The plain meaning of the text
Some of the less literal translations suggest that the correct meaning of Ex 21.21 is "is the slave recovers after a day or two", relying on one of the senses of 'md being "to stand", but this is incorrect, as the idea of "stand" here is that if the slave can remain for one or two days, not stand after one or two days. This is not how the text is translated in any literal translation, in the targums, or in any academic translation.
Literal translations:
- KJV: "if he continue a day or two, he shall not be punished"
- LEB: "Yet if he survives a day or two days, he will not be avenged"
- ESV: "if the slave survives a day or two, he is not to be avenged"
- RSV: "if the slave survives a day or two, he is not to be punished"
- NASB95: "If, however, he survives a day or two, no vengeance shall be taken"
Targums and ancient translations:
Targum Neofiti[1]: "but if he survives a day or two, revenge shall not be taken of him"
Targum Onqelos[2]: "But if he will survive for a day or two days, he shall not be punished"
Douay-Rheims (vulgate): "But if the party remain alive a day or two, he shall not be subject to the punishment".
LXX: "But if he survives one day or two, he shall not be penalized"
Samaritan Pentateuch: "But if he survives a day or two, he will not be put to death"[4]
Academic translations:
Word Biblical Commentary (John Durham): "though if for a day or two days the slave lives, he is not to suffer punishment"[5]
Anchor Yale Bible Commentary: (William Propp): "However, if a day or two days he stands, he shall not be avenged"[6]
Therefore the interpretation of the NIV and related looser translations is an innovation that inserts into the text a crucial "after" that is not present. It is not supported by traditional understanding or modern scholarship.
Traditional Rabbinical Interpretations
Having established that the text says the owner of a slave that dies need not be punished if the slave survives for two days, we can look at how this passage was interpreted in the rabbinic tradition:
The rabbis primarily focused on whether this applied to a Hebrew or Canaanite slave, and came to the conclusion that it must refer only to gentile slaves, due to the final clause "for he is his money" - Gentile slaves were permanent property whereas Hebrew slaves might be freed after a period of time.
Rabbi Ishmael:
The Hebrew slave is thus excluded, for although when acquired by
inheritance he is completely his, he cannot be acquired as a lasting
possession. The slave belonging to partners and one who is half slave
and half free are also excluded. For although they can be acquired as
a lasting possession, they cannot be inherited so as to be the one
heir’s complete possession.[11]
Here is Rashi:
The text speaks of a Canaanite slave. Or perhaps it refers to a Hebrew
slave? No, v. 21 calls the slave his “property,” meaning a permanent
possession. This case would have been included under v. 12, had not
this verse specifically excluded it for the sake of the “day or two”
(v. 21) rule, saying that one who kills a slave is not punished unless
the slave dies under his hand [7]
Rashbam agrees that this must be a Canaanite slave:
His Canaanite slave. A Hebrew slave is not his “property”: “he shall
remain with you as a hired or bound laborer” (Lev. 25:40). He is
treated as an ordinary Jew in all respects except that his master may
provide him with a Canaanite slave-woman as his wife. [8]
Ibn Ezra agrees:
Those who deny rabbinic tradition [M] say that this slave is a Hebrew
slave, or a convert. But there is no doubt that Jewish law makes no
distinction between a Jew who is a slave and one who is free. So this
law must apply only to a slave acquired “from the nations round about”
(Lev. 25:44), i.e., a non-Jew. According to Saadia, the verse
discusses the case of a man who strikes his slave but not that of a
man who strikes his son because a man has tender feelings for his son
and could never be suspected of killing him deliberately [9]
Nahmanides also weighs in on this important distinction:
Our Sages deduced from “he is the other’s property” (v. 21) that the
slave must be a Canaanite, not an Israelite. And the plain sense of
the text really is what they say. For “slave” without any other
identification never means a Hebrew slave [10]
Traditional Christian Interpretations
I could only find one reference to this passage among Church Fathers, a Homily by John Chrysostom, taking the optimistic view (as was common among Church fathers), that the true meaning of this verse was that the owner of a slave would not want to kill him because the slave is his property, and then making the analogy that believers are God's slaves, and therefore His property, so that we shouldn't despise his discipline. This type of difference in emphasis between rabbinical and church fathers in their approach to the law is quite common.
John Chrysostom:
This is the part of well-disposed servants, not only in His mercies,
but in His corrections, and in punishments wholly to submit to Him.
For how is it not absurd,3 if we bear with masters beating their
servants, knowing that they will spare them, because they are their
own;4 and yet suppose that God in punishing will not spare? This also
Paul has intimated, saying, “Whether we live or die, we are the
Lord’s.” (Rom. 14:8.) A man, we say, wishes not his property to be
diminished, he knows how he punishes, he is punishing his own
servants. But surely no one of us spares more than He Who brought us
into being out of nothing, Who maketh the sun to rise, Who causeth
rain; Who breathed our life into us, Who gave His own Son for us. [12]
Modern Interpretations
Critical commentaries tend to be skeptical of the rabbinical view that the passage applies only to gentile slaves:
Lange:
On the one hand, the danger of a fatal blow was greater than in other
relations, for it was lawful for a master to smite his slave (vid.
