Exodus 21:5

But when it is time for the slave to be set free, if the slave says, ‘I love my master and my wife and my children, and I do not want to be set free,’

Translation for Translators

In The King James Version

And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free:

In Context

4If a slave’s master gives him a wife, and she gives birth to sons or daughters while her husband is a slave, only the man is to be freed. His wife and children will continue to be slaves of their master.

6then his master must take him to the place where they worship God (OR, to the owner’s house). There he must make the slave stand against the door or the doorpost. Then the master will use an ◄awl/pointed metal rod► to make a hole in the slave’s ear. Then he will fasten a tag to the slave’s ear to indicate that ◄he will own that slave for the rest of his life/he will own the slave as long as the slave lives►.

Read all of Exodus 21

Cross References

Isaiah 26:13Yahweh, our God, others have ruled over us, but you [MTY] are the only one whom we honor.

Matthew Henry on Exodus 21:2-12

Judicial Laws. ( b. c. 1491.) 1 Now these are the judgments which thou shalt set before them. 2 If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. 3 If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him. 4 If his master have given him a wife, and she have born him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out by himself. 5 And if the servant shall plainly say,… Read the whole commentary →

This Verse In Other Editions

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