The calendar rule
The sacred calendar begins at Nisan; the land year turns at Tishri
After the Exodus, numbered sacred months continue from Nisan. The Sabbatical and Jubilee land-year cycle turns at Tishri, when Deuteronomy places the end-of-seven-years reading and Leviticus commands the Jubilee trumpet on Tishri 10. A Tishri-to-Tishri Jubilee therefore spans portions of two consecutive Nisan years.
Leviticus 25:8, 10 · KJV
“And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years… And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.”
Leviticus 25:9 · KJV
“Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubile to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month…”
Why the count uses fifty years
Count forty-nine years; hallow the fiftieth
Leviticus commands Israel to number seven sabbaths of years—seven times seven, totaling forty-nine years—and then says, “ye shall hallow the fiftieth year.” This study therefore treats Jubilee as a distinct fiftieth year and begins the next complete fifty-year span afterward.
Leviticus 25:8–10 · KJV
“And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years… Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubile to sound… And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year…”
Leviticus 25:20–22 · KJV
“And if ye shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year?… Then I will command my blessing upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth fruit for three years.”
The principal alternative treats Jubilee as part of a repeating forty-nine-year cycle, partly because successive years without ordinary sowing appear difficult. Leviticus itself anticipates “What shall we eat?” and promises sufficient produce, so the agricultural difficulty does not require changing the stated fiftieth year.
Rule used hereYears one through forty-nine complete seven sabbaths of years. The following year is hallowed as the fiftieth.
The feast-day pattern
Seven complete Sabbaths—and then day fifty
Leviticus uses the same precise counting pattern for days. Seven complete Sabbaths contain forty-nine days; the morrow after the seventh Sabbath is expressly numbered as the fiftieth day. The comparison does not replace the Jubilee command—it illustrates how Leviticus treats completed sevens and the following numbered unit.
Leviticus 23:15–16 · KJV
“Seven sabbaths shall be complete: Even unto the morrow after the seventh sabbath shall ye number fifty days…”
Leviticus 25:8, 10 · KJV
“And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years… And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year…”
PassoverNisan 14The Passover is appointed on the fourteenth day of the first month at even.
Leviticus 23:5⌄
King James Version“In the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the Lord’s passover.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close. Unleavened BreadNisan 15 · seven daysThe feast begins on the following numbered day and continues seven days.
Leviticus 23:6–8⌄
King James Version“And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread unto the Lord: seven days ye must eat unleavened bread.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close. FirstfruitsMorrow after the SabbathThe sheaf is waved on the day from which the seven-Sabbath count begins.
Leviticus 23:10–11⌄
King James Version“Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come into the land which I give unto you, and shall reap the harvest thereof, then ye shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest unto the priest: And he shall wave the sheaf before the Lord, to be accepted for you: on the morrow after the sabbath the priest shall wave it.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close. Feast of WeeksSeven Sabbaths · day 50Seven complete Sabbaths total forty-nine days; the following day is expressly numbered fifty.
Leviticus 23:15–16⌄
King James Version“And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave offering; seven sabbaths shall be complete: Even unto the morrow after the seventh sabbath shall ye number fifty days; and ye shall offer a new meat offering unto the Lord.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close. TrumpetsTishri 1The seventh month opens with a memorial of blowing of trumpets.
Leviticus 23:24⌄
King James Version“Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall ye have a sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, an holy convocation.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close. Day of AtonementTishri 10 · even to evenThe appointed tenth day is kept from the ninth day at even unto the following even.
Leviticus 23:27, 32⌄
King James Version“Also on the tenth day of this seventh month there shall be a day of atonement: it shall be an holy convocation unto you; and ye shall afflict your souls, and offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord. It shall be unto you a sabbath of rest, and ye shall afflict your souls: in the ninth day of the month at even, from even unto even, shall ye celebrate your sabbath.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close. TabernaclesTishri 15 · seven daysSeven feast days are followed by a separately named eighth-day solemn assembly.
