Leviticus 23:31
in Leviticus 23You are not to do any work at all. This is a permanent statute for the generations to come, wherever you live.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Ye shall do no manner of work: it is a statute for ever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.
KJV
Ye shall do no manner of work: it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.
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This verse in Leviticus 23
Commentary
4 notes on this verseThis site's exposition
If anyone does not humble himself on this day
on Leviticus 23:29-33
These are the only penalties in the chapter, and there are two. Anyone who does not humble himself is cut off from his people. Anyone who works hears the LORD speaking in the first person, "I will destroy" him.
This site's exposition
not to do any work at all
Verses 28, 30 and 31 all turn on work. Wherever you live carries the day into every town, as John Wesley says of the Sabbath at verse 3. The rites of chapter 16 stayed at the sanctuary, while the rest reached every house.
The record, by era
The Puritans and the Awakening1 voice
Ye shall do no manner of work,.... Which is repeated, that it might be observed, and to show how strictly God required this day should be kept, and how careful men should be of breaking the command in this respect, and how much he should resent it if they did: it shall be a statute for ever, throughout your generations, in all your dwellings; unto the coming of the Messiah, who, by the atoning sacrifice of himself, would answer to this law, and put an end to it.
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
proposed
there shall be a day of atonement . . . and ye shall afflict your souls--an unusual festival, at which the sins of the whole year were expiated. It is here only stated that the severest penalty was incurred by the violation of this day.
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — starts-lowercase
How the passage was read
On Leviticus 23:1-44On Leviticus 23:1-44
The year Israel keeps
This chapter is the calendar of the whole Jewish year, and every feast in it is still on the calendar today. In order: the weekly Sabbath; Passover and Unleavened Bread in spring (now kept as the seder meal and a week without leavened bread); Firstfruits (the first sheaf of barley waved before God); Weeks, in Hebrew Shavuot, fifty days later (Christians know the Greek name: Pentecost); then in autumn the Day of Trumpets (now Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year, announced by the ram's-horn trumpet called a shofar), the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur, the great fast), and Tabernacles, in Hebrew Sukkot, when families still build and eat in leafy backyard booths for a week, remembering the wilderness.
So when the New Testament says Jesus or Paul went up for “the feast,” it means one of these appointments: the same calendar, kept for over three thousand years.
This section is reception history: how the passage was read and kept in the Jewish tradition. Where a reading parts from an essential of the Christian faith, the section says so at that point.
Sources: The Feasts of the LORD (this site's study of all seven) · Mishnah Rosh Hashanah 1:1 (the four new years)
The words behind it
9 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| כָּל־ | kol- | any | H3605 → | 5413 times |
| מְלָאכָ֖ה | melakhah | work | H4399 → | 167 times |
| לֹ֣א | lo' | not | H3808 → | 5168 times |
| תַעֲשׂ֑וּ | taasu | you will do | H6213 → | 2628 times |
| חֻקַּ֤ת | chukat | a statute of | H2708 → | 104 times |
| עוֹלָם֙ | olam | perpetuity | H5769 → | 438 times |
| לְדֹרֹ֣תֵיכֶ֔ם | ledoroteikhem | to generations your | H1755 → | 167 times |
| בְּכֹ֖ל | bekhol | in all | H3605 → | 5413 times |
| מֹֽשְׁבֹֽתֵיכֶֽם׃ | moshevoteikhem | dwelling places your | H4186 → | 44 times |
כָּל־any
kol-H3605 →5413 times
מְלָאכָ֖הwork
melakhahH4399 →167 times
לֹ֣אnot
lo'H3808 →5168 times
תַעֲשׂ֑וּyou will do
taasuH6213 →2628 times
חֻקַּ֤תa statute of
chukatH2708 →104 times
עוֹלָם֙perpetuity
olamH5769 →438 times
לְדֹרֹ֣תֵיכֶ֔םto generations your
ledoroteikhemH1755 →167 times
בְּכֹ֖לin all
bekholH3605 →5413 times
מֹֽשְׁבֹֽתֵיכֶֽם׃dwelling places your
moshevoteikhemH4186 →44 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
Where this verse is studied
On this page
Studies22
About Leviticus
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament and Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament: The Pentateuch.