[EGW editor’s preface:  One of our readers sent in the following question: “What determined the value of open land sold in the Land of Promise?”  As with any question concerning what we hope to learn from the Bible, we must always strive to apply good hermeneutics and to let the Bible interpret itself.
     (For more tips on good Bible-reading skills, click the subjects Hermeneutics and Bible study)]

     Under the Mosaic Law, God provided that Israelites could sell all or part of their land to raise money.  However, in the Year of Jubilee every 50 years, all land was to revert back to the original family and all slave Israelites set free (see Leviticus chapter 25 … especially verses 13-17, 23-24, 39-46).  This was to preserve every family’s land inheritance, thus protecting each family’s long-term source of food and income, in turn protecting the family’s ongoing existence.  So essentially, what was actually being sold were the crops that would have been collected by the original family off the land during a negotiated number of years between the last & the next Year of Jubilee.  The more years (i.e. crops) being sold, the higher the selling price.
     I suspect, that like today’s agriculture, the exact value of a land’s crop probably depended on what was grown, e.g. wheat vs. barley vs. oats.  Likewise, vineyards and orchards and animal pastures probably had different crop values compared to, for example, a wheat field.

     One important lesson that God wanted the Israelites to learn from this arrangement was to treat each other fairly and considerately (Lev. 25:17,43) citing “you shall fear your God; for I am the LORD your God” as their motivation.
      This is also a good example of how God provided for His people and their families through the use of His written instructions.