Leviticus
Chapter 25
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Leningrad Codex, through the Open Scriptures Westminster Leningrad Codex. The written consonants are printed. A Masoretic reading is footnoted when it differs. No Dead Sea reading was substituted unless it was read from a fragment. The Samaritan Pentateuch and the Greek, Syriac, and Latin versions are witnesses, not the default.
A dotted word is a harder one. Point at it, or tap it, for a short definition.
1God’s own name. The Hebrew writes YHWH. See the glossary. spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai:
2Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, When you come into the land that I am giving you, the land shall keep a A time of rest set aside for God. It may be a day, or a whole year for the land. for God’s own name. The Hebrew writes YHWH. See the glossary..
3Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and you shall gather its yield.
4In the seventh year there shall be a A time of rest set aside for God. It may be a day, or a whole year for the land. of complete rest for the land, a A time of rest set aside for God. It may be a day, or a whole year for the land. for God’s own name. The Hebrew writes YHWH. See the glossary.. You shall not sow your field, and you shall not prune your vineyard.
5You shall not reap the aftergrowth of your harvest, and you shall not gather the grapes of your unpruned vine. It shall be a year of complete rest for the land.
Notes (1)Hide notes
- Translation
Sefiach is the aftergrowth, what comes up without a sowing. Nezir is the vine left unpruned. It is not the nazirite vow.
6The A time of rest set aside for God. It may be a day, or a whole year for the land. of the land shall be food for you: for you, and for your male slave and for your female slave, and for your hired man and for your resident, the People living in a land that is not their own. with you,
7and for your livestock and for the wild animal that is in your land. All its yield shall be for food.
8You shall count for yourself seven Times of rest set aside for God. of years, seven years seven times, and the days of the seven Times of rest set aside for God. of years shall be forty-nine years for you.
9You shall send a ram’s horn blast through on the tenth of the seventh month. On the day of The making of people right with God after a wrong. you shall send a ram’s horn through all your land.
10You shall set apart the fiftieth year and proclaim a release in the land for all who live in it. It shall be a The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it. for you. You shall return, each to his holding, and each to his clan you shall return.
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- Translation
Yovel is the jubilee, the fiftieth year, named with the ram’s horn of verse 9. Deror is a release. Achuzzah is a holding of land.
11The fiftieth year shall be a The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it. for you. You shall not sow, and you shall not reap its aftergrowth, and you shall not gather its unpruned vines.
12Because it is a The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it., it shall be holy for you. From the field you shall eat its yield.
13In this year of The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it. you shall return, each to his holding.
14When you sell a sale to your fellow, or buy from your fellow’s hand, you shall not wrong one another.
15By the number of years after the The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it. you shall buy from your fellow. By the number of years of yields he shall sell to you.
16According to the many years you shall raise its price, and according to the few years you shall lower its price, because he is selling you a number of yields.
17You shall not wrong one another. You shall fear your God, because I am God’s own name. The Hebrew writes YHWH. See the glossary. your God.
18You shall do my Rules that are meant to last., and you shall keep my rules and do them, and you shall live on the land in security.
19The land shall give its fruit, and you shall eat to the full, and you shall live on it in security.
20If you say, What shall we eat in the seventh year? Look, we shall not sow, and we shall not gather our yield,
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- Text
The diplomatic text marks the form נאכל as anomalous. The word is still “we shall eat.” No other reading is printed.
21I will command my blessing for you in the sixth year, and it shall make the yield for the three years.
22You shall sow the eighth year and eat from the old yield until the ninth year. Until its yield comes in, you shall eat the old.
23The land shall not be sold in For all time, with no date when it ends., because the land is mine. You are People living in a land that is not their own. and residents with me.
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- Translation
Tzemithut is perpetuity, a sale that does not return. Gerim ve-toshavim is sojourners and residents.
24In all the land of your holding you shall allow a Buying a person or land back. for the land.
25When your brother grows poor and sells some of his holding, his A close relative who can take on family land or buy a relative back. who is nearest to him shall come and To buy a person, an animal, or land back. what his brother sold.
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- Translation
Goel is the redeemer, the near kin who can buy the holding back. See the glossary. Ge’ullah is that redemption.
