a spiritual dimension to life.
\nThe association of Shavuot with the establishment of the covenant between God and Israel, although not explicit in the Bible, is exceedingly ancient. Exodus 19:1 has the Israelites arriving at Sinai on the New Moon of the third month after the Exodus, that is, in the month of Sivan. A report in 2 Chronicles 15:10\u201313 tells that King Asa of Judah (913\u2013873 B.C.E.) called a great assembly of the people \u201cin the third month\u201d for a national ceremony of covenant renewal. The pilgrimage festival of Shavuot, falling in that month, would have been the most likely occasion for that ceremony. The Jewish sectarian community at Qumran by the Dead Sea (destroyed by the Romans ca. 70 C.E.) annually held a \u201ccovenant feast\u201d on Shavuot, doubtless following an ancient and widespread tradition. The Book of Jubilees 6:17 (2nd cent. B.C.E.) explicitly identifies Shavuot with the giving of the Torah, although on a different date from the one accepted by normative Judaism.
\nAs long as the Temple in Jerusalem existed, Shavuot was observed by bringing to the priest on duty there \u201ca wave offering\u201d consisting of two loaves of bread baked from flour made of the finest wheat grown that year in the Land of Israel, as well as a basket of the first ripe fruits of the seven species mentioned in Deuteronomy 8:8. The ceremonies and rituals are described in Leviticus 23:15\u201322 and Deuteronomy 26:1\u20132 and are elaborated in Mishnah Bikkurim.<\/p>\n
the Feast of Ingathering The third in the series of pilgrimage festivals also has this name, in Hebrew \u02beasif, in Exodus 34:22 and in a tenth-century B.C.E. agricultural calendar from Gezer, in Israel. The designation derives from the harvest and thanksgiving character of the festival\u2014the celebration of the final ingathering of the yield of the fields and orchards and of its storage in the barns before the onset of the rainy season.25 Sukkot, known in English as \u201cTabernacles,\u201d26 has its origin in the practice of constructing booths from branches and vines for protection from the weather and for guarding the orchards during the harvesting period.27 As with the other two agricultural festivals, this too was historicized in Israel and interpreted as commemorating the wilderness wanderings following the Exodus.28 The date of the festival is the fifteenth to the twenty-first of the seventh month, Tishrei.29 Sukkot assumed such great importance in the course of time that it came to be known as \u201cthe Festival\u201d (he-\u1e25ag) par excellence.30<\/p>\n
at the end of the year At the close of the agricultural year. In 34:22 the synonymous phrase \u201cat the turn of the year\u201d is used, thereby signifying the transition from one agricultural season to the other.<\/p>\n
17. An expansive restatement of verse 14 elucidating the meaning of \u201cfestival\u201d (\u1e25ag) used there.<\/p>\n
times Hebrew pe\u02bfamin, a synonym of regalim (v. 14), both meaning \u201cfeet, times.\u201d31<\/p>\n
males The story of Hannah in 1 Samuel 1 shows that it must not have been uncommon for women, too, to make the pilgrimage.32 Deuteronomy 16:11, 14 include women and children among those who are to appear \u201cbefore the LORD\u201d on these festivals.<\/p>\n
the Sovereign Hebrew \u02beadon, literally \u201cmaster,\u201d33 is often used as a royal title and is applied to God as Sovereign of the universe to whom all creation is subordinate and to whom all owe homage.34 In the parallel passage in 34:23, the title of God is given as \u201cthe Sovereign LORD, the God of Israel.\u201d<\/p>\n
18\u201319. This appendix to verses 14\u201317 contains four laws regulating ritual and ceremonial aspects of the three foregoing celebrations. The same, also following the religious calendar, appears in the parallel version of 34:25\u201326, although with some variations:
\n(1) The first rule forbids the slaughtering of the paschal lamb on the fourteenth of Nisan while leaven is still in possession of the participants in the sacrifice. The same prohibition is repeated in Deuteronomy 16:2\u20134. The rabbis inferred that the obligation to remove all \u1e25amets (leaven) commences from the time that the offering was made in the Temple, that is, at midday. But due to the severity of the prohibition on leaven, the deadline was moved back two hours as a precaution.35 For the idea of leaven as symbolic of corruption, see Comment to 12:15.
