Perhaps the
greatest challenge that continues to face human beings on earth is that YHVH’s
ways are higher than our ways.
Isa 55:8 “For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways My ways,” declares יהוה.
Isa 55:9 “For as
the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways,
and My thoughts than your thoughts.
Isa 55:10 “For as
the rain comes down, and the snow from the heavens, and do not return there,
but water the earth, and make it bring forth and bud, and give seed to the
sower and bread to the eater,
Isa
55:11 so is My Word that goes forth from
My mouth – it does not return to Me empty, but shall do what I please, and
shall certainly accomplish what I sent it for.
This Torah
portion is about YHVH’s “ways” His “Halacha” – when human beings ignore or
confuse YHVH’s Ways – His Right Rulings – His Torah – His Messiah, they do so
with extremely serious consequences. The present condition of humanity is the
inescapable evidence of this reality.
The most
perilous (dangerous) decision we can make as human beings is to honour the ways
of religious men above the ways of YHVH.
Our Torah
Portion –
Right-rulings or “Mishpatim.” This Hebrew word
comes from the root “shaphat” which means to judge and by implication to
vindicate or punish and by extension to govern.
We could also say this is the way the Kingdom of
Elohim operates. We seek first His Kingdom and everything else will fall into
place (Mat 6:33).
Exo 21:1 “These are the right-rulings which you are to
set before them:
See Mt 5:17-19
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Exo 21:2 “When you buy a Hebrew servant, he serves six
years, and in the seventh he goes out
free, for naught.
Exo 21:3 “If
he comes in by himself, he goes out by himself; if he comes in married, then
his wife shall go out with him.
Exo 21:4 “If
his master has given him a wife, and she has borne him sons or daughters, the
wife and her children are her master’s, and he goes out by himself.
Exo 21:5
“And if the servant truly says, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my
children, let me not go out free,’
Exo 21:6
then his master shall bring him before Elohim, and shall bring him to
the door, or to the doorpost, and his master shall pierce his ear with an awl.
And he shall serve him forever.
Only a freeman (one whose debt has been paid in
full) could become a bondservant, the Hebrew slave (ivri eved) could only
become a bondservant after 6 years. Yahshua was free because he had no sin, no
debt to pay off, yet Yahshua very kindly paid our debt and chose to remain in a
position of servitude to His Master forever and ever so that we could remain
part of His household forever and ever.
Isa 50:5 The
Master יהוה has opened My
ear, and I was not rebellious, nor did I turn away.
Isa
50:6 I gave My back to those who struck
Me, and My cheeks to those who plucked out the beard, I did not hide My face
from humiliation and spitting.
The
Hebrew verb for “opened” has a more intense form which means to carve or
engrave. This reminds us of the ritual of “opening” the ear of a bondservant
with an awl against the door post.
Yahshua will bear in his body the scars of the
covenant he entered into, on our behalf forever.
The
gematria (numerical worth) of Mashiach and Hebrew slave is 358.
(mem,shin,yud,chet
= Messiah and ayin,veit,reish,yud – ayin,veit,daleth = Ivri eved or Hebrew
slave)
Quote on Hebrew
Slavery - Prof. Dov Landau.
“How can it be that
the Torah, YHVH's
perfect book of Law – of perfect freedom
- did not take into account that in our day slavery would be considered morally
reprehensible?
Indeed, the gemara
in Tractate Kiddushin 15a says:
A hired laborer only
works during the day; a Hebrew bondsman works day or night. [On this the gemara
asks:] But is it conceivable that a Hebrew bondsman should work day or
night? After all, it is said (Deut. 15:16): "he...is happy with you"
- eating with you, drinking with you, and enjoying shelter with you.
For the next four
pages the gemara sets forth all the protections due to a Hebrew
bondsman, such as: he should not be made to work as a slave; his master must
provide sustenance for his wife and children; the bondsman is released after
the sixth year and in the jubilee year with a grant from his master; he may
even redeem himself, etc., so that in the end he essentially is removed from
the class of a slave and is no less than a resident hired worker. Moreover, a
Hebrew slave is like a master, for the gemara (Kiddushin 20a)
interprets the verse, "he... is happy with you" as follows:
Eating with you and
drinking with you, for you are not to eat fresh bread while he eats stale
mouldy bread, you drink aged wine while he drinks young wine, you bed down on
feathers while he on hay. Hence it is said that whoever buys himself a Hebrew
bondsman (i.e. slave) is as if he bought himself a master.