26When a man has no A close relative who can take on family land or buy a relative back., and his hand reaches it, and he finds enough for its Buying a person or land back.,
27he shall count the years of its sale and return the remainder to the man to whom he sold it, and he shall return to his holding.
28If his hand does not find enough to return it to him, what he sold shall stay in the hand of the one who bought it until the year of The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it.. It shall go out in the The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it., and he shall return to his holding.
29When a man sells a dwelling house in a walled city, its Buying a person or land back. shall last until the end of the year of its sale. For a period of days its Buying a person or land back. shall last.
30If it is not Bought back. before a full year is completed for him, the house that is in the city that has not a wall shall stand in For all time, with no date when it ends. for the one who bought it, through his generations. It shall not go out in the The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it..
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- Text
The written consonants are לא, “not”: a city that has not a wall. The Masoretic reading is לו, “to it”: a city that has a wall. The written form is printed. Verse 31 is the separate rule for houses that have no wall around them.
31Houses of the villages that have no wall around them shall be counted with the field of the land. Buying a person or land back. shall belong to it, and it shall go out in the The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it..
32The cities of the Levites, the houses of the cities of their holding: a lasting Buying a person or land back. shall belong to the Levites.
33What is Bought back. from the Levites, a sold house and the city of his holding, shall go out in the The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it., because the houses of the cities of the Levites are their holding among the sons of Israel.
34The field of the open land of their cities shall not be sold, because it is a lasting holding for them.
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- Translation
Migrash is the open land around a city, the ground outside the houses.
35When your brother grows poor, and his hand fails with you, you shall take hold of him, A person living in a land that is not their own. and resident, and he shall live with you.
36Do not take interest or increase from him. You shall fear your God, and your brother shall live with you.
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- Translation
Neshekh is interest, a bite taken from a loan. Tarbit is increase. No rate is added.
37You shall not give him your silver at interest, and you shall not give your food at increase.
38I am God’s own name. The Hebrew writes YHWH. See the glossary. your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan, to be God to you.
39When your brother grows poor with you and sells himself to you, you shall not make him serve the service of a slave.
40He shall be with you as a hired man, as a resident. Until the year of The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it. he shall serve with you.
41Then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and he shall return to his clan, and he shall return to his fathers’ holding.
42Because they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. They shall not be sold in a slave’s sale.
43You shall not rule over him with harshness. You shall fear your God.
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- Translation
Perekh is harshness, crushing rule. The same word returns in verses 46 and 53.
44Your male slave and your female slave who belong to you, from the nations that are around you, from them you may buy a male slave and a female slave.
45Also from the sons of the residents who sojourn with you, from them you may buy, and from their clans that are with you, whom they fathered in your land. They may become a holding for you.
46You may leave them as a possession to your sons after you, to inherit a holding. You may make them serve for good. But over your brothers, the sons of Israel, a man over his brother, you shall not rule with harshness.
47When the hand of a A person living in a land that is not their own. or a resident with you reaches the means, and your brother grows poor with him and sells himself to the A person living in a land that is not their own., a resident with you, or to a member of a A person living in a land that is not their own.’s clan,
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- Translation
Eqer is a member, a root of the clan. The buyer is not an Israelite brother.
48after he is sold, Buying a person or land back. shall belong to him. One of his brothers shall To buy a person, an animal, or land back. him,
49or his uncle, or his uncle’s son, shall To buy a person, an animal, or land back. him, or a close kin of his body from his clan shall To buy a person, an animal, or land back. him, or if his own hand reaches it, he shall To buy a person, an animal, or land back. himself.
50He shall count with the one who bought him, from the year he was sold to him until the year of The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it.. The silver of his sale shall be by the number of years. It shall be with him as the days of a hired man.
51If there are still many years, he shall return his Buying a person or land back. in proportion to them, from the silver of his purchase.
52If few years remain until the year of The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it., he shall count it for him. In proportion to his years he shall return his Buying a person or land back..
53Year by year he shall be with him as a hired man. He shall not rule him with harshness in your sight.
54If he is not Bought back. by these, he shall go out in the year of The fiftieth year, when land goes back to the family that held it., he and his children with him.
55Because the sons of Israel are servants to me. They are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. I am God’s own name. The Hebrew writes YHWH. See the glossary. your God.