Leviticus; The Law of Holiness and Grace

The Jubilee II

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Pentateuch

Genre: Lessons with Q & A

Lesson: 68

Track: 68

Dictation Name: RR172AK68

Date: Early 70s

Let us worship God. Our help is in the name of the Lord who made Heaven and earth. The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon Him, to all them who call up on Him in truth. He will fulfill the desire of them that fear Him. He also will hear their cry and will save them. Where two or three are gathered together in my name, saith the Lord Jesus Christ, there am I in the midst of them.

Let us pray.

Oh Lord our God, Thou hast been the help of Thy people in ages past, and Thy strength hath not waned nor Thine eyes grown dim. Thou art the same yesterday, today and forever. Teach us therefore as we study Thy Word to know that as Thy people saw Thy wondrous works of old, we shall see Thy work, Thy judgment, Thy redemption in our time also. Make us therefore joyful in Thy service, confident in Thy Word, and ever strong in Thy Spirit. Grant us this we beseech Thee in Christ’s name, amen.

Our scripture this morning is Leviticus 25:18-24. Our subject is again, “The Jubilee.” Leviticus 25:18-24:

“18 Wherefore ye shall do my statutes, and keep my judgments, and do them; and ye shall dwell in the land in safety.

19 And the land shall yield her fruit, and ye shall eat your fill, and dwell therein in safety.

20 And if ye shall say, what shall we eat the seventh year? Behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase:

21 Then I will command my blessing upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth fruit for three years.

22 And ye shall sow the eighth year, and eat yet of old fruit until the ninth year; until her fruits come in ye shall eat of the old store.

23 The land shall not be sold for ever: for the land is mine; for ye are strangers and sojourners with me.

24 And in all the land of your possession ye shall grant redemption for the land.”

As we have seen the past two weeks, the jubilee is at the heart of the doctrine of the sabbath. It tells us that God’s Sabbath embraces more than a weekly rest. It is a rest from work, a rest for the land every seventh year and then the forty-ninth and fiftieth year a jubilee. This doctrine requires providential living.

A part of the doctrine is that man shall not go into debt beyond six years. As a general rule, ye shall owe no man anything save but to love one another. Short-term debt, therefore, is the requirement of all believers. This means a very different way of life, and as we examine the implications of this, we saw last week and the week before, part of it was the family had to get together. It was to be a time of concentration on the family, so there was to be a family reunion during the seventh year and the jubilee year. Moreover, it meant that there had to be providential living. Debt had to be contracted only in cases of necessity.

It meant too that our modern form of long-term debt and high interest would be impossible because if you bought something on a short-term note, you had to buy with a substantial down payment and because the land was not sold in perpetuity except in urban properties, you paid for the value of the crops of the land for the remaining years of the sabbath and in the city you bought the land outright, but you paid for it in a very short time—six years. This meant providential living. There was a time in this country when mortgages were for five years, in terms of this law. They rounded out the number of years to five as more convenient for bookkeeping.

It also meant the kind of thing could not exist which prevails today, where in the cities, so many young couples who are buying their homes are paying a $1,000 a month and more in interest for modest homes, and almost nothing on the principle. Now, figure out what $1,000 a month in five and six years would amount to. It would be $70,000 and more, which if saved would keep one going a year, easily. Very well. Or two years. You can see what the implications of the Law of the Sabbath and of jubilee involve.

Now, the Laws of Jubilee are also called The Laws of Release, also the Laws of Liberty. As we saw in verse 10, there is a great statement, “proclaim liberty throughout all the land, unto all the inhabitants thereof.” In Honeycutt’s words, “All of creation is the Lord’s. And to set creation free is to acknowledge that sanctity. And so, God’s continuing call is ‘Free the land! Free the poor! Free all who are encumbered!’ Freedom acknowledges that all creation is sacred, belonging not to persons but to the Lord.”

In the biblical perspective, rural land is not a commodity to be sold for a profit, but a trust from God to the family. The family here means also the generations yet to come so that the trustee possessor of the land today holds it under God from past generations for future generations. A future-oriented tenure results from such a perspective. At the same time, the past trustees, in their work to build up the family’s land was a very present fact. A man lived with the knowledge that his forbearers had made possible what he today enjoys.

Biblical faith is land-oriented. The earth was cursed for man’s sake at the fall and it is to be blessed at the New Creation of all things. And we are to begin the redemption of the whole of the earth.

In both verses 18 and 19, there is a stress on the fact of our safety when we are faithful to the Lord. “And ye shall dwell in the land in safety and ye shall eat your fill and dwell therein in safety.” George Bush, an American scholar of a century or half ago, century and a half, said that the Hebrew word translated as safety could be rendered as ‘confident safety.’ “…The Hebrew word expresses both the boldness and confidence with which men that fear and obey God trust in Him and the safety and security which they feel in His protection in times of doubt or danger.” One of the great and governing facts of our time is the sense of insecurity men feel. But what God tells us is that when we are faithful to His Law, we shall live in the land in confident safety. The land and the people will life in security and peace if they obey God, if they observe this law.

