(1) One who pays attention to meanings, Both general and particular; Will understand why a vav Precedes Eleh Ha-Mishpatim. (2) NOW THESE ARE THE ORDINANCES. After the children of Israel told Moses, Speak thou with us, etc. (Ex. 20:16), God told Moses, when Moses drew near to the thick darkness, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, etc. (Ex. 20:19). God began to warn them against making golden gods. He told Moses that upon Moses’ descent from Mount Sinai, He would make a covenant with Israel to the effect that the Lord alone would be their God. God taught Moses the ordinances and commandments so that Moses would tell Israel, if you accept these ordinances and commandments then God will make a covenant with you. At the end of these conditions, God told Moses the portion of Behold, I send an angel before thee (Ex. 23:20). The most important part of the latter chapter is the elimination of idol worship from their country when they entered it. Moses explained this to Israel before he made the covenant, for Moses concluded with, neither shalt thou serve their gods (Deut. 7:16). Now the portion opens with the prohibition against making other gods alongside the Lord and concludes with the commandment to uproot the memory of idols and molten gods which were made in the land of Canaan.

(1) ואלה המשפטים, "And these are the ordinances, etc." The word ואלה needs analysis. We find a disagreement in the Mechilta between Rabbi Yishmael and Rabbi Akiva on this subject. The former holds that the reason for the linkage between the Ten Commandments and the ordinances is to tell us that just as the former are of Sinaitic i.e. Divine origin, so are the latter. Rabbi Akiva said the reason for the conjunctive letter ו is that we could have thought that Moses was to teach the ordinances to the Israelites and if they did not understand them all, he, Moses, did not have to repeat them; therefore the Torah speaks of תשים לפניהם "place them in front of them," as one lays a meal before people which is ready to be eaten. According to Rabbi Yishmael who holds that the ordinances are of Sinaitic origin it is obvious that the Torah speaks about the details of these various laws being of Divine origin seeing we already know that the outlines are of Divine origin. Rabbi Yishmael has said himself in Zevachim 115 that all the general rules of the commandments of the Torah were handed down from Sinai, whereas Moses was told the details when G'd used to speak to him in the Tabernacle. If so, the commandments referred to here were the general outline only and there would be no reason for adding the letter ו in front of אלה. According to Rabbi Akiva who claimed that both general outlines and details were revealed to Moses at Mount Sinai, the expression ואלה המשפטים is also unnecessary. We need to look a little closer at what Rashi has to say on our verse. In our verse he explains the expression in line with Rabbi Yishmael, whereas at the beginning of Leviticus 25,1 where the Torah speaks about what G'd said to Moses at Mount Sinai, Rashi explains the verse in terms of Rabbi Akiva's statement in the Mechilta we quoted earlier. Rabbi Akiva said that just as both the outline and the details of the Shmittah regulations originated at Sinai, so all the laws in the Torah originated at Sinai. (2) Why does Rashi give two separate interpretations instead of mentioning that Rabbi Yishmael and Rabbi Akiva disagree in their understanding of our verse? Rashi could have more easily stated that the letter ו is to tell Moses how to teach the laws to the Jewish people, i.e. to set it before them like a table which is all laid out for the guests. He could have said that this rule applies both to the commandments regulating our relations with G'd as well as to those regulating our relations with each other. (3) I have seen that Rabbi Eliyah Mizrachi explains the statement of Rabbi Yishmael to mean that even the ordinances were also communicated to the Israelites amidst thunder and lightning, and that G'd spoke more than just the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai. Even if Rabbi Yishmael had said so expressly, he would have had to substantiate this, all the more so since Rabbi Mizrachi only credits him with having meant this. According to the Mechilta all Rabbi Yishmael is quoted as saying is "just as the earlier statements were revealed at Sinai so the (later) ordinances were also revealed at Sinai." He did not say that "just as the earlier commandments were issued amidst thunder and lightning so were the ordinances revealed amidst thunder and lightning." There is no hint in this statement of the ordinances having been revealed amidst thunder and lightning. Furthermore, we have already answered the question we raised about Rabbi Yishmael's statement referring to the details of these ordinances not being revealed here because he has stated that when the Torah introduces the Shmittah legislation in Leviticus. It is posssible that Rabbi Yishmael thought that the example of the שמטה legislation was not enough to use it as a role model for all the commandments seeing that there are three other occasions in the Torah when a commandment is specifically mentioned as related to Mount Sinai. The principal reason, however, is the one we already mentioned. It might be best to leave the question against Rashi as a matter unresolved pending further study than to follow the path of Rabbi Mizrachi who put words into Rabbi Yishmael's mouth that he has not been able to support with evidence. (4) If Rabbi Mizrachi's intention was to say that whereas the Ten Commandments were handed down amidst both thunder and lightning, whereas the ordinances were handed down only amidst thunder, not exactly like the Ten Commandments, this would also not be acceptable as it would create a third category of commandments and the manner in which they were communicated to the Jewish people. The first category would be the way the Ten Commandments were communicated; the second category would be the way G'd communicated all the commandments to Moses during the forty days Moses spent on the Mountain; the third category would be the ordinances. Who would be prepared to even listen to such an explanation?! There is nothing anywhere in the Torah which could serve as a comparison for such an approach! (5) Another reason why the Torah wrote ואלה may well have to do with Sanhedrin 86, which stipulates that the judges of the Sanhedrin had to officiate near the Tabernacle or Temple. The expression ואלה then hints that just as there are other locations which are sacred, namely the altar and subsequently the Tabernacle, so the site where the judges pronounced G'd's law also had to be a site which was close by and had been sanctified....

