Nehemiah 10:31 → Deuteronomy 15:1

Deuteronomy 15:1 commands debt cancellation "at the end of every seven years" (מִקֵּץ שֶׁבַע שָׁנִים, miqqetz sheva' shanim), establishing the שְׁמִטָּה (shemittah, "release") as a pillar of Israelite economic justice. Nehemiah 10:31 records the post-exilic community pledging, "Every seventh year we will let the fields lie fallow, and will cancel every debt," binding themselves by oath to the very sabbatical-year legislation they had previously neglected. The community's formal re-commitment to the shemittah after the exile demonstrates that the Deuteronomic economic laws remained normative and that covenant renewal required explicit recommitment to social provisions that protected the poor.