Chapter 4: Forgiving Debts

 

In the flow of Moses’ speech, he moves from the subject of the tithe and its use in supporting the poor to the subject of debt cancellation on behalf of those who have become debtors on account of poverty. Deuteronomy 15 begins,

¹ At the end of every seven years you shall grant a remission of debts. ² And this is the manner of remission: every creditor shall release what he has loaned to his neighbor, he shall not exact it of his neighbor and his brother, because the Lord’s remission has been proclaimed.

The sons of God are natural forgivers. All sin is reckoned as a debt, and so the sons of God are always ready to forgive. In Matt. 6:12 Jesus taught us to pray,

¹² And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

Luke 11:4 records it in a little different way,

⁴ And forgive us our sins; for we ourselves also forgive everyone who is indebted to us.

Here we see that “sins” and “debts” are clearly equated. That is because in the law, when a man sins against another, the sinner is then indebted to his victim and is required to pay restitution. And so, when the law speaks of the forgiveness of debt, the meaning includes the forgiveness of sin which may have been the cause of debt.

After Jesus’s resurrection, He appeared to His disciples, breathed on them, and said in John 20:22, 23,

²² … Receive the Holy Spirit. ²³ If you forgive [aphiemi, “remit”] the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained.

In other words, the first stated purpose of receiving the Holy Spirit was to remit sin (debt). Later, this was taken to be a special power given to church leaders only, but when we understand that all men are expected to receive the Holy Spirit, this calling was given to all men. The problem is that not all men—not even Spirit-filled believers—actually exercise this authority. For the sons of God, however, it is a natural part of their way of life.

The Parable of the Debtor

Jesus told a parable in Matthew 18 to illustrate this. A debtor owed 10,000 “talents.” (A talent was 3,000 shekels of silver, or about 117 pounds.) The debtor in this case appealed for more time—that is, a grace period—but the creditor (king) cancelled the entire debt. But then the forgiven debtor refused to forgive a small debt that his neighbor owed him. The king then demanded full payment from the forgiven debtor. The moral of the story is given in the last verse, Matt. 18:35,

³⁵ So shall My heavenly Father also do to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart [paraptoma, “sin, trespass, deviation from truth or uprightness”].

This is a parable about the overcomers, or the sons of God. Men can be justified by faith without growing to spiritual maturity. Many are genuine believers, but not all are genuine forgivers. The “debtor” in this parable asked for a temporary release from his debt, which correlates to a seventh-year remission of debt. But the “king” gave him a Jubilee, an outright cancellation of the whole debt.

But the released debtor was not a forgiver and proved to be unworthy of a Jubilee. For this reason, his debt was placed back upon his shoulders. This man did not know how to live according to the way of life that the sons of God are expected to live. For this reason, he lost the right to inherit life in the first resurrection of Rev. 20:4-6. He and those like him will have to wait until the general resurrection to receive life (John 5:28, 29), and will be raised along with the unbelievers at the Great White Throne.

Seventh Year Remission of Debt

Deut. 15:1 mandates “a remission of debts” every seventh year.

Dates are important in making contracts. Yet to write a date, one must have an official calendar to define those dates. The Biblical system functions on the Jubilee calendar, which is based on sevens. There are seven days in each week. Seven years are a week of years, and seven weeks of years comprise another long-term week of 49 years, followed by the Year of Jubilee in the 50^th year.

These are called Sabbaths, a word that literally means “cessation or rest.” In other words at the end of each week—on every level—something ceases or ends.

In God’s system, these Sabbath cycles govern all labor in the nation, legislating primarily against any form of slavery that men might devise. Slavery forces men to work nonstop. God’s perfect “law of liberty” (James 2:12) forbids employers from forcing men to work as slaves. God’s reason, stated in so many places, is that we are God’s slaves—not the slaves of men. He is the One who purchased us from Egypt (the world system), and so we are to work for Him by promoting the culture and government of His Kingdom and living by its moral principles.

In Deuteronomy 15 God deals with the slavery that comes with poverty. Slavery itself is well regulated by Scripture, limiting it to a court-imposed time of indebtedness which is limited by time. If a man steals and cannot pay restitution, he was to be sold as a slave in order for him to work off his debt. If a man simply came to poverty through natural disaster, he could voluntarily sell himself as an indentured servant (slave). The result was the same, whether the slavery was voluntary or court-imposed.

All slavery was limited by time, and if any slave was mistreated he was to be set free and his debt cancelled (Exodus 21:26, 27).

In order to understand the remission of debt after seven years, we must see it within the context of the larger picture. The law demanded rest for slaves on the seventh day Sabbath (Deut. 5:14). In Deut. 15:1 Moses deals with the seventh year Sabbath, wherein debts were remitted temporarily. But there was also to be a greater release of debt after the seventh cycle of seven years—that is, in the Jubilee Year.

