3.Mose 25 | New International Reader’s Version

The Sabbath Year

1 The LORD spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai. He said, 2 ‘Speak to the Israelites. Tell them, “You will enter the land I am going to give you. When you do, you must honour the LORD every seventh year by not farming the land that year. 3 For six years plant your fields. Trim the branches in your vineyards and gather your crops. 4 But the seventh year must be a year of sabbath rest for the land. The land must rest during it. It is a sabbath year to honour the LORD. Do not plant your fields. Do not trim the branches in your vineyards. 5 Do not gather what grows without being planted. And do not gather the grapes from the vines you have not taken care of. The land must have a year of rest. 6 Anything the land produces during the sabbath year will be food for you. It will be for you and your male and female servants. Your hired workers will eat it. So will people who live with you for a while. 7 And so will your livestock and the wild animals that are in your land. Anything the land produces can be eaten.

The Year of Jubilee

8 ‘ “Count seven sabbath years. Count seven times seven years. The seven sabbath years add up to a total of 49 years. 9 The tenth day of the seventh month is the day when sin is paid for. On that day blow the trumpet all through your land. 10 Set the 50th year apart. Announce freedom all over the land to everyone who lives there. The 50th year will be a Year of Jubilee for you. Each of you must return to your own family property. And each of you must return to your own tribe. 11 The 50th year will be a Year of Jubilee for you. Do not plant anything. Do not gather what grows without being planted. And do not gather the grapes from the vines you have not taken care of. 12 It is a Year of Jubilee. It will be holy for you. Eat only what the fields produce. 13 ‘ “In the Year of Jubilee all of you must return to your own property. 14 ‘ “Suppose you sell land to any of your own people. Or you buy land from them. Then do not take advantage of each other. 15 The price you pay must be based on the number of years since the last Year of Jubilee. Here is how the price you charge must be decided. It must be based on the number of years left for gathering crops before the next Year of Jubilee. 16 When there are many years left, you must raise the price. When there are only a few years left, you must lower the price. That is because what is really being sold to you is the number of crops the land will produce. 17 Do not take advantage of each other. Instead, have respect for your God. I am the LORD your God. 18 ‘ “Follow my rules. Be careful to obey my laws. Then you will live safely in the land. 19 The land will produce its fruit. You will eat as much as you want. And you will live there in safety. 20 Suppose you say, ‘In the seventh year we will not plant anything or gather our crops. So what will we eat?’ 21 I will send you a great blessing in the sixth year. The land will produce enough for three years. 22 While you plant during the eighth year, you will eat food from the old crop. You will continue to eat food from it until the crops from the ninth year are gathered. 23 ‘ “The land must not be sold without a way of getting it back. That is because it belongs to me. You are only outsiders and strangers in my land. 24 You must make sure that you can buy the land back. That applies to all the land that belongs to you. 25 ‘ “Suppose one of your own people becomes poor. And suppose they have to sell some of their land. Then their nearest relative must come and buy back what they have sold. 26 But suppose they do not have anyone to buy it back for them. And suppose things go well for them and they earn enough money to buy it back themselves. 27 Then they must decide how much the crops have become worth since the time they sold the land. They must take that amount off the price the land was sold for. They must give the one selling it back to them the money that is left. Then they can go back to their own property. 28 But suppose they have not earned enough money to pay them back. Then the buyer they sold the land to will keep it until the Year of Jubilee. At that time it will be returned to them. Then they can go back to their property. 29 ‘ “Suppose someone sells a house in a city that has a wall around it. Then for a full year after they sell it they have the right to buy it back. 30 But suppose they do not buy it back before the full year has passed. Then the house in the walled city will continue to belong to the buyer and the buyer’s children. It will not be returned to the seller in the Year of Jubilee. 31 But houses in villages that do not have walls around them must be treated like property outside walled cities. Those houses can be bought back at any time. And they must be returned in the Year of Jubilee. 32 ‘ “The Levites always have the right to buy back their houses in the towns that belong to them. 33 So their property among the Israelites can be bought back. That applies to a house sold in any of their towns. Any house that is sold must be returned to its original owner in the Year of Jubilee. That is because the houses of the Levites will always belong to them. 34 But the grasslands around their towns must never be sold. They will belong to them for all time to come. 35 ‘ “Suppose any of your own people become poor. And suppose they can’t take care of themselves. Then help them just as you would help an outsider or a stranger. In that way, the poor can continue to live among you. 36 Do not charge them interest of any kind. Instead, have respect for God. Then those who have become poor can continue to live among you. 37 If you lend them money, you must not charge them interest. And you must not sell them food for more than it cost you. 38 I am the LORD your God. I brought you out of Egypt. I did it to give you the land of Canaan. I wanted to be your God. 39 ‘ “Suppose any of your own people become poor. And suppose they sell themselves to you. Then do not make them work as slaves. 40 You must treat them like hired workers. Or you must treat them like those living among you for a while. They must work for you until the Year of Jubilee. 41 Then they and their children must be set free. They will go back to their own tribes. They will go back to the property their people have always owned. 42 The Israelites are my servants. I brought them out of Egypt. So they must not be sold as slaves. 43 Show them pity when you rule over them. Have respect for God. 44 ‘ “You must get your male and female slaves from the nations that are around you. You can buy slaves from them. 45 You can also buy as slaves some of the people living among you for a while. You can also buy members of their families born among you. They will become your property. 46 You can leave them to your children as their share of your property. You can make them slaves for life. But when you rule over your own people, you must be kind to them. 47 ‘ “Suppose an outsider living among you for a while becomes rich. Then suppose any of your own people become poor. Then they sell themselves to the outsider living among you. Or they sell themselves to a member of the outsider’s family. 48 Then they keep the right to buy themselves back after they have sold themselves. One of their relatives can buy them back. 49 An uncle or a cousin can buy them back after they have sold themselves. In fact, any relative in their tribe can do it. Or suppose things go well for them. Then they can buy themselves back. 50 They and their buyer must count the number of years from the time of the sale up to the Year of Jubilee. The price for their freedom must be based on the amount paid to a hired man for that number of years. 51 Suppose there are many years until the Year of Jubilee. Then for their freedom they must pay a larger share of the price paid for them. 52 But suppose there are only a few years left until the Year of Jubilee. Then they must count the number of years that are left. The payment for their freedom must be based on that number. 53 They must be treated as workers hired from year to year. You must make sure that those they must work for are kind to them when they rule over them. 54 ‘ “Suppose they are not bought back in any of those ways. Then they and their children must still be set free in the Year of Jubilee. 55 That’s because the Israelites belong to me. They are my servants. I brought them out of Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

