Bible references

Key NT Scriptures

• James 1:27

Key OT Scriptures

• Deuteronomy 15:1-18
  Click to retrieve Deuteronomy 15:1-18
  Jewish Commentary
• Exodus 21:2-6
  Jewish Commentary
• Exodus 23:10-12
  Jewish Commentary
• Leviticus 25:2-34
  Click to retrieve Leviticus 25:2-34
  Jewish Commentary

Supportive NT Scriptures

• Matthew 25:14-30
  Click to retrieve Matthew 25:14-30
• Matthew 26:11
• 1 Timothy 6:17-19

Supportive OT Scriptures

• Deuteronomy 8:17-18
  Jewish Commentary
• Ezekiel 46:16-18
  Jewish Commentary
• Haggai 2:6-8
  Jewish Commentary
• Proverbs 22:2
  Jewish Commentary
• Psalms 24:1-2
  Jewish Commentary
• Psalms 50:10-12
  Jewish Commentary
• 1 Samuel 2:7
  Jewish Commentary

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Commentary

Rabbi Michael Rudolph

This Mitzvah addresses our governmental, societal, and religious institutions (e.g. our national and local governments, our congregations, our families, etc.), regarding their contributions to the financial equity for us that God intends. Financial equity is not the same thing as financial equality; equity is fairness in opportunity, and God addresses this most clearly in Deuteronomy 8:18 when He says to the Israelites: No, you are to remember ADONAI your God, because it is he who is giving you the power to get wealth, in order to confirm his covenant, which he swore to your ancestors, as is happening even today. The "power to get wealth" spoken of in the Scripture is financial opportunity, but Scripture is clear that not all of us will achieve wealth, for Yeshua said in Matthew 26:11a : The poor you will always have with you ... Exodus 21:2-6 , Exodus 23:10-12 , Leviticus 25:2-34 , and Deuteronomy 15:1-18 , contain commandments that redistributed monetary wealth and restored land to its original Israelite owners every seven years (the Sh'mitah - the Sabbatical year) and every fifty years (the Jubilee year - also a Sh'mitah ) respectively. They also command forgiving debts and releasing slaves on Sh'mitah , and the Sh'mitah is a year of rest (analogous to the weekly Sabbath) when the Israelites, along with their land and animals, were required to cease from work. It was a year when all (including those who were poor) could eat from what grew of its own accord, that was the result of the prior six years of cultivation. Food could be gathered but not methodically harvested; the latter was considered working the land, whereas the former was not. These Scriptures, especially those about the Sh'mitah and the year of Jubilee ( Yovel ), difficult as they are with which to comply in today's society, remind us that it is God (and not we) who owns the land and other forms of worldly wealth and, if we acquire them, we are required to periodically return them so that other individuals and other generations may have similar opportunity. This is especially emphasized by the requirement that all land sales must be with a right of redemption by either the one who sells it or his kin. Some argue against the foregoing by pointing out that the mandated redemption or return is not back to God, but rather back to persons and families that were previously given the land or, in the case of forgiveness of loans, to individual borrowers who had no historic right to retain what they borrowed. What causes all of this to make sense is adding to it the biblical mandate of stewardship. God ultimately owns everything, and we are mere trustees of what He owns and entrusts to us for a time. Our property, both real and personal, is temporary and intended for our own use, and also for the use of others as we are charged with generosity, and compassion for the needs of our neighbors. Whether we are good stewards of God's wealth depends on how wisely and how charitably we use His wealth - how much we use for ourselves as compared to how much of it we use to bless others. While this Mitzvah has ramifications for our personal tithing and tzadakah (charitable giving), its purpose is mainly to mandate that we employ its principle of economic equity in how we manage our various institutions over which we have influence. The relevant Scriptures of the Torah to which I have referred cannot be literally applied today because we are subject to the laws of the secular governments under which we live that almost never make allowance for them. That notwithstanding, God wants us to incorporate the Torah principle of financial equity in the institutions that we control, and wherever else we are able.

Classical commentators

This Mitzvah , in the general way it is stated, is not addressed by Maimonides, Meir, or HaChinuch. The probable reason is that their mitzvot are drawn solely from the Scriptures of the Mosaic period when economic equity was intrinsically built into Israel's societal and governmental institutions by God, so they felt that constructing a separate mitzvah commanding it was not needed.

Copyright © Michael Rudolph and Daniel C. Juster, The Law of Messiah, Torah from a New Covenant Perspective, Volume 1 & 2

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Based on The Law of Messiah - Torah from a New Covenant Perspective by Michael Rudolph and Daniel C. Juster.

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Record source: The Law of Messiah - Torah from a New Covenant Perspective - Volume 1 & 2

Copyright note: Copyright © Michael Rudolph and Daniel C. Juster, The Law of Messiah, Torah from a New Covenant Perspective, Volume 1 & 2