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The Torah says the Hebrew maid-servant "shall go out free" if her master fails to fulfill his obligations (Exodus 21:11). The Mekhilta probes the meaning of the word "free" with a ...
The Torah describes a young woman sold into servitude by her father and establishes the conditions under which she goes free. Rabbi Eliezer interprets the verse "Then she shall go ...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael preserves a legal teaching from Rabbi Nathan that resolves an apparent contradiction in the Torah's laws about monetary obligations. On the one hand, ...
The Torah promises that God will provide "a place where he shall flee" for a person who kills accidentally (Exodus 21:13). This is the institution of the city of refuge, where an u...
The Mekhilta debates the physical dimensions of the refuge space that a person who killed accidentally was confined to. The previous passage established that even in the wilderness...
The Mekhilta now draws the ultimate conclusion from the legal hierarchy it has been constructing. Murder overrides the sacrificial service. This is established. But saving a life o...
The Torah says a person who strikes his father or mother "shall be put to death" (Exodus 21:15), but it does not specify the method of execution. The Mekhilta identifies this silen...
The Mekhilta records the precise procedure for carrying out the judicial penalty of strangulation — one of the four methods of capital punishment prescribed by Torah law. Far from ...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael presents a classic a fortiori argument, known in rabbinic logic as kal va-chomer, "from the light to the heavy." This particular kal va-chomer address...
The Torah states plainly: "If a man be found to have stolen a soul" (Deuteronomy 24:7). This is the law against kidnapping, one of the gravest crimes in Jewish jurisprudence, punis...
The Torah states that a kidnapper "shall be put to death" (Exodus 21:16), but does not specify the method of execution. The Mekhilta identifies the method as strangulation. But how...
The Mekhilta asks yet another question about the verse "And if one curses his father and his mother." From (Leviticus 20:9), which says "every man who curses," we would know only t...
The Torah commands, "And if one curses his father and his mother" he is liable for a grave sin (Exodus 21:17). The Mekhilta noticed that the verse as written only clearly applies w...
Rabbi Yoshiyah pushed the question of women in injury law even further. If men and women are truly equated, he argued, why does the Torah mention either gender at all? Let neither ...
Rabbi Yonathan argued that the explicit mention of "a man or a woman" in (Exodus 21:29) was not even necessary to include women in injury law. Two other verses already accomplished...
When a man strikes another and the victim recovers — "if he arise and walk outside upon his staff" — the Torah says "the striker shall be absolved" (Exodus 21:19). Absolved of what...
The Torah prescribes that when one person injures another, the attacker must pay for the victim's lost wages: "his sheveth shall he give" (Exodus 21:19). The Hebrew word sheveth me...
The Mekhilta explores a subtle legal distinction between two types of compensation: ripui (medical expenses) and sheveth (work-disability payment). When it comes to medical expense...
"And heal shall he heal" — the Torah doubles the word "heal," and the Mekhilta mines this repetition for legal content. If the victim was healed once but then relapsed, and was hea...
The Torah requires that for a killing to be classified as murder — and thus subject to the death penalty — the blow must be struck in a place on the body where it could actually ca...
R. Yitzchak says: Even a man who intends to smite one and smites another is not liable—until he makes it clear that it is this man that he wishes to smite, as it is written (Devari...
"And they hit a pregnant woman, and her fetuses miscarry" — Abba Chanin asked in the name of Rabbi Eliezer: why does the verse bother saying "a pregnant woman"? If her fetuses misc...
The Torah addresses a troubling scenario in (Exodus 21:22): two men are fighting, and in the chaos, a pregnant woman gets struck. The blow causes her to miscarry. Who pays? And to ...
(Exodus 21:26) "And if a man strike the eye of his (Canaanite) man-servant": What is the intent of this? From (Leviticus 25:26) "Forever shall you have them serve you," I might thi...
"the eye of his man-servant": I might think (that he goes free) even if it developed a leucoma; it is, therefore, written "and he destroy it." Only a blow that causes destruction (...
The Mekhilta addresses a precise scenario: what happens when a master knocks out two of his bondservant's teeth — or blinds both eyes — simultaneously, in a single blow? The ruling...
The Torah grants freedom to a bondservant whose master knocks out a tooth or blinds an eye. But does this apply only to adult bondservants? What about a minor — a child bondservant...
I might think (that he goes free) even if he knocked out a milk tooth, (which grows back); it is, therefore, written "eye." Just as an eye does not grow back, so the tooth (in ques...
Rabbi Yishmael taught a sobering principle about Canaanite bondservants: a Canaanite bondservant can never be redeemed by an outside party. The only path to freedom is the master's...
"And if an ox gore" — the Torah mentions only an ox. But what about other animals? If a donkey kicks someone, or a camel bites, do the same laws apply? The Mekhilta says yes, and d...
This tells me only of eating. Whence do I derive that it is even forbidden to derive benefit from it?—Do you ask? If follows a fortiori, viz.: If it is forbidden to derive benefit ...
The Mekhilta presents a logical reversal. It initially attempted to compare a stoned ox to an eglah arufah — the heifer whose neck is broken in the ceremony for an unsolved murder ...
One of Rabbi Yishmael's disciples raised a distinction between different categories of oxen. An ox that has become ritually impure (tamei) is still permitted for deriving benefit —...
"and the owner of the ox is absolved": R. Yehudah says: He is absolved by Heaven. For it would follow (otherwise), viz.: Since a mued is stoned and a tam is stoned, then if we have...
(Exodus 21:32) addresses the case of an ox that gores a bondservant: "If the ox gore a man-servant or a maid-servant." The Mekhilta explains that bondservants were already included...
R. Yehudah b. Betheira says: Opening (a pit) is not like digging, or digging, like opening. What is common to them is that wherever one is liable for guarding it, he is liable for ...
"And also the carcass shall they halve" — the Mekhilta derives practical rulings about how damages are calculated when one ox kills another. The rule depends on the relative values...
(Exodus 21:37) introduces the severe penalty for livestock theft: "If a man steal an ox or a lamb and slaughter it or sell it, he shall pay five oxen for the ox and four sheep for ...
Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai asked a beautiful question: why does the Torah require a five-fold payment for stealing an ox but only a four-fold payment for stealing a lamb? His answer...
The Mekhilta raises an objection to the theory that the four-and-five payment applies only to animals that are sacrificed on the altar. If that were the rule, then a blemished anim...
From the law of the burglar, the Mekhilta derives one of the most important principles in Jewish law: a doubt about whether a life is in danger overrides the Sabbath. The reasoning...
The Torah addresses the case of a thief who cannot repay what he stole. (Exodus 22:3) states: "If he lacks it, he is to be sold for his theft." The thief, unable to make restitutio...
"Then he shall be sold for his theft" — the Torah prescribes that a thief who cannot pay the required restitution is sold into servitude to raise the funds. But the Mekhilta adds a...
"living, two shall he pay": and not (the value of) dead (animals). There are seven "thefts": "stealing men's minds" (i.e., deceiving them), importuning one's neighbor to be his gue...
The Mekhilta expands the concept of theft beyond physical property. They said about certain people: if they could "steal" the Higher Mind — God's mind itself — they would do so. Th...
(Exodus 22:4) "If a man ravage a field or a vineyard, and he send his beast, etc.": Why is this written? (Even) if it were not written, it would follow a fortiori, viz.: If a pit i...
The Mekhilta establishes a foundational principle of tort law in the Torah: a person is not liable for damage unless the harmful agent leaves their property and causes damage elsew...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael derives a precise set of liability rules from the verse "and he send his beast" (Exodus 22:4), establishing who is responsible when an animal causes d...
