In respect to the harmonizing of the two classes of passages now under consideration, Saalschütz, while he fairly states the common view, maintains at length that the first class of passages, Ex. xxi. 2-6, and Deut. xv. 12-18, refers to a peculiar class of servants, not belonging to the heathen, and yet not to be regarded as proper Israelites, but constituting a middle class between slaves purchased of heathen and the impoverished Israelites that appear in the second class of passages, Lev. xxv. 39-43, and vs. 47-55. See his enumeration in § 7 above. As this is an important point, we give in full Mielziner's criticism on Saalschütz's view. "Prof. Saalschütz, in his Mos. Recht, 702, attempts an explanation of this same difficulty. He agrees with Rabbi Eliezer (in opposition to the Rabbins), that wholly different persons are intended in Leviticus and Exodus. The passage in Lev. xxv. 40, he says, refers only to the case of an Israelite reduced to poverty, who had sold his possessions until the year of jubilee, and who was therefore allowed to sell his services for more than six years, that is, till the year of jubilee. The other passages (in Ex. and Deut.) refer, not, as the Rabbins allege, to one sold for theft, but to a special class of servants, who, without being heathen, were not considered as proper Israelites, but formed a middle class, born in slavery, between the impoverished Israelites and the slaves purchased of heathen. Under this category come, first of all, those born in the house of an Israelite from the marriage of slaves; also, slaves purchased who had become incorporated with the family by circumcision, and thus attained a kind of naturalization. This class was known under the name of 'Hebrew slaves,' and to them applies the ordinance that, when sold by their first master the second owner has no longer the same rights over them with the first, but must release them in the seventh year. Saalschütz finds himself compelled to take this view, from the difficulty which he sees in the words of Ex. xxi. 2: 'If thou buy an Hebrew servant.' As this could not be said of one who, up to that time, had not been a Hebrew servant, but a holder of property. But the difficulty in the passsage is less than that in the interpretation. Why does the phrase to buy a servant,' presuppose that he was already a servant, any more than the phrases 'to make a king' (Judg. ix. 8), or 'to take a wife' (creare regem, ducere uxorem), presuppose that the former was already a king, and the latter already a wife? And opposed to the interpretation of Saalschütz is the fact that, in the repetition of the law (Deut. xv. 12) about emancipation after six years service, the ebed [servant] is not named. And, in fine, we do not see why the whole special legislation in Exodus should be introduced with provisions about this peculiar class of servants, even before the enactments as to the freedom of the Hebrews themselves, to which, according to the usual interpretation, this passage refers." 1 To us Mielziner does not seem, in the note just quoted, to have fully met the argument of Saalschütz, §§ 6-8. The assumption of the Rabbins, to which he gives his adherence, that the release at the year of jubilee had respect only to the Hebrew servant who had been sold into servitude a few years, less than six before the year of jubilee, - who "was not to wait for the seventh year, but regained his freedom in the year of jubilee," seems to us very forced and unnatural, and we cannot but say with Saalschütz: "This is getting over the difficulty in a very superficial way. It is impossible that a law should have been given containing such a perilous ambiguity." His position, also, in respect to the formula, "If thou buy a Hebrew servant," does not appear to be conclusive. Undoubtedly the phrases, "to make a king," "to take a wife," presuppose, from their very nature, that neither the king nor the wife existed before. Otherwise the former could not have been made, nor the latter taken. So, also, with the phrase, "to buy a wife," which means to take a wife by purchase. But, on the other hand, to depose a king, and to divorce a wife, presuppose the previous existence of both. We must, then, judge of each expression from its own character. Now the phrase, "to buy a Hebrew servant," is most obviously and naturally understood as meaning, to buy a Hebrew who is already a servant. It might, perhaps, apply to the Hebrew who was sold into servitude for theft, but not, as Mielziner contends, to the case of the poor Israelite who sold himself for poverty. When we consider how carefully worded is the ordinance respecting the latter, Lev. xxv. 39-43, 47-55, and how widely the language differs, in every respect, from that n Ex. xxi. 2-6, Deut. xv. 12-18, it is hard to believe that both classes of regulations relate to the same persons. It is not, however, our purpose to advocate the position of Saalschütz against the common Rabbinic view. Our Am. Theo'. Review for April, pp. 244, 245. readers have both before them, and we leave to them the decision between the two. Only this we would remark, that the view of Saalschütz is peculiarly favorable to all servants of foreign descent who had been incorporated by circumcision into the Hebrew commonwealth. For it gave to each of them, upon every change of masters, the privilege of freedom after six years of service; while, according to the common view, as well stated by Mielziner, "Besides the case of serious injuries inflicted upon the slave by the master (Ex. xxi. 26, 27), the Mosaic law has no ordinance about the manumission of