Leviticus 25

1 Yahweh spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying,

The Lord told Moses on Mount Sinai,

2 “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, 'When you come into the land that I give you, then the land must be made to keep a Sabbath for Yahweh.

“Tell the Israelites: When you enter the land that I'm giving you, the land itself must also observe a Sabbath rest in honor of the Lord.

3 You must plant your field for six years, and for six years you must prune your vineyard and gather the produce.

Six years you can cultivate your fields, take care of your vineyards, and harvest your crops.

4 But in the seventh year, a Sabbath of solemn rest for the land must be observed, a Sabbath for Yahweh. You must not plant your field or prune your vineyard.

But the seventh year is to be a Sabbath of complete rest for the land, a Sabbath in honor of the Lord. Don't plant your fields or care for your vineyards.

5 You must not conduct an organized harvest of whatever grows by itself, and you must not conduct an organized harvest of whatever grapes grow on your unpruned vines. This will be a year of solemn rest for the land.

Don't harvest what may have grown up in your fields, or collect the grapes from your vineyards that you haven't cared for. The land is to have a year of complete rest.

6 Whatever the unworked land grows during the Sabbath year will be food for you. You, your male and female servants, your hired servants and the foreigners who live with you may gather food,

You can eat whatever the land produces during the Sabbath year. This applies to yourself, your male and female slaves, paid workers and foreigners who live with you,

7 and your livestock and also wild animals may eat whatever the land produces.

and to your livestock and the wild animals living in your land. Whatever grows can be used for food.

8 You must count off seven Sabbaths of years, that is, seven times seven years, so that there will be seven Sabbaths of years, totaling forty-nine years.

Count seven ‘sabbaths’ of years, in other words, seven times seven years, so that the seven sabbaths of years come to forty-nine years.

9 Then you must blow a loud trumpet everywhere on the tenth day of the seventh month. On the Day of Atonement you must blow a trumpet throughout all your land.

Then blow the trumpet all through the country on the tenth day of the seventh month, which is the Day of Atonement. Make sure this signal is heard throughout your whole country.

10 You must set apart the fiftieth year to Yahweh and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It will be a Jubilee for you, in which property and slaves must be returned to their families.

You are to dedicate the fiftieth year and announce freedom everywhere in the country for all who live there. This is to be your Jubilee, when each of you is to return to reclaim your property and to be part of your family once more.

11 The fiftieth year will be a Jubilee for you. You must not plant or conduct an organized harvest. Eat whatever grows by itself, and gather the grapes that grow on the unpruned vines.

The fiftieth year will be a Jubilee for you. Don't sow the land; don't harvest what may have grown up in your fields, or collect the grapes from your vineyards that you haven't cared for.

12 For it is a Jubilee, which will be holy for you. You must eat the produce that grows by itself out of the fields.

It is a Jubilee and it is to be holy to you. You can eat whatever the land produces.

13 You must return everyone to his own property in this year of Jubilee.

In this Jubilee Year, every one of you shall return to your own property.

14 If you sell any land to your neighbor or buy any land from your neighbor, you must not cheat or wrong each other.

If you sell land to your neighbor, or buy land from him, don't exploit one another.

15 If you buy land from your neighbor, consider the number of years and crops that can be harvested until the next Jubilee. Your neighbor selling the land must consider that also.

When you buy from your neighbor work out how many years have passed since the last Jubilee, for he is to sell to you depending on how many years of harvest remain.

16 A larger number of years until the next Jubilee will increase the value of land, and a smaller number of years until the next Jubilee will decrease the value, because the number of harvests the land will produce for the new owner is related to the number of years before the next Jubilee.

The more years that are left, the more you shall pay; the fewer years that are left, the less you shall pay, because he is actually selling you a specific number of harvests.

17 You must not cheat or wrong one another; instead, you must honor your God, for I am Yahweh your God.

Don't exploit one another, but have respect for your God, because I am the Lord your God.

18 Therefore you must obey my decrees, keep my laws, and carry them out. Then you will live in the land in safety.

Keep my rules and observe my regulations, so you can live in safety in the land.