If debts were to be fully cancelled in the seventh year, why would there also be a Jubilee Year? Would not the seventh year serve as a Jubilee? No, the remission of debt in the seventh year is not an absolute cancellation of all debt, but only a temporary remission during the Sabbatic year.

Gesenius Lexicon says that the word “remission” is from the Hebrew word shemittah, which means, “letting drop of exactions, (temporary) remitting, release (from debt).”

After the seventh year has passed, men again labor to pay off whatever debt is still owed. It is only at the Jubilee Year that the divine reset button is pushed, terminating all remaining debt, and every man returns to his family inheritance that may have been sold on account of the debt (Lev. 25:10).

During a seventh-year land rest year, the people were instructed, “you shall not sow your field nor prune your vineyard” (Lev. 25:4). Whatever grew of itself was shared by all, both the owner of the field and any other person, including the aliens (Lev. 25:6). Therefore, because land owners had no income during a Sabbath year, their debts were remitted (deferred) as well. If payment on debts were demanded continuously, it would force many to continue farming during the Sabbatic year.

For this reason, debts were remitted during the time of land rest. But in the eighth year, they were to resume their labor, obtain income, and resume payment on whatever debts were owed. In this way, the Sabbath year was like the Sabbath day. In each case, the remission was temporary. The permanent and complete cancellation of debt came in the Year of Jubilee, for this final Sabbath represents the highest level of “rest” in the law.

Jacob’s Life Follows the Sabbath Patterns

Scripture gives us an illustration of this principle in the life of Jacob. Jacob was born in the year 2108 (from Adam). If you divide these years by Jubilee cycles of 49 years each, you see that the 2107 was the final year of the 42^nd Jubilee cycle. (43 x 49 = 2107). Hence, Jacob was born in the 50^th Year, which was the Jubilee Year in his time.

Jacob, or Israel, lived to the age of 147, or three Jubilee cycles (49 x 3 = 147). See Genesis 47:28, which says,

²⁸ Now Israel lived in the land of Egypt seventeen years; so the length of Jacob’s life was one hundred and forty-seven years.

According to the book of Jasher (29:11), Jacob was 63 when he received the blessing from his father, Isaac. His age was nine Sabbatic cycles (9 x 7 = 63), and hence, he received the blessing in a Sabbath year. Esau, of course, was very angry at Jacob, and so Jasher says that Jacob fled to the house of Heber.

Shem had died just eight years earlier at the age of 600 (Genesis 11:10, 11). The twins, Jacob and Esau, were 55 when Shem died. Shem had built Jerusalem and ruled it as the King-Priest (Melchizedek). When Shem died, Heber, the father of the “Hebrews,” ruled in his place. When Jacob needed a refuge from Esau, he went to the house of Heber in Jerusalem at the age of 63.

Jasher 29:20 says that Jacob remained with Heber for 14 years before returning to Isaac’s house. Jacob was then 77 years old, and it was the year 2184-2185, the tenth Sabbath year since his birth.

As soon as Jacob arrived, the old animosity flared up in Esau, and so Isaac sent Jacob away to Haran to find a wife and to get away from Esau. His father loaded up the camels with the means necessary to pay a dowry for the anticipated wife, but all of this was stolen by Eliphaz, the son of Esau, even before he arrived at Bethel (Jasher 29:38).

For this reason, when Jacob arrived at Uncle Laban’s house, he fell in love with Rachel as soon as he met her. It was love at first sight. But that is why he wept when he met Rachel (Gen. 29:11), for he had no dowry to offer her father to obtain her hand in marriage. But love finds a way, and so Jacob agreed to work for Laban for seven years in place of the dowry (Gen. 29:20). This was the next Sabbatic cycle on the Creation Jubilee Calendar.

But Rachel had a twin sister named Leah (Jasher 28:28), and because Leah had been born first, Laban used this as an excuse to give Leah to Jacob as a wife. Because she was veiled and resembled Rachel in the dim light of the festivities, he did not realize who she was until the next morning.

Jacob objected, and so Laban proposed that Jacob continue to work for another seven years for Rachel. Jasher says that a second wedding was arranged immediately, but Jacob was then obligated to work for Laban for another Sabbath cycle.

Jacob was 84 (12 x 7) when he married Leah and Rachel, and he was 91 when his debt to Laban was paid. It was in this year that Rachel finally gave birth to Joseph. We know this because when Joseph was 39, Jacob was 130 (Genesis 47:9). Therefore, Joseph was born when Jacob was 91.

Jacob then worked for Laban for six more years (Gen. 31:41), not as a slave but as a free man. As a free man, his seven-year contract included six years of labor with a year’s vacation in the seventh year. At the end of six years, God appeared to him in a dream and told him to return to Canaan at the start of the seventh year—the Sabbatic year. This is why Jacob only worked for Laban 20 years instead of 21. It is plain from the story of Jacob that they knew about the Sabbath years and Jubilees, long before the time of Moses, and that Jacob’s entire life was structured around those Sabbaths and Jubilees.