The Sabbath and Jubilee Years are quite obviously laws that presuppose faith and obedience. To go without planting for one year in Sabbath Years, and two years in Jubilee Years and to rest for that length of time means living two and three years on old stored food, on faith because another season would have to pass before a harvest. And yet, God promises a blessing of very great plenty for all who are obedient. He commands His blessings on all who are commanded by Him, on all who obey Him in faith. This is a very special and providential blessing.

Let us look again at the fact that these laws are laws of release. The Jubilee is the Great Sabbath, and the sabbaths are all a rest and a release. John Newton’s hymn, “Safely Through Another Week God has Brought us on our Way,” says in part, “from all worldly cares set free, may we rest this day in Thee.” Now, that’s the meaning of the Sabbath Years—to be free from all worldly cares to rest and to enjoy life.

Now we need to recognize the kind of meaning set forth concerning the Sabbath Doctrine of days, years, and the Jubilee: safety, release, plenty, rest, and much more if we are faithful to the Lord. The land too has a release and a rest. First of all, the land has a release from man. We are not to prune or cultivate the land and its vines and trees in the sabbatical years. Because the earth is the Lords, we must obey God’s law and give the land its periodical release. This release applies to every person and sphere. In the Ten Commandments the rest applies to our families, workers and animals. In no sphere, including our own lives, do we have unrestricted power or jurisdiction. (Incidentally, the laws concerning menstruation give alike immunity and rest to women.) The earth is the Lord’s and so are we.

Does this work? Well, no one has bothered to study the history of this. We have dim hints that it has been observed in the past. We know it is observed in the present and no one will turn and look at it. The Amish observe it. They prosper because of it. It has not hurt them, and their land remains more fertile than surrounding lands.

Second, not only are we the Lord’s property, and the land also, but the harvests also are His possession. The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and they that dwell therein. The tithe, the offering of the first fruits, the sabbaths, gleaning, and much more in the law, witness to God’s ownership of the products of the earth, whether they are agricultural, mineral, or manufactured.

Then third, God’s ownerships must be acknowledged by more than merely verbal statement, such as theological affirmations, such as ‘Saying Yes to Jesus’ at a revival meeting, and so on. Our faith must be confessed by the observance, not only of the land’s release, but our observance of the whole Law of God. One of the evils of the modern Church is the substitution of a verbal profession of faith for a life of faithfulness, so that the churches are full of people who are worthless outside of the church building as far as the kingdom of God is concerned.

Such living is strongly condemned in scripture. Isaiah says, “Wherefore the Lord said for as much as His people draw near me with their mouth and with their lips do honor me but have removed their heart far from me and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men. Therefore behold I will proceed to do a marvelous work among this people, even a marvelous work and a wonder for the wisdom of their wise men shall perish and the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid.” Our Lord quotes this in Matthew 15:7-9, saying, “7 ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, 8 This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. 9 But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.” Symptomatic of this evil is the fact that today the Sabbath is a church observance, not the life of release in the Lord for the land and the people.

Then fourth, we must say that God’s requirement for the land and the people is holiness. His blunt demand is, “ye shall not pollute the land.” “Defile not therefore the land,” we read in Numbers 35:33-34 and elsewhere as well. In many laws as in Leviticus 18:24-30 and 20:22-26, God declares plainly that the land itself will vomit out a disobedient and a faithless people. What happened to the Canaanites, the Israelites, and many other peoples will happen to us and to all who defile the land. The earth is under a curse because of man’s sin, and the earth itself takes vengeance upon men and nations who continue the defilement of God’s holy creation. We are very plainly told in Leviticus 25:23, “the land shall not be sold forever (or in perpetuity), for the land is mine, for ye are strangers and sojourners with me.” This is why as W.D. Davies pointed out, “It is impossible to discover any Israelite idea of the State.” The State means government by man, whereas by God’s Law, all areas of government, including civil government are under Him and His Law.

History is the story of God’s dispossession of false tenants and His insistence on the holiness of the land which must have a holy people. Because the earth is the Lord’s, men must believe and obey God’s terms of tenancy—His Law—or else they will be dispossessed, or at very least, cursed. The promise of the Great Commission is that all nations must be discipled because it is God’s earth they dwell in.

Now commentators are usually skeptical about the Jubilee Laws and question whether it was ever observed. Honeycutt correctly notes, “Leviticus speaks to so few today because so few believe that God can come to them through and yet beyond the words of another culture and time.” To limit the validity, as many people do, of Leviticus to ancient Israel is to sin. It means positing an evolving God who adapts Himself to an evolving people. To question the validity of God’s Law for today is arrogance on the part of scholars and churchmen. A better approach is found in Demalow, who said, “The Year of Jubilee was thus, as it were, the new birth of the whole nation, when property was redistributed and the inequalities arising in the previous period were removed. It was a remarkable social law, putting a check upon ambition and covetousness, preventing the acquisition of huge estates and adjusting the distribution of wealth in the various classes of the community. The instant of Ruth and of Naboth show that the law against the alienation of land was in force in early times, that it was not unnecessary in later times appears from such passages as Isaiah 5:8 and Micah 2:2.”