(2) When you acquire a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years; in the seventh year he shall go free, without payment. (3) If he came single, he shall leave single; if he had a wife, his wife shall leave with him. (4) If his master gave him a wife, and she has borne him children, the wife and her children shall belong to the master, and he shall leave alone.

(1) IF THOU BUY. Before I begin to explain let me give you a general rule. Each ordinance or commandment is an independent unit. If we are able to find a reason that two ordinances or commandments are connected to each other, then we will expend all of our efforts to connect them. If we are not able to do so, we will conclude that the reason this cannot be done is our intellectual deficiency. There is nothing in the world more difficult for a human being to bear than to be under the control of another person like himself. Scripture therefore began with the law of the Hebrew servant. Our sages said that the Hebrew servant is an Israelite. The same applies to And if a man sell his daughter to be a maid-servant (v. 7). However, our sages maintain that And if a man smite the eye of his bondmen (v. 26) refers to a Canaanite. Similarly, If the ox gore a bondman (v. 32). And they said that then he shall be sold for his theft (Ex. 22:2) refers to an Israelite. Those who dispute with our sages say that the Hebrew slave is not an Israelite but rather someone of Abraham’s family. The same is true of the daughter sold into slavery and of all the slaves mentioned afterwards. They are to be understood in the same way...

(1) IF THOU BUY A HEBREW SERVANT. G-d began the first ordinance with the subject of a Hebrew servant, because the liberation of the servant in the seventh year contains a rememberance of the departure from Egypt which is mentioned in the first commandment, just as He said on it, And thou shalt remember that thou wast a bondman in the land of Egypt, and the Eternal thy G-d redeemed thee; therefore I command thee this thing today. It also contains a remembrance of the creation, just as the Sabbath does, for the seventh year signals to a servant a complete rest from the work of his master, just as the seventh day of the week does. There is in addition a ‘seventh’ amongst the years, which is the jubilee, for seven is the chosen of the days [to be the Sabbath], and of the years [to be the Sabbatical year], and of the [seven] Sabbaticals [to be the jubilee]; and they all point to one subject, namely, the secret of the days of the world — from bereshith (in the beginning) till vayechulu (and they were finished). Therefore this commandment deserved to be mentioned first, because of its extreme importance, alluding as it does to great things in the process of creation. This is why the prophet Jeremiah was very stringent about it and said, Thus saith the Eternal, the G-d of Israel: I made a covenant with your fathers; At the end of the seven years ye shall let go every one his manservant, and every one his maidservant. And on account of its violation, G-d decreed the exile, just as the Torah decreed exile for the Sabbatical rest of the land which was not observed, as I will yet write, with the help of the Rock.
When He finished stating the ordinance of this [first] commandment as it applies to Hebrew servants, He began the ordinance of the commandment, Thou shalt not murder, since it is the worst [sin] and then [He stated the ordinances of the commandments] to honor one’s parents, and of Thou shalt not steal, and then He went back to the ordinance of one who smites his fellow-man but did not kill him, and then to the murder of a bondman, which is worse than the killing of an offspring, and after that to [injury to] the limbs of Israelites and bondmen, and then to cases of death inflicted by cattle which cause injury. All the sections are thus arranged in logical sequence and in proper order.