Weird Stuff in the Bible

Did Moses say it’s OK to beat your slave? Does the Bible endorse slavery?
Exodus 21

Introduction
When you’re a Christian, you believe certain things about God. That the Bible reveals God to us. That God is morally perfect. That God is the same yesterday, today and forever.
But also, in the Old Testament, that God allowed slavery.
Wait wait wait. Wait a minute. We all know that slavery is wrong.
We had a Civil War about it, we had Martin Luther King Jr, we had like four Planet of the Apes movies to teach us why slavery is wrong.
And yet Old Testament Israel includes people who were slaves, Old Testament laws regulating the use of slaves, and even this shocking command from Moses in
Exodus 21:20-21
20 “When a man strikes his slave, male or female, with a rod and the slave dies under his hand, he shall be avenged. 21 But if the slave survives a day or two, he is not to be avenged, for the slave is his money.
So wait- is Moses saying that it’s OK to beat your slave, as long as you don’t kill him?
I find this to be weird, and I’d like to explore why it’s in the Bible.
Turn to Exodus 21 and Leviticus 25, and let’s get weird.
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Slavery in the Old Testament
Welcome to Weird Stuff in the Bible, where we explore scripture passages that are bizarre, perplexing or just plain weird. This is Luke Taylor, and today we’re going to be talking about why God had laws governing slavery in the Old Testament- and how to handle it if these laws don’t always line up with our 21st Century mentality about these things.
And that’s probably where we should start off, because I know slavery can be a tough issue for some to hear about. In America, there are many black or african-american individuals who had ancestors who were slaves in this country. It’s a tragedy.
And I’d also say this: for almost any of us listening, no matter what race you are, you almost certainly have ancestors who were slaves at some point. Slavery was a practice in virtually all civilizations and all nations among all races of people throughout world history. Including in the Middle East at the time that the Bible was written.
But wait a minute. Isn’t God morally perfect? Couldn’t God have set His own standards for His people? Why would He allow something as barbaric and cruel as slavery to exist in His own nation?
Some have explained this problem by saying: slavery was a practice so widespread in the ancient world that God couldn’t just quit it cold-turkey. But God had to introduce legislation that regulated it so that it was much more humane and civil than the slavery of the surrounding peoples.
And there may be some truth to that, but it doesn’t totally satisfy me. I mean, if there was something inherently wrong about slavery- something intrinsically wrong about the practice of owning another human- I just don’t think God would have allowed for it, period. I don’t see other places in the Mosaic law where God says, “This is wrong, but we’re going to tolerate it, we’re just going to soften it so it’s not as bad as how everybody else does it.” I mean, when God says something is wrong, God says, “Thou shalt not.” But with slavery, God does allow for it to take place to a certain extent.
To some of you, that might sound horrifying. “What do you mean that God could be fine with slavery?” So either it’s not inherently wrong to enslave people OR perhaps the slavery in the Bible is very different from our modern conception of slavery.
So what I want to do first with you today is define slavery in the Biblical context. As Americans who have a Civil War that was fought over the issue, we have a particular picture in our minds of what happens in slavery. Or we might even think of the cruel Egyptian taskmasters in the book of Exodus to get an idea of what slavery was like. These are often called chattel slavery, where people are treated like livestock.
But I want to explain the economic situation in ancient Israel to help us understand how it was different from those other situations. And then we’ll talk about why God had certain laws that allowed for slavery.

Jubilee years and the Mosaic Economy
Ancient Israel had a completely different economic system than we have. First of all, let’s talk about the land allotments. The nation was divided up into 12 sections, and each section went to a different tribe. This is kind of like how America is divided up into 50 states. Then within those tribes, different clans and families had their own allotments of land as well. You might think of this more like how we have counties within our states in America. But each family’s territory was supposed to remain in the family.
