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Old July 11th, 2014 #1
Karl Radl
The Epitome of Evil
 
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Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: The Unseen University of New York
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Default Slavery in the Hebrew Bible

Slavery in the Hebrew Bible


Slavery is one of the most controversial of all subjects and its relation to the Biblical text is something that needs to be; in my view, addressed here. I am not here going to discuss the various rabbinical interpretations of the text of the (Written) Torah and the Tanakh on issue, because that would make this article into a quite significant tome. What I am going to do is focus on what the Hebrew Bible; or Tanakh, actually says about the matter as opposed to what later rabbinic commentators have interpreted it as saying.

It is first of all necessary to begin by pointing out that the Hebrew Bible text and the nature of Judaism as a caste-based; as opposed to confession-based, religion means that there are two groups to considered separately in relation to slavery: Israel (i.e. jews) and non-Israel (non-jews). This is because Judaism; and the Hebrew Bible, splits the world up into those two camps: those who are born jewish and those who aren't.

This distinction forms the basis for much of what the Torah and the Tanakh (aka the Hebrew Bible) have to say on the matter of slavery since there is quite clearly one rule for jews and one for non-jews. For example in the book of Exodus we are told that a jewish man or woman can be a slave, but that their slavery comes with the condition that they be set free in seven years.

We read:

'Now these are the ordinances which you shall set before them. When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing. If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master's and he shall go out alone. But if the slave plainly says, 'I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,' then his master shall bring him to God, and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him for life.' (1)

The first thing we need to be wary of in the above text is that this ruling refers explicitly to jews who are slaves and not to non-jews in the same condition. Having removed any attempt to universalize this passage: we can see that it states that jewish slaves should go out into freedom from their master in the seventh year.

So far so good, but notice the qualifications that are introduced by the text in that the slave may not take his wife or any children that he did not come into the household with along with him: unless he decides to 'voluntarily' become his master's indentured servant for life by having an awl (a tent peg) driven through his ear as a distinctive (and disfiguring) public badge of his perpetual servitude. This is quite clearly a vile ruling by the (Written) Torah in so far it deliberately splits up families and forces slaves into an untenable position of either being a good husband and father by 'voluntarily' enslaving ones self in perpetuity or abandoning your wife and children to their fate as your former master's property.

This is confirmed by the book of Deuteronomy, which states that:

'If your brother, a Hebrew man, or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you, he shall serve you six years, and in the seventh year you shall let him go free from you. And when you let him go free from you, you shall not let him go empty-handed; you shall furnish him liberally out of your flock, out of your threshing floor, and out of your wine press; as the Lord your God has blessed you, you shall give to him. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God redeemed you; therefore I command you this day. But if he says to you, 'I will not go out from you,' becauses he loves you and your household, since he fares well with you, then you shall take an awl, and thrust it through his ear into the door, and he shall be your bondsman for ever. And to your bondswoman you shall do likewise. It shall seem hard to you, when you let him go free from you; for at half the cost of a hired servant he has served you six years. So the Lord your God will bless you in all that you do.' (2)

In this excerpt we can see that much the same is specified as in the book of Exodus: with jewish slaves being unilaterally freed on the seventh year of their enslavement and being given the choice of freedom or staying with their master if they commit to perpetual servitude with the identifying mark being once again that an awl should be driven through their ear (which can hardly have been a pleasant experience).

However we also learn that jewish slaves; if they decide they wish to go free, are to be treated rather well in so far as when they are given their freedom automatically on the seventh year then their former master is required to liberally furnish them with all the necessaries to start them in the world: livestock, grain and wine. This is explained by the (Written) Torah as not being harsh because their master has had six years of work out of them for half the cost of a hired servant.

In other words: the jewish master has profited and thus should give back a little to the jew he has bought and used as a slave.

