Jubilee,Discipleship and Social Rest

Abstract

As we structure the economic and social practices of the communities, institutions and nations of which we are all a part, jubilee calls us to discipleship. Jubilee speaks to the creation of societies of hope, of celebration and of prosperity. It is about the creation of social rest as we rest in God. This requires the careful and intentional formation of agents of social rest. Jubilee clearly advocates for proactive rather than reactive social practices in relation to immediate needs as well as long-term social legacy. Jubilee clearly addresses six of the 10 principles for just peacemaking.

Keywords

Discipleship jubilee narrative mutuality peacemaking social rest social hermeneutic

Let us consider how to stir one another to love and good works. (Hebrews 10:24)

There are different wells within your heart.

Some fill with each good rain,

Others are far too deep for that. (Hafiz)

There is a particular romanticism in the human soul that is awakened by jubilee, an instinctive longing for something that is all too often fleeting or absent. ‘In the contemporary Christian church, one does not need to look far to find references to the biblical Jubilee‘ (Bruno, 2010: 81). In the experience of celebration and social rest so beautifully prescribed in the Levitical instructions, in the laments of the prophets facing jubilee’s absence within the community of God, in Jesus’ proclamation of redemption and release and in the early church experiences of jubilary mutuality, we poignantly find ourselves and our communities, with all their brokenness and need, hopes and dreams, challenges and quandaries. Jubilee is a lived narrative deep within our history and experience.

The progression of jubilee through the history of its engagement within communities of God’s people has often been discussed in the language of metaphor or symbol. Robert Willoughby (1995: 47) speaks of ‘the Jubilee trajectory’. Harking back to Deuteronomy, he takes the narrative to theological and practical origins that were in place even before the Levitical instructions were given. John Howard Yoder uses the even broader conceptualisation of jubilee as ‘the idiom of the Bible’ (Yoder, 2009: 17). But relegation of jubilee to a succession of motifs, whether symbolic, metaphorical or eschatological (Dennison, 2016; Sloan, 1977), does not do justice to the gravity with which the experience of jubilee has been articulated. Jubilee has been, since its Mosaic delivery through to the present day, a lived reality, experienced deeply by God himself, and in its practice as well as its absence, experienced profoundly by God’s people (Bergsma, 2007:1). The account of jubilee experience is one of lament and hope, correction and blessing, proclamation and pleading, community and alienation. We do not know it as one without the other. Nor do we experience it without also experiencing the history of how it has been experienced by others.

Jubilee has come to us, within our contemporary context, not only as a text with an origin but as a tradition with a history (Ringe, 2004), a history of which we are a part. Sharon Ringe employs the language of ‘image’ to describe the traverse of jubilee through its interpretive and experiential tradition. The images of jubilee ‘bear the mark both of a particular context in which they emerged, and of the cultural, historical, and ecclesial traditions through which they have passed’ (Ringe, 2004: 9). Jubilee has a history of interpretation and is itself an interpretive story. The transformative power of jubilee lies beyond its deeply human language. Jubilee is a deeply human narrative which employs ‘language that is especially appropriate to matters at the core of human life’ (Ringe, 2004: 2). Jubilee is more than a continually expressed set of concepts which has found itself applicable to a progression of contexts in which God’s people have found themselves. It is a significantly lived narrative that has been continually experienced by the people of God.

Three practical implications of an experiential narrative understanding of jubilee are addressed in the current article. First, the hermeneutical task presented by the ‘living’, experiential narrative of jubilee is not solely defined by textual criticism. Of primary import for those who seek to join the narrative is identification of the hermeneutic which the narrative itself provides for its experience. The social hermeneutic of mutuality operates as an important guide for how the jubilee narrative is to be sociologically understood and practiced.

Second, a hermeneutical conceptualisation of the narrative’s intent places significant emphasis on continued, contemporary embrace of this intent. Every generation is called to live out the narrative. This requires an understanding of the ‘abiding concern’ of the narrative. The concept of social rest is proposed as the ‘abiding sociological concern’ of the jubilee narrative.

Lastly, the jubilee narrative is experienced by a succession of actors, whose roles and responsibilities must continually be examined by the narrative itself, and a succession of communities, whose conditions must continually be measured against the standards of the same narrative. There is a continual need for the development of actors and communities who can engage with the jubilee narrative and respond to its examination. This is a task of discipleship. The call of jubilee is a call to formation, to the fostering of sociological postures within the people of God that equip them to live deeply as those blessed by God, fully empowered to be a blessing to the nations (Gen. 12:2), to be ‘enriched in every way to be generous in every way‘ (2 Cor. 9:11 (ESV)).

This article closes with a reflection on how the social hermeneutic of mutuality can be applied today, in the spirit of jubilee, to pursue contemporary conditions of social rest through the process of discipling within communities of the people of God.

