Exodus 21
Easy Reader Bible: Purple Letter EditionKJP 
1Now these are the judgments which you shall set before them. 2If you buy a Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve; and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. 3If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself; if he was married, then his wife shall go out with him. 4If his master has given him a wife, and she has born him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out by himself. 5And if the servant shall plainly say, “I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free”: 6Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him forever. 7And if a man sells his daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not go out as the menservants do. 8If she please not her master, who has betrothed her to himself, then shall he let her be redeemed; but to sell her to a foreign nation he shall have no power, seeing he has dealt deceitfully with her. 9And if he has betrothed her to his son, he shall deal with her after the manner of daughters. 10If he takes him another wife; her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage, shall he not diminish. 11And if he does not these three to her, then shall she go out free without money (at no cost).

12Anyone who strikes a man with a fatal blow shall be surely put to death. 13But if a man does it unintentionally, not premeditated; then he shall flee to a place that I will appoint. 14But if someone schemes against his neighbor, to slay him with guile; you shall take him from My altar, that he may die. 15And he that strikes his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death. 16And he that steals a man, and sells him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death. 17And he that curses his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death.

18And if men strive together, and one strikes another with a stone, or with his fist, and he dies not, but keeps his bed: 19If he rise again, and walk abroad upon his staff, then shall he that smote him be clear: only he shall pay for the loss of his time, and shall cause him to be thoroughly healed. 20And if a man strikes his servant, or his maid, with a rod, and he dies under his hand; he shall be surely punished. 21Notwithstanding, if he continues a day or two, he shall not be punished; for he is his money. 22If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follows; he shall be surely punished, according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. 23And if any mischief follow, then you shall give life for life, 24Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. 26And if a man strikes the eye of his servant, or the eye of his maid, that it perishes; he shall let him go free for his eye's sake. 27And if he strikes out his manservant's tooth, or his maidservant's tooth; he shall let him go free for his tooth's sake.

28If an ox gores a man or a woman, that they die; then the ox shall be surely stoned, and its flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox shall be clear. 29But if the ox was accustomed to push with his horn in times past, and it has been testified to his owner, and he has not kept him in, but that he has killed a man or a woman; the ox shall be stoned, and his owner also shall be put to death. 30If there be laid on him a sum of money, then he shall give for the ransom of his life whatever is laid upon him. 31Whether he has gored a son, or a daughter, according to this judgment shall it be done unto him. 32If the ox shall push a manservant or a maidservant; he shall give to their master thirty shekels of silver, and the ox shall be stoned.

33And if a man shall open a pit, or if a man shall dig a pit, and not cover it, and an ox or an ass fall in it; 34The owner of the pit shall make it good, and give money to the owner of them; and the dead beast shall be his. 35And if one man's ox injures another man's oz, so that it dies; then they shall sell the live ox, and divide the money of it; and the dead ox also they shall divide. 36But if it is known that the ox was accustomed to push in time past, and his owner has not kept him in; he shall surely pay ox for ox; and the dead shall be his own.

Easy Reader Bible: Purple Letter Edition
© 2023 by Jim Musser. Used by Permission. All rights Reserved.

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