This issue is further commented on in the book of Leviticus, which states:

'And if your brothers becomes poor beside you, and sells himself to you, you shall not make him serve as a slave: he shall be with you as a hired servant and as a sojourner. He shall serve with you until the year of the jubilee; then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and go back to his own family, and return to the possession of his fathers. For they are my servants, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: they shall not be sold as slaves. You shall not rule over him with harshness, but shall fear your God.' (3)

In the above we can once again see the distinction between jewish and non-jewish slave is brought out by the text with the jewish slave being provided with a large number of benefits. In this instance we are told that if a jewish man falls upon hard times then he can sell himself to another jew to repay the debt but that the jew who has bought his penurious fellow tribesman (and his family) cannot treat them as if they were actually slaves, but rather servants who he has hired for a number of years commensurate to the Jubilee (which is every fifty years).

In practice this would mean that the term of voluntary indenture of the male jewish slave (and his family) to his jewish buyer is whatever years remain to the year of the Jubilee. This could be as long as forty-nine years and as short as a day: dependent on the time of purchase. Regardless the (Written) Torah admonishes the jews that the reason for this is because they are Yahweh's chosen people then they shall not be sold as slaves or ever enslaved.

This special status is confirmed when we read the following in the book of Exodus:

'Whoever steals a man, whether he sells him or is found in possession of him, shall be put to death.' (4)

That the man; and not a woman mind, in question is specifically a jewish man we learn from the book of Deuteronomy, which clarifies this passage thus:

'If a man is found stealing one of his brethren, the sons of Israel, and if he treats him as a slave or sells him, then that thief shall die; so you shall purge the evil from the midst of you.' (5)

While the second book of Kings relates the story of how Eli'sha performed a 'miracle' to prevent the enslavement to a (presumably jewish) creditor of a jewish woman's sons:

'Now the wife of one of the sons of the prophets cried to Eli'sha, "Your servant my husband is dead; and you know that your servant feared the Lord, but his creditor has come to take my two children to be his slaves." And Eli'sha said to her, "What shall I do for you? Tell me; what have you in the house?" And she said, "Your maidservant has nothing in the house, except a jar of oil." Then he said, "Go outside, borrow vessels of all your neighbours, empty vessels and not too few. Then go in, and shut the door upon yourself and your sons, and pour into all these vessels; and when one is full, set it aside." So she went from him and shut the door upon herself and her sons; and as she poured they brought the vessels to her. When the vessels were full, she said to her son, "Bring me another vessel." And he said to her, "There is not another." Then the oil stopped flowing. She came and told the man of God, and he said, "Go, sell the oil and pay your debts, and you and your sons can live on the rest.' (6)

If the jews do manage to enslave their fellow jews and sell them to non-jewish masters then; in the book of Joel, Yahweh threatens that he will allow the jews themselves to be enslaved by their non-jewish enemies in the following passage:

'You have sold the people of Judah and Jerusalem to the Greeks, removing them far from their own border. But now I will stir them up from the place to which you have sold them, and I will repay your deed on your own head. I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hands of the sons of Judah, and they will sell them to the Sabe'ans, to a nation far off; for the Lord has spoken.' (7)

Thus we can see that Yahweh distinctly does not approve of jews being enslaved by their fellow tribesmen and makes specific rulings against it as well as prescribing the death sentence for those guilty of it (and the prospect of protracted enslavement to non-jews if the Israelites do not follow his legal dictates on the matter).

The fact that this possibility is mentioned so much in both the (Written) Torah and Tanakh is interesting as it directly suggests that the jews were; as was the case over a millennium later, (8) intimately involved in the slave trade and that said slave trade regularly meant jews trying to enslave each other (or selling themselves to each other), which lead to the reality of jews purchasing non-jewish slaves and also selling their jewish slaves to non-jewish masters for profit.

