oke of oxen" when Elijah threw his
mantle upon him. 1 Kings xix. 19. King Uzziah "loved husbandry." 2
Chron. xxvi. 10. Gideon, the deliverer of Israel, _was "threshing wheat_
by the wine press" when called to lead the host against the Midianites.
Judges vi. 11. The superior honorableness of agriculture, is shown by
the fact, that it was _protected and supported by the fundamental law_
of the theocracy--God thus indicating it as the chief prop of the
government, and putting upon it peculiar honor. An inheritance of land
seems to have filled out an Israelite's idea of worldly furnishment.
They were like permanent fixtures on their soil, so did they cling to
it. To be agriculturalists on their own inheritances, was, in their
notions, the basis of family consequence, and the grand claim to
honorable estimation. Agriculture being pre-eminently a _Jewish_
employment, to assign a native Israelite to _other_ employments as a
_business_, was to break up his habits, do violence to cherished
predilections, and put him to a kind of labor in which he had no skill,
and which he deemed degrading. In short, it was, in the earlier ages of
the Mosaic system, practically to _unjew_ him, a hardship and rigor
grievous to be borne, as it annihilated a visible distinction between
the descendants of Abraham and the Strangers--a distinction vital to the
system, and gloried in by every Jew.

_To guard this and another fundamental distinction_, God instituted the
regulation contained in Leviticus xxv. 39, which stands at the head of
this branch of our inquiry, "_If thy brother that dwelleth by thee be
waxen poor, and be sold unto thee, thou shalt not compel him to serve as
a bond-servant._" In other words, thou shalt not put him to _servants'
work_--to the _business_, and into the _condition_ of _domestics_.

In the Persian version it is translated thus, "Thou shalt not assign to
him the work of _servitude_," (or _menial_ labor.) In the Septuagint
thus, "He shall not serve thee with the service of a _domestic or
household servant_." In the Syriac thus, "Thou shalt not employ him
after the manner of servants." In the Samaritan thus, "Thou shalt not
require him to serve in the service of a servant." In the Targum of
Onkelos thus, "He shall not serve thee with the service of a household
servant." In the Targum of Jonathan thus, "Thou shalt not cause him to
serve according to the usages of the servitude of servants[A]." In fine,
"thou shalt not comp