complete verse (Exodus 21:32)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Exodus 21:32:

  • Kupsabiny: “And/But if that bull has pierced a male or female slave, then the owner of the bull pays up to thirty pieces of silver to the owner of the slave. After that, the bull is stoned to death.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “If an ox gores to someone’s manservant or maid servant to the death, the owner must pay thirty shekels of silver to the master of the slave, and the ox must be stoned to death.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “If the bull/(cow) gores a slave, male or female, the owner must pay 30 pieces of silver to the master of the slave, and the bull/(cow) must be-stoned until will-die.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • Bariai: “And if the bulmakao strikes another man’s male or female laborer, the bulmakao’s owner will pay the laborer’s chief with thirty silva coins. And they must strike that bulmakao with stones so that it dies.” (Source: Bariai Back Translation)
  • Opo: “If cow will butt slave, male or woman, they must strike it with stone [that] it might die, and owner of cow, let him give chief of slave coin of gold which be 30 (thirty).” (Source: Opo Back Translation)
  • English: “If a bull attacks and gores a male or female slave, its owner must pay to the slave’s owner 30 pieces of silver. Then you must kill the bull by throwing stones at it.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Exod 21:32

In contrast to verse 31, this verse gives an exception. If the ox gores a slave does not say that the slave dies, but this is clearly implied. So Good News Translation has “If the bull kills.” As in verse 20, slave, male or female is literally “male-slave or female-slave”; but in some languages one may simply say “a slave.” The owner shall give is literally “he shall give,” but the context makes clear that the “he” refers to the owner of the “bull,” and that give really means “pay” (Good News Translation). To their master means, as Good News Translation expresses it, “to the owner of the slave,” or the “slaveowner” (New Revised Standard Version).

Thirty shekels of silver specifies the definite amount of money for the fine. The shekel was a weight measure that averaged about 11.4 grams, or 0.4 ounces. The total amount, thirty shekels, would be about 12 ounces, or 342 grams. This should not be given the same value as silver today, however. In ancient Israel one shekel could purchase ten pounds (three kilograms) of the best wheat or twenty pounds (six kilograms) of barley. (See 2Kgs 7.16 in Good News Translation.) Shekels of silver is specified, since shekels were sometimes measured in gold, bronze, and even iron. Since silver was much more common than gold, the word later came to be used for “money” (see verses 11 and 21). Both Good News Translation and Contemporary English Version translate this as “thirty pieces of silver.”

And the ox shall be stoned means, of course, that “the bull shall be stoned to death” (Good News Translation). (See the comment on stoning at verse 28.)

Quoted with permission from Osborn, Noel D. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Exodus. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1999. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .