Leviticus 25:14

25:14 If you make a sale ¹  to your fellow citizen ²  or buy ³  from your fellow citizen, no one is to wrong his brother. ⁴ 

Leviticus 25:17

25:17 No one is to oppress his fellow citizen, ⁵  but you must fear your God, because I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 25:1

Regulations for the Sabbatical Year

25:1 The Lord spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai:

Leviticus 12:3-4

12:3 On ⁶  the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin ⁷  must be circumcised. 12:4 Then she will remain ⁸  thirty-three days in blood purity. ⁹  She must not touch anything holy and she must not enter the sanctuary until the days of her purification are fulfilled. ¹⁰ 

Proverbs 22:22

22:22 Do not exploit ¹¹  a poor person because he is poor

and do not crush the needy in court, ¹² 

Jeremiah 7:6

7:6 Stop oppressing foreigners who live in your land, children who have lost their fathers, and women who have lost their husbands. ¹³  Stop killing innocent people ¹⁴  in this land. Stop paying allegiance to ¹⁵  other gods. That will only bring about your ruin. ¹⁶ 

Micah 2:2

2:2 They confiscate the fields they desire,

and seize the houses they want. ¹⁷ 

They defraud people of their homes, ¹⁸ 

and deprive people of the land they have inherited. ¹⁹ 

Zephaniah 3:1

Jerusalem is Corrupt

3:1 The filthy, ²⁰  stained city is as good as dead;

the city filled with oppressors is finished! ²¹ 

James 2:6

2:6 But you have dishonored the poor! ²²  Are not the rich oppressing you and dragging you into the courts?

[25:14]  ¹ tn Heb “sell a sale.”

[25:14]  ² tn Or “to one of your countrymen” (NIV); NASB “to your friend.”

[25:14]  ³ tn The Hebrew infinitive absolute קָנֹה (qanoh, “buying”) substitutes for the finite verb here in sequence with the previous finite verb “sell” at the beginning of the verse (see GKC 345 §113.z).

[25:14]  ⁴ tn Heb “do not oppress a man his brother.” Here “brother” does not refer only to a sibling, but to a fellow Israelite.

[25:17]  ⁵ tn Heb “And you shall not oppress a man his fellow citizen.”

[12:3]  ⁶ tn Heb “and in….”

[12:3]  ⁷ tn This rendering, “the flesh of his foreskin,” is literal. Based on Lev 15:2-3, one could argue that the Hebrew word for “flesh” here (בָּשָׂר, basar) is euphemistic for the male genitals and therefore translate “the foreskin of his member” (see, e.g., J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:748). A number of English versions omit this reference to the foreskin and mention only circumcision, presumably for euphemistic reasons (cf. NIV, NCV, TEV, CEV, NLT).

[12:4]  ⁸ tn Heb “sit, dwell” (יָשָׁב, yashav) normally means “to sit, to dwell”), but here it means “to remain, to stay” in the same condition for a period of time (cf., e.g., Gen 24:55).

[12:4]  ⁹ tn Heb “in bloods of purification” or “purifying” or “purity”; NASB “in the blood of her purification”; NRSV “her time of blood purification.” See the following note.

[12:4]  ¹⁰ tn The initial seven days after the birth of a son were days of blood impurity for the woman as if she were having her menstrual period. Her impurity was contagious during this period, so no one should touch her or even furniture on which she has sat or reclined (Lev 15:19-23), lest they too become impure. Even her husband would become impure for seven days if he had sexual intercourse with her during this time (Lev 15:24; cf. 18:19). The next thirty-three days were either “days of purification, purifying” or “days of purity,” depending on how one understands the abstract noun טֹהֳרָה (toharah, “purification, purity”) in this context. During this time the woman could not touch anything holy or enter the sanctuary, but she was no longer contagious like she had been during the first seven days. She could engage in normal everyday life, including sexual intercourse, without fear of contaminating anyone else (B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 73-74; cf. J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:749-50). Thus, in a sense, the thirty-three days were a time of blood “purity” (cf. the present translation) as compared to the previous seven days of blood “impurity,” but they were also a time of blood “purification” (or “purifying”) as compared to the time after the thirty-three days, when the blood atonement had been made and she was pronounced “clean” by the priest (see vv. 6-8 below). In other words, the thirty-three day period was a time of “blood” (flow), but this was “pure blood,” as opposed to the blood of the first seven days.

[22:22]  ¹¹ tn Two negated jussives form the instruction here: אַל־תִּגְזָל (’al-tigzal, “do not exploit”) and וְאַל־תְּדַכֵּא (ve’al-tÿdakke’, “do not crush”).

[22:22]  ¹² tn Heb “in the gate” (so KJV); NAB, NASB, NRSV “at the gate.” The “gate” of the city was the center of activity, the place of business as well as the place for settling legal disputes. The language of the next verse suggests a legal setting, so “court” is an appropriate translation here.

[7:6]  ¹³ tn Heb “Stop oppressing foreigner, orphan, and widow.”

[7:6]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “Stop shedding innocent blood.”

[7:6]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “going/following after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for an explanation of the idiom involved here.

[7:6]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “going after other gods to your ruin.”

[2:2]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “they desire fields and rob [them], and houses and take [them] away.”

[2:2]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “and they oppress a man and his home.”

[2:2]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and a man and his inheritance.” The verb עָשַׁק (’ashaq, “to oppress”; “to wrong”) does double duty in the parallel structure and is understood by ellipsis in the second line.

[3:1]  ²⁰ tn The present translation assumes מֹרְאָה (mor’ah) is derived from רֹאִי (ro’i,“excrement”; see Jastrow 1436 s.v. רֳאִי). The following participle, “stained,” supports this interpretation (cf. NEB “filthy and foul”; NRSV “soiled, defiled”). Another option is to derive the form from מָרָה (marah, “to rebel”); in this case the term should be translated “rebellious” (cf. NASB, NIV “rebellious and defiled”). This idea is supported by v. 2. For discussion of the two options, see HALOT 630 s.v. I מרא and J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 206.

[3:1]  ²¹ tn Heb “Woe, soiled and stained one, oppressive city.” The verb “is finished” is supplied in the second line. On the Hebrew word הוֹי (hoy, “ah, woe”), see the note on the word “dead” in 2:5.

[2:6]  ²² tn This is singular: “the poor person,” perhaps referring to the hypothetical one described in vv. 2-3.