The Fallible · Synthetic · Study Bible
The Seventh Year
Leviticus 25:1–7 — The Seventh Year. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.
1Then the LORD said to Moses on Mount Sinai,
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
Yah·weh way·ḏab·bêr ’el- mō·šeh bə·har sî·nay lê·mōr
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-spoke the LORD to Moses in-mount Sinai, saying:
Where the English smooths the original
The law for the sabbatical and jubilee years brings to a close the laws given to Moses by Jehovah upon Mount Sinai. This is shown by the words of the heading ( Leviticus 25:1 ), which point back to Exodus 34:32 , and bind together into an inward unity the whole round of laws that Moses received from God upon the mountain
In Mount Sinai. —That is, in the mountainous regions of Sinai. The expression “mountain” is often used to denote a mountainous tract of country ( Numbers 12:9 ; Deuteronomy 1:2 ; Joshua 14:12 , &c.).Ellicott also argues the chapter belongs after Lev 23; we cite only his lexical point on the preposition.
The sabbatical year and the year of Jubilee belong to that great sabbatical system which runs through the religious observances of the Law, but rest upon moral rather than upon formally religious ground.
i.e. Near Mount Sinai. So the Hebrew particle beth is sometimes used, as Genesis 27:13 Joshua 5:13 Judges 8:5JFB stacks four cross-references (Gen 27:13, Josh 5:13, Judg 8:5, 2 Chr 33:20) where beth = near; we trim to the lexical claim and its first witnesses.
We are to exercise willing dependence on God's providence for our support; to consider ourselves the Lord's tenants or stewards, and to use our possessions accordingly.
2“Speak to the Israelites and say to them: When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land itself must observe a Sabbath to the LORD.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
dab·bêr ’el- bə·nê yiś·rā·’êl wə·’ā·mar·tā kî ṯā·ḇō·’ū ’el- ’ă·lê·hem hā·’ā·reṣ ’ă·šer ’ă·nî nō·ṯên lā·ḵem hā·’ā·reṣ wə·šā·ḇə·ṯāh šab·bāṯ Yah·weh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Speak to the sons of Israel and-you-shall-say to-them: When you-come into the land that I am-giving to-you, then-shall-rest the land a Sabbath to-the-LORD.
Where the English smooths the original
Just as the seventh day is dedicated to God in recognition of His being the Creator of the world, so the seventh year is to be consecrated to Him in acknowledgment that He is the owner of the land.
This was instituted partly for the assertion of God’s sovereign right to the land, . in which the Israelites were but tenants at God’s will; partly for the trial and exercise of their obedience
As the nation at large, with its labourers and beasts of burden, was to keep a Sabbath or day of rest every seventh day of the week, so the land which they filled was to rest
The land shall rest in the seventh year, as man rests on the seventh day, the sabbath.
it was calculated to teach the people, in a remarkable manner, the reality of the presence and providential power of God.JFB ties the lying-fallow to faith: a whole year living on what is not sown trains Israel to trust God's providence.
3For six years you may sow your field and prune your vineyard and gather its crops.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
šêš šā·nîm tiz·ra‘ śā·ḏe·ḵā tiz·mōr kar·me·ḵā wə·’ā·sap̄·tā ’eṯ- tə·ḇū·’ā·ṯāh wə·šêš šā·nîm
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Six years you-shall-sow your-field, and-you-shall-prune your-vineyard, and-you-shall-gather its-produce.
Where the English smooths the original
Vineyard - Rather, fruit-garden. The Hebrew word is a general one for a plantation of fruit-trees.
Six years thou shalt sow thy field,.... Under which is comprehended everything relating to agriculture, both before and after sowing, as dunging the land, ploughing and harrowing it, treading the corn, reaping and gathering it in
זמר in Kal applies only to the cutting of grapes, and so also in Niphal, Isaiah 5:6 ; hence zemorah, a vine-branch ( Numbers 13:23 ), and mazmerah, a pruning-knife ( Isaiah 2:4 , etc.).Keil's note on זמר supplies the lexical thread to Isaiah 5:6 used below.
4But in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of complete rest for the land—a Sabbath to the LORD. You are not to sow your field or prune your vineyard.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
haš·šə·ḇî·‘iṯ ū·ḇaš·šā·nāh yih·yeh šab·baṯ šab·bā·ṯō·wn lā·’ā·reṣ šab·bāṯ Yah·weh lō ṯiz·rā‘ śā·ḏə·ḵā ṯiz·mōr wə·ḵar·mə·ḵā lō
Literal — word-for-word from the original
But-in-the-year the-seventh a Sabbath of Sabbath-rest shall-be for-the-land, a Sabbath to-the-LORD; your-field not you-shall-sow and-your-vineyard not you-shall-prune.
