Exodus 22:1

Laws about Property

22:1 1 (21:37) 2  “If a man steals an ox or a sheep and kills it or sells it, he must pay back 3  five head of cattle for the ox, and four sheep for the one sheep. 4 

Exodus 26:8

26:8 The length of each 5  curtain is to be forty-five feet, and the width of each curtain is to be six feet – the same size for the eleven curtains.

Exodus 27:18

27:18 The length of the courtyard is to be one hundred fifty feet 6  and the width seventy-five feet, 7  and the height of the fine twisted linen hangings 8  is to be 9  seven and a half feet, with their bronze bases.

Exodus 38:12

38:12 For the west side there were 10  hangings seventy-five feet long, with 11  their ten posts and their ten bases, with the hooks of the posts and their bands of silver.

1 sn The next section of laws concerns property rights. These laws protected property from thieves and oppressors, but also set limits to retribution. The message could be: God’s laws demand that the guilty make restitution for their crimes against property and that the innocent be exonerated.

2 sn Beginning with 22:1, the verse numbers through 22:31 in the English Bible differ from the verse numbers in the Hebrew text (BHS), with 22:1 ET = 21:37 HT, 22:2 ET = 22:1 HT, etc., through 22:31 ET = 22:30 HT. Thus in the English Bible ch. 22 has 31 verses, while in the Hebrew Bible it has 30 verses, with the one extra verse attached to ch. 21 in the Hebrew Bible.

3 tn The imperfect tense here has the nuance of obligatory imperfect – he must pay back.

4 tn בָּקַר (baqar) and צֹאן (tso’n) are the categories to which the ox and the sheep belonged, so that the criminal had some latitude in paying back animals.

5 tn Heb “one”

6 tn Heb “a hundred cubits.”

7 tn Heb “fifty.” The text has “and the width fifty [cubits] with fifty.” This means that it is fifty cubits wide on the western end and fifty cubits wide on the eastern end.

8 tn Here “hangings” has been supplied.

9 tn Here the phrase “is to be” has been supplied.

10 tn The phrase “there were” has been supplied.

11 tn The text simply has “their posts ten and their bases ten”; this may be added here as a circumstantial clause with the main sentence in order to make sense out of the construction.