That the jews had sold; or at least could in theory sell, their fellow members of the tribe to non-jews as slaves is taken for granted in the book of Leviticus, which has the following to say about it:

'If a stranger or sojourner with you becomes rich, and your brother beside him becomes poor and sells himself to the stranger or sojourner with you, or to a member of the stranger's family, then after he is sold he may be redeemed; one of his brothers may redeem him, or his uncle, or his cousin may redeem him, or a near kinsman belonging to his family may redeem him, or if he grows rich he may redeem himself. He shall reckon with him who bought him from the year when he sold himself to him until the year of the jubilee, and the price of his release shall be according to the number of years; the time he was with his owner shall be rated as the time of a hired servant. If there are still many years, according to them he shall refund out of the price paid for him the price of his redemption. If there remain but a few years until the year of the jubilee, he shall make a reckoning with him; according to the years of service due from him he shall refund the money for his redemption. As a servant hired year by year shall he be with him; he shall not rule with harshness over him in your sight. And if he is not redeemed by these means, then he shall be released in the year of the jubilee, he and his children with him. For to me the sons of Israel are servants, they are my servants who I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.' (9)

In the above quoted text it is necessary to qualify for the reader that a 'stranger' is a non-jew who is temporarily resident among the jews for a time (like a travelling merchant) and a 'sojourner' is a non-jew who is temporarily resident among the jews; as a form of political asylum for example, until he is able to go back to his own people. The thrust of this passage describes an eventuality where a penurious jew sells himself as a slave to a non-jew when the non-jew is resident in Israelite controlled territory and what should be done about it.

Simplified the passage states that after the jew has sold himself into slavery to a non-jew then it is beholden unto himself (if he somehow becomes wealthy during his time as a slave of a non-jew [possibly as a non-jewish merchant's factor and thus able to pocket part of his master's profits for himself]) or a member of his family to pay the non-jew the price of his release.

The price of this release from slavery from a non-jew shall be worked by using the wages of a hired servant as a basis; and remember this presents jews as inherently superior to non-jews because while he costs his master half of the cost of a hired servant (10) he is worth the actual cost of a hired servant, multiplied by the time left to the next Jubilee.

This is deliberately capped however; presumably to prevent the cost of freeing jews from slavery to non-jews becoming excessive and also to encourage and enable their kin to buy their freedom back as quickly as possible, since when there is a long time to the next jubilee then the jew or his relatives will only pay the price the non-jew paid for the jewish slave in the first place.

Where-as if there is a short-time left to the next jubilee then the cost will the cost of a hired servant multiplied by the time to the next jubilee: thus in most cases being significantly less.

This system prevents the cost of freeing the jew who has sold himself into slavery to a non-jew ever being higher than what the non-jew paid for the jewish slave. It also acts as a method for cheating non-jews of their money by forcing them to free non-jews who offered themselves as slaves to them at a loss.

Simply put a jew could defraud a non-jewish 'stranger' or 'sojourner' by offering to sell themselves as a slave to the non-jew at a time very close to the Jubilee year. If the non-jew accepted then the jew would be 'liberated' by his relatives for an amount significantly less than the price the non-jewish 'stranger' or 'sojourner' paid for him in the first place. Indeed the relatives of the jew could even free him with part of the price paid for the jewish slave by his non-jewish master. Thus the jew and his relatives could then keep the difference between the amount paid by the non-jew to buy the jew as a slave and the cost of 'liberating' said jew from slavery.

It is a neat little money-making scheme: isn't it?

It doesn't take a lot of imagination to envision jews in Israelite controlled territory playing this little trick on non-jewish travellers and exiles unfamiliar with the intricacies of jewish law on the enslavement and freeing of the member of the tribe.

This gives a whole new meaning to the claimed 'compassionate' qualifier on the subject of slavery from the book of Proverbs, which states:

'Open your mouth for the mute, for the rights of all who are left desolate.

Open your mouth, judge righteously, maintain the rights of the poor and needy.' (11)

In other words: it is an admonision for jews to dig deep into their pockets to free 'poor and needy' jews from slavery to non-jews!

The extraordinary position adopted by jewish law on this issue; and one that is clearly intended to enable jews to cheat non-jews of their material goods and wealth, is symptomatic of the contempt held for non-jews in the (Written) Torah and Tanakh.