Experiencing the Levitical Jubilee: Leviticus 25:8-55

The Mosaic jubilee was a practice of expectation. It was to occur calendrically (v8) and was the basis for deep practices of social rest (vv11-55; Zion, 2013). When jubilee was proclaimed it was publicly marked by a trumpet blast of celebration throughout the land. It was experienced as a divinely instituted (v1), divinely blessed (vv21-22) point of hope, both in its observance and as it was expectantly awaited (vv16, 28, 40, 50-55; Sklar, 2014: 310). It was to be universally prepared for as a long-term social practice (vv15, 25-34, 40, 50), joyfully expected as the year of jubilee rest was approaching (vv10, 21-22) and practiced by all who lived in the land God had given to his people (v10). The land itself was to receive rest as part of the ‘deep Sabbath’ practice of jubilee (v11).

The year of jubilee was to be consecrated (v10), and it was to be observed with reverence (v12). Preparations for and practices of jubilee were founded on a covenantal identity (Gunjević, 2018). Twice, this covenantal identity is clearly described in Leviticus 25:

I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan and to be your God. (v38)

… for the Israelites belong to me as servants. They are my servants, whom I brought out of Egypt. I am the Lord your God. (v55)

This identity was shared by every member of the people of God, giving them a mutual position before God (vv39, 55) and thus warranted postures of mutual recognition, respect and concern for one another (vv14, 17, 35-36). A significant aspect of this shared, mutual identity was the provision of God for his people through land, family and rest (vv10-12). In order to fully experience the blessing that these were to be, the people of God were given the jubilee. They were to mutually value this gift, corporately prepare for it, live it out and fully enjoy it together, celebrating it as a people richly loved by God.

Jubilee was a corporate experience which provided a clear reminder of shared identity and position before God. It was also specifically designed to enrich this corporate identity and position, not just celebrate it. The jubilee laws were given to God’s people for their flourishing. They were significant for the deep protection of healthy social conditions which were an integral part of being and becoming the people of God. There was a constant danger present among the people of God that his blessings, which had been given to strengthen them as a people and allow them to thrive, would become the means of dividing and destroying their mutually shared prosperity. Jubilee was meant to promote social conditions of attentiveness and awareness, postures which made well-being and prosperity a goal to be pursued together, for mutual benefit.

Jubilee required a profound ethical awareness that went beyond practices of economic parity or preservation of human liberty. Jubilee established a foundational sociological principle of mutuality. Mutuality is the principle of, ‘from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs‘ (Graeber, 2011: 94). A posture of mutuality is ‘an appreciation of the wholeness of the other person with a special awareness of the other’s subjective experience … the other person is not there merely to take care of one’s needs’ (Jordan, 1986: 2).

An Experience of Mutuality

Mutuality in the Levitical jubilee is most clearly evident in the recognition of universal agency. Whether rich or poor, powerful or powerless, landed or unlanded, every individual had a role. All were required to return to their ancestral land and family (vv10-13); thus some were to release and some were to be released. All were commanded to handle the process of debt in a responsible manner (vv14-16). Debt was to be calculated, and managed with reference to a reasonable, shared understanding of valuation. The terms of land lease are clearly bracketed in the Levitical text with the phrase, ‘Do not take advantage of each other‘ (vv14, 17), expressing the ‘importance of free, mutually beneficial transactions’ (Levine, 2010: 75).

But the call to socially productive agency did not stop with the management of debt. There is a realistic understanding in the jubilee laws of the range of situations into which life can place an individual. Prior to a situation in which a debt arrangement was to be considered, the text urges a posture of charity.

‘If your brother becomes poor or unable to support himself, help …’ (v35).

The rationale for this posture is the shared social status of ‘fellow Israelites’ (v35). The social goal of this posture was to maintain each member of society’s ability to ‘continue to live among’ one another (vv35, 36), to stay positionally within the community. This was a position before God and established by God. Each member of the community of God was to recognise a lived, shared, positional experience of mutuality.

Beyond situations for which immediate charity was to be the appropriate response, there was also recognition in the jubilee laws of the possibility for more extended difficulty. For situations which required a different kind of responsibility, beyond what a relationship of charity was designed to provide, borrowing became necessary. However, there was to be no profiting from another’s misfortune (v36). This seems to be the kind of situation which the earlier principles of land lease are addressing (vv14-16).

Jubilee also gives recognition to difficulties that could place an individual into long-term destitution. This was a different kind of situation, along the path of ‘accelerating destitution’ (Zion, 2013), which could not be addressed by immediate charity, short-term loans or even long-term leasing of land. In such situations a limitation was laid down. The year of jubilee was the point beyond which destitution could not extend (vv39-41).

Within the jubilee laws, the personhood of each individual was not defined by what they owned or controlled, but rather by their place as a discerning, contributive person in society. This was not a personhood of autonomy. It was a personhood of connectedness. Personhood was always in relation to others. In relation to God, and others within society, each individual was called to discern, from a posture of mutuality, the appropriate response to the needs of others.

