Leviticus 25:25

25:25 “‘If your brother becomes impoverished and sells some of his property, his near redeemer is to come to you and redeem what his brother sold. ¹ 

Leviticus 25:35

Debt and Slave Regulations

25:35 “‘If your brother ²  becomes impoverished and is indebted to you, ³  you must support ⁴  him; he must live ⁵  with you like a foreign resident. ⁶ 

Nehemiah 5:5

5:5 And now, though we share the same flesh and blood as our fellow countrymen, ⁷  and our children are just like their children, ⁸  still we have found it necessary to subject our sons and daughters to slavery. ⁹  Some of our daughters have been subjected to slavery, while we are powerless to help, ¹⁰  since our fields and vineyards now belong to other people.” ¹¹ 

Nehemiah 5:8

5:8 I said to them, “To the extent possible we have bought back our fellow Jews ¹²  who had been sold to the Gentiles. But now you yourselves want to sell your own countrymen, ¹³  so that we can then buy them back!” They were utterly silent, and could find nothing to say.

Galatians 4:4-5

4:4 But when the appropriate time ¹⁴  had come, God sent out his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 4:5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we may be adopted as sons with full rights. ¹⁵ 

Hebrews 2:11-13

2:11 For indeed he who makes holy and those being made holy all have the same origin, ¹⁶  and so ¹⁷  he is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters, ¹⁸  2:12 saying, “I will proclaim your name to my brothers; ¹⁹  in the midst of the assembly I will praise you.” ²⁰  2:13 Again he says, ²¹  “I will be confident in him,” and again, “Here I am, ²²  with ²³  the children God has given me.” ²⁴ 

[25:25]  ¹ tn Heb “the sale of his brother.”

[25:35]  ² tn It is not clear to whom this refers. It is probably broader than “sibling” (cf. NRSV “any of your kin”; NLT “any of your Israelite relatives”) but some English versions take it to mean “fellow Israelite” (so TEV; cf. NAB, NIV “countrymen”) and others are ambiguous (cf. CEV “any of your people”).

[25:35]  ³ tn Heb “and his hand slips with you.”

[25:35]  ⁴ tn Heb “strengthen”; NASB “sustain.”

[25:35]  ⁵ tn The form וָחַי (vakhay, “and shall live”) looks like the adjective “living,” but the MT form is simply the same verb written as a double ayin verb (see HALOT 309 s.v. חיה qal, and GKC 218 §76.i; cf. Lev 18:5).

[25:35]  ⁶ tn Heb “a foreigner and resident,” which is probably to be combined (see B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 170-71).

[5:5]  ⁷ tn Heb “according to the flesh of our brothers is our flesh.”

[5:5]  ⁸ tn Heb “like their children, our children.”

[5:5]  ⁹ tn Heb “to become slaves” (also later in this verse).

[5:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “there is not power for our hand.” The Hebrew expression used here is rather difficult.

[5:5]  ¹¹ 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).

[5:8]  ¹² tn Heb “our brothers, the Jews.”

[5:8]  ¹³ tn Heb “your brothers.”

[4:4]  ¹⁴ tn Grk “the fullness of time” (an idiom for the totality of a period of time, with the implication of proper completion; see L&N 67.69).

[4:5]  ¹⁵ tn The Greek term υἱοθεσία (Juioqesia) was originally a legal technical term for adoption as a son with full rights of inheritance. BDAG 1024 s.v. notes, “a legal t.t. of ‘adoption’ of children, in our lit., i.e. in Paul, only in a transferred sense of a transcendent filial relationship between God and humans (with the legal aspect, not gender specificity, as major semantic component).” Although some modern translations remove the filial sense completely and render the term merely “adoption” (cf. NAB), the retention of this component of meaning was accomplished in the present translation by the phrase “as sons.”

[2:11]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “are all from one.”

[2:11]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “for which reason.”

[2:11]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “brothers,” but the Greek word may be used for “brothers and sisters” as here (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 1, where considerable nonbiblical evidence for the plural ἀδελφοί [adelfoi] meaning “brothers and sisters” is cited). The context here also indicates both men and women are in view; note especially the collective τὰ παιδία (ta paidia) in v. 14.

[2:12]  ¹⁹ tn Here, because of its occurrence in an OT quotation, τοῖς ἀδελφοῖς (tois adelfois) has been translated simply as “brothers” rather than “brothers and sisters” (see the note on the latter phrase in the previous verse).

[2:12]  ²⁰ sn A quotation from Ps 22:22.

[2:13]  ²¹ tn Grk “and again,” as a continuation of the preceding.

[2:13]  ²² tn Grk “behold, I,” but this construction often means “here is/there is” (cf. BDAG 468 s.v. ἰδού 2).

[2:13]  ²³ tn Grk “and.”

[2:13]  ²⁴ sn A quotation from Isa 8:17-18.