You shall do no work: it is a statute forever throughout your generations in all your settlements.
It shall be to you a sabbath of complete rest, and you shall deny yourselves;[36 (#ulink_ab89caa0-b579-55cd-82dd-2e946d247d44)] on the ninth day of the month at evening, from evening to evening you shall keep your sabbath.
33 The LORD spoke to Moses, saying:
Speak to the people of Israel, saying: On the fifteenth day of this seventh month, and lasting seven days, there shall be the festival of booths[38 (#ulink_6d549735-c020-5982-b9ce-9e1b700de7e4)] to the LORD.
The first day shall be a holy convocation; you shall not work at your occupations.
Seven days you shall present the LORD’s offerings by fire; on the eighth day you shall observe a holy convocation and present the LORD’s offerings by fire; it is a solemn assembly; you shall not work at your occupations.
37 These are the appointed festivals of the LORD, which you shall celebrate as times of holy convocation, for presenting to the LORD offerings by fire—burnt offerings and grain offerings, sacrifices and drink offerings, each on its proper day—
apart from the sabbaths of the LORD, and apart from your gifts, and apart from all your votive offerings, and apart from all your freewill offerings, which you give to the LORD.
39 Now, the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you have gathered in the produce of the land, you shall keep the festival of the LORD, lasting seven days; a complete rest on the first day, and a complete rest on the eighth day.
On the first day you shall take the fruit of majestic[39 (#ulink_55a69681-af0c-5774-bc81-1c9157991728)] trees, branches of palm trees, boughs of leafy trees, and willows of the brook; and you shall rejoice before the LORD your God for seven days.
You shall keep it as a festival to the LORD seven days in the year; you shall keep it in the seventh month as a statute forever throughout your generations.
You shall live in booths for seven days; all that are citizens in Israel shall live in booths,
so that your generations may know that I made the people of Israel live in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.
44 Thus Moses declared to the people of Israel the appointed festivals of the LORD.
24 The LORD spoke to Moses, saying:
Command the people of Israel to bring you pure oil of beaten olives for the lamp, that a light may be kept burning regularly.
Aaron shall set it up in the tent of meeting, outside the curtain of the covenant,[40 (#ulink_a87f1404-0393-5ca9-9a3b-f1d071ef780b)] to burn from evening to morning before the LORD regularly; it shall be a statute forever throughout your generations.
He shall set up the lamps on the lampstand of pure gold[41 (#ulink_cad74aa0-565f-5888-a48c-ae7610c68992)] before the LORD regularly.
5 You shall take choice flour, and bake twelve loaves of it; two-tenths of an ephah shall be in each loaf.
You shall place them in two rows, six in a row, on the table of pure gold.[42 (#ulink_b8bb1b99-49ef-5865-a6dc-6d228507d5ba)]
You shall put pure frankincense with each row, to be a token offering for the bread, as an offering by fire to the LORD.
Every sabbath day Aaron shall set them in order before the LORD regularly as a commitment of the people of Israel, as a covenant forever.
They shall be for Aaron and his descendants, who shall eat them in a holy place, for they are most holy portions for him from the offerings by fire to the LORD, a perpetual due.
10 A man whose mother was an Israelite and whose father was an Egyptian came out among the people of Israel; and the Israelite woman’s son and a certain Israelite began fighting in the camp.
The Israelite woman’s son blasphemed the Name in a curse. And they brought him to Moses—now his mother’s name was Shelomith, daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan—
and they put him in custody, until the decision of the LORD should be made clear to them.
13 The LORD said to Moses, saying:
Take the blasphemer outside the camp; and let all who were within hearing lay their hands on his head, and let the whole congregation stone him.
And speak to the people of Israel, saying: Anyone who curses God shall bear the sin.
One who blasphemes the name of the LORD shall be put to death; the whole congregation shall stone the blasphemer. Aliens as well as citizens, when they blaspheme the Name, shall be put to death.
Anyone who kills a human being shall be put to death.
Anyone who kills an animal shall make restitution for it, life for life.
Anyone who maims another shall suffer the same injury in return:
fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; the injury inflicted is the injury to be suffered.
One who kills an animal shall make restitution for it; but one who kills a human being shall be put to death.
You shall have one law for the alien and for the citizen: for I am the LORD your God.
Moses spoke thus to the people of Israel; and they took the blasphemer outside the camp, and stoned him to death. The people of Israel did as the LORD had commanded Moses.
25 The LORD spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying:
Speak to the people of Israel and say to them: When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land shall observe a sabbath for the LORD.
Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and gather in their yield;
but in the seventh year there shall be a sabbath of complete rest for the land, a sabbath for the LORD: you shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard.
You shall not reap the aftergrowth of your harvest or gather the grapes of your unpruned vine: it shall be a year of complete rest for the land.
You may eat what the land yields during its sabbath—you, your male and female slaves, your hired and your bound laborers who live with you;
for your livestock also, and for the wild animals in your land all its yield shall be for food.
For reflection: Leviticus 25:1–7
It is well to have specifically holy places, and things, and days, for, without these focal points or reminders, the belief that all is holy and “big with God” will soon dwindle into a mere sentiment.
—from Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer
8 You shall count off seven weeks[43 (#ulink_47eb13eb-5d49-5f6e-bc8d-b2287cc24c60)] of years, seven times seven years, so that the period of seven weeks of years gives forty-nine years.
Then you shall have the trumpet sounded loud; on the tenth day of the seventh month—on the day of atonement—you shall have the trumpet sounded throughout all your land.
And you shall hallow the fiftieth year and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you: you shall return, every one of you, to your property and every one of you to your family.
