When the Land Rests and the Heart Responds
When we align with Yehovah’s appointed order, rest becomes blessing—and obedience secures restoration.

A Brief Insight
Laws are presented concerning the land, rest, and social justice. Every seventh year, the land must rest, reminding the people that it belongs to Yehovah. A greater appointed time is also established in which properties are restored, servants are released, and debts are canceled, promoting balance and dignity. Fair treatment toward others is emphasized, avoiding oppression and acting with reverent fear.
Then, blessings for obedience are described: peace, provision, and the divine presence. But warnings for disobedience are also given: scarcity, fear, and dispersion. Even so, it is affirmed that if there is repentance, Yehovah remembers His covenant and restores. The central message highlights faithfulness, responsibility, and the hope of restoration.
Read the Story as Told in Scripture
25 And Yehovah spake unto Moshe in mount Sinai, saying, 2Speak unto the children of Isra’el, and say unto them, When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a Shabbat unto Yehovah. 3Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruits thereof; 4but in the seventh year shall be a Shabbat of solemn rest for the land, a Shabbat unto Yehovah: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard. 5That which groweth of itself of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, and the grapes of thy undressed vine thou shalt not gather: it shall be a year of solemn rest for the land. 6And the Shabbat of the land shall be for food for you; for thee, and for thy servant and for thy maid, and for thy hired servant and for thy stranger, who sojourn with thee. 7And for thy cattle, and for the beasts that are in thy land, shall all the increase thereof be for food.
8And thou shalt number seven Shabbatot of years unto thee, seven times seven years; and there shall be unto thee the days of seven Shabbatot of years, even forty and nine years. 9Then shalt thou send abroad the shofar on the tenth day of the seventh month; in the day of Yom Kippur shall ye send abroad the trumpet throughout all your land. 10And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a yovel unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family. 11A yovel shall that fiftieth year be unto you: ye shall not sow, neither reap that which groweth of itself in it, nor gather the grapes in it of the undressed vines. 12For it is a yovel; it shall be holy unto you: ye shall eat the increase thereof out of the field.
13In this year of yovel ye shall return every man unto his possession. 14And if thou sell aught unto thy neighbor, or buy of thy neighbor’s hand, ye shall not wrong one another. 15According to the number of years after the yovel thou shalt buy of thy neighbor, and according unto the number of years of the crops he shall sell unto thee. 16According to the multitude of the years thou shalt increase the price thereof, and according to the fewness of the years thou shalt diminish the price of it; for the number of the crops doth he sell unto thee. 17And ye shall not wrong one another; but thou shalt fear thy God: for I am Yehovah your God.
18Wherefore ye shall do my statutes, and keep mine ordinances and do them; and ye shall dwell in the land in safety. 19And the land shall yield its fruit, and ye shall eat your fill, and dwell therein in safety. 20And if ye shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase; 21then I will command my blessing upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth fruit for the three years. 22And ye shall sow the eighth year, and eat of the fruits, the old store; until the ninth year, until its fruits come in, ye shall eat the old store.
23And the land shall not be sold in perpetuity; for the land is mine: for ye are strangers and sojourners with me. 24And in all the land of your possession ye shall grant a redemption for the land. 25If thy brother be waxed poor, and sell some of his possession, then shall his kinsman that is next unto him come, and shall redeem that which his brother hath sold. 26And if a man have no one to redeem it, and he be waxed rich and find sufficient to redeem it; 27then let him reckon the years of the sale thereof, and restore the overplus unto the man to whom he sold it; and he shall return unto his possession. 28But if he be not able to get it back for himself, then that which he hath sold shall remain in the hand of him that hath bought it until the year of yovel: and in the yovel it shall go out, and he shall return unto his possession.
29And if a man sell a dwelling-house in a walled city, then he may redeem it within a whole year after it is sold; for a full year shall he have the right of redemption. 30And if it be not redeemed within the space of a full year, then the house that is in the walled city shall be made sure in perpetuity to him that bought it, throughout his generations: it shall not go out in the yovel. 31But the houses of the villages which have no wall round about them shall be reckoned with the fields of the country: they may be redeemed, and they shall go out in the yovel. 32Nevertheless the cities of the Levites, the houses of the cities of their possession, may the Levites redeem at any time. 33And if one of the Levites redeem, then the house that was sold, and the city of his possession, shall go out in the yovel; for the houses of the cities of the Levites are their possession among the children of Isra’el. 34But the field of the suburbs of their cities may not be sold; for it is their perpetual possession.
