Leviticus 25

The Sabbath Year

1The LORD spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying, 2“Speak to the Israelites and say to them: When you come into the land that I am giving you, the land shall keep a Sabbath to the LORD. 3Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather its produce. 4But in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of complete 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 by itself from your harvest, and you shall not gather the grapes of your untrimmed vine. It shall be a year of complete rest for the land. 6The Sabbath produce of the land shall be food for you—for you, your male and female servants, your hired worker, and the resident alien who lives with you, 7and for your livestock and the wild animals in your land. All its produce shall be for food.

The Year of Jubilee

8You shall count seven Sabbaths of years, seven times seven years, so that the time of the seven Sabbaths of years amounts to forty-nine years. 9Then you shall sound a loud blast on the horn in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month. On the Day of Atonement you shall sound the horn throughout all your land. 10You shall make the fiftieth year holy and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you, and each of you shall return to your property, and each of you shall return to your family. 11The fiftieth year shall be a Jubilee for you. You shall not sow, and you shall not reap what grows by itself or gather from the untrimmed vines, 12for it is a Jubilee. It shall be holy to you. You shall eat its produce from the field. 13In this Year of Jubilee each of you shall return to your property.

14When you sell something to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor, do not wrong one another. 15According to the number of years after the Jubilee, you shall buy from your neighbor; according to the number of crop years remaining, your neighbor shall sell to you. 16If the years are many, you shall increase the price, and if the years are few, you shall reduce the price, for what is being sold to you is the number of harvests. 17You shall not wrong one another, but you shall fear your God, for I am the LORD your God.

Provision in the Sabbath Year

18You shall do my statutes and keep my ordinances and do them, so that you may dwell securely in the land. 19The land will give its fruit, and you will eat your fill and dwell securely in it. 20If you say, ‘What will we eat in the seventh year, if we do not sow or gather our produce?’ 21I will command my blessing for you in the sixth year, and it will produce enough for three years. 22You will sow in the eighth year, but you will continue eating from the old produce until the ninth year. Until its produce comes in, you will eat from the old.

The Land Belongs to the LORD

23The land shall not be sold permanently, for the land is mine. You are resident aliens and temporary residents with me. 24Throughout all the land of your possession, you shall provide for the redemption of the land.

25If a fellow Israelite becomes poor and sells some of their property, the nearest redeemer shall come and redeem what the relative sold. 26If someone has no redeemer but later prospers and finds sufficient means to redeem it, 27that person shall calculate the years since its sale, repay the remaining value to the person to whom it was sold, and return to the property. 28But if there are not sufficient means to recover it, what was sold shall remain in the hand of the buyer until the Year of Jubilee. In the Jubilee it shall be released, and the seller shall return to the property.

Houses and Levitical Property

29If someone sells a dwelling house in a walled city, the right of redemption shall last until a full year after its sale. The right to redeem it shall last one year. 30If it is not redeemed before a full year is complete, the house in the walled city shall belong permanently to the buyer throughout the generations. It shall not be released in the Jubilee. 31But houses in villages that have no wall around them shall be considered as 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 shall always have the right to redeem houses in the cities of their possession. 33If one of the Levites does not redeem a sold house, the house in the city of their possession shall be released in the Jubilee, for the houses in the cities of the Levites are their possession among the Israelites. 34But the pastureland belonging to their cities shall not be sold, for it is their permanent possession.

Support the Impoverished

35If a fellow Israelite becomes poor and their hand falters beside you, you shall support them as you would a resident alien or temporary resident, so that they may live beside you. 36Do not take interest or profit from them, but fear your God, so that your fellow Israelite may live beside you. 37You shall not give your silver to them at interest or give 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.

Israelite Servants

39If a fellow Israelite becomes poor beside you and sells themselves to you, you shall not make that person serve as a slave. 40That person shall be with you like a hired worker or temporary resident and shall serve with you until the Year of Jubilee. 41Then that person and the children with them shall go out from you and return to their family and to the property of their ancestors. 42For they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. They shall not be sold as slaves are sold. 43You shall not rule over them with harshness, but you shall fear your God.

44As for the male and female slaves you may have, you may acquire male and female slaves from the nations around you. 45You may also acquire them from the children of the resident aliens who live among you and from their clans who are with you, those born in your land. They may become your property. 46You may leave them as an inheritance to your children after you, to inherit as property. You may have them serve permanently. But over your fellow Israelites you shall not rule over one another with harshness.

Redemption from a Resident Alien

47If a resident alien or temporary resident beside you prospers, and a fellow Israelite beside them becomes poor and sells themselves to the resident alien or temporary resident, or to a member of the resident alien’s clan, 48after being sold, that person retains the right of redemption. One of their relatives may redeem them: 49an uncle, an uncle’s child, or another close relative from the clan may redeem them; or if the person prospers, they may redeem themselves. 50They shall calculate with the buyer from the year they sold themselves until the Year of Jubilee. The price of the sale shall correspond to the number of years; the time shall be valued like the time of a hired worker. 51If many years remain, according to them the person shall repay the price of redemption from the purchase price. 52If only a few years remain until the Year of Jubilee, the person shall calculate accordingly; according to the years of service, the person shall repay the redemption price. 53The person shall be with the buyer like a worker hired year by year. The buyer shall not rule with harshness over that person in your sight. 54If the person is not redeemed by these means, that person and the children with them shall go free in the Year of Jubilee. 55For the Israelites are servants to me. They are my servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. I am the LORD your God.