“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.”
When the years are many, you are to increase the price, and when the years are few, you are to decrease it, because what is really being sold to you is the number of crops. The explicit statement of the Jubilee pricing principle: you are buying crops, not land. The covenant community's understanding of land ownership is theological, not commercial: the land belongs to God (verse 23), the family holds it in trust, and the sale is always a temporary transfer of use-rights. The number of crops determines the price; the Jubilee determines the limit.
COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS
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