Commentaria in Leviticum
Symbolically, Franciscus Valesius, On Sacred Philosophy, chap. 21: God, he says, described the jubilee by seven septennia of years, in fitting reference to the climacteric years, that is, the scalar. These are the years which are closed by single septennia, namely the year 7, 14, 21, 28, 35, 42, 49 (seven septennia), 56, 63 (nine septennia). These years are called scalar, because in them the life of man ascends as by the steps of a ladder. For the steps are the septennia themselves, in each of which notable changes of age and life happen, and many are attacked by diseases, nay die, especially in the 49th and 63rd year, which therefore Augustus Caesar rightly so feared. The jubilee was fittingly appointed, therefore, after the seventh septennium, as if after the life of one man and generation a new age should succeed, and a new time and generation, in which accordingly all things are to be renewed, and brought back to ancestral possessions.
The mysteries of the number seven (which the sabbatical year and the jubilee contain) I shall set forth on Deuter. 5:12.
9. IN THE SEVENTH MONTH, THE TENTH DAY OF THE MONTH.—Note: The other feasts of the Jews began from Nisan, that is, March; for this was the first month of the sacred year, as is plain Exod. 12:1. But the sabbatical year and the jubilee did not begin from Nisan, as Abulensis holds, but from Tisri, or the seventh month, which was the beginning of the common and profane year. So Burgensis, Pererius, Scaliger, and from them Serarius on Josue 13, Quest. 14. The reason was that if these years had begun with the other feasts from March, then the Jews would have lost the harvest of that year which followed March: for in these years, being sabbatical, there was a sabbath, that is, a rest of the land, so that it was lawful neither to reap nor to sow; wherefore the Jews would then have lost the harvest of the current year, and also of the following: for since in that year they could not sow, consequently in the summer of the following year they could not reap. Wherefore at the eighth jubilee, when the sabbatical year and the jubilee coincided, so that the jubilee immediately followed the sabbatical, they would have lost the harvest of three years. But now, beginning from Tisri, or the seventh month, they lost, as the sowing, so the harvest of that one year only, and of two if the sabbatical year and the jubilee coincided.
IN THE TIME OF THE EXPIATION,—namely on the day and feast of Expiation, which was celebrated on the tenth day of the seventh month, as was said chap. 23, ver. 27: for on that day throughout all the land of Israel, as is here said, in the single cities there were trumpeters, who by the sound of the trumpet proclaimed that the jubilee would be the next year. This was fittingly done at the feast of propitiation, because in the jubilee there was to be a full remission and propitiation.
10. AND THOU SHALT SANCTIFY (that is, thou shalt declare the next year holy and dedicated to me) THE FIFTIETH YEAR.—See Canon 11. Otherwise Ribera: “Thou shalt sanctify,” he says, that is, thou shalt prepare the people for the year 50. So to sanctify is taken for to prepare, Isaias 13:3: “I have commanded my sanctified ones,” that is, the Persians and Medes, whom I have prepared to destroy the empire of the Chaldeans.
AND YE SHALL CALL REMISSION,—that is, you shall proclaim that in the jubilee year there will be remission of servitudes, of debts and of alienated goods. For if in the seventh year there was a remission of debts, as is plain from Deuteronomy 15:2, much more ought that remission to be made in the fiftieth year, the jubilee, which was the year of fullest remission of alienated things. FOR IT IS THE JUBILEE.—In Hebrew, for it is joel or jobel. For so, with other points supplied, Josephus, St. Jerome on chap. 1 to the Galatians, the Chaldee and the Masoretes read. You will ask, whence is this year called jobel, jobelus, jubilee or jubileus? Andreas Masius on Josue chap. 6 thinks it derived from Jubal, the first inventor of the harp and organs, Genesis chap. 4. Others commonly, following the Chaldee and the Rabbis, as Lyranus, Paginus, Vatablus and Augustinus Eugubinus, on the last chapter of Numbers, hold that jobel signifies a ram’s horn, and that the year is called jubilee from this, that in that year they sounded with rams’ horns. Some add that jobel is an Arabic name and signifies a ram: whence the Chaldee sometimes renders it dichra, that is, a ram. Others think otherwise, as Serarius recounts on Josue 13, Question 14. But it is much more certain in this matter to follow the ancient and most learned Hebrews. I say therefore: Jobel or jubilee is derived from the root jabal, that is, to bring, to lead, and that with joy and gladness, either of him who leads, or of him who is led, as Serarius shows by various examples on Josue 6, Question 5. The year Jobel, therefore, is the same as the year bringing all good things, and bringing each one back to his former liberty and inheritance. So Oleaster, Ribera, Serarius and others. Cajetan also favours it, who derives jobel from jobel, that is, a bud, so that the year jobel is the same as the year budding forth every good thing. With Cajetan agree Angelus Pientinus, book 3 On the Jubilee, chap. 4, and Bellarmine, book 1 On Indulgences, chap. 1.
