B’HAR בהר on Mount [Sinai] Lev 25:1-26:2

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Behar
(On Mount [Sinai])
Vayikra 25:1-26:2 (Leviticus 25:1-26:2)

• Sabbatical Year or Seven-Year Land Sabbath (Shemittah)
• The Fifty-Year Jubilee (Yovel)
• The Events Leading to Enslavement
• Redemption of Ancestral Land
• Levite Cities—The Levites’ Ancestral Heritage
• Preventing Poverty—Those Who Have Means give Charity to Those in Need 
• An Israelite’s “Slave” or BondServant

The Shemitah is the final year in a seven-year cycle of debt forgiveness and land use prescribed in this weeks Torah portion – the Shemitah year culminates in the Day of Remission – to set us free from our bondage to sin, sickness, disease and poverty are we fast approaching that 1000-year period of rest – the Millennial Kingdom?

Alludes to the six thousand years of history that will be climaxed by the seventh millennium

The central element of the Kavod Glory of יהוה and the requirements of Holiness upon all who would approach! 

Just as יהוה limits slavery of a Hebrew slave since he is under His ownership, the reason for observance of the Shemittah in Leviticus 25 is because יהוה owns the land! 

Like a ripple in a pond it starts out small and then becoming larger and larger, it’s ultimately about the reign of YHWH in our life.

Schemata truth: the land is not the absolute possession of man, but it’s יהוה’s. It’s a Trust. יהוה is the creator or settlor of the trust and it’s held in trust by the trustees-the prophets for his beneficiaries – all 12 tribes. It’s term, its length is determined by the Jubilees! Redemption causes you to return to your possession (Eden) and return to your family (Jacob-Israel).

It’s His land, therefore, He has the final say on how often it can be plowed and who can own it.

The focus is on celebrating Shemittah because of our relationship with יהוה . He owns the land; therefore, Shemittah is seen as an acknowledgement of His ownership of the land and His authority.

Lev 25:1 And the LORD spake unto Moses in mount Sinai, saying,

Lev 25:2 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto the LORD.Lev 25:3 Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof; Lev 25:4 But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the LORD: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard. Lev 25:5 That which groweth of its own accord of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, neither gather the grapes of thy vine undressed: for it is a year of rest unto the land. Lev 25:6 And the sabbath of the land shall be meat for you; for thee, and for thy servant, and for thy maid, and for thy hired servant, and for thy stranger that sojourneth with thee, Lev 25:7 And for thy cattle, and for the beast that are in thy land, shall all the increase thereof be meat. Lev 25:8 And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years shall be unto thee forty and nine years. Lev 25:9 Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubile to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall ye make the trumpet sound throughout all your land. Lev 25:10 And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubile unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family. Lev 25:11 A jubile shall that fiftieth year be unto you: ye shall not sow, neither reap that which groweth of itself in it, nor gather the grapes in it of thy vine undressed. Lev 25:12 For it is the jubile; it shall be holy unto you: ye shall eat the increase thereof out of the field. Lev 25:13 In the year of this jubile ye shall return every man unto his possession. Lev 25:14 And if thou sell ought unto thy neighbour, or buyest ought of thy neighbour’s hand, ye shall not oppress one another: Lev 25:15 According to the number of years after the jubile thou shalt buy of thy neighbour, and according unto the number of years of the fruits he shall sell unto thee: Lev 25:16 According to the multitude of years thou shalt increase the price thereof, and according to the fewness of years thou shalt diminish the price of it: for according to the number of the years of the fruits doth he sell unto thee. Lev 25:17 Ye shall not therefore oppress one another; but thou shalt fear thy God: for I am the LORD your God.

The Shemittah is a land ordinance, not something that would of applied outside the land, ie in the dispersion for you farmers…now crop rotation and letting the land lie fallow are very sensible ideas…yet the religious context is lost in the nations. 

In our Haftorah portion Jeremiah knew that the Babylonians were to take the land; therefore, he wanted to know what use there would be in buying land that is about to be given to another nation.

Today brethren most are still living in that fallen reality. If a man truly owned land he would have land, water and air rights, allodial title and would not be paying property tax – property tax is prima facie evidence that the man is still a tenant, a resident of Mystery Babylon. 

