[Is this declaration possible? Yes, only in a ideal Torah-centric society that focuses on other-centeredness, that gives special treatment for the disadvantaged in society: the widows and orphans, the stranger; which requires that original landowners be given back their land on Jubilee year and that debts be cancelled on sabbatical year.
Does such an ideal exist anywhere in the world? It has been commanded to the Law-Giver’s chosen people; Israel has yet to fulfill its Divine assignment in this un-Torah world system! For Israel and any Torah-observant society, V. 5 is the condition:
5 Only: if you hearken, yes, hearken to the voice of YHVH your God, by taking-care to observe all this commandment that I command you today,6 indeed, YHVH your God will bless you
Commentary is from the best of Jewish minds as collected in one resource book by Dr. J.H. Hertz, Pentateuch and Haftorahs; our translation of choice is EF/Everett Fox, The Five Books of Mosees.—Admin1.]
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Deuteronomy/Davarim 15
THE YEAR OF RELEASE
Every seventh year shall be a year of remission for all debts; this however shall not operate as a motive for refusing loans. Likewise, the seventh year of the individual’s service brought freedom to the Hebrew bondman, with liberal parting gifts from his master.
1-11. OF DEBTS
1 At the end of seven years, you are to make a Release.
at the end of every seven years. It is possible that these words signify ‘when each seventh year has arrived’; Jer. XXXIV,14, where ‘at the end of seven years’ clearly means, ‘in the seventh year.’
a release. Heb. shemittah. This ‘release’ took two forms. (1) The soil was not to be sown; see Exod. XXIII,10, and Lev. XXV,2. (2) The remission of loans.
2 Now this is the matter of the Release: he shall release, every possessor of a loan of his hand, what he has lent to his neighbor. He is not to oppress his neighbor or his brother, for the Release of YHVH has been proclaimed!not exact it of his neighbour. Or, ‘he shall not press his neighbour for payment.’ The Jewish traditional view is that the Year of Release in regard to debts does not come into operation until the end of the seventh year. This law was intended for an agricultural community, in which each family had its homestead. A debt would only be contracted in case of misfortune. The loan was, therefore, an act of charity, rather than a business transaction. Circumstances had altered altogether when economic life became more complex and people engaged in commerce. Debts contracted in the course of trading belonged to quite a different category, and this law could not fairly be invoked for their cancellation. Consequently in the first century of the present era, Hillel instituted a method whereby the operation of the year of release did not affect debts that had been delivered to the Court before the intervention of the year of release. Without actually handing over the bond or promissory note to the Court, the creditor could secure his debt against forfeiture by appearing before the Beth Din, and making the declaration, ‘I announce unto you, judges of this Court, that I shall collect any debt which I may have outstanding with N.N., whenever I desire.’ This institution was known as Prosbul.
brother. Fellow-Israelite.
the LORD’s release . . . proclaimed. Better, a release hath been proclaimed unto the LORD; i.e. in His honour, as the bestower of all wealth and increase (Ibn Ezra).
3 The foreigner you may oppress, and he who belongs to you; as for your brother, your hand is to release (him).a foreigner. Heb. nochri; to be distinguished from the ger (X,19). The ‘foreigner’ merely visits Canaan temporarily, for trade. He is not, like the Israelite (Exod. XXIII,10), under the obligation of surrendering the produce of his land every seventh year; there is, therefore, no reason in his case for any relaxation of his creditor’s claims (Driver). It should be noted that the Torah does not declare that the creditor must exact payment; he may do so, if he wish.
thy hand shall release. lit. ‘let thy hand release.’ The Rabbis understood this to mean that payment could not be claimed; but if the debtor voluntarily offered it, it may be accepted.
4 However, there will not be among you any needy-person, for YHVH will bless, yes, bless you in the land that YHVH your God is giving you as an inheritance, to possess.needy among you. This expresses an ideal which would only be realized if the condition of obedience in v. 5 were fulfilled. There is thus no contradiction with the statement in v. 11, ‘the poor shall never cease out of the land.’
5 Only: if you hearken, yes, hearken to the voice of YHVH your God, by taking-care to observe all this commandment that I command you today,6 indeed, YHVH your God will bless you as he promised you; you will cause many nations to give-pledges, but you will not (have to) give-pledges; you will rule over many nations, but over you they shall not rule.
as He promised thee. See VII,13; Exod. XXIII,25; Lev. XXVI,3.
thou shalt lend. This is, like v. 4 above, a conditional promise that was as unlikely to become actual as the ideal of ‘there shall be no poor with thee.’ The Israelites began to engage in commerce in the days of King Solomon. Isa. II,7 and Hos. XII,8 testify to considerable foreign trade in the long reigns of Uzziah and Jeroboam II. Of later times, the Greek geographer Strabo writes: ‘These Jews have penetrated to every city, and it would not be easy to find a single place in the inhabited world which has not received this race, and where it has not become master.’ Through no fault of their own, Jews were divorced from agriculture and confined to commerce for over 1,500 years. However, commerce is not their native bent, as is evidenced by the fact that, in recent generations, leadership has almost everywhere been wrested from them by the non-Jewish newcomers in industrial and financial enterprise.
7 When there is among you a needy-person from any-one of your brothers, within one of your gates in the land that YHVH your God is giving you, you are not to toughen your heart, you are not to shut your hand to your brother, the needy-one.7-11. The Israelite is warned against letting the approach of the Year of Release hinder him from helping his needy brother.
within any of thy gates. i.e. in one of thy cities’ and the Sifri bases therein the rule, ‘The poor of thine own city should be helped before those of another city.’
in thy land. The Sifri similarly explains that one must assist the poor in the Holy Land before helping an Israelite who dwelt outside of Palestine.