A posture of mutuality was naturally understood within the jubilee laws as a posture of empathy, ‘the process of understanding a person’s subjective experience by vicariously sharing that experience’ (Ioannidou and Konstantikaki, 2008: 119; Zinn, 1993). Jubilee assumed a highly attuned posture of mutual empathy within the people of God (vv42, 46, 53, 55).

‘… you must see to it that those who to whom they owe service do not rule over them ruthlessly’ (v53).

The mutuality of jubilee was a relational concept which recognised difference, for it is ‘the nature of human life that someone is always rising and someone is always falling’ (Zion, 2013: 238). The Levitical instructions worked hard to clearly identify equality before God (v23, 38, 42, 55), but distinctiveness within community (Levine, 2010: 76–79). This distinctiveness had to be matched with empathy and ‘preference for the other’. In his commentary on Leviticus 25:36, SR Hirsch writes:

The Torah says: the life of your brother is with you (Lev. 25:36) … the whole of the development of his life, the fulfillment of the mission of his life is closely bound up with you and yours. You are not there only for yourself, and you do not earn only for yourself. Although, in the first instance, you have to look after yourself in order to acquire the means which enable you to accomplish the mission in life which God has set for you, part of this mission in life is to acquire also the means which enable you to help the brother who is socially connected with you to achieve the mission of his life. What you earn you earn for yourself and for him. His life is bound up with you and with what you possess. (Hirsch and Levy, 1962: 768)

Jubilee mutuality did not seek to remove difference so much as it sought to strengthen connection despite differences. The jubilee rhythms acted as a reminder, as a means to keep empathy at the forefront. They defined an ethic of each playing their part for the good of the other. This looked different in each situation. It was a posture before it was a practice. It was a readiness which facilitated the observance of the rule.

A Social Hermeneutic for the Jubilee Narrative

The soteriological themes of the jubilee text in Leviticus 25:8-55 were not new to the people of God. Prior to the jubilee instructions, Sabbath expectations (Ex. 16:4-5, 26, 20:8-12, 23:10-12, 31:12-18; Lev. 23:3), the principles of redemption (Ex. 15:16-17, 21:8), God’s covenant with his people (Ex. 23:20-22, 25-33, 24:1-11, 29:45-46, 34:10-16, 35:1-3) and the necessity of atonement within this covenant (Ex. 29; Lev. 1, 4:1-5:19, 7:1-38) had all been established by God. The sociological themes of the Levitical jubilee were also not new. Laws concerning slavery (Ex. 22:11), care for the poor and less fortunate (Ex. 22:21-24) and just lending of money (Ex. 22:25-27) had previously been established by God.

The uniqueness of the jubilee laws lay in the new context they were addressing. They were written for a unique time in the history of God’s people, when the latter would have their first full experience of the blessings promised to Abraham (Gen. 17:1-9). The people were to be a nation, united under the rule of God, in the land that he had given them, positioned to flourish under the covenant he had established. The jubilee laws were specifically designed to contribute to the shared experience of this flourishing by every member of God’s blessed community. Noam Zion describes this shared experience as ‘a matter of … social identity’ (Zion, 2013: 18). The sociological intent of the Levitical jubilee was to provide a solid foundation for this shared experience by establishing a deep sociological posture within the hearts of God’s people, a posture of mutuality.

As the jubilee narrative is taken up by the prophets (Is. 55-58, 61; Jer. 34; Ezek. 46; Dan. 9), this sociological posture of mutuality becomes a central interpretive mechanism for their understanding of God’s expectations of his people. Jesus’ personal embrace of the soteriological and sociological intent of the jubilee narrative (Luke 4:16-30) enshrined mutuality into the fabric of what his followers came to practice in their daily lives. Jesus ‘expected his disciples to follow his example of care, and this is, in fact, what the early Christians did (Acts 2:44-47; 4:34)’ (Sklar, 2014: 301). The sociological entreaties of Galatians 5-6, James 2 and 1 John 3:17 are a few examples of the early church’s continued experience of and discipleship towards this jubilee posture of mutuality.

The manner in which the sociological force of the Levitical jubilee instructions carries through the narrative of jubilee as it has come down to us today is more than just thematic or even metaphorical. Jubilee mutuality, initiated in Leviticus, focuses the proclamation, experience and embodiment of the developing narrative. The interpretive force of this posture of mutuality is that of a social hermeneutic for the jubilee narrative we have come to know and live.

