E. The Reign of Hezekiah
7. A Vineyard Gone Bad (5:1-30)
Isaiah’s Preaching and the lsaianic Narratives
Yee, “A Form Critical Study of Isaiah 5:1-7 as a Song and a Juridical Parable,” CBQ 43(1981)30-40.
B. S. Childs, “The Enemy from the North and the Chaos Tradition,” JBL 78(1959)187-98; R. B. Chisholm, “Structure, Style, and the Prophetic Message: An Analysis of Isaiah 5:8-30,” BS 143(1986)46-60; R. J. Clifford, “The Use of HOY in the Prophets,” CBQ 28(1966)458-64; E. W. Davies, Prophecy and Ethics: Isaiah and the Ethical Traditions of Israel (Sheffield, England: JSOT Press, 1981)65-89; H. Donner, “Der Feind aus dem Norden,” ZDPV 84(1968)46-54; J. A. Emerton, “The Textual Problems of Isaiah V 14,” VT 17(1967)135-42; E.
Gerstenberger, “The Woe-Oracles of the Prophets,” JBL 81(1962)249-63; A. Graffy, “The Literary Genre of Isaiah 5, l-7,” Bib 60(1979)400-409; D. R. Hillers, “Hoy and Hoy- Oracles: A Neglected Syntactic Aspect,” The Word of the Lord Shall Go Forth: Essays in Honor of David Noel Freedman (ed. C. L.
Meyers and M. O’Connor; Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns/
American Schools of Oriental Research, 1983)185-88; W.
Janzen, Mourning Cy and Woe Oracle (Berlin/New York:
Walter de Gruyter, 1972); H. Junker, “Die literarische Art von Is. 5:1-7,” Bib 40(1959)259-66; H.-J. Krause, “Hoi als prophetische Leichenklage iiber das eigene Volk im 8.
Jahrhundert,” ZAW 85(1973)15-46; C. E. L’Heureux, “The Redactional History of Isaiah 5.1-10.4,” In the Shelter of Elyon:
Essays on Ancient Palestinian Life and Literature in Honor of G. W.
Ahlstriim (ed. W. B. Barrick and J. R. Spencer; Sheffield, England: JSOT Press, 1984)99-119; 0. Lore& “Weinberglied und prophetische Deutuqg im Protest-Song Jes. 5:1-7,” UF 7(1975)573-76; D. Lys, “La vigne et le double je. Exercice de style sur Esa”ia V:l-7,” SVT 26(1974)1-16; T. de Orbiso, “El cantico a la viria de1 amado (Is. 5:1-7),” Est EC 34(1960)715-31;
W. Schottroff, “Das Weinberglied Jesajas (Jes 5.1-7): Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Parabel,” ZAW 82(1970) 68-91;
G. T. Sheppard, “More on Isaiah 5:1-7 as a Juridical Parable,”
CBQ 44(1982)45-47; J. W. Whedbee, Isaiah and Wisdom (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1971); G. R. Williams, “Frus- trated Expectations in Isaiah v l-7: A Literary Interpreta- tion,” VT 35(1985)459-65; J. G. Williams, “The Alas-oracles of the Eighth Century Prophets,” HUCA 38(1967) 75-91; J. T.
Willis, “The Genre of Isaiah 5:1-7,“JBL 96(1977) 337-62; G. A.
Isaiah uses a song about a vineyard to introduce this lengthy speech containing a number of genre forms. If the speeches of Isaiah are generally arranged in chronological order, then this unit should belong to the period after civil strife had come to characterize Israelite society. This assumes that the preceding speech (3:X-4:6) contains references to the potential or actual flight to Jerusalem of fugitives from the north (4:2). These fugitives would have been fleeing the terrors associated with the political struggles, regicide, and open warfare attendant upon the Zechariah-Shallum- Menahem struggle as well as the encroachment of neighbor- ing peoples on Israelite territory (see II Kings 15:8-16; and above chap. 1, sect. 3C).
