Leviticus 25:22

WEB

You shall sow the eighth year, and eat of the fruits, the old store; until the ninth year, until its fruits come in, you shall eat the old store.

KJV

And ye shall sow the eighth year, and eat yet of old fruit until the ninth year; until her fruits come in ye shall eat of the old store.

Commentary

And ye shall sow the eighth year,.... Sow the land in the eighth year, and likewise dress their vines, olives, &c. and eat yet of the old fruit; even in the eighth year, of the old fruit of the sixth year, as the Targum of Jonathan adds: until the ninth year; that is, as Jarchi explains it, until the feast of tabernacles of the ninth, wh ich was the time that the increase of the eighth came into the house; for all summer it was in the field, and in Tisri or September was the time of gathering it into the house; and sometimes it was necessary to provide for four years on the sixth, which was before the sabbatical year, the seventh, for they ceased from tilling the ground two years running, the seventh and the jubilee year; but this Scripture is said concerning all the rest of the sabbatical years: these encouraging promises, one would have thought, would have been placed more naturally after the account of the sabbatical year that followed, Lev 25:7 ; but the reason of their being inserted here seems to be, because in the year of jubilee they were neither to sow nor reap, nor gather in the grapes of the undressed vine, as in the sabbatical year, Lev 25:11 ; wherefore those things are said for encouragement at the one time as at the other; since it might easily be concluded, that he that could provide for them every sixth year for three years to come, could once in fifty years provide for four: until her fruits come in, ye shall eat of the old store; some of which came in in March, as barley, others in May, as the wheat, and others in August and September, as the grapes, olives, &c. which was the time of ingathering several fruits of the earth, and of finishing the whole.