ABSTRACT
This source, a short comment on Exodus 22:24 from second-century Midrash on Exodus, is the most explicit de-coupling of usury and poverty in early rabbinic literature (see also sources A20 and A26 ). Exodus ( A2 ) limits its discussion of lending and borrowing quite explicitly to the poor, but the Midrash negates the legal significance of this limitation. God, however, cares for the poor more than for the rich.
