Leviticus 25:39-40

25:39 “‘If your brother becomes impoverished with regard to you so that he sells himself to you, you must not subject him to slave service. ¹  25:40 He must be with you as a hired worker, as a resident foreigner; ²  he must serve with you until the year of jubilee,

Leviticus 25:48

25:48 after he has sold himself he retains a right of redemption. ³  One of his brothers may redeem him,

Nehemiah 5:2-5

5:2 There were those who said, “With our sons and daughters, we are many. We must obtain ⁴  grain in order to eat and stay alive.” 5:3 There were others who said, “We are putting up our fields, our vineyards, and our houses as collateral in order to obtain grain during the famine.” 5:4 Then there were those who said, “We have borrowed money to pay our taxes to the king ⁵  on our fields and our vineyards. 5:5 And now, though we share the same flesh and blood as our fellow countrymen, ⁶  and our children are just like their children, ⁷  still we have found it necessary to subject our sons and daughters to slavery. ⁸  Some of our daughters have been subjected to slavery, while we are powerless to help, ⁹  since our fields and vineyards now belong to other people.” ¹⁰ 

Nehemiah 10:31

10:31 We will not buy ¹¹  on the Sabbath or on a holy day from the neighboring peoples who bring their wares and all kinds of grain to sell on the Sabbath day. We will let the fields lie fallow every seventh year, and we will cancel every loan. ¹² 

Jeremiah 34:14

34:14 “Every seven years each of you must free any fellow Hebrews who have sold themselves to you. After they have served you for six years, you shall set them free.” ¹³  But your ancestors did not obey me or pay any attention to me.

Matthew 18:25

18:25 Because ¹⁴  he was not able to repay it, ¹⁵  the lord ordered him to be sold, along with ¹⁶  his wife, children, and whatever he possessed, and repayment to be made.

Matthew 18:30

18:30 But he refused. Instead, he went out and threw him in prison until he repaid the debt.

Matthew 18:35

18:35 So also my heavenly Father will do to you, if each of you does not forgive your ¹⁷  brother ¹⁸  from your heart.”

James 2:13

2:13 For judgment is merciless for the one who has shown no mercy. But mercy triumphs over ¹⁹  judgment.

¹ tn Heb “you shall not serve against him service of a slave.” A distinction is being made here between the status of slave and indentured servant.

² tn See the note on Lev 25:6 above.

³ tn Heb “right of redemption shall be to him.”

⁴ tn Heb “take” (so also in v. 3).

⁵ tn Heb “for the tax of the king.”

⁶ tn Heb “according to the flesh of our brothers is our flesh.”

⁷ tn Heb “like their children, our children.”

⁸ tn Heb “to become slaves” (also later in this verse).

⁹ tn Heb “there is not power for our hand.” The Hebrew expression used here is rather difficult.

¹⁰ sn The poor among the returned exiles were being exploited by their rich countrymen. Moneylenders were loaning large amounts of money, and not only collecting interest on loans which was illegal (Lev 25:36-37; Deut 23:19-20), but also seizing pledges as collateral (Neh 5:3) which was allowed (Deut 24:10). When the debtors missed a payment, the moneylenders would seize their collateral: their fields, vineyards and homes. With no other means of income, the debtors were forced to sell their children into slavery, a common practice at this time (Neh 5:5). Nehemiah himself was one of the moneylenders (Neh 5:10), but he insisted that seizure of collateral from fellow Jewish countrymen was ethically wrong (Neh 5:9).

¹¹ tn Heb “take.”

¹² tn Heb “debt of every hand,” an idiom referring to the hand that holds legally binding contractual agreements.

¹³ sn Compare Deut 15:12-18 for the complete statement of this law. Here only the first part of it is cited.

¹⁴ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

¹⁵ tn The word “it” is not in the Greek text, but is implied. Direct objects were often omitted in Greek when clear from the context.

¹⁶ tn Grk “and his wife.”

¹⁷ tn Grk “his.” The pronoun has been translated to follow English idiom (the last pronoun of the verse [“from your heart”] is second person plural in the original).

¹⁸ tn Here the term “brother” means “fellow believer” or “fellow Christian” (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 2.a), whether male or female. Concerning the familial connotations, see also the note on the first occurrence of this term in v. 15.

¹⁹ tn Grk “boasts against, exults over,” in victory.