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Sunday, September 21st, 2025
the Week of Proper 20 / Ordinary 25
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Read the Bible

Literal Standard Version

Leviticus 25:20

And when you say, What do we eat in the seventh year, behold, do we not sow, nor gather our increase?

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Agriculture;   Blessing;   Jubilee;   Torrey's Topical Textbook - Feast of Sabbatical Year, the;   Seed;  

Dictionaries:

- American Tract Society Bible Dictionary - Jubilee;   Poor;   Bridgeway Bible Dictionary - Sabbatical year;   Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - Jubilee, Year of;   Fausset Bible Dictionary - Sabbatical Year;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Festivals;   Leviticus;   Number Systems and Number Symbolism;   Pentateuch;   Year of Jubilee;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Canon of the Old Testament;   Congregation, Assembly;   Crimes and Punishments;   Deuteronomy;   Hexateuch;   Holiness;   Law;   Leviticus;   Poverty;   Priests and Levites;   Sabbatical Year;   Sanctification, Sanctify;   The Hawker's Poor Man's Concordance And Dictionary - Feasts;   People's Dictionary of the Bible - Jubilee;   Smith Bible Dictionary - Jubilee, the Year of;   Watson's Biblical & Theological Dictionary - Weeks;   Year;  

Encyclopedias:

- Condensed Biblical Cyclopedia - Sabbath and Feasts;   International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Agrarian Laws;   Jubilee Year;   The Jewish Encyclopedia - Restraints on Alienation;   Sidra;  

Parallel Translations

Hebrew Names Version
If you shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? Behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase;
King James Version
And if ye shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase:
Lexham English Bible
And if you should say, "What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we do not sow and we do not gather its yield?"
New Century Version
"‘But you might ask, "If we don't plant seeds or gather crops, what will we eat the seventh year?"
New English Translation
If you say, ‘What will we eat in the seventh year if we do not sow and gather our produce?'
Amplified Bible
'And if you say, "What are we going to eat in the seventh year if we do not sow [seed] or gather in our crops?"
New American Standard Bible
'But if you say, "What are we going to eat in the seventh year if we do not sow nor gather in our produce?"
Geneva Bible (1587)
And if ye shall say, What shall we eate the seuenth yeere, for we shall not sowe, nor gather in our increase?
Legacy Standard Bible
But if you say, "What are we going to eat on the seventh year if we do not sow or gather in our produce?"
Contemporary English Version
Don't ever worry about what you will eat during the seventh year when you are forbidden to plant or harvest.
Complete Jewish Bible
"‘If you ask, "If we aren't allowed to sow seed or harvest what our land produces, what are we going to eat the seventh year?"
Darby Translation
And if ye say, What shall we eat in the seventh year? behold, we may not sow, nor gather in our produce;
Easy-to-Read Version
"But maybe you will say, ‘If we don't plant seeds or gather our crops, we will not have anything to eat during the seventh year.'
English Standard Version
And if you say, ‘What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?'
George Lamsa Translation
And if you shall say, What shall we eat in the seventh year? For we shall not sow, nor gather in the produce thereof;
Good News Translation
But someone may ask what there will be to eat during the seventh year, when no fields are planted and no crops gathered.
Christian Standard Bible®
If you wonder: ‘What will we eat in the seventh year if we don’t sow or gather our produce?’
Literal Translation
And when you say, What shall we eat in the seventh year; for, lo, we may not sow nor gather our increase?
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
And yf ye wolde saye: What shall we eate in the seuenth yeare, in as moch as we shal not sowe, ner gather in oure increase?
American Standard Version
And if ye shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase;
Bible in Basic English
And if you say, Where will our food come from in the seventh year, when we may not put in seed, or get in the increase
Bishop's Bible (1568)
And yf ye shall say, what shall we eate the seuenth yere? for we shall not sowe, nor gather in our increase:
JPS Old Testament (1917)
And if ye shall say: 'What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we may not sow, nor gather in our increase';
King James Version (1611)
And if ye shall say, What shall we eate the seuenth yeere? Behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase:
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
And if ye should say, What shall we eat in this seventh year, if we do not sow nor gather in our fruits?
English Revised Version
And if ye shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase:
Berean Standard Bible
Now you may wonder, 'What will we eat in the seventh year if we do not sow or gather our produce?'
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
That if ye seien, what schulen we ete in the seuenthe yeer, if we sowen not, nether gaderen oure fruytis?
Young's Literal Translation
`And when ye say, What do we eat in the seventh year, lo, we do not sow, nor gather our increase?
Update Bible Version
And if you shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? Look, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase;
Webster's Bible Translation
And if ye shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we shall not sow nor gather in our increase:
World English Bible
If you shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? Behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase;
New King James Version
"And if you say, "What shall we eat in the seventh year, since we shall not sow nor gather in our produce?"
New Living Translation
But you might ask, ‘What will we eat during the seventh year, since we are not allowed to plant or harvest crops that year?'
New Life Bible
If you say, "What will we eat in the seventh year if we do not plant seeds or gather in the food of our field?"
New Revised Standard
Should you ask, "What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?"
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
And since ye may say, What shall we eat in the seventh year? Lo! we are not to sow, neither are we to gather our increase!
Douay-Rheims Bible
But if you say: What shall we eat the seventh year, if we sow not, nor gather our fruits?
Revised Standard Version
And if you say, 'What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?'
New American Standard Bible (1995)
'But if you say, "What are we going to eat on the seventh year if we do not sow or gather in our crops?"

