Charles Ellicott Commentary Exodus 22:15

"If the owner thereof be with it, he shall not make it good: if it be a hired thing, it came for its hire." — Exodus 22:15 (ASV)

If it is a hired thing. —Letting out for hire is akin to lending; but still quite a different transaction. Damage to a thing hired was not to be made good by the hirer, since the risk of it might be considered to have formed part of the calculation upon which the amount of the hire was fixed.