In his exploration of the means by which one can understand a lived narrative, Narayan Kafle (2011) provides a short list of steps, three of which I propose can guide ‘living out’ the social hermeneutic which undergirds the jubilee narrative: ‘commitment to an abiding concern, oriented stance toward the question, investigating the experience as it is lived’ (Kafle, 2011: 191). Each of these steps poses a question to the jubilee narrative and to us: What is the abiding sociological concern which ‘mutuality’ provides for the jubilee narrative (to which, therefore, we must be committed)? How do we ‘orient’ ourselves towards this concern? How do we ‘enter in’ to the jubilee narrative, to practically live it, so that we may ‘continue to live alongside one another’ (Lev. 25:35-36), fully embracing the realities of ‘mutuality’?

These are questions of discipleship. They provide a personal, formative guide to a contemporary experience of the jubilee narrative. In the remainder of this article, each of these questions is explored. First, the ‘abiding sociological concern’ for social rest within the jubilee narrative is considered. This is followed by an exposition of the ‘transformative orientation’ towards this concern which the narrative provides. Finally, there is a reflection on how a concern for social rest can be ‘lived out’. Three principles for ‘discipling agents of social rest’ are proposed.

An ‘Abiding Concern’ for Social Rest

The sociological import of the jubilee instructions of Leviticus is deeper than a set of rules that, when followed, please God and prompt his granting of prosperity in response. The role of God’s responsive blessing is certainly clear in the jubilee narrative. The covenantal proclamations of Leviticus 26:3-13 describe the progression of divine actions which will be taken if his instructions are obeyed (vv3-13) or if they are not (vv14-33). Within the jubilee narrative, however, there is also a constructive blessing, delineating the manner by which the people of God can be agents in the process of their own blessing. Leviticus 25:18-19 introduces the interwoven nature of God’s responsive blessing and the sociologically obtained constructive blessing offered in jubilee: ‘Follow my decrees and be careful to obey my laws, and you will live safely in the land. Then the land will yield its fruit, and you will eat your fill and live there in safety’. The concept of ‘living safely in the land’, which is the ultimate sociological intent of the jubilee narrative, is described in more detail in Leviticus 26:5b-6a: ‘… you shall eat your bread to the full and dwell in your land securely. I will give peace in the land, and you shall lie down and none shall make you afraid’ (ESV).

This ‘utopian’ (Breuggemann, 1994: 20; Walzer, 1993: 71) condition of prosperity, security and peace differs from earlier blessings listed in Leviticus 26 in the depth of its agency. It is only God who can give the ‘rains in their season’ (v4 (ESV)), cause the fields and trees to produce fruit in abundance (vv4b-5a), ‘remove harmful beasts from the land’ (v6a (ESV)) and provide victory in the face of enemies (vv6b-8). But, the conditions of sociological blessing which jubilee is designed to promote are to be achieved cooperatively.

With its strong jubilary resonance, Isaiah 58:1-12 clearly expresses divine lament over the failure of his people to comprehend the constructive, cooperative design of jubilee (Gunjević, 2018:129). Isaiah expresses God’s incredulity with regard to the manner in which the social hermeneutic of jubilee was not understood: ‘Yet they seek me daily and delight to know my ways, as if they were a nation that did righteousness and did not forsake the judgment of their God’ (Isa. 58:2a (ESV)).

Isaiah’s prophetic lament places God’s sociological intent (Isa. 58:6-7) into juxtaposition with the desire of God’s people to experience his blessing (Isa. 58:2b-3a), the assumption that this blessing is primarily tied to ritual practices (Isa. 58:3a) and a blindness to their neglect of a deeper sociological posture of jubilee concern (Isa. 58:3b-5).

God’s sociological vision within the jubilee narrative is the establishment of a people of God who are a blessing to one another. The ‘abiding sociological concern’ in the jubilee narrative is for what can be labelled social rest. ‘Social unrest’ (Kohl and Farthing, 2009; Tufekci and Freelon, 2013) is a more frequently referenced concept today than ‘social rest’. ‘Social unrest’ is a state of affairs associated with a myriad of dysfunctional inter-relational dynamics within a social group. It consists of actions taken by members of a social group as an expression of disgruntlement with a social situation, against others who are deemed to be the cause or source of dissatisfactory conditions. ‘Social unrest’ arises from social conditions which have failed to provide, for at least some members of a social group, the results they were expecting or for which they were hoping.

The importance of the jubilee narrative is frequently expressed with reference to conditions which are considered to be significant causes of ‘social unrest’ (Baker, 1998; Harbin, 2011). Slavery, disparity of wealth and relative difference of power are often expressed as ‘evils’ which are the source of society’s ills. On closer analysis, however, it becomes clear that the sociological intent of the jubilee narrative is not oriented towards correction of ‘social unrest’. The jubilee narrative addresses the more fundamental tasks of mitigating for conditions which will inevitably cause ‘social unrest’, and contributing, at the same time, to conditions which will lead to social flourishing. This mitigative, productive state is social rest, a condition of mutually embraced, intentional, healthy social agency. The sociological intent of the jubilee narrative is not corrective but preemptive. It is not reactive, but rather proactive.

