When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap all the way to the edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and the foreign resident. I am the LORD your God.’”
Parallel translations
- WEB “‘When you reap the harvest of your land, you must not wholly reap into the corners of your field, and you must not gather the gleanings of your harvest. You must leave them for the poor, and for the foreigner. I am Yahweh your God.’”
- KJV And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not make clean riddance of the corners of thy field when thou reapest, neither shalt thou gather any gleaning of thy harvest: thou shalt leave them unto the poor, and to the stranger: I am the LORD your God.
- NKJV ‘When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not wholly reap the corners of your field when you reap, nor shall you gather any gleaning from your harvest. You shall leave them for the poor and for the stranger: I am the Lord your God.’ ”
- NASB ‘When you reap the harvest of your land, moreover, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field nor gather the gleaning of your harvest; you are to leave them for the needy and the stranger. I am the Lord your God.’ ”
- NLT “When you harvest the crops of your land, do not harvest the grain along the edges of your fields, and do not pick up what the harvesters drop. Leave it for the poor and the foreigners living among you. I am the Lord your God.”
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
When harvesting, Israel must leave the field's corners and gleanings for the poor and the foreigner; God is Yahweh.
Overview
Set within the harvest feasts, this law turned gratitude into generosity toward the needy and the outsider. Those blessed with a harvest were to share its margins with the vulnerable, as Ruth would later glean (Ruth 2). True worship of God overflows in mercy and care for the poor, a theme the New Testament richly affirms (James 1:27).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 13
- Lev 19:9–10When you reap the harvest of your land, you are not to reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest.
- Deut 24:19–21If you are harvesting in your field and forget a sheaf there, do not go back to get it. It is to be left for the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow, so that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands.
- Prov 11:24–25One gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds what is right, only to become poor.
- Isa 58:10and if you give yourself to the hungry and satisfy the afflicted soul, then your light will go forth in the darkness, and your night will be like noonday.
- 2 Cor 9:5–12So I thought it necessary to urge the brothers to visit you beforehand and make arrangements for the bountiful gift you had promised. This way, your gift will be prepared generously and not begrudgingly.
- Ruth 2:15–23When Ruth got up to glean, Boaz ordered his young men, “Even if she gathers among the sheaves, do not insult her.
- Isa 58:7–8Isn’t it to share your bread with the hungry, to bring the poor and homeless into your home, to clothe the naked when you see him, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
- Luke 11:41But give as alms the things that are within you, and you will see that everything is clean for you.
- Ruth 2:3–7So Ruth departed and went out into the field and gleaned after the harvesters. And she happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz, who was from the clan of Elimelech.
- Deut 16:11–14and you shall rejoice before the LORD your God in the place He will choose as a dwelling for His Name—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates, as well as the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widows among you.
- Job 31:16–21If I have denied the desires of the poor or allowed the widow’s eyes to fail,
- Ps 41:1–3For the choirmaster. A Psalm of David. Blessed is the one who cares for the poor; the LORD will deliver him in the day of trouble.
- Ps 112:9He has scattered abroad his gifts to the poor; his righteousness endures forever; his horn will be lifted high in honor.
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Every sacrifice, every priest, and every day of atonement points beyond itself to the one perfect offering and the great High Priest who, by his own blood, makes the unclean holy once for all.
How Leviticus 23:22 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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