Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
The seventh year of remission is described, and in verse 8, the fiftieth year of jubilee, in which all returned to their original inheritances, and Jewish slaves were manumitted and became free, verse 39.
Vulgate Text: Leviticus 25:1-55
1. And the Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying: 2. Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: When you have entered the land which I will give you, you shall keep a sabbath to the Lord. 3. Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and gather its fruits; 4. but in the seventh year there shall be a sabbath of rest for the land, a rest for the Lord: you shall not sow your field, nor prune your vineyard. 5. What the ground produces of itself, you shall not reap; and you shall not gather the grapes of your firstfruits as a vintage: for it is a year of rest for the land: 6. but they shall be food for you, for your servant and your handmaid, and for your hired worker, and for the stranger who sojourns with you, 7. for your cattle and beasts, all that grows shall provide food. 8. You shall also count seven weeks of years, that is, seven times seven, which together make forty-nine years; 9. and you shall sound the trumpet in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, at the time of propitiation throughout all your land. 10. And you shall sanctify the fiftieth year, and you shall proclaim remission to all the inhabitants of your land: for it is the jubilee. Each man shall return to his possession, and each one shall go back to his original family; 11. because it is the jubilee and the fiftieth year. You shall not sow, nor reap what grows of itself in the field, nor gather the firstfruits of the vintage, 12. because of the sanctification of the jubilee, but you shall eat what is offered immediately. 13. In the year of jubilee all shall return to their possessions. 14. When you sell anything to your fellow citizen, or buy from him, do not sadden your brother, but according to the number of years of the jubilee you shall buy from him, 15. and according to the reckoning of the fruits he shall sell to you. 16. The more years that remain after the jubilee, the more the price will increase: and the less time you count, the less the purchase will cost; for he sells you the time of the fruits. 17. Do not afflict your fellow tribesmen, but let each one fear his God, for I am the Lord your God. 18. Carry out My precepts, and keep My judgments, and fulfill them, so that you may dwell in the land without any fear, 19. and the ground may produce its fruits for you, which you may eat to your fill, fearing no one's attack. 20. But if you say: What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we do not sow or gather our crops? 21. I will give you My blessing in the sixth year, and it shall produce the fruits of three years, 22. and you shall sow in the eighth year, and eat old fruits until the ninth year: until new crops grow, you shall eat the old. 23. The land also shall not be sold in perpetuity; for it is Mine, and you are strangers and tenants of Mine. 24. Therefore the whole region of your possession shall be sold under the condition of redemption. 25. If your impoverished brother sells his small property, and his kinsman is willing, he may redeem what the other had sold. 26. But if he has no near relative, and he himself can find the price for redeeming it, 27. the fruits shall be counted from the time he sold; and what remains he shall return to the buyer, and so he shall recover his possession: 28. but if his hand cannot find the means to repay the price, the buyer shall have what he bought until the year of jubilee. For in that year every sale shall return to the owner and to the original possessor. 29. Whoever sells a house within the walls of a city shall have the right to redeem it until one year is completed. 30. If he does not redeem it, and the cycle of a year has passed, the buyer shall possess it, and his posterity in perpetuity, and it cannot be redeemed, even in the jubilee. 31. But if the house is in a village that has no walls, it shall be sold by the right of fields: if it has not been redeemed before, it shall return to the owner in the jubilee. 32. The houses of the Levites that are in the cities may always be redeemed: 33. if they are not redeemed, they shall return to the owners in the jubilee, because the houses of the Levitical cities serve as possessions among the children of Israel. 34. But their suburban lands shall not be sold, because it is an everlasting possession. 35. If your brother becomes impoverished and weak of hand, and you take him in as a stranger and pilgrim, and he lives with you, 36. do not take interest from him, nor more than you gave. Fear your God, so that your brother may live with you. 37. You shall not give him your money at interest, nor demand an excess of crops. 38. I 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. 39. If your brother, compelled by poverty, sells himself to you, you shall not oppress him with the servitude of slaves; 40. but he shall be as a hired worker and a tenant: he shall work for you until the year of jubilee, 41. and afterwards he shall go out with his children, and return to his kindred and to the possession of his fathers. 42. For they are My servants, and I brought them out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as slaves. 43. Do not afflict him by your power, but fear your God. 44. Let your male and female slaves be from the nations that are around you.
45. And from the strangers who sojourn among you, or from those born of them in your land, these you shall have as servants, 46. and by hereditary right you shall pass them to your descendants, and possess them forever; but your brothers, the children of Israel, you shall not oppress by your power. 47. If the hand of a stranger and pilgrim grows strong among you, and your impoverished brother sells himself to him, or to anyone of his family, 48. after the sale he may be redeemed. Whoever among his brothers wishes may redeem him, 49. both uncle, and cousin, and kinsman, and relation by marriage. But if he himself is able, he shall redeem himself, 50. counting only the years from the time of his sale until the year of jubilee; and the money for which he was sold shall be reckoned according to the number of years and the wages of a hired worker. 51. If more years remain until the jubilee, according to these he shall also pay the price: 52. if few, he shall reckon with him according to the number of years, and shall pay the buyer what remains of the years, 53. with the wages of the years he served before being deducted: he shall not afflict him violently in your sight. 54. But if he cannot be redeemed by these means, he shall go out in the year of jubilee with his children. 55. For the children of Israel are My servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt.
Verse 2: When You Shall Have Entered the Land
2. When you shall have entered the land which I will give you, you shall keep a sabbath to the Lord -- that is, observe the sabbath or rest of the land, make the land rest in the seventh year. Hence the Hebrew, Chaldean, Septuagint, and some Latin versions have 'let the land keep sabbath,' that is, let the land rest in the sabbath of the Lord, that is, in a rest ordained for the honor and worship of the Lord. For this was a ceremonial law pertaining to divine worship, commanding that the seventh year be celebrated universally by all, just as the seventh day: therefore every seventh year was a sabbath, that is, a rest for the land; hence these years were called sabbatical. God instituted this sabbath of the land so that, as St. Augustine says, Question LXXXIX, the very vacation of the land might be like the payment for habitation, and as the price of redemption from Him whose it is, that is, from its Creator God, so that the Hebrews, for the land given them by God, might render Him this sabbath as a kind of worship and homage.
