And you shall number seven sabbaths of years unto you, seven times seven years; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years shall be unto you forty and nine years.
Read Chapter 25
George Leo Haydock
AD 1849
Years. It is dubious whether the 49th or the 50th year was appointed for the jubilee. The former year is fixed upon by many able chronologers, who remark, that if two years of rest had occurred together, it would have been a serious inconvenience; and Moses might have said the 50th year for a round number, or comprise therein the year of the former jubilee, as we give five years to the olympiad, and eight days to the week, though the former consists only of four years, and the latter of seven days. (Rader; Scaliger;) But others decide for the fiftieth year, ver. 10. (Philo; Josephus, iii. 10.; St. Augustine, q. 92.; Salien;) (Calmet)
On the feast of expiation of the 49th year, they promulgated the following to be the year of jubilee. (Menochius)
Usher places the first in the year of the world 2609, 49 years after the partition of the land by Josue in 2560: Salien dates 50 years from the entrance (ver. 2,) of the Hebrews into Chanaan, in the year of the world 2583, six years sooner; and places the first jubilee 2633, immediately after the sabbatic year, which fell in the 32nd year of Othoniel. He supposes that both were proclaimed at the same time, on the 1st of Tisri, Ros Hassana, "the head of the year "though the heralds went about the country only on the 10th. The writers both of the Synagogue and of the Church generally adopt the 50th for the year of jubilee; and the pretended inconvenience of two years' rest is nugatory, since God promised a three years' crop, ver. 21. (Haydock)
