Leviticus 25:17-27

17 Do not afflict your countrymen: but let every one fear his God. Because I am the Lord your God.
18 Do my precepts, and keep my judgments, and fulfil them: that you may dwell in the land without any fear.
19 And the ground may yield you its fruits, of which you may eat your fill, fearing no man’s invasion.
20 But if you say: What shall we eat the seventh year, if we sow not, nor gather our fruits?
21 I will give you my blessing the sixth year: and it shall yield the fruits of three years.
22 And the eighth year you shall sow, and shall eat of the old fruits, until the ninth year: till new grow up, you shall eat the old store.
23 The land also shall not be sold for ever: because it is mine, and you are strangers and sojourners with me.
24 For which cause all the country of your possession shall be under the condition of redemption.
25 If thy brother being impoverished sell his little possession, and his kinsman will: he may redeem what he had sold.
26 But if he have no kinsman, and he himself can find the price to redeem it:
27 The value of the fruits shall be counted from that time when he sold it. And the overplus he shall restore to the buyer, and so shall receive his possession again.

Leviticus 25:17-27 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO LEVITICUS 25

In this chapter the Israelites are directed, when come into the land of Canaan, to observe every seventh year as a sabbatical year, in which there was to be no tillage of the land, and yet there would be a sufficiency for man and beast, Le 25:1-7; and every fiftieth year as a year of jubilee, in which also there was to be no tillage of the land, and every man was to return to his possession or estate, which had been sold to another any time before this, Le 25:8-17; and a promise of safety and plenty in the seventh year is made to encourage the observance of it, Le 25:18-22; and several laws and rules are delivered out concerning the sale of lands, the redemption of them, and their return to their original owner in the year of jubilee, Le 25:23-28; and the sale of houses, and the redemption of them, and the difference between those in walled cities and those in villages, with respect thereunto, Le 25:29-31; and also concerning the houses of the cities of the Levites, and the fields of the suburbs of them, Le 25:32-34; to which are added some instructions about relieving decayed, persons, and lending and giving to them, without taking usury of them, Le 25:34-38; and other laws concerning the release of such Israelites as had sold themselves for servants to the Israelites, in the year of jubilee, since none but Heathens were to be bondmen and bondmaids for ever, Le 25:39-46; and of such who were sold to proselytes, Le 25:47-55.

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