But if the ox has been accustomed to gore in the past, and its owner has been warned but has not kept it in, and it kills a man or a woman, the ox shall be stoned, and its owner also shall be put to death.
The law shields pregnant women with tender care, the tree and fruit must not be destroyed together. God's providence protects those who fear Him in child-bearing. Yet mark this: the lex talionis belongs to magistrates and God's hand in providence, never to private revenge, which would make men like fishes of the sea, devouring one another.
AI summary
Commenting on Exodus 21:22-36
But if the ox were wont to push with his horns in time past,.... Or "from or before yesterday, to the third" (m) that is, three days before, and had made three pushes, as Jarchi explains it: and it hath been testified to his owner; by sufficient witnesses, who saw him push at people for three days past: the Targum of Jonathan is,"and it hath...
A man who sells his daughter into servitude cannot sell her onward to another master. Either her owner or his son must take her as intended wife with fitting maintenance for her condition, or release her free at once.
AI summary
Commenting on Exodus 21:7-36