\n(2) The second rule requires that the fatty portions of the paschal sacrifice, those that attach to the stomach and intestines, be burnt before dawn. The parallel passage in 34:25 reads: \u201cThe sacrifice of the Feast of Passover shall not be left lying until the morning.\u201d The same restriction governed the original paschal offering,36 which had to be eaten during the night hours, and all the leftovers had to be burnt.
\n(3) The third rule relates to the Festival of Shavuot.37 The choicest38 of the first fruits must be brought to the sanctuary, as described more fully in Deuteronomy 26:2\u201311; compare Numbers 18:12\u201313.
\n(4) The fourth rule largely remains an enigma. Its importance may be measured by its being repeated twice more in the Torah, in Exodus 34:26 and Deuteronomy 14:21. In this latter source the prohibition appears in the context of the dietary laws, but the other two sources indicate that its origin lies in the overall context of the festivals. The juxtaposition of this rule with the law of the first fruits led Menahem ibn Saruq39 (10th cent.) to interpret gedi not as a kid of the goats but as \u201cberries.\u201d This eccentric explanation was taken up by Menahem ben Solomon40 (first half 12th cent.), who took \u201cmother\u2019s milk\u201d to be figurative for the juice of the bud that contains the berry. The entire passage conveyed to him a proscription on bringing the first fruits before they are ripe.41 Many scholars, medieval and modern, follow the suggestion of Maimonides that this law prohibits some pagan rite42\u2014although no such rite is presently known.
\nRashbam, Bekhor Shor, Ibn Ezra, and Abravanel all, in various ways, adduce a humanitarian motivation akin to that cited in the Comment to 22:29. Rashbam further suggests that because festivals were celebrated with feasts of meat, and because goats are generally multiparous and have a high yield of milk, it was customary to slaughter one of the kids of a fresh litter and to cook it in its mother\u2019s milk. The Torah looks upon such a practice as exhibiting insensitivity to the animal\u2019s feelings. The explanation of Rashbam has been buttressed by the modern observation that in biblical times goats were far more plentiful than sheep in the Land of Israel and were the main source of milk. The flesh of the young kid is more tender and more delicate in flavor than lamb. Also, since the estrous cycle of goats occurs during the summer months and parturition takes place in the rainy season, the earliest litter would be produced just around the time of Sukkot. This injunction, therefore, regulates the festivities at the Festival of the Ingathering of the Harvest.
\nThe interdiction of boiling a kid in its mother\u2019s milk was generalized to outlaw the mixing of all meat and milk (meaning all dairy products). Its threefold repetition in the Torah was explained by Rabbi Simeon bar Yo\u1e25ai as indicative of three aspects of the prohibition: cooking such a mixture, eating it, and deriving any benefit from it.43<\/p>\n
RENEWAL OF THE DIVINE PROMISES (vv. 20\u201333)<\/p>\n
The complex of laws closes with a peroration that contains divine promises and admonitions. The laws in the preceding section, verses 10\u201319, all presume settled life in the promised land following the anticipated conquest. The closing oration emphasizes that the ability to enjoy the happy cycle of harvest festivals is conditional upon Israel\u2019s fidelity to its covenant with God. The exhortation is appropriate because the narrative at this point considers the experience at Sinai to be nearing its conclusion, with the people soon to be on their way to Canaan to engage in a series of battles with the native population.
