Leviticus 25
McGeeCHAPTER 25THEME: The sabbatical year; the year of Jubilee; the redemption of property; the redemption of personsNot only was the Mosaic economy directed to the people of Israel, but it also pertained particularly to the land of Palestine. This is emphasized in this chapter. The laws given here could not be enforced until Israel entered the land of Canaan. They could not possibly be adapted to the wilderness. There is a constant and almost monotonous reference to and repetition of the word land"When ye come into the land," “rest unto the land,” and “proclaim liberty throughout all the land.” That last phrase is found ten times. Everything in this chapter is tied down to the land which God gave Israel.
The Mosaic economy was directed to a peculiar people, Israel, and to a particular land, Palestine. Furthermore, it is directed to a people engaged in agriculture. There are those who try to saddle the Old Testament Law as a way of life upon the church. These laws don’t fit in California, and they won’t fit other areas of our nation. “Proclaim liberty throughout all the land” is inscribed on our Liberty Bell in Philadelphia. Yet, we need always remember that these laws were given to a particular people in a particular land. One cannot read Leviticus, nor the rest of the Bible, without noticing the recurrence of the number seven. It is the number used to denote completeness. It does not mean perfection in every instance, but it denotes completeness. There is a definite connection of the many occurences of the number seven in Leviticus with the number seven in Revelation. Both books use it in a structural way. Time was divided into sevens both for the civil and ceremonial calendars. There is the seventh day, the seventh week, the seventh month, the seventh year. The calendar was geared to Sabbatic times and the Levitical code was run on wheels of seven cycles. This occurs again in Revelation. God rested on the seventh day, not because He was tired, but because He had completed creation in six days, and there was no more to do. The Sabbath was made the basic unit of measurement of time, and then from the Sabbath there were ever-expanding units of time measurement.
Leviticus 25:1
THE SABBATICAL YEARIt should be noted that this reverts back to Mount Sinai, but it is to be put into effect when they get into the Land. Remember that God spoke out of the tabernacle in Lev_1:1.
Leviticus 25:2
This is amazing. There is a sabbath for the land as well as for man. The seventh day is for man, and the seventh year is for the land. The seventh day hearkens back to creation when God rested from His labors, for His work of creation was complete. Sabbath means rest, and in its ultimate meaning it refers to the rest of redemption. “There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God. For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his. Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief” (Heb_4:9-11). Rest in these verses means literally “keeping of a sabbath.” It is obvious in this day of scientific agriculture that letting the land lie fallow on the seventh year was good for the land. It was also a rest for those who tilled the soil, although they could discharge other necessary duties. This Sabbatical year for the land was to deliver the Israelite from covetousness. Actually, it was the breaking of this regulation concerning the Sabbatical year that sent Israel into the seventy years Babylonian captivity (2Ch_36:21). They failed to keep seventy Sabbatic years over a period of 490 years; so they went into captivity for seventy years.
Leviticus 25:3
This makes it perfectly clear that the Sabbatical year related to the land. They were to sow their fields and prune their vineyards for six years, and then neither sow nor prune on the seventh year. There is a curse upon the earth as well as upon man, and it is by the sweat of man’s brow that he extracts bread from the soil. There will be a day when the curse shall be lifted from creation (Rom_8:20-22 and Isa_35:1-2). The southland where I was reared has learned, to its sorrow, that one should let the land lie fallow. A great deal of the land has been worn out by planting cotton every year, year after year. The Sabbatical year was actually a good agricultural principle which God gave to them. It is quite interesting that God knows all about farming, isn’t it?
Leviticus 25:5
This shows how the physical needs of the people were supplied during the Sabbatical year. The land was so productive that it was not necessary to plant each year. In the Euphrates Valley, in the days of Abraham, it was not necessary to plant at all. The grain grew without planting. The ground in Israel produced enough to supply the needs of the owner, his servants, and the stranger. Even the cattle could survive and probably grew fat by grazing on the untilled land. God took care of both man and beast, Israelite and stranger, rich and poor during the year of rest. They were all given enough to eat. However, they could not harvest anything to market it. Years ago, before all the subdivisions were built, there were many fine vineyards near Pasadena. I had a very fine neighbor who had a wonderful vineyard of Concord grapes. He was a generous man and he would always bring me a basket or two during the season. He was a Seventh Day Adventist and at times he would try to goad me about the Sabbath Day. He would ask me why I didn’t keep the Sabbath Day. I would tell him that I did keep the Sabbath Dayon Saturday and on Sunday and on Monday and on Tuesday and every day of the week.
I tried to explain to him that sabbath means rest and that we have entered into the rest of redemption. We have ceased from works and put our trust in Jesus Christ which makes every day a day of rest, a rest in Jesus Christ. Of course, he didn’t like it that way. Then I would ask him a question. “Are you keeping the Mosaic Law? Are you keeping the Sabbath as they did in Israel?” He assured me that he was. Then I showed him chapter 25 of Leviticus.
I told him there was not a Sabbath Day only, but there was also a Sabbatical year. In that year the poor people could go into the vineyard and glean grapes. I asked him to let me know when he would observe that Sabbatical year so I could get my basket and glean some of his grapes. He answered, “You’d better not go into that vineyard without my permission!” May I say to you, he was not keeping the Mosaic Law. He was keeping only a small part of it. He did not keep the Sabbatical year nor the year of Jubilee. God was teaching Israel several lessons. He never permitted any one of them to monopolize the land so that the poor people were not taken care of. God was protecting the land and the poor people at the same time. Also He was teaching them that the land was cursed but that the time would come when the land would produce in abundance. Today, people worry about the population explosion and the inability of the earth to produce enough food for the people. When the curse is removed, my friend, this earth will produce in a way never seen since the fall of man. God is the supplier of all human needs. God is the owner of this earth.