Where the English smooths the original
Literally, the seventh year shall be a rest of solemn resting, or a sabbath of sabbaths. For the import of this phrase see Note on Leviticus 16:31 .
Its great spiritual lesson was that there was no such thing as absolute ownership in the land vested in any man, that the soil was the property of Yahweh, that it was to be held in trust for Him
All yearly labours were to be intermitted in the seventh year, as much as daily labours on the seventh day.
5You are not to reap the aftergrowth of your harvest or gather the grapes of your untended vines. The land must have a year of complete rest.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’êṯ lō ṯiq·ṣō·wr wə·’eṯ- sə·p̄î·aḥ qə·ṣî·rə·ḵā ṯiḇ·ṣōr ‘in·nə·ḇê nə·zî·re·ḵā lō lā·’ā·reṣ yih·yeh šə·naṯ šab·bā·ṯō·wn
Literal — word-for-word from the original
The-aftergrowth of-your-harvest not you-shall-reap, and-the-grapes of-your-untended-vine not you-shall-gather; a year of Sabbath-rest it-shall-be for-the-land.
Where the English smooths the original
Vine undressed - That is, "unpruned"; literally "Nazarite vine", the figure being taken from the unshorn locks of the Nazarite. Numbers 6:5 .
the Nazarite, who let his hair grow freely without cutting it ( Numbers 6:5 ), is used figuratively, both here and in Leviticus 25:11 , to denote a vine not pruned, since by being left to put forth all its productive power it was consecrated to the Lord.
Thou shalt not reap, i.e. as thy own peculiarly, but only so as others may reap it with thee, for present food.
untrimmed by lopping and hence consecrated. The Heb. word is the same as that denoting the Nazirite, who in token of his consecration wore his hair uncut ( Numbers 6:5 ).
Or, which you have separated from yourself, and consecrated to God for the poor.The Geneva marginal gloss takes nâzîyr a step beyond the Nazirite figure: the vine is consecrated not merely as God's but as set apart for the poor — the consecration has a recipient.
6Whatever the land yields during the Sabbath year shall be food for you—for yourself, your manservant and maidservant, the hired hand or foreigner who stays with you,
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
hā·’ā·reṣ lā·ḵem šab·baṯ wə·hā·yə·ṯāh lə·’āḵ·lāh lə·ḵā ū·lə·‘aḇ·də·ḵā wə·la·’ă·mā·ṯe·ḵā wə·liś·ḵî·rə·ḵā ū·lə·ṯō·wō·šā·ḇə·ḵā hag·gā·rîm ‘im·māḵ
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-shall-be the-Sabbath of-the-land for-food for-you: for-you and-for-your-manservant and-for-your-maidservant and-for-your-hired-hand and-for-your-resident-alien who sojourns with-you,
Where the English smooths the original
Shall be meat for you. —That is, it shall serve as your food, but you must not trade with it, or store it up.
the food of this year was common to masters and servants, to rich and poor, to Israelites and Gentiles; all had an equal right unto, and share therein; which might be an emblem of the first times of the Gospel, in which all things were had in common
The produce arising without tilling or sowing was to be a common good for man and beast. According to Exodus 23:11 , it was to belong to the poor and needy; but the owner was not forbidden to partake of it also
7and for your livestock and the wild animals in your land. All its growth may serve as food.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
wə·liḇ·hem·tə·ḵā wə·la·ḥay·yāh ’ă·šer bə·’ar·ṣe·ḵā ḵāl tə·ḇū·’ā·ṯāh tih·yeh le·’ĕ·ḵōl
Literal — word-for-word from the original
and-for-your-livestock and-for-the-wild-animal that is in-your-land — all its-produce shall-be for-eating.
Where the English smooths the original
The former signifies tame cattle, such as were kept at home, or in fields, or were used in service, and the latter the wild beasts of the field
The earth was to be saved from the hand of man exhausting its power for earthly purposes as his own property, and to enjoy the holy rest with which God had blessed the earth and all its productions after the creation.
the administrators of the law inferred from this verse, and hence enacted, that the fruit of the seventh year may only be eaten by man at home, as long as the kind is found in the field.Ellicott's longer note details the king's septennial reading of the Law; we excerpt only his comment on this verse's provision rule.
