Landlords and Tenants

In the first century, the elite owned much of the land and rented it to tenant farmers. These farms were managed by a steward; the landlord typically lived elsewhere (e.g., Mark 12:1–2). It was rare for farmers to own their fields for two reasons:

1. Taxes created a slim profit line. Along with the general tax burden, Jews paid taxes to support the temple (Josephus, Antiquities 18.312–313). Therefore, an average Jew in the first century was required to pay roughly 30–50 percent of their income in taxes each year (Hanson and Oakman, Palestine in the Time of Jesus, 105–8).

2. A bad harvest could force farmers to sell their land to a distant landlord. The landlord had the luxury of leaving the land fallow for two to four years in order to yield a more profitable crop, which could leave the farmer without work. In a normal year, a farmer might be able to meet his needs, but a famine would destroy his livelihood (e.g., Josephus, Antiquities, 20.51–53).

In an attempt to keep their land, some first-century farmers accrued debt that they could not repay. Nehemiah recognized a similar situation in the fifth century bc and called for the Jewish people to restore land to its original owners and to stop charging interest (Neh 5:1–5, 10–11). To protect the unfortunate, the Mosaic law made provisions for land ownership; those who lost their land would receive it back in the Year of Jubilee (Lev 25:13–17). However, it is unknown whether the Year of Jubilee was ever observed. Josephus highlights that Jews destroyed the debt records as part of the Jewish revolt in order to relieve the strain of debt on the poor (Josephus, Jewish War, 7.61; Oakman, “Jesus and Agrarian Palestine,” 68–75).