I. BUYING SERVANTS WAS REGARDED AS A KINDNESS TO THE PERSONS BOUGHT, and as establishing between them and their purchasers a bond of affection and confidence.  This is plain from the frequent use of it to illustrate the love and care of God for his chosen people.  Deut. xxxii. 6; Ex. xv. 16; Ps. lxxiv. 2; Prov. viii. 22.

II.  NO STRANGER COULD JOIN THE FAMILY OF AN ISRAELITE WITHOUT BECOMING A PROSELYTE.  Compliance with this condition was the price of the privilege.  Gen. xvii. 9-14, 23, 27.  In other words, to become a servant was virtually to become an Israelite.[A] In the light of this fact, look at the relation sustained by a proselyted servant to his master.  Was it a sentence consigning to punishment, or a ticket of admission to privileges?

[Footnote A:  The rites by which a stranger became a proselyte transformed him into a Jew.  Compare 1 Chron. ii. 17, with 2 Sam. xvii. 25.  In Esther viii. 17, it is said “Many of the people of the land became Jews.”  In the Septuagint, the passage is thus rendered, “Many of the heathen were circumcised and became Jews.”  The intimate union and incorporation of the proselytes with the Hebrews is shown by such passages as Isa. lvi. 6, 7, 8; Eph. ii. 11, 22; Num. x. 29-32.  Calmet, Art.  Proselyte, says “They were admitted to all the prerogatives of the people of the Lord.”  Mahommed doubtless borrowed from the laws and usages of the Jews, his well known regulation for admitting to all civil and religious privileges, all proselytes of whatever nation or religion.]

III.  EXPULSION FROM THE FAMILY WAS THE DEPRIVATION OF A PRIVILEGE IF NOT A PUNISHMENT.  When Sarah took umbrage at the conduct of Hagar and Ishmael, her servants, “She said unto Abraham cast out this bond-woman and her son.” * * And Abraham rose up early in the morning and took bread and a bottle of water and gave it unto Hagar and the child, and sent her away.  Gen. xxi. 10, 14; in Luke xvi. 1-8, our Lord tells us of the steward or head-servant of a rich man who defrauded his master, and was, in consequence, excluded from his household.  The servant anticipating such a punishment, says, “I am resolved what to do, that when I am put out of the stewardship, they may receive me into their houses.”  The case of Gehazi, the servant of Elisha, appears to be a similar one.  He was guilty of fraud in procuring a large sum of money from Naaman, and of deliberate lying to his master, on account of which Elisha seems to have discarded him. 2 Kings v. 20-27.  In this connection we may add that if a servant neglected the observance of any ceremonial rite, and was on that account excommunicated from the congregation of Israel, such excommunication excluded him also from the family of an Israelite.  In other words he could be a servant no longer than he was an Israelite.  To forfeit the latter distinction involved the forfeiture of the former privilege—­which proves that it was a privilege.