Indeed we are told in the book of Deuteronomy that non-jewish women and children are to be captured and enslaved by jews. To wit:

'But if it makes no peace with you, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it; and when the Lord your God gives it into your hands you shall put all its males to the sword, but the women and the little ones, the cattle, and everything else in the city, all its spoil, you shall take as booty for yourselves; and you shall enjoy the spoil of your enemies, which the Lord your God has given you.' (12)

While in the book of Numbers we read:

'Now the booty remaining of the spoil that the men of war took was: six hundred and seventy-five thousand sheep, seventy-two thousand cattle, sixty-one thousand donkeys, and thirty-two thousand persons in all, women who had not known man by lying with him. And the half, the portion of those who had gone out to war, was in number three hundred and thirty-three thousand five hundred sheep, and the Lord's tribute of sheep was six hundred and seventy-five. The cattle were thirty-six thousand, of which the Lord's tribute was seventy-two. The donkeys were thirty thousand five hundred, of which the Lord's tribute was sixty-one. The persons were sixteen thousand, of which the Lord's tribute was thirty-two persons. And Moses gave the tribute, which was the offering for the Lord; to Elea'zar the priest, as the Lord commanded Moses.

From the sons of Israel's half, which Moses separated from that of the men who had gone to war – now the congregation's half was three hundred and thirty-seven thousand five hundred ship, thirty-six thousand cattle, and thirty thousand five hundred donkeys, and sixteen thousand persons – from the sons of Israel's half Moses took one of every fifty; both of persons and of beasts, and gave them to the Levites who had charge of the tabernacle of the Lord; as the Lord commanded Moses.' (13)

The above excerpts clearly demonstrate that among the ancient Israelites the capture and enslavement of non-jews; who were either women and children (as remember all the men had been murdered by the jews), was not only something they actively sought to do, but was considered a religious duty since they had to offer some of their new slaves as human sacrifices ('tributes') on Yahweh's altar. (14)

Indeed when we read the following passage from the book of Leviticus:

'As for your male and female slaves whom you may have: you may buy male and female slaves from among the nations that are round about you. You may also buy from among the strangers who sojourn with you and their families that are with you, who have been born in your land; and they may be your property. You may bequeath them to your sons after you, to inherit as a possession for ever; you may make slaves of them, but over your brethren the sons of Israel you shall not rule, one over another, with harshness.' (15)

It is immediately apparent that Yahweh desires that the jews should actively trade non-jewish slaves with non-jews.

Also worth mentioning is that this passage gives explicit license for jews to enslave any non-jews who have 'been born in their land' (i.e. to 'strangers' and 'sojourners' temporarily resident there) and informs us that these non-jewish slaves born in Israelite controlled territory will be treated as slaves for perpetuity.

After this we are treated once again to the admonition that jewish slave owners should not rule over jewish indentured servants and slaves with harshness with the necessary corollary to this statement being that jewish slave owners may rule over non-jewish slaves with as much harshness as they please (as non-jews are not members of the chosen people and thus are good for little more than slaves anyway).

This provides the contextual rationale for the following passage from the book of Deuteronomy:

'You shall not give up to his master a slave who has escaped from his master to you; he shall dwell with you, in your midst, in the place which he shall choose within one of your towns, where it pleases him best; you shall not oppress him.' (16)

Why; after all the previous statements that enslaving and trading in non-jewish slaves is to be encouraged and is right and just, does this passage exist?

The explanation is deceptively simple in so far as it is found in the ruling in the book of Leviticus, which allowed the children of 'strangers' and 'sojourners' to be enslaved and then traded by the jews. With this ruling in Leviticus in combination with the passage under discussion from the book of Deuteronomy: it combines to mean that jewish slaves could escape to Israelite controlled territory and then be provided for by their own kind as free men and women, while non-jews would be allowed to remain in said territory as 'sojourners'.

Thus when the non-jews almost inevitably had children: the jews could simply wait until they had a nice brood of little ones, enslave them under the provisions outlined in the book of Leviticus and then trade them to non-jews or fellow jew as slaves. Therefore this oft-quoted proviso has literally nothing to do with 'protecting' slaves or showing 'humanity', but has everything to do with the endemic hatred of; and discrimination against, non-jews in jewish law and the significant historical involvement of jews in the slave trade.