Note the 'when you shall have entered the land': for before the entry, namely in the desert, this law of the seventh year, as also of the jubilee, was not observed. For the seventh year and the jubilee were instituted for releasing debts, labors, and servitudes; but there were no debts in the desert, since there was no want there; nor did they labor or till the land there, since all were equally fed from heaven with manna, and clothed with the same garments that always remained whole and uncorrupted, as is clear from Deuteronomy VIII, 4. In the desert there were also no servitudes, which were introduced among the Jews on account of these debts and bodily necessities, as is implied in verse 39.
'When you shall have entered the land' -- supply: and possessed it, so that you could cultivate it; for as it continues: 'Six years you shall sow your field, but in the seventh year a sabbath,' that is rest, 'shall be for the land.' Therefore the counting of years, both sabbatical and jubilee (for the jubilee year depends on and must be computed from the sabbatical years, as I shall say shortly), could not begin before the Hebrews received possession of the promised land, and having obtained peace and quiet could cultivate it: for how could fields not yet occupied be cultivated? Or how could a sabbatical year be counted from land not yet tilled? Hence it is clear that the beginning of the sabbatical and jubilee years must be reckoned from the year in which the land was divided by lot among the Hebrews by Joshua; for then the people, having been brought into possession of it, began to cultivate the fields; and this happened in the 47th year from the departure from Egypt, as is gathered from Joshua XIV, verse 10, which was the seventh year of Joshua after the death of Moses, and the year 2500 of the world; therefore from the 7th month, 10th day, of that same year, the counting of sabbatical and jubilee years must begin. So Serarius on Joshua chapter XIII, Question XIV, at the end, where he refutes the Rabbis in the Seder Olam, who begin these years from the later division of the land, which was made not in year 7 but year 14 at Shiloh. Therefore computing from this year of the world 2500 onwards, the 105th sabbatical year falls in the 15th year of King Hezekiah, as is clear both from chronology and from IV Kings XIX, 29, compared with IV Kings XVIII, 13. And consequently the 121st sabbatical year falls in the 9th year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah, so that the first year of Zedekiah was the fourth year of the 121st sabbatical week, as is clear from Jeremiah XXVIII, 1. So Vatablus there, and Scaliger in the Emendation of Times.
Therefore those who begin the sabbatical years from the first year of Joshua, when the Hebrews entered Canaan fighting against Jericho, are wrong, since they should begin from the seventh year of Joshua, when the land, having been subdued by so many wars, began to be divided and cultivated: for from that point the next seventh year was the sabbath of the land, and had to be observed as a sabbath, and from it consequently every seventh year was sabbatical; and after seven sabbatical years, that is, after 49 completed years (for seven times seven are 49), the following fiftieth year was the jubilee, as is clear from verse 8. Therefore the first jubilee began to be counted from the year of the world 2500, which year was the world's fiftieth jubilee; for fifty times 50 make 2500; therefore in this year of the world 2500, the 50th jubilee of the world ends and the 51st begins. Therefore with the ending of the world's fiftieth jubilee, there follows the counting of the Mosaic jubilee years, so that the fifty-first jubilee of the world is the beginning and starting point of the first Mosaic jubilee; so that from then, in the fiftieth year, namely the year of the world 2550, the first Mosaic jubilee was celebrated. From this it follows that Christ was born at the end of the twenty-ninth Mosaic jubilee. For the first jubilee of Moses began in the year of the world 2500, from which, if you count jubilees by 50 years, up to the year of the world 3950 in which Christ was born, you will find that precisely 29 jubilees elapsed up to Christ.
Mention of these sabbatical years, whether they were kept or neglected by the Jews, is found in Jeremiah chapter XXXIV, 14, and IV Kings XIX, 29, and I Maccabees VI, 53, and in Josephus, book XIII, chapter XV, and book XIV, chapter XXVIII.
Verse 5: You Shall Not Gather the Grapes of Your Firstfruits
5. You shall not gather the grapes of your firstfruits. -- 'The grapes of the firstfruits,' which in the seventh year, as the first of the following seven-year cycle, you leave as firstfruits to the Lord, so that they may be gathered by the poor, in honor of God. Hence in Hebrew these grapes are called nezirecha, that is, of the nazirate, which means of sanctification, as the Septuagint translate, or of separation, as the Chaldean translates, which namely in this seventh year they left untouched and, as it were, separated for God.
The Four Privileges of the Sabbatical Year
Therefore there were four notable features and privileges of the seventh or sabbatical year. First, that in that year the Jews could not sow, reap, prune, or harvest grapes, but rest was given to the fields and vineyards, and the fruits that grew spontaneously from them were common to all people and animals; see what was said on Exodus XXIII, 11. Second, that in this seventh year there was a remission of all debts, if the debtor was a Jew by birth, but not if he was a foreigner and Gentile; this is clear from Deuteronomy XV, 2 and following. Which was indeed an unusual and wonderful law. Hence Deuteronomy XV, 9 says: 'Beware lest you say in your heart: The seventh year of remission approaches, and you turn your eyes away from your poor brother, unwilling to lend him what he asks, but you shall give to him, nor act craftily in relieving his necessities'; and He adds a reward, saying: 'That the Lord your God may bless you at all times, and in all things to which you put your hand.' If you keep this law of remission of debts, God will abundantly compensate you for every debt by His blessing. For as the Wise Man says, Proverbs XIX, 17: 'He who has mercy on the poor lends to God, and He will repay him his reward.' Third, that in this year there was a remission and release from servitude: for Hebrew slaves were manumitted, as is clear from Exodus XXI, 2. See what was said there. But if the slave was not a Hebrew but a foreigner, he remained a slave perpetually, as is said here in verse 46. Fourth, in this year Deuteronomy was commanded to be read before the whole people, Deuteronomy XXXI, 10.
