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The LORD spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai:
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“Speak to the people of Israel and say to them: When you come into the land that I am giving you, the land shall keep a sabbath rest to the LORD.
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For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its produce,
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but in the seventh year there shall be a sabbath for the land, a complete rest, a sabbath to the LORD. You shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard.
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What grows of itself from your harvest you shall not reap, and the grapes of your unpruned vine you shall not gather. It shall be a year of complete rest for the land.
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The produce of the land during its sabbath shall be food for you: for yourself, for your male servant, for your female servant, for your hired worker, and for the foreigner among you, all who live with you.
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It shall also be for your livestock and for the wild animals that are in your land; all its produce shall be for food.
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You shall count seven sabbath years, that is, seven times seven years; so that the period of seven sabbath years comes to forty-nine years.
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Then you shall sound the trumpet throughout the land in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month; on the Day of Atonement you shall sound the trumpet throughout all your land.
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You shall consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee year for you, and each of you shall return to his property and to his clan.
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The fiftieth year shall be a jubilee year for you; you shall not sow, and what grows of itself in it you shall not reap, nor gather the grapes of the unpruned vine.
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For it is a jubilee year; it shall be holy to you. You shall eat its produce from the field.
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In this year of jubilee each of you shall return to his property.
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If you sell anything to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor, you shall not wrong one another.
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According to the number of years after the jubilee you shall buy from your neighbor, and according to the number of years of crops he shall sell to you.
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The greater the number of years, the greater the price you shall pay; and the fewer the years, the less the price you shall pay, for it is the number of crops that he is selling to you.
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Do not wrong one another, but you shall fear your God; for I am the LORD your God.
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Therefore you shall observe My statutes and keep My ordinances and do them, and you shall dwell in your land in safety.
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Then the land will yield its fruit, and you will eat your fill and dwell there in safety.
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And if you ask, ‘What shall we eat in the seventh year, since we may not sow or gather in our produce?’
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then I will command My blessing on you in the sixth year, so that it will yield produce for three years.
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When you sow in the eighth year, you will still eat from the old crop until the ninth year, until its produce comes in; you shall eat the old crop.
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“The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is Mine; for you are strangers and sojourners with Me.
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And in all the land you possess, you shall grant a right of redemption for the land.
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If your brother becomes poor and sells part of his property, then his nearest redeemer, one of his relatives, shall come and redeem what his brother has sold.
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If a man has no redeemer, but later becomes prosperous and finds sufficient means to redeem it,
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then he shall calculate the years since its sale and refund the balance to the man to whom he sold it, so that he may return to his property.
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But if he is not able to restore it to him, then what was sold shall remain in the hand of the buyer until the Year of Jubilee; in the Jubilee it shall be released, and he may return to his property.”
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“If a man sells a dwelling house in a walled city, then his right of redemption shall last until a full year from the day of its sale; his right of redemption shall last one year.
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But if it is not redeemed within that full year, then the house in the walled city shall belong permanently to the buyer and his descendants; it shall not be released in the Jubilee.
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But the houses of the villages that have no surrounding wall shall be regarded as open country fields; they shall have the right of redemption, and in the Jubilee they shall be released.
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As for the houses of the cities of the Levites, the Levites shall always have the right of redemption for those houses.
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And if one of the Levites redeems a house sold in a city of his possession, then it shall be released in the Jubilee, for the houses in the cities of the Levites are their possession among the people of Israel.
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And the pastureland around their cities shall not be sold, for it is their possession forever.”
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“If your brother becomes poor and cannot sustain himself among you, then you shall support him as a stranger and a sojourner, so that he may live among you.
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You shall not take interest or profit from him, but you shall fear your God, so that your brother may live among you.
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You shall not lend him your money at interest, nor give him your food for profit.
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I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan, that I might be your God.
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If your brother becomes poor among you and sells himself to you, you shall not make him serve as a slave.
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He shall be with you as a hired worker and as a sojourner; he shall serve you until the year of Jubilee.
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Then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and return to his clan, and he may return to the property of his fathers.
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For they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as slaves are sold.
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You shall not rule over him harshly, but you shall fear your God.