You could use your family’s land to support yourselves, and you could do that however you wanted, even selling or leasing it out to other families. However, every 50 years, all land boundaries were supposed to revert back to whatever family they originally belonged to. There was this reset on the land every 50 years; it was called the Year of Jubilee.
Leviticus 25:10
10 And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you, when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his clan.
Everything in Israel’s economy was calculated in relation to the year of Jubilee. If you wanted to sell your land and it was 5 years until the year of Jubilee, the buyer and seller were aware that the buyer was only going to get 5 years of use out of this land, so its value was a lot less than if it was 25 years to the year of Jubilee.
Leviticus 25:13-16
13 “In this year of jubilee each of you shall return to his property. 14 And if you make a sale to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor, you shall not wrong one another. 15 You shall pay your neighbor according to the number of years after the jubilee, and he shall sell to you according to the number of years for crops. 16 If the years are many, you shall increase the price, and if the years are few, you shall reduce the price, for it is the number of the crops that he is selling to you.
Also in the year of Jubilee, all slaves were to go free and all debts forgiven or released. It was a reset for them as well. So if you wanted to sell yourself into slavery or servitude, it was only at maximum until the year of Jubilee, and it was usually even shorter than that. But you would calculate the value of your servitude based on how many years it was until the year of Jubilee, because that’s how long you could serve.
Now why would someone want to be a slave? Let’s say that you came under hard times and ran out of money. Maybe it was your own fault; maybe it was a famine you hadn’t prepared for; maybe it was something out of your control. You couldn’t exactly file for bankruptcy. If you had a debt you couldn’t pay, one option might be selling your land. But if that didn’t pay off the debt, your other option was to sell yourself into service to work off your debt. This would be an agreement between you and your lender. But unlike a job, this wasn’t something you could get fired from. You were stuck until your debt was paid off or until the Jubilee reset. That’s why it was more like slavery than a job. But in modern terms, it might be more like what was called being an indentured servant. And if a friend or family member came along and wanted to redeem that slave, they were allowed to pay off the debt and get him off the hook early. And not only that, if the slaves made enough money on the side, they could even redeem themselves early if possible.
Leviticus 25:48-54
One of his brothers may redeem him, 49 or his uncle or his cousin may redeem him, or a close relative from his clan may redeem him. Or if he grows rich he may redeem himself. 50 He shall calculate with his buyer from the year when he sold himself to him until the year of jubilee, and the price of his sale shall vary with the number of years. The time he was with his owner shall be rated as the time of a hired worker. 51 If there are still many years left, he shall pay proportionately for his redemption some of his sale price. 52 If there remain but a few years until the year of jubilee, he shall calculate and pay for his redemption in proportion to his years of service. 53 He shall treat him as a worker hired year by year. He shall not rule ruthlessly over him in your sight. 54 And if he is not redeemed by these means, then he and his children with him shall be released in the year of jubilee.
So from this, we can conclude that the Mosaic Law slavery is much much different from the chattel slavery of America. And different from what the Israelites experienced in Egypt. It is so different, we probably wouldn’t even call it slavery if someone just described it to us.

Differences from Chattel Slavery
In chattel slavery, you were a slave for life. In Mosaic slavery, it was for a temporary period of time. In chattel slavery, you were taken against your will typically on the basis of your race. In Mosaic slavery, it was based on an economic need. It was a contractual agreement for a predetermined amount of time. It had nothing to do with race.
And here’s what I think is the main distinction we have to remember from American slavery- it was a choice. This is important because some of the American slaveowners would justify their treatment of their African American slaves because they’d pick out some Bible verses about slave ownership from the Bible. God’s Word was used to support chattel slavery.
Let me show you why that was so wrong. In American slavery, the slaves were often kidnapped in Africa and taken against their will across the world to America. It was very sad because many of them didn’t even survive the trip, they were given such horrible living conditions on the ships. What happened was, in fact, the African slaves were usually captured and enslaved by their own fellow Africans over there, and then they were sold to American slaveowners. So these people were horribly exploited by their own people and then by foreign people, and brought to an entirely different hemisphere to work.