Through Him we are eased of the burden of wordly care and labour, both being sanctified and sweetened to us; and we are enabled and encouraged to live by faith.Henry reads the whole seventh-year provision (man and beast fed without labour) as a figure of the believer's rest in Christ; the unit ends, as it should, on faith rather than husbandry.
The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.
AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.
The unit opens with the formula way·ḏab·bêr Yahweh… bə·har sînay lê·mōr (v.1) — And the LORD spoke… on Mount Sinai, saying. Keil & Delitzsch hear in this heading a deliberate echo of Exodus 34:32, binding into an inward unity the whole round of laws that Moses received from God upon the mountain. Ellicott, Benson, and Gill read the preposition bə- on har as near or in the district of Sinai — not a claim about altitude but about the moment: these are the last laws of the Sinai encampment. The command itself (v.2) is startling in its grammar: the verb wə·šā·ḇə·ṯāh (H7673) takes the land as its subject — the land itself sabbaths. Cambridge states the principle plainly: The land shall rest in the seventh year, as man rests on the seventh day, the sabbath. Ellicott draws the theological inference: as the seventh day confesses God as Creator, the seventh year confesses Him as Owner — which is why Poole calls Israel only tenants at God's will, the ongoing participle nō·ṯên (am giving, v.2) keeping the title in God's hand.
Verse 3 grants the work — sow… prune… gather — and verse 4 withdraws it for the seventh. Gill takes sow thy field as shorthand for everything relating to agriculture. The pivot is the doubled noun of v.4, šab·baṯ šab·bā·ṯō·wn, which Ellicott renders a sabbath of sabbaths — and the rarity of šab·bā·ṯō·wn (H7677, ten occurrences) is what makes the link to the Day of Atonement's rest (Lev 16:31) and the Sabbath of cessation (Ex 31:15) verbal, not merely thematic. Benson sets the rhythm: All yearly labours were to be intermitted in the seventh year, as much as daily labours on the seventh day. Barnes presses to the root: the law teaches there was no such thing as absolute ownership in the land vested in any man — the soil is Yahweh's, held in trust. JFB adds the pedagogical edge: a whole year living off the unsown field was calculated to teach the people, in a remarkable manner, the reality of the presence and providential power of God — the fallow ground is a catechism in dependence. The verb tiz·mōr (H2168, prune), as Keil observes, is a technical viticultural term that surfaces again in Isaiah 5:6 — there a vineyard left unpruned in judgment, here a vineyard left unpruned in worship.
The negatives of v.5 forbid not eating but owning: ṯiq·ṣō·wr (reap) is barred, Poole explains, only as thy own peculiarly. The verse's most arresting word is nā·zîr — the vine called thy Nazirite. Barnes, Cambridge, and Keil converge: the unpruned vine, like the Nazirite's unshorn head (Num 6:5), is consecrated by being left to grow. Abstention is dedication. The Geneva margin presses the point to its end — the vine is separated from yourself, and consecrated to God for the poor: the consecration has a recipient. And the self-sown grain forbidden here (çāphîyach, H5599) is the very word Isaiah will use of the unsown harvest God grants Hezekiah under siege (2 Kings 19:29) — eating from the unworked field is, in both texts, an act of faith in the God who feeds. Verses 6–7 then throw the table wide: by metonymy the Sabbath of the land (v.6) is its produce, and lə·’āḵ·lāh (for food) names it as what is eaten, not traded — Ellicott: you must not trade with it, or store it up. The list expands outward — owner, manservant, maidservant, hired hand, resident alien (v.6), livestock, wild beast (v.7) — until, as Keil says, the produce is a common good for man and beast. Gill hears in this leveling a gospel foreshadow, the year's food common to masters and servants, to rich and poor, to Israelites and Gentiles. The unit closes on a single infinitive, le·’ĕ·ḵōl — to eat: the whole creation fed from rest rather than from labor.
Read under Sola Scriptura and offered as fallible, the seventh year looks less like agronomy and more like a recurring confession. Every sabbatical year the soil itself preaches the first article of faith — that the world is not ours to exhaust but God's to bless — and the second article in shadow — that rest, not striving, is the destination of God's people. Israel was to learn dependence by deliberately not-working, eating from a field they had not sown, exactly as Adam first ate from a garden he had not planted. The text never says the land belongs to Israel; the participle keeps God giving it (v.2). And when the produce of rest feeds slave and alien and even the wild beast on equal terms (vv.6–7), the law rehearses a world reconciled — the fences of ownership down, the curse of Genesis 3:19 (bread by sweat) suspended for a season. The New Testament hears this and presses on: there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God (Heb 4:9), and the one who said my yoke is easy is the field from which the weary eat without laboring. The sabbatical year is a promissory note; Christ is the payment. This reading must be tested against the whole counsel of Scripture — but if it errs, it errs toward grace.
