Addition of end comment: Sorry to send twice.
Leviticus, Parshat Behar. 23: 39 ff.
23: 39 - If your brother becomes impoverished with you and is sold to you; you shall not work him with slave labor.
Rashi: Slave labor. This refers to demeaning labor, - by which he can be identified as a slave.* For example, that he should not carry [the master’s] clothes behind [the master] to the bathhouse, and he should not put [the master’s] shoes on [the master].
* Lifshuto shel Rashi: The verse does not mean to prohibit using a Hebrew servant for difficult labor.
23:40-43 – Like a hired laborer or a resident shall he be with you; until the yovel shall he work with you. Then he shall return to his family and he will return to the heritage of his ancestors. For they are slaves, whom I have taken out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold by a selling of a slave. Do not subjugate him through hard labor – you shall have fear of God.
23:44 – And your slave or your maidservant whom you may own, from the nations surround you from them you may purchase a slave or a maidservant.
Rashi: And your slave or your maidservant whome you may own. If you will say, “If so that I may not use a Hebrew servant for personal services, what (whom) will I use for such services? I do not hold full authority over my Hebrew servants. Nor may I take possession of members of the seven nations who occupy the Land of Canaan, for, see now, You have enjoined me, ‘You shall not allow any soul to remain alive!”
Who then will serve me? The Torah answers …
Rashi: From the Nations. … they shall be to you for slaves.
Obviously, slavery and genocide are both equally acceptable as long as they are the command of God.
Posted by Binyamin at May 14, 2008 09:03 AM