Now, here is what God’s law says in
Exodus 21:16
16 “Whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him, shall be put to death.
So according to God’s Mosaic Law, if you took someone into slavery against their will, that meant the death penalty for you. Let that sink in for a moment.
People would use the Bible in the 1800s to justify slavery. But according to that same Bible, if you kidnapped someone and forced them into slavery- or if you even bought a slave who had been kidnapped and forced into slavery- the Bible says you deserve to be put to death for that.
So the slavery that American slaveowners practiced was nothing like the slavery that God was OK with in the Old Testament. And these people were cherry-picking their Bibles to try and make it seem like God was cool with it. According to the Bible, the African enslavers who first captured their own people should have been put to death. And anyone over here in America who purchased those slaves should have been put to death as well.

Laws Regulating the Treatment of Slaves
So now that we’ve observed that the Biblical slavery was something completely different from other nations and their conception of slavery, hopefully we can appreciate how much more humane and sensible God’s laws were on the issue. In fact, I don’t have any moral qualms at all with God’s version of slavery.
I know a lot of us have a negative emotional reaction when we hear the word “slave” or “slavery,” and that’s understandable, so it seems shocking and horrifying to us that God would even allow slavery in His own nation.
But God’s version of slavery was based on a economic agreement that was completely voluntary. Again, it was more like indentured servitude. And God had a number of laws regulating proper treatment of slaves in Leviticus 25 and Exodus 21.
But wait- what about that verse that I brought up at the beginning of the episode-
Exodus 21:20-21
20 “When a man strikes his slave, male or female, with a rod and the slave dies under his hand, he shall be avenged. 21 But if the slave survives a day or two, he is not to be avenged, for the slave is his money.
Does that mean Moses said it’s OK to beat your slave, as long as you don’t hurt him too bad? That doesn’t sound like humane treatment.
And this is a verse that many atheists will point to today to show how God’s Word was just as barbaric as any other ancient slave-owning society. But if we check out the context for just a minute, this actually doesn’t say what it sounds like at first. This is not about beating your slave, but about interpersonal conflicts and how they should be handled. Let’s back up a few verses.
Exodus 21:12-14
12 “Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death. 13 But if he did not lie in wait for him, but God let him fall into his hand, then I will appoint for you a place to which he may flee. 14 But if a man willfully attacks another to kill him by cunning, you shall take him from my altar, that he may die.
This is talking about first-degree and second-degree murderer. If someone intentionally kills another man, you get the death penalty for that. That’s called first-degree murder today. But if two men get in a fight and one kills the other and it wasn’t predetermined or with malice aforethought, in our modern legal vernacular, then there was still a penalty but it wasn’t the death penalty. Again, just like our American legal system in that respect. That is one of the ways our legal system has been influenced by Biblical thought.
However, the Mosaic law had several other things that could get you the death penalty as well.
Exodus 21:15-17
15 “Whoever strikes his father or his mother shall be put to death.
16 “Whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him, shall be put to death.
17 “Whoever curses his father or his mother shall be put to death.
Wow. This shows you how seriously God takes these things. It’s true, we are not under the law anymore. We are not bound by following the civil penalties of the Mosaic Law in modern America. But studying God’s law does show us how seriously God takes it when we engage in these activities.
Now, keep all this context in mind as we keep reading. God is talking about penalties for human conflicts in this chapter.
Exodus 21:18-19
18 “When men quarrel and one strikes the other with a stone or with his fist and the man does not die but takes to his bed, 19 then if the man rises again and walks outdoors with his staff, he who struck him shall be clear; only he shall pay for the loss of his time, and shall have him thoroughly healed.
So in these two verses, the Bible is discussing what to do if you get in a physical altercation with someone and you injure him. If your injury of him causes him to miss some work, then you need to pay for the days he missed work.