The land keeps a Sabbath so that Israel might remember the world is on loan and rest is the homeland. (synthesis, not Scripture)
AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.
The verb zāmar (to prune a vine, H2168) is rare — only three verses use it. Leviticus 25:3–4 commands and then forbids pruning the vineyard; Isaiah 5:6 turns the same word into judgment: the vineyard of the Song shall not be pruned and so is given to briers. The Verifier records the shared rare lexeme as the basis. The contrast is theological: in Leviticus the vine left unpruned is consecrated rest; in Isaiah it is abandonment to ruin — the same outward fact, opposite covenant meanings.
Isaiah 5:6
basis: rare shared lexeme H2168 zâmar (in only 3 verses); also H3808 lôʼ
The doubled phrase of v.4–5, šab·baṯ šab·bā·ṯō·wn, hinges on šab·bā·ṯō·wn (H7677), a word found in only ten verses. Leviticus 23:32 uses the identical heightened pairing for the Day of Atonement, the most solemn rest of the year. The Verifier confirms the shared rare lexeme. The land's seventh-year rest is thus framed in the very language of Israel's deepest day of cessation — atonement and agriculture share a vocabulary of holy stillness.
Leviticus 23:32 · Leviticus 16:31
basis: rare shared lexeme H7677 shabbâthôwn (in only 10 verses), with H7676 shabbâth
The institution rests on the analogy the commentators all draw: the seventh year is to the six working years what the seventh day is to the six days. Leviticus 23:3 and Exodus 20:10 (the Sabbath command) share with this unit the noun shabbâth (H7676). The Verifier records the shared lexeme but at a moderate frequency (89 verses), so this is structural/thematic — a pattern-sharing, not a quotation. Cambridge: The land shall rest in the seventh year, as man rests on the seventh day.
Leviticus 23:3 · Exodus 20:10 · Exodus 31:15
basis: shared lexeme H7676 shabbâth (89 vv) — common, hence structural not verbal; the day→year analogy is the recorded motif
The word çāphîyach (H5599, what springs up of itself) is scarce — five verses in all. Leviticus 25:5 forbids reaping it as one's own; but its richest echo is the sign Isaiah gives Hezekiah when the Assyrian siege has stopped all farming: 2 Kings 19:29 / Isaiah 37:30 — you will eat this year what grows of itself (sephiach), and the second year what springs from that; then in the third year sow and reap. There the Verifier records not only the rare çāphîyach but also qātsar (reap, H7114) and shâneh (year, H8141) as shared — and the thematic parallel is exact: a divinely imposed rest from sowing in which the people live on what the land yields unbidden, the very logic of the sabbatical year, here turned into a promise of restoration. The same word surfaces once more in Job 14:19, of what the floods wash over the earth; that occurrence is verbal but contextually unrelated (erosion, not provision) and is noted only as the lexeme's other home, not as an argument.
2 Kings 19:29 · Isaiah 37:30 · Job 14:19
basis: rare shared lexeme H5599 çâphîyach (5 vv), with H7114 qâtsar + H8141 shâneh, links Lev 25:5 to 2 Kgs 19:29 / Isa 37:30 (same word + same motif of living on the self-sown during a rest from tillage); Job 14:19 shares the word only
The companion law in Exodus 23:10–11 sets the same six-years-then-rest pattern, sharing with Lev 25:4 the lexemes kerem (H3754, vineyard), sâdeh (H7704, field), and the ordinal shᵉbîyʻîy (H7637, seventh). The Verifier records these as the basis. Cambridge notes the difference of emphasis: in Exodus the fallow year is framed as a provision for the poor, while Leviticus foregrounds the religious idea — the same law in two keys. Structural, not verbal: the shared words are common agricultural terms.
Exodus 23:11 · Leviticus 25:11
basis: shared lexemes H3754 kerem, H7704 sâdeh, H7637 shᵉbîyʻîy (Lev 25:4 ↔ Ex 23:11); common terms → structural
Verse 6's pairing of śākîr (H7916, hired servant) and tôwšâb (H8453, resident alien) is a fixed legal couplet, and both members are rare — śākîr in 17 verses, tôwšâb in only 13. Exodus 12:45 and Leviticus 22:10 use the same pair to draw the boundary of who may share holy food (the Passover, the priest's portion), and Leviticus 25:40 reuses it within this very chapter. Because the link rests on two genuinely rare words occurring together, the Verifier scores it verbal, not merely thematic. The theological force is the inversion: where the holy meal excludes the sojourner (Ex 12:45, Lev 22:10), the Sabbath-year field includes him — provision opened wide where ritual access was closed.
