When we learned about the names of God, one of the names we learned about was the name Adonai, which means Lord, Master and even Owner and we tackled the uncomfortable truth that if we who know, love and worship God – Adonai, then we belong to Him, He owns us and we are His bond-slaves.
Dealing with the issues of being slaves to God isn’t easy to understand or accept, especially when the Bible also tells us that we’ve been set free from slavery to sin to freedom in Christ. Yet the Bible very clearly states that we who belong to Jesus, that is, those of us who have put our faith and trust in Him, are now no longer our own, we have been bought with a price. We BELONG to Jesus our Messiah.
Slavery has a bad reputation, human slavery throughout the centuries has been appalling and the treatment of slaves is sickening. So when God’s Word describes us as His slaves and one of His names describes Him as our Owner, it takes some serious effort to reconcile what it really means.
There’s some incredible symbolism in the Old Covenant on this subject, and there’s a fabulous article from a ministry called ‘One For Israel’ that I’m using for this particular study. This is not my own personal research, so I can’t lay claim to it, but it’s important and in my own words I want to share it with you.
There are three main elements that make a bond-slave and at first glance they appear to be a little weird and you can’t help but wonder why God would institute these specific instructions. So we’re going to look at them.
Why was body piercing necessary?
Why was ear the body part that had to be pierced?
Why did this procedure have to be done against a door?
Exodus 21:1-6 “When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing… But if the slave plainly says, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,’ then his master shall bring him to God, and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost. And his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall be his slave forever.”
When you take the time to dig into this ritual you discover some rather intriguing and significant elements. I can remember hearing Dr Chuck Missler say often that nothing is in the Bible by accident, every single word has incredible significance and the only reason we don’t see it is because we don’t take the time to dig into it. There are no coincidences in the Bible, so never be afraid to dig.
There are two places in the Torah where God gave instructions for a regular slave to become a bond-slave, they are Exodus 21, and Deuteronomy 15.
In the Exodus account, slavery is a very near memory for the Hebrews and they suffered terribly under the Egyptians, and yet God gave them instructions about themselves owning slaves. Interesting isn’t it? They had been slaves and yet they didn’t protest in any way at all about becoming slave owners so to speak. But God gave them very important instructions and keep in mind too, that everything in the Old Covenant points to Jesus the Messiah.
So the Hebrews have been set free from slavery, they’ve crossed the Red Sea and are no longer in danger of their former slave masters and they’re now in the wilderness in an isolated area and they’re having to get to know about their God who just saved them so dramatically. This time in the wilderness was actually very important for them.
Right after the dramatic Exodus from slavery in Egypt, God seems to indicate that at some point in their national future, they will themselves have slaves, even from among their own people, but He also lets them know that slavery isn’t meant to be forever. In fact, He instructs His people that after a set time all slaves must be set free and in fact, when the slave is set free he has to be sent out with plenty of provisions as well at the cost of the owner!
Remember, slavery in ancient Israel has no comparison with slavery throughout the rest of the world throughout human history.
What if the slave doesn’t want to be free? It’s hard to imagine a slave not wanting to be free, but if his life is vastly better than ever before and he loves his master who is good and kind and compassionate, why would he want to be free? What if he’s found a home and a family and an environment that is safe and comfortable and he’s found his place? He wants to stay…what then?
To us and our understanding of human slavery, that sounds utterly ridiculous? How could a ‘slave’ want to remain a slave? Again, Biblical slavery is very different to human slavery because God demanded His own people treat their slaves well and to never forget what it was like to be severely mistreated as they were at the hands of the Egyptians.
It’s also important to understand that ‘slaves’ in Biblical Israel weren’t captured and forced into labour, they were usually people who had for various different reasons, got into very difficult situations and indentured themselves in order to survive and it was always for a limited time. Never more than six years. In those environments, the often never wanted to leave because they’d been able to fit into a home and family environment that was perfect for them.
We’ve mentioned this before, but there was no such thing as social security in the ancient world, so if you feel on hard times, no matter how they came about, men and women could indenture themselves to someone and this provided them not only with work, but a home, food, clothing, medical care and the opportunity to have their own family for either a set period of time…no longer than six years, or for their lifetime if they really found a proper home and family to be part of.
Deuteronomy 15:12-17, “If your brother, a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you, he shall serve you six years, and in the seventh year you shall let him go free from you. And when you let him go free from you, you shall not let him go empty-handed. You shall furnish him liberally out of your flock, out of your threshing floor, and out of your winepress. As the Lord your God has blessed you, you shall give to him. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God redeemed you; therefore, I command you this today. But if he says to you, ‘I will not go out from you,’ because he loves you and your household, since he is well-off with you, then you shall take an awl, and put it through his ear into the door, and he shall be your slave forever.”
So you can understand why he or she would want to stay but why the awl through the ear, why the piercing and why against a door?
This is where we place a marker in the ground and start to dig and when you dig into the Word of God, you’re guaranteed to strike gold. Just look at the initial elements in this process.
Nails driven into flesh
Blood on door frames
Piercing that results in permanent scars and holes forever
Ringing any bells? We’re going to unpack this in more detail next time.
Shalom
Mandy
[1] www.blueletterbible.org/lang/Lexicon/Lexicon.cfm?strongs=G4742&t=KJV
[2] www.blueletterbible.org/lang/Lexicon/Lexicon.cfm?strongs=G2374&t=KJV
