thus violated what was written in the law,68 to wit: Take heed to thyself lest a base thought arise in thy heart. 9969 In order to overcome this difficulty the creditor was allowed to make a formal declaration in court to the effect that the transaction to which he was a party should not be subject to the provisions of the Deuteronomic law. The formula to be used in such a case was to the following effect:-"I so and so deliver unto you the judges of such and such a place (the declaration) that I may at any time I choose demand the payment of all my outstanding debts. ""70 The document was then signed by a judge or other competent witnesses71 in whose presence the declaration had been made.72 The enactment was a salutary one in that it served as a protection to the creditor against the loss of his property and enabled the debtor to make a loan whenever he needed it.73

An oral agreement of a similar nature between two or more parties to a contract attested by witnesses could also be substituted for the written prosbul. Goldschmidt, Bab. Talmud, v. I, 278, n. 9. 73 Shebi' it, 10: 4b.

73 Git., 37a.

CHAPTER X

SABBATICAL YEAR

It is worthy of observation that the year of release first acquires a religious significance in Deuteronomy. The Shenat Shemiṭṭa is proclaimed in honor of Yahwe. Thus a preliminary stage is reached in the development of the sabbatical year of Leviticus in which the seventh year is to be 'a complete rest for the land, a rest for Yahwe'.2 Agricultural pursuits are forbidden; only the spontaneous yield of the soil may be gathered on condition that the members of the community, including domestic and wild animals, receive an equal share. 'In the seventh year. . thou shalt neither sow thy field nor prune thy vineyard. The aftergrowth3 of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, and the grapes of thy undressed vine thou shalt not gather; it shall be a year of complete rest for the land. And the sabbath produce of the land shall be for food for you; for thee, for thy male and female slave, for

1 15: 2.

שמטה ליהוה which is apparently analogous to,שבת ליהוה

of Deut., 15: 2. Cf. Lev., 25:4.

T

'', the produce of loose grains which had not been gathered by the farmer at the last harvest, Lev. 25: 11; 37: 30; 2 K. 19: 29. ', 'separated,' from, to separate, consecrate (Lev. 25: 5, 11, 'to prune a vine'). The consecrated one- -(1) prince, Gen. 49: 26; Deut. 33: 16. (2) Nazarite, a person consecrated to God, Judg. 13: 5, 7; 16: 17; Am. 2: 11, 12, Num. 6: 2, 13, 18 f. "produce of the sabbatical year.

thy hireling and for the settler, who reside with thee, also for thy cattle and for the beasts that are in thy land shall all the produce be for food." The needs of the people in the sabbatical year and the year following will be met by abundant harvests in the sixth year. 'And if ye shall say, What shall we eat in the seventh year, since we shall neither sow, nor gather in our produce? Then I will command my blessing upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth produce for three years. And ye shall sow the eighth year and still eat of the old produce.' It is taken for granted that the year begins in the spring," and not in the fall,10 as in the pre-exilic period. In view of the fact that both sower and reaper are to remain inactive during the seventh year, there can be no harvest in the eighth year. The harvest of the sixth year must suffice for the sixth, seventh, and eighth years. In the month Nisan of the ninth year a new harvest could

', 'settler,' LXX: ¿λλoyevýs, Vulg. alienigena, cf. Bertholet,

T

S.I.J.F., 157 f.; Baentsch, Ex., 107; Driver, Ex., 103.

'i. e., in Abib, 'ripening ears' (of barley, Lev. 2: 14; Ex. 9:31); also called 'the month of ripening ears' (Ex. 13:4; 23: 15; 34: 18; Deut. 16: 1). This term is later supplanted by Nisan (April) in consequence of the Babylonian exile, and it was about this time that the Jewish calendar had to undergo a radical change. Babylonian names are substituted for the months of the Hebrew calendar and the beginning of the year from now on coincides with that of the Babylonian calendar. Cf. Benz. H.A., 168-170; Baentsch, op. cit., p. 92.

10 Before the exile the year is reckoned from the 'wheat harvest' (Ex. 34: 22) and the vintage feast (Isa. 32: 10), or from the fall of the year.

be reaped. If the year began in the spring,11 it would be futile to expect a harvest before the beginning of the next year, owing to climatic conditions.12

That the sabbatical year was not observed before the captivity is attested by Lev. 26: 34 f.13 Now that the people are in exile shall the land repay a debt of long standing to Yahwe.14 Then shall the land have its sabbaths15 restored, as long as it lieth desolate, and ye be in your enemies' land, then shall the land rest and repay its sabbaths (to Yahwe).' The guilty nation shall not return until the debt is paid.16

In the law of Exodus 23:10 f., as already intimated, the seventh year is not called a sabbath. It merely provides for a year's fallow every seventh year. There is no indication that the entire land was to be subject to a common septennial fallow, as in the case of Leviticus 25:2 f. It is obvious that the spontaneous produce of the sabbatical year would hardly insure the possibility of a most precarious existence in the face of peculiar climatic conditions occasionally productive of famines. Moreover, it will be remembered, that the grazing husbandry of an earlier period played but a subsidiary part in later Israelitish economy. An agri

11 About April.

12 The land is ploughed and sown after the early rains of October and November. Equally indispensable for the growing crops are the late rains of April and May by reason of the extreme heat of early summer.

13 v. 43 [R].

14 Cf. Baentsch, Lev. 423, 435; Gesenius, H.W.B. (1905), p. 705.

cultural community cannot well afford to lose the products of the soil every seventh year. And finally, trade and commerce on a large scale were still a thing of the future. Thus, in the days of Nehemiah conditions were more favorable for its observance.1 But to judge from the distress occasioned by the observance of a common septennial fallow year in the Greek period,18 Nehemiah's efforts in this direction could scarcely have met with anything like success.

17 Neh. 10:32.

Cf. Siegfried, Neh., in H.K.A.T., 114; Bertholet, Neh., in K.H.K.A.T., 78.

18

19 1 Macc. 6: 49, 53; Josephus, Ant., XIV, 16: 2; XV, 1, 2.