\nThe hortatory style of the epilogue, with its conditional blessings and misfortunes, is reminiscent of ancient Near Eastern law codes and covenants, which often close with a series of blessings and curses, much like those in Deuteronomy 27\u201330 and Leviticus 26. Here, however, this feature has been supplemented by several didactic elements of a theological, historical, and geographical nature. The characteristic themes are divine help for Israel in conquering the land, divine blessings on Israel after the settlement, and prohibitions on making peace with the native population or accepting their cult. The entire section has close parallels in Deuteronomy 6:10\u201325 and 7.<\/p>\n
20. an angel On angels in the Bible, see Comment to 3:2. Classical Jewish commentators are divided on whether a heavenly44 or human45 messenger is here intended by Hebrew mal\u02beakh.46
\nThe phrase may simply be an idiom expressing the activity of Divine Providence, as in Genesis 24:7.47<\/p>\n
the place that I have made ready Apparently, a reference to the land of Canaan, in which the Israelites will take possession of \u201cgreat and flourishing cities \u2026 houses full of all good things \u2026 hewn cisterns \u2026 vineyards and olive groves,\u201d in the words of Deuteronomy 6:10\u201311. Since Hebrew makom, \u201cplace,\u201d frequently means \u201csacred space,\u201d it is possible that this unusual designation of the land carries with it the idea of the Holy Land.<\/p>\n
21. Do not defy him The verbal stem m-r-h is overwhelmingly used of rebellion against God.48<\/p>\n
your offenses Hebrew pesha\u02bf, originally a term for the violation of vassal treaty obligations,49 was transferred from the political to the religious sphere to express an infringement of God\u2019s covenant with Israel. See Comment to 22:8.<\/p>\n
My name is in him The Divine Will and Power manifests itself through this heaven-sent messenger.<\/p>\n
22. This statement seems to belong to the language of treaties. Similar sentiments are found in the peace treaty made between the Hittite Hattusilis and the Egyptian Ramses II, as well as in a Northwest Semitic treaty.50<\/p>\n
24. Worship of the gods of the native peoples is prohibited as is also the adoption of their cultic practices\u2014even in the service of the God of Israel. Their cultic appurtenances are to be destroyed.<\/p>\n
pillars Hebrew matsevah derives from the stem n-ts-v, \u201cto stand.\u201d It denotes a single, upright slab of stone. Believed to be the repository of a divinity or spirit, it was often used as a cultic object and was therefore considered by Israelite religion to be idolatrous.51<\/p>\n
25\u201326. For a fuller description of the blessings that flow from fidelity to the covenant, see Deuteronomy 7:13\u201315.<\/p>\n
26. the full count of your days Long life.52<\/p>\n
27. My terror That is, He will cause the enemy to be struck with terror.53<\/p>\n
throw into panic Such will be the impact of the \u201cterror.\u201d54<\/p>\n
28. a plague Hebrew tsir\u02bfah occurs again in the Bible only in Deuteronomy 7:20 and in Joshua 24:12, also in reference to the conquest of Canaan. One rendering is \u201chornet,\u201d55 which, if taken literally, must reflect some tradition of a plague of hornets sent against the Canaanites on the pattern of the Egyptian plagues. If taken figuratively, the divinely sent agency may have been none other than the pharaohs whose successive and devastating campaigns in Canaan drained the country of its resources, ruined its economy, and destroyed its fortifications, thereby facilitating its collapse under the Israelite onslaught. If such be the case, it is not just that tsir\u02bfah may evoke word play with mitsrayim, \u201cEgypt,\u201d but that the tsir\u02bfah may be the word for the insect that was the symbol of kingship of Lower Egypt. Another understanding of the term is some epidemic or perhaps leprosy, tsara\u02bfat.56<\/p>\n
29\u201330. This passage qualifies the foregoing promises, which imply the speedy conquest of the entire land. That would leave large areas of the country uninhabited because the people of Israel was insufficiently numerous to fill the void that would be created following the expulsion of the native population. Deuteronomy 7:22 gives the same explanation. That the initial campaigns were unable to complete the conquest is explicitly stated in the books of Joshua and Judges.57 This historic reality generated varied responses. Judges 2:20\u201321 explains it as divine punishment for infidelity to the covenant; Judges 2:22\u201323 and 3:1, 4 see it as a means of trying Israel\u2019s faith; and Judges 3:2 understands the protracted nature of the conquest as a prudent strategy for training successive generations in the art of warfare.<\/p>\n