Several details in this speech point to the period of Menahem’s rule as its historical context and background. (1) In the description of the treatment of the vineyard (i.e., Israel and Judah), the vineyard’s walls have been demolished, and the vineyard is being trampled. This parallels the treatment that Israel and Judah were beginning to receive during the days of Menahem. (2) The fact that some of the people had already been taken into captivity (5:13) fits the period of Menahem, when anti-Assyrian states in Syria-Palestine had taken over Israelite and perhaps some Judean territory and carried off Israelites and Judeans (Amos l-2, and see below on Isa. 9:l). (3) In 5:26-30, Isaiah speaks of “a nation afar off”
who will come against the land. The identity of this nation is not specified. Isaiah may have thought of either Urartu or Assyria, for the international situation was such that it was not clear that Assyria would emerge from the present struggle as the dominant power. This was the state of affairs early in the reign of Menahem, when Tiglath-pileser was moving to break Urartian influence in the eastern Mediter- ranean seaboard. (4) The devastation of the earthquake is still sufficiently recent and memory of it vivid enough for Isaiah to appeal to this as an act of Yahweh’s recent judgment and as illustrative of matters to come (w. 14-17, 25).
The following is an outline of the speech.
lsaiah
(1) Introduction: an owner and his vineyard (l-7)
(2) Exposition: the failure of the vineyard and the owner’s reactions (8-24a)
(3) Conclusion: the penalties for wrongdoing (24b-30)
Isaiah’s Preaching and the lsaianic Narratives
ing the grapes into wine. But, the abnormal factor, the unexpected feature, is that the farmer, anticipating a good yield, harvested only inedible grapes unsuited for winemak- ing. The conclusion of the song describes the disappointing results that attended the hard work of a farmer whose vineyard produced what he had not planted.
At a deeper, allegorical level, Isaiah has here presented a theological overview of his people’s history. The enterprising farmer (David-Solomon and/or Yahweh) establishes a vine- yard (Israel) on a promising site and provides it with all that is required, but the people produce bad fruit. They turn out to be very disappointing (see Ps. 80:8-11 for a similar picture and compare Isa. 4:2). Probably by the time the prophet had finished verse 2, the audience had clearly made the connection between themselves and the vineyard, its history and theirs.
In verses 3-6, Isaiah assumes the role of the vineyard owner. He first asks his audience, Jerusalemites and Judeans but stated in the singular (“you inhabitant of Jerusalem, you Judean”), to judge where the fault in the enterprise lay (w.
3-4). Obviously, as he has presented the case, only one verdict is possible. It was not the owner’s fault. Isaiah and all his hearers know that, so he is really not asking them for a juridical decision.
Before his audience has a chance to do the natural-name- ly, offer advice about what to do (“Maybe you should use a different fertilizer”, “Another type of grape would probably solve the problem”)-the owner announces an unexpected course of action. The protective walls are to be torn down and the vineyard left unworked to return to the wild like the grapes it bore. With the last statement of verse 6, Isaiah moves in his presentation to what no human owner could do, namely, control the clouds and the rainfall. Thus he prepares for verse 7 in which he drives home his point without ambiguity. The vineyard and the vines are the house of Israel and the people of Judah, and the owner is Yahweh. When Yahweh sought to gather the fruits of his labor,
Isaiah 5:1-7
Isaiah opens his song about a vineyard with words that must have reminded his hearers of David and Solomon. The latter also bore the name Jedidiah or Yedidiah (“Beloved of Yahweh”), given him by the prophet Nathan (II Sam. 12:25).
Both the names, David and Jedidiah, have a nickname quality about them, expressing endearment and/or benefi- cence, and may have been applied this way to later members of the house of David. The root for both names, dwd, was used to speak of a lover or a close, actual or “assumed,”
kinship relationship (such as our [rich] “uncle,” “sugar daddy,” or “godfather”). If we write out the consonants of the line introducing the song, it is easy to see the possibility of associating the imagery with David (dwd) and Yedidiah (ydydy0
‘shyrh n’ Zydydy shyrt d w d y lkrmw
One can imagine that this line may have once read, or at least have been understood (with only slightly different vocaliza- tion), as: “Let me sing for Yedidiah a song of my David about his vineyard.” The audience probably expected to hear some song with erotic content similar to those found in the Song of Solomon, where the young male lover is spoken of not only as a dwd, but also as a mlk (“king”). Even the term “vineyard”
carried female sexual overtones.
The content of the song, which is limited to verses lb-2, appears on the surface to be merely the depiction of what one would normally do in preparing land and establishing a vineyard, as must have been very widespread at the time of Uzziah, who was recalled in tradition as a proponent of viniculture, one “who loved the soil” (II Chron. 26:lO).
Having a choice site, the owner