35And if thy brother be waxed poor, and his hand fail with thee; then thou shalt uphold him: as a stranger and a sojourner shall he live with thee. 36Take thou no interest of him or increase, but fear thy God; that thy brother may live with thee. 37Thou shalt not give him thy money upon interest, nor give him thy victuals for increase. 38I am Yehovah your God, who brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Kena’an, and to be your God.
39And if thy brother be waxed poor with thee, and sell himself unto thee; thou shalt not make him to serve as a bondservant. 40As a hired servant, and as a sojourner, he shall be with thee; he shall serve with thee unto the year of yovel: 41then shall he go out from thee, he and his children with him, and shall return unto his own family, and unto the possession of his fathers shall he return. 42For they are my servants, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: they shall not be sold as bondmen. 43Thou shalt not rule over him with rigor, but shalt fear thy God. 44And as for thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, whom thou shalt have; of the nations that are round about you, of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. 45Moreover of the children of the strangers that sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they have begotten in your land: and they shall be your possession. 46And ye shall make them an inheritance for your children after you, to hold for a possession; of them shall ye take your bondmen for ever: but over your brethren the children of Isra’el ye shall not rule, one over another, with rigor.
47And if a stranger or sojourner with thee be waxed rich, and thy brother be waxed poor beside him, and sell himself unto the stranger or sojourner with thee, or to the stock of the stranger’s family; 48after that he is sold he may be redeemed: one of his brethren may redeem him; 49or his uncle, or his uncle’s son, may redeem him, or any that is nigh of kin unto him of his family may redeem him; or if he be waxed rich, he may redeem himself. 50And he shall reckon with him that bought him from the year that he sold himself to him unto the year of yovel: and the price of his sale shall be according unto the number of years; according to the time of a hired servant shall he be with him. 51If there be yet many years, according unto them he shall give back the price of his redemption out of the money that he was bought for. 52And if there remain but few years unto the year of yovel, then he shall reckon with him; according unto his years shall he give back the price of his redemption. 53As a servant hired year by year shall he be with him: he shall not rule with rigor over him in thy sight. 54And if he be not redeemed by these means, then he shall go out in the year of yovel, he, and his children with him. 55For unto me the children of Isra’el are servants; they are my servants whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: I am Yehovah your God.
26 Ye shall make you no idols, neither shall ye rear you up a graven image, or a pillar, neither shall ye place any figured stone in your land, to bow down unto it: for I am Yehovah your God. 2Ye shall keep my Shabbatot, and reverence my sanctuary: I am Yehovah.
3If ye walk in my statutes, and keep my commandments, and do them; 4then I will give your rains in their season, and the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. 5And your threshing shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time; and ye shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely. 6And I will give peace in the land, and ye shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid: and I will cause evil beasts to cease out of the land, neither shall the sword go through your land. 7And ye shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword. 8And five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall chase ten thousand; and your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. 9And I will have respect unto you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, and will establish my covenant with you. 10And ye shall eat old store long kept, and ye shall bring forth the old because of the new. 11And I will set my Tabernacle among you: and my soul shall not abhor you. 12And I will walk among you, and will be your God, and ye shall be my people. 13I am Yehovah your God, who brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, that ye should not be their bondmen; and I have broken the bars of your yoke, and made you go upright.
14But if ye will not hearken unto me, and will not do all these commandments; 15and if ye shall reject my statutes, and if your soul abhor mine ordinances, so that ye will not do all my commandments, but break my covenant; 16I also will do this unto you: I will appoint terror over you, even consumption and fever, that shall consume the eyes, and make the soul to pine away; and ye shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it. 17And I will set my face against you, and ye shall be smitten before your enemies: they that hate you shall rule over you; and ye shall flee when none pursueth you. 18And if ye will not yet for these things hearken unto me, then I will chastise you seven times more for your sins. 19And I will break the pride of your power: and I will make your heaven as iron, and your earth as brass; 20and your strength shall be spent in vain; for your land shall not yield its increase, neither shall the trees of the land yield their fruit.
21And if ye walk contrary unto me, and will not hearken unto me, I will bring seven times more plagues upon you according to your sins. 22And I will send the beast of the field among you, which shall rob you of your children, and destroy your cattle, and make you few in number; and your ways shall become desolate.
23And if by these things ye will not be reformed unto me, but will walk contrary unto me; 24then will I also walk contrary unto you; and I will smite you, even I, seven times for your sins. 25And I will bring a sword upon you, that shall execute the vengeance of the covenant; and ye shall be gathered together within your cities: and I will send the pestilence among you; and ye shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy. 26When I break your staff of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and they shall deliver your bread again by weight: and ye shall eat, and not be satisfied.
