Matthew Henry on Deuteronomy 15:1-11
Here is, I. A law for the relief of poor debtors, such (we may suppose) as were insolvent. Every seventh year was a year of release, in which the ground rested from being tilled and servants were discharged from their services; and, among other acts of grace, this was one, that those who had borrowed money, and had not been able to pay it before, should this year be released from it; and though, if they were able, they were afterwards bound in conscience to repay it, yet thenceforth the creditor should never recover it by law. Many good expositors think it only forbids the exacting of the debt in the year of release, because, no harvest being gathered in that year, it could not be expected t…
Read the whole note in the consoleJohn Gill on Deuteronomy 15:1
At the end of every seven years thou shalt make a release. Not of servants, for they were not to be dismissed from their service until they had served six years, as is directed to in a following law; for if they were to be set free whenever a sabbatical year came, they might be discharged when they had not served more than a year, or than half a year, or than a month or two. Indeed when the year of jubilee intervened, they were released be it at what time it would; but not in a sabbatical year, which was a year of release of debts, as the following verses show, as well as there was, then a rest of the land from tillage, Leviticus 25:2. Now this was done at the end or extremity of every seven…
Read the whole note in the consoleJohn Calvin on Deuteronomy 15:1-11
Deuteronomy 15:1-11
1. At the end of every seven years thou shalt make a release.
1. Septimo quoque anno facies remissionem.
2. And this is the manner of the release: Every creditor that lendeth ought unto his neighbor shall release it; he shall not exact it of his neighbor, or of his brother; because it is called the Lord's release.
2. Haec autem est ratio remissionis, ut remittat omnis qui mutuum dederit manu sua, id quod mutuum dederit amico suo: non reposcet ab amico suo, aut a fratre suo, quia proclamata est remissio Jehovae.
3. Of a foreigner thou mayest exact it again: but that which is thine with thy brother thine hand shall release;
3. Ab alienigena reposces, aut quod fuerit…