English Standard Version

The Sabbath Year

1 The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying, 2 “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When you come into the land that I give you, the land shall keep a Sabbath to the Lord. 3 For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its fruits, 4 but in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a Sabbath to the Lord. You shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard. 5 You shall not reap what grows of itself in your harvest, or gather the grapes of your undressed vine. It shall be a year of solemn rest for the land. 6 The Sabbath of the land* shall provide food for you, for yourself and for your male and female slaves* and for your hired worker and the sojourner who lives with you, 7 and for your cattle and for the wild animals that are in your land: all its yield shall be for food.

The Year of Jubilee

8 “You shall count seven weeks* of years, seven times seven years, so that the time of the seven weeks of years shall give you forty-nine years. 9 Then you shall sound the loud trumpet on the tenth day of the seventh month. On the Day of Atonement you shall sound the trumpet throughout all your land. 10 And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you, when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his clan. 11 That fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you; in it you shall neither sow nor reap what grows of itself nor gather the grapes from the undressed vines. 12 For it is a jubilee. It shall be holy to you. You may eat the produce of the field.* 13 “In this year of jubilee each of you shall return to his property. 14 And if you make a sale to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor, you shall not wrong one another. 15 You shall pay your neighbor according to the number of years after the jubilee, and he shall sell to you according to the number of years for crops. 16 If the years are many, you shall increase the price, and if the years are few, you shall reduce the price, for it is the number of the crops that he is selling to you. 17 You shall not wrong one another, but you shall fear your God, for I am the Lord your God. 18 “Therefore you shall do my statutes and keep my rules and perform them, and then you will dwell in the land securely. 19 The land will yield its fruit, and you will eat your fill and dwell in it securely. 20 And if you say, ‘What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?’ 21 I will command my blessing on you in the sixth year, so that it will produce a crop sufficient for three years. 22 When you sow in the eighth year, you will be eating some of the old crop; you shall eat the old until the ninth year, when its crop arrives.

