What Does Deuteronomy 15:18 Mean?
It shall not be hard in your eyes when you send him out unbound from you, for he has been worth double the wage of a hired hand, serving you six years. And the LORD your God will bless you in all that you do.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
It shall not seem hard unto thee, when thou sendest him away free from thee; for he hath been worth a double hired servant to thee, in serving thee six years: and the LORD thy God shall bless thee in all that thou doest.THE KEY
The verse makes release the fitting end of labor by naming the departing servant’s service as worth twice a hired worker’s.
THE MEANING
Your authority over another person’s labor has a limit: after six years, the servant is released. His service counts as double a hired worker’s, and the verse holds that recognition beside the promise that the LORD your God blesses all you do.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Keeping a person’s labor after years of service is your right, and releasing them means taking a loss.
THE ROOT
שִׁלֵּחַ
shilleaḥ
GROWS FROM
שלח
Send, send forth, release, let go.
“send him out unbound” in this verse is shilleaḥ. The verb makes freedom an act of sending someone out from your authority and onward. Release here is more than ending service; it is letting the person go forth.
ALSO GROWS
shilleaḥ: Send away; release.
שִׁלֵּחַ
This is the verb in the verse: the servant is sent away free.
Shiloach: Sent water; the name of the Siloam pool.
שִׁלֹחַ
The same root’s image of what is sent forth connects release with movement outward.
שָׂכִיר
sākhîr
GROWS FROM
שכר
Hire for wages; pay for service.
“double the wage of a hired hand” in this verse is sākhîr. The verse measures the servant’s years against wage-paid labor. English can make “worth a double hired servant” sound like a comparison of status, while the Hebrew places the value of his service in view.
ALSO GROWS
sākār: Wages; payment for work.
שָׂכָר
This branch brings the wage measure behind the comparison into view.
sākhar: Hire; pay for service.
שָׂכַר
The verb names the paid labor against which the servant’s six years are measured.
חָפְשִׁי
ḥop̄šî
GROWS FROM
חפש
Freedom; release from service.
“send him out unbound” in this verse is ḥop̄šî. The word names a condition of freedom, not merely a change of employer. The verse makes that freedom the destination of the servant’s years of labor.
ALSO GROWS
ḥōpheš: Freedom; release.
חֹפֶשׁ
The related noun names the state the servant enters when sent away.
ḥop̄šî: Free; released from service.
חָפְשִׁי
This is the word used for the servant’s condition at release.
THE PATTERN
Service and captivity have limits: release arrives as a rightful boundary, not a favor that erases a person’s worth.
If you buy a Hebrew servant, six years he serves, and in the seventh he goes out free for nothing.And you shall set apart the fiftieth year, and proclaim a free flowing through all the land to all who settle in it. It shall be a ram's horn year for you, and you shall turn back each to his holding, and each to his family you shall turn back.The breath of the LORD is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the emptied. He has sent me to heal the shattered in heart, to herald release to the captives, and the return of sight for the blind, to send the crushed away into release.THE THREAD
If you buy a Hebrew servant, six years he serves, and in the seventh he goes out free for nothing.The same Hebrew word חָפְשִׁי (ḥop̄šî, free) names the condition at the end of service. Deuteronomy adds that the released worker’s years carry measurable worth, so freedom and recognition arrive together.
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