They shall stay with you as hired workers and serve you until the next Year of Restoration.

as if they had been hired on an annual basis. Their master must not treat them harshly.

Do not be resentful when you set slaves free; after all, they have served you for six years at half the cost of hired servants. Do this, and the LORD your God will bless you in all that you do.

Human life is like forced army service, like a life of hard manual labor,

like a slave longing for cool shade; like a worker waiting to be paid.

Look away from us and leave us alone; let us enjoy our hard life---if we can.

And now the LORD says, "In exactly three years Moab's great wealth will disappear. Of its many people, only a few will survive, and they will be weak."

Then the Lord said to me, "In exactly one year the greatness of the tribes of Kedar will be at an end.