Leviticus 25:14–17

¹³¶ Thou shalt not defraud thy neighbour, neither rob him: the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the morning.

¹⁷Ye shall not therefore oppress one another; but thou shalt fear thy God: for I am the Lord your God.

³Behold, here I am: witness against me before the Lord, and before his anointed: whose ox have I taken? or whose ass have I taken? or whom have I defrauded? whom have I oppressed? or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind mine eyes therewith? and I will restore it you.

⁴And they said, Thou hast not defrauded us, nor oppressed us, neither hast thou taken ought of any man’s hand.

¹¹Forasmuch therefore as your treading is upon the poor, and ye take from him burdens of wheat: ye have built houses of hewn stone, but ye shall not dwell in them; ye have planted pleasant vineyards, but ye shall not drink wine of them.

¹²For I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins: they afflict the just, they take a bribe, and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their right.

⁴¶ Hear this, O ye that swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of the land to fail,

⁵Saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit?

⁶That we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes; yea, and sell the refuse of the wheat?

⁷The Lord hath sworn by the excellency of Jacob, Surely I will never forget any of their works.

¹²In thee have they taken gifts to shed blood; thou hast taken usury and increase, and thou hast greedily gained of thy neighbours by extortion, and hast forgotten me, saith the Lord God.

¹³¶ Behold, therefore I have smitten mine hand at thy dishonest gain which thou hast made, and at thy blood which hath been in the midst of thee.

⁷In thee have they set light by father and mother: in the midst of thee have they dealt by oppression with the stranger: in thee have they vexed the fatherless and the widow.

⁶Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke?

¹GO to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.

²Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.

³Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.

⁴Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.

⁵Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter.

²And they covet fields, and take them by violence; and houses, and take them away: so they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage.

³Therefore thus saith the Lord; Behold, against this family do I devise an evil, from which ye shall not remove your necks; neither shall ye go haughtily: for this time is evil.

¹⁰¶ Are there yet the treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked, and the scant measure that is abominable?

¹¹Shall I count them pure with the wicked balances, and with the bag of deceitful weights?

¹²For the rich men thereof are full of violence, and the inhabitants thereof have spoken lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their mouth.

⁸Nay, ye do wrong, and defraud, and that your brethren.

¹⁰Then Asa was wroth with the seer, and put him in a prison house; for he was in a rage with him because of this thing. And Asa oppressed some of the people the same time.

¹⁹Thou shalt not wrest judgment; thou shalt not respect persons, neither take a gift: for a gift doth blind the eyes of the wise, and pervert the words of the righteous.

²⁰That which is altogether just shalt thou follow, that thou mayest live, and inherit the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.

⁸¶ If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter: for he that is higher than the highest regardeth; and there be higher than they.

¹⁷Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.

¹²¶ As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths.

¹³The Lord standeth up to plead, and standeth to judge the people.

¹⁴The Lord will enter into judgment with the ancients of his people, and the princes thereof: for ye have eaten up the vineyard; the spoil of the poor is in your houses.

¹⁵What mean ye that ye beat my people to pieces, and grind the faces of the poor? saith the Lord God of hosts.

¹⁵He that walketh righteously, and speaketh uprightly; he that despiseth the gain of oppressions, that shaketh his hands from holding of bribes, that stoppeth his ears from hearing of blood, and shutteth his eyes from seeing evil;

⁷For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.

¹⁷But thine eyes and thine heart are not but for thy covetousness, and for to shed innocent blood, and for oppression, and for violence, to do it.

³And the children of Israel cried unto the Lord: for he had nine hundred chariots of iron; and twenty years he mightily oppressed the children of Israel.

¹⁴And the soldiers likewise demanded of him, saying, And what shall we do? And he said unto them, Do violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely; and be content with your wages.

³¶ That they may do evil with both hands earnestly, the prince asketh, and the judge asketh for a reward; and the great man, he uttereth his mischievous desire: so they wrap it up.

³⁶Behold, we are servants this day, and for the land that thou gavest unto our fathers to eat the fruit thereof and the good thereof, behold, we are servants in it:

³⁷And it yieldeth much increase unto the kings whom thou hast set over us because of our sins: also they have dominion over our bodies, and over our cattle, at their pleasure, and we are in great distress.

³¹He that oppresseth the poor reproacheth his Maker: but he that honoureth him hath mercy on the poor.

