Leviticus 25
25
Sabbath Years and Jubilee
1The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai: 2“Speak to the Israelites and tell them: When you enter the land I am giving you, the land will observe a Sabbath to the Lord. 3You may sow your field for six years, and you may prune your vineyard and gather its produce for six years. 4But there will be a Sabbath of complete rest # Lv 16:31 for the land in the seventh year, a Sabbath to the Lord: you are not to sow your field or prune your vineyard. 5You are not to reap what grows by itself from your crop, or harvest the grapes of your untended vines. It must be a year of complete rest for the land. 6Whatever the land produces during the Sabbath year can be food for you — for yourself, your male or female slave, and the hired hand or foreigner who stays with you. 7All of its growth may serve as food for your livestock and the wild animals in your land.
8“You are to count seven sabbatical years, seven times seven years, so that the time period of the seven sabbatical years amounts to 49. 9Then you are to sound a trumpet loudly in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month; you will sound it throughout your land on the Day of Atonement. # Lv 23:27 10You are to consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim freedom in the land for all its inhabitants. It will be your Jubilee, # Lv 27:17-24; Nm 36:4; Dt 15:1 when each of you is to return to his property and each of you to his clan. 11The fiftieth year will be your Jubilee; you are not to sow, reap what grows by itself, or harvest its untended vines. 12It is to be holy to you because it is the Jubilee; you may only eat its produce directly from the field.
13“In this Year of Jubilee, each of you will return to his property. 14If you make a sale to your neighbor or a purchase from him, do not cheat # Dt 23:16 one another. 15You are to make the purchase from your neighbor based on the number of years since the last Jubilee. He is to sell to you based on the number of remaining harvest years. 16You are to increase its price in proportion to a greater amount of years, and decrease its price in proportion to a lesser amount of years, because what he is selling to you is a number of harvests. 17You are not to cheat one another, but fear your God, for I am Yahweh your God.
18“You are to keep My statutes and ordinances and carefully observe them, so that you may live securely in the land. # Lv 18:4-5,26; 19:37; 20:8,22; 26:3-5 19Then the land will yield its fruit, so that you can eat, be satisfied, and live securely in the land. 20If you wonder: ‘What will we eat in the seventh year if we don’t sow or gather our produce? ’ 21I will appoint My blessing for you in the sixth year, so that it will produce a crop sufficient for three years. 22When you sow in the eighth year, you will be eating from the previous harvest. You will be eating this until the ninth year when its harvest comes in.
23“The land is not to be permanently sold because it is Mine, and you are only foreigners and temporary residents on My land. # Lit residents with Me # 1Ch 29:15; Heb 11:13 24You are to allow the redemption of any land you occupy. 25If your brother becomes destitute and sells part of his property, his nearest relative may come and redeem what his brother has sold. 26If a man has no family redeemer, but he prospers # Lit but his hand reaches and obtains enough to redeem his land, 27he may calculate the years since its sale, repay the balance to the man he sold it to, and return to his property. 28But if he cannot obtain enough to repay him, what he sold will remain in the possession of its purchaser until the Year of Jubilee. It is to be released at the Jubilee, so that he may return to his property.
29“If a man sells a residence in a walled city, his right of redemption will last until a year has passed after its sale; his right of redemption will last a year. 30If it is not redeemed by the end of a full year, then the house in the walled city is permanently transferred to its purchaser throughout his generations. It is not to be released on the Jubilee. 31But houses in villages that have no walls around them are to be classified as open fields. The right to redeem such houses stays in effect, and they are to be released at the Jubilee.
32“Concerning the Levitical cities, # Nm 35:1-8; Dt 18:1-2; 19:2-9; Jos 21; 1Ch 6:54-81 the Levites always have the right to redeem houses in the cities they possess. 33Whatever property one of the Levites can redeem # Hb obscure — a house sold in a city they possess — must be released at the Jubilee, because the houses in the Levitical cities are their possession among the Israelites. 34The open pastureland around their cities may not be sold, for it is their permanent possession.