Contextual Overview

8And you have numbered seven Sabbaths of years for yourself, seven times seven years, and the days of the seven Sabbaths of years have been forty-nine years for you, 9and you have caused a horn of shouting to pass over in the seventh month, on the tenth of the month; in the Day of Atonements you cause a horn to pass over through all your land; 10and you have hallowed the year, the fiftieth year; and you have proclaimed liberty in the land to all its inhabitants; it is a Jubilee for you; and you have turned back each to his possession; indeed, you return each to his family. 11It [is] a Jubilee, the fiftieth year, it is a year for you; you do not sow, nor reap its spontaneous growth, nor gather its separated things; 12for it [is] a Jubilee—it is holy to you; you eat its increase from the field; 13you return each to his possession in this Year of the Jubilee. 14And when you sell anything to your fellow, or buy from the hand of your fellow, you do not oppress one another; 15you buy from your fellow by the number of years after the Jubilee; he sells to you by the number of the years of increase; 16you multiply its price according to the multitude of the years, and you diminish its price according to the fewness of the years; for [it is] a number of increases [that] he is selling to you; 17and you do not oppress one another, and you have been afraid of your God; for I [am] your God YHWH.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Numbers 11:4, Numbers 11:13, 2 Kings 6:15-17, 2 Kings 7:2, 2 Chronicles 25:9, Psalms 78:19, Psalms 78:20, Isaiah 1:2, Matthew 6:25-34, Matthew 8:26, Luke 12:29, Philippians 4:6, Hebrews 13:5, Hebrews 13:6

Reciprocal: Exodus 23:11 - the seventh Leviticus 25:4 - General 2 Kings 19:29 - Ye shall eat Isaiah 37:30 - Ye shall Matthew 6:31 - What shall we eat Matthew 6:33 - and all

Cross-References

Genesis 22:23
and Bethuel has begotten Rebekah"; Milcah has borne these eight to Nahor, Abraham's brother;
Genesis 24:67
and Isaac brings her into the tent of his mother Sarah, and he takes Rebekah, and she becomes his wife, and he loves her, and Isaac is comforted after [the death of] his mother.
Genesis 25:5
And Abraham gives all that he has to Isaac;
Genesis 25:6
and to the sons of the concubines whom Abraham has, Abraham has given gifts, and sends them away from his son Isaac (in his being yet alive) eastward, to the east country.
Genesis 31:18
and leads all his livestock, and all his substance which he has acquired, the livestock of his getting, which he has acquired in Padan-Aram, to go to his father Isaac, to the land of Canaan.
Genesis 31:20
and Jacob deceives the heart of Laban the Aramean, because he has not declared to him that he is fleeing;
Genesis 31:24
And God comes to Laban the Aramean in a dream of the night and says to him, "Take heed to yourself lest you speak with Jacob from good to evil."
Genesis 35:9
And God appears to Jacob again, in his coming from Padan-Aram, and blesses him;
Deuteronomy 26:5
And you have answered and said before your God YHWH, My father [is] a perishing Aramean! And he goes down to Egypt, and sojourns there with few men, and becomes a great, mighty, and populous nation there;
Luke 4:27
and many lepers were in the time of Elisha the prophet, in Israel, and none of them was cleansed, but—Naaman the Syrian."

Gill's Notes on the Bible

And ye shall say, what shall ye eat the seventh year?.... Such as are of little faith, disbelieve the promise, and distrust the providence of God, and take thought for tomorrow, and indulge an anxiety of mind how they shall be provided with food in the sabbatical year ordered to be observed, in which there were to be no tillage of land, nor pruning of trees:

behold, we shall not sow; that being forbidden:

nor gather in our increase; neither the barley, nor the wheat, nor the grapes, nor olives, nor figs, into their houses and barns, to lay up for stores, as in other years; though they might go out and gather in for present use in common with others: now if any should put the above question, as it was very likely some would, in such a view of things, the answer to it follows.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Leviticus 25:20. What shall we eat the seventh year? — A very natural question, which could only be laid at rest by the sovereign promise in the next verse: I will COMMAND my BLESSING upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth fruit for THREE YEARS. Leviticus 25:2; Leviticus 25:2.


 
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