31. The ideal boundaries of the land are now set forth. As in Genesis 15:18\u201321, the ethnographic description of verses 23, 28 is supplemented by a closer geographic definition. At no time in Israelite history, even at the height of the Davidic-Solomonic empire, were these boundaries a reality.58 They are believed to have their origin in the pre-Israelite Egyptian province of Canaan, which included Palestine and Syria as a single political and geographical entity. It was Thutmose III and IV who, in the course of the fifteenth century B.C.E., carried out numerous military expeditions to Palestine and Syria and the pharaohs of the thirteenth and twelfth centuries who established Egyptian imperial rule over these lands.59<\/p>\n
Sea of Reeds Here, undoubtedly, the Gulf of Akaba.<\/p>\n
Sea of Philistia The Mediterranean Sea. See Comment to 13:17.<\/p>\n
the wilderness Probably a general term for the desert and steppeland.<\/p>\n
the Euphrates Literally, \u201cthe river.\u201d<\/p>\n
32\u201333. The covenant demands exclusive recognition of YHVH as the Sovereign King to whom is owed undivided and uncompromising loyalty. Hence, a warning against making covenants with the native peoples is appropriate. Such compacts would imperil the integrity of Israel\u2019s religion and pose a dire threat to its national existence. Other biblical texts emphasize the dangers of inter-marriage and resulting apostasy that flow from intermingling with the pagans.60<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 24*<\/p>\n
RATIFICATION OF THE COVENANT (vv. 1\u201318)<\/p>\n
The stipulations of the covenant between God and Israel\u2014the rules and principles that are hence-forth to govern Israelite society\u2014have been promulgated. The climactic scene in the historic covenant drama is about to be enacted. An elaborate rite of ratification takes place, after which Moses is called upon to ascend Mount Sinai in order to receive the tangible, permanent symbol of the covenant: the two stone tablets into which the Decalogue is incised.
\nThe present chapter rounds out the literary complex that began with chapter 19. It frames the unit by the sevenfold use of the key stem d-b-r, \u201cto speak, word,\u201d in both the opening and closing chapters,1 and by the sevenfold employment of the stem y-r-d, \u201cto go down,\u201d in chapter 192 and of its antonym \u02bf-l-h, \u201cto go up,\u201d in this chapter.3<\/p>\n
Popular Assent (vv. 1\u201311)<\/p>\n
1\u201311. This section actually constitutes the earliest stage in the process of canonizing the Torah literature. It registers the beginning of the long history of the development of the authoritative corpus of sacred literature that came to be known as Tanakh in Hebrew and Bible in English.4
\nThe initial step was the unanimous popular assent to the divine initiative for a covenant, as recorded in 19:8: \u201cAll that the LORD has spoken we will do!\u201d Then Moses mediated the commandments orally to the entire people assembled at the foot of Sinai. Having heard the stipulations, they now orally bind themselves to obedience, using the same formula of affirmation as before (24:3). The stipulations are then put into writing, and a sacrificial ritual and a blood rite take place (vv. 4\u20136). The written document is read to the people who again make a collective pledge of affirmation and loyalty, whereupon the blood rite is completed (vv. 7\u20138). The representatives of the people ascend partway up the mountain and there experience a manifestation of the divine majesty. A solemn covenantal meal concludes the entire episode (vv. 9\u201311).<\/p>\n
1. Then He said to Moses The Hebrew inverts the usual syntactical order and literally reads, \u201cAnd to Moses He said,\u201d thus emphasizing that this particular instruction pertains specifically to Moses and not to the assembled Israelites, as in previous instances.5 The point is reiterated in verse 2.<\/p>\n
Come up According to 20:18(21), Moses had already \u201capproached the thick cloud where God was,\u201d that is, the summit of the mountain; it must therefore be presumed that he had since descended. In chapter 19 there is repeated ascent and descent.6<\/p>\n
Nadab and Abihu Their introduction without any descriptive identity presupposes knowledge of Aaron\u2019s genealogy given in 6:23. The two later perished while performing some sinful ritual act.7 Their inclusion in the present delegation and the exclusion of their two younger brothers, who succeeded them in the priesthood,8 attest to the antiquity of this tradition.<\/p>\n
elders of Israel See Comment to 3:16. Seventy elders are mentioned again only in Numbers 11:16, 24\u201325 and Ezekiel 8:11. As in Exodus 1:5, the number seventy has symbolic force expressing totality, comprehensiveness. It represents the entire community of Israel.<\/p>\n
