Yobel 2022
Jubile (Jubilee)
God’s Yobel (Jubile or Jubilee)
Yobel means a continuous sound (signal) of a horn or the blast of the silver trumpets and the ram’s horn (shofar). The ancient meaning is to bring forth the blasts of the Silver Trumpets. It also means to bring forth the Shabbat (Sabbath) of the Fiftieth year––the year of Redemption (Leviticus 25:10, 25-28, 32).
The Yobel (the word Jubilee is a derivative of the English Jubile, which is the English word for Yobel). The Jubile is God’s Shabbat celebrated every forty-nine years.
The fiftieth year is the Year of the Yobel, but it is also the first year of the next forty-nine years (Leviticus 25:8––God always works in sevens).
Most people assume the Yobel year begins on the first day of Etanim (Tishrei), but it really is to begin on Yom Kippur in the fiftieth year, ten days later. It is on Yom Kippur that the horns are to be sounded throughout the land of Israel Leviticus 25:9) to signal the start of the Yobel year––this day is ONLY supposed to signal the Yobel year, NOT the actual year that begins on Abib 1. This day has come to be confused with always being the first of the actual year (mostly likely begun by the Thieves!).
Yobel was a joyous celebration of the Silver Trumpets and Shofarot (Ram’s horns) being blown in a series all day long, with the Silver horns dominant. It was a day of release: land would revert to its original owner, slaves were set free, all debts were canceled, and the land would rest.
It is a picture of the results of Messiah’s sacrificial death and resurrection: Yeshua canceled mankind’s sin debt, redeemed mankind out of the slave market of sin and set them free, promised us a place in Paradise on the Restored Earth, and He gives us rest.
Was Yeshua Born in a Yobel Year?
It is thought that Yeshua was born during a Yobel year. And it is also believed that Yeshua will also return during the Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles), in a Yobel year. This cannot be found in the Bible, nor in the Talmud.
The Talmud states that the Earth was given six thousand years by God. But it also states in one of the Talmuds (Sanhedrin 97b), that the Messiah will arrive no later than 82 Jubilees; while in the other Talmud they wrote no more than 85 Jubilees. We have absolutely nothing that states that Yeshua was born in, or will return in a Jubilee year––everything in the Talmud is speaking of the first coming of Yeshua, not His birth.
The Yobel (Jubilee) years are really a matter of counting everything prophetic for God, therefore the Talmud is merely speaking of how many Yobels would pass, not that the Messiah would actually be born in a Yobel year.
What we do know for sure is that Yeshua died and was raised from the dead in a Yobel year (the acceptable year of Yahweh was a Yobel year). Since He was about 33 years old when He died, then He couldn’t have been born in a Yobel year.
The Acceptable Year of Yahweh
In Luke 4:18-21 Yeshua read and was teaching from Isaiah 49:8 and stated, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” This was actually a prophetic statement because Yeshua was just beginning His 3 1/2 year ministry. He was reading about the Acceptable year of Yahweh, and had just stood up on Yom Kippur. The Acceptable year of Yahweh was when God would accept the final propitiation (atonement) for His people’s sin––and all Hebrews knew this.
The Greek word is dektos, and the Hebrew word is ratson, both mean acceptable (to God). Acceptable to God means that an offering was accepted by God, therefore the figurative meaning of these words is propitious when referring to Yeshua’s offering of Himself. God literally offered Himself to Himself and, of course He accepted the offering.
Taking a closer look at the words today or this day (Luke 4:21) we find that they are translated from the Greek word semeron, which implies Yeshua was speaking of that day in particular. However, Greek words generally miss the Hebrew intention, and there is a reference in the Strong’s to another word that we simply cannot ignore, hemera which figuratively means a period of time, as in an age.
In Hebrew terms this means a period of time usually referred to as roughly two thousand years. The Jews believe that the first two thousand years they were without the Torah, then there were two thousand years with the Torah, and the last two thousand years would be the Messianic age, therefore all the Israelites were anticipating the arrival of the Messiah that year or soon thereafter, and Yeshua had just stated that He was the Messiah.
He was stating that the Messianic Age had just begun and He would be the One to fulfill the Acceptable Year of Yahweh––in that Age.
Three and a half years later, on Pesach in the Yobel year, Yeshua did in fact fulfill both Pesach and Yom kippur at the same time (note that no one was actually celebrating the Yobel years at this time). The only way we know it was a Yobel year is because of Yeshua saying He fulfilled the Scripture He just read, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”
The First Yobel
The first Yom Kippur was when God killed the lamb for Adam and Eve’s clothing after they fell from grace, so it would have been forty-nine years from that day, when the first Yobel took place the following year––the fiftieth year would have been the first year God began counting the second of His Yobel years. There would have been no reason for a Yom Kippur before that fateful day of the first human sin. So the first Yobel was the fiftieth year after the first Yom Kippur.
We may not be able to predict the next Yobel year, but we do know that Yeshua died and was raised from the dead in a Yobel year. This would have been about the year 4003 or 4004. So about 41 Jubilees from then would bring us to about now––give or take a few years (the Gregorian calendar is off by about 30 years; the Jewish calendar by 230 years).
Celebrating the year of Yobel
It is believed we will be celebrating this Holy day again very soon. And it just may be the most joyous day ever for believers in Yeshua!
There really isn’t much in the Bible about how to celebrate the Yobel year, other than the blowing of the trumpets and shofarot. And the offerings required––actually I could not find any offerings since this is a Shabbat year. But we can have a meal from past harvests, therefore going by what your meals were at the other Feasts, choose either lamb or beef.
It is also a day of remembering our Redemption and appropriately, it falls on Yom Kippur. So it is to be combined with the observing of Yom Kippur in the year that it falls (when we find out what year that is!). Since the Hebrews stopped counting the Yobel year (Jubilees) at some point, and the counting of the Jubilees is from the first Yom Kippur, we can’t really know for sure when the next Yobel year will be. Today there is no calendar that is correct.