The heart of the portion is Lk 6:38 Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.

The connection between יהוה and man – vertical commandments and horizontal commandments.

Exo 23:1 Thou shalt not raise a false report: put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness. Exo 23:2 Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil; neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment: Exo 23:3 Neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause. Exo 23:4 If thou meet thine enemy’s ox or his ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back to him again. Exo 23:5 If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden, and wouldest forbear to help him, thou shalt surely help with him. Exo 23:6 Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of thy poor in his cause. Exo 23:7 Keep thee far from a false matter; and the innocent and righteous slay thou not: for I will not justify the wicked. Exo 23:8 And thou shalt take no gift: for the gift blindeth the wise, and perverteth the words of the righteous. Exo 23:9 Also thou shalt not oppress a stranger: for ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. Laws About the Sabbath and Festivals Exo 23:10 And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof: Exo 23:11 But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy oliveyard. Exo 23:12 Six days thou shalt do thy work, and on the seventh day thou shalt rest: that thine ox and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid, and the stranger, may be refreshed.

Give or contextually, obey Shemittah by allowing the poor to harvest in your fields and it will be given to you, good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over…because of יהוה’s  blessing, you will eat the sixth year’s harvest in the ninth year! This is what Yahusha is teaching. Torah portion Behar right here. 

The heart of the matter has always been the relationships between man and his fellow man! This is the exact context within which the instructions of Shemittah are presented in Exodus 23 and expanded on in our torah portion Behar. 

Behar brings forth shadow of resurrection, shadows of renewed life all a result of deliverance from impending death, shadows of victory and renewed life as a result of death – the connections three years/three days is apparent – partaking of the sixth year’s harvest in the ninth year!

The first LIVING things (plants, grass, etc.) were created on day THREE – life coming from a state where there is no life – Really RESURRECTION as we know of Messiah is found in these Holy Days. The Holy Day that is a shadow of Yahusha’s RESURRECTION is the THIRD Holy Day, the Day of the Omer Wave Offering (Leviticus 23)! 

The Shemittah in Leviticus 25 is all about our duty to יהוה as the true owner of the land. The presentation of Shemittah earlier in Exodus 23 focused on our duty to our fellow man. Taken together, these two passages teach us to love יהוה by obeying His words and to love our fellow man (especially the poor) by treating him as we would want to be treated.

Matt 22:37 Yahusha said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. – the Shemita connection Exo 23 – man in relation to the Shemita, Lev 25/25 יהוה and the connection to the Shemita – on this hangs all the Torah and the Prophets. 

The Jubilee/Yovel occurs every fifty years, interesting that Yahusha came 50 generations after Noah’s grandson Shem, meaning that he would come again at a fifty generation (instead of years) Jubilee! Look to the generations not years!

• Gen. 7:1 I seen righteous before me in this generation.
• Gen 15:6 But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again:
• Years are transformed prophetically to generations: Num 32:13 he made them wander in the wilderness forty years, until all the generation, 

The 7 Biblical generations of prophecy are: 

• Generation of vipers
• Wicked and adulterous generation
• Judgment generation
• Faithless and perverse generation
• Requiem of blood generation
• Rejected generation
• The chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light – AKA the Jubilee generation. 

Jubilee is the time of our redemption and freedom, He comes to set us free from our bondage to sin, sickness, disease and poverty are we fast approaching that 1000-year period of rest – the Millennial Kingdom.

The Jubilee/Yovel: Beresheeth 6:3 And YHWH said, My Ruach shall not always strive (Diyn – Dalet-Yod-Nun Sofeet – means to judge) (with) Man (Adam),  for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be one hundred twenty years (Shaneh – Shin-Nun-Heh – A division of time)

It should could be interpreted as Jubilee cycles – YHWH will not judge man until 120 jubilee cycles are completed from this point – 1 Jubilee cycle had already passed since creation!

 The 121st Jubilee cycle started Tishri/October 1974, (Sefer Yovel records the Jubilees and the first Jubilee cycle as Tishri, 10, 3907BCE.) 

The next Jubilee cycle would start in Tishri 2023. From 1974 – 2023, YHWH is no longer constrained by “the not.” He’s working to bring about His end time prophecies.