The jubilee narrative’s social hermeneutic of mutuality places an emphasis on the importance of preemptive, proactive social agency with the goal of creating conditions of social rest. The jubilee challenge is one of ‘prevention rather than cure … to design a society’s institutions in a fallen world so as to maximise the likelihood of positive relational outcomes, and address the most fundamental causes of relational breakdown’ (Schluter, 2007: 1). Social rest is a condition in which all can maximally enjoy what God has given and maximally seek to use these God-given gifts to benefit others. These conditions require intentionality to achieve.

The contribution of the processes of redemption offered in Leviticus 25:24-34 within God’s vision for social rest is significant. Noam Zion’s (2013) commentary on the ‘forms of brotherly redemption’ in Leviticus 25 provides an important perspective on the need for intentional agency towards social rest:

Leviticus 25 envisions a society which is made up of a web of brothers related to one another in terms of mutual obligation to redeem one’s brother…Long before the Jubilee year the remedies for one’s needy brother are supposed to prevent a state of indebtedness from plaguing members of society or from further sinking individuals into a landless, debt-ridden slavery…Even after further declines, there is an escalation of preventative intervention. Human redemption does not await a complete fall, but begins to prop up one’s faltering brothers…Brothers are not meant to be wholly selfless, but in doing their duty they know they are creating bonds of mutual aid that provide for a community based insurance policy. (Zion, 2013: 240, emphasis in original)

This ‘insurance policy’ is the crux of social rest. It is a foundation for avoiding social unrest as well as building a flourishing social net in which all can prosper. Redemption is the ultimate expression of a posture of mutuality. It is a sacrificial act of restoration, an investment in the deep welfare of society. The various elements of jubilee which are introduced in the Levitical instructions – the principles for shared valuation and lease (vv14-17), the processes of redemption (vv24-34) and the steps of mitigation against the escalation of destitution (vv35-43) – each contribute to conditions which facilitate the constructive blessings which allow for living ‘safely’ and ‘securely’ in the land (Lev. 25:18-19; 26:5b-6a).

A ‘Transformative Orientation’ Towards Social Rest

It would be difficult to separate the contemporary conceptualisation of the jubilee narrative from its Messianic appropriation in the person of Jesus. Though jubilee originated within the Mosaic Law, it found new birth in the life and teaching of the Christ. In his Just Peacemaking, Glen Stassen (1992) uses the language of ‘transformation’ to describe the soteriological and sociological intent of the words and works of Jesus. Within his in-depth exposition of the Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5-7), Stassen references the importance of Jesus’ jubilary proclamations in Luke 4 for shaping our sociological understanding of ‘God’s transforming initiatives to deliver us from the vicious cycles in which we get stuck’ (Stassen, 1992: 37). Stassen identifies two aspects of God’s vision for sociological transformation which can inform a contemporary ‘orientation’ towards the jubilee narrative. These can be labelled as ‘internal’ and ‘external’ transformative orientations.

First, ‘God is taking transformative initiatives, and we are asked to participate in what God is doing, imitating God’s initiatives’ (Stassen, 1992: 38). We are to orient ourselves towards the sociological concern of the jubilee narrative by imitating Christ. This is an ‘internal’ transformative orientation which involves a personal embrace of the character and practices of Jesus. This personal embrace is defined by Jesus in the language of ‘following’ (Lk. 18:22-23), an orientation which requires a full surrender to the agency of Christ in determining how one lives one’s life.

As he opens his public ministry with a proclamation of ‘the year of the Lord’s favour’ (Lk. 4:19), Jesus profoundly reiterates and then ‘re-orients’ the agentive principles of the jubilee narrative. The delineation between responsive blessings and cooperative blessings, which was stressed in the Levitical jubilee, is now removed as Jesus takes on primary agency for the attainment of both. He declares, ‘The Spirit of the Lord is on me, for he has anointed me … He has sent me …’ (Lk. 4:18 (ESV)). The covenantal contingency of obedience that was required of God’s people in order for them to continue to live under the blessings of his covenant with them was declared ‘fulfilled in your hearing’ (Lk. 4:21). Jesus could declare the Lord’s jubilee to have come because he could fully declare his righteous agency of its requirements.

Jesus was also able to declare the complete fulfilment of the sociological, cooperative conditions which jubilee was intended to provide. His proclamation was more than a soteriological statement expressed in the language of sociological metaphor. The real, sociological intent of Jesus’ proclamation was made clear in his references to the physical, personal acts of feeding and healing in the ministry of the prophets. The acts which Jesus expressly identified were shown not only to the socially powerless – widows – but also to the excluded – foreigners (Lk. 4:25-27). Jesus was making a distinct parallel with his own ministry in these references. Jesus’ proclamation of jubilee was one of real, sociological import, within which he, himself, was the agent of attainment.