But at the same time, we must say that the basic emphasis in the Jubilee Law is not economic but theonomic. The concern is holiness, not society’s goal. We must minister to men because God requires it for His kingdom, not because men see it as a humanistic concern. The purpose is a holy community, not the kingdom of man. Hence, we are told by Paul in the apostolic fellowship, wherefore lift up the hands which hang down and the feeble knee, and make straight paths for your feet lest that which is lame be turned out of the way but let it rather be healed. Follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord.

Let us pray.

Our Lord and our God, we give thanks unto Thee for Thy Word. We thank Thee that Thy Word gives us safety when we are obedient to it. And we pray that thou wouldst make us again an obedient people that we might dwell in the land that Thou hast given us in confidence and in peace. Grant us this; we beseech Thee in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Are there any questions now about our lesson?

[Audience] I’m not sure that I understand it, uh, when it says the land, the property is sold for a six-year period and then returned on the seventh.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Audience] Does that mean returned to the original possessor?

[Rushdoony] Yes, it’s only leased.

[Audience] It’s a lease. I see.

[Rushdoony] It’s properly a lease for a short-term period.

[Audience] I see.

[Rushdoony] What this did was to create stability in the rural areas and give an element in the population that was very stable, that is, it was sold until the Jubilee, but then it had to return to the original family. It prevented the concentration of huge estates. It insisted that the family had to see their possession as a heritage for the future. They were free if they did not want to farm to move into the city. But the land had to be maintained for those in the family who wanted to maintain themselves there.

[Audience] Well, it’s interesting to contemplate that something like 96%, 96 or 97% of all the property in Japan is held and is not for sale.

[Rushdoony] Yes. There are a few countries where, in terms of scripture, land is still not taxed. Greece is one, and there are a few countries in which the peasants still feel that selling the land is a sin, because of the

[Audience] keys to the future

[Rushdoony] Yes. The sad fact is that no one has bothered to study the Laws of Jubilee. We have hints about it here and there in history, but not even in American History, not even among the Amish has anyone ever bothered to study it, because they see it as something so alien and threatening to man’s dominion and control

[Audience] Well, nobody has studied the Amish or written about them.

[Rushdoony] There are a few studies but nothing other than treatments of them as a curiosity, their folkways, that sort of thing.

[Audience] Well, now, we have right now lots of homes in shaky position because of the stock market crash.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Audience] These people who have borrowed to invest, then have to cover their margin are in bad condition.

[Rushdoony] The sad fact is on Tuesday, a great many of them dumped their hard assets like gold.

[Audience] …owed a debt.

[Rushdoony] Yes. You may recall on Monday, the price of gold shot up $19. It dropped 19 on Tuesday, and I asked Bert Loomart about it and he said it was very simple. People were dumping their solid assets, paid for assets, to cover their margins on shaky assets. And this is a characteristic of people again and again over the generations. In a crisis they sacrifice the solid assets.

Any other questions or comments?

[Audience] The only other comment I have is that although I knew about the electronic exchange that crossed international borders, it’s created a financial black market out of the control of the central banks and out of the control of the government. I’ve never before realized that all the stock exchanges of the world are not one and the various exchanges in various parts of the world are simply divisions of an on-going continuing exchange.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Audience] So it rises or falls together.

[Rushdoony] Yes. This is why the current disaster will build up to the worst ever known. I was called by a couple of men, one of the prominent in politics, and their picture makes anything that anyone else had to say look very, very optimistic.

[Audience] The whole West is connected now.

[Rushdoony] Yes. The whole world in fact.

[Audience] Well, the world outside of the slave countries, which are not economic in any modern sense. There’s no stock exchange in Moscow or Peking. But this is the kind of crisis which will bring to a bubble the political situation.

[Rushdoony] Yes, one of these men who called me had been, he also is in the political scene, investigating the use of funds in another state, and he found the picture appalling. There was no restraint, no feeling that there might be a day of reckoning, monies were misappropriated and used with a casualness that was startling. The only problem is getting anyone to be concerned about it.

[Audience] One of the great shocks of the New York Stock Exchange is that a great many people who have placed orders have now refusing to pay for them because the price dropped. So the trust or the assumption of honesty which has always been the basis of stock action has been greatly shaken because modern people don’t understand that their word is anything of value.

[Rushdoony] Yes. This is the end of the modern age, and after talking to these men I felt that anything I had ever said was optimistic compared to their analysis.

Well if there are no further questions or comments, let us conclude with prayer.

Lord, we thank Thee that in a time or crisis, Thy hand is upon us for good. Thou hast commanded us to trust in Thee, and according to Thy Word we are not to fear what man may do unto us for Thou wilt never leave us nor forsake us. Give us grace therefore to cast our every care upon Thee, knowing Thou carest for us. And now, go in peace. God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost bless you and keep you, guide and protect you this day and always. Amen.