Verses 8, 9, and 10: The Jubilee Year Described
8, 9 and 10. You shall also count seven weeks of years, etc., and you shall sound the trumpet in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, and you shall sanctify the fiftieth year. -- The jubilee year is described here: it is commanded therefore that not in year 50, or the year of jubilee, as Serarius holds, but in the 49th year preceding the jubilee they should sound the trumpet and proclaim that the following fiftieth year will be the jubilee, so that each person may prepare himself for it; for the 49th year was not the year of jubilee, but was a sabbatical year.
Therefore Radulphus, Hugo Cardinalis, Gerard Mercator in his Chronology, and Joseph Scaliger, book V, seem to err, who think that year 49 was the jubilee, yet say it is called and is the fiftieth, if in this number you include the preceding fiftieth year or jubilee: for they say this must be counted, and from it the numbering of the 50th year, or the following jubilee, must begin. They err, I say, because thus that 50th year would be counted twice: first, when it is the last and 50th, that is, the jubilee; second, insofar as the same year is the beginning of the following jubilee. Hence St. Cyril, Ambrose, Clement, Bede, St. Jerome, Cassiodorus, Isidore, Abulensis, Oleaster refute this opinion, and from them Serarius at length in Joshua XIII, Question XIV.
Hence these same authors err a second time when they think the jubilee year coincided with the sabbatical, lest, they say, two years of idleness should concur; for from this it would follow either that the jubilee was celebrated not in year 50 but 49, or that the sabbatical year was celebrated not in the seventh but the eighth year, both of which contradict this decree of God. Therefore year 49 was sabbatical, and the following year 50 was the jubilee: understand this of the first jubilee, for in the following or second jubilee, one year intervened between the sabbatical and jubilee years; in the third jubilee two years intervened, in the fourth three, and so on successively, until at the return of the seventh jubilee the sabbatical and jubilee years coincided. The reason and origin of this was that the following jubilee was always counted from the preceding jubilee, or year 50, while the sabbatical year was always computed from the prior sabbatical, or seventh year. Hence it happens that each jubilee is one year distant from 7 sabbatical cycles, or 49 years, which you will see plainly if you double these years; for twice 49 makes 98: therefore year 98 was the fourteenth sabbatical, while the second jubilee was year 100. Similarly if you triple 49, you get 147, so that year 147 was the twenty-first sabbatical, while the third jubilee was year 150; where you clearly see two years intervening between the sabbatical and the jubilee, which was the third in order. Therefore at every eighth jubilee, the sabbatical and jubilee years followed one another immediately: and so the Jews then had two consecutive years of rest, in which neither sowing nor reaping was permitted; but the Lord had promised to give the Hebrews in those years double, indeed triple the usual harvest, as is clear here from verse 21. The same would happen to Christians if they kept the feasts as they ought.
Symbolically, Francis Valesius, On Sacred Philosophy, chapter 21, says: God described the jubilee through seven periods of seven years, fittingly corresponding to the climacteric years, that is, the stair years. These are the years that close each seven-year period, namely year 7, 14, 21, 28, 35, 42, but especially 49 and 63, because 49 is composed of seven seven-year periods, and 63 of nine seven-year periods. These years are called stair years because in them human life, as it were, ascends by the steps of a staircase. For the steps are the seven-year periods themselves, in each of which notable changes in every stage of age and life occur, and many are tried by diseases, and indeed it happens that they die, especially in year 49 and 63, which last Augustus Caesar therefore justly feared. The jubilee was therefore fittingly established after the seventh seven-year period, as if after the life of one man and generation there should succeed a new age and a new generation, in which therefore all things are to be renewed and restored to their ancestral possessions.
The mysteries of the number seven (which the sabbatical year and the jubilee contain) I shall set forth at Deuteronomy 5:12.
In the Seventh Month, on the Tenth Day of the Month
Note: The other feasts of the Jews began from Nisan, that is, March; for this was the first month of the sacred year, as is clear from Exodus 12:1. But the sabbatical year and the jubilee did not begin from Nisan, as Abulensis holds, but from Tishri, or the seventh month, which was the beginning of the common and civil year. So Burgensis, Pererius, Scaliger, and from them Serarius in Joshua 13, Question 14. The reason was that if these years had begun with the other feasts from March, then the Jews would have lost the harvest of the year following March: for in these years, being sabbatical, there was a sabbath, that is, rest for the land, so that neither reaping nor sowing was permitted; and so the Jews would have lost the harvest of the current year, and also of the following year: for since they could not sow in that year, consequently they could not reap in the summer of the following year. Therefore in the eighth jubilee, when the sabbatical year and the jubilee coincided, so that the jubilee immediately followed the sabbatical, they would have lost the harvest of three years. But by beginning from Tishri, or the seventh month, they lost the sowing and harvest of only one year, or of two if the sabbatical and jubilee years coincided.
At the time of propitiation -- that is, on the day and feast of Expiation, which was celebrated on the tenth day of the seventh month, as was said in chapter 23, verse 27: for on that day throughout the whole land of Israel, as is said here, in each city there were trumpeters who by the blast of the trumpet proclaimed that the coming year would be the jubilee. This was fittingly done on the feast of propitiation, because in the jubilee there was to be a full remission and propitiation.
And You Shall Sanctify the Fiftieth Year
And you shall sanctify (that is, you shall proclaim as holy and dedicated to Me the coming) fiftieth year. -- See Canon 11. Ribera explains differently: 'you shall sanctify,' he says, means you shall prepare the people for the celebration of the 50th year. Thus 'to sanctify' is used in the sense of 'to prepare,' Isaiah 13:3: 'I have commanded my sanctified ones,' that is, the Persians and Medes, whom I have prepared to destroy the empire of the Chaldeans.
And you shall proclaim a release -- that is, you shall proclaim that in that year there will be a release from servitude, debts, and alienated goods. For if in the seventh year there was a remission of debts, as is clear from Deuteronomy 15:2, much more should that remission be made in the 50th year, or the jubilee, which was the year of the fullest release.
For it is the jubilee. -- In Hebrew: for it is the jobel, or jobelus. For thus, with different vowel points, read Josephus, St. Jerome in his commentary on Galatians chapter 1, the Chaldean, and the Masoretes.
