205. The Goring Ox - February 13, 2021

There are laws that address the possible goring to death of a person by an ox that date to the 18th century BCE, long before the Israelite dating of the passage we read in Exodus 21. Penalties in other Near Eastern cultures required a monetary payment, but the ox was allowed to live and continue to provide value to the owner. In the Israelite law, an ox that gored a human must be killed. And maybe the owner would be, too!