Exodus 12:45 · Leviticus 22:10 · Leviticus 25:40
basis: Verifier-computed: shared rare lexeme pair H7916 sâkîyr (17 vv) + H8453 tôwshâb (13 vv) co-occurring — a fixed two-word couplet of low-frequency terms, hence verbal not structural
AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.
The seventh-year rest of the land, the weekly Sabbath, and the rest of Canaan together form, in Hebrews' reading, an unfulfilled type. Hebrews 4:9 declares there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God — a rest into which one enters by ceasing from one's own works (Heb 4:10), exactly as the land ceased from sowing. Matthew Henry, on this unit, says the year of rest typified the spiritual rest which all believers enter into through Christ, by whom we are eased of the burden of wordly care and labour. This is a cross-Testament link: Greek (Hebrews) and Hebrew (Leviticus) cannot share a Strong's lexeme, so the connection is typological/structural by motif (cessation, seventh, divine rest), not a verbal quotation — and on this point it is widely held in the Christian tradition.
Hebrews 4:9 · Hebrews 4:10 · Matthew 11:28
The sabbatical economy — living for a year on produce one neither sowed nor reaped (vv.5–7) — is a figure of grace: provision received, not earned. John Gill hears the open table of v.6 as an emblem of the first times of the Gospel, in which all things were had in common, and of salvation by Jesus Christ, common to Jews and Gentiles, high and low, bond and free. The one who calls the weary to himself offers rest and bread without the sweat of Genesis 3:19. The reading is figural and ancient in substance (the fathers and Reformers read the sabbatical provision Christologically), though the precise application to the gospel-commons is Gill's own development.
Matthew 11:28 · John 6:35 · Acts 4:32
The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.
Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:
This unit is Hebrew throughout, so all confirmed verbal threads rest on shared Strong's lexemes; cross-Testament links (e.g., Hebrews 4) are tiered typological/structural because Greek and Hebrew cannot share a Strong's number — stated explicitly in each case. Four threads earn verbal / quotation — confirmed. Three rest on genuinely rare single lexemes: zāmar (H2168, 3 vv → Isaiah 5:6), shabbâthôwn (H7677, 10 vv → Lev 23:32 / 16:31), and çāphîyach (H5599, 5 vv). The çāphîyach thread is the most fruitful: the same five-verse word, joined by qātsar (reap) and shâneh (year), links Lev 25:5 to the sign given Hezekiah (2 Kings 19:29 / Isaiah 37:30), where Israel likewise lives on the self-sown during a forced rest from tillage — a verbal and thematic match, where the Job 14:19 occurrence shares only the word. The fourth verbal thread is the śākîr+tôwšâb couplet (H7916, 17 vv + H8453, 13 vv): the Verifier scores it verbal because the basis is two rare words co-occurring, not one common term, so it has been upgraded from the draft's structural tier — honestly, on the Verifier's own computation, not by inflation. The Sabbath-analogy threads (Lev 23:3, Ex 20:10) remain structural because shabbâth (89 vv) is too common to count as quotation, even though the day→year motif is real and unanimous in the commentators. The commonly-cited Exodus 23:11 parallel shares no lexeme with Lev 25:6 in the index (the Verifier returns flagged — no shared lexeme); it does share kerem/sâdeh/shᵉbîyʻîy with Lev 25:4, so the thread is routed through v.4 and tiered structural — the v.6↔Ex 23:11 link, asserted by JFB, the Pulpit Commentary, Barnes, and Keil, is real thematically but not lexically verifiable, and is presented as commentary, not as a confirmed verbal basis. The Nazirite reading of nā·zîr (v.5) is grammatically secured (Berean/Strong's parse the noun as nâzîyr, separate/consecrated) and the figural application to the unpruned vine is the unanimous reading of Barnes, Cambridge, Poole, and Keil; the Geneva Bible pushes it one step further (consecrated for the poor) — a complementary, not contradictory, gloss. All ⚙ synthesis is fallible and marked; the BSB text and the ✦ public-domain commentary excerpts are the load-bearing authorities and are quoted verbatim.
✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)