You may ask, whence is this year called jobel, jobelus, jubilee? Andrew Masius in Joshua chapter 6 thinks jobel is derived from Jubal, the first inventor of the harp and organ, Genesis chapter 4. Others, following the Chaldean and the Rabbis, as Lyranus, Pagninus, Vatablus, and Augustinus Eugubinus in the last chapter of Numbers, hold that jobel signifies a ram's horn, and hence the jubilee year is so called because in that year they would blow on rams' horns. Some add that jobel is an Arabic word meaning a ram: hence the Chaldean sometimes translates dichra, that is, a ram.
Jobel and Jubilee: Where Do These Names Come From?
Others have other opinions, as Serarius reviews in Joshua 13, Question 14. But it is far more certain in this matter to follow the ancient and most learned Hebrews.
The Third and True Opinion: From Jabal, That Is, 'To Bring, To Lead Back'
I say therefore: Jobel or jubilee is derived from the root jabal, that is, to bring, to lead, and indeed with joy and gladness, either of the one who leads or of the one who is led, as Serarius shows with various examples in Joshua 6, Question 5. The year of jobel is therefore the same as the year that brings all good things and leads each person back to his former liberty and inheritance. So hold Oleaster, Ribera, Serarius, and others. Cajetan also agrees, deriving jobel from jobel, meaning a shoot or bud, so that the year of jobel is the same as the year that makes every good thing bud forth. Angelus Pientinus agrees with Cajetan (Book III, On the Jubilee, chapter 4), as does Bellarmine (Book I, On Indulgences, chapter 1).
That this is the origin and etymology of jobel and jubilee is clear, first, from Josephus, who says in Book 3 of the Antiquities, chapter 10: 'The word jobel signifies liberty, that is, a restoration to liberty.'
Second, because the Septuagint everywhere translates jobel as aphesis, that is, remission.
Third, because Philo and his translator St. Jerome, in the book On Hebrew Names under Genesis, translate jobel as 'the one who sends away.' The same Jerome, in Book 2 on Isaiah, near the beginning, says: 'The jubilee, that is, the year of release.'
Fourth, because this passage entirely proves it, for it reads: 'You shall proclaim release; for it is the jubilee,' as if to say: For it is the year of release. And what follows confirms this: 'Each person shall return to his own possession and to his family.' Hence we too call the year of the fullest indulgences a jubilee, as Serarius shows in Joshua chapter 6, Question 7.
Jobel therefore signifies release. From this, secondly, jobel signifies the trumpet, or rather the blast of the trumpet, which sounded festively in that year. Hence the Latin words jubilum and jubilare (exultation and to exult) seem to be derived from it, as Eugubinus teaches above. Hence also the blast of the trumpet sounding at Sinai, when the law was given, is called by anticipation jobel in Hebrew (Exodus 19:13).
Now the trumpets of the jubilee were not those two silver trumpets, as Abulensis supposed, with which the people were summoned to festivals, about which see Numbers 10. For in Joshua 6:13, there are said to have been seven trumpets of the jubilee, which have a different name in Hebrew, and they were never used in festivals and years except in the jubilee; for it specifically says: 'Whose use is in the jubilee.' These trumpets were therefore not silver but made of horn. For St. Jerome, commenting on Hosea chapter 5, and the Septuagint at Psalm 97:6, so interpret the Hebrew word shophar, which occurs in this passage. However, these trumpets were not made from a ram's horn, since they only sounded those in the feast of trumpets, in memory of the ram substituted for Isaac when his father was about to sacrifice him; rather, they were made from an ox horn. For St. Jerome says above: 'The trumpet is pastoral.' But shepherds blow the horns not of rams but of oxen; and Varro teaches that the horns of the ancients were of the same kind, in Book 4 of On the Latin Language: 'The horns which are now made of bronze were then made from ox horn,' adding that buccina (trumpet) is named from bubus (oxen) or from the sound of oxen 'bou bou,' because it sings to the oxen and calls them. Hence also the bronze war trumpets were afterward called horns, as: 'The horns blared with hoarse blast' (Aeneid VIII). From this it is clear that the sound of this trumpet was harsh and rough (for such is the sound of horns), which nevertheless in festivals moderated and tempered the sharp and excited sounds of other instruments, as a deeper tone.
In the seventh year there was a remission of debts, as is clear from Deuteronomy 15:2; much more, then, should that remission have been made in the fiftieth year, or jubilee, which was the year of the fullest remission.
Anagogical Sense: The Jubilee and the Resurrection
Anagogically, just as the sabbath and the seventh year or sabbatical, so too the jubilee signifies the resurrection and the eternal rest of the whole year, that is, of eternity. For then, first, all servants, hired workers, beasts of burden, and cattle -- that is, the simple and all who labor -- will be free from toil, because the praise and vision of God will be the leisurely occupation of the Blessed. Second, they will sound the trumpet in the preceding year, namely the 49th, because terrible signs proclaiming the approaching judgment will precede the resurrection. Third, they will also sound it in the jubilee itself, because on account of the consummated victory, a perpetual alleluia will be sung through all the streets of heaven. Fourth, we shall return to our first possession, that is, to paradise, from which we were cast out with our first parent, having now received full remission of sins -- and because this is beyond measure, it is repeated so many times here. Fifth, the land will not be sown, because then there will be no planting of new merits, but we shall most sweetly enjoy the fruit of our former ones. So say roughly Radulphus, Isychius, and Ribera (Book 5, On the Temple, chapter 25).
Tropological Sense: The Jubilee and Forgiveness
Tropologically, Rupert says: 'This is truly the holy and most beautiful feast of the jubilee, to be celebrated with the trumpet blast of the Gospel preaching, so that each person returns to his own possession and family -- that is, when we forgive offenses against us, so that with all discord removed, all may return to the former family of peace and concord, and have one heart and one soul, and sing: Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell in unity!'
