Вайикра 19:20 Комментарий: Rashi, Ibn Ezra, Ramban & Rashbam

נחרפת לאיש [AND WHOSOEVER LIETH CARNALLY WITH A WOMAN THAT IS A HANDMAID] GIVEN OVER TO A MAN — נחרפת signifies: destined and designated to a man. I do not know of any similar use of it (the root חרף) in Scripture. — And it is of a Canaanitish handmaid who is partly a שפחה and partly a free-woman and who is betrothed to a Hebrew servant who is permitted to marry a שפחה, that Scripture is here speaking (Sifra, Kedoshim, Chapter 5 2; Keritot 11a).

a bondmaid The Exegetes have asserted that this woman is not Jewish. Otherwise, a literal interpretation of this verse would identify her with the Israelite woman who is discussed in the passage “When a man sells his daughter to be a maid-servant…” [Exodus 21:7]. In both cases, the woman has been designated eventually to marry her master, or her master’s son, but she is not formally engaged. This is the meaning of she was not free — for she does not become completely free until she receives a proper betrothal.

AND WHOSOEVER LIETH CARNALLY WITH A WOMAN THAT IS A BONDMAID, ‘NECHEREPHETH’ FOR A MAN — “‘Destined’ for a man. I know not of a similar usage of this root [choraph] in Scripture.” This is Rashi’s language. It appears to me that it is associated with the expression, as I was in the days of ‘chorpi,’¹³⁷Job 29:4. meaning, in the days of my youth. Similarly, my heart shall not ‘yecheraph’ me so long as I live,¹³⁸Ibid., 27:6. meaning that I will not have the heart of a youth [who has not yet matured in wisdom]. The days of youth are called “the days of choreph” [a term which means “winter”], since the winter is at the beginning of the year, while the days of old age correspond to the summer which are the days of gathering in. Scripture, then, is stating here that she is a bondmaid, a young girl designated for a certain man, for a concubine who ministers to a man and with whom she has sexual relations, is called “his maiden,” just as every ministering person is also called [the master’s] lad. It is very common in the language of the Sages to say of a woman who has sexual relations with a man, that she is “an attendant to him.” And it is this [relationship that is here called] necherepheth, meaning that she has become a maiden [— attendant] to a man, and is known to him, called in the vernacular [i.e., in Spanish] mancipada (designated to a man). In the language of the Sages likewise we find the expression:¹³⁹Sanhedrin 58 b. “that slave’s girl” [assigned to him by his master]. Thus the meaning thereof is that she is not completely as his wife, but he has betrothed her and she is to him a maiden-attendant.