Leviticus 23:34–36⌄
King James Version“Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, The fifteenth day of this seventh month shall be the feast of tabernacles for seven days unto the Lord. On the first day shall be an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein. Seven days ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord: on the eighth day shall be an holy convocation unto you; and ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord: it is a solemn assembly; and ye shall do no servile work therein.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close. Counting principleForty-nine completes seven Sabbaths; the next numbered unit is fifty. Tabernacles similarly keeps its following eighth day distinct from the preceding seven.
The starting boundary
Why the first Jubilee spans Nisan 103–104
Caleb’s inheritance occurs while seven tribes still remain without theirs. The present count therefore waits for completion of the wider conquest and division before beginning the land’s agricultural count.
Land entryNisan 40Israel enters Canaan under Joshua.
Caleb receives HebronNisan 45The sixth counted year after entry; seven tribes had not yet received their inheritance.
Working start of the land countTishri within Nisan 55The land-year count begins after the conquest and division, not at Caleb’s earlier allotment.
First JubileeNisan 103–104The Tishri-to-Tishri fiftieth year spans portions of both Nisan years.
Twenty-ninth JubileeNisan 1503–1504The Tishri-to-Tishri Jubilee includes the opening of Jesus’s ministry and his first named ministry Passover.
Formula: Forty-nine Tishri-to-Tishri land years are completed before the first fiftieth year. That first Jubilee spans parts of Nisan 103–104. Adding twenty-eight further fifty-year spans reaches the twenty-ninth Jubilee across Nisan 1503–1504.
The complete sequence
All twenty-nine Jubilees through AD 29
Each Jubilee runs from Tishri to Tishri and therefore crosses portions of two Nisan years. The register shows both Nisan labels instead of assigning the whole Jubilee to only one of them.
Download the complete Jubilee spreadsheet ↓
1st JubileeNisan 103–104Creation years 2550–2551
Othniel’s forty years of rest · Judges 3:9–11
2nd JubileeNisan 153–154Creation years 2600–2601
3rd JubileeNisan 203–204Creation years 2650–2651
4th JubileeNisan 253–254Creation years 2700–2701
5th JubileeNisan 303–304Creation years 2750–2751
Gideon’s deliverance and forty years of rest · Judges 6:14; 8:28
6th JubileeNisan 353–354Creation years 2800–2801
7th JubileeNisan 403–404Creation years 2850–2851
8th JubileeNisan 453–454Creation years 2900–2901
9th JubileeNisan 503–504Creation years 2950–2951
10th JubileeNisan 553–554Creation years 3000–3001
11th JubileeNisan 603–604Creation years 3050–3051
12th JubileeNisan 653–654Creation years 3100–3101
13th JubileeNisan 703–704Creation years 3150–3151
14th JubileeNisan 753–754Creation years 3200–3201
15th JubileeNisan 803–804Creation years 3250–3251
16th JubileeNisan 853–854Creation years 3300–3301
17th JubileeNisan 903–904Creation years 3350–3351
Ezekiel’s restored-Temple vision · Ezekiel 40:1
18th JubileeNisan 953–954Creation years 3400–3401
Darius and the Temple-restoration sequence · Ezra 4–6
19th JubileeNisan 1003–1004Creation years 3450–3451
20th JubileeNisan 1053–1054Creation years 3500–3501
21st JubileeNisan 1103–1104Creation years 3550–3551
22nd JubileeNisan 1153–1154Creation years 3600–3601
23rd JubileeNisan 1203–1204Creation years 3650–3651
24th JubileeNisan 1253–1254Creation years 3700–3701
25th JubileeNisan 1303–1304Creation years 3750–3751
26th JubileeNisan 1353–1354Creation years 3800–3801
27th JubileeNisan 1403–1404Creation years 3850–3851
28th JubileeNisan 1453–1454Creation years 3900–3901
29th JubileeNisan 1503–1504Creation years 3950–3951
Jesus’ opening ministry · Gospel cross-check
How these notes are labeled: These events fall within the corresponding Jubilee year in the Living Bible Timeline’s established count. Scripture does not expressly label Othniel’s rest, Gideon’s deliverance, or Jesus’ proclamation as calendrical Jubilees; the agreements are displayed as chronological observations.