Allegorical Sense: The Jubilee and the Time of Christ
Allegorically, the jubilee is the time of Christ and of grace, as Isaiah foretold, and from him Christ Himself (Luke 4:19), and St. Paul (2 Corinthians 6:2).
The Christian Jubilee
Finally, among Christians, Pope Boniface VIII instituted the jubilee year under that name in the year of Christ 1293, to be celebrated in the year of Christ 1300, and he ordered it to be renewed every hundredth year, and to those who came to Rome and visited the tombs of Saints Peter and Paul, he granted a plenary indulgence of all sins -- and this in order to lead the Roman people from the vain celebration of secular games back to a true and solemn sacred observance.
Fifty years later, Clement VI decreed that the jubilee should be celebrated every fiftieth year (since the span of human life could hardly reach that jubilee at the hundredth year), which was the true jubilee. He decreed this in the year of Christ 1345, as Volaterranus testifies (Book 22). The first such jubilee was therefore in the year of Christ 1350, in which year there was such a great throng of people at Rome, as the eyewitness Petrarch attests, that it was no wonder that a plague arose from it so severe throughout all of Italy that out of a thousand scarcely ten survived, as Crantzius testifies (Book 9, Metropolis, chapter 43).
Again, under Nicholas V, in the jubilee of the year of Christ 1450, there was such a great crowd of people at Rome that many were crushed to death in it, as Platina and Sabellicus testify (Book 5 of the Enneads, chapter 10).
Finally, Sixtus IV reduced the jubilee to every twenty-fifth year, and was the first to celebrate it in the year of Christ 1475; he did this so that every generation might share in this gift. Moreover, in the jubilee the Pope opens the golden gate, as it is called, to which an immense multitude rushes in order to obtain the remission of sins. The prayers, almsgiving, penances, and other exercises of piety that take place that year both at Rome and elsewhere are beyond description. And in all these things, the Prelates and leading men of Rome take the lead.
If Jews purchased fields outside the land, even from their own fellow Jews, these remained theirs in perpetuity, and did not return to the original heir in the jubilee. So says Oleaster. Hence it follows that in Judea no one was wealthy in real property unless he was born wealthy, or unless by hereditary right, when other heirs had died out, properties devolved to him. In movable goods, therefore, the Jews could alone grow rich.
And Each One Shall Return to His Former Family
For by the fact that one returns to his former possession, as was stated above, he also returns to his family, since properties had been distributed and assigned by Joshua to each family in the promised land.
Verses 11 and 12: The Sabbath of the Jubilee Year
You shall not sow on account of the sanctification (holiness) of the jubilee (that is, so that you may observe this year with religious rest), but you shall eat what is offered at once (so it must be read with the Roman edition -- not 'taken away,' but the fruits of the field spontaneously growing and readily available in the jubilee year), by plucking only, not however by reaping or harvesting for yourself. The Hebrews give this reason for this law: namely that the rich might lift their eyes to heaven and consider the needs of the poor, so that when they themselves complain in the seventh year, 'What shall we eat, or what shall we drink?', they might remember that the poor are always in that anxiety and care, who never sow or reap, and thus learn to have compassion on them and to help them.
Five Reasons for the Return of Goods in the Jubilee
God ordained this return of goods to the original owner in the jubilee, first, for this purpose: that the tribes of Israel might not become confused, but that through inheritances and hereditary successions, in the territories and possessions assigned to each tribe, it might be known from which tribe each person came -- and this on account of the Messiah, so that the Jews might know with certainty, according to Jacob's prophecy (Genesis 49:10), that Christ was born from the tribe of Judah. So says Abulensis.
Second, so that honorable and noble families might remain in their honorable state, lest any prodigal son squander ancestral estates and goods, and thus ruin his family. For this evil was provided against by this return of goods in the jubilee.
Third, to set a limit to avarice and greed, lest any miser, buying up all goods, grow immensely rich.
Fourth, that a certain equality might be preserved among the Jews, lest some become exceedingly rich and others utterly destitute, and thus occasion be given to envy, pride, and murmuring; but that all, content with their own lot equally distributed by Joshua among everyone, might lead a sociable and friendly life.
Fifth, that the Jews might know they had not so much ownership as use of their land, and that God had reserved its ownership for Himself, as stated in verse 23. Finally, for this reason the Jews, from the time of their destruction onward, do not observe the jubilee, because the distinction of possessions and tribes among them has already been abolished, and they do not have the properties for the sake of whose return the jubilee was principally instituted.
Verse 13: Each One Shall Return to His Own Possession
That is, to field, house, and similar immovable goods; for the discussion is only about these. For even if these had been sold a thousand times, at the time of the jubilee they returned to the original owner by themselves, without any payment. Hence it happened that the closer the fiftieth year was, the less immovable property was sold for. The sale of these goods among the Jews was therefore not absolute but only for a set period of time, so that this sale seemed to be a lease of the property for fifty years rather than an outright sale, although in reality it did transfer ownership of the property to the buyer. Understand this of goods situated in Judea itself.
Verse 14: When You Sell Anything to Your Fellow Citizen
That is, lest contrary to the law here prescribed by Me you wish to buy, or to retain what was bought from him beyond the jubilee, in perpetuity; or wish to sell a thing for more, or buy for less, than the thing is worth -- that is, the use and enjoyment of the thing until the jubilee. For this is what follows: 'But according to the number of years of the jubilee you shall buy from him, and according to the reckoning of the harvests he shall sell to you,' so that if few years remain until the jubilee, the thing is sold for less; if more years remain, for more. For the thing must be sold according to the reckoning of its fruits and crops; therefore if the buyer will receive the fruits of only a few years, let him buy the thing for less; if of many years, for more. For this is what follows: 'The time of the harvests he shall sell to you.'
Verses 20 and 21: The Triple Harvest of the Sixth Year
From this it is clear that the fertility of the holy land was in part not natural but divine, and from the gift of God. For God here promises the Jews that, if they keep the law, especially regarding the rest to be observed in the seventh or sabbatical year, He will give them in the sixth year crops for three years -- namely for the sixth year, the seventh or sabbatical year, and the eighth year, in which they sowed again.
