Jesus and the Jubilee: The Biblical Roots of the Year of God’s Favor by John Bergsma

(Steubenville: Emmaus Road Publishing, 2024), 141

The Jubilee is an act of the restoration of creation, and Israel's hopes for jubilee are fulfilled in Christ.

The year 2025 is an Ordinary Jubilee year in the Catholic Church. Ordinary Jubilees happen every 25 years1, though the Pope can call an Extraordinary Jubilee like Pope Francis did for the Jubilee Year of Mercy in 2016.

I knew very little about the Jubilee year until recently, but that is remedied by hearing Dr. Bergsma speak on the topic and then reading his book. The book is both an interesting discussion of the history of the Biblical sources of the Jubilee, as well as a personal testimony to the power of the Jubilee and invitation to really engage in this 2025 Jubilee. I read this while planning our family pilgrimage to Rome, and found it to be especially helpful for developing the right disposition to enter into a pilgrimage.

The Jubilee is an act of restoration of the goods of creation. The Jubilee year is a way of living these jubilee promises of freedom. This freedom is primarily spiritual freedom, and it is fully realized in Christ. We can enter more deeply into this Jubilee through the sacraments (especially daily mass and weekly confession), by taking a pilgrimage, and by obtaining indulgences for souls in Purgatory. I found this part of the book to be an especially fruitful way to think about the works of an indulgence as helping us to achieve the right spiritual disposition so as to receive the spiritual benefits of the indulgence.

Central Texts

  • Lv-25-55: "And you shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants; it shall be a jubilee for you..."
  • Dt-15-18: "At the end of every seven years you shall grant a release..."
  • Is-61-2: "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good tidings to the afflicted; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn."
  • Dn-09-27: "Seventy weeks of years are decreed concerning your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and prophet, and to anoint a most holy place..."

Notes


Contents


Introduction: Our Need for Jubilee

  • Use the Bishop's forgiveness of Jean Valjean in Les Miserables as an image for the Jubilee: "I have bought your soul for God." (2)
  • "God created a world of peace and harmony that is shattered, and the rest of the biblical story recounts his relentless attempts to restore his original order." (3)
  • God established the year of jubilee as a year of favor where we experience the goods of forgiveness, freedom, family, and fullness. (4)
  • With Jesus all that has been promised is fulfilled. (5)
  • The Jubilee lies at the heart of God's plan for our salvation (5) and we want to understand this so that "this great year of favor doesn't pass by leaving us unchanged." (7)

Chapter 1: Back the the Garden: Creation as the Model of the Jubilee

Summary: The Jubilee is an act of restoration to the Good Creation.

  • God created the Garden of Eden as a temple under the authority of man, who is the crown of his creation. Adam had five roles in this temple: son of God, king, priest, prophet, and bridegroom. (13)
  • By letting the serpent into the garden, Adam failed in his priestly duty to guard the temple. (14)
  • Keep in mind the original goods of creation which are the blueprint of the jubilee and a sign of what God desires for us. (17)

Chapter 2: The First Jubilee: Israel's Exodus from Egypt

Summary: Spiritual freedom always precedes physical freedom as we see in the Exodus from Egypt, where God first exorcises and frees Israel from slavery to the Egyptian gods (demons).

  • Sidenote: God's original plan for Moses was to use his authority as price of Egypt to help Israel escape their bondage. (22)
  • The ten plagues were an exorcism of Egypt, a theomachy (divine combat) between the true God of Israel and the false gods of Egypt. Each plague targets a specific demon and makes them into a mockery. (24-25)
  • Spiritual freedom always precedes physical freedom in jubilee thought. (27)

Chapter 3: Laws of Liberation: The Structure That Sustains Freedom

Summary: The Laws given by God are designed to lead us to freedom.

  • "There is a paradox in the human condition: we feel like boundaries (laws) restrict our freedom, but if we fail to observe good boundaries (laws), we end up losing our freedom to sin and addiction...True freedom means directing our will to what is good. It means directing our will to God, for he is the good from where all good and freedom flows. And this takes structure. It takes boundaries. But most importantly, it requires discipline to say no to our own desires that enslave us—to denounce our own will." (31)
  • Pg 33+ is a reflection on the Ten Commandments, which were (before the Jubilee laws), aimed at freedom for God's people.

