John Sietze Bergsma, «The Jubilee: A Post-Exilic Priestly Attempt to Reclaim Lands?», Vol. 84 (2003) 225-246

The article examines the hypothesis that the jubilee legislation of Lev 25 was a post-exilic attempt on the part of returning Judean exiles — particularly the priests — to provide legal justification for the reclamation of their former lands. This hypothesis is found to be dubious because (1) the jubilee did not serve the interests of the socio-economic classes that were exiled, and (2) Lev 25 does not show signs of having been redacted with the post-exilic situation in mind. A comparison with Ezekiel’s vision of restoration points out the differences between Lev 25 and actual priestly land legislation for the post-exilic period.

        Similar views can be found in Habel³⁸ and Gottwald³⁹. However, Fager, while holding that "the priests" may have benefited from receiving back some land, sufficiently points out the inadequacy of this kind of argument:

There are those who believe the jubilee actually bestowed power on the priests through its control of land distribution ... However, the jubilee worked automatically, independent from priestly prerogatives, and it tended to maintain a relatively equal distribution of land, dispersing economic power widely. At most, the priests may have wanted to establish the returning exiles’ right to their ‘fair share’ of the land; however, had they wanted control of the distribution of the land, they could have stated that explicitly in the legislation; the simple presence of the jubilee in the Priestly Code does not express a grab for power by the priests⁴⁰.

 

III. Does the Jubilee Legislation Show Signs
of a "Land-reclamation" Redaction?

        One weakness of the "land-reclamation" hypothesis is that nothing in Lev 25 requires it for explanation. Indeed, prior to Wallis (1969), commentators such as Wellhausen, Kuenen, Eerdmans, Ginzberg, Albright, Jirku, Eichrodt, Noth, and Snaith found it unnecessary to