not reap your field right up to its edge, nor shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest. You shall leave them for the poor and the sojourner: I am the LORD.” Leviticus 23.22

The poor must not be deprived of the dignity of work simply because they are poor. In the Law of God the poor in Israel were expected to work in order to overcome their impoverished condition, whether that condition was for a short or long term.

Gleaning fields was the most common form of labor for the poor. It could also be highly productive for the poor, as we see in the case of Ruth (Ruth 2). Israelite society was based in agriculture. Every community would have had plenty of fields and gardens, and each landowner was responsible to make sure that, when the harvest came in, food was left on the stalk or vine for the poor to glean.

By extension, we might suppose that some measures were taken to make it possible for the poor to find work in those fields before the harvest was realized. And that other opportunities for the poor to work were also held in store, community by community, for those who might have needs.

Resources were not distributed to the poor by local governments at centralized collections centers. Nor were the poor sought out and “counseled” by government agents to enroll for local assistance, as is often the case today. The poor were expected to go and retrieve their sustenance, at their own initiative, through the dignity of honest labor.

In our day, when communities are no longer so directly based on agriculture, policies could be adopted and programs created which provide other means whereby the poor can work to provide for their needs. The practice of giving “hand-outs” to those who meet some government-decreed standard for being poor does not fulfill the principal of gleaning; instead, it may serve to foster a mindset of dependency, if not entitlement.

One who had become poor in ancient Israel might choose to “sell” himself into the service of another, especially, it seems, a close relative (Lev. 25.39-43). This was not slavery but more a form of indentured servitude in which, for a specified period of time, one who had fallen on hard times would contract with another to serve in whatever ways might have been needed. During the tenure of such contracts the one serving was to be treated with love and respect, as unto the Lord (Lev. 25.43). He was not to be treated scornfully or in a manner that assaulted his dignity as an image-bearer of God.

T. M. Moore

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