They Are My Servants
39 “‘If your brother has grown poor among you, and sells himself to you, you shall not make him to serve as a slave. 40 As a hired servant, and as a temporary resident, he shall be with you; he shall serve with you until the Year of Jubilee. 41 Then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and shall return to his own family, and to the possession of his fathers. 42 For they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. They shall not be sold as slaves. 43 You shall not rule over him with harshness, but shall fear your God. 44 “‘As for your male and your female slaves, whom you may have from the nations that are around you, from them you may buy male and female slaves. 45 Moreover, of the children of the aliens who live among you, of them you may buy, and of their families who are with you, which they have conceived in your land; and they will be your property. 46 You may make them an inheritance for your children after you, to hold for a possession. Of them you may take your slaves forever, but over your brothers the children of Israel you shall not rule, one over another, with harshness. 47 “‘If an alien or temporary resident with you becomes rich, and your brother beside him has grown poor, and sells himself to the stranger or foreigner living among you, or to a member of the stranger’s family, 48 after he is sold he may be redeemed. One of his brothers may redeem him; 49 or his uncle, or his uncle’s son, may redeem him, or any who is a close relative to him of his family may redeem him; or if he has grown rich, he may redeem himself. 50 He shall reckon with him who bought him from the year that he sold himself to him to the Year of Jubilee. The price of his sale shall be according to the number of years; he shall be with him according to the time of a hired servant. 51 If there are yet many years, according to them he shall give back the price of his redemption out of the money that he was bought for. 52 If there remain but a few years to the year of jubilee, then he shall reckon with him; according to his years of service he shall give back the price of his redemption. 53 As a servant hired year by year shall he be with him. He shall not rule with harshness over him in your sight. 54 If he isn’t redeemed by these means, then he shall be released in the Year of Jubilee: he and his children with him. 55 For to me the children of Israel are servants; they are my servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. I am Yahweh your God.
An Israelite who sells himself is a hired man rather than a slave, and the reason given is that he already belongs to somebody.
The last case is the hardest and the legislation is careful.
39 “‘If your brother has grown poor among you, and sells himself to you, you shall not make him to serve as a slave. 40 As a hired servant, and as a temporary resident, he shall be with you; he shall serve with you until the Year of Jubilee.
The transaction is permitted and its character is redefined. What is bought is labor for a term, not a person, and the term ends at the jubilee — then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and shall return to his own family, and to the possession of his fathers Leviticus 25:41.
He goes home, with his children, to land that is waiting for him. The system is designed so that the worst outcome of destitution is temporary.
The reason given is the sentence that governs everything: for they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. They shall not be sold as slaves Leviticus 25:42.
An Israelite cannot be owned because he is owned already. God's prior claim is what makes the second one impossible, and the argument is repeated at the end of the chapter Leviticus 25:55.
And twice the manner of treatment is specified: you shall not rule over him with harshness, but shall fear your God Leviticus 25:43 Leviticus 25:46. The word is the one used of Egypt's treatment of Israel, which is the comparison being ruled out.
What the chapter does not do is abolish slavery, and it should not be represented as doing so. Slaves may be bought from the nations that are around you and held as an inheritance Leviticus 25:44–46, and that stands in the text.
What can be said is what the law does with the institution it found. It removes Israelites from it entirely. It requires a foreign slave to rest every seventh day, and the fourth commandment names him Deuteronomy 5:14. It forbids returning a runaway Deuteronomy 23:15. It gives him the Passover and the day of atonement. And it grounds every provision for the vulnerable in the memory of having been slaves — a reasoning that, followed out, dissolves the thing it regulates, and did.
The chapter's last words are the ground of all of it: to me the children of Israel are servants; they are my servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt Leviticus 25:55.
held with reason What this mark means