What Does Exodus 21:11 Mean?
And if he does not do these three for her, she goes out free without silver.
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
And if he do not these three unto her, then shall she go out free without money.THE KEY
Her freedom is not a debt she must pay off: when the named obligations fail, she goes out free without money.
THE MEANING
If the three obligations named just before this are withheld, she goes out free without paying anything. Her release does not depend on her ability to reimburse the one who holds her. The verse makes her freedom the consequence of those failures, not a price she must produce.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a person in bondage must purchase her own freedom: here, she leaves without money when the named obligations are withheld.
THE ROOT
חָפְשִׁי
ḥophshî
GROWS FROM
חפשׁ
To be free, released from service.
The Hebrew names a released status, not a payment or favor from the one who holds her. Her freedom stands alongside her going out: she leaves the service and is free of its claim.
ALSO GROWS
ḥophshî: Free, released from service.
חָפְשִׁי
This is the word for her status when she goes out; the release is explicit.
ḥōpheš: Freedom or release from servitude.
חֹפֶשׁ
This related form makes freedom a state of release, not something she has to buy.
וְיָצְאָה
veyats’ah
GROWS FROM
יצא
To go out, come forth, or leave.
“goes out” in this verse is veyats’ah. The verse describes freedom as an actual departure from the condition holding her. The same root can describe being brought out, so the English phrase holds movement and release together.
ALSO GROWS
yetsi’ah: A going out or departure.
יְצִיאָה
Her freedom takes the form of leaving; it is not only an inward state.
hotsi’: To bring out or lead out.
הוֹצִיא
This causative form shows the same root can name release as being brought out of a constrained place.
THE PATTERN
Release is an exit from bondage, and the person bound is not made to pay the price of that freedom.
If you buy a Hebrew servant, six years he serves, and in the seventh he goes out free for nothing.For thus says the LORD, You were sold for nothing, and you shall be bought back without silver.Stand, then, in the freedom for which the Anointed One set us free, and do not be caught again in the yoke of slavery.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 roots for “go out” (יצא, yatsa) and “free” (חָפְשִׁי, ḥophshî) appear in this chapter’s earlier release rule. The repeated phrase “for nothing” shows that the person leaving is not charged for her freedom.
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