As Jesus takes on the full agency of the jubilee narrative, the position of God’s people in this narrative now shifts. The ‘good news’ of the Levitical jubilee was that ‘the people of God can receive God’s blessings by obeying and cooperating with his sociological instructions’. The ‘good news’ of the jubilee narrative is transformed by Jesus to ‘the people of God have received full access to God’s blessings through the person of Christ and can now experience the tangible effects of these blessings by following his example’. The thrust of Jesus’ ministry becomes proclamation of the ‘good news’ (Lk. 4:43), through his teaching as well as his personal embodiment of the way God intends his people to live ‘among one another’. ‘What God inaugurates, people should take part in and what God’s power effects and sustains, people should carry through in the earthly-historical sphere, until God finishes it’ (Schnackenburg et al., 1982: 41, in Stassen, 1992: 39).

Second, as the people of God orient themselves towards the sociological concern of the jubilee narrative by imitating the social postures of Christ, Stassen finds a clearly central role for an ‘external’ transformative orientation of ‘peacemaking’. He connects Jesus’ jubilee proclamation (Lk. 4:18-19) to the Beatitudes (Matt. 5:3-11). ‘The year of the Lord’s favour’ which Jesus proclaims was an announcement of ‘comforting of those who mourn, inheriting the land for those who are dispossessed, justice for those who hunger for it, good news for the poor, and the year of God’s deliverance’ (Stassen, 1992: 38). In this connection, the ‘year of the Lord’s favour’ is declared as an inauguration of the ‘rule of God … the fulfillment of the moral content of Old Testament expectations for a new creation, a new heart and spirit, justice and peace and the presence of God’ (Davies, 1962: 168).

A connection between peacemaking and social rest provides a powerful lens through which a contemporary application of the jubilee narrative can be examined. The social hermeneutic of mutuality within the jubilee narrative is greatly served by proactive steps of peacemaking. In jubilee terms, peacemaking can be defined as intentional, sacrificial steps taken to create inter-personal conditions of rest. Peacemaking is a natural ‘external’ transformative orientation towards conditions of social rest, ‘a hermeneutic for what witness to Jesus as Lord means in societies such as ours’ (Yoder, 2009: 10).

Discipling for Social Rest

How then is this orientation to be pursued? It is the narrative character of jubilee which provides some answer to this question. In his After Virtue, Alasdair MacIntyre (1984) proposes, ‘I can only answer the question “What am I to do?” if I can answer the prior question “Of what story or stories do I find myself a part?”’ (MacIntyre, 1984: 216). Jubilee is deeply a part of the story of God’s people. We are continually called by the narrative to an understanding of its ‘transformative and self-involving demands’ (Bockmeuhl, 2006: 46). The jubilee narrative places a demand on the people of God for intentional ‘orientation’ towards the achievement of social rest:

… to be a community that covenants, that distributes its produce equally, that values all its members, and that brings the strong and the weak together in common work and common joy. Though it is not yet that kind of community, we are assured that soon or late it will be. And the mission of the believing community is to articulate, anticipate, and practice the transformation that is sure to come … The faithful community knows something about the world, hopes something for the world, and expects something of the world. What it knows and hopes and expects is that the world is to be transformed … (Brueggemann, 1994: 50–51)

At the heart of this ‘orientation’ is an understanding that, in jubilee, God has gifted his people with knowledge that produces hope and inspires action. Jubilee provides considerable wisdom in developing postures for ‘social rest’ in today’s world. It clearly advocates for proactive rather than reactive social practices in relation to immediate needs as well as long-term social legacy. Crucial to this legacy is a commitment by the people of God to continue writing the jubilee narrative. Jubilee must be discipled, as ‘each generation is afforded the opportunity to ask what kind of a community we must be to be faithful to Yahweh and his purposes for us’ (Pleins, 2001: 518).

Three elements of mutuality were articulated earlier in this article: ‘using one’s capacity to give and contribute to the needs of others’; ‘being attentive and aware of the needs of others’; and ‘recognizing the uniqueness of others’ life experiences’ (Graeber, 2011: 94, Jordan, 1986: 2). In line with these elements of mutuality, three principles can be proposed for discipling ‘agents of social rest’ within communities of God’s people. These can be seen as a path towards a deeper embrace of jubilee mutuality by communities of God’s people.

1. Embrace Generosity: Use One’s Capacity to Give and Contribute to the Needs of Others.

There is beauty and scandal in the jubilee narrative’s call upon the powerful and prosperous to share of their God-given blessing. Jubilee is frequently celebrated for its provision of physical freedom and economic restoration. But the reality of this provision is that holders of power and wealth must give them up, sacrifice them for the good of others. It is not a natural human inclination to give up what one has. This disinclination has been noted as one of the central challenges to ‘social rest’ (Asad, 1973; Bourdieu, 1984; Foucault, 1976). If generosity is to be a hallmark of the people of God, it must be taught.