35“If your brother becomes destitute and cannot sustain himself among # Lit and his hand falters with you, you are to support him as a foreigner or temporary resident, so that he can continue to live among you. 36Do not profit or take interest from him, # Ex 22:25; Dt 23:19-20; Ezk 22:12 but fear your God and let your brother live among you. 37You are not to lend him your silver with interest or sell him your food for profit. 38I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan and to be your God.
39“If your brother among you becomes destitute and sells himself to you, # 2Kg 4:1; Neh 5:5; Is 50:1; Mt 18:25 you must not force him to do slave labor. 40Let him stay with you as a hired hand or temporary resident; he may work for you until the Year of Jubilee. 41Then he and his children are to be released from you, and he may return to his clan and his ancestral property. # Ex 21:3-6 42They are not to be sold as slaves, # Lit sold with a sale of a slave because they are My slaves that I brought out of the land of Egypt. 43You are not to rule over them harshly # Ex 1:13-14 but fear your God. 44Your male and female slaves are to be from the nations around you; you may purchase male and female slaves. 45You may also purchase them from the foreigners staying with you, or from their families living among you — those born in your land. These may become your property. 46You may leave them to your sons after you to inherit as property; you can make them slaves for life. But concerning your brothers, the Israelites, you must not rule over one another harshly.
47“If a foreigner or temporary resident living among you prospers, but your brother living near him becomes destitute and sells himself to the foreigner living among you, or to a member of the foreigner’s clan, 48he has the right of redemption after he has been sold. One of his brothers may redeem him. 49His uncle or cousin may redeem him, or any of his close relatives from his clan may redeem him. If he prospers, he may redeem himself. 50The one who purchased him is to calculate the time from the year he sold himself to him until the Year of Jubilee. The price of his sale will be determined by the number of years. It will be set for him like the daily wages of a hired hand. 51If many years are still left, he must pay his redemption price in proportion to them based on his purchase price. 52If only a few years remain until the Year of Jubilee, he will calculate and pay the price of his redemption in proportion to his remaining years. 53He will stay with him like a man hired year by year. A foreign owner is not to rule over him harshly in your sight. 54If he is not redeemed in any of these ways, he and his children are to be released at the Year of Jubilee. 55For the Israelites are My slaves. # Ex 4:10 They are My slaves that I brought out of the land of Egypt; I am Yahweh your God.
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Leviticus 25: HCSB
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Leviticus 25
25
The sabbatical year
1The LORD said to Moses on Mount Sinai, 2Speak to the Israelites and say to them: Once you enter the land that I am giving you, the land must celebrate a sabbath rest to the LORD. 3You will plant your fields for six years, and prune your vineyards and gather their crops for six years. 4But in the seventh year the land will have a special sabbath rest, a Sabbath to the LORD: You must not plant your fields or prune your vineyards. 5You must not harvest the secondary growth of your produce or gather the grapes of your freely growing vines. It will be a year of special rest for the land. 6Whatever the land produces during its sabbath will be your food—for you, for your male and female servants, and for your hired laborers and foreign guests who live with you, 7as well as for your livestock and for the wild animals in your land. All of the land’s produce can be eaten.
The Jubilee year
8Count off seven weeks of years—that is, seven times seven—so that the seven weeks of years totals forty-nine years. 9Then have the trumpet#25.9 Heb shofar blown on the tenth day of the seventh month.#25.9 September–October, Tishrei Have the trumpet blown throughout your land on the Day of Reconciliation. 10You will make the fiftieth year holy, proclaiming freedom throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It will be a Jubilee year#25.10 Heb yobel for you: each of you must return to your family property and to your extended family. 11The fiftieth year will be a Jubilee year for you. Do not plant, do not harvest the secondary growth, and do not gather from the freely growing vines 12because it is a Jubilee: it will be holy to you. You can eat only the produce directly out of the field. 13Each of you must return to your family property in this year of Jubilee.
14When you sell something to or buy something from your fellow citizen, you must not cheat each other. 15You will buy from your fellow citizen according to the number of years since the Jubilee; he will sell to you according to the number of years left for harvests. 16You will raise the price if there are more years, or lower the price if there are less years because it is the number of harvests that are being sold to you. 17You must not cheat each other but fear your God because I am the LORD your God. 18You will observe my rules, and you will keep my regulations and do them so that you can live securely on the land.
