[Avodah] Rav Hirsch on Slavery

[Professor L. Levine via Avodah]

Shemos 12:44 says

??  ?????-????? ?????, ???????-??????--?????????? ?????, ??? ?????? ????.


44 but every man's servant that is bought for money, when thou hast circumcised him, then shall he eat thereof  [from the Korban Pesach].


RSRH comments on this pasuk


????? ?????, ???????   The Torah here assumes that,  even The Torah here assumes that, even amidst a people just released from slavery to freedom, the possession of slaves acquired

abroad will continue to exist. To arrive at an understanding of this fact,
we must consider the background conditions.

A Jew could not transform a person [against his will] into a slave.
[A person could, however, voluntarily sell himself as a slave to a Jew.]
A Jew could acquire a person as his property [against that person's will]
only if, by accepted international law, that person was already a slave.
This transference into the property of a Jew was the only salvation for
a person who, by accepted international law, was stamped as a slave.
The saddening experiences of our own times (the struggle over the
slaves in the United States; the rebellion of the blacks in Jamaica in
1865) show how wretched and vulnerable is the lot of a slave, no matter
whether he was deprived of his rights by accepted international law, or
was granted equal rights but is still universally looked upon as a slave
or as someone who was a slave.

A Jewish home was a haven to a slave. There, he was protected by
law against mishandling; and - this should not be undervalued - he
could join if he wished (according to Yevamos 48b), through , God's covenant with Israel, together with his master. He became a member of the household, like his master's children,

and like them he participated in the Pesach offering, on which God's people was
founded.


Moreover, according to the Halachah, if you have in your possession
a slave who has not been accepted - through milah and t'vilah - as your equal in God's covenant, you cannot place your home under God's  protection and guidance, and you are not allowed to participate in the Pesach offering.

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