Exodus 21:
Strong's Hebrew: 5769. עוֹלָם (olam or olam) — 438 Occurrences
He would be his slave for a finite amount of time, i.e., the rest of his life.
Genesis 21:
It is the same word here, but now it seems to mean infinite time.
Exodus 30:
The temple was destroyed over 2000 years ago. This statute is not working today. Perhaps H5769 means something like
perpetual:
There was another Hebrew word, H5704, which often was translated as "forever". Gen 13:
Strong's Hebrew: 5704. עַד (ad) — 1260 Occurrences
But then, the same word was translated as "till" in Genesis 3:
H5769-forever and H5704-forever are ambiguous. They do not always mean time going on to infinity.
See also
Forever vs eternal
Oooooo....... I think the trees have been observed at the expense of the forest.
The ear-piercing ritual was part of the bond service system God established in His Law. In ancient times God's people did not have penitentiaries where wrongdoers were warehoused at the expense of the assembly. In God's jurisprudence a wrongdoer either worked off his debt or he was killed. Capital crimes had to be decided on the testimony of two or more witnesses. The sanctioned killing was a means fo removing dross and purifying society. Otherwise, God's jurisprudence is restitutional and rehabilitative, not vindictive and retributional. Vengeance is God's (and His alone). We're supposed to love. Love is the fulfillment of the Law.
In modern vernacular what this means is that if I borrow your lawnmowers and break it then I owe you a lawnmower. And because of what we now call "tort" I might bring you a new five-gallon can of gas to fuel your new mower for multiple mows. I do so as an expression of my sincere remorse and amends for any additional lose, suffering or inconvenience you might have experienced losing the mower.
In God's law one of the examples is the loss of a donkey. If I borrowed your donkey and broke your donkey, then I owed you a donkey.... plus five shekels. If, conversely, I borrowed your ox and broke your ox then I owed you an ox..... plus
40 shekels! Why the larger increase in additional penalty? Simply put, the ox was worth more. It can plow more acreage, it can be eaten, and its hide can be used in ways the donkey cannot be used.
Suppose, however, I could not afford to re-pay you the donkey I broke? You would then take me to the priests and have them arbitrate. The value of the donkey would be appraised, and the penalty amount added, and that would be the monetary amount assigned as my debt. I would then be taken to the marketplace where my debt would be sold. Someone with sufficient wealth would purchase those who owed debts for the amount of the debt. This debt-purchaser would repay the one who lost the donkey and then the donkey owner and I would no longer have the division of debt between us. I would now be indebted to the debt-purchaser. The debt-purchaser would appraise the debt because all debts were forgiven every seven years. Would I be able to work off the debt in what remained of the seven-year cycle? A debt of 50 or 100 shekels might easily be worked off in three, five, or seven years, but a much larger debt could not. However, regardless of the debt owed, I would be taken out of the marketplace to work off the debt now owned by the debt-purchaser.
Buying a debt entailed risks other than whether or not the debt would be sufficiently repaid with labor. The debt-purchaser was obligated to assign me labor AND equip me sufficiently to perform those tasks. I purchased to lay brick then I was to be provided with bricks, mortar, and a trowel. Carpentry labor required the provision of wood, nails, and other necessities. A house servant must be provided attire consistent with those duties - all at the expense of the debt-purchaser and all to be repaid by the debtor.
At the point my debt was worked off the debt-purchaser would then take me back to the priests and testify the debt had been repaid and no debt was owed. At this point the record was made public, and I was now reconciled to the originally offended donkey owner, the one who had purchased my debt and the community indirectly but intrinsically damaged by my wrongdoing. Because I had been given a new service, a new trade by my debt-purchaser I was also now in possession of a new profession by which I could make a living and be a contributing member of the community. I need no longer rely on my prior profession (plowing fields) or criminal activity (like thieving were the original offence being my getting caught in thievery). God's Law did not maim. Thieves did not have their hands cut off like the surrounding pagan cultures.
God's Law is restitutional and rehabilitative. My debt was repaid by my own hand, and I was now a more-skilled productive member of the community, wholly reconciled to all.
But what happened if I wanted to remain in the employ of the one who purchased my debt. That is where the ritual of the ear piercing occurred. I would pledge my loving faithfulness to the one who had purchased my debt, and I would then be taken to the doorway of his house where the lobe of my ear would be pierced, and a ring put through the lobe. That ring would then be a symbol to everyone that I was a bondservant in perpetuity, a bondservant whose debt had been paid off and still voluntarily worked in service to his master in perpetuity when he no longer otherwise needed to do so.
In other words, the bond service system God instituted among His people was a foreshadowing of the gospel.
Each of us owed a debt we could not repay. Each of us was purchased at a price and none of us are our own any longer. We are the bondservants of Christ. It was with his blood that we were purchased, and that blood was shed by grace. Having been purchased we are to be about the work of our Debt-Purchaser.
Ephesians 2:8-10
For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
So.... NO! The "forever" associated with the ear-piercing ritual is NOT about "
a finite amount of time." It's permanent and eternal.
One more aspect of the bond service system deserve mention. When I broke your donkey you had the power, authority, and privilege to forgive the debt right then. You need not hold me accountable for the broken donkey. That power rested solely with you. No one else could cancel the debt but you. The priests could not usurp someone else's authority and cancel the debt. No judge could do that, either. The Law laid that power to forgive debt only on the one owed the debt. You might take me to the priests to have the debt recorded
and then forgive the debt! Why? Because a chronic donkey-breaker should have his wrongdoing made known to the community. Others might not loan donkeys to a person who'd broken more than one donkey. The donkey-breaker, having his chronic practice made known, might look for other work. Regardless of when the one owed forgave the debt he did so by grace out of mercy and he and he alone possessed that power and authority.
The debt of sin is owed God, and God alone. Only He can forgive it. If and when He forgives that debt is it not for a finite period of time.