Food during fallow years
19The land will give its fruit so that you can eat your fill and live securely on it. 20Suppose you ask, “What will we eat in the seventh year if we don’t plant or gather our crops then?” 21I will send my blessing on you in the sixth year so that it will make enough produce for three years. 22You can plant again in the eighth year and eat food from the previous year’s produce until the ninth year. Until its produce comes, you will eat the food from the previous year.
Buying back family property
23The land must not be permanently sold because the land is mine. You are just immigrants and foreign guests of mine.
24Throughout the whole land that you possess, you must allow for the land to be bought back. 25When one of your fellow Israelites faces financial difficulty and must sell part of their family property, the closest relative#25.25 Or next of kin; traditionally redeemer will come and buy back what their fellow Israelite has sold. 26If the person doesn’t have someone to buy it back, but then manages to afford buying it back, 27they must calculate the years since its sale and refund the balance to the person to whom they sold it. Then it will go back to the family property.#25.27 Or they will go back to their family property; also in 25:28. 28If they cannot afford to make a refund to the buyer, whatever was sold will remain in the possession of the buyer until the Jubilee year. It will be released in the Jubilee year, at which point it will return to the family property.
29When a person sells a home in a walled city, it may be bought back until a year after its sale. The period for buying it back will be one year. 30If it is not bought back before a full year has passed, the house in the walled city will belong to the buyer permanently and their descendants forever. It will not be released at the Jubilee. 31But houses in settlements that are unwalled will be considered as if they were country fields. They can be bought back, and they must be released at the Jubilee.
32Levites will always have the right to buy back homes in the levitical cities that are part of their family property. 33Levite property that can be bought back—houses sold in a city that is their family property—must be released at the Jubilee, because homes in levitical cities are the Levites’ family property among the Israelites. 34But the pastureland around their cities cannot be sold, because that is their permanent family property.
Poor Israelites and slavery
35If one of your fellow Israelites faces financial difficulty and is in a shaky situation with you,#25.35 Heb uncertain you must assist them as you would an immigrant or foreign guest so that they can survive among you. 36Do not take interest from them, or any kind of profit from interest, but fear your God so that your fellow Israelite can survive among you. 37Do not lend a poor Israelite money with interest or lend food at a profit. 38I am the LORD your God, who brought you out from the land of Egypt to give you Canaan’s land and to be your God.
39If one of your fellow Israelites faces financial difficulty with you and sells themselves to you, you must not make him work as a slave. 40Instead, they will be like a hired laborer or foreign guest to you. They will work for you until the Jubilee year, 41at which point the poor Israelite along with their children will be released from you. They can return to their extended family and to their family property. 42You must do this because these people are my servants—I brought them out of Egypt’s land. They must not be sold as slaves. 43You will not harshly rule over them but must fear your God.
44Regarding male or female slaves that you are allowed to have: You can buy a male or a female slave from the nations that are around you. 45You can also buy them from the foreign guests who live with you and from their extended families that are with you, who were born in your land. These can belong to you as property. 46You can pass them on to your children as inheritance that they can own as permanent property. You can make these people work as slaves, but you must not rule harshly over your own people, the Israelites.
47If an immigrant or foreign guest prospers financially among you, but your fellow Israelite faces financial difficulty and so sells themselves to the immigrant or foreign guest, or to a descendant of a foreigner, 48the Israelite will have the right to be bought back after they sold themselves. One of their relatives can buy them back: 49their uncle or cousin can buy them back; one of their blood relatives from their family can buy them back; or they may be able to afford their own purchase. 50The Israelite will calculate with their owner the time from the year they were sold until the Jubilee year. The price of their release will be based on the number of years they were with the owner, as in the case of a hired laborer. 51If there are many years left before the Jubilee, the Israelite will pay for their purchase in proportion to their purchase price. 52If only a few years are left, they will calculate that and pay for their purchase according to the years of service. 53Regardless, the Israelite will be to the buyer like a yearly laborer; the buyer must not harshly rule over them in your sight. 54If the Israelite is not bought back in one of these ways, they and their children must be released in the Jubilee year 55because the Israelites belong to me as servants. They are my servants—I brought them out of Egypt’s land; I am the LORD your God.
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