Deuteronomy 15: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

Moses sets out the rule that at the end of every seven years debts between Israelites are canceled, though what a foreigner owes may still be collected. He tells the people not to refuse help to a poor brother as the seventh year draws near, and says the poor will never disappear from the land. He also commands that a Hebrew servant be set free in the seventh year and sent off well supplied, unless the servant chooses to stay for life. The chapter ends with rules for firstborn males from the herds and flocks: sound ones are eaten before the LORD at the place he chooses, flawed ones are eaten at home, and the blood is never eaten.

Claim by Claim

1. 15:1
   • At the end of every seven years a release is to be made.
   • The release is commanded as an obligation.
2. 15:2
   • This is the procedure of the release.
   • Every creditor is to let drop the loan he has made to his neighbor.
   • A creditor is not to press his neighbor for payment.
   • A creditor is not to press his brother for payment.
   • The reason given is that a release belonging to the LORD has been proclaimed.
3. 15:3
   • A foreigner may be pressed for payment.
   • Whatever of yours is held by your brother, your hand is to release.
4. 15:4
   • There is to be no poor person among you.
   • The Hebrew is ambiguous whether this is a promise that no poor will exist or a proviso limiting the preceding rule.
   • The LORD will surely bless you in the land.
   • The LORD your God is giving you that land as an inheritance to possess.
5. 15:5
   • This is conditioned on your carefully listening to the voice of the LORD your God.
   • The listening is defined as keeping and doing all this commandment.
   • The speaker says he is commanding it this day.
6. 15:6
   • The LORD your God has blessed you.
   • He blessed you as he said he would.
   • You will lend to many nations.
   • You will not borrow.
   • You will rule over many nations.
   • They will not rule over you.
7. 15:7
   • The case is a poor man among your brothers.
   • The case is that he is within one of your gates.
   • The land is the land the LORD your God is giving you.
   • You are not to harden your heart.
   • You are not to shut your hand from your poor brother.
8. 15:8
   • You are to open your hand wide to him.
   • You are to surely lend to him.
   • The loan is to be enough for his need, whatever he lacks.
9. 15:9
   • You are to guard yourself against a worthless thought in your heart.
   • The thought is: the seventh year, the year of release, is near.
   • The consequence guarded against is that your eye be grudging toward your poor brother.
   • The consequence guarded against is that you give him nothing.
   • He would cry out to the LORD against you.
   • It would be sin in you.
10. 15:10
    • You are to surely give to him.
    • Your heart is not to be grieved when you give to him.
    • Because of this thing the LORD your God will bless you in all your work.
    • He will bless you in everything you put your hand to.
11. 15:11
    • The poor will never cease from the midst of the land.
    • For that reason the speaker gives this command.
    • You are to open your hand wide to your brother.
    • You are to open your hand wide to your poor.
    • You are to open your hand wide to your needy in your land.
12. 15:12
    • The case is your brother, a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman, being sold to you.
    • He serves you six years.
    • In the seventh year you are to send him away free from you.
13. 15:13
    • When you send him away free, you are not to send him away empty-handed.
14. 15:14
    • You are to furnish him generously.
    • The provision comes from your flock.
    • The provision comes from your threshing floor.
    • The provision comes from your winepress.
    • You are to give to him according to how the LORD your God has blessed you.
15. 15:15
    • You are to remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt.
    • The LORD your God redeemed you.
    • For that reason the speaker commands this thing today.
16. 15:16
    • The case is that the servant says to you, I will not go out from you.
    • His reason is that he loves you and your household.
    • His reason is that it is good for him with you.
17. 15:17
    • You are to take an awl.
    • You are to put it through his ear into the door.
    • He becomes your servant permanently.
    • You are to do the same for your maidservant.
18. 15:18
    • It is not to be hard in your eyes to send him away free from you.
    • He served you six years at double the wage of a hired worker.
    • The Hebrew is ambiguous whether his service was literally twice a hired worker's wage or simply equivalent to it.
    • The LORD your God will bless you in all that you do.
19. 15:19
    • Every firstborn male born in your herd and your flock is to be set apart to the LORD your God.
    • You are not to work with the firstborn of your ox.
    • You are not to shear the firstborn of your flock.
20. 15:20
    • You are to eat it before the LORD your God year by year.
    • You are to eat it in the place the LORD will choose.
    • You and your household are to eat it.
21. 15:21
    • The case is that the animal has a defect.
    • Examples of defect are lameness and blindness.
    • The rule covers any serious defect.
    • You are not to sacrifice such an animal to the LORD your God.
22. 15:22
    • You are to eat it within your gates.
    • The unclean and the clean may eat it together.
    • It may be eaten as a gazelle and a deer are eaten.
23. 15:23
    • You are not to eat its blood.
    • You are to pour the blood on the ground like water.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

15:1

The Hebrew word behind "release" (shemittah) means a letting go or letting drop. It was a fixed nationwide year on a shared calendar, every seventh year everyone observed at once, not seven years counted separately from the date of each loan. Ancient and modern readers have differed over whether the creditor's "letting go" wiped out the debt permanently or only suspended collection for that year; the Hebrew wording does not settle it.

