In my morning prayers this past week I was reading through the last chapters of Leviticus. Chapter 25 has always been one of my favorites, with its detailed description of the Year of Jubilee. This was a "sabbath of sabbaths," the great 50th year following the sabbath of sabbath years (7 x 7). The emphasis of this Jubilee seems to be the return of everything back to how God intended it. Land is returned, relationships are restored, etc. It is a literal enactment, though perhaps only a taste, of the final Day of the Lord where God will be all in all.
The Jubilee Year got me to thinking about forgiveness. In Matthew 18:21-22 Saint Peter asks our Lord Jesus how often he should do this forgiveness thing. Some translations give Jesus' answer as: "77 times." I once heard someone say: "Anyone who has been married for more than a year has already hit that number!" A better translation is the more difficult 70 times 7, pointing us not just to 490 times (still keeping track!) but to an impossibly perfect number. If seven is the number of perfection, then 70 times 7 points us to perfection squared... and then some. In other words, something like the Year of Jubilee. Perhaps even a Jubilee of Jubilees.
The emphasis seems to be not just on "keep forgiving" (although that is certainly the point too), but on forgiveness as the main thing, the central thing, forgiveness as a way of life, forgiveness as God's intentions for the whole creation. In choosing to forgive, we choose not just a set number of times (How many times as a parent have I begun my threats with "Next time..."?), but to enter into a pattern, a way of life, a Jubilee year that points us toward God and to God's final plan for the fullness of time.
In other words, when we forgive like God forgives, we walk on holy ground, we glimpse and taste the Divine.
Want to read more? See the verses that follow: Matthew 18:23-35.
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