People & groups
Sojourner
A person residing among a people without full ancestral standing in the land.
Also called · Resident alien · Foreigner · Stranger
What it means
A sojourner lived for a time or settled among Israel without the same kinship and land protections as a native household.
The law commands fair treatment and love for the sojourner, grounding this duty in Israel’s own experience as foreigners in Egypt.
How it appears in the Bible
Sojourners could participate in parts of community life while remaining especially vulnerable to exclusion and injustice.
Translation note
“Stranger” can sound merely unfamiliar today; “resident alien” or “foreigner” may better show the social status in some passages.