Prov. 10:13; the rod was also used on children); but on the other hand
an intention to kill could not easily be assumed, because the slave
had a pecuniary value. Furthermore, the owner is exempted from
punishment, if the beaten one survives a day or two; and the
punishment then consists in the fact that the slave was his money,
i.e. that in injuring the slave he has lost his own money. The Rabbins
hold that this applied only to slaves of a foreign race, according to
Lev. 25:44. This is not likely, if at the same time, in case of death,
execution by the sword was to be prescribed; also according to this
view there would have been a great gap in the law as regards Hebrew
slaves. It is true, reference is here had only to injuries inflicted
by the rod. When one was killed with an iron instrument, an intention
to kill was assumed, and then capital punishment was inflicted
unconditionally, Num. 35:16, Lev. 24:17, 21, Deut. 19:11 sqq. On the
Egyptian, Greek, and Roman legislation, see Knobel, p. 219. [13]
I believe the cleanest and most correct reading of the plain text is by K&D.
Keil and Delitzsch:
Ex. 21:20, 21. The case was different with regard to a slave. The
master had always the right to punish or “chasten” him with a stick
(Prov. 10:13; 13:24); this right was involved in the paternal
authority of the master over the servants in his possession. The law
was therefore confined to the abuse of this authority in outbursts of
passion, in which case, “if the servant or the maid should die under
his hand (i.e., under his blows), he was to be punished” (נָקֹם
יִנָּקֵם: “vengeance shall surely be taken”). But in what the נָקֹם
was to consist is not explained; certainly not in slaying by the
sword, as the Jewish commentators maintain. The lawgiver would have
expressed this by מֹות יוּמַת. No doubt it was left to the authorities
to determine this according to the circumstances. The law in v. 12
could hardly be applied to a case of this description, although it was
afterwards extended to foreigners as well as natives (Lev. 24:21, 22),
for the simple reason, that it is hardly conceivable that a master
would intentionally kill his slave, who was his possession and money.
How far the lawgiver was from presupposing any such intention here, is
evident from the law which follows in v. 21, “Notwithstanding, if he
continue a day or two (i.e., remain alive), it shall not be avenged,
for he is his money.” By the continuance of his life, if only for a
day or two, it would become perfectly evident that the master did not
wish to kill his servant; and if nevertheless he died after this, the
loss of the slave was punishment enough for the master. There is no
ground whatever for restricting this regulation, as the Rabbins do, to
slaves who were not of Hebrew extraction.[14]
[1] Kevin Cathcart, Michael Maher, and Martin McNamara, eds., The Aramaic Bible: Targum Neofiti 1: Exodus and Targum Pseudo-Jonathan: Exodus, trans. Martin McNamara, Michael Maher, and Robert Hayward, vol. 2 (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1994), Ex 21:21.
[2] Kevin Cathcart, Michael Maher, and Martin McNamara, eds., The Aramaic Bible: The Targum of Onqelos to Exodus, trans. Bernard Grossfeld, vol. 7 (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1990), Ex 21:21.
[3] The Lexham English Septuagint, Second Edition. (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2020), Ex 21:21.
[4] Benyamim Tsedaka, ed., The Israelite Samaritan Version of the Torah: First English Translation Compared with the Masoretic Version, trans. Benyamim Tsedaka (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2013), Ex 21:21.
[5] John I. Durham, Exodus, vol. 3, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1987), 307.
[6] William H. C. Propp, Exodus 19–40: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, vol. 2A, Anchor Yale Bible (New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 2008), 104.
[7] Michael Carasik, ed., Exodus: Introduction and Commentary, trans. Michael Carasik, First edition., The Commentators’ Bible (Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society, 2005), 178.
[8] Michael Carasik, ed., Exodus: Introduction and Commentary, trans. Michael Carasik, First edition., The Commentators’ Bible (Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society, 2005), 178.
[9] Michael Carasik, ed., Exodus: Introduction and Commentary, trans. Michael Carasik, First edition., The Commentators’ Bible (Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society, 2005), 178.
[10] Michael Carasik, ed., Exodus: Introduction and Commentary, trans. Michael Carasik, First edition., The Commentators’ Bible (Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society, 2005), 178.
[11] Jacob Zallel Lauterbach, Mekilta de-Rabbi Ishmael, New ed. (Philadelphia, Pa: Jewish Publication Society, 2004), 395.
[12] John Chrysostom, “Homilies of St. John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople, on the Epistle of St. Paul the Apostle to Philemon,” in Saint Chrysostom: Homilies on Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus, and Philemon, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. James Tweed and Philip Schaff, vol. 13, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1889), 553.
[13] John Peter Lange, Philip Schaff, and Charles M. Mead, A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures: Exodus, vol. 2 (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2008), 89–90.
[14] Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch, Commentary on the Old Testament, vol. 1 (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1996), 408–409.