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But your male and female slaves whom you may have are to be from the nations around you; from them you may buy male and female slaves.
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Also from the children of the strangers who live among you, from them you may buy, and from their families that are with you, who have been born in your land. They may become your property.
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You shall leave them as an inheritance to your children after you, to be held as property; you may make them slaves forever, but over your brothers, the Israelites, you shall not rule one over another harshly.
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If a stranger or sojourner among you becomes rich, and your brother who lives beside him becomes poor and sells himself to the stranger or sojourner among you, or to a member of the stranger’s clan,
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after he has sold himself, he may be redeemed; one of his brothers may redeem him,
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or his uncle or his uncle’s son may redeem him, or any close relative of his clan may redeem him; or if he has become able, he may redeem himself.
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Together with the one who bought him, he shall make a reckoning from the year he sold himself to that man until the Year of Jubilee; and the price of his sale shall be determined according to the number of those years. The time he has been with him shall be counted as the time of a hired worker.
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If the number of years is still great, he shall repay for his redemption out of the purchase price according to those years.
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But if only a few years remain until the Year of Jubilee, then he shall make a reckoning with that man; according to the number of years he shall pay the money for his redemption.
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He shall remain with him from year to year as a hired worker. He shall not be ruled harshly by that man in your sight.
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But if he is not redeemed in this way, then he shall be allowed to go out in the Year of Jubilee, he and his children with him.
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For the Israelites are servants to Me; they are My servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. I am the LORD your God.”
🌾🔔📅 Summary of Leviticus 25 – The Sabbath Year and the Year of Jubilee: God Owns All
Leviticus 25 contains two important economic and social commands that show that the land, time, and the fruit of labor belong to God, and His people are called to trust and honor Him through a just and compassionate way of life.
This chapter discusses:
- The Sabbath Year (every 7 years)
- The Year of Jubilee (every 50 years)
📌 1. The Sabbath Year (verses 1–7)
- Every 7th year, the land must rest, not be sown or reaped.
- What grows of itself may be eaten by all: the owner, servants, foreigners, and animals.
🎯 Its purpose:
- To remind them that the land belongs to God.
- To give ecological rest to creation.
- To train the people to trust in God’s provision.
📌 2. The Year of Jubilee (verses 8–22)
- Every 50 years (after 7 x 7 years), the ram’s horn was sounded on the Day of Atonement → the Year of Jubilee began.
What happens during the Year of Jubilee?
- Land that has been sold must be returned to its original owner.
- Israelite slaves must be set free and return to their families.
- No sowing or harvesting of the produce of the land is allowed in that year.
“The land must not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is Mine.” (verse 23)
📌 3. The Lord’s Land & Prohibition of Oppression (verses 23–38)
- Sale of land is only a long-term lease → the price is set according to the number of years until Jubilee.
- No one may oppress or deceive a fellow Israelite.
- The poor must be helped, not burdened with interest.
- Principle: “Fear your God, so that you may live with your brother.”
📌 4. Slaves & Redemption (verses 39–55)
- An Israelite who becomes a slave because of poverty:
Must not be treated as a permanent servant.
Must be set free in the Year of Jubilee.
- If sold to a foreigner, his relative has the right to redeem him.
- All Israelites are servants of the Lord, not slaves of men.
📖 Main Teaching
- The Lord is the owner of the land, the harvest, and time.
- Every 7 and 50 years, God gives a “social and economic reset” to prevent structural poverty.
- Compassion for the poor and the restoration of social justice are part of the law of holiness.
- Land and wealth are not absolute private property—they are all grace.
- God wants His people to live in mutual help, not mutual oppression.
✨ Spiritual Meaning (New Testament)
- Jesus is the fulfillment of the Year of Jubilee. In Luke 4:18–19, He declared His mission:
“… to proclaim release to the captives… to proclaim that the year of the Lord’s favor has come.”
- Jubilee portrays deliverance from sin, spiritual debt, and the bondage of the world.
- We are no longer slaves of sin, but children of God who have been set free.
- The principle of Jubilee teaches us to:
Rest from greed.
Make room for restoration and forgiveness.
Live simply and in surrender.
