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The sabbath of the seventh day is commemorative of the rest of God after the work of creation, and anticipative of the rest in heaven for his people after the world's great week of toil and sorrow (see Hebrews 3, 4). The more to impress these things upon us, to keep alive our gratitude, and to stimulate our faith and hope, he also instituted the sabbaths of the Levitical system. Conspicuous amongst these are the grand sabbaths mentioned in this chapter, viz. that of the seventh year and that of the week of years. This last comes now under review; and we notice -

I. THE TIME OF THE JUBILEE.

1. In its astronomical aspect.

(1) It was regulated by the sun. It was reckoned from the entrance of the children of Israel into Canaan, and recurred at the time of the autumnal harvest.

(2) It was also regulated by the moon. It was counted from the tenth day of the first month, that being the month in which Israel crossed the Jordan.

(3) It was itself an important factor in reconciling solar and lunar time. Forty-nine years is a soli-lunar cycle. The interval from the tenth day of the first month of the year to the tenth of the seventh month of the forty-ninth year is exactly six hundred lunations. The sabbaths are all worked in, as elements of intercalation, and the intercalations of the Levitical system are very superior to those of the Gregorian (see 'Dissertation Concerning the Sabbath; and a Sabbatical Era,' in the third volume of King's 'Morsels of Criticism'). Who but God could have instituted a system so scientifically perfect? (see Genesis 1:14).

2. In its theological aspect.

(1) The jubilee dated from the great Day of Atonement. Some compute that the very year in which Christ suffered was the year of jubilee, and the last of the Levitical series.

(2) Its provisions were typical of gospel mysteries. As the jubilee ended the yoke and burden of the slave, so the bringing in of the gospel released us from the yoke and burden even of the ceremonial Law itself.

(3) When the gospel is received by faith, it introduces us into a spiritual rest from the burden and yoke of sin.

(4) The rest of the soul in Christ is an earnest of the rest in heaven. This last also springs from the great atonement of Calvary.

II. THE PROCLAMATION OF THE JUBILEE.

1. This foreshadowed the preaching of the gospel.

(1) It was by sound of trumpet. Some suppose that the jubilee had its name (יובל) from a particular sound of the trumpet.. The word jobel (יבל) is used for a trumpet in Exodus 19:13. The gospel should have a certain sound (see 1 Corinthians 14:8).

(2) The trumpet was sounded over the sacrifices. This foreshowed the connection between the great atonement of Christ and the blessings of salvation. The preaching of the gospel is the preaching of the cross. "The great liberty or redemption from thraldom, published under the gospel, could not take place till the great atonement - the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus - had been offered up (Clarke).

(3) The trumpet was sounded throughout the land (verse 9).

(a) If the land of Canaan be taken as a specimen of the world at large, then was this a prophecy of the proclamation of the gospel to the ends of the earth (Matthew 28:19; Mark 16:16; Colossians 1:23).

(b) But if the land be taken in a restricted sense as applicable to the people of the Law in contradistinction to the heathen, then the teaching is that those only who renounce sin by repentance are concerned in the blessings of the gospel.

2. The trumpet also suggests the judgment.

(1) The jobel, or trumpet, sounded the giving of the Law (Exodus 19:13). It called attention to the Law as the standard by which we shall be judged. The trumpet will sound at the last day,

(a) to awaken the dead (1 Corinthians 15:52);

(b) to summon all men to the tribunal.

(2) The jubilee trumpet was the trumpet of a seventh period. There was the trumpet of the seventh day; again, of the seventh year; and now again, of the sabbath of a week of sabbatic periods. To these correspond the seventh of the seven great trumpets of the Apocalypse, which proclaims the judgment.

(3) While to the wicked the trumpet of the judgment is a fearful alarm, to the good it is a joyful sound. If we sing of judgment we must also sing of mercy (Psalm 101:1). The seventh trumpet heralds in the reign of peace.

III. THE BLESSINGS OF THE JUBILEE.

1. It proclaimed a release.

(1) As to the person. The slave was released from the hand of his brother; from the hand of the stranger. Whom the Son maketh free is free indeed.

(2) As to the land. Every man returned to his possession. Adam Clarke derives the word jubilee (יובל) from hobil (הוביל), to cause to bring back, because estates, etc., which had been alienated, were then brought back to their primitive owners. No true believer can be deprived of his share in the land of promise (see Ephesians 1:14; Hebrews 11:9-14).

2. It was a season of joy.

(1) The poor then rejoiced in plenty. In the sabbatic year the fruit of the Lord's laud was free. In the year of jubilee every man returned to his possession.

(2) The generous rejoiced in the prosperity of the poor. No doubt there were churls. Such persons are never to be envied; least of all in a season of rejoicing. Heaven would be hell to the churl.

(3) The spectacle of blessedness periodically witnessed in sabbatic years and jubilees encouraged generous habits of thought, feeling, and action. Happy is the people whose God is the Lord. - J.A.M.

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KJV: 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.

WEB: "'You shall count off seven Sabbaths of years, seven times seven years; and there shall be to you the days of seven Sabbaths of years, even forty-nine years.