Let Christians hear this and learn not to seek their profits by violating feast days through labor, sales, and so forth. For if God here promises the Jews, who observe rest for an entire sabbatical year, provisions for three years, how much more will He provide food and profits for Christians who observe the rest of just a few feast days.
The Jews were deprived of this great benefit of God -- namely the triple harvest of the sixth year -- in the time of the Maccabees, as is clear from 1 Maccabees 6:49 and 53.
Verses 23 and 24: The Land Shall Not Be Sold in Perpetuity
In Hebrew it reads: The land shall not be sold unto destruction, ruin, or cutting off -- that is, so as to be permanently cut off and alienated from the seller. The Chaldean translates: the land shall not be sold into ownership; the Septuagint: into confirmation -- meaning that it be appropriated and confirmed to the buyer in perpetuity. The reason follows: 'Because it is Mine,' as if to say: I, God, have supreme and transcendent dominion over your land; therefore it is lawful for Me to impose whatever conditions I wish upon its sale, especially since I brought you into it as strangers and tenants.
'All the territory of your possession' (that is, all the possession of your territory -- it is a hypallage; we saw a similar one in chapter 12, verse 4) 'shall be sold under the condition of redemption.' This is a law different from the preceding one; for it arranges and ordains that in every alienation of land, the right to redeem it shall be understood as attached. This is clear from the Hebrew, which reads: And in all the land of your possession you shall grant redemption of the land -- and this so that by this means also the stability of each tribe's possessions would be upheld. So says Cajetan, and it is clear from what follows.
Philo, in the book On the Cherubim, beautifully teaches from this passage that God alone is the lord and possessor of all things; but that human beings have only the usufruct of them for their lifetime, not true ownership. 'Hence it is clear,' he says, 'that we use another's possessions, and we possess neither glory, nor riches, nor honors, nor authority, nor anything else of body or soul as our own -- not even these things themselves, as though they were ours by right and dominion; rather, while we live here, we have only the usufruct.' Therefore we must use this world only in passing, just as dogs drink from the Nile; for in Egypt, dogs, lest they be caught by crocodiles, do not linger in drinking, but lap and flee, as Pliny testifies (Book 8, chapter 40). Hence after the flight from Mutina, when people asked what Antony was doing, someone replied: 'What a dog does in Egypt -- he drinks and runs.' So we must snatch the necessities from this world in haste, lest we be caught by the devil; all else must be passed through. 'Whatever things lie around you, regard them as the baggage of a wayside inn: one must pass through,' says Seneca (Book 17, Epistle 103).
Verse 29: He Who Sells a House
As if to say: He who sells a house situated within a city may redeem it within a year by returning the price; but if he does not do this, he can never, not even in the jubilee, redeem it or reclaim it. God ordained this, first, so that by this means cities might be made populous; for this attracts buyers and inhabitants to cities, if they can acquire a stable and secure house there. Second, lest anyone easily and rashly sell his house in the city, seeing that he would know he could never recover it. Third, because tribes and families were not distinguished by the possessions or houses that were within cities; hence even the Levites could possess them, who nevertheless were said to have no possession in the promised land.
Excepted from this law are the houses of the Levites: for these, if they were not redeemed, returned to their owners in the jubilee, because, as is said in verse 33: 'The houses of the cities of the Levites serve as possessions among the children of Israel,' as if to say: The Levites have no other possession than their houses, and so it is fair that these should return, just as the other possessions of laypeople return. But houses situated outside cities, in villages, were considered under the same law as their fields, and returned at the time of the jubilee to the original owner, whether they belonged to Levites or to others. See Abulensis, Question 20.
Tropologically, he who is in mortal sin can, during the time of the year -- that is, of this life -- redeem the house, that is, charity, by the price of repentance; but if he neglects to do so, he will not be able to redeem it in the future.
Within the walls of the city. From this it is clear that the Jews surrounded their cities with walls, and that this does not conflict with trust in God; indeed, the contrary would rather be to tempt God: for it often happened that enemies far superior in number and strength invaded citizens and cities, who unless they protected themselves with walls, could not resist. Hence Aristotle, in Book 7 of the Politics, condemns the vain opinion of those who held that cities should not be fortified with walls, but should rely on the strength and courage of soldiers. And the advice of Nestor was the salvation of the Greeks, when he ordered a wall built around the camp to ward off the attacks of the Trojans. Hence also the Jews, with the Lord's approval, built the wall of Jerusalem (2 Esdras, chapter 4).
Verse 32: The Dwellings of the Levites
In Hebrew: the cities of the Levites, and the dwellings of the cities. So also the Chaldean and the Septuagint; but our Translator (the Vulgate), under 'dwellings,' left it to be understood that cities too are meant. For if the dwellings of the Levites can always be redeemed, then much more so can their cities.
Verse 34: Their Suburban Lands Shall Not Be Sold
Because it is a perpetual possession (of the Levites), as if to say: I forbid the suburban lands of the Levites to be sold, because these are their perpetual possession and necessary for feeding their livestock, and the Levites have no other possession among the Jews.
Mystically and tropologically, by this was signified that the Levites above all others ought to be free for themselves and for God, and therefore should from time to time withdraw from the city and the noise of the people and devote themselves to holy rest, solitude, and contemplation in the suburbs; hence they could sell their urban houses, but not their suburban lands. From this let religious and clergy learn to prefer Mary to Martha -- that is, prayer to action. In which matter many err: for they so occupy themselves with studies and other affairs that they neglect prayer. Let them learn from this that it is better to sell urban houses than suburban ones; better to reduce studies, social engagements, and activities than the set times of prayer. Whatever business therefore arises at the time of prayer, let it all yield to prayer; let the morning meditation be kept inviolate -- let action and study be impaired instead. And yet they will not be impaired, because prayer will obtain light from God, so that one hour accomplishes more than two otherwise would have. For wisdom is a gift of God; therefore it must be sought from God through prayer, as St. James says (chapter 1, verse 5). So St. Thomas Aquinas confessed that he learned more from prayer than from study. Finally, let us all hear and follow that saying of Christ: 'Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things. But one thing is necessary: Mary has chosen the better part, which shall not be taken from her' (Luke 10:41).