It’s not saying it’s OK to get into a fight with somebody and beat them up. It’s saying if you do beat someone up, you need to compensate them for the amount of time they missed work. If they weren’t hurt badly enough that they had to miss any work, then you don’t owe them any money.
It is NOT saying that it’s OK to get into a fight as long as you don’t hurt them too badly. It’s simply saying this is how you handle it if you do hurt them and have them laid up for a few days.
It’s kind of like if the law said, “If you punch someone in the face and break their nose, you have to pay their hospital bill.” Well does that mean the law is saying it’s OK to punch people in the face as long as you don’t break their nose? No. It’s just saying, “this is what you do if you do break their nose.”
So that’s the context here. Two men get into a fight; one gets hurt and misses a few days of work. The other guy who struck him covers the cost. Simple to understand, I hope. And that brings us to
verses 20 and 21:
20 “When a man strikes his slave, male or female, with a rod and the slave dies under his hand, he shall be avenged. 21 But if the slave survives a day or two, he is not to be avenged, for the slave is his money.
This is not talking about tying your slave to a whipping post and torturing them. This is talking about when two guys get into a fight, and one of them is a servant of the other. But you have to regulate that a little bit differently than just two random guys getting into a fight, because one of them works for the other.
First of all, if you kill your slave, you might face the death penalty for that. That’s why it says “he shall be avenged.” Your life is worth just as much as your slave’s life. So if you intentionally killed them, you would be killed for that. If you accidentally killed them, you would have to flee to a city of refuge, which is covered in a later chapter. But you’d lose everything. You’re not allowed to kill anyone- slave or free- on purpose or on accident- and get away with it.
But what about verse 21?
But if the slave survives a day or two, he is not to be avenged, for the slave is his money.
What does that mean? It’s just like the preceding law about two guys getting into a fight. If you cause someone to miss work because you injure them, your loss is that you pay for their loss of wages.
If you injure your slave and cause them to miss work, your loss is the loss of work while they take time off to heal. You don’t have to cover their wages, because they presumably aren’t being paid wages. He’s working off a debt. That’s why it says “for the slave is his money.”
The Mosaic law right here is just talking about when two guys get into a scuffle. Because fights happen. Maybe two guys like the same girl and they get jealous. Maybe two guys don’t like how a business partnership is going. Maybe you’re jealous because every since the new guy showed up, Andy has a new favorite toy and doesn’t want to play with you anymore. Fights happen.
And here in the law, it’s regulating how you handle it if you hurt someone and cause them to miss work. And if the fight happens to be between you and a slave who works for you, you’d handle it differently than how you’d handle it with someone else.
But the Bible certainly isn’t saying right here that as long as you don’t kill the slave, no harm no foul. In fact, if you go down just a couple verses, it says this:
Exodus 21:26-27
26 “When a man strikes the eye of his slave, male or female, and destroys it, he shall let the slave go free because of his eye. 27 If he knocks out the tooth of his slave, male or female, he shall let the slave go free because of his tooth.
If you cause any permanent damage to your slave- even knocking out a tooth- then all debt is canceled and the slave is free. Because you aren’t allowed to treat your fellow people that way- even if they’re technically your slave.
God’s laws governing the use of slaves are completely different from the rest of the world’s conception of slavery. So different, in our modern terminology, we probably wouldn’t even call it slavery. In fact, the King James Version doesn’t even use the word “slave” in the Mosaic Law, it calls them servants. God’s doesn’t say you’re allowed to beat your servants as long as you don’t kill them. God’s law teaches us how we treat fellow humans of any class. And God’s law is perfect.

Newsletter & Feedback
Now, if you were an eagle-eyed listener, you might have noticed that I skipped over verses 22-25 as I was moving through the chapter. I actually had planned to go into them more extensively, but I don’t have nearly as much time as I would have liked to go into them now.
