Nehemiah 5:7
5:7 I considered these things carefully
and then registered a complaint with the wealthy
and the officials. I said to them, “Each one of you is seizing the collateral
from your own countrymen!”
Because of them I called for
a great public assembly.
Proverbs 28:9
28:9 The one who turns away his ear from hearing the law,
even his prayer is an abomination.
Jeremiah 34:9-17
34:9 Everyone was supposed to free their male and female Hebrew slaves. No one was supposed to keep a fellow Judean enslaved.
34:10 All the people and their leaders had agreed to this. They had agreed to free their male and female slaves and not keep them enslaved any longer. They originally complied with the covenant and freed them.
34:11 But later
they had changed their minds. They had taken back their male and female slaves that they had freed and forced them to be slaves again.
34:12 That was when the
Lord spoke to Jeremiah,
34:13 “The
Lord God of Israel has a message for you.
‘I made a covenant with your ancestors
when I brought them out of Egypt where they had been slaves.
It stipulated,
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.”
But your ancestors did not obey me or pay any attention to me.
34:15 Recently, however, you yourselves
showed a change of heart and did what is pleasing to me. You granted your fellow countrymen their freedom and you made a covenant to that effect in my presence in the house that I have claimed for my own.
34:16 But then you turned right around
and showed that you did not honor me.
Each of you took back your male and female slaves whom you had freed as they desired, and you forced them to be your slaves again.
34:17 So I, the
Lord, say: “You have not really obeyed me and granted freedom to your neighbor and fellow countryman.
Therefore, I will grant you freedom, the freedom
to die in war, or by starvation or disease. I, the
Lord, affirm it!
I will make all the kingdoms of the earth horrified at what happens to you.
Matthew 18:28-35
18:28 After
he went out, that same slave found one of his fellow slaves who owed him one hundred silver coins.
So
he grabbed him by the throat and started to choke him,
saying, ‘Pay back what you owe me!’
18:29 Then his fellow slave threw himself down and begged him,
‘Be patient with me, and I will repay you.’
18:30 But he refused. Instead, he went out and threw him in prison until he repaid the debt.
18:31 When
his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were very upset and went and told their lord everything that had taken place.
18:32 Then his lord called the first slave
and said to him, ‘Evil slave! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me!
18:33 Should you not have shown mercy to your fellow slave, just as I showed it to you?’
18:34 And in anger his lord turned him over to the prison guards to torture him
until he repaid all he owed.
18:35 So also my heavenly Father will do to you, if each of you does not forgive your
brother
from your heart.”