That this is the origin and etymon of jobel and jubilee, is plain first from Josephus, who, book 3 Antiquit. 10, says: The word jobel signifies liberty, that is, restoration to liberty.
Secondly, because the Septuagint commonly for jobel render aphesis, that is, remission.
Thirdly, because Philo and his interpreter St. Jerome, in the book On Hebrew Names on Genesis, render jobel one dismissing. The same Jerome, book 2 on Isaias, near the beginning: “Jubilee,” he says, “that is, the year of release.”
Fourthly, because this place altogether convinces of it, for it reads thus: “Thou shalt proclaim remission; for it is the year of jubilee,” as if to say: For it is the year of remission. Whence it follows: “Every man shall return to his possession and family.” Hence also we call the year of the fullest Indulgences a jubilee, as Serarius shows on Josue chap. 6, Quest. 7.
Jobel therefore signifies remission: hence secondly, jobel signifies the year in which full remission was made, which was the fiftieth year. Thirdly, jobel signifies a trumpet, or rather the blast of a trumpet, which festively sounded in that year. Whence also the Latin jubilum, jubilare seems derived, as Eugubinus teaches above. Hence also the blast of the trumpet sounding on Sinai, when the law was given, is by anticipation called jobel in the Hebrew, Exod. 19:13.
These trumpets of the jubilee, however, were not those two silver trumpets, as Abulensis thought, by which the people were called to the feasts, of which Numbers 10.
For Josue 6:13, seven trumpets of the jubilee are said to have been, which have also another name in Hebrew, nor were they ever used on other feasts and years, but in the jubilee; therefore it is said: “Whose use is in the jubilee.” These trumpets were therefore not silver but of horn. For so St. Jerome interprets the word shophar, which is found in this place, on chap. 5 of Osee, and the Septuagint, Psalm 97:6. But these trumpets were not of ram’s horn, because they sounded these only at the feast of trumpets, in memory of the ram substituted for Isaac, who was to be immolated by his father; but they were of ox horn. For St. Jerome above: “The trumpet,” he says, “is a pastoral one.” But shepherds blow not rams’ horns but oxen’s; and that such were the ancient horns Varro teaches, book 4 On the Latin Language: “The horns,” he says, “which are now of brass, were then made of the ox’s horn,” and adds that the trumpet (bucina) is so called from oxen (boves), or from the sound of oxen bou bou, because it sounds for oxen, and calls oxen. Hence afterwards trumpets, even military ones, were called horns, as:
“The horns blared with hoarse note,” Aeneid 8.
Hence it is plain that the sound of this trumpet was harsh and hoarse (for such is that of horns), which yet on feasts, as the graver, moderated and tempered the shrill and excited sounds of the other instruments.
Anagogically, as the sabbath and the seventh or sabbatical year, so the jubilee signifies the resurrection and the eternal rest of the whole year, that is, of eternity; for then, first, all hired servants, beasts of burden also and cattle, that is, all the simple, shall be free from labour: because the praise and vision of God will be the leisurely business of the Blessed. Secondly, the trumpets shall sound in the preceding year, namely the 49th, because the dreadful signs proclaiming the nearer judgment shall precede the resurrection. Thirdly, they shall sound also in the jubilee itself, because on account of the consummated victory a perpetual alleluia shall be sung through all the streets of heaven. Fourthly, we shall return to our first possession, that is, to paradise, from which we were cast out with our first parent, having now received full remission of sins; which, because it is inestimable, is hence so often repeated here. Fifthly, the land shall not be sown, because then there will be no sowing of new merits, but we shall most sweetly enjoy the fruit of the old. So in the main Radulphus, Hesychius and Ribera, book 5 On the Temple, chap. 25.
Tropologically Rupert: “This,” he says, “is the truly holy and most beautiful feast of jubilee, to be celebrated with the Evangelical trumpet sounding, so that man returns to his possession and his family, when we forgive the offence done to us, that, all discord being razed and dissolved, all may return to the former family of peace and concord, and have one heart and one soul, and sing: Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!” Allegorically, the jubilee is the time of Christ and of grace, as Isaias foretold, and from him Christ, Luke 4. Finally, among Christians the jubilee year was instituted under this name by Pope Boniface VIII in the year of Christ 1295, to be celebrated in the year of Christ 1300, and he commanded it to be renewed every hundredth year, and granted to those who should come to Rome and visit the sepulchres of SS. Peter and Paul a plenary Indulgence of all sins; and that to recall the Roman people from the vain games of the secular, to the true solemn sacred rite.