Thus we can view the allegedly 'compassionate' and 'progressive' passages on the subject of slavery in the Torah and Tanakh in the fresh light of this contextual understanding. These passages are as follows:

'When a man strikes his slave, male or female, with a rod and the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished. But if the slave survives a day or two, he is not to be punished; for the slave is his money.' (17)

'When a man strikes the eye of his slave, male or female, and destroys it, he shall let the slave go free for the eye's sake. If he knocks out the tooth of his slave, male or female, he shall let the slave go free for the tooth's sake.' (18)

'If the ox gores a slave, male or female, the owner shall give to their master thirty shekels of silver, and the ox shall be stoned.' (19)

To put no finer point on it: these passages are not; as often claimed, about 'compassion' or 'humanity' but rather are simple regulations in regard to protecting two different types of slave for two different reasons.

Firstly; as we have seen, the Torah and Tanakh explicitly command the jews not to treat those jews who are their indentured servants or (temporary) slaves with 'harshness'. These regulations then provide some specific protection to jews who are indentured or enslaved to fellow jews so that they are less likely to be maltreated or put into situations by their master where it is quite likely they could be injured or killed .

Secondly these passages served as a guarantee and a legal framework whereby jews could protect their economic assets (which; don't forget, slaves fundamentally were) from injury and death as well as claim compensation and justice when and if this occurred. These passages are simply rulings in relation to property and compassion should not be read into them any more than compassion should read into the (fairly brutal) laws of Hammurabi.

Another consideration related to this; which is again specific and exclusive to non-jewish slaves, is trying to curb the worst abuses by jewish masters (e.g. beating non-jewish slaves to death with rods) in order to prevent the non-jewish slaves having nothing left to lose and rising in rebellion against their jewish masters (which remember every slave owning society has had to contend with): an eventuality that a relatively small and weak people like the jews of this time could ill afford (as it could very easily weaken them sufficiently in military terms for their neighbours to crush their forces and conquer them).

This fear of non-jews as potential overlords over an enslaved jewish nation is demonstrated in the book of Isaiah when we are told that:

'The Lord will have compassion on Jacob and will again choose Israel, and will set them in their own land, and strangers will join them and will cling to the house of Jacob. And the peoples will take them and bring them to their place, and the house of Israel will possess them in the Lord's land as male and female slaves; they will take captive those who were their captors, and rule over those who oppressed them.' (20)

In other words: Isaiah deeply fears that the jews will be conquered once again, transported as slaves into a foreign land and removed from Yahweh's good graces. In order to conquer this fear Isaiah's solution is simply religious fanaticism in so far as he admonishes the Israelites to be absolute and resolute in their faith in Yahweh and he will then recognize their righteousness and make their former masters their slaves in perpetuity in a reviewed jewish state.

Now before we move on to the subject of female slavery in the Torah and the Tanakh. It should be noted that according to the book of Genesis: all male non-jews who have been bought by jews as slaves are required to be circumcised.

We read as follows:

'He that is eight days old among you shall be circumcised; every male throughout your generations, whether born in your house, or brought with money from any foreigner who is not your offspring, both he that is born in your house and he that is bought with your money, shall be circumcised.' (21)

Which continues:

'That very day Abraham and his son Ish'mael were circumcised; and all the men of his house, those born in house and those bought with money from a foreigner, were circumcised with him.' (22)

When we recall that Ish'mael was the son of Abraham by an Egyptian sex slave named Hagar (23) and the statement that any male who is 'brought with money from any foreigner who is not your offspring' needs to be circumcised. Then it makes clear that; according to the (Written) Torah and Tanakh, any gentile who is born in jewish land needs to be circumcised and thus it could be postulated that the promotion of circumcision in non-jewish countries today is a sign of jewish attempts to seal their domination over non-jews by convincing them to 'obey' the covenant of Abraham as part of the concept of Tikkun Olam (lit. 'Repairing the World').

Having discussed both jewish and non-jewish slavery in the Torah and Tanakh: we can move on to the issue of jewish female slaves, while noting that non-jewish female slaves; as we saw earlier, have no rights and were considered as booty by the imperialistic Israelites.