27And if ye will not for all this hearken unto me, but walk contrary unto me; 28then I will walk contrary unto you in wrath; and I also will chastise you seven times for your sins. 29And ye shall eat the flesh of your sons, and the flesh of your daughters shall ye eat. 30And I will destroy your high places, and cut down your sun-images, and cast your dead bodies upon the bodies of your idols; and my soul shall abhor you. 31And I will make your cities a waste, and will bring your sanctuaries unto desolation, and I will not smell the savor of your sweet odors. 32And I will bring the land into desolation; and your enemies that dwell therein shall be astonished at it. 33And you will I scatter among the nations, and I will draw out the sword after you: and your land shall be a desolation, and your cities shall be a waste.
34Then shall the land enjoy its Shabbatot, as long as it lieth desolate, and ye are in your enemies’ land; even then shall the land rest, and enjoy its Shabbatot. 35As long as it lieth desolate it shall have rest, even the rest which it had not in your Shabbatot, when ye dwelt upon it. 36And as for them that are left of you, I will send a faintness into their heart in the lands of their enemies: and the sound of a driven leaf shall chase them; and they shall flee, as one fleeth from the sword; and they shall fall when none pursueth. 37And they shall stumble one upon another, as it were before the sword, when none pursueth: and ye shall have no power to stand before your enemies. 38And ye shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up. 39And they that are left of you shall pine away in their iniquity in your enemies’ lands; and also in the iniquities of their fathers shall they pine away with them.
40And they shall confess their iniquity, and the iniquity of their fathers, in their trespass which they trespassed against me, and also that, because they walked contrary unto me, 41I also walked contrary unto them, and brought them into the land of their enemies: if then their uncircumcised heart be humbled, and they then accept of the punishment of their iniquity; 42then will I remember my covenant with Ya’akov; and also my covenant with Yitz’chak, and also my covenant with Avraham will I remember; and I will remember the land. 43The land also shall be left by them, and shall enjoy its Shabbatot, while it lieth desolate without them: and they shall accept of the punishment of their iniquity; because, even because they rejected mine ordinances, and their soul abhorred my statutes. 44And yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant with them; for I am Yehovah their God; 45but I will for their sakes remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am Yehovah.
46These are the statutes and ordinances and laws, which Yehovah made between him and the children of Isra’el in mount Sinai by Moshe.
27 And Yehovah spake unto Moshe, saying, 2Speak unto the children of Isra’el, and say unto them, When a man shall accomplish a vow, the persons shall be for Yehovah by thy estimation. 3And thy estimation shall be of the male from twenty years old even unto sixty years old, even thy estimation shall be fifty shekels of silver, after the shekel of the sanctuary. 4And if it be a female, then thy estimation shall be thirty shekels. 5And if it be from five years old even unto twenty years old, then thy estimation shall be of the male twenty shekels, and for the female ten shekels. 6And if it be from a month old even unto five years old, then thy estimation shall be of the male five shekels of silver, and for the female thy estimation shall be three shekels of silver. 7And if it be from sixty years old and upward; if it be a male, then thy estimation shall be fifteen shekels, and for the female ten shekels. 8But if he be poorer than thy estimation, then he shall be set before the priest, and the priest shall value him; according to the ability of him that vowed shall the priest value him.
9And if it be a beast, whereof men offer an oblation unto Yehovah, all that any man giveth of such unto Yehovah shall be holy. 10He shall not alter it, nor change it, a good for a bad, or a bad for a good: and if he shall at all change beast for beast, then both it and that for which it is changed shall be holy. 11And if it be any unclean beast, of which they do not offer an oblation unto Yehovah, then he shall set the beast before the priest; 12and the priest shall value it, whether it be good or bad: as thou the priest valuest it, so shall it be. 13But if he will indeed redeem it, then he shall add the fifth part thereof unto thy estimation.