The seventeenth Jubilee
Ezekiel’s restoration vision—and an independent Jewish witness
The timeline’s fifty-year count was constructed from the land-division boundary and carried forward without using later Jewish Jubilee tables. It reaches Ezekiel’s restored-Temple vision in the seventeenth Jubilee. A later Jewish chronological tradition independently identifies the same vision as a Jubilee and likewise describes Israel as having counted seventeen Jubilees from the division of the land to the exile.
Scripture · Ezekiel 40:1 · KJV
“In the five and twentieth year of our captivity, in the beginning of the year, in the tenth day of the month, in the fourteenth year after that the city was smitten… the hand of the LORD was upon me, and brought me thither.”
Scripture · Leviticus 25:9–10 · KJV
“Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubile to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month… And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land…”
KJV recordBeginning of year · day 10Ezekiel dates the vision by Jehoiachin’s captivity and by fourteen years after Jerusalem was smitten. Scripture gives the date and the restoration vision; it does not add the sentence, “this was the seventeenth Jubilee.”
Living Bible Timeline17th Jubilee · Nisan 903–904The Tishri-to-Tishri Jubilee begins while Nisan 903 is underway and continues into Nisan 904. Ezekiel’s vision falls on Tishri 10 within that span.
Later Jewish traditionParallel historical witnessBabylonian Talmud, Arakhin 12a, interprets Ezekiel’s “beginning of the year” on the tenth day as the Jubilee beginning on Tishri 10. Zevachim 118b preserves the related calculation that Israel counted seventeen complete Jubilees after the conquest and division. These writings are not Scripture and do not govern the timeline.
Why the agreement mattersThe timeline and the later Jewish calculation begin from the completed conquest and division of the land and independently arrive at Ezekiel’s vision as the seventeenth Jubilee. The agreement does not replace the KJV evidence, but it is a substantial historical cross-check rather than an event used to manufacture the count.
From vision to completion
The eighteenth Jubilee and the restored Temple
One fifty-year span after Ezekiel’s vision, the eighteenth Jubilee spans Nisan 953–954. In the Persian period surrounding Darius’s rise, the stopped Temple work is resumed; Cyrus’s original command is found and confirmed; and the house is completed near the end of the sixth working year following that Jubilee.
17th JubileeNisan 903–904Ezekiel receives the restored-Temple, restored-land, and restored-inheritance vision on Tishri 10 · Ezekiel 40–48.
18th JubileeNisan 953–954The next Tishri-to-Tishri Jubilee falls at the opening of the Darius-era restoration sequence.
Six working yearsNisan 955–960The work is resumed and protected under Darius. The Temple is finished on Adar 3 in Darius’s sixth year, near the close of Nisan year 960 · Ezra 4:24; 5:1–2; 6:1–15.
First Sabbath yearNisan 961The first seventh-year rest following the eighteenth Jubilee begins immediately after the Nisan year in which the restored Temple was completed.
Ezra 6:15 · KJV
“And this house was finished on the third day of the month Adar, which was in the sixth year of the reign of Darius the king.”
Exodus 23:10–11 · KJV
“And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof: But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still…”
Chronological observation: Scripture dates the reign, resumption, and completion events. The Jubilee and Sabbath-year labels come from the Living Bible Timeline’s continuous calculated register and remain identified as such.
The twenty-ninth Jubilee
Jesus and “the acceptable year of the Lord”
The twenty-ninth Jubilee runs from Tishri while Nisan 1503 is underway to the following Tishri while Nisan 1504 is underway. Jesus’s opening ministry and first named ministry Passover therefore fall within it. Luke does not explicitly call that Sabbath the calendrical Jubilee, so the agreement is presented as a Gospel cross-check rather than used to create the count.
Luke 4:18–19 · KJV
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me… to preach deliverance to the captives… To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.”
Luke 4:21 · KJV
“This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears.”
Questions involving Tiberius, Jesus’ age, Herod’s death, Josephus’s eclipse, and competing BC/AD placements remain in the separate Jesus chronology study so disputed outside dates do not control the biblical Jubilee calculation.
Examine the count
The controlling passages
The full result can be checked from the land-allotment record, the Jubilee command, the feast-day counting pattern, and Luke’s first-century markers.