bow low Throughout the ancient Near East full-length prostration of the body was a conventional gesture expressing unconditional submission and homage to a superior authority.9 The present instruction is to be understood as part of the formal ceremonial attending the ratification of the covenant; it was not simply an act of worshipful reverence.<\/p>\n
from afar This phrase might be construed to mean that they are to keep their distance from the mountain summit. However, the figurative use of the idiom \u201cto prostrate from afar\u201d is found in letters to royalty from Ugarit in both the native language10 and in Akkadian,11 suggesting a recognized diplomatic courtesy on the part of a vassal, who makes repeated prostrations starting at a distance from the suzerain\u2019s presence. Jacob\u2019s performance in meeting Esau, as told in Genesis 33:3, illustrates this practice: \u201cHe himself went on ahead and bowed low to the ground seven times until he was near his brother.\u201d<\/p>\n
2. Moses alone Mount Sinai is divided into three zones, each of which has restricted access. Moses alone reaches the summit; a site partway up is reserved for Aaron and his delegation; the people are confined to the foot of the mountain. See Comment to 19:12\u201325.<\/p>\n
3. went and repented In response to the instructions given to Moses in 20:19(22) and 21:1.<\/p>\n
commands \u2026 rules The Hebrew terms devarim and mishpatim, respectively, distinguish the two types of laws in the foregoing legal corpus. The \u201ccommands\u201d are those formulated in concise apodictic style\u2014the Decalogue and the bulk of 22:17\u201323:19. Their enforcement is left to the individual conscience. The \u201crules,\u201d contained in 21:1\u201322:16, fall within the scope of the coercive power of the state and the jurisdiction of the law courts.<\/p>\n
4. wrote down This document is termed sefer ha-berit, \u201cbook of the covenant,\u201d in verse 7. (See introduction to chap. 21 and Comment to v. 7 below.) The commitment to writing was an essential part of the ratification process of treaties in the ancient Near East. It made the treaty a legal reality.<\/p>\n
set up an altar Doubtless, in accord with the provisions of 20:21(24). This altar not only had a practical use for sacrifices (v. 5), but it also symbolized the Divine Presence, just as the twelve pillars represented the other contracting party,12 the twelve tribes.<\/p>\n
twelve pillars It is likely that the dashing of the blood \u201con the people\u201d described in verse 8 was effectuated by sprinkling it over the pillars. In Genesis 31:45\u201354 an upright pillar (matsevah) served as a mute witness to a treaty between Jacob and Laban. A large stone was similarly used to commemorate the covenant between God and Israel made at Shechem. The note in Joshua 24:27 is instructive:13 \u201cSee, this very stone shall be a witness against us, for it heard all the words that the LORD spoke to us.\u201d<\/p>\n
5. young men The strenuous task of slaughtering bulls and preparing them for the altar could only be performed by young men. It is likely, in light of the designation of Samuel the Ephraimite and of Eli\u2019s sons in 1 Samuel 2:13\u201317 and 3:1, that the ne\u02bfarim constituted a class of subordinate cultic assistants. A guild of temple servitors named n\u02bfrm existed at Ugarit.14 Rabbinic tradition identified the \u201cyoung men\u201d as the first-born males upon whom devolved cultic duties prior to the establishment of the priesthood in Israel.15<\/p>\n
they offered The two types of sacrifice are the \u02bfolah and the shelamim; the latter term, often rendered \u201cpeace offerings,\u201d is more accurately \u201can offering of well-being\u201d or \u201ca sacrifice of greeting.\u201d The first was wholly consumed by fire upon the altar; the second was shared, certain parts being burnt and the rest consumed by the worshiper. The sacrifice of shelamim was a kind of shared sacred meal. See Comment to verse 11.<\/p>\n
6. The blood of the \u02bfolah and the shelamim was always collected and dashed against the sides of the altar. In the present ceremony Moses performs this standard ritual with only half of the blood; he stored the other half in basins for later sprinkling on the people (v. 8). The two parts were for the two parties to the covenant, God and Israel, respectively.16
\nThe significance of the sprinkling of the blood is never explained. However, the prevailing notion in Israel was that the blood, the vital bodily fluid, constituted the life-force. As such, like life itself, it belonged to God alone. For that reason, its consumption by humans is strictly forbidden,17 and the blood of sacrifices is dashed on the altar. The use of blood in a covenant is found nowhere else in the Bible. The ordination of Aaron as High Priest, as related in Leviticus 8, involved daubing the blood of the sacrificial lamb of ordination on parts of his body and on the altar.18 It is likely that in both these ceremonies\u2014covenant and ordination\u2014the blood functions mysteriously to cement the bond between the involved parties. Through God\u2019s sharing, as it were, of the vital fluid with Israel or with Aaron, the life of the recipient is thought to take on a new dimension and to be elevated to a higher level of intimate relationship with the Deity.<\/p>\n
