every year in celebrating the Passover, the feast of Pentecost, and the
feast of Tabernacles; every male throughout the land was to appear
before the Lord at Jerusalem with a gift; here the bond and the free
stood on common ground. Deut. xvi.

9. If a man smite his servant or his maid with a rod, and he die under
his hand, he shall be surely punished. Notwithstanding, if he continue a
day or two, he shall not be punished, for he is his money. Ex. xxi, 20,
21.

From these laws we learn that Hebrew men servants were bound to serve
their masters _only six_ years, unless their attachment to their
employers, their wives and children, should induce them to wish to
remain in servitude, in which case, in order to prevent the possibility
of deception on the part of the master, the servant was first taken
before the magistrate, where he openly declared his intention of
continuing in his master's service, (probably a public register was kept
of such) he was then conducted to the door of the house, (in warm
climates doors are thrown open,) and _there_ his ear was _publicly_
bored, and by submitting to this operation he testified his willingness
to serve him _forever_, i.e. during his life, for Jewish Rabbins who
must have understood Jewish _slavery_, (as it is called,) "affirm that
servants were set free at the death of their masters and did _not_
descend to their heirs:" or that he was to serve him until the year of
Jubilee, when _all_ servants were set at liberty. To protect servants
from violence, it was ordained that if a master struck out the tooth or
destroyed the eye of a servant, that servant immediately became _free_,
for such an act of violence evidently showed he was unfit to possess the
power of a master, and therefore that power was taken from him. All
servants enjoyed the rest of the Sabbath and partook of the privileges