John Gill Commentary Deuteronomy 15:1

"At the end of every seven years thou shalt make a release." — Deuteronomy 15:1 (ASV)

At the end of every seven years you shall make a release .
] Not of servants, for they were not to be dismissed from their service until they had served six years, as is directed to in a following law; for if they were to be set free whenever a sabbatical year came, they might be discharged when they had not served more than a year, or than half a year, or than a month or two. Indeed when the year of jubilee intervened, they were released be it at what time it would; but not in a sabbatical year, which was a year of release of debts, as the following verses show, as well as there was, then a rest of the land from tillage, (Leviticus 25:2–4) .

Now this was done at the end or extremity of every seventh year; not at the latter end or extremity of it, for if the debt of a poor man might be exacted of him in the year, and until the end of it, it would not in this respect have been a sabbatical year, or a year of rest and quiet; but this was done at the first extremity of it, at the beginning of it, as Aben Ezra and Ben Melech observe; though Maimonides ^F2 asserts it to be after the seven years were ended; for he says,``the seventh year releaseth not monies but at the end of it,'' according to (Deuteronomy 15:1) that as in (Deuteronomy 31:10) after seven years is meant, so the release of monies is after seven years.

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FOOTNOTES:

• F2: Hilchot Shemittah & Yobel, c. 9. sect. 4.