basins Hebrew \u02beaggan, mentioned again only in Isaiah 22:24 and Song 7:3, has turned up in the Hebrew inscriptions found at Arad,19 as well as in several other Semitic languages.20 The \u02beaggan has been established archaeologically to be a large and deep two-handled bowl.<\/p>\n
7. the record of the covenant Hebrew sefer ha-berit, usually rendered \u201cthe Book of the Covenant,\u201d occurs only once again in the Bible, in a context very similar to the present one. It is the designation given to the \u201cscroll of the Torah\u201d that was found in the Temple by the High Priest Hilkiah in the days of King Josiah. On the basis of that scroll, the king convened a national assembly and publicly read its entire text, after which the people entered into \u201ca covenant before the LORD\u201d to be bound by the laws inscribed in the scroll of the Torah.21 This ceremony of covenant-renewal indicates that the public reading and popular assent were necessary elements of the ratification process. Interestingly, some Hittite treaty texts require periodic public recital of the terms of the pact before the vassal and his people.22<\/p>\n
we will faithfully do Literally, \u201cwe will do and obey.\u201d Since this is the last act of public participation, the formula of consent is expanded to give it finality.<\/p>\n
8. With the conclusion of the formalities of popular consent, Moses completes the blood-sprinkling rite.<\/p>\n
concerning all these commands The essence of the covenant is obedience to the laws of the Torah.<\/p>\n
9. The authorized, select representatives of the people now advance partway up the mountain where they experience a vision of the divine majesty. Rashbam draws an analogy with the covenant between God and Abraham: There too God projects a visual manifestation of His Presence by appearing as \u201ca flaming torch which passed between those pieces\u201d (Gen. 15:17).<\/p>\n
10. Maimonides maintains that \u201cseeing\u201d God refers not to perception by the senses but to perception by the intellect.23 Ibn Ezra understands the experience to be a prophetic vision similar to those described in 1 Kings 22:19, Isaiah 6:1, Ezekiel 1, and Amos 9:1.<\/p>\n
the God of Israel This name befits the context of the special relationship now being forged between God and Israel.<\/p>\n
under His feet The language is circumspect. There is no description of God Himself, only of the celestial setting beneath the visionary heavenly throne. Even so, the Hebrew particle k- is used in order to indicate mere similarity and approximation.<\/p>\n
a pavement of sapphire Hebrew livnat, from levenah, \u201cbrick,\u201d suggests a decorative floor area of covered bricks or tiles. Hebrew sappir, rendered \u201csapphire,\u201d is not the modern blue gemstone (corundum), which was unknown in the ancient Near East, but the widely used deep blue lapis lazuli. In the vision of Ezekiel (1:26; 10:1) God\u2019s throne is made of this material. The decorative use of lapis lazuli in a palace is mentioned in Ugaritic literature.24<\/p>\n
the very sky for purity The same word, \u1e6dhr, is used in Ugaritic to describe lapis lazuli and can mean both purity and brightness.25<\/p>\n
11. did not raise His hand Exceptionally, they survived the experience. See Comment to 3:6 and 33:20.<\/p>\n
the leaders Those listed in verse 9. The unusual term \u02beatsilim seems to be connected with Arabic \u02bea\u1e63ula, \u201cto be distinguished.\u201d<\/p>\n
they beheld God The repetition points up the extraordinary nature of the experience. The general verb r-\u02be-h, \u201cto see,\u201d is replaced by the stronger \u1e25-z-h, \u201cto behold,\u201d which connotes far greater intensity, belongs to the vocabulary of prophetic vision, and qualifies the earlier statement by taking the encounter outside the range of natural ocular experience.<\/p>\n
and they ate and drank Possibly another figurative way of saying they survived.26 More likely, it describes a formal element in the conclusion of the covenant. See the Comment to 18:12 for evidence of such solemn covenant meals as an integral part of treaty-making. The meal would have consisted of the sacrifices mentioned in verse 5.<\/p>\n
Moses Receives the Tablets (vv. 12\u201318)<\/p>\n
These verses contain subtle intimations of the two themes that occupy the last section of Exodus (chaps. 25\u201340). They prepare us for, and make the transition to, the account of the building of the Tabernacle and the episode of the golden calf.