Jacob was in his 98^th year when he left Laban. Hence, when he wrestled with the angel and received his new name, Israel, he was celebrating his fourteenth “week” of Sabbaths (14 x 7 = 98). His youngest son, Benjamin, was born the following year (the Jubilee) near Bethlehem (Gen. 35:19). His mother gave him the name Ben-oni, “son of my sorrow,” because she died in childbirth. But his father gave him the name Benjamin, “son of my right hand.”

The two names of Benjamin depict two manifestations of Christ. He came first as a “man of sorrows” (Isaiah 53:3), but He comes the second time as the “son of my right hand,” for He sits at the right hand of the Father (Heb. 10:12). The fact that Benjamin was born in a year of Jubilee shows that Christ is our Jubilee.

When we see how Jacob’s journey to Haran and back established the pattern of the feast-day cycles, the revelation comes to life.

Beersheba is Passover
Bethel is Pentecost
Mahanaim is Trumpets
Peniel is the Day of Atonement and Jubilee
Succoth is Tabernacles

Thus, when Jacob wrestled with the angel Peniel, it represented the tenth day of the seventh month at the start of the Jubilee Year—Jacob’s 98^th year. We are not told the precise month or day that Jacob wrestled with the angel. It is plain, however, that this event was at least a representation of the Jubilee, and it may have been the actual day as well. For the full story of this feast-day pattern, see chapter 4 of my book, The Laws of the Second Coming.

Forgiving Loans to Foreigners

At the end of six years on the Hebrew calendar, a remission of debt took place every seventh year. Moses then explained this law further in Deut. 15:2 and 3,

² And this is the manner of remission: every creditor shall release what he has loaned to his neighbor; he shall not exact it of his neighbor and his brother, because the Lord’s remission has been proclaimed. ³ From a foreigner you may exact it, but your hand shall release whatever of yours is with your brother.

Once again we see a potential problem of interpretation here. Is there really just one law for both Israelites and foreigners, as God says in Num. 15:16, or has God established a double standard between genealogical Israelites and all others? If we interpret this law to mean that God condones a double standard, the Scriptures become self-contradictory. The key is in seeing that if a foreigner becomes a citizen of Israel, wanting to join Himself to Covenant of God, then he is no longer to be treated as a foreigner who is just passing through.

The foreigner in this case is a guest, not a citizen of Israel. As a citizen of another nation, he does not have the same rights as a citizen of Israel. But if he obtains citizenship in the Kingdom, he must be treated equally. In other words, the law is impartial to all citizens and discriminates only against non-citizens. The reason is because a non-citizen follows a different set of laws and moral practices, for he has not sworn allegiance to Jesus Christ, the King of Israel.

For example, an Israelite could charge interest on a loan to a foreigner (Deut. 23:20). The reason is because the foreigner might obtain an interest-free loan from an Israelite and then loan it at 30% to a Babylonian which was allowed by their laws. Such a person has no right to profit from such an arrangement. But if he was a non-Israelite who had become a citizen of the Kingdom, the law says in Leviticus 25:35-37 that he is to be treated equally.

³⁵ Now in case a countryman of yours becomes poor and his means with regard to you falter, then you are to sustain him, like a stranger or a sojourner, that he may live with you. ³⁶ Do not take usurious interest from him….

In other words, a “countryman” was to be treated “like a stranger or a sojourner” by not exacting usury from him. The way it is worded, the law presumes that the people already know not to charge interest from a resident alien, and so the Israelites are commanded to treat their native countrymen in the same loving manner.

Further, Num. 15:15 and 16 says,

¹⁵ As for the assembly, there shall be one statute for you and for the alien who sojourns with you, a perpetual statute throughout your generations; as you are, so shall the alien be before the Lord. ¹⁶ There is to be one law and one ordinance for you and for the alien who sojourns with you.

As history shows, the people of Judah later interpreted the law differently in order to justify their mistreatment of foreigners. This came out of their pride in thinking that they were more righteous and more holy, having superior genes by virtue of their descent from Abraham. It is natural (in one’s fleshly tendency) to become nationalistic, for we are influenced by conflicts between nations.

By the time Jesus was born, such nationalism was fully ingrained by their past conflict with Samaritans, Greeks, and Romans. Hence, the religious leaders taught the people to despise all foreigners. Even when they attached themselves to God’s covenant, they remained as second-class citizens—something that the Apostle Paul fought with all of his might. We must be careful not to allow such nationalistic self-interest to determine our interpretation of Scripture or to make the law of God our exclusive property.

