Leviticus 25:25
If thy brother be waxen poor, and hath sold away some of his possession, and if any of his kin come to redeem it, then shall he redeem that which his brother sold. If thy brother be waxen poor, and hath sold away some of his possession, and if any of his kin come to redeem it, then shall he redeem that which his brother sold.
This law belongs to the Lord's provision for the poor through the sabbatical year and jubilee. It rests on the truth that the land belongs to God and Israelites are His tenants and strangers and sojourners with Him, so land could not be sold forever or permanently alienated or bartered away from the family and its children. When poverty forced a Hebrew to sell part of his possession, estate, or inheritance, the seller himself when able could redeem it at any time and return to his possession, and his kin, especially the nearest kin, had the duty and right to redeem what his brother sold. That same duty is applied as an obligation to relieve a brother fallen into poverty and destitution with practical, merciful aid rather than leave him without support.
Debts were remitted every seventh year, and if land was not redeemed it stayed with the buyer only until the fiftieth year, when in the jubilee all landed property reverted to the original owner and every man returned to his possession and family. Thus every family was secured in its possession and inheritance as a safeguard against the extremes of wealth and want or poverty, protecting the poor from losing family land forever and preserving their chance to share equally in the land. These laws taught practical care of one another to encourage liberality and overcome selfishness, including relieving the poor and charging them no interest or increase so they could continue to live among their people.
God's plan was that every family in Israel have a home on the land with sufficient ground for tilling, providing both the means and the incentive for a useful, industrious, and self-supporting life. Under that order industrial training was a duty, with every father required to teach his sons some useful trade, knowledge of housewifery essential for every woman and skill in it an honor even in the highest station, and various industries taught in the schools of the prophets where many students sustained themselves by manual labor. No human devising has ever improved upon that plan, and the world's departure from it causes to a large degree the poverty and wretchedness that exist today. The nearest-kin duty illustrates and was fulfilled by Christ's relation to His people: He took human nature and became human as humanity's nearest of kin to redeem them and the inheritance lost through sin, acting as substitute and surety by giving His life as a ransom, and by dying as a human He defeated the power of death and opened the tomb and eternal life to all who receive Him as their personal Saviour.