Chapter 4: Liberty Lost and Regained (Forever): The Calf and the Jubilee Laws

Summary: The Jubilee laws facilitate redemption, release, return, and rest.

  • "Moses got the people out of Egypt, but he hadn't gotten Egypt out of the people." The laws given in Lev 1-16 for liturgy and Lev 17-27 for lifestyle are designed to de-Egyptianize them—the sacrifices slay animals that symbolized Egyptian gods. (41-42)
  • Lv-25-9 commands that every seventh year to be a year of rest.
  • Lv-25-25 commands that every fiftieth year be a special Jubilee of redemption, release, return, and rest.
  • The Jubilee begins on the Day of Atonement because the liberation begins with spiritual liberation. (44)

Chapter 5: Jubilee in Theory...and Practice: Did the Israelites Actually Observe the Jubilee?

Summary: Israel did not in fact observe the Jubilee as intended, leading them to exile and requiring them to wait for the Messiah to proclaim the final jubilee.

  • Did the Israelites Actually Observe the Jubilee? Not very well: we have very little evidence they did at all apart from the first one or two. (49)
  • Is-37-32: God asks the remnant to observe the Jubilee year and to step our in faith and trust in his fullness. (51)
  • Jeremiah observes the laws of the jubilee by acting as go'el (kinsmen-redeemer): there is still Jubilee hope even when it looks like all is lost from the invading armies of Babylon. (52)
  • The long overdue observance of the Jubilee was Zedekiah's release of Jewish slaves (Jer-34-10), but this was quickly reversed when the threat subsided. (53)
  • The seventy year length of the exile corresponds to a "make-up" for the five hundred years when Israel failed to observe the Jubilee. (54, cf. 2 Chr-36-21)
  • Is-61-2 indicates that the Jubilee would only be fulfilled when the Messiah came and announced it, and he would also be the go'el or redeemer of his people. (56)
  • The whole chronology of Dn-09-27 is based on the Jubilee cycles: at the end of ten jubilees, the Messiah would arrive to proclaim the final jubilee of history. (60)

Chapter 6: Miracle at Qumran: Hard Evidence for the Jubilee

Summary: Shortly before Jesus' coming the Essens had meditated upon these prophecies and become convinced that a divine Melchizedek would return after ten jubilee cycles.

  • The Dead Sea Scrolls include a complete book of Isaiah dating from the 200s BC, compared with the previously known oldest copy from the 900s AD. (62, cf Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls)
  • The Essene author of 11QMelchizedek combined interpretations of Leviticus 25, Deuteronomy 15, Isaiah 61, and Daniel 9 into a prophecy about the final judgement and identifies the Messiah as Melchizedek, who will proclaim to them jubilee, thus releasing them from the debt of all their sins. (65-67)
  • This shows how shortly before Jesus' coming the Essens had meditated upon these prophecies and become convinced that a divine Melchizedek would return after ten jubilee cycles to make atonement for God's faithful remnant and release them from sin. (69)

Chapter 7: A Year of Favor: The Coming of Christ, the New Melchizedek

Summary: Christ is the New Melchizedek, the high priest who frees his people from their sins through the Sacraments, which are the ordinary way in which we experience the Jubilee.

