A-Z: Common sayings from the Bible: Jubilee

Usage

A fiftieth anniversary.

Definition

The jubilee was named after the ram's horn trumpet, which was sounded to announce the festival of the fiftieth year in Jewish tradition. It was a time of joy and celebration, the freeing of slaves and the return of property.

Bible References

Leviticus 25:10

English Standard Version
King James Version

¹The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying, ²Speak 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. ³For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its fruits, ⁴but 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. ⁵You 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. ⁶The 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, ⁷and for your cattle and for the wild animals that are in your land: all its yield shall be for food. ⁸You 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. ⁹Then 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. ¹⁰And 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. ¹¹That 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. ¹²For it is a jubilee. It shall be holy to you. You may eat the produce of the field. ¹³In this year of jubilee each of you shall return to his property. ¹⁴And if you make a sale to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor, you shall not wrong one another. ¹⁵You 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. ¹⁶If 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. ¹⁷You shall not wrong one another, but you shall fear your God, for I am the Lord your God. ¹⁸Therefore you shall do my statutes and keep my rules and perform them, and then you will dwell in the land securely. ¹⁹The land will yield its fruit, and you will eat your fill and dwell in it securely. ²⁰And if you say, What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop? ²¹I will command my blessing on 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 some of the old crop; you shall eat the old until the ninth year, when its crop arrives. ²³The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine. For you are strangers and sojourners with me. ²⁴And in all the country you possess, you shall allow a redemption of the land. ²⁵If your brother becomes poor and sells part of his property, then his nearest redeemer shall come and redeem what his brother has sold. ²⁶If a man has no one to redeem it and then himself becomes prosperous and finds sufficient means to redeem it, ²⁷let 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. ²⁸But 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. ²⁹If 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. ³⁰If 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. ³¹But 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. ³²As for the cities of the Levites, the Levites may redeem at any time the houses in the cities they possess. ³³And 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. ³⁴But the fields of pastureland belonging to their cities may not be sold, for that is their possession forever. ³⁵If 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. ³⁶Take no interest from him or profit, but fear your God, that your brother may live beside you. ³⁷You shall not lend him your money at interest, nor give him your food for profit. ³⁸I 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. ³⁹If your brother becomes poor beside you and sells himself to you, you shall not make him serve as a slave: ⁴⁰he shall be with you as a hired worker and as a sojourner. He shall serve with you until the year of the jubilee. ⁴¹Then 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. ⁴²For they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as slaves. ⁴³You shall not rule over him ruthlessly but shall fear your God. ⁴⁴As 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. ⁴⁵You 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. ⁴⁶You 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. ⁴⁷If 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, ⁴⁸then after he is sold he may be redeemed. One of his brothers may redeem him, ⁴⁹or 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. ⁵⁰He 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. ⁵¹If there are still many years left, he shall pay proportionately for his redemption some of his sale price. ⁵²If 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. ⁵³He shall treat him as a worker hired year by year. He shall not rule ruthlessly over him in your sight. ⁵⁴And if he is not redeemed by these means, then he and his children with him shall be released in the year of jubilee. ⁵⁵For 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.

¹And the LORD spake unto Moses in mount Sinai, saying, ²Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto the LORD. ³Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof; ⁴But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the LORD: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard. ⁵That which groweth of its own accord of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, neither gather the grapes of thy vine undressed: for it is a year of rest unto the land. ⁶And the sabbath of the land shall be meat for you; for thee, and for thy servant, and for thy maid, and for thy hired servant, and for thy stranger that sojourneth with thee. ⁷And for thy cattle, and for the beast that are in thy land, shall all the increase thereof be meat. ⁸And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years shall be unto thee forty and nine years. ⁹Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubilee to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall ye make the trumpet sound throughout all your land. ¹⁰And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubilee unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family. ¹¹A jubilee shall that fiftieth year be unto you: ye shall not sow, neither reap that which groweth of itself in it, nor gather the grapes in it of thy vine undressed. ¹²For it is the jubilee; it shall be holy unto you: ye shall eat the increase thereof out of the field. ¹³In the year of this jubilee ye shall return every man unto his possession. ¹⁴And if thou sell ought unto thy neighbor, or buyest ought of thy neighbor's hand, ye shall not oppress one another: ¹⁵According to the number of years after the jubilee thou shalt buy of thy neighbor, and according unto the number of years of the fruits he shall sell unto thee: ¹⁶According to the multitude of years thou shalt increase the price thereof, and according to the fewness of years thou shalt diminish the price of it: for according to the number of the years of the fruits doth he sell unto thee. ¹⁷Ye shall not therefore oppress one another; but thou shalt fear thy God: for I am the LORD your God. ¹⁸Wherefore ye shall do my statutes, and keep my judgments, and do them; and ye shall dwell in the land in safety. ¹⁹And the land shall yield her fruit, and ye shall eat your fill, and dwell therein in safety. ²⁰And if ye 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 upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth fruit for three years. ²²And ye shall sow the eighth year, and eat yet of old fruit until the ninth year; until her fruits come in ye shall eat of the old store. ²³The land shall not be sold for ever: for the land is mine, for ye are strangers and sojourners with me. ²⁴And in all the land of your possession ye shall grant a redemption for the land. ²⁵If thy brother be waxen poor, and hath 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 overplus unto the man to whom he sold it; that he may return unto 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 hath bought it until the year of jubilee: and in the jubilee it shall go out, and he shall return unto 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. ³⁵And if thy brother be waxen poor, and fallen in decay with thee; then thou shalt relieve him: yea, though he be a stranger, or a sojourner; that he may live with thee. ³⁶Take thou no usury of him, or increase: but fear thy God; that thy brother may live with thee. ³⁷Thou shalt not give him thy money upon usury, nor lend him thy 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. ³⁹And if thy brother that dwelleth by thee be waxen poor, and be sold unto thee; thou shalt not compel him to serve as a bondservant: ⁴⁰But as an hired servant, and as a sojourner, he shall be with thee, and shall serve thee unto the year of jubilee. ⁴¹And then shall he depart from thee, both he and his children with him, and shall return unto his own family, and unto 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 bondmen. ⁴³Thou shalt not rule over him with rigor; but shalt fear thy God. ⁴⁴Both thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. ⁴⁵Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession. ⁴⁶And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your bondmen for ever: but over your brethren the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigor. ⁴⁷And if a sojourner or stranger wax rich by thee, and thy brother that dwelleth by him wax poor, and sell himself unto the stranger or sojourner by thee, or to the stock of the stranger's family: ⁴⁸After that he is sold he may be redeemed again; one of his brethren may redeem him: ⁴⁹Either his uncle, or his uncle's son, may redeem him, or any that is nigh of kin unto 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 unto the year of jubilee: and the price of his sale shall be according unto 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 unto 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 unto the year of jubilee, then he shall count with him, and according unto 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 thy 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 unto 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.

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