I was just wondering but could not remember any clear account in the bible that the jubilee years (50) or sabbath years (7) were really practiced by the israelites. Is this true? I can't remember any account of lands being returned and slaves being freed etc. etc.
sabbath & jubilee years
by the-illuminator81 6 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Anony Mous
I think a lot, if not all of the farming nations did something similar to that. I know from history lessons in school that farmers in the middle ages had 2 fields they worked and 1 they didn't and then kept swapping between them. Even farmers these days still do it even though they have fertilizers and basically can chemically analyze the dirt they're trudging through with high precision to see what exactly they can plant and what it will yield especially if they're doing monocultures.
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belbab
In the Book of Jeremiah, when Jerusalem was under siege, the leaders decided that perhaps if they followed the regulation of the the Jubilee year and let all the slaves go free, Jeho would maybe stop the Babylonian siege. When they saw that no change took place they enslaved all the people again.
Something like that.
belbab
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transhuman68
The commandment to observe the year of jubilee is in Leviticus chapter 25:10-40. Seems to be the only mention of it in the Bible...
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Larsinger58
The Israelites were poor at maintaining their sabbaths and jubilees. But there is a mention of Hezekiah keeping the jubilee year while under siege by Assyria. It falls in the 16th year of Hezekiah and is used to coordinate the ancient timeline.
2 Kings 19:29 " And I shall indeed lead you back by the way by which you have come.”
29 “‘And this will be the sign for you: There will be an eating this year of the growth from spilled kernels, and in the second year grain that shoots up of itself; but in the third year sow seed, you people, and reap and plant vineyards and eat their fruitage. 30 And those who escape of the house of Judah, those who are left, will certainly take root downward and produce fruitage upward."
So there is some mention and acknowledgement of jublees.
For JWs, of course, many don't realize the 1925 date for yet another end of the world is based on chronology calculations for the jubilees. JWs thought that a jubilee was 50 years instead of 49 years. That is, some think an extra year after 49 years is added, and some believe the first year of the next 49 is the true jubilee cycle. I believe in the latter.
At any rate, based on some date they have since considered unsubstantiated for when the Israelites entered the land, they figured 3500 years later would be a spiritual jubilee. The year 3500 years later was 1925.
But if you assign 49 years to the jubilee period, the 490 years or "70 weeks" gives you 10 jubilees. If you make a week of these 10-jubilee periods to get 70 jubilees and begin the final jubilee, the 70th jubilee, on November 30, 1947, which is when the Jews came out of offiial exile during our time, very much a jubilee theme of freedom from bondage and restoration of pastoral lands, then you can calculate any major event relating to a jubilee in the ancient past. Case in point the Exodus in 1386 BCE and the jubilee-year return from Babylon in 455 BCE.
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the-illuminator81
@Larsinger
To me it seems that 1 king 19 refers to a sabbath year, not a jubilee year? But thanks for the tip.
I haven't had time to really research this matter, but to me it seems like more evidence that the israelites were just as godless as the heathens surrounding them. They didn't listen to the law at all, unless a king loyal to Jehovah forced them to. Then after the king died, they went back to worshipping baal.
Funny that God's blessed communication channel has such a big problem with basic timekeeping arithmetic. It's not rocket science!
@belbab
Sounds like a nice story to slap on a JW, i'll go try and find it
@Anony Mous
Now that you mention it, it does seem like normal farming practice, like rotating the crops between different fields. But the jubilee year should also entail the return of lands to the original owner and slaves being freed. And that just never happened. The sabbath year had to apply to all fields, not just some.
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Larsinger58
@the-illuminator81 The indication that this was a jubilee year for 2 Kings 19: is that theywould not plant for two years in a row. A normal sabbath year would just be one year's rest, but this is two.
This means that you have to harmonize the 16th of Hezekiah with the return from Babylon. When the return occurs in 455 BCE, the 16th of Hezekiah must fall 4 jubilees earlier.