The Sabbatical Year^(A)

15 At the end of every seven years you shall grant a relinquishing of debts. ² This is the manner of the relinquishing: Every creditor that has loaned anything to his neighbor shall relinquish it. He shall not exact it of his neighbor, or of his brother, because it is called the Lord’s relinquishment. ³ You may collect it from a foreigner, but that which your brother has that is yours your hand shall release. ⁴ However, there will be no poor among you, for the Lord will greatly bless you in the land which the Lord your God has given you for an inheritance to possess, ⁵ if only you carefully obey the voice of the Lord your God, by carefully observing all these commandments which I command you today. ⁶ For the Lord your God will bless you, just as He promised you, and you will lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. You will reign over many nations, but they will not reign over you.

⁷ If there be among you a poor man, one of your brothers within any of your gates in your land which the Lord your God has given you, you must not harden your heart or shut your hand from your poor brother. ⁸ But you shall open your hand wide to him and must surely lend him what is sufficient for his need, in that which he lacks. ⁹ Beware lest there be a wicked thought in your heart, saying, “The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand,” and your eye be evil against your poor brother and you give him nothing, and he cry out to the Lord against you, and it become sin in you. ¹⁰ You must surely give to him, and your heart shall not be grieved when you give to him, because in this thing the Lord your God will bless you in all your works, and in all that you put your hand to do. ¹¹ For the poor will never cease from being in the land. Therefore, I command you, saying, “You shall open your hand wide to your brother, to your poor and needy in your land.”

² If you buy a Hebrew servant, he will serve for six years, but in the seventh he shall go out free without paying anything. ³ If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself. If he is married, then his wife will go out with him. ⁴ If his master gives him a wife, and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall belong to her master, and he will go out by himself.

⁵ However, if the servant plainly says, “I love my master, my wife, and my children. I will not go out free,” ⁶ then his master will bring him to the judges, then he shall also bring him to the door or to the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall serve him forever.

⁷ If a man sells his daughter to be a female servant, she shall not go out as the male servants do. ⁸ If she does not please her master, who has betrothed her to himself, then he shall let her be redeemed. He has no authority to sell her to a foreign nation, because he has dealt deceitfully with her. ⁹ If he has designated her for his son, then he shall deal with her according to the customary rights of daughters. ¹⁰ If he marries another wife, then he must not diminish the first one’s food, her clothing, or her marital rights. ¹¹ If he does not provide these three for her, then she shall go out free, without paying money.

Freeing Servants^(A)

¹² If your brother, a Hebrew man, or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you and serves you six years, then in the seventh year you must let him go free from you. ¹³ When you send him out free from you, you must not let him go away empty-handed. ¹⁴ You shall supply him liberally out of your flock, out of your floor, and out of your winepress. From that with which the Lord your God has blessed you, you shall give to him. ¹⁵ You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you. Therefore, I command this to you today.

¹⁶ It shall be, if he says to you, “I will not go away from you,” because he loves you and your house, because he is well off with you, ¹⁷ then you must take an awl and pierce it through his ear into the door, and he shall be your servant forever. And you shall also do likewise to your female servant.

¹⁸ It will not seem difficult for you when you send him away free from you, for he has been worth a double hired servant^[a] in serving you six years. Then the Lord your God will bless you in all that you do.