Nehemiah 10:31

And if the people of the land bring ware,.... Any thing to be sold, any sort of goods, that being sold might be taken away, as the word signifies; or any victuals on the sabbath day to sell; anything

And that we would not give our daughters unto the people of the land, nor take their daughters for our sons: No JFB commentary on these verses.

That we would leave the seventh year, i.e. leave the land at rest from ploughing or tilling it in that year, according to God’ s command, ,11 Le 25:4. The exaction of every debt, Heb. hand: debts are called hands, because they are commonly contracted or confirmed by a bill under the hand of the debtor.

Nehemiah 10:31 And [if] the people of the land bring ware or any victuals on the sabbath day to sell, [that] we would not buy it of them on the sabbath, or on the holy day: and [that] we would leave the seventh year, and the exaction of every debt.Ver. 31. And if the people of the land bring any ware] As they might without the Jews’ leave; and did, Nehemiah 13:16, and some of those Jews, forgetting their covenant, bought of them too; even the children of Judah in Jerusalem, ib., as if they had been of her religion in the tragedy, who said, ηγλωττομωμοχηδεφοηνανωμοτος. that is, I swore with my tongue, but not with my heart. But shall they thus escape by iniquity? Be not deceived, God is not mocked; a God of truth, and without iniquity; just and right is he, Deuteronomy 32:4. That we would not buy it of them] Lest we should trouble and disquiet that holy rest; and God should sue us upon an action of waste; "For the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God," Exodus 20:10 Jeremiah 17:12. Or on the holy day] Now abrogated, Colossians 2:16. And that we would leave the seventh year] That Sabbatical year, prefiguring the year of grace, the kingdom of Christ, Qui noxas et nexus omnes solveret, who giveth his people a general release, Deuteronomy 15:2, and comes not over them again with a later reckoning, Peccata non redeunt. The land also was to rest from tillage this year, Exodus 23:11. And the exaction of every debt] For that year, at least, and the next too, if the debtor were not able to pay; the lender was to expect a recompense from God, Deuteronomy 15:6.

(31) Or on the holy day.—On the great festivals, equally with the Sabbath days of rest. Leave the seventh year.—The Sabbatical year naturally follows; in it the ground should be left untilled. The exaction of every debt.—The “Lord’s release” of the seventh year (Deuteronomy 15:2).

Verse 31. Bring ware] We will most solemnly keep the Sabbath. Leave the seventh year-We will let the land have its Sabbath, and rest every seventh year. See on Exodus 23:10-11.

31. Prohibition of Traffic on the Sabbath; and Observance of Sabbatic Yearpeople] R.V. peoples. ‘The peoples of the land (’ammey haβrec̣ ?) are the heathen dwellers in the land. The title ‘the people of the land’ (’am haβrec̣ ?) was used in later days of the unlearned multitude ‘which knoweth not the law’ (John 7:49). ware] The Hebrew word occurs only here in the O.T. (LXX. ἀγορασμούς, Vulg. ‘venalia’). on the sabbath day] The prohibition is not found in so many words in the Pentateuch. But it represents the natural expansion of the command to keep the Sabbath holy. Pollution would most easily be contracted by the interchange of wares with the heathen. Complete abstention from such occupation was the only safeguard for the purity of the people, as well as for the observance of the Sabbath as a day of rest, cf. Nehemiah 13:15. This abstention was practised in the kingly period in respect of the sabbath and the new-moon days. Amos 8:5, ‘When will the new moon be gone that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat?’ on the holy day] R.V. on a holy day. The days set apart to be observed as ‘holy-days’ are described in Numbers 28, 31. That these were to be observed as ‘days of rest,’ and were thus on the same footing with the Sabbath-days argues the acquaintance of the writer with the Levitical Law of the Priestly Code. leave] R.V. forgo. The same word that is used in Exodus 23:11 for ‘let lie fallow.’ LXX. ἀνήσομεν. the seventh year] See Exodus 23:10-11, ‘And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the increase thereof; but the seventh year thou shalt let it rest (marg. ‘release it’) and lie fallow.’ This observance of the Sabbatic year is not referred to in the Deuteronomic Law which only speaks of it as the year of release from debt (Deuteronomy 15). But the Priestly Law in Leviticus 25:2-7 enters with some minuteness into the agricultural ‘rest’ of the seventh year. This regulation was not, for practical reasons, scrupulously carried out; its neglect is the subject of rebuke, Leviticus 26:34-35; Leviticus 26:43; 2 Chronicles 36:21. It seems to have been observed in later times, cf. 1Ma 6:49; 1Ma 6:53; Jos. Ant. xi. 8. 6, xiii. 8. 1, &c. Tacitus, who is prejudiced against the Jews, attributes the custom to national laziness, Hist. Nehemiah 10:4. and the exaction of every debt] This is a technical expression taken from Deuteronomy 15:2, and constitutes the expansion, for the requirements of a more developed time, of the principle laid down in the agricultural Law of the Sabbatic Year (Exodus 23). By a common error it has been supposed that debts were on this year altogether remitted. The analogy of the ‘fallow’ land shows that the debts remained, but were not exacted; payment was ‘hung up’ for a whole year. Some render ‘the exaction of every man’s pledge.’ The versions are literal, LXX. ἀπαίτησινπάσηςχειρός. Vulg.

Bring ware ... on the sabbath day - Compare Nehemiah 13:16, where this desecration of the Sabbath is shown to have commonly taken place. Leave the seventh year ... - i.

31. We would not buy… on the sabbath — Such breaking of the Sabbath had prevailed among them before this. Or on the holy day — The day of any of the great religious festivals, on which the law forbade all servile work.