Calum Carmichael, «The Sabbatical/Jubilee Cycle and the Seven-Year Famine in Egypt», Vol. 80 (1999) 224-239

The comparative method is of limited value in locating the Sabbatical/Jubilee cycle of Leviticus 25 within the framework of similar institutions in the ancient Near East. Not only is the character of the biblical institution distinctively Israelite, but so is the manner in which the Levitical lawgiver devised the entire cycle. The lawgiver formulated rules to ensure that the Israelites do not do what the Egyptians did in their land (Lev 18,3). Borrowing details from the Genesis account of the seven-year famine in Egypt, the lawgiver set out Yahweh’s scheme for his people’s welfare. The scheme stands opposed to the pharaoh’s for the Egyptians at the time of the famine.

transaction with them when he gives them seed to grow in the fields. Leviticus 27 addresses issues about Yahweh’s claims to an Israelite’s possessions and person, and the transactions that follow.

        For the Levitical lawgiver the figure of Yahweh corresponds to the figure of the pharaoh. He is, however, alert to the obvious fact that in translating this correspondence into real life the perception of Yahweh is necessarily different from the perception of the pharaoh³⁰. Yahweh does not have power over the Israelites in the same way that the pharaoh has power over the Egyptians. Consequently, the situations of the Egyptians and the Israelites differ. The Egyptians have no fields or houses or animals to give over to the pharaoh because he has already acquired them, nor can they give their persons because they already belong to him. The only transaction they enter into with the pharaoh concerns the production of food. He gives them seed to sow the fields and later at the harvest they keep four fifths of its yield for themselves and give him the remaining fifth.

        In regard to their possessions and persons the Israelites have a different but related order from the Egyptian one. Sometimes Yahweh, like the pharaoh, unconditionally requires the Israelites to hand over certain of their animals, certain produce from their fields, and even certain persons (those "devoted" or "banned" [Mrx], Lev 27,28.29). The exercise of such absolute authority on the part of Yahweh is on a scale comparable to the pharaoh’s at the time of the famine. Although I would stress that the ruling power in Israel is but analogous to the one in Egypt it seems clear that there has been a conscious attempt to relate the effects of the one to the other. Thus the rates of redemption in the rules for persons who are dedicated to Yahweh (as against those "banned") appear to be the equivalent of those for slaves³¹. In other words, the analogous, not strictly parallel, Israelite situation to the Egyptian one is that of the religious equivalent of secular slavery.

        Other times an Israelite, unlike an Egyptian with the pharaoh,