23 And the land shall not be sold for ever; for the land is mine; for ye are strangers and sojourners with me. 24 And in all the land of your possession ye shall grant a redemption for the land. 25 If thy brother grow poor, and sell of his possession, then shall his redeemer, his nearest relation, come and redeem that which his brother sold. 26 And if the man have no one having right of redemption, and his hand have acquired and found what sufficeth for its redemption, 27 then shall he reckon the years since the sale thereof, and restore the overplus unto the man to whom he sold it; and so return unto his possession. 28 And if his hand have not found what sufficeth for him to restore it to him, then that which is sold shall remain in the hand of the purchaser, until the year of jubilee; and in the jubilee it shall go out, and he shall return unto his possession. 29 And if any one sell a dwelling-house in a walled city, then he shall have the right of redemption up to the end of the year of the sale thereof; for a full year shall he have the right of redemption. 30 But if it be not redeemed until a whole year is complete, then the house that is in the walled city shall be established for ever to him that bought it, throughout his generations: it shall not go out in the jubilee. 31 But the houses in villages that have no wall round about them shall be reckoned as the fields of the country: they may be redeemed, and they shall go out in the jubilee. 32 But as to the cities of the Levites, the houses in the cities of their possession, the Levites shall have a perpetual right of redemption. 33 And if any one redeem from one of the Levites, then the house that was sold, in the city of his possession, shall go out in the jubilee; for the houses of the cities of the Levites are their possession among the children of Israel. 34 And the field of the suburbs of their cities shall not be sold; for it is their perpetual possession.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Leviticus 25:23-34
Commentary on Leviticus 25:23-34
(Read Leviticus 25:23-34)
If the land were not redeemed before the year of jubilee, it then returned to him that sold or mortgaged it. This was a figure of the free grace of God in Christ; by which, and not by any price or merit of our own, we are restored to the favour of God. Houses in walled cities were more the fruits of their own industry than land in the country, which was the direct gift of God's bounty; therefore if a man sold a house in a city, he might redeem it only within a year after the sale. This encouraged strangers and proselytes to come and settle among them.