slaves from foreign nations."1 It has been maintained by some writers that the words of Moses in reference to the year of jubilee: "And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof," apply, by fair interpretation, to the servants of foreign origin also, as being a part of "the inhabitants of the land." This view is ably advocated by Rev. Albert Barnes, who says: "To one who should read this law, if there were no other to conflict with it, or that made it necessary to seek a different interpretation, the plain meaning of the statute would appear to be, that all who resided in the land from whatever motive, or whatever were their relations or employments, were from that moment to be regarded as freemen."2 Undoubtedly such would be the view of the statute taken absolutely by itself. But in interpreting it, we are to consider the limitations imposed on it by the context, as well as by other laws. Now, if we examine the context, we find that the ordinance of the year of jubilee provides not simply for liberty, but for liberty in connection with the return of the people to their hereditary possessions, which had been temporarily alienated through the pressure of poverty. The entire verse, Lev. xxv. 10, reads thus; "And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof; it shall be a jubilee unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man 1 In Am. Theol. Review for July, p. 436. unto his family." The same words are repeated, v. 13: "In the year of this jubilee ye shall return every man unto his possession." Then follow extended regulations having for their basis the fundamental law that all landed estate is to return at the year of jubilee to its hereditary owners, so that there shall be no perpetual alienation of it. After these follow, in the remainder of the chapter, provisions for the release at the year of jubilee of the impoverished Israelite who has sold himself (or been sold) to one of his countrymen or to a gentile. Now all this certainly looks as if these provisions referred throughout to one and the same class of persons,impoverished Israelites. One who reads the chapter through with no preconceived theory, naturally infers that the provisions, vs. 39-43, and 47 - 55, are intended to specify how the ordinance of v. 10, "Ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family," is to be carried out. Such has ever been the view of Jewish commentators. They have held that all Hebrew servants, though their ear had been bored with the awl, were released at the year of jubilee; but they have not extended this rule to gentile servants. This view is further confirmed by the fact, that between the two passages relating to the release at the year of jubilee of an Israelite held in servitude, first, by one of his own countrymen, vs. 39-43; secondly, by a foreigner, vs. 47-55, there occur the following remarkable words: "Both thy bond-men and thy bond-maids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bond-men and bond-maids. Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land; and they shall be your possession, and ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession, they shall be your bond-men forever: but over your brethren, the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigor." vs. 44 - 46. Mr. Barnes explains the clause: "They shall be your bond-men forever," as meaning that "the permanent provision for servants was not that they were to enslave or employ their brethren, the Hebrews, but that they were to employ foreigners; or, as he immediately afterwards expresses it: "it would be a permanent arrangement that they might be purchased and introduced among the Hebrews." In other words, he refers the words "for ever," not to the persons bought and their children, but to the ordinance. But, first, this is not the natural interpretation of the passage grammatically considered. Had Moses intended such a sense, he would probably have said, as often elsewhere, "It shall be to you an ordinance forever;" secondly, the context is against such an interpretation. He has just been prohibiting the permanent servitude of an Israelite (and of course his posterity) to one of his brethren; and he immediately proceeds to make the same prohibition in respect to a heathen master. We seem, therefore, necessitated to understand him as here allowing such servitude in the case of heathen servants, and them only. If, now, the view of Saalschütz as to the class of persons called "Hebrew servants" is tenable, then, since incorporation into the Hebrew commonwealth by circumcision was at least free to all of gentile origin who desired it, a way was opened for the gradual fusion of gentile servants in the Hebrew commonwealth, and the termination of their state of servitude. Otherwise we must say that, in respect to them, the custom already existing was tolerated, just as in the case of polygamy and divorce, and the evils incident to it mitigated by humane restrictions and regulations. But we entirely agree with Mr. Barnes that the passage in question furnishes no warrant for the system of slavery as it exists in our southern states. Here we might draw a contrast between the mild laws of the Hebrews, even in respect to "the heathen round about them," and the barbarous code of American slavery. The Hebrew laws recognized the rights of the slave as a man. If his master smote out his eye or his tooth, he was to let him go free for his eye's or his tooth's sake. But the southern slave codes begin by converting slaves into chattels personal. And, lest any one 1 Barnes on Slavery, ubi supra, p. 155. |