14And when a man shall sanctify his house to be holy unto Yehovah, then the priest shall estimate it, whether it be good or bad: as the priest shall estimate it, so shall it stand. 15And if he that sanctified it will redeem his house, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of thy estimation unto it, and it shall be his. 16And if a man shall sanctify unto Yehovah part of the field of his possession, then thy estimation shall be according to the sowing thereof: the sowing of a homer of barley shall be valued at fifty shekels of silver. 17If he sanctify his field from the year of yovel, according to thy estimation it shall stand. 18But if he sanctify his field after the yovel, then the priest shall reckon unto him the money according to the years that remain unto the year of yovel; and an abatement shall be made from thy estimation. 19And if he that sanctified the field will indeed redeem it, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of thy estimation unto it, and it shall be assured to him. 20And if he will not redeem the field, or if he have sold the field to another man, it shall not be redeemed any more: 21but the field, when it goeth out in the yovel, shall be holy unto Yehovah, as a field devoted; the possession thereof shall be the priest’s. 22And if he sanctify unto Yehovah a field which he hath bought, which is not of the field of his possession; 23then the priest shall reckon unto him the worth of thy estimation unto the year of yovel: and he shall give thine estimation in that day, as a holy thing unto Yehovah. 24In the year of yovel the field shall return unto him of whom it was bought, even to him to whom the possession of the land belongeth. 25And all thy estimations shall be according to the shekel of the sanctuary: twenty gerahs shall be the shekel.
26Only the firstling among beasts, which is made a firstling to Yehovah, no man shall sanctify it; whether it be ox or sheep, it is Yehovah’s. 27And if it be of an unclean beast, then he shall ransom it according to thine estimation, and shall add unto it the fifth part thereof: or if it be not redeemed, then it shall be sold according to thy estimation.
28Notwithstanding, no devoted thing, that a man shall devote unto Yehovah of all that he hath, whether of man or beast, or of the field of his possession, shall be sold or redeemed: every devoted thing is most holy unto Yehovah. 29No one devoted, that shall be devoted from among men, shall be ransomed; he shall surely be put to death.
30And all the tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land, or of the fruit of the tree, is Yehovah’s: it is holy unto Yehovah. 31And if a man will redeem aught of his tithe, he shall add unto it the fifth part thereof. 32And all the tithe of the herd or the flock, whatsoever passeth under the rod, the tenth shall be holy unto Yehovah. 33He shall not search whether it be good or bad, neither shall he change it: and if he change it at all, then both it and that for which it is changed shall be holy; it shall not be redeemed.
34These are the commandments, which Yehovah commanded Moshe for the children of Isra’el in mount Sinai.
16:19
O Yehovah, my strength, and my stronghold, and my refuge in the day of affliction, unto thee shall the nations come from the ends of the earth, and shall say, Our fathers have inherited nought but lies, even vanity and things wherein there is no profit. 20Shall a man make unto himself gods, which yet are no gods?
21Therefore, behold, I will cause them to know, this once will I cause them to know my hand and my might; and they shall know that my name is Yehovah.
17 The sin of Y’hudah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond: it is graven upon the tablet of their heart, and upon the horns of your altars; 2whilst their children remember their altars and their Asherim by the green trees upon the high hills. 3O my mountain in the field, I will give thy substance and all thy treasures for a spoil, and thy high places, because of sin, throughout all thy borders. 4And thou, even of thyself, shalt discontinue from thy heritage that I gave thee; and I will cause thee to serve thine enemies in the land which thou knowest not: for ye have kindled a fire in mine anger which shall burn for ever.
5Thus saith Yehovah: Cursed is the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from Yehovah. 6For he shall be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh, but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, a salt land and not inhabited. 7Blessed is the man that trusteth in Yehovah, and whose trust Yehovah is. 8For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, that spreadeth out its roots by the river, and shall not fear when heat cometh, but its leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.
9The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is exceedingly corrupt: who can know it? 10I, Yehovah, search the mind, I try the heart, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings. 11As the partridge that sitteth on eggs which she hath not laid, so is he that getteth riches, and not by right; in the midst of his days they shall leave him, and at his end he shall be a fool.
12A glorious throne, set on high from the beginning, is the place of our sanctuary. 13O Yehovah, the hope of Isra’el, all that forsake thee shall be put to shame. They that depart from me shall be written in the earth, because they have forsaken Yehovah, the fountain of living waters. 14Heal me, O Yehovah, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.
20Then charged he the disciples that they should tell no man that he was the Messiah.
21From that time began Yeshua to show unto his disciples, that he must go unto Yerushalayim, and suffer many things of the elders, the head cohanim and the Torah-teachers, and be killed, and the third day be raised up. 22And Kefa took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall never be unto thee. 23But he turned, and said unto Kefa, Get thee behind me, Satan! thou art a stumbling-block unto me: for thou mindest not the things of Yehovah, but the things of men.
24Then said Yeshua unto his disciples, If any man would come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. 25For whosoever would save his life shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake shall find it. 26For what shall a man be profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and forfeit his life? or what shall a man give in exchange for his life? 27For the Son of Man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then shall he render unto every man according to his deeds. 28Verily I say unto you, There are some of them that stand here, who shall in no wise taste of death, till they see the Son of Man coming in his Kingdom.
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