——你们把他主人的事办妥了,主人在这奴仆身上的权分全得着了;他自己的事你们却没有办妥。怎见得呢?他不能娶婢女,因他一半已是自由身,自由的犹大人不可娶迦南籍的婢女。他也不能娶自由的妇人,因他一半还是奴仆,犹大妇人不可嫁迦南籍的奴仆。你们若说他索性闲着不娶——世界受造,岂不单是为着生养众多么?如经上所说:「他创造坚定大地,并非使地荒凉,是要给人居住」(以赛亚书 45:18)。倒不如为着世上的好处,勒着他主人放他作自由人,这奴仆再立一张字据,认下把自己半身之价还给主人。这是密释纳先前那一样文字。
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——你们把他主人的事办妥了,主人在这奴仆身上的权分全得着了;他自己的事你们却没有办妥。
You have remedied the situation of his master, who benefits fully from all his rights to the slave, but his own situation you have not remedied.
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怎见得呢?
How so?
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他不能娶婢女,因他一半已是自由身,自由的犹大人不可娶迦南籍的婢女。
He is not able to marry a maidservant, since half of him is already free, and a free Jew may not marry a Canaanite maidservant.
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他也不能娶自由的妇人,因他一半还是奴仆,犹大妇人不可嫁迦南籍的奴仆。
He is also not able to marry a free woman, since half of him is still a slave, and a Jewish woman may not marry a Canaanite slave.
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你们若说他索性闲着不娶——世界受造,岂不单是为着生养众多么?如经上所说:「他创造坚定大地,并非使地荒凉,是要给人居住」(以赛亚书 45:18)。
And if you say he should be idle and not marry, but is it not true that the world was created only for procreation, as it is stated: “He did not create it to be a waste; He formed it to be inhabited” (Isaiah 45:18)?
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倒不如为着世上的好处,勒着他主人放他作自由人,这奴仆再立一张字据,认下把自己半身之价还给主人。
Rather, for the improvement of the world we force his master to make him a free man, and the slave writes a bill accepting his responsibility to pay half his value to his master.
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这是密释纳先前那一样文字。
This was the original version of the mishna.