Leviticus 25:8
THE YEAR OF JUBILEEThis continues in the multiples of seven. Seven Sabbatical years were numbered and this made forty-nine years. Then, the following year, the fiftieth, was set aside as the year of Jubilee. The year of Jubilee was a continuing of the number seven to the ever-ascending scale of the calendar. It was the largest unit of timefifty years. Today we operate by leases. People may have a fifty-year lease or a ninety-nine-year lease. God worked on that basis, also. There were two years of Jubilee in every century.
Leviticus 25:9
This was the crowning point of the entire sabbatical structure of the nation. It was the SHeNATH HAYOBHEL, the year of Jubilee. In many respects it was the most anticipated and joyful period of the Mosaic economy. The KEREN HAYOBHEL meant the horn of a ram, and in the time the YOBHEL came to mean trumpet. It is translated twenty-one times as “jubilee,” five times as “ram’s horn,” and once as “trumpet.” After Israel was settled in the land, it is difficult to see how one blast of the trumpet could be heard from Dan to Beersheba. It is reasonable to conclude that in every populated area there was a simultaneous blowing of the ram’s horn to usher in the year of Jubilee. I think it would begin at the tabernacle or temple. There would be a person stationed far enough away to be able to hear it, and then the trumpet note would be passed on and on out to the very end of the land.
Leviticus 25:10
In that day people could mortgage their land, but in the year of Jubilee that land would return back to the original owner. This was the way God protected the land from leaving the original owner. The land could be taken away for a period of fifty years, but in the year of Jubilee the land went back to the original owner or to his descendants. If a man had sold himself into slavery, when that trumpet was sounded he went free. The shackles were broken. This is how we are freed today. The Greek word for trumpet is kerux and the verb kerusso means to proclaim or to herald. The year of Jubilee is likened to this age of grace when the gospel is preached to slaves of sin and captives of Satan. “But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness. For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom_6:17-18, Rom_6:23). The Lord Jesus Christ said, “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free…. If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed” (Joh_8:32, Joh_8:36). In the year of Jubilee everything went free. All mortgages were canceled. When you come to Jesus Christ, my friend, the sin question is settled. He paid the penalty. It is all settled, and you go free. He makes you free! “But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life” (Rom_6:22). “Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage” (Gal_5:1). In this connection it is interesting to note the words of our Lord in the synagogue at Nazareth: “And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Esaias. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable year of the Lord. And he closed the book, and he gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him. And he began to say unto them, This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears” (Luk_4:17-21). “To preach the gospel to the poor” is to herald it, to trumpet it. Isn’t this the year of Jubileeto heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, to set at liberty them that are bruised? Possibly the best application and final fulfillment of the year of Jubilee will be in the Millennium as it relates directly to the nation Israel. I would encourage you to read Isaiah 11, 35, and 40, Jeremiah 23, Micah 4, and Revelation 20.
Leviticus 25:11
The year of Jubilee followed a Sabbatical year when the land lay fallow. God promised to provide providentially for them. They were to obey. God would provide.
Leviticus 25:13
This section explains that all property and possessions were to be returned to the original owner. This prevented any one individual or group from getting possession of most of the land while the rest became extremely poor. It preserved a balance in Israel. This was not a choice between communism and capitalism, but it was God’s plan. He retained ownership of the land and Israel held it in perpetuity. God promised His blessing upon them. He promised to bless the land in the sixth year. They would sow again on the eighth year and they would eat of the old fruit of the land until the ninth year when it would produce again. God makes it very clear to them in verse Lev_25:23: “The land shall not be sold for ever: for the land is mine.”
Leviticus 25:25
THE REDEMPTION OF PROPERTYIt was a long time from one year of Jubilee to the next. If a man lost his property shortly after a Jubilee, there was the possibility he would not be alive to enjoy it the next time a year of Jubilee came around. So God made another provision for the recovery of the land. If there was a rich relative, he was able to redeem the property if he was willing to do so, and then the land could be restored to the original owner. It depended on the willingness of the kinsman. This is the law of the kinsman-redeemer which we will see in operation in the Book of Ruth.
Leviticus 25:28
Laws were also made concerning dwellings and buildings on property. Depreciation was taken into consideration. There were different rules applying to the Levites.
Leviticus 25:35
THE REDEMPTION OF PERSONSGod was explicit about the care of unfortunate folk. They were to be helped; they were not to be taken advantage of.
Leviticus 25:38
The poor brother who probably had a low I.Q. was to be protected from becoming a slave. He was to be treated as a hired servant, not as a slave. They were permitted to have only foreigners as slaveswhich was a great step forward in a world of slavery. It is the adaptation of the Mosaic Law to the mores of that day.
Leviticus 25:47
This is the application of the law of Jubilee to the person (see verse Lev_25:10) who not only had lost his property, but had to sell his person as well. He could have the services of a kinsman-redeemer if there was one who was willing and able to deliver him before the year of Jubilee. You and I have a Kinsman-Redeemer. He is rich. Yet, for our sakes He was willing to become poor so that He might shed His precious blood to redeem us. He has redeemed not only our persons but He has also paid the price for this cursed earth. It too will be redeemed from the curse that is on it now. The law of the kinsman-redeemer points to our Lord Jesus Christ who is our Kinsman-Redeemer.