The Beginning of the Galilean Ministry

¹⁴ Then Jesus, in the power of the Spirit, returned to Galilee, and a report about him spread through all the surrounding region.^{(A) 15} He began to teach in their synagogues and was praised by everyone.^(B)

The Rejection of Jesus at Nazareth

¹⁶ When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read,^{(C) 17} and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:

²⁰ And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him.^{(F) 21} Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

The Good News of Deliverance

The Sabbatical Year

25 The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying, ² “Speak to the Israelites and say to them: When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land shall observe a Sabbath for the Lord.^{(A) 3} Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in their yield, ⁴ but in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of complete rest for the land, a Sabbath for the Lord: you shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard. ⁵ You shall not reap the aftergrowth of your harvest or gather the grapes of your unpruned vine: it shall be a year of complete rest for the land. ⁶ You may eat what the land yields during its Sabbath—you, your male and female slaves, your hired and your bound laborers who live with you,^{(B) 7} for your livestock also, and for the wild animals in your land all its yield shall be for food.

The Year of Jubilee

⁸ “You shall count off seven weeks^[a] of years, seven times seven years, so that the period of seven weeks of years gives forty-nine years. ⁹ Then you shall have the trumpet sounded loud; on the tenth day of the seventh month—on the Day of Atonement—you shall have the trumpet sounded throughout all your land.^{(C) 10} And you shall hallow the fiftieth year, and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you: you shall return, every one of you, to your property and every one of you to your family.^{(D) 11} That fiftieth year shall be a Jubilee for you: you shall not sow or reap the aftergrowth or harvest the unpruned vines. ¹² For it is a Jubilee; it shall be holy to you: you shall eat only what the field itself produces.

¹³ “In this year of Jubilee you shall return, every one of you, to your property.^{(E) 14} When you make a sale to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor, you shall not cheat one another.^{(F) 15} When you buy from your neighbor, you shall pay only for the number of years until the Jubilee; the seller shall charge you only for the remaining crop years.^{(G) 16} If the years are more, you shall increase the price, and if the years are fewer, you shall diminish the price, for it is a certain number of harvests that are being sold to you. ¹⁷ You shall not cheat one another, but you shall fear your God, for I am the Lord your God.^(H)

¹⁸ “You shall observe my statutes and faithfully keep my ordinances, so that you may live on the land securely.^{(I) 19} The land will yield its fruit, and you will eat your fill and live on it securely. ²⁰ Should you ask, ‘What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?’^{(J) 21} I will order my blessing for you in the sixth year, so that it will yield a crop for three years. ²² When you sow in the eighth year, you will be eating from the old crop; until the ninth year, when its produce comes in, you shall eat the old.^{(K) 23} The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; with me you are but aliens and tenants.^{(L) 24} Throughout the land that you hold, you shall provide for the redemption of the land.