The Sabbatic Year

(Exodus 23:10-13; Deuteronomy 15:1-6)

1And the LORD spoke to Moses in mount Sinai, saying, 2Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them, When you come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath to the LORD. 3Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof; 4But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest to the land, a sabbath for the LORD: you shall neither sow your field, nor prune your vineyard. 5That which grows of its own accord of your harvest you shall not reap, neither gather the grapes of your vine undressed: for it is a year of rest to the land. 6And the sabbath of the land shall be meat for you; for you, and for your servant, and for your maid, and for your hired servant, and for your stranger that sojournes with you. 7And for your cattle, and for the beast that are in your land, shall all the increase thereof be meat.

The Year of Jubilee

8And you shall number seven sabbaths of years to you, seven times seven years; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years shall be to you forty and nine years. 9Then shall you cause the trumpet of the jubilee to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall you make the trumpet sound throughout all your land. 10And you shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land to all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubilee to you; and you shall return every man to his possession, and you shall return every man to his family. 11A jubilee shall that fiftieth year be to you: you shall not sow, neither reap that which grows of itself in it, nor gather the grapes in it of your vine undressed. 12For it is the jubilee; it shall be holy to you: you shall eat the increase thereof out of the field.

Return of Property

13In the year of this jubilee you shall return every man to his possession. 14And if you sell ought to your neighbor, or buy ought of your neighbor's hand, you shall not oppress one another: 15According to the number of years after the jubilee you shall buy of your neighbor, and according to the number of years of the fruits he shall sell to you: 16According to the multitude of years you shall increase the price thereof, and according to the fewness of years you shall diminish the price of it: for according to the number of the years of the fruits does he sell to you. 17You shall not therefore oppress one another; but you shall fear your God: for I am the LORD your God.

The Blessing of Obedience

(Deuteronomy 4:1-14; Deuteronomy 11:1-7; Deuteronomy 28:1-14)

18Why you shall do my statutes, and keep my judgments, and do them; and you shall dwell in the land in safety. 19And the land shall yield her fruit, and you shall eat your fill, and dwell therein in safety. 20And if you shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase: 21Then I will command my blessing on you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth fruit for three years. 22And you shall sow the eighth year, and eat yet of old fruit until the ninth year; until her fruits come in you shall eat of the old store.

The Law of Redemption

23The land shall not be sold for ever: for the land is mine, for you are strangers and sojourners with me. 24And in all the land of your possession you shall grant a redemption for the land.

25If your brother be waxen poor, and has sold away some of his possession, and if any of his kin come to redeem it, then shall he redeem that which his brother sold. 26And if the man have none to redeem it, and himself be able to redeem it; 27Then let him count the years of the sale thereof, and restore the remainder to the man to whom he sold it; that he may return to his possession. 28But if he be not able to restore it to him, then that which is sold shall remain in the hand of him that has bought it until the year of jubilee: and in the jubilee it shall go out, and he shall return to his possession.

29And if a man sell a dwelling house in a walled city, then he may redeem it within a whole year after it is sold; within a full year may he redeem it. 30And if it be not redeemed within the space of a full year, then the house that is in the walled city shall be established for ever to him that bought it throughout his generations: it shall not go out in the jubilee. 31But the houses of the villages which have no wall round about them shall be counted as the fields of the country: they may be redeemed, and they shall go out in the jubilee. 32Notwithstanding the cities of the Levites, and the houses of the cities of their possession, may the Levites redeem at any time. 33And if a man purchase of the Levites, then the house that was sold, and the city of his possession, shall go out in the year of jubilee: for the houses of the cities of the Levites are their possession among the children of Israel. 34But the field of the suburbs of their cities may not be sold; for it is their perpetual possession.

Redemption of the Poor

35And if your brother be waxen poor, and fallen in decay with you; then you shall relieve him: yes, though he be a stranger, or a sojourner; that he may live with you. 36Take you no usury of him, or increase: but fear your God; that your brother may live with you. 37You shall not give him your money on usury, nor lend him your victuals for increase. 38I am the LORD your God, which brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan, and to be your God.

Redemption of Bondmen

39And if your brother that dwells by you be waxen poor, and be sold to you; you shall not compel him to serve as a bondservant: 40But as an hired servant, and as a sojourner, he shall be with you, and shall serve you to the year of jubilee. 41And then shall he depart from you, both he and his children with him, and shall return to his own family, and to the possession of his fathers shall he return. 42For they are my servants, which I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: they shall not be sold as slaves. 43You shall not rule over him with rigor; but shall fear your God. 44Both your slaves, and your bondmaids, which you shall have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall you buy slaves and bondmaids. 45Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall you buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession. 46And you shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your slaves for ever: but over your brothers the children of Israel, you shall not rule one over another with rigor.

Redemption of Servants

47And if a sojourner or stranger wax rich by you, and your brother that dwells by him wax poor, and sell himself to the stranger or sojourner by you, or to the stock of the stranger's family: 48After that he is sold he may be redeemed again; one of his brothers may redeem him: 49Either his uncle, or his uncle's son, may redeem him, or any that is near of kin to him of his family may redeem him; or if he be able, he may redeem himself. 50And he shall reckon with him that bought him from the year that he was sold to him to the year of jubilee: and the price of his sale shall be according to the number of years, according to the time of an hired servant shall it be with him. 51If there be yet many years behind, according to them he shall give again the price of his redemption out of the money that he was bought for. 52And if there remain but few years to the year of jubilee, then he shall count with him, and according to his years shall he give him again the price of his redemption. 53And as a yearly hired servant shall he be with him: and the other shall not rule with rigor over him in your sight. 54And if he be not redeemed in these years, then he shall go out in the year of jubilee, both he, and his children with him. 55For to me the children of Israel are servants; they are my servants whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.