John Gill Bible Commentary

But as an hired servant,.... Who is hired by the day, or month, or year; and, when his time is up, receives his wages and goes where he pleases, and while a servant is not under such despotic power and government as a slave is: and as a sojourner; an inmate, one that dwells in part of a man's house, or boards and lodges with him, and whom he treats in a kind and familiar manner, rather like one of his own family than otherwise: he shall be with thee; as under the above characters, and used as such: this the Jews refer to food and drink, and other things, as they do, Deu 15:16; and say (q) that a master might not eat fine bread, and his servant bread of bran; nor drink old wine, and his servant new; nor sleep on soft pillows and bedding, and his servant on straw: hence, they say (r), he that gets himself an Hebrew servant is as if he got himself a master: and shall serve thee unto the year of the jubilee; and no longer; for if the year of jubilee came before the six years were expired for which he sold himself, the jubilee set him free, as Jarchi observes; nay, if be sold himself for ten or twenty years, and that but one year before the jubilee, it set him free, as Maimonides says (s). (q) Maimon. in Misn. Kiddushin, c. 1. sect. 2. (r) Ibid. (s) Hilchot Abadim, c. 2. sect. 3.