Quotes about Freedom

“This is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: ‘I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon.

Then the prophet Hananiah took the yoke off the neck of Jeremiah the prophet and broke it.

On that day, declares the LORD of Hosts, I will break the yoke off their necks and tear off their bonds, and no longer will strangers enslave them.

that each man should free his Hebrew slaves, both male and female, and no one should hold his fellow Jew in bondage.

So all the officials and all the people who entered into this covenant agreed that they would free their menservants and maidservants and no longer hold them in bondage. They obeyed and released them,

but later they changed their minds and took back the menservants and maidservants they had freed, and they forced them to become slaves again.

“This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: I made a covenant with your forefathers when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, saying:

Every seventh year, each of you must free his Hebrew brother who has sold himself to you. He may serve you six years, but then you must let him go free. But your fathers did not listen or incline their ear.

Recently you repented and did what pleased Me; each of you proclaimed freedom for his neighbor. You made a covenant before Me in the house that bears My Name.

But now you have changed your minds and profaned My name. Each of you has taken back the menservants and maidservants whom you had set at liberty to go wherever they wanted, and you have again forced them to be your slaves.

Therefore this is what the LORD says: You have not obeyed Me; you have not proclaimed freedom, each man for his brother and for his neighbor. So now I proclaim freedom for you, declares the LORD—freedom to fall by sword, by plague, and by famine! I will make you a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.

Now Jeremiah was free to come and go among the people, for they had not yet put him in prison.