8 Rather, you are to open, yes, open your hand to him, and are to give-pledge, yes, pledge to him, sufficient for his lack that is lacking to him.9 Take-you-care, lest there be a word in your heart, a base-one, saying: The seventh year, the Year of Release, is nearing- and your eye be set-on-ill toward your brother, the needy-one, and you not give to him, so that he calls out because of you to YHVH, and sin be incurred by you.
thine eye be evil. i.e. refuse to assist, assuming that the loan will not be refunded.
he cry unto the LORD. God hears the cry of those who are hardly treated; Exod. XXII,122.
10 You are to give, yes, give (freely) to him, your heart is not to be ill-disposed in your giving to him, for on account of this matter YHVH your God will bless you in all your doings and in all the enterprises of your hand!thy heart shall not be grieved. i.e. the loan must not be made in a grudging spirit; Prov. XIX,17, ‘He that is gracious unto the poor lendeth unto the LORD, and his good deed will He repay unto him.’
11 For the needy will never be-gone from amid the land; therefore I command you, saying: You are to open, yes, open your hand to your brother, to your afflicted-one, and to your needy-one in your land!for the poor shall never cease. See on v. 4.
1-18. THE RELEASE OF SLAVES
A man’s misfortune may be so overwhelming that he could not save himself by a loan. To avoid destitution, a Hebrew might sell himself temporarily; i.e. become a member of another’s household, and earn his food and shelter by his labour. The ‘slavery’ of the Bible was in no way identical with what was understood by that term in Greece or Rome. The master had many obligations towards the bondman, and the infliction of bodily injury by the master secured the bondman his immediate freedom.
In the seventh year of service the bondman goes free, and his master is required at the time of the emancipation liberally to supply the new freedman with an equipment that shall enable him to begin life again with some confidence for the future. This provision is characteristic of the humanness and philantropy of the Torah in regard to the bondman.
12 When your brother is sold to you, Hebrew-male or Hebrew-female, and serves you for six years: now in the seventh year you are to send-him-free, at liberty, from beside you.Hebrew woman. This is an addition to the law as stated in Exod. XXI,1-6, and decrees that the same treatment is to be meted out to a an and woman. Exod. XXI,7 refers to a different set of circumstances.
be sold. The Heb. could also mean ‘sell himself’. According to the Talmud, Scripture here speaks of the case where a person is sold by the court of law because he had committed a burglary and could not repay what he ahd stolen; Exod. XXII,2.
14 you are to adorn, yes, adorn him from your flock, from your threshing-floor and from your vat, (from) that which YHVH your God has blessed you, you are to give to him.
liberally. The compliance with this command must be more than sour obedience of the letter of the law.
out of thy flock . . . winepress. The freed slave is thus to be helped to make a fresh start in life. This principle has become part of Jewish social ethics.
15 You must bear-in-mind that a serf were you in the land of Egypt, and YHVH your God redeemed you, therefore I command you this word today!land of Egypt. Let him remember that he owes his own freedom to the Divine grace; XVI,12.
16 Now it shall be if he says to you: I will not go out from beside you, for I love you and your household -for it goes-well for him beside you-17 you are to take a piercing-tool and are to put it through his ear, into the door, and he shall be your serf forever; even to your maid you are to do thus.
also unto thy bondwoman. The comment of the Sifri is: ‘This refers back to the injunction, thou shalt furnish him liberally (v. 14). ‘Thou mightest say it refers to “thou shalt take an awl, and thrust it through the ear”; therefore the Torah states “and it shall be, if he say unto thee”; he, not she.’ Accordingly, the female slave had to leave in the seventh year, and was not subjected to the rule of having the ear bored.
18 You are not to let-it-be-hard in your eyes when you send-him-free, at liberty, from beside you, for double the hire of a hired-hand did he serve you, six years. Then YHVH will bless you in all that you do.for to the double. The master gets double value out of a slave of this kind as compared with a hireling, i.e. a day-labourer; the slave being a member of the household, the master could get work done by him at night as well as by day.
19-23. OF FIRSTLINGS
This paragraph, dealing with the firstlings of the cattle, should have followed on XIV,22-29, the law of the tithe. But the last verses, which mentioned the ‘poor tithe’, suggested the subject of the treatment of the poor, which has occupied this chapter up to this point.
19 Every firstling that is born in your flock and in your herd, the male-one, you are to hallow to YHVH your God; you are not to do serving-tasks with the firstling of your ox, you are not to shear the firstling of your sheep.all the firstling males. For the idea of consecrating the firstborn, see Exod. XIII,2.
20 Before the presence of YHVH your God you are to eat (it), year after year, in the place that YHVH chooses- you and your household.year by year. i.e. the offering must not be delayed beyond a year. This is not at variance with what was stated in Exod. XXI,29 ‘on the eighth day thou shalt give it Me’, for the Mechilta explains that to mean, from the eighth day onwards; Lev. XXII,27.
21 Now if there be in it a defect, lame or blind, any defect for ill, you are not to slaughter (it) to YHVH your God.be any blemish. The law of the firstlings is also dealt with in Lev. XXVII,26, where it is forbidden to sanctify the firstling by using it as an offering for any other purpose. Also in Num. XVIII,17, where the flesh of the firstlings is declared to be the priest’s. The words, ‘Thou shalt eat it before the LORD,’ in this section refer to the person who is entitled to eat it; i.e. the priest, as is prescribed in Numbers. As Deut. is a continuation of the preceding Books of the Pentateuch, it was obvious to Moses’ hearers who it was that were to eat the firstling, since it had already been ordained and well understood (Hoffmann).
22 Within your gates you are to eat it, the tamei and the pure together, as the gazelle, so the deer.23 Only: its blood you are not to eat, on the earth you are to pour it out, like water.