Let us see the meaning of this term, applied to persons in other passages. In Gen. 31:15, Rachel and Leah say of their father, "He hath _sold_ us, and quite devoured also our money," referring to Jacob's long service for them; were they chattels? Gen. 47:23, Joseph _bought_ the Egyptians; were they chattels? Ex. 21:2, "If thou _buy_ a Hebrew servant, six years shall he serve, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing;" was he a chattel? Ruth 4:10, "Ruth the Moabitess have I _purchased_ this day to be my _wife_;" was she a chattel? These passages clearly show that the simple application of the term "bought with money" does _not_ imply property and possession as a chattel. The phrase "bought with money" relates, in the case of wives, to the dowry usual in Eastern countries; in the case of servants, to the ransom paid for captives in war, and paid by the individual on adoption into the tribe; or to an equivalent paid as hire of time and labor for a limited period, either to parents for their children as apprentices, &c., or to the individual himself, as Jacob to Laban. Gen. 31:41, "Thus have I been twenty years _in thy house_; I served thee fourteen years for thy two daughters, and six years for thy cattle, and thou hast changed my wages ten times." Thus Abraham could acquire a claim on the service of a man during life by purchase from himself; could acquire the allegiance of a man and his family, and all born in it, by contract, not to be broken but by mutual agreement; and in a few years have a vast household under his authority, "born in his house," and "bought with money," yet not one of them a slave. Another general proof already alluded to is, that the terms עֶבֶד, "servant," and נַעַר, _naar_, "young man," are applied synonymously and equally to servants and free persons. Gen. 14:24, Abraham calls his servants young men, and again in Gen. 17:23, 27. So in Job 1:15-19, the term נַעַר is applied alike to Job's servants and sons. Also in Judg. 7:10; 19:3, 11, 19; 1 Sam. 9:3, 5, 10, 22, and numerous other places, these terms are applied indiscriminately to servants, showing that they were always regarded as men, never as chattels. But we are not left to conjecture in regard to the status or condition of Abraham's servants; we will bring proofs showing that it could not have been chattel slavery. Two of the fundamental characteristics of chattelism are, The status of the mother decides that of the child, and The slave, being property, can not inherit or possess property. Was this the condition of "servants" in patriarchal society? If so, then these characteristics brand them as chattels; but on the contrary, if no record is found of their being sold, (the buying we have already reasonably accounted for;) if the children of these servants were reckoned free, if they and their children could inherit property, then even American slave law and custom declare them free persons, and not chattels personal.