When Jacob became Isrаel, after the slaughter of the folk who had defiled his only daughter, on the occasion of the raising of his new altar to the God of Abraham, he told his people to put away their earrings and other vestments, and in particular their idols.

This reflects one of the numerous purposes for earrings. Animists and other superstitious folk often believe that demons may enter the ears or nose, and placed piercings and plugs, and rings and gages and bones there as a kind of ward against evil spirits entering into their mind and afflicting their soul.

There is also the use of jewelry in general, particularly adorning women, who take few risks than men, as a mobile store of value and as an ostentatious display.

But when one reflects on the fact that in the ancient world women were not free, always owned by a master, from father, to husband to son, even when not members of the slave class, suspicion creeps forth. Particularly, when one considers that ears were routinely cropped and cut off, as were noses, when a slave was disobedient or ran away in Christian realms, it follows that Scripture might serve as an origin.

Below the Mosaic Law addresses the fact that Hebrews were permitted to buy and sell one another, but only for a limited period, unless one could use a woman and children to entrap him FOREVER.

According to Exodus 21:2–6:

-21:2: “If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing.”

-21:3 “If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him.” [1]

-21:4: “If his master have given him a wife, and she have born him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master’s, and he shall go out by himself.” [2]

-21:5: “And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free:” [3]

-21:6: “Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an aul; and he shall serve him for ever.”

One sees here the antiquity of the notion that the children of a slave woman should follow in his or her mother’s condition, as originating as part of the most famous and cohesive in-group covenant community in human history, while we are instead mislead that it was invented to deal with African slaves in America. Gentiles and Heathens were held forever until the Book of Leviticus stipulated that they should be released every 50 years, which was a good decade longer than they could expect to live.

So the facial mutilations of Medieval and Modern Christendom and Plantation America came down to those miserable wretches out of hallowed antiquity.

Notes

-1. It does not specify whether this man was in debt, brought in against his will, was seeking servitude in hopes of advancing up the social order as had Jacob, who served in return for a wife’s bride price, or was being purchased from a non-Hebrew in order to redeem him. Since all of these conditions applied to Medieval and Modern slaves, and there is no specification, than this too was probably variable, although the pastor teaching this segment of the scripture last week clearly stated that all Biblical slavery was voluntary, covering up the messy facts with the highest ideal.

-2. American slaves were generally handled according to this rule and it’s later refinement under Leviticus.

-3. While men were clearly held in bondage by keeping their family hostage in antiquity, in Plantation America, this manipulation was instead used almost exclusively to keep women in bondage, most infamously by breeding Irish Girls with Negroes, and using the mսlatto children, born into slavery as an anchor to keep the mother in voluntary unpaid service.

Sources

The Holy Bible, King James Version