Jubilee in my World
It’s my impression that Jubilee is rarely discussed in church circles, except when encountered in Bible lessons. The topic is not exciting preaching material, either, I suspect.
Everybody knows Jubilee is found in Leviticus 25, and there are at least three different scholarly opinions as to when Leviticus was written and why. However, there is little question as to what it means. Every 50 years, they were supposed to free all Jewish slaves owned by fellow Jews, and they were to return all land held as security to the original Jewish owner (who borrowed against it) and to his tribe. It was okay to hold alien slaves for life.
There seems to be no evidence that the rule was ever seriously practiced. I t seems to have been a great religio-ethical ideal, but there was no enforcing it. The Torah actually had penalties as stiff as execution by stoning, but not for violation of the Jubilee. Like some of our own rights under the Constitution, including voting, majority public sentiment can manage to render plainly written laws null and void. There is a traditionally selective process at work in law enforcement.
Considering the laws that govern a bank’s collection of money lent to whomsoever, what on earth could the rule of Jubilee mean to people in the 21st century? For a great many, to take it literally or seriously no doubt sounds outlandish — even ridiculous. But not to me! I’ve been hearing that word sung all my life, and that with real enthusiasm. I have yet to figure out how slaves, legally prohibited from reading, could manage to find Leviticus 25, but some time in the early 1860’s (I suppose), they sang this Spiritual: “Dis is the year of Jubilee; Gawd gwine set His people free.” And God did!! Yes, God did set my ancestors free.
Beneath the ecstasy of emancipation were some theological notions of note; these were the same profound doctrines which underlay the rules of Jubilee in Leviticus:
1. God owns everything we go through the motions of possessing. In the case of the return of land to the original owner, it was only being put back where God, the owner, assigned it in the first place. The assignees were divided by tribes and given stewardship over such of God’s lands as they were supposed to have. God was believed to have meant for them to keep their birthright in the family, even if times got tight and they may have had to borrow on it for a while.
An agency o f the United States Government, “HUD” as we call it, is working right now on Jubilee principles. They help people own a home of their own, by making Jubilee-type resources available. There can be no doubt that the country as a whole is better off when we have a high percentage of folks as stewards of their own “vine and fig tree,” assigned by God.
The slaves were God’s possessions also, and God intended for them to be set free as children belonging to God. Whatever the reason for their being in bondage, the Jubilee year was the appointed time for them to be set free. It applied in ancient Egypt, and it applied to the then contemporary U.S.A. In both cases, the owner and only titleholder, God, had the authority to set them free.
Even in the case of money and major debt, which is a modem phenomenon, the Jubilee principle isn’t as far out as might appear. We have learned that huge debts owed by underdeveloped countries are best forgiven. A country recovering is a more profitable customer of our exports than a country struggling to pay an impossible debt. Our national welfares are much too closely woven for us to think we can climb up by making our neighbors go down.
What can be said of loans to underdeveloped countries can be said of struggling sons and daughters and other relatives who owe us money. And lest all of us forget, the Lord’s Prayer includes “as we forgive our debtors,” a phrase with tremendous relevance to an application of Jubilee principles to each of our own personal cases in the hands of God.
2. God is just and righteous. In order to keep some sort of parity among the stewards of God’s earth, there had to be a leveling process every 50 years. Otherwise, God’s possessions would get bunched up in one or two places. The Jubilee principle would seem to some to limit the cumulative advantages to be gained by hard work, shrewd business, and breaks. This is presumed to be the very heart of free enterprise in our democracy, and we dare not tamper with it. Earned or unearned and inherited, we citizens of the U.S.A. hold ownership of things to be sacred. However, if this Jubilee righteousness is one of limits to human experience, the main limits deal with cumulative disadvantage.
Beyond fairly obvious limits, the accumulation of things no longer satisfies real human need. In fact there is a firm limit to how much of the most lavish of possessions can be used or consumed and enjoyed by one person or family in a life time. Whether it be food or clothing, cars or houses, equities or anything else, we can only enjoy so much. Empires of things last only so long, a generation or so, and they disappear. Only what is done for the Kingdom of God actually lasts. What is done for self is severely limited by human calendars and capacities.
Beyond these limits, what we acquire is used to gain control of other people’s lives, indeed the lives of whole nations, all to gain even more power and money. When one person or group of persons controls so much, huge inequalities and injustices evolve. Jubilee principles allow the highly privileged to enjoy their greater advantages without going to cruel extremes in the name of free enterprise. There needs to be a time of leveling in order for some to get a fresh start. Once they get going, those who gave Jubilee help will be glad they did.
3. The third theological principle or doctrine held that the one who owns the world and us, and who wills a kind of approximate parity between all the children, God actually holds the power to make that Jubilee principle become a reality in human history. The opening of the Red Sea is a classic example; it put the all-powerful God on record as supporting and empowering the emancipation of Hebrew slaves.
It was this awesome act, as recorded in the Bible, which convinced my ancestors that God had the power to free them too. Fully believing this, they sang joyfully about Jubilee. They also sang about Moses, saying, “Go Down, Moses… Tell ol’ Pharaoh to let my people go.”
There was no serious doubt about God’s having and using such power. Their only question had to do with when, not if. They put it, “How long, oh Lord, how long?” When emancipation was finally declared, the supposedly simple-minded slaves interpreted this war measure with awesome insight. They may or may not have known that the proclamation applied only to seceding states over which Lincoln had no jurisdiction. Whatever they knew, they simply said: “Marse Lincum sign de paper, but Gawd de one what sot us free.”
The crowning validation of the Jubilee faith of those once-enslaved Africans came just after the signing of the amenities closing the Civil War, in Richmond. Abraham Lincoln signed papers with Gen. Robert E. Lee and strode down Broad Street to 10th. He turned right and onto the grounds of the Virginia State Capitol. Amidst the cheering of the host just freed from bondage, Lincoln mounted the steps of the rotunda and made a very brief speech. It began with these words: “In reference to you, colored people, let me say God has made you free.” It ended with, “God created all men free, giving to each the same rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
He was absolutely right. Not Lincoln, not abolitionists, not unwilling Union soldiers, not any human agency. God had declared the year of Jubilee and set God’s people free.
