the sanctuary in the year of jubilee, consisted simply in the fact that he had looked upon the land which he vowed to the Lord as though it were his own property, still and entirely at his own disposal, and therefore had allowed himself to violate the rights of the Lord by the sale of his land. At any rate, it is quite inadmissible to supply a different subject to מכר from that of the parallel גּאל, viz., the priest.
verses 22-24
If on the other hand any one dedicated to the Lord a “field of his purchase,” i.e., a field that had been bought and did not belong to his patrimony, he was to give the amount of the valuation as estimated by the priest up to the year of jubilee “on that day,” i.e., immediately, and all at once. This regulation warrants the conclusion, that on the dedication of hereditary fields, the amount was not paid all at once, but year by year. In the year of jubilee the field that had been vowed, if a field acquired by purchase, did not revert to the buyer, but to the hereditary owner from whom it had been bought, according to the law in Lev 25:23-28.
Verse 25
All valuations were to be made according to the shekel of the sanctuary.
verses 26-27
What belonged to the Lord by law could not be dedicated to Him by a vow, especially the first-born of clean cattle (cf. Exo 13:1-2). The first-born of unclean animals were to be redeemed according to the valuation of the priest, with the addition of a fifth; and if this was not done, it was to be sold at the estimated value. By this regulation the earlier law, which commanded that an ass should either be redeemed with a sheep or else be put to death (Exo 13:13; Exo 34:20), was modified in favour of the revenues of the sanctuary and its servants.
verses 28-29
Moreover, nothing put under the ban, nothing that a man had devoted (banned) to the Lord of his property, of man, beast, or the field of his possession, was to be sold or redeemed, because it was most holy (see at Lev 2:3). The man laid under the ban was to be put to death. According to the words of Lev 27:28, the individual Israelite was quite at liberty to ban, not only his cattle and field, but also men who belonged to him, that is to say, slaves and children. החרים signifies to dedicate something to the Lord in an unredeemable manner, as cherum, i.e., ban, or banned. חרם (to devote, or ban), judging from the cognate words in the Arabic, signifying prohibere, vetare, illicitum facere, illicitum, sacrum, has the primary signification “to cut