  • David's throne first belonged to Melchizedek who founded the city of Salem that became Jerusalem (72). Jesus read Is-61-2 which the Essenes identified with the return of the divine Melchizedek (73).
  • Christ created the Church and appointed priests of the order of Melchizedek to proclaim liberty and free people from slavery to Satan and debt to sin. The main theme of Hebrews is how Jesus is the high priest of the order of Melchizedek. (78)
  • Christ established the sacraments by which sin is vanquished. The "seventy times seven" in Mt-18-22 about forgiveness (confession) is Jubilee language, a perfect set of ten jubilee cycles. (79)
  • John identifies the Passion as the great exorcism of Satan: "he spoke of the temple of his body" in Jn-02-21, and the "most holy place" or "holy of holies" in Dn-09 can be interpreted as the temple of his body. (81)
  • The Feast of Tabernacles celebrates the supernatural river of life from Ez-47-12 (and Jl-03, Zec-13, 14:8). In the context of this feast Jesus says that "Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water." (Jn-07-38)
  • The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of freedom, the Spirit of jubilee, flows from the Passion of Christ. The Sacraments are the usual way in which we experience jubilee, which flows from Christ through his body, the Church. (88)

Chapter 8: Freedom from Sin: The Liberating Power of Confession

Summary: Confession attains spiritual freedom and confession is the fulfillment of the Jubilee.

  • Protestant ministers can perform exorcisms that are effective under the right conditions, as he did as a pastor in deliverance ministry with a non-sacramental general confession. (90, cf. Lk-09-50). "God works in the sacraments, but he can also work outside them, because he's God." (50)
  • "When we sin, we grant permission for the evil one to work in our lives. Confession and renunciation of sin, therefore, revoke the permission given, preventing the evil one and his collaborators form operating within our person." (95)
  • "He shall confess the sin he has committed" (Lv-05) and "Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed" (Jas-05).
  • Bergsma's realization as a Protestant minister: " Catholics have a way of literally obeying parts of the Bible which is not available to me a s a Protestant." (100)
  • Fr. Gabriele Amorth: "Many times I have written that Satan is much more enraged when we take souls away from him through confession than when we take away bodies through exorcism." Fr. Amorth always started exorcism with a general confession. (100-101, cf. An Exorcist Tells His Story)
  • St. Josemaría Escrivá recommended weekly confession to "keep short books" (102)
  • Bergsma: "For my part, I practice weekly confession, because as a teacher of Scripture and theology, I feel particularly vulnerable." (103)
  • St. Ignatius of Loyola and St. Francis de Sales recommend an annual retreat with a general confession (!!, 104)
  • "If you want vague grace, make a vague confession. But if you want specific, robust, concrete, actual graces in your life, make a specific, robust, concrete confession: name the sin, give the number, be specific, and it will better dispose you to receive the graces in the sacrament." (107)

Chapter 9: Perpetual Jubilee: A Spirit-Led Lifestyle of Liberty and Liturgy

Summary: The Spirit is the agent of the Jubilee. Live the Jubilee by drawing closer to the Spirit, and by the sacraments, pilgrimages, and indulgences.