But if one has sold a house in a village -- that is, has abandoned perfection, to which he was not bound -- he shall receive it back in the jubilee, that is, in heaven he shall receive back the merits that he earned while living in his state of perfection. A similar tropological meaning applies to the Levites, who signify the perfect and those endowed with outstanding charity. So Ribera explains, following Radulphus and Rupert (Book 5, On the Temple, chapter 25).
Verses 35, 36, and 37: On Usury
If your brother is weak of hand (the Septuagint: if he is powerless with his hands -- that is, some Jew who cannot earn what is necessary for his livelihood by the labor of his hands, and is compelled to seek a loan from you): you shall not take usury from him, etc., and you shall not exact an overabundance of crops -- that is to say, you shall not exact as interest more crops from him than you gave, that is, lent to him.
Verse 40: He Shall Work Until the Jubilee Year
A Jew who had sold himself as a slave to another Jew could in the seventh year, which was the year of liberty and the sabbatical year, go free from servitude from his master's house; but if he did not go out in that year, he went out in the jubilee, and could not be held in servitude beyond it. On this point, note from Exodus 21:2 and following: if a master had given a Gentile female slave to a Jewish male slave (for he could not give a Hebrew woman -- for he or his son was required to marry her if she was purchased), and he had fathered children by her, the slave could, if he wished, go free in the seventh year, but alone -- that is, so that the children with their mother would remain with the master or lord, and would remain his slaves. But if the slave, captivated by love for his wife and children, did not wish to leave the master's house alone as a free man in the seventh year, he had to serve until the jubilee year, and then he led out with him into freedom his wife and children. See Abulensis on this passage, Question 21.
Verse 42: They Are My Servants
That is, the Hebrews -- and not only by creation, but also by redemption from Egyptian slavery. Therefore I do not want you to sell them to anyone else under the condition of slaves, that is, so that they be slaves in perpetuity; but rather you should have them as hired workers, who for the price received from you hire out their labor to you for a set period of time, and serve until the jubilee. Here, says Radulphus, masters are warned not to oppress their slaves tyrannically, but to remember to show them reverence as servants of God, and therefore to treat them kindly and mercifully.
Marcus Crassus, says Plutarch in his Life, maintained a great throng of slaves in his household and took particular care of them, sometimes standing by as they learned and teaching them himself, and he used to say: 'This should be the chief concern of the head of a household: to know how many living instruments of his domestic affairs he has.' Demonax, seeing someone cruelly beating his own slave, said: 'Stop, lest you become like your slave.' That wisest of men judged that the one who cannot command his own passions is truly a slave. Diogenes used to say that between slaves and bad masters there was no difference except in name, save that slaves served their masters, while masters served their desires -- that is, many masters who are base and harsh. So Laertius testifies (Book 6). Hear also Seneca, Epistle 47: 'Consider,' he says, 'that the one you call your slave was born of the same seed, enjoys the same sky, breathes equally, lives equally, dies equally. For you can see him as a free man, and he you as a slave. I saw Callistus's own master standing before his threshold and being shut out while others entered. The Marian disaster cast down many born to the greatest splendor: from some it made a shepherd, from others a guardian of a cottage. Do you know at what age Hecuba began to serve, or Croesus, or the mother of Darius, or Plato, or Diogenes?' Finally, Ecclesiasticus chapter 7, verse 23: 'Let a wise servant be dear to you as your own soul: do not defraud him of his freedom, nor leave him destitute.'
Verse 44: Your Male and Female Slaves
Your male and female slaves (who, that is, are slaves absolutely) shall be from the nations -- as if to say: Take your male and female slaves from the Gentiles, and buy them from them; because I do not want you to buy or keep as perpetual slaves the Jews, who are My servants. Therefore Gentiles, even if they had converted to Judaism, remained slaves forever; and likewise their children, as is said in verse 45. For God did not want Gentile proselytes to be made equal to Jews by birth and origin in these privileges of the jubilee, lest jealousy and sedition arise among them. That this is so is clear: for otherwise all the slaves of the Jews would have gone free at the jubilee; which is here denied. For as I said on Exodus 12:41, every slave of the Jews, even if a Gentile, was required to be circumcised and become a proselyte.
Verses 45 and 46: Proselyte Slaves
And from the strangers (the proselytes just mentioned) you shall have servants (slaves) and you shall possess them forever -- that is, until the jubilee, says St. Augustine; and, if the rule were true which some derive from St. Jerome, namely that the Hebrew olam, meaning age or eternity, signifies the jubilee when written without a vav, the Hebrew text would confirm it: for olam is written without a vav here. But, as I have already said, the context seems to require a different and true perpetuity, namely that the proselyte should always be and remain a slave for his whole life, so that when the master dies, he passes to his heirs and serves them as long as he lives. For in this the proselyte slave is distinguished from the Jewish slave: the latter is a slave only until the jubilee, while the former is a slave for his whole life. And so also the rule of St. Jerome about olam applies here: for olam here does not signify absolute eternity, but only the span of the slave's life. St. Jerome, however, only says that olam with a vav signifies absolute eternity, but without a vav signifies a finite time; and such is the span of a man's life.
Verse 47: If the Hand of a Stranger Grows Strong
As if to say: If a Gentile proselyte has become rich and powerful among you, so that he purchases a Jew who, pressed by poverty, has sold himself into slavery: he shall have him as a slave, not only until the seventh or sabbatical year, but until the jubilee, unless this slave is redeemed by repaying the price for which he was bought. A Jew serving a proselyte, therefore, went free only in the jubilee year; nor is this surprising: for if conversely such proselytes sold themselves to Jews as slaves, they remained slaves for their whole life.