The Good Samaritan

Jesus told the parable of the Good Samaritan, a story that probably shocked many who heard it. In Luke 10:25, a lawyer came to test Jesus, wanting to know what he should DO to inherit life in the Age to come. It was a loaded question, because an inheritance is something that is given, not earned. Inheritance is not given as payment for services rendered. But if he wished to DO something, then the path is to follow the law perfectly—if you think you can do so. Yet Jesus answered the lawyer with a question of his own: “What is written in the Law? How does it read to you?”

The lawyer gave the correct answer, which was to love God and your neighbor as yourself (Luke 10:27). But the lawyer, still wanting to “test” Jesus, asked Him, “And who is my neighbor?” Luke says in verse 29 that the lawyer wanted to “justify himself.” Today we think of this phrase in terms of making an excuse for bad behavior; but to a student of the law, it meant achieving right standing before God and His law. How does one fulfill the law about loving one’s neighbor?

The definition of neighbor is the central core of the parable that follows. This was very much a problem of law interpretation. The lawyer was a student of the law. No doubt he had been schooled in the near universal belief of his day that neighbor meant a fellow Judean who could trace his ancestry back to Judah and ultimately to Abraham. All others did not qualify for equal treatment.

So Jesus answered his question with the parable of the Samaritan. Samaritans were despised and hated. When Lev. 19:18 commanded Israel to “love your neighbor as yourself,” the religious leaders taught that this applied only to fellow Jews. In fact, it was a religious duty to abhor Samaritans. Jesus’ parable corrected this viewpoint and brought Scriptural interpretation back into alignment with the mind of God.

The man in the parable was traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho, but was robbed and beaten. In Middle Eastern culture, those being robbed are normally not beaten unless they resist the robbery. So it is plain that he resisted being robbed and was beaten severely for his trouble. He was also stripped of his clothing, which would make it difficult for anyone passing by to recognize his nationality or status.

The first to walk by was a priest. Many of the priests in the first century lived in Jericho, and they would come to Jerusalem to minister in the temple when their two-week shift arrived. The priest in the parable simply walked by on the other side. After all, he had priestly duties in the temple, and if the man were dead, he would defile himself by touching him. If he had made himself unclean and then attempted to serve at the altar, he stood in danger of being killed (Mishnah, Sanhedrin 9:6). So the priest walked on.

Next, the Levite came to the scene, and he too did nothing. Levites served as assistants to the priests. He may have been the assistant to the priest walking ahead of him. Hence, if the priest did nothing, surely the Levite was justified in doing the same. He chose to follow the precedent set forth by the priest’s example.

Then a Samaritan came and assisted the wounded man. Though we are not told the nationality of the wounded man, he was presumably a Jew. The outrageous insult came when Jesus said that a hated Samaritan would help a wounded Jew.

Even more astounding is the fact that the Samaritan brought the wounded Jew to an inn in Jericho, which was a Jewish city at that time. Keep in mind that most Jews avoided danger by walking many miles out of their way to go around Samaria. The same was true for a Samaritan in Judea. We may conclude, then, that the Samaritan was willing to put himself in danger by taking the wounded Jew to an inn in Jericho.

The final blow to the lawyer’s ego came when Jesus said that the Samaritan paid two denarii for the wounded Jew’s lodging and care at the inn, which was more than enough for a full week in those days. He was even willing to pay more upon his return, if the cost of his care exceeded this. Jesus then asked the lawyer a final question in Luke 10:36,

³⁶ Which of these three do you think proved to be [ginomai, “became”] a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers hands?

The key here is that Jesus did not ask the lawyer who WAS the neighbor, but who BECAME a neighbor by his actions. Obviously, the Samaritan became the neighbor to the wounded Jew. Why? Because he acted neighborly. Being a neighbor is not about race or nationality—or even religion. The spirit and intent of the law was to treat all men equally with kindness and love.

This parable provides us with the proper way to interpret the law. While Jews may argue that Jesus was violating the law by His good treatment of the Samaritans, in reality He was only violating their misinterpretation of the law. The law mandates impartiality and specifically singles out foreigners as the beneficiaries of this impartial treatment. It is clear, then, that to love our neighbor as ourselves means that we are to love the foreigners as ourselves, as Lev. 19:33 and 34 commands,

³³ When a foreigner resides with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. ³⁴ The foreigner who resides with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself; for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.

If the Israelis had followed this law today, they would have avoided much conflict with the Palestinians. In fact, if they had immigrated to that land as law-abiding Christians, modern history would have been far different. Likewise, if the early Americans had understood this law properly, the modern history of America too would have been far different. Unfortunately, like the Jews, even professing Christians have had difficulty knowing the mind of God that is revealed in His law.

The sons of God are forgivers. They are also impartial in their forgiveness, not limiting their goodwill to their own group, their own race, denomination, or nation. This is the way of life of the sons of God.