These verses say this:
22 “When men strive together and hit a pregnant woman, so that her children come out, but there is no harm, the one who hit her shall surely be fined, as the woman's husband shall impose on him, and he shall pay as the judges determine. 23 But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, 24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25 burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
There are some today who will look at these verses to say that the Bible does not respect the life of an unborn child in the womb, because they say that it simply attaches a monetary value to the fetus’ life. I actually think those verses make the exact opposite point. But to go into that, it would take more time than I have available to spend today.
So, I’m going to explore those verses in this weekend’s newsletter. If you haven’t signed up for the newsletter yet, you can do so at our website: WeirdStuffInTheBible.com. Or you can click the link in the show notes and enter your email to get the newsletters as they come out. I don’t have a newsletter every single week, but I occasionally have them so I can dig a little deeper or explore rabbit trails that relate to the topic of the week.
If you do miss the newsletter because you find this episode later, no worries: there is an archive at that link to all the past newsletters, so you can go back and find the one released October 26, 2025.
Next week, I want to spend another week on the Old Testament Law, talking about polygamy. We observe a lot of polygamy going on in the Bible. Yes, it was the culture of those ancient times. But was God OK with it? Because it seems like God doesn’t say much about it. Well, I want to check out that question next time. So if you haven’t yet, make sure you’re subscribed so you can get that episode.
A few shoutouts from listeners who have written in. Thank you to Rowdy, to Daniela, to Joe, and to Joey. I do want to read or respond to some of their emails later, but with how little time I have left for today, I just want to leave us with this one thought.
One of the purposes of the law, as we talked about last week, was that it functioned as a schoolteacher to bring us to Christ. And some of the verses we’ve been reading today about slavery actually do just that.
For example, in a spiritual sense, we were all actually slaves.
It says this in John 8
31 So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” 33 They answered him, “We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?”
34 Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.
Slavery is actually a picture in the Bible of how we are trapped in our sinful state. And of course, it is only the blood of Christ that sets us free. In this way the year of Jubilee is that chance for a clean slate. Your debt is wiped away, you are set free, and you are given a second chance. And let’s drill down on that concept for a minute.
The average life expectancy in the Bible was 70-80 years, according to the book of Psalms; and that’s actually pretty much the same in modern times, too. The year of Jubilee came along once every 50 years, so for most people you would only experience- at a maximum- one Jubilee year in your entire life. Everyone who is a slave gets that reset probably just once; and you aren’t likely to fall into debt right after a Jubilee year. It’s something that would likely come after many years and numerous misfortunes. So you’re not likely to be a slave for 35 or 40 years. And you’re not likely be a slave at all. But if you do fall into slavery, unless you just live a really really really long time, you’re only likely to get one Jubilee year. One opportunity to be set free.
How does that relate to the Gospel? Jesus is your one opportunity to be set free. If you don’t accept the freedom offered in Christ, there is no second chance for heaven. There isn’t another sacrifice offered for your sins. It’s Jesus, or nothing.
There’s a passage in Hebrews that confuses and scares a lot of people. It says
In Hebrews 6:4-6
4 For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, 5 and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, 6 and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt.
We could spend a lot of time talking about exactly what that means, but here’s what I think it means at a minimum. If you have the opportunity to accept Jesus, you understand what He did for you and that He died to set you free, and then you decide to walk away from it, there isn’t a Plan B to get you into heaven. It’s impossible to get you to heaven if you decide you don’t want to do it with Jesus.
Just like, if you were a slave and the Jubilee year sets you free, and then you go back into slavery, you’re not likely to get a second Jubilee.
I don’t know who’s listening today. Most of my listeners are Christians, but I regularly hear from listeners who aren’t. So if you’re listening today and you haven’t yet accepted the freedom Christ offers, don’t wait for something else, because there isn’t anything else.
Thanks for listening, God bless you for sticking around until the end, and we’ll see you next time on Weird Stuff in the Bible.