346. My Coffee’s Cold: The prohibition against working an eved Ivri too hard

Not only may we not give an eved Ivri degrading labor, as described in Mitzvah #344, we may not give him harsh labor, which is described as labor without limit. For example, the master may instruct his servant to hoe a certain field until a particular time or until he reaches a particular spot but not “Until I get back,” which is open-ended. Similarly, the master may not give the servant “busy work” just to occupy his time. For example, he may not instruct him to go reheat a beverage that has gone cold if he doesn’t really want it. (If the master can’t give the servant such a simple task as busy work, it goes without saying that he can’t give him unnecessary tasks that are actually grueling.)

The reason is as we have said, that it’s bad enough that someone had to sell himself as servant. We have no right to add to his troubles.

While we don’t currently have indentured servants, the lessons of this mitzvah still apply. We should be careful in the tasks we give the members of our household.

This mitzvah applied to both men and women in Israel at a time when the Jubilee year was observed. It is codified in the Mishneh Torah in the first chapter of Hilchos Avadim and is #259 of the 365 negative mitzvos in the Rambam’s Sefer HaMitzvos.