Verses 49 and 50: Redemption of the Hebrew Slave
The meaning and the case of these verses up to verse 54 is this, as if to say: I will that, just as the wages of a hired worker are calculated and paid according to the length of time -- for example, the days or years during which he worked in a garden, field, or house -- so also here the wages shall be calculated for the Hebrew slave, when he offers the price to his master, even a Gentile proselyte, to redeem himself and gain his freedom; his wages, I say, shall be calculated in proportion to the years he has served, and that amount shall be deducted from the price, so that, for example, if a Jew has sold himself as a slave for 40 shekels, with 40 years remaining until the jubilee, and then has served 10 years and wishes to redeem himself immediately, 10 shekels are reckoned to him as wages for the 10 years he served, and therefore he need only add 30 shekels to redeem himself; but if he has served 20 years, 20 shekels are reckoned as his wages, and he need only add 20, which being paid to the master, he redeems himself and goes free, and so proportionally in other cases. That this is the meaning is more clearly seen in the Hebrew, the Chaldean, and the Septuagint. So Abulensis.
Summary of the Privileges of the Jubilee
From what has been said in this chapter, it is clear that these were the privileges of the jubilee. First, that in it all debts were remitted; for this reason it was called the year of release, as is clear from verse 10. Second, that in it slaves were manumitted and became free. Third, that ancestral possessions returned to their legitimate and original heirs, without any price or compensation.
By this institution of the jubilee, besides the reasons given at verse 10, God first provided for the poor, so that they would not be perpetually excluded from their goods and paternal inheritance, but with the bond of debt dissolved in the jubilee, they might return to their possessions.
Second, God willed the jubilee and the seventh year to serve chronology; for according to sabbatical years and jubilees all things were sold, reckoned, and computed, just as among the Greeks according to Olympiads, and among the Romans according to lustra.
The Perpetual Jubilee of Christians
Third, God willed the jubilee to be a type of the fullest liberty, grace, and joy which Christ the Redeemer brought and in which He established us under the new law, as is clear from Luke chapter 4, verse 19. Therefore the perpetual jubilee of Christians consists, first, in the remission of sins and in a good and holy conscience. 'What is richer,' says St. Bernard in his book On Consideration, 'what sweeter in the heart, what more peaceful and more secure on earth than a good conscience? It does not fear the loss of goods, nor the insults of words, nor the torments of the body; by death itself it is more raised up than cast down.' Even the pagan Cicero, in book 6 of his Epistle to Torquatus, says: 'The consciousness of an upright will is the greatest consolation in adversity.' And Seneca, Epistle 24 to Lucilius: 'I never want you to be without joy; I want it to be born in your own home. It is born, if only it dwells within you. Other delights do not fill the heart, but only relax the brow.' And further: 'The desire for the true good is safe. You ask what that is, or whence it arises? I will tell you: from a good conscience, from honorable counsels and right actions, from contempt for chance events, from the calm and unbroken tenor of a life that treads one path.'
This, then, is the continual jubilation and jubilee of the Christian mind.
Second, the same jubilee consists in the fear and worship of God. 'The fear of the Lord,' says Ecclesiasticus, chapter 1, verse 11, 'is glory and exultation, and gladness and a crown of rejoicing. The fear of the Lord shall delight the heart, and shall give joy and gladness, and length of days.' And Malachi chapter 4, verse 2: 'And the sun of justice shall arise for you who fear My name, and healing in His wings; and you shall go forth and leap like calves from the stall.' Hence St. Chrysostom, Homily 18 to the People: 'The fear of the Lord,' he says, 'is stable and unmoved, and provides so great a joy that no sense of other evils seizes us; for he who fears God as he ought and trusts in Him has gained the root of delight and possesses every fountain of gladness.'
Third, it consists in the firm hope of eternal happiness. Hence Christ, Matthew chapter 5, verse 12: 'Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is plentiful in heaven.' And: 'Rejoice that your names are written in heaven.' St. Basil, in his Homily on Thanksgiving: 'The hope of reward,' he says, 'makes lighter the things that are sorrowful in this life. Has someone afflicted you with disgrace? Rather, look up to the glory that is stored in heaven, to be won by you through the merit of patience. Have you suffered the loss of your possessions? Fix your eyes more firmly on the heavenly riches and the incomparable treasure that you have laid up for yourself at the price of good works. Have you been driven from your native land? But you have as your homeland that heavenly Jerusalem.' Rufinus and Palladius relate in the Life of Blessed Apollonius, concerning his monastery and monks: 'There was in them,' he says, 'joy and gladness beyond measure, and as great an exultation as could be had by any men on earth. No one among them was found sad; and even if someone appeared more gloomy, Apollonius would inquire the cause and would say: We who have salvation in God and hope in the kingdom of heaven ought not to be sad. Let the Gentiles be sorrowful, let the Jews mourn, let sinners weep without ceasing; but we who have the hope of such great glory and the exultation of eternity -- why should we not rejoice with all rejoicing?'
Fourth, it consists in friendship and union with God. 'Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice,' says the Apostle. St. Basil asks in his Shorter Rules, Question 193: 'What is joy in the Lord?' and he answers: 'To rejoice in those things that are done according to the commandment of the Lord is to rejoice in the Lord. Therefore whenever we fulfill the commandments of God, or suffer something for the name of the Lord, we ought to rejoice and be glad.' St. Augustine, On Salutary Precepts, chapter 10: 'If,' he says, 'we delight in possessing anything in this world, it is expedient that we possess in our mind God, who possesses all things, who created all things, and in Him have whatever we happily and holily desire. But since no one possesses God unless he is possessed by God, let us ourselves be God's possession, and God will become our possession. And what can be happier in this world than the one whose Emperor and Redeemer becomes his treasure, and the Divinity itself deigns to be his inheritance? What more does he seek, for whom his Redeemer must be all joy and all things?' And St. Bernard, Epistle 114 to a certain religious woman: 'It is a great joy to me,' he says, 'that I have found you willing to strive toward true and perfect joy: which is not of the earth, but of heaven -- that is, not of this valley of weeping, but of that city of God which the rushing of the river makes glad. And truly that is the only true joy which is conceived not from the creature, but from the Creator, and which when you possess it, no one shall take from you: compared with which all other delight is sadness; all sweetness, pain; all that is sweet, bitter; all that is beautiful, foul; and finally, whatever else could delight, burdensome.'