\nMention of the \u201cstone tablets\u201d (v. 12) is indispensable both for explaining the purpose of constructing the Ark (25:10\u201322) and for understanding Moses\u2019 reaction to the apostasy (32:15\u201316, 19). It was Moses\u2019 prolonged stay on the mountain (v. 18) that precipitated the crisis (32:1). the stem sh-k-n used of God\u2019s Presence on Sinai (v. 16) is also employed in connection with the Tabernacle (25:8, 9; 40:34\u201338). The Divine Presence (kevod YHVH) rests on Sinai (vv. 16, 17) and in the completed Tabernacle (40:34\u201335), and the cloud covers the mountain (v. 15) and the Tent of Meeting (40:34). Finally, Joshua\u2019s partial ascent of Sinai (vv. 13\u201314) explains his puzzled reaction to the worshipers\u2019 noisy revelry around the calf (32:17\u201318)<\/p>\n
12. Come up to Me Either Moses had descended with the entire delegation and is now instructed to ascend once again or he is still on the mountain and is directed to ascend to its highest level. The former is favored by verses 13\u201314, which imply that he has been down among the people. The latter is supported by the parallel account in Deuteronomy 5:28 in which Moses is told, \u201cBut you remain here with Me.\u201d Two strands of tradition appear to have been interwoven here.<\/p>\n
the stone tablets This follows the widespread Near Eastern practice of recording important public documents, particularly treaty stipulations, on imperishable materials. See the introductory Comment to chapter 20.27<\/p>\n
13. his attendant Joshua See Comment to 17:9.28<\/p>\n
mountain of God See Comment to 3:1. The site is identified as Sinai in verse 16.<\/p>\n
14. Moses is concerned about the welfare of Israel during his absence. Aaron and Hur are to substitute for Moses\u2014either as sole magistrates or as the court of final appeal, depending on whether the establishment of the judiciary took place before or after the Sinai episode. This issue is discussed in the introductory Comment to chapter 18.<\/p>\n
for us Even though only Moses is mentioned in verses 13 and 15, the plural indicates that Joshua too ascended up to a certain level. As Bekhor Shor notes, Joshua was not able to observe the scene of the golden calf from his position on the mountain (32:17).<\/p>\n
Hur See Comment to 17:10.<\/p>\n
15. the cloud The symbol of the Divine Presence in the wilderness wanderings. See Comment to 13:21.<\/p>\n
16. Presence Hebrew kavod, the glory or majesty of God, is used for His manifested presence. See Comment to 16:7.<\/p>\n
abode Hebrew stem sh-k-n, \u201cto tent, abide,\u201d29 is the base of the postbiblical term Shekhinah, the presence, or indwelling of God in the life of the world.<\/p>\n
six days. On the seventh day This is an example of a well-known literary phenomenon\u2014the climactic use of numbers. It appears in Akkadian and Ugaritic literature and often in the Bible.30 An action continues for six consecutive days, and then a new event occurs on the seventh. Here the six days are probably intended for spiritual preparation.<\/p>\n
17. appeared Hebrew mar\u02beeh is literally \u201cthe appearance of.\u201d The term serves to translate the supernatural reality into terms approximating human experience.31<\/p>\n
a consuming fire For the imagery, see Comment to 3:2.32 This instance manifests the twin aspects of the visible emblem of God\u2019s invisible presence at the Exodus: the \u201cpillar of cloud\u201d and the \u201cpillar of fire.\u201d See Comment to 13:21\u201322.<\/p>\n
18. forty days and forty nights A tradition repeated several times.33 Forty is frequently used as a symbolic number, and forty days expresses a significant period of time,34 often connected with purification and purging of sin.<\/p>\n
THE TABERNACLE (25:1\u201331:17; 35:1\u201340:38)<\/p>\n
With the conclusion of the revelation at Sinai, preparations are made for the spiritual welfare of the people during their trek through the wilderness on their way to the promised land. This requires the construction of a central, mobile sanctuary to serve as the symbol of God\u2019s continued Presence in the midst of Israel, to accommodate the organized practice of religion. Additionally, it became the focus of national unity. It is not designed, as are modern places of worship, for communal use.