19 The land will yield its produce, and you will eat your fill and live there in safety.

Then the land will produce good harvest, so you will have plenty to eat and live in safety there.

20 You might say, “What will we eat during the seventh year? Look, we cannot plant or gather our produce.”

But if you ask, ‘What are we going to in the seventh year if we do not sow or harvest our crops?’

21 I will command my blessing to come upon you in the sixth year, and it will produce harvest enough for three years.

I will bless you in the sixth year, so that the land will produce a crop that will be enough for three years.

22 You will plant in the eighth year and continue to eat from the previous years' produce and the stored food. Until the harvest of the ninth year comes in, you will be able to eat from the provisions stored in the previous years.

As you sow in the eighth year, you will still be eating from that harvest, which will last until your harvest in the ninth year.

23 The land must not be sold to a new permanent owner, because the land is mine. You are all foreigners and temporary residents on my land.

Land must not be permanently sold, because it really belongs to me. To me you are only foreigners and travelers passing through.

24 You must observe the right of redemption for all the land that you acquire; you must allow the land to be bought back by the family from whom you bought it.

So whatever land you buy to own, you must make arrangements so it can be returned to its original owner.

25 If your fellow Israelite became poor and for that reason sold some of his property, then his nearest relative may come and buy back the property that he sold to you.

If one of your people becomes poor and sells you some of their land, their close family can come and buy back what they have sold.

26 If a man has no relative to redeem his property, but if he has prospered and has the ability to redeem it,

However, if they don't have anyone who can buy it back, but in the meantime their financial situation improves and they have enough to buy back the land,

27 then he may calculate the years since the land was sold and repay the balance to the man to whom he sold it. Then he may return to his own property.

they will work how many years it has been since the sale, and pay back the balance to the person who bought it, and go back to their property

28 But if he is not able to get the land back for himself, then the land he has sold will remain in the ownership of the one who bought it until the year of Jubilee. At the year of Jubilee, the land will be returned to the man who sold it, and the original owner will return to his property.

If they can't raise enough to pay the person back for the land, the buyer will remain its owner until the Jubilee Year. But in the Jubilee the land will be returned so that the original owner can so that they can go back to their property.

29 If a man sells a house in a walled city, then he may buy it back within a whole year after it was sold. For a full year he will have the right of redemption.

If someone sells a house located in a walled town, they have the right to buy it back for a full year after selling it. It can be bought back any time during that year.

30 If the house is not redeemed within a full year, then the house in the walled city will become the permanent property of the buyer and his descendants. It is not to be returned in the year of Jubilee.

If it isn't bought back be the end of a full year, then ownership of the house in the walled town is permanently transferred to the one who bought it and their descendants. It won't be returned in the Jubilee.

31 But the houses of the villages that have no wall around them will be considered as the field of the land. They may be redeemed, and they must be returned during the year of Jubilee.

But houses in villages that don't have walls around them are to be treated as located in the fields. They can be bought back, and will be returned in the Jubilee.

32 However, the houses owned by the Levites in their cities may be redeemed at any time.

However, the Levites always have the right to buy back their houses in the towns that belong to them.

33 If one of the Levites does not redeem a house he sold, then the house that was sold in the city where it is located must be returned in the year of Jubilee, for the houses of the cities of the Levites are their property among the people of Israel.

Whatever the Levites own can be bought back, even houses sold in their towns, and must be returned in the Jubilee. That's because the houses in the towns of the Levites are what they were given to own as their share among the Israelites.

34 But the fields around their cities may not be sold because they are the permanent property of the Levites.

However, the fields surrounding their towns must not be sold because they belong to the Levites permanently.

35 If your fellow countryman becomes poor, so that he can no longer provide for himself, then you must help him as you would help a foreigner or anyone else living as an outsider among you.

If any of your people become poor and can't survive, you must help them in the same way you would help a foreigner or a stranger, so that they can go on living in your neighborhood.

