the
Israelites.

"When you go among the heathen round about to get a man to work for you,
I straightly charge you to go first to his _neighbors_, get _their_
consent that you may have him, settle the terms with _them_, and pay to
them a fair equivalent. If it is not _their_ choice to let him go, I
charge you not to take him on your peril. If _they_ consent, and you pay
_them_ the full value of his labor, then you may go and catch the man
and drag him home with you, and make him work for you, and I will bless
you in the work of your hands and you shall eat of the fat of the land.
As to the man himself, his choice is nothing, and you need give him
nothing for his work: but take care and pay his _neighbors_ well for
him, and respect _their_ free choice in taking him, for to deprive a
heathen man by force and without pay of the _use of himself_ is well
pleasing in my sight, but to deprive his heathen neighbors of the use of
him is that abominable thing which my soul hateth."

3. "FOREVER." This is quoted to prove that servants were to serve during
their life time, and their posterity from generation to generation.[A]
No such idea is contained in the passage. The word "forever," instead of
defining the length of _individual_ service, proclaims the permanence of
the regulation laid down in the two verses preceding, namely, that their
_permanent domestics_ should be of the _Strangers_, and not of the
Israelites; it declares the duration of that general provision. As if
God had said, "You shall _always_ get your _permanent_ laborers from the
nations round about you; your servants shall _always_ be of that class
of persons." As it stands in the original, it is plain--"_Forever of
them shall ye serve yourselves_." This is the literal rendering.

[Footnote A: One would think that the explicit testimony of our Lord
should for ever forestall all cavil on this point. "_The servant abideth
not in the house_ FOR EVER, but the Son, abideth ever." John viii. 35.]

That "_forever_" refers to the permanent relations of a _community_,
rather than to the services of _individuals_, is a fair inference from
the form of the expression, "Both thy bondmen, &c., shall be of the
_heathen_. OF THEM shall ye buy." "They shall be your possession." "THEY
shall be your bondmen forever." "But over your brethren the CHILDREN OF
ISRAEL," &c. To say nothing of the uncertainty of _these individuals_
surviving those _after_ whom they are to live, the lang