¹³Whoso stoppeth his ears at the cry of the poor, he also shall cry himself, but shall not be heard.

¹⁶He that oppresseth the poor to increase his riches, and he that giveth to the rich, shall surely come to want.

¹⁶The prince that wanteth understanding is also a great oppressor: but he that hateth covetousness shall prolong his days.

³A poor man that oppresseth the poor is like a sweeping rain which leaveth no food.

⁸He that by usury and unjust gain increaseth his substance, he shall gather it for him that will pity the poor.

¹⁸To judge the fatherless and the oppressed, that the man of the earth may no more oppress.

¹⁹Because he hath oppressed and hath forsaken the poor; because he hath violently taken away an house which he builded not;

²⁰Surely he shall not feel quietness in his belly, he shall not save of that which he desired.

¹⁸But if he sanctify his field after the jubile, then the priest shall reckon unto him the money according to the years that remain, even unto the year of the jubile, and it shall be abated from thy estimation.

¹⁹And if he that sanctified the field will in any wise redeem it, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of thy estimation unto it, and it shall be assured to him.

²⁰And if he will not redeem the field, or if he have sold the field to another man, it shall not be redeemed any more.

²¹But the field, when it goeth out in the jubile, shall be holy unto the Lord, as a field devoted; the possession thereof shall be the priest’s.

²²And if a man sanctify unto the Lord a field which he hath bought, which is not of the fields of his possession;

²³Then the priest shall reckon unto him the worth of thy estimation, even unto the year of the jubile: and he shall give thine estimation in that day, as a holy thing unto the Lord.

⁵Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand.

²⁷Then let him count the years of the sale thereof, and restore the overplus unto the man to whom he sold it; that he may return unto his possession.

⁵¹If there be yet many years behind, according unto them he shall give again the price of his redemption out of the money that he was bought for.

¹⁴¶ Thou shalt not curse the deaf, nor put a stumblingblock before the blind, but shalt fear thy God: I am the Lord.

³²¶ Thou shalt rise up before the hoary head, and honour the face of the old man, and fear thy God: I am the Lord.

⁴³Thou shalt not rule over him with rigour; but shalt fear thy God.

²⁰And Moses said unto the people, Fear not: for God is come to prove you, and that his fear may be before your faces, that ye sin not.

¹⁸And Joseph said unto them the third day, This do, and live; for I fear God:

¹⁴And if thou sell ought unto thy neighbour, or buyest ought of thy neighbour’s hand, ye shall not oppress one another:

²⁴Only fear the Lord, and serve him in truth with all your heart: for consider how great things he hath done for you.

⁶That no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter: because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also have forewarned you and testified.

⁷Wherefore now let the fear of the Lord be upon you; take heed and do it: for there is no iniquity with the Lord our God, nor respect of persons, nor taking of gifts.

²A devout man, and one that feared God with all his house, which gave much alms to the people, and prayed to God alway.

³⁵But in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him.

³¹Then had the churches rest throughout all Judæa and Galilee and Samaria, and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.

¹⁸How he met thee by the way, and smote the hindmost of thee, even all that were feeble behind thee, when thou wast faint and weary; and he feared not God.

¹¹And Abraham said, Because I thought, Surely the fear of God is not in this place; and they will slay me for my wife’s sake.

¹²And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me.

⁹There is none greater in this house than I; neither hath he kept back any thing from me but thee, because thou art his wife: how then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?

¹⁶He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well with him: was not this to know me? saith the Lord.

⁵For if ye throughly amend your ways and your doings; if ye throughly execute judgment between a man and his neighbour;

⁶If ye oppress not the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, and shed not innocent blood in this place, neither walk after other gods to your hurt:

⁵But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him.

⁵And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear not me, saith the Lord of hosts.

¹⁵But the former governors that had been before me were chargeable unto the people, and had taken of them bread and wine, beside forty shekels of silver; yea, even their servants bare rule over the people: but so did not I, because of the fear of God.

⁹Also I said, It is not good that ye do: ought ye not to walk in the fear of our God because of the reproach of the heathen our enemies?

⁷¶ The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction.

²²Rob not the poor, because he is poor: neither oppress the afflicted in the gate:

⁹The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.

²⁰Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not highminded, but fear:

¹⁸There is no fear of God before their eyes.