36 Do not charge him interest or try to profit from him in any way, but honor your God so that your brother may keep living with you.

Don't make them pay you any interest or demand more than they borrowed, but respect your God so that they can remain living in your area.

37 You must not give him a loan of money and charge interest, nor sell him your food to earn a profit.

Don't lend them silver with interest or sell them food at an inflated price.

38 I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, in order that I might give you the land of Canaan, and that I might be your God.

Remember, I am the Lord your God who led you out of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan and to be your God.

39 If your fellow countryman has become poor and sells himself to you, you must not make him work like a slave.

If any of your people become poor and have to sell themselves to work for you, don't force them to work as a slave.

40 Treat him as a hired servant. He must be like someone living temporarily with you. He will serve with you until the year of Jubilee.

Have them live with you like a paid worker who is staying with you for a while. They are to work for you until the Jubilee Year.

41 Then he will go away from you, he and his children with him, and he will return to his own family and to his fathers' property.

Then they and their children must be freed, and they can go back to their family and to their family's property.

42 For they are my servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. They will not be sold as slaves.

Israelites are not to be sold as slaves because they belong to me as my slaves—I led them out of Egypt.

43 You must not rule over them harshly, but you must honor your God.

Don't treat them with brutality. Have respect for your God.

44 As for your male and female slaves, whom you can obtain from the nations who live around you, you may buy slaves from them.

Buy your male and female slaves from the surrounding nations.

45 You may also buy slaves from the foreigners who are living among you, that is, from their families who are with you, children who have been born in your land. They may become your property.

You can also buy them from foreigners who have come to live among you, or from their descendants born in your land. You can treat them as your property.

46 You may provide such slaves as an inheritance for your children after you, to hold as property, and make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your brothers among the people of Israel with harshness.

You can pass them on to your children to inherit as property after you die. You can make them slaves for life, but you must not brutally treat any of your own people, the Israelites, as a slave.

47 If a foreigner or someone living temporarily with you has become wealthy, and if one of your fellow Israelites has become poor and sells himself to that foreigner, or to someone in a foreigner's family,

If a foreigner among you becomes successful, and one of your people living nearby becomes poor and sells themselves to the foreigner or to a member of the foreigner's family,

48 after your fellow Israelite has been bought, he may be bought back. Someone in his family may redeem him.

they still have the right of being bought back after the sale. A member of their family can buy them back—

49 It might be the person's uncle, or his uncle's son, who redeems him, or anyone who is his close relative from his family. Or, if he has become prosperous, he may redeem himself.

an uncle or cousin or any close relative from their family can buy them back. If they become successful, they can buy themselves back.

50 He must bargain with the man who bought him; they must count the years from the year he sold himself to his purchaser until the year of Jubilee. The price of his redemption must be figured in keeping with the rate paid to a hired servant, for the number of years he might continue to work for the one who bought him.

The person concerned and their buyer will work out the time from the year of the sale up to the Jubilee Year. The price will depend on the number of years, calculated using the daily rate for a paid worker.

51 If there are still many years until the year of Jubilee, he must pay back as the price for his redemption an amount of money that is in proportion to the number of those years.

If there are many years left, they must pay a larger percentage of the purchase price.

52 If there are only a few years to the year of Jubilee, then he must bargain with his purchaser to reflect the number of years left before the year of Jubilee, and he must pay for his redemption in keeping with the number of years.

If there are only a few years remaining before the Jubilee Year, then they only have to pay a percentage depending on the number of years still left.

53 He is to be treated like a man hired year by year. You must make sure he is not treated with harshness.

They are to live with their foreign owner just like a paid worker, hired from year to year, but see to it that the owner doesn't treat him brutally.

54 If he is not redeemed by these means, then he must serve until the year of Jubilee, he and his children with him.

If they are not bought back in any of the ways described, they and their children shall be freed in the Jubilee Year.

55 To me the people of Israel are servants. They are my servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. I am Yahweh your God.'”

For the Israelites belong to me as my slaves. They are my slaves—I led them out of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.”