BIBLE CHRISTIAN MAGAZINE. THE JUBILEE: A SERMON. BY JAMES THORNE. "And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years shall be unto thee forty and nine years. Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubile to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall ye make the trumpet sound throughout all your land: And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubile unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man to his family. A jubile shall that fiftieth year be unto you: ye shall not sow, neither reap that which groweth of itself in it, nor gather the grapes in it of thy vine undressed. For it is the jubile, it shall be holy unto you ye shall eat the increase thereof out of the field. In the year of this jubile ye shall return every man unto his possession.”—Lev. xxv. 8-13. THERE are various opinions respecting the literal meaning of the word Jubilee. Dr. A. CLARKE remarks, "The most natural derivation is from hobil, to cause to bring back, or recall, because estates, &c., which had been alienated, were then brought back to their primitive owners." The Jews lived under a theocracy—a government immediately superintended by God-and possessed their land by Divine appointment. It was divided among the tribes by lot, and one reason assigned for the Jubilee was, "That the land shall not be sold for ever. An exception was made of houses in walled cities, which might be sold in permanency, not to return to the original owners in this year of Jubilee. By the returning of land to its original owners every fiftieth year, (or, as some suppose, the forty-ninth), provision was made against its accumulating in a few hands. There seems to be in some minds no limit to the desire for adding "house to house, and field to field." Not only during life do men buy up all the lands within reach, but their testamentary arrangements provide for a portion of their annual revenue to be applied to increasing the family lands. The evils engendered by this policy would be enormous, were it carried out to the extent intended; but it sometimes happens, either that these lands descend to a spendthrift who soon disposes of large possessions, or, the direct line becoming extinct, the lands are divided among a host of distant relatives. An exorbitant acquisition of lands is the source of many evils; it tempts the owners to play the tyrant, to oppress the poor, to foster a system strikingly akin to that of caste in India, and to look contemptuously on the poor, who may be greatly superior to them in moral worth. On the other hand, it too often provokes envy and hatred among the poor, and irritates to malicious actions those who smart under oppression; and thus weakens, and sometimes dissolves, the ties that should bind together, in one general bond of brotherhood, all persons in the community. The great Lawgiver, by the appointment of the Jubilee, in which lands were to return to their original owners, wisely guarded the Israelites against this evil; and at the same time taught a lesson to all other people and nations, to avoid a destructive course. Another object secured by this institution was, the keeping a correct genealogical register of the families in the several tribes, which in due time furnished evidence of the Messiahship of the Lord Jesus. It was predicted that that glorious Personage was to come of the tribe of Judah, and the family of David; and the evangelical history informs us that Cæsar Augustus's decree that all the empire should be taxed rendered it necessary that Joseph and Mary should depart from Nazareth and repair to Bethlehem, because they were "of the house and lineage of David ;" and while thus temporarily there, the Saviour was born. Whilst the observance of the Jubilee operated against any attempt of the wealthy to engross to themselves the permanent possession of lands, it also guarded against any being held in hopeless servitude; for although a person in reduced circumstances might be bound to serve another, yet in the year of Jubilee he was to be allowed to depart from that service, "he and his children with him," and to “return to his own family, and unto the possession of his father;" Jehovah declaring, "they are my servants, which I brought forth out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as bondmen." Those whom they served were also enjoined to treat them fairly, "Thou shalt not rule over them with rigour; but shalt fear thy God." The prophecy of Isaiah, lxi. 1, quoted by our Lord in the synagogue at Nazareth, Luke iv. 18, 19,-"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the |