The University of Notre Dame’s Science of Generosity Initiative defines generosity as ‘the virtue of giving good things to others freely and abundantly’ (Smith and Davidson, 2014: 4). In the jubilee narrative, giving is assumed to be an act of generosity (Is. 58:7). Jubilee giving was not meant to be experienced as a hardship. It was meant to be carried out as part of a celebratory, communal act (Lev 25:9).

There is real beauty in the jubilee narrative’s provision of a deep motivation for generosity. Jubilee teaches that the key to living a generous life is a full experience of gratefulness to God for all that he has given (Lev. 25:38, 42). Discipling generosity is founded first on fostering gratefulness. This gratefulness has its roots in practices of remembering. However, it is also inspired by a profound paradox. Christian Smith and Hilary Davidson (2014: 1) refer to this as the ‘generosity paradox’:

By spending ourselves for others’ well-being we enhance our own standing. In letting go of some of what we own, we better secure our lives. By giving ourselves away, we ourselves move towards flourishing. This is not only a philosophical or religious teaching; it is a sociological fact. (Smith and Davidson, 2014: 1)

Generosity is a foundational practice for the creation of conditions of ‘social rest’, because of its power to ensure care for the less fortunate, but also, more deeply, because being generous is a crucial contributor to personal well-being. The Science of Generosity Initiative at the University of Notre Dame, established in 2009, has revealed in numerous sociological studies the benefits to individual and group well-being of practicing generosity. Marriages, parenting relationships, career success and workplace performance have all been proven to be significantly improved when generosity is embraced. As part of the fabric of jubilee mutuality, God recognised the importance of deep social postures of generosity for his people. These deep social postures were a blessing far beyond the economic and political spheres of wealth and power. They were a blessing in their contribution to the very character of the people of God. This character made them a blessed people.

Generosity does require attentiveness. It is all too easy to equate generosity with the simple act of giving. But it must embrace more than that. Inattentive generosity can contribute to numerous social stresses, such as dependency (Corbett et al., 2009), proliferation of poverty-inducing structures and practices (Adato et al., 2006) and even accentuation of inequalities through strengthening of disparities of power (Bonk, 2007). There is a growing appreciation for the relational commitments necessary for generosity to function in socially beneficial ways.

There is a wisdom in the Levitical Law that places relationship at the centre of jubilee. Both the motivation for jubilee practices and the processes which are prescribed hinge on relational commitment. Jubilee was to be driven by the commitment of God’s people to maintaining their ability to relate well to one another in the midst of life’s up and downs. Jubilee generosity is a commitment to persons, not to actions alone. This is a commitment which is recognised today as a challenge for communities of God’s people to continue to embrace. In generosity is also a call to deepening relationships. The practice of hospitality opens new perspectives on this relational call.

2. Embrace Hospitality: Be Attentive to and Aware of the Needs of Others.

Where generosity defines the character of a community’s relationships, hospitality defines its scope. ‘The practice of hospitality … is an essential element in the formation and flourishing of communities’ (Wrobleski, 2012: xiii). In the jubilee narrative, there is a distinct posture of ‘reaching out’ to others that warrants the language of ‘hospitality’. There is an element of concern for others in jubilee that goes beyond what generosity alone can describe. The jubilee narrative is one of attentiveness, careful concern, an active awareness of the needs of others. In the watchfulness of jubilee is a deep recognition of others. Christine Pohl (1999) describes this posture of deep recognition as the ‘moral bond’ of hospitality (Pohl, 1999: 62).

Jubilee hospitality is not a ‘give and take’ relationship dependent on ‘equal reward’ or ‘quid pro quo’. Rather, it is a mutuality of responsibility, a commitment to play one’s given role in hospitable exchange to the best of one’s capacity. This kind of commitment necessarily requires learning. ‘Hospitality is a skill and a gift, but it is also a practice which flourishes as multiple skills are developed, as particular commitments and values are nurtured, and as certain settings are cultivated’ (Pohl, 1999: 9). Jubilee hospitality requires discipling.

One particular aspect of jubilee hospitality which is significant for a community’s practices of discipling ‘agents of social rest’ is the establishment of ‘discernment’ as an assumed practice when attending to the needs of others. As discussed earlier in this article, the jubilee narrative gives recognition to a range of social situations. Discernment is needed within a community in order to appropriately respond to the needs of an individual (Zion, 2013). Jubilee hospitality is not ‘shallowly’ restricted to acts of charity. Nor is it solely defined by absolute annulment of economic or social obligations. Embracing the needs of others within the jubilee narrative entails embracing the person of others. There is a relational commitment in jubilee that demands the development of wisdom.