On this subject we read in the book of Exodus that:

'When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. If she does not please her master, who has designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed; he shall have no right to sell her to foreign people, since he has dealt faithlessly with her. If he designates her for his son, he shall deal with her as with a daughter. If he takes another wife for himself, he shall not diminsh her food, her clothing, or her marital rights. And if she does not do these three things for her, she shall go out for nothing, without payment of money.' (24)

As you can see female jewish slaves are not accorded the rights of male jewish slaves in spite of the various fatuous claims made about the 'equability' and 'humanity' of Judaism's ideas on the slave trade and the role/place of women in society.

Instead the jewish female slave has to 'please her master', which is clearly a euphemism for the jewish male owner of said slave forcing her to sleep with him. Then if he doesn't like her abilities in the bedroom: he can free (i.e. redeem) her, but if he likes her then he can keep her as his sex slave and concubine for as long as he so desires. (25) If he marries during the time of her enslaved concubinage to him then he has to maintain her (on the logic that even if she is female she is still jewish) in the state with which she is accustomed to be maintained or he has to free her.

He also has the power to give her as a wife or concubine to his son.

We can see in all of this that the female jewish slave has almost no rights when compared to male jewish slaves (although significantly more than non-jewish slaves) and is regarded as property by both her jewish master and jewish men more generally.

This is also related by the book of Leviticus, which states:

'If a man lies carnally with a woman who is a slave, betrothed to another man and not yet ransomed or given her freedom, an inquiry shall be held. They shall not be put to death, because she was not free; but he shall bring a guilt offering for himself to the Lord, to the door to the tent of meeting, a ram for a guilt offering. And the priest shall make atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering before the Lord for his sin that he has committed; and the sin which he has committed shall be forgiven him.' (26)

In other words if a jewish woman is a slave and is raped when she is betrothed to another (jewish) man; such as the son of her master, and has not been freed then a trial will be held where the worst thing that will happen to the man who raped her is that he has to sacrifice a goat to Yahweh via the agency of a priest.

Nice: huh?

We can thus clearly see the significant difference in status between male jewish slaves (who are heavily protected and are to be freed with all conceivable speed), female jewish slaves (who enjoy few rights but are somewhat protected by jewish law) and non-jewish slaves who a jewish master may do what they like with bar some basic considerations to do with the broader safety of the economic and political situation of the Israelites.

In summary the Hebrew Bible unequivocally tells us that jews are to be treated well and are not to be enslaved, while non-jews are to be enslaved at every opportunity and treated like sub-humans!


References


(1) Ex. 21:1-6 (RSV)
(2) Deut. 15:12-18 (RSV)
(3) Lev. 25:39-46 (RSV)
(4) Ex. 21:16 (RSV)
(5) Deut. 24:7 (RSV)
(6) 2 Kg. 4:1-7 (RSV)
(7) Joel 3:6-8 (RSV)
(8) On this please see the following article: http://semiticcontroversies.blogspot...ave-trade.html
(9) Lev. 25:47-55 (RSV)
(10) Deut. 15:18 (RSV)
(11) Prov. 31:8-9 (RSV)
(12) Deut. 20:12-14 (RSV)
(13) Num. 31:28-47 (RSV)
(14) On this please see the following articles: http://semiticcontroversies.blogspot...h-part-i.html; http://semiticcontroversies.blogspot...orah-part.html ; http://semiticcontroversies.blogspot...ish-bible.html
(15) Lev. 25:44-46 (RSV)
(16) Deut. 23:15-16 (RSV)
(17) Ex. 21:20-21 (RSV)
(18) Ibid. 21:26-27
(19) Ibid. 21:32
(20) Is. 14:1-2 (RSV)
(21) Gen. 17:13 (RSV)
(22) Ibid. 17:27
(23) Ibid. 16:15-16
(24) Ex. 21:7-11 (RSV)
(25) I have commented on this issue in the following articles: http://semiticcontroversies.blogspot...in-torah.html; http://semiticcontroversies.blogspot...ish-bible.html
(26) Lev. 19:20-22 (RSV)

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This was originally published at the following address: http://semiticcontroversies.blogspot...rew-bible.html
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