Leviticus 25
1THE Lord spoke to Moses, saying,
2Speak to the children of Israel, and thou shalt say unto them: When you are come into the land which I give you, the land which I give you must rest sabbaths for the Lord.
3Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather the fruit thereof.
4But in the seventh year there shall be sabbaths—there shall be a rest for the land—sabbaths for the Lord.
5Thou shalt neither sow thy field nor prune thy vineyard, nor reap the spontaneous productions of thy field, nor gather the grapes of thy dedication. It shall be a year of rest for the land.
6And the sabbaths of the land shall be food for thee, and for thy man servant, and for thy maid servant, and for thy hired servant, and for the stranger who sojourneth with thee;
7and for thy cattle, and the wild beasts in thy land, shall the whole product thereof be for food.
8Moreover thou shalt reckon for thyself seven rests of years, seven times seven years, and these forty nine years, shall be the seven weeks of years;
9and you shall make proclamation with the sound of a trumpet, throughout all your land, in the seventh month, and tenth day of the month—On the day of the atonement, you shall make proclamation with a trumpet, throughout all your land,
10and dedicate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty in the land, to all the inhabitants thereof. And this shall be a year of rest, a Jubilee for you; and every one shall return to his possession, and every one shall go to his family.
11This jubilee, this fiftieth year, shall be for you a general release, you shall not sow, nor shall you reap the spontaneous productions thereof, nor gather the vintage which is dedicated.
12Because it is a jubilee, it shall be holy to you. From the fields you may eat the productions thereof.
13In this year of release, proclaimed by the sound of trumpets, every one shall return to his possession.
14Whether therefore thou sellest to thy neighbour, or purchasest of thy neighbour, let no man take advantage of his neighbour.
15According to the number of years after the jubilee, thou shalt purchase of thy neighbour; and according to the number of years of crops, he shall sell to thee.
16In proportion to the greater number of years, thou shalt rate his possession higher, and according to the fewness of the years, thou shalt rate it lower. For according to the number of crops, so shall he sell to thee.
17Let no man take advantage of his neighbour. Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God.
18I am the Lord your God, therefore you shall practise all my rules of rectitude, and all my judgments, and keep and do them; so shall you dwell securely in the land,
19and the land shall yield its productions; and you shall eat plentifully, and dwell securely therein.
20Now if you should say, What shall we eat in this seventh year, if we neither sow nor gather our produce?
21I indeed will send my blessing for you, in the sixth year, and it will make the products thereof sufficient for the three years.
22Though you are to sow in the eighth year, yet on account of the produce, you shall eat the old, even to the ninth year, even till the products of that come in, you shall eat of the old store.
23Now the land must not be sold forever; for the land is mine. Because you are strangers, and sojourners before me,
24therefore in all the land of your possession, you shall grant a right of redeeming the land.
25And if thy brother who is with thee become poor, and sell any part of his possession; when he who is next of kin to him cometh, he shall redeem what his brother hath sold.
26And if any person hath none to redeem, and his own hand hath attained, and found a sufficiency, he shall have the right of redemption.
27And he shall compute the years of his sale, and pay back what is still due to the man to whom he sold it. So shall he return to his possession.
28But if his hand cannot attain a sufficiency to repay him, the sale shall be good to him who purchased, until the last sixth year of the jubilee, and in the jubilee, he shall quit, and the seller shall return to his possession.
29And if any person sell a dwelling house in a walled city, he shall have the right of redeeming it till the term expire. The term for redemption shall be a year.
30And if it be not redeemed till the whole year expire, the house which is in a walled city, shall be confirmed for ever to the purchaser. And he shall not go out in the jubilee.
31But the houses which are in villages, unsurrounded with walls, shall be accounted as the fields in the country, and shall be always subject to redemption, and go out in the jubilee.
32And the cities of the Levites, the houses of the cities of their possession, shall always be redeemable by the Levites;
33and whoever among the Levites shall redeem, the intermediate purchase of the houses of the city of their possession shall terminate in the jubilee. For the houses of the cities of the Levites are their possession among the children of Israel.
34And the fields set apart for their cities shall not be sold; for this is their perpetual possession.
35And if thy brother who is with thee become poor and distressed in his circumstances when near thee, thou shalt help him, as a proselyte or a sojourner, and thy brother shall live with thee.
36Thou shalt not take from him usury or increase, but thou shalt fear thy God, I, the Lord; and thy brother shall live with thee.
37Thou shalt not lend him thy money on usury, nor give him thy victuals for an increase.
38I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Chanaan, and to be your God.
39And if thy brother who dwelleth by thee be humbled, and sold to thee, he shall not serve thee as a slave.
40He shall be with thee as a hireling, or a sojourner. Until the year of the release he shall work for thee,
41and in the year of the release he shall go out, and his children with him, and shall go to his own family—to his paternal possession he shall haste away.
42Because they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; he must not be sold as a slave.
43Thou shall not over burthen him with toil, but fear the Lord thy God.
44The male and female slaves, whom thou mayst have, must be of the nations around thee. Of them you may purchase a male or a female slave;
45or of the children of strangers who sojourn among you—of them you may purchase and of their relations who may be born in your land.
46Let them be your property, and divide them among your children after you, and they shall be your slaves for life: but of your brethren, the children of Israel, one shall not rule over another with rigour.
47And if a proselyte, or a sojourner who is with thee, prosper, and thy brother, being poor, be sold to the proselyte, or to the stranger who is with thee, or to the descendant of the proselyte;
48after he is sold he shall have a right to be redeemed. One of his brethren may redeem him,
49his uncle, or his uncle’s son, may redeem him, or any of his blood relations, of the same tribe, may redeem him; and if he be able he may redeem himself.
50In which case he shall settle with him who purchased him, from the year he sold himself, to the year of the release, and the price of his purchase shall be as the yearly wages of a hired servant for the years he is to be with him.
51And if any one hath many years to serve, for them he shall pay the rates of redemption, on account of the money paid for him;
52and if but few years remain to the year of release, he shall settle with him according to those years, and pay the rates of his redemption.
53As a servant hired from year to year, he shall be with him; and thou shalt not suffer him to be oppressed with labour in thy sight.
54If he be not redeemed in any of these ways, in the year of the release he shall go out, and his children with him;
55for the children of Israel are My domestics—they are My servants whom I brought out of Egypt.