Throughout the ages there have been differences in Israel regarding possessions. No doubt it will stay that way. However, it is absolutely unacceptable that among the people of God, fellow brothers and their families should live in poverty. Yet in the Pentateuch we find instances of people who go through difficult times, and repeatedly there are indications about what things you are not allowed to do to them and what good things you ought to give them.

The Destitute⤒🔗

In the list of destitute people widows and orphans come first. The death of a husband and father meant not only deep sadness but also a profound concern. Who will be the breadwinner? Wealthy widows may be able to weather such a situation, but what about the wife of a day labourer? This explains the prohibition of Deuteronomy 24:17 to take a widow’s garment in pledge, for it is her clothing for the day and her blanket at night. Anyone who dares to misuse the situation of widows and orphans will find out according to Exodus 22:23-24 how God himself is on their side and how he guards their cause. His anger will burn if any dare to mistreat them.

A second group of destitute people comprises the Levites, at least in Deuteronomy. Based on chapter 12:12 they possess no lands, and in 12:19 it says explicitly that people may not neglect them. Such a deplorable state of affairs may be connected to the fact that for some time they did their work in the many small sanctuaries throughout the country and that their work became less significant because the worship services were directed mainly to the central sanctuary at Jerusalem. These servants of God had to live too; and therefore, there was concern for them.

A third group consisted of strangers or sojourners. In Israel there were two types. The first were called the “Ger”’ and even though they were no true Israelites they always lived among them and had certain rights. These free aliens were possibly descendants of the original population. According to Deuteronomy 10:19 the Israelites had to look after them well because they themselves had been aliens in Egypt and therefore knew what it meant to be strangers. The other kind was called the “Nokhri” (or “Ben Nekhar”). Theirs was a better position. They were foreigners who were in Israel for business. One does not need to have special pity for them.

A fourth group of destitute people could be found in the day labourers who had a hand-to-mouth existence. Such people needed to receive their wages before sundown so they could provide for their families. Both Leviticus 19:13 as well as Deuteronomy 24:15 explicitly instruct the employer that he has to pay them the same day. They are too dependent to be able to wait until the next day.

The fifth group of lamentable people was the slaves. Sometimes these were prisoners of war who were regarded as slaves, at other times people who had already lost their liberty and who were bought at the market, sometimes so-called indebted slaves: people who were deep into debt and in order to pay their debt they first had to sell their land, then their other possessions, and ultimately their own self. The Israelites are repeatedly instructed to do well especially to their slaves, for they had indeed been slaves in Egypt and therefore knew or felt all too well what it meant to be slaves.

Perhaps there are more poor people whom we should be taking into account, but these five groups as mentioned already give a clear indication of the fact that also among God’s people there were abuses that needed to be addressed and corrected. Deuteronomy 27 fiercely criticizes those who dare to pervert the justice due to the sojourner, the fatherless and the widow. God curses anyone who does so!

Help for the Poor Neighbour←⤒🔗

Besides the general prospects of providing assistance to the needy, in the Pentateuch we also read of some special opportunities that illustrate how much people were expected to care for their impoverished neighbours.

Deuteronomy 24:19-22 mentions an age-old custom whereby you would leave the last sheaf of grain in the field. Corresponding to heathen popular belief there is the notion that the spirit of the grain that is saved in the last sheaf will ensure another crop for the coming year. Something similar would also hold true for the last olives and the last grapes. Of course, Israel is not allowed to perpetuate that old heathen idea; it has to break away from it in a radical way. However, the form of it is continued but is given a new meaning: instead of a crop-insurance, the last sheaf, the last olives and the last grapes are left for the poor, specifically for the alien, the fatherless and the widow. That also explains what we find in the book of Ruth, about the gleaning of the leftover sheaves.

Next there was also the provision of the tithes, as described in Deuteronomy 14:22-29. For two years the landowners needed to bring their tithes to the central sanctuary in order to enjoy in thankfulness and delight in the blessings of God’s rich gifts. They do so in the bond of family, together with the Levites, before God’s face. In the third year however, nothing will go to the central sanctuary, but the entire tithe is destined for the Levite, the alien, the fatherless and the widow. The owner himself gets nothing; it is all for the poor.

Lastly, the poor receive special attention on the great feast days. Initially these would have been the feasts of harvest: the feast of unleavened bread for the barley, the feast of Weeks (Pentecost) for the wheat, the feast of booths for the fruit from the trees and the field. In Israel all three of these feasts also received another special meaning. With the feast of unleavened bread Israel was reminded of the hastily arranged standing meal at the exodus from Egypt. The second remained a harvest feast for centuries until a connection was made to the regulations of the law at Sinai. The third feast became a remembrance of the journey through the wilderness and the people living in tents. The feasts of weeks and booths have always kept their character as feasts of harvest as well. The farmers brought a portion of their harvest to the central sanctuary to celebrate with their families the feast of God’s gifts, along with their male and female slaves. But here again we meet the typical arrangement for Israel: also those who have been unable to harvest because they had no fields of their own, would yet share fully in the joy, as one large family. Deuteronomy 16 lists them all: “And you shall rejoice before the Lord your God, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, the Levite who is within your towns, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow who are among you” (v. 11); the latter were all needy. And as reason for this care the purpose is restated: you know how it feels to be poor, for “you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt”.

The Year of Jubilee←⤒🔗

And yet, all of this is still piecework. The poor remain, in spite of the care that is offered them in special moments and at prescribed events. The matter is only tackled seriously in the ostensibly long and drawn-out chapter 25 of Leviticus. This chapter is constructed as two closely connected parts. The first part provides factual regulations. The second part shows how everything is based on two core ideas, namely a) “The land belongs to God and he determines how it will be assigned” and b) “Every Israelite is his possession, his servant, his slave, and therefore can never be the slave of another man.”

In the course of time society grew out of sync with the ideal, especially in the time of the kings. This was the time of large landownership, and it was the reason that ever fewer people possessed more and more real estate, and that subsequently more and more people became poor: great riches contrasted to extreme poverty and inequality. Over against this abuse we find the institution of the Year of Jubilee, the year of the ram’s horn. Once in the seven times seven years (according to a different interpretation, the 50th year) everything had to revert to the initial situation. This significant change begins on the great Day of Atonement, and it returns to each Israelite his own property, and in the case of indebted slavery, their freedom.

Therefore the first thing is that everything is all right between God and us (the ceremony of Atonement), and then follows the great turnaround of society. In time, after the conquest of the Promised Land, all property had been divided among the tribes, the relatives and the individual families. Every fifty years this was to be repeated. Every time there were those who had become slaves due to unpaid debts. According to Exodus 21:1-4 the indebted slave would again receive his freedom after a period of six years. If he already had a wife before this debt, she was allowed to come along; otherwise he alone was allowed to go free. Deuteronomy 15:12-14 takes it a step further and prescribes: freedom after six years, with women and children, and on top of that well provided with money and possessions in order to begin a new existence. Leviticus 25 aims at the reality that an Israelite will never have a compatriot as a slave in his service, at most only as a day labourer. When the Year of Jubilee is truly maintained, the great objective will be realized: “Every Israelite, as a free person along with his family, living on and from his own property, in order to serve there with joy the living God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”