In Hospitality Studies much attention has been given to the importance of attentiveness (Fausto, 2012; Selwyn, 2001). Good hospitality requires clear discernment of the needs, and even the desires, of those to whom it is being provided (Derrida and Dufourmantelle, 2000; Swancutt, 2012). Skills of discernment in reaching out to others are particularly important in the modern era, as economic, political and social disparities have created a growing ‘experiential distance’ between holders of power and wealth and others. This creates hermeneutical challenges as an individual or group’s ‘social location among the privileged muffles the images of liberation, so that [they] fail to be grasped by them’ (Ringe, 2004: 14).

The jubilee narrative must be lived and experienced if it is to be joined. And if it is to be understood, the only hermeneutic which suffices is this joining, the living of it, the extension of it into our own circle of being (Gadamer, 2014; Heidegger et al., 2013). It is a crucial task of communities of God’s people to disciple one another towards discerning hospitality. ‘Each people must be taught to expand, not displace, their care for those connected to their own experience’ (Zion, 2013: 184). ‘Agents of social change’ are those who extend the sphere of their practices of care. They are continually growing in their practices of reaching out – more often, more readily and with greater discernment.

The call to hospitality is not a naive one. Practices of hospitality are risky. In reaching out to others there is great potential for rejection and even violence (Boersma, 2004).

The darkness of the human heart can easily make it a distorting lens whereby even the best-intentioned acts come to be regarded with deep suspicion, and generosity and honesty misconstrued as perfidy. Unhealed wounds can distort relationships, often in ways that may not be fully appreciated by the parties themselves or by others who become involved. (Ive, 2003: 1)

There is, therefore, an even deeper commitment which is required by communities of God’s people in the pursuit of social rest. This is a commitment to peacemaking.

3. Embrace Peacemaking: Recognise the Uniqueness of Others’ Life Experiences

A life of jubilee which begins with a character of generosity and grows through continually reaching out to live life with others is further embodied by postures of peacemaking – intentional, sacrificial steps taken to create inter-personal conditions of rest. The jubilee narrative is candidly aware of the ubiquitous brokenness of human communities. But God’s answer to the deep brokenness of humanity, his soteriological and sociological passion for his people, is as ‘coherent, broad and deep as the exigencies of human existence’ (Bosch, 1991: 400). God’s desire for his people is that they will experience the hope of restoration and that they themselves will be included in its agency.

The principles of just peacemaking (Stassen, 1992) provide a practical guide for discipling communities of God’s people to embrace peacemaking. They have been framed as initiatives (Stassen, 1998) and six of the 10 initiatives are directly applicable to discipling towards jubilee living:

Support nonviolent direct action;

Take independent initiatives to reduce threat;

Use cooperative conflict resolution;

Acknowledge responsibility for conflict and injustice and seek repentance and forgiveness;

Advance democracy, human rights and religious liberty;

Foster just and sustainable economic development.

Each of these initiatives contributes to conditions of social rest and embraces a commitment to postures of mutuality. The remaining four initiatives, not listed above, are specifically focused on contributing to the structures and processes of global politics. These six initiatives provide valuable guidelines for peacemaking at the inter-personal, social level. The foundational understanding behind them is that peace is something to be actively sought, worked for, struggled for. This seeking is not violent. It does not employ force to impose itself upon another. This seeking is, however, intentional and focused. At the heart of seeking peace is a recognition of the personhood of the ‘other’. Peacemaking recognises the interests of the other, seeks to protect them as much as possible and often requires personal sacrifice of one’s own interests for the sake of maintaining or restoring relationships. Peacemaking is cooperative and embraces dialogue and shared efforts towards relational harmony.

The concept of peacemaking is important for contemporary embrace of the jubilee narrative. Jubilee’s call to empathy (Lev. 25:42, 46, 53, 55) is clearly directed towards more than an appreciation of the needs of others. It is a call to intentionally seek to meet the needs of the other, to legitimise the personhood of the other. The ultimate goal of jubilee discipleship is interpersonal conditions of rest, a state of peace:

the restoring of just relationships among us personally and societally, and with God. It points us to God’s gracious initiative in delivering us from sin, guilt, and oppression into a new community of justice, peace, and freedom and our obedient participation in God’s way of deliverance. (Stassen, 1992: 41)

This is the jubilee narrative. It is a rich narrative into which we are invited to enter and in which we are challenged to live. Jubilee provides us with an opportunity to experience community and relational blessing in deep personal and inter-personal ways. But we need to embrace it. As communities of God’s people we need to live it and teach it. Jubilee will continually stand before us as a benchmark for community wholeness. As a narrative it will continue to shine into our daily practices, examining us (Gadamer, 2014) as much as we examine it. It speaks to our values in relation to wealth and power, in relation to one another and in relation to our God. Ultimately, the jubilee narrative stands as a measure, a testament and a testimony of who we are as the people of God.

Footnotes

Funding

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Author Biography

Calvin Tiessen is an educator and linguist with a special interest in the mentoring and equipping of professionals for effective cross-cultural interaction. He has published most extensively on the sociolinguistics of lesser known language communities.

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