Imamat 25:9-10

25:9 You must sound loud horn blasts ¹  – in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, on the Day of Atonement – you must sound the horn in your entire land. 25:10 So you must consecrate the fiftieth year, ²  and you must proclaim a release ³  in the land for all its inhabitants. That year will be your jubilee; ⁴  each one of you must return ⁵  to his property and each one of you must return to his clan.

Imamat 25:13

Release of Landed Property

25:13 “‘In this year of jubilee you must each return ⁶  to your property.

Imamat 25:28

25:28 If he has not prospered enough to refund ⁷  a balance to him, then what he sold ⁸  will belong to ⁹  the one who bought it until the jubilee year, but it must revert ¹⁰  in the jubilee and the original owner ¹¹  may return to his property.

Imamat 25:30

25:30 If it is not redeemed before the full calendar year is ended, ¹²  the house in the walled city ¹³  will belong without reclaim ¹⁴  to the one who bought it throughout his generations; it will not revert in the jubilee.

Imamat 25:40-41

25:40 He must be with you as a hired worker, as a resident foreigner; ¹⁵  he must serve with you until the year of jubilee, 25:41 but then ¹⁶  he may go free, ¹⁷  he and his children with him, and may return to his family and to the property of his ancestors. ¹⁸ 

Imamat 25:50

25:50 He must calculate with the one who bought him the number of years ¹⁹  from the year he sold himself to him until the jubilee year, and the cost of his sale must correspond to the number of years, according to the rate of wages a hired worker would have earned while with him. ²⁰ 

[25:9]  ¹ sn On the “loud horn blasts” see the note on Lev 23:24, but unlike the language there, the Hebrew term for “horn” (שׁוֹפָר, shofar) actually appears here in this verse (twice).

[25:10]  ² tn Heb “the year of the fifty years,” or perhaps “the year, fifty years” (GKC 435 §134.o, note 2).

[25:10]  ³ tn Cf. KJV, ASV, NAB, NIV, NRSV “liberty”; TEV, CEV “freedom.” The characteristics of this “release” are detailed in the following verses. For substantial summaries and bibliography on the biblical and ancient Near Eastern material regarding such a “release” see J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 427-34, and B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 270-74.

[25:10]  ⁴ tn Heb “A jubilee that shall be to you.” Although there has been some significant debate about the original meaning of the Hebrew word translated “jubilee” (יוֹבֵל, yovel; see the summary in J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 434), the term most likely means “ram” and can refer also to a “ram’s horn.” The fiftieth year would, therefore, be called the “jubilee” because of the associated sounding of the “ram’s horn” (see B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 172, and the literature cited there).

[25:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “you [plural] shall return, a man.”

[25:13]  ⁶ tn Heb “you [plural] shall return, a man.”

[25:28]  ⁷ tn Heb “And if his hand has not found sufficiency of returning.” Although some versions take this to mean that he has not made enough to regain the land (e.g., NASB, NRSV; see also B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 176), the combination of terms in Hebrew corresponds to the portion of v. 27 that refers specifically to refunding the money (cf. v. 27; see NIV and G. J. Wenham, Leviticus [NICOT], 315).

[25:28]  ⁸ tn Heb “his sale.”

[25:28]  ⁹ tn Heb “will be in the hand of.” This refers to the temporary control of the one who purchased its produce until the next year of jubilee, at which time it would revert to the original owner.

[25:28]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “it shall go out” (so KJV, ASV; see B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 176).

[25:28]  ¹¹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the original owner of the land) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[25:30]  ¹² tn Heb “until fulfilling to it a complete year.’

[25:30]  ¹³ tn Heb “the house which [is] in the city which to it [is] a wall.” The Kethib has לֹא (lo’, “no, not”) rather than לוֹ (lo, “to it”) which is the Qere.

[25:30]  ¹⁴ tn See the note on v. 23 above.

[25:40]  ¹⁵ tn See the note on Lev 25:6 above.

[25:41]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have adversative force here.

[25:41]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “may go out from you.”

[25:41]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “fathers.”

[25:50]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “the years.”

[25:50]  ²⁰ tn Heb “as days of a hired worker he shall be with him.” For this and the following verses see the explanation in P. J. Budd, Leviticus (NCBC), 358-59.