  • The Spirit is the agent of the Jubilee, and the agent of forgiveness. (109-110)
  • "The connection between the Spirit and forgiveness explains why blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is the unforgivable sin. Rejection of the Holy Spirit cannot be forgiven, because it is the Holy Spirit who does the forgiving." (110, cf. Mt-12)
  • The Spirit is the agent of exorcism, and the presence of the Holy Spirit prevents the entry of evil. (110-111)
  • "All the goals of the jubilee are fulfilled by the gift of the Spirit. The Spirit forgives our sins, grants us freedom from the tyranny of Satan, institutes us as children of God and members of his family, and initiates us into the fullness of God so that we become "partakers of the divine nature" (2 Pt-01). For that reason, the Jubilee 2025 is a highly appropriate time for individuals and communities to enter more deeply into the life of the Holy Spirit."
  • Live a jubilee lifestyle through sacramenets, pilgrimates, and indulgences
  • Sacraments
    • A lifestyle of jubilee involves frequently the liturgy to receive the grace present in the sacraments. (113)
    • "True liberation theology lives in the 'glorious liberty of the children of God' (Rom-08) , and the Spirit is the liberator (2 Cor-03)." (113-114)
    • We should receive our daily bread...daily: "Spiritual warriors are formed in the liturgy of the Church." (115)
    • "Many saints have recommended a lifestyle of daily communion and weekly confession," but whatever your current frequency is use the jubilee year as an opportunity to go more often. (117)
  • Pilgrimages
    • The jubilee has always been about returning home, and every pilgrimage is a spiritual homecoming(117-118)
  • Indulgences
    • Decree on the granting of the Indulgence during the Ordinary Jubilee Year 2025 called by His Holiness Pope Francis (13 May 2024)
    • "Confession removes guilt (culpability or responsibility for sin) and the eternal punishment due to mortal sin, but there still remains the temporal punishment required by Divine justice, which must be fulfilled wither in the present life or in Purgatory. An indulgence offers the penitent sinner the means of discharging this debt during his life." (124 cf. William Kent: "Indulgences" in The Catholic Encyclopedia)
    • The distinction between guilt and temporal punishment is found in the two types of sacrifices in the Old Testament: hatat, חַטָּאָה (Lv-04-5:13) and the asham, אָשָׁם (Lv-05-6:7), which used to be translated as "sin" and "guilt" offerings, but correspond more closely to "guilt" and "reparation" i.e. temporal punishment (124-125)
    • The requirements of the indulgence help the Christian believer achieve the right disposition or state of should to receive the spiritual benefit of the indulgence." (125)
    • 💡Some of Jesus's parables are best understood in light of temporal punishment and purgatory, for example Settling with Your Accuser (Lk-12-59: the "prison" here is purgatory since you don't get out of hell) and the Rich Man and Lazarus (Lk-16-31: the Rich Man is in purgatory because he can communicate outside and still has charity) (126)
    • #read Stunned by Scripture and #listen to Plenary & Partial Indulgences by Fr. Chad Ripperger(128)
  • A Plenary Indulgence is gained by going to confession, receiving the Eucharist, praying an Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be for the Pope's intentions, and having complete detachment from sin, and completing one of the below:
    • Thirty minutes of reading the Bible
    • Thirty minutes before the Blessed Sacrament
    • Praying the Stations of the Cross before properly blessed stations (in a church)
    • Praying the Rosary in a group of two or more with the mysteries announced before a crucifix
    • Visit a cemetery and pray for the deceased during All Souls Week
  • During the Jubilee Year 2025, Pope Francis has attached a plenary indulgence to making a pilgrimage to Rome and visiting at least one of the four major basilicas (132)

Conclusion: Conversion: The Heart of Jubilee

Summary: The Jubilee is a way of life. It is a lifestyle of liberation.

  • "The spiritual battle rages on, but falling wounded is not the worst thing in battle. The worst thing is not being healed." (135)
  • "The jubilee is and always has been at the heart of God's plan." (136)
  • "I urge you to embrace the jubilee of 2025 in a special way. Do something you have never done before." (137)

Epilogue: The Jubilee and Me

  • The two solas that actually separate Protestant from Catholics are sola fide and sola scriptura: both crumbled for Bergsma as a Protestant minister. (140)
  • Sola fide by an extreme hypothetical of "if you receive Jesus and then murder someone, do you go to heaven?" (141)
  • Sola scriptura: The problem is that everyone has their own interpretation of the Bible. The Bible alone is not a recipe for church unity, and "in fact, there is no way that one could maintain the kind of deeply unified church that Jesus clearly expressed a desire for in John 17 on the basis of the Bible alone." (142-143)
  • The experienced the great Jubilee of 2000 as a Calvinist doctoral student at Notre Dame, in his "verses versus verses" with Michael, and then by reading the Fathers of the Church: First Clement about apostolic succession, and the letters of Ignatius of Antioch including his letter to Smyrna on the Eucharist (148-149). The plain sense of the New Testament is that the Eucharist is Jesus body (150).
    • "If the Eucharist is Jesus, I have to become Catholic." (151)
  • "The Catholic Church simple is the jubilee, established and perpetuated." (152)

Topic: 2025 Jubilee Year

Source

New Words

  • theomachy: divine combat

Created: 2025-03-02-Sun
Updated: 2025-03-20-Thu

  1. Apparently it has been every 25 years since 1470 instead of the Biblical 50 years so that more people can experience the Jubilee. (Wikipedia) ↩