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In Moses’ day, slavery exists everywhere in the world, and slaves are the first to be given protection under these guiding principles or judgments.

If you acquire a slave who is not married, then he will depart as a single man. But if you acquire a man who is married, then his wife will also leave when he goes free.

If his master provides a wife for him, and the wife gives him sons and daughters, then both the wife and the children belong to the master, and only the slave will leave the master’s service when the seventh year arrives.

But if the seventh year arrives and the slave freely renounces his right to freedom, saying, “My heart is full of love for my master, my wife, and my children. I will not leave my master’s service as a free man,”

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If he comes alone, he is to go free alone; but if he has a wife when he comes, she is to go with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her master, and only the man shall go free.

“But if the servant declares, ‘I love my master and my wife and children and do not want to go free,’(A)

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