Chapter Summary

Laws concerning servants. Injuries to the person.

Discussion Questions for Exodus, Chapter 21

1. Which general law regarding slaves do you have the most difficulty understanding?
2. How does slavery in Exodus differ from slavery in the 1800’s?
3. What are some of the different reasons for a Hebrew becoming a slave?
4. Why would a slave go free on the seventh year of his service? What do you think was the significance in the number 7?
5. What did the ear piercing (opening) signify in verse 6? Read Psalm 40:6 and discuss how Exodus 21:6 parallel.
6. Read verse 22-25 and discuss how this verse gives us a glimpse into the reality of life inside the womb. What does it mean that one “shall pay life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe”? Why do you think it says this specifically in regard to a pregnant woman and her child being harmed?
7. Why do you think there was such a strong presence of laws regarding animals in this chapter? What relevance to this have to the culture of that time?
8. If an ox has no moral standard, why do you think they were to be put to death if they were the cause of death?
9. What kind of stewardship are cattle owners held to? How does this connect to one of the first acts of stewardship man is called to in Genesis 1:26? (“Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” ESV)
10. What effect do you think these laws has on a society as a whole?

Key Words/Phrase

Judgments, v. 1.

Characters

God, Moses.

Strong Verse(s)

12