15:2

"Ought" in the King James English simply means "anything." "Brother" here, and throughout the chapter, means a fellow Israelite rather than a blood relative. That the release "is called" or "has been proclaimed" points to a public announcement, so that debtors and creditors alike knew the year had come.

15:3

The foreigner meant here is a non-Israelite trader or traveler doing business in the land, not the resident immigrant living permanently among Israel, who was covered by the same protections as Israelites. A loan to a passing merchant was commercial capital, not emergency help for a neighbor in trouble.

15:4

"Inheritance" translates a word for an allotted holding: land assigned to each family and meant to stay in that family's hands down the generations, rather than property freely bought and sold.

15:5

Commands are rules. God gave his people rules to show them how to live.

15:6

To lend to other nations without borrowing was a standard ancient way of describing national strength, a country that is everyone's creditor and nobody's debtor.

15:7

The King James "gates" means towns. The gateway of a walled town was where markets were held and legal cases were heard, so "your gates" stood for the settlements themselves.

15:8

"That which he wanteth" in the King James English means what he lacks, not what he desires. Under Israelite law, loans to a poor fellow Israelite were to be made without charging interest.

15:9

"Thine eye be evil" is a Hebrew idiom for being tight-fisted or begrudging; a "good eye" meant generosity. "It be sin unto thee" means you incur guilt, the wronged person's cry becomes a formal complaint against you.

15:11

This is not a contradiction of verse 4. Verse 4 states what would be true if the law were kept; verse 11 deals with the situation as it actually is, and draws the practical command from it.

15:12

This is debt-bondage, not lifelong slavery. An Israelite who could not pay what he owed, or could not feed his family, sold his labor (or was sold) for a fixed term of six years to work the debt off. The law here treats such a person as a fellow Israelite with a release date, unlike foreign slaves bought as property.

15:13

Long ago, a very poor person could sell himself to work for someone else. He worked to pay back what he owed. This law says that work must end after six years.

15:14

The three sources named cover the basic wealth of a farming household: the flock (animals, meat and wool), the threshing floor (grain, the flat open area where grain was beaten loose from the stalks), and the winepress (wine). The freed servant leaves with a share of each.

15:15

"Redeemed" translates a word from family and commercial law: to pay the price that buys a relative out of slavery or debt. A family member had a duty to do this for his kin, and the word is applied here to the exodus from Egypt.

15:17

An awl is a sharp pointed tool used for punching holes in leather or wood. The piercing was done at the door or doorpost of the master's house, a public, witnessed act marking the servant's permanent attachment to that household, and leaving a visible mark in the ear. "For ever" here means for the rest of his life.

15:18

The Hebrew is ambiguous. It may mean the servant's labor was worth twice what a hired worker's wages would have cost, or that he served twice the usual term of a hired man, whose contracts commonly ran about three years.

15:19

"Firstling" means firstborn; "sanctify" means to set apart as belonging to God rather than to the owner. Not working the ox and not shearing the sheep means the owner takes no profit from the animal before handing it over.

15:20

"The place the LORD will choose" is a recurring phrase in Deuteronomy for a single central sanctuary where offerings were to be brought; the text here does not name the site. "Household" covers the whole domestic group, including servants.

15:21

An animal brought as an offering had to be physically sound. A lame, blind, or otherwise defective animal was disqualified, so this firstborn was handled differently, as ordinary food, described in the next verse.

15:22

"Unclean" and "clean" describe ritual status, not dirt or morality. A person became unclean temporarily through ordinary events such as touching a corpse or childbirth, and could not approach the sanctuary until the condition passed, but could eat ordinary meat at home. The gazelle and the deer are wild game, which was never offered in sacrifice and so could be eaten anywhere by anyone.

15:23

Draining the blood was a standing rule for all meat eaten in Israel; blood was spoken of as the life of the creature and was returned to the ground. "Like water" means poured out on the spot with no ritual attached, unlike the blood of an animal offered at the sanctuary.