Redemption of Property

23 “The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine. For you are strangers and sojourners with me. 24 And in all the country you possess, you shall allow a redemption of the land. 25 “If your brother becomes poor and sells part of his property, then his nearest redeemer shall come and redeem what his brother has sold. 26 If a man has no one to redeem it and then himself becomes prosperous and finds sufficient means to redeem it, 27 let him calculate the years since he sold it and pay back the balance to the man to whom he sold it, and then return to his property. 28 But if he does not have sufficient means to recover it, then what he sold shall remain in the hand of the buyer until the year of jubilee. In the jubilee it shall be released, and he shall return to his property. 29 “If a man sells a dwelling house in a walled city, he may redeem it within a year of its sale. For a full year he shall have the right of redemption. 30 If it is not redeemed within a full year, then the house in the walled city shall belong in perpetuity to the buyer, throughout his generations; it shall not be released in the jubilee. 31 But the houses of the villages that have no wall around them shall be classified with the fields of the land. They may be redeemed, and they shall be released in the jubilee. 32 As for the cities of the Levites, the Levites may redeem at any time the houses in the cities they possess. 33 And if one of the Levites exercises his right of redemption, then the house that was sold in a city they possess shall be released in the jubilee. For the houses in the cities of the Levites are their possession among the people of Israel. 34 But the fields of pastureland belonging to their cities may not be sold, for that is their possession forever.

Kindness for Poor Brothers

35 “If your brother becomes poor and cannot maintain himself with you, you shall support him as though he were a stranger and a sojourner, and he shall live with you. 36 Take no interest from him or profit, but fear your God, that your brother may live beside you. 37 You shall not lend him your money at interest, nor give him your food for profit. 38 I am the Lord 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 becomes poor beside you and sells himself to you, you shall not make him serve as a slave: 40 he shall be with you as a hired worker and as a sojourner. He shall serve with you until the year of the jubilee. 41 Then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and go back to his own clan and return to the possession of his fathers. 42 For they are my servants,* whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as slaves. 43 You shall not rule over him ruthlessly but shall fear your God. 44 As for your male and female slaves whom you may have: you may buy male and female slaves from among the nations that are around you. 45 You may also buy from among the strangers who sojourn with you and their clans that are with you, who have been born in your land, and they may be your property. 46 You may bequeath them to your sons after you to inherit as a possession forever. You may make slaves of them, but over your brothers the people of Israel you shall not rule, one over another ruthlessly.

Redeeming a Poor Man

47 “If a stranger or sojourner with you becomes rich, and your brother beside him becomes poor and sells himself to the stranger or sojourner with you or to a member of the stranger’s clan, 48 then after he is sold he may be redeemed. One of his brothers may redeem him, 49 or his uncle or his cousin may redeem him, or a close relative from his clan may redeem him. Or if he grows rich he may redeem himself. 50 He shall calculate with his buyer from the year when he sold himself to him until the year of jubilee, and the price of his sale shall vary with the number of years. The time he was with his owner shall be rated as the time of a hired worker. 51 If there are still many years left, he shall pay proportionately for his redemption some of his sale price. 52 If there remain but a few years until the year of jubilee, he shall calculate and pay for his redemption in proportion to his years of service. 53 He shall treat him as a worker hired year by year. He shall not rule ruthlessly over him in your sight. 54 And if he is not redeemed by these means, then he and his children with him shall be released in the year of jubilee. 55 For it is to me that the people of Israel are servants.* They are my servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.

3.Mose 25 | New International Reader’s Version English Standard Version

The Sabbath Year

The Year of Jubilee

The Sabbath Year

The Year of Jubilee

Redemption of Property

Kindness for Poor Brothers

Redeeming a Poor Man