Texts in Conversation
Exodus reverses the use of an ear mark in Hammurabi's slave-master rule, linking it to choosing continued service. The changed declaration turns a mark associated with rejection of a master into confirmation of a lasting bond.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Code of Hammurabi 1:292
Babylonian Legal Text
Ancient Near East
280 If a man buys a male or female slave in a foreign country, and the slave's former owner recognizes the slave when he comes home: if the male or female slave is a native of the country, he shall give the slave back without any payment. 281 If they are from another country, the buyer shall declare the amount of money he paid to the merchant, and he shall keep the male or female slave. 282 If a slave says to his master, "You are not my master," and he is convicted, his master shall cut off his ear. These are the laws of justice which Hammurabi, the wise king, established. He gave the land a righteous law and a pious statute. I am Hammurabi, the protecting king.
Exodus 21:6
Hebrew Bible
3 If he came in by himself he will go out by himself; if he had a wife when he came in, then his wife will go out with him. 4 If his master gave him a wife, and she bore sons or daughters, the wife and the children will belong to her master, and he will go out by himself. 5 But if the servant should declare, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,’ 6 then his master must bring him to the gods13, and he will bring him to the door or the doorpost, and his master will pierce his ear with an awl, and he shall serve him forever.
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Notes and References
“... In addition to the evidence about sequence, many of the individual laws in CC and LH, in or outside the common sequence, agree in their internal details. Note, for example, that the debt-slavery laws describe work for X years with release in year X + 1 (21:2 // LH 117); the laws on slave-master relations have a slave declaring his relationship to his master with subsequent marking or marring of his ear to reflect his submission or rebellion (21:5–6 // LH 282); the laws about marrying a second wife describe it as “taking another” and require one to provide for the support of the first in three ways (by implication if not explicitly; 21:10–11 // LH 148–149); the child rebellion laws describe both verbal and physical attacks (21:15, 17 // LH 192–193, 195); the laws about striking a person set the injury in the context of a fight and require the injurer to care for the victim’s recovery (21:18–19 // LH 206); the miscarriage laws treat two cases, causing a miscarriage alone and then death to the woman (21:22–23 // LH 209–210); talion laws mention eye, tooth, and bone injuries and deal with such injuries to slaves (21:24–27 // LH 196–201); the goring ox laws consider ad hoc goring first, then habitual goring, then the goring of a slave (21:28–32 // LH 250–251); animal theft laws mention finding a stolen object in the thief’s possession, an inability to pay the penalty, and twofold or more restoration (21:37 + 22:2b–3 // LH 253–265); grazing laws presumably deal with two cases, causing animals to graze and releasing animals in a field (22:4 // LH 57–58); deposit laws require double compensation and declarations before the deity (22:6–8 // LH 120; cf. 126); and the animal death and injury laws speak, in order, about how the animal died, a declaration of innocence, and the owner’s acceptance of the loss (22:9–10 // LH 266). ...”
Wright, David P.
Inventing God's Law: How the Covenant Code of the Bible Used and Revised the Laws of Hammurabi
(p. 50) Oxford University Press, 2009
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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