\nThe detailed narrative that recounts the building and functioning of this sanctuary, known in English as the Tabernacle, is divided into two parts: the series of instructions (25:1\u201331:17) and the account of its construction (35:1\u201340:38). Interposed between these two is the episode of the violation of the covenant through the making and worship of the golden calf.<\/p>\n
The Ground Plan The Tabernacle is an oblong structure comprising three zones. These are, in descending order of holiness: the Holy of Holies, the Holy Place, and the Court. The structure is oriented longitudinally, on an east-west axis, with the most sacred zone in the west. An outer perimeter demarcates the sacred area. This is divided into two equal squares. The first two zones lie in one square and the Court constitutes the other square. From the Ark in the Holy of Holies, God reaches out to Israel; from the altar of sacrifice, the Israelites reach out to God. Each seems to be located exactly at the point of intersection of the diagonals of the squares. See diagram, page 155.<\/p>\n
THE WILDERNESS TABERNACLE. All numbers within the rectangle refer to cubits. The Ark was 1.5 cubits high; the Altar of Incense was 2 cubits high; the Table was 1.5 cubits high; the Altar of Burnt Offering was 3 cubits high.<\/p>\n
Ancient Parallels Mobile sanctuaries are known to us from Arab Bedouin practices, pre-Islamic and Islamic, and even from pre-Christian times. They are also documented in Phoenician and Egyptian sources, the latter from the period of Rameses II (ca. 1290\u20131224 B.C.E.). Furthermore, the method of construction described here in our chapters is now known to be based on well-established Egyptian techniques.1<\/p>\n
The Celestial Blueprint A prominent characteristic of the narrative in both its parts is the repeated reference to divinely given instructions and celestial patterns for the terrestrial edifice and for its contents.2 Such a conception of a sanctuary is not unknown elsewhere in the ancient world. It is attested as early as about 2200 B.C.E. in the narration of a building project by the Sumerian King Gudea of Lagash. It also occurs in Egyptian texts that treat of similar enterprises. This idea of divine inspiration, initiation, and specification of a religious institution generally communicates the deity\u2019s sanction and acceptance of the sacred structure, which is thereby endowed with legitimacy.3<\/p>\n
The Tabernacle and Creation The series of instructions for the components of the Tabernacle is made up of seven subsections, each of which is introduced by the formula \u201cThe Lord spoke\/said to Moses.\u201d4 Six of them deal with creativity, and the seventh features the Sabbath law. This latter is explicitly grounded in creation. The association of the Tabernacle with the Sabbath is given prominence in Leviticus 19:30 and 26:2: \u201cYou shall keep my Sabbaths and venerate My sanctuary: I am the Lord.\u201d Further, the completed Tabernacle is erected on New Year\u2019s day, as Exodus 40:17 records. This underscores the idea that a new era in the life of the people has begun and the cosmogonic association of the Tabernacle is thereby strengthened. Finally, other thematic and verbal echoes of the Genesis Creation narrative in our account5 confirm their interdependence.<\/p>\n