The year of tithing.
Why so called? A double tithe was taken each year—the ordinary Levitical tithe (Numbers 18:21-28), which Deuteronomy, without mention, takes for granted; and the festal tithe, ordained as a provision for the sanctuary feasts (Deuteronomy 14:21-27). On the third year a tithe was to be devoted to festivities at home (Deuteronomy 14:28, Deuteronomy 14:29). It is usually, but too hastily, assumed that this third tithe was but the second diversely applied. That in itself is unlikely, as the feasts at the sanctuary required to be held on the third and sixth years, as well as on the others, and the provision for these could not well be dispensed with. Neither does it explain the expression, "year of tithing;" for while, on this supposition, the tithe was differently applied, there was nothing unusual in the manner of taking it. Each year was a year of tithing (sabbatical years excepted), and this no more than the rest. The ordinary view, besides, is directly in the teeth of the testimony of Josephus, who may be supposed to have known the practice of his time. His statement distinctly is that one-tenth was to be given to the priests and Levites; one-tenth was to be applied to feasts at the sanctuary; and a tenth besides was, every third year, to be given to the poor. If this was so, we have a natural explanation of the phrase, "the year of tithing," and self-consistency is introduced into the laws. The tithe-laws in Deuteronomy are often represented as if in conflict with those in Leviticus and Numbers. Part of the plausibility of the objection lies in the use of the definite article in the English version—"all the tithe" (Deuteronomy 14:28; Deuteronomy 26:12)—which gives an impression of allusion to the ordinary, the well-known tithe. That impression is not created if we take the plain Hebrew—"a whole tithe"—which by its very nakedness suggests a new regulation. Deuteronomy legislates for its own purposes in connection with the centralizing of the worship at the sanctuary. The newer criticism seems to have abandoned the old ground, which made the Levitical laws the earliest. It assumes that the distinction of priests and Levites, with the body of legislation based on that distinction, took shape not earlier than the exile—a view hopelessly in conflict with the histories of the return. Indeed, so great was the disproportion in the numbers of priests and Levites returning with Zerubbabel—twelve or thirteen priests for every Levite—that the Levitical laws could only have been put in force with material alterations and modifications. They are in some respects singularly inapplicable to the very times in which they are supposed to have originated.—J.O.