Definition
The jubilee (Hebrew: יוֹבֵל yovel; Lev. 25) was the 50th year in the Mosaic cycle: all slaves were freed, all debts cancelled, all land returned to its original owner. In Jones’ soteriological system the Jubilee law is not merely a historical social institution of Israel but the most fundamental principle of God’s creation: everything ultimately returns to its Creator-Owner. The Jubilee is thus the soteriological structure of apokatastasis.
Usage in the Corpus
Stephen Jones
Jones develops the Jubilee law as the structural principle of his entire soteriology. The Jubilee cycle (7 × 7 + 1 = 49 + 1 = 50) is embedded in the creation order and determines the time structure of salvation history. Christ announced the Jubilee in his first preaching (Luke 4:18-19 citing Isa. 61:1-2). The eschatological apokatastasis is the cosmic Jubilee fulfillment: all “alienated property” (people as God’s property) returns. [Jones, Creation’s Jubilee, Ch. 7; The Restoration of All Things, Ch. 7]
E.W. Bullinger
Bullinger connects the Jubilee to his numerological exegesis of number 7 as the number of completion and rest: the Jubilee cycle is a doubling of the sabbath structure (7 × 7) culminating in the great liberation of the 50th year. [Bullinger, Number in Scripture]
Origin
The word yovel possibly refers to the ram’s horn (shofar) by which the Jubilee was proclaimed (Lev. 25:9). Lev. 25:10 instructs: “Consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants.” The Jubilee is historically disputed as an actually-practiced institution, but as a symbolic-theological principle it has a rich interpretive tradition.