Page "Jubilee (biblical)" Paragraph 15

The biblical regulations state that the land was to rest a " Sabbath " when the Children of Israel came to the land God was giving them Israel.

The Seder Olam Rabbah ( second century AD ), stated that this verse meant that the counting was not to start until after the Israelites had gained control of Canaan, which the Seder Olam, based upon received tradition, placed at 14 years after their entry into the land.

This interpretation has been largely adopted in later rabbinic scholarship.

One reason for this interpretation of the Levitical text was that if counting started before the land was completely conquered, it would require the Israelites to return the land to the Canaanites within 50 years ; similar nationalistic concerns about the impact of the Jubilee on land ownership have been raised by Zionist settlers.

From a legal point of view, the Jubilee law effectively banned sale of land as fee simple, and instead land could only be leased for no more than 50 years.

The biblical regulations go on to specify that the price of land had to be proportional to how many years remained before the Jubilee, with land being cheaper the closer it is to the Jubilee.