Exodus 21

¹Now these are the rules that you shall set before them.

²When you buy a Hebrew slave , he shall serve six years , and in the seventh he shall go out free , for nothing .

³If he comes in single , he shall go out single ; if he comes in married , then his wife shall go out with him.

⁴If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters , the wife and her children shall be her master’s , and he shall go out alone .

⁵But if the slave plainly says , I love my master , my wife , and my children ; I will not go out free ,

⁶then his master shall bring him to God , and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost . And his master shall bore his ear through with an awl , and he shall be his slave forever .

⁷When a man sells his daughter as a slave , she shall not go out as the male slaves do .

⁸If she does not please her master , who has designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed . He shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people , since he has broken faith with her .

⁹If he designates her for his son , he shall deal with her as with a daughter .

¹⁰If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food , her clothing , or her marital rights .

¹¹And if he does not do these three things for her, she shall go out for nothing , without payment of money .

¹²Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death .

¹³But if he did not lie in wait for him, but God let him fall into his hand , then I will appoint for you a place to which he may flee .

¹⁴But if a man willfully attacks another to kill him by cunning , you shall take him from my altar , that he may die .

¹⁵Whoever strikes his father or his mother shall be put to death .

¹⁶Whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him, shall be put to death .

¹⁷Whoever curses his father or his mother shall be put to death .

¹⁸When men quarrel and one strikes the other with a stone or with his fist and the man does not die but takes to his bed ,

¹⁹then if the man rises again and walks outdoors with his staff , he who struck him shall be clear ; only he shall pay for the loss of his time , and shall have him thoroughly healed .

²⁰When a man strikes his slave , male or female , with a rod and the slave dies under his hand , he shall be avenged .

²¹But if the slave survives a day or two , he is not to be avenged , for the slave is his money .

²²When men strive together and hit a pregnant woman , so that her children come out , but there is no harm , the one who hit her shall surely be fined , as the woman’s husband shall impose on him, and he shall pay as the judges determine.

²³But if there is harm , then you shall pay life for life ,

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

²⁵burn for burn , wound for wound , stripe for stripe .

²⁶When a man strikes the eye of his slave , male or female , and destroys it, he shall let the slave go free because of his eye .

²⁷If he knocks out the tooth of his slave , male or female , he shall let the slave go free because of his tooth .

²⁸When an ox gores a man or a woman to death , the ox shall be stoned , and its flesh shall not be eaten , but the owner of the ox shall not be liable .

²⁹But if the ox has been accustomed to gore in the past , and its owner has been warned but has not kept it in , and it kills a man or a woman , the ox shall be stoned , and its owner also shall be put to death .

³⁰If a ransom is imposed on him, then he shall give for the redemption of his life whatever is imposed on him.

³¹If it gores a man’s son or daughter , he shall be dealt with according to this same rule .

³²If the ox gores a slave , male or female , the owner shall give to their master thirty shekels of silver , and the ox shall be stoned .

³³When a man opens a pit , or when a man digs a pit and does not cover it, and an ox or a donkey falls into it,

³⁴the owner of the pit shall make restoration . He shall give money to its owner , and the dead beast shall be his.

³⁵When one man’s ox butts another’s , so that it dies , then they shall sell the live ox and share its price , and the dead beast also they shall share .

³⁶Or if it is known that the ox has been accustomed to gore in the past , and its owner has not kept it in , he shall repay ox for ox , and the dead beast shall be his.