Abarbanel looked for
the lesson to be learned from the juxtaposition between the Ten Commandments at
the end of Parashat Yitro and the passage on Hebrew slaves at the beginning of
this week's reading. He further developed the Sages' interpretation that the
conjunction "And" appearing in the Hebrew as the first letter in
Mishpatim, appended to the words, "These are the rules," means that
the text which follows should be seen as adding to what preceded (i.e., to the
first commandment, which says "who brought you out of the land of Egypt,
the house of bondage," Ex. 20:2). Abarbanel felt that the juxtaposition
taught that by taking the Israelites out of bondage YHVH acquired them as His
very own, as indicated by the Midrash on the words, "The children of
Israel are My servants," (Lev. 25:58) "and not servants of
servants". This idea was further developed by Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch
in his commentary on this text. He adds that a Hebrew slave was not something
encountered every day. Jewish courts did not sell a person, and a person would
not sell himself except in the most dire of circumstances. Accordingly, even
the situation of a "slave who is not a slave" came about only in the most rare of circumstances. Even in the
extreme case of a thief sold for his theft it is said: "He shall remain
with you as a hired or bound laborer" (Lev. 25:40), and we are taught that
"you may not change his trade," that is, he must continue doing the
skills he learned and may not be forced to do menial tasks.
We conclude with a
quote from Rabbi Wolf:
Rather, the Torah left
slavery in and of itself in existence, but improved the condition of the slave to the extent that the land of Israel
would in any case become a paradise for slaves. The life and health of the
Canaanite slave are well protected (vv. 20-21, 26-27). A weekly day of rest is
assured him (Deut. 5:14). Slaves from other lands would flee to the land of Israel,
to find refuge and be decently treated there, and in the fullness of time this
situation would force slave owners in other countries to improve the lot of
their slaves, so that in the end it would be recognized that a human being is
not chattel and slavery would end of its own accord.
It must not be
forgotten that in these matters the Torah does not permit any agreements to
turn over slaves, for it says: "You shall not turn over to his master a
slave who seeks refuge with you from his master" (Deut. 23:16). Even in
our time, with the enlightened progress in morality of the third millennium, we
have not yet reached this level. For all our progressive approaches, we are not
capable of changing the mistaken conceptions to which we have become
accustomed. Even the word 'slave' we are not capable of interpreting in its
historic context, but give it anachronistic connotations in line with our
modern-primitive conceptions.
Perhaps we would do
better to learn our modern humane ideas precisely from the words of our ancient
Torah?” End of quote.
It is was from this
deep spiritual understanding of bondservants that the talmadim - the messengers of our master Yahshua referred
to themselves as bondservants.
The Greek word
“doulos” means a “bond servant.” Rom 1:1; Gal1:10; Col4:12; Tit 1:1; James
1:1; 2 Pet1:1; Jude 1:1
Exo 21:7
“And when a man sells his daughter to be a female servant, she does not
go out as the male servants do.
A female slave was to
be treated the way her own father would have treated her.
See Stones Chumash page 419 – “Sale of a daughter”
Exo 21:8 “If
she is displeasing in the eyes of her master who has engaged her to himself,
then he shall let her be ransomed. He shall have no authority to sell her to a
foreign people, because of him deceiving her.
ח אִם-רָעָה
בְּעֵינֵי אֲדֹנֶיהָ, אֲשֶׁר-לא (לוֹ) יְעָדָהּ--וְהֶפְדָּהּ: לְעַם
נָכְרִי לֹא-יִמְשֹׁל לְמָכְרָהּ, בְּבִגְדוֹ-בָהּ.
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8 If there is evil in the eyes of her
master’s (an evil eye meant a man was not generous) which not (ie her masters
did not designate her for marriage) or
allow her to be ransomed by a foreign people which would be a wrong
ruling(“mashal” to rule or have dominion over) to sell her – this would be
treacherous of him towards her.
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Mat 6:22 “The lamp of the body is the eye. If
therefore your eye is good (you are generous), all your body shall be
enlightened.
Mat 6:23 “But if your eye is evil,1 (you
are stingy) all your body shall be darkened. If, then, the light that is within
you is darkness, how great is that darkness! Footnote: 1This is a
Heḇrew idiom – a good
eye means to be generous, while an evil eye means to be stingy.