“If you lend money to any of my people who are in need, do not charge interest as a money lender would.
Parallel translations
- WEB “If you lend money to any of my people with you who is poor, you shall not be to him as a creditor. You shall not charge him interest.
- KJV If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him as an usurer, neither shalt thou lay upon him usury.
- BSB If you lend money to one of My people among you who is poor, you must not act as a creditor to him; you are not to charge him interest.
- NKJV “If you lend money to any of My people who are poor among you, you shall not be like a moneylender to him; you shall not charge him interest.
- NASB “If you lend money to My people, to the poor among you, you are not to act as a creditor to him; you shall not charge him interest.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Lending to a poor fellow Israelite must not be done as a harsh creditor charging interest. Care for the poor outweighs personal profit.
Overview
This law restrains the wealthy from exploiting the poor through burdensome interest, fostering generosity within the covenant community. It treats lending to the needy as an act of mercy, not gain. Such selfless generosity reflects the grace of God, who in Christ gives freely without demanding repayment we could never make.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 16
- Lev 25:35–37“‘If your brother has become poor, and his hand can’t support himself among you; then you shall uphold him. He shall live with you like an alien and a temporary resident.
- Ps 15:5he who doesn’t lend out his money for usury, nor take a bribe against the innocent. He who does these things shall never be shaken.
- Deut 23:19–20You shall not lend on interest to your brother; interest of money, interest of food, interest of anything that is lent on interest.
- Ezek 18:8he who has not lent on interest, neither has taken any increase, who has withdrawn his hand from iniquity, has executed true justice between man and man,
- Neh 5:7Then I consulted with myself, and contended with the nobles and the rulers, and said to them, “You exact usury, everyone of his brother.” I held a great assembly against them.
- Prov 28:8He who increases his wealth by excessive interest gathers it for one who has pity on the poor.
- Ezek 18:17who has withdrawn his hand from the poor, who has not received interest nor increase, has executed my ordinances, has walked in my statutes; he shall not die for the iniquity of his father, he shall surely live.
- Neh 5:10–11I likewise, my brothers and my servants, lend them money and grain. Please let us stop this usury.
- Jer 15:10Woe is me, my mother, that you have borne me a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have not lent, neither have men lent to me; yet everyone of them curses me.
- Neh 5:2–5For there were that said, “We, our sons and our daughters, are many. Let us get grain, that we may eat and live.”
- 2 Kgs 4:7Then she came and told the man of God. He said, “Go, sell the oil, and pay your debt; and you and your sons live on the rest.”
- Ezek 18:13has lent on interest, and has taken increase; shall he then live? He shall not live. He has done all these abominations. He shall surely die. His blood shall be on him.
- 2 Kgs 4:1Now a certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets cried out to Elisha, saying, “Your servant my husband is dead. You know that your servant feared Yahweh. Now the creditor has come to take for himself my two children to be slaves.”
- Luke 19:23Then why didn’t you deposit my money in the bank, and at my coming, I might have earned interest on it?’
- Ezek 22:12In you have they taken bribes to shed blood. You have taken interest and increase, and you have greedily gained of your neighbors by oppression, and have forgotten me,” says the Lord Yahweh.
- Matt 25:27You ought therefore to have deposited my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received back my own with interest.
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Christ at the center
The Passover lamb whose blood turns away death, the exodus through the sea, the manna, the rock, and the tabernacle where God dwells with his people all foreshadow Jesus — our Passover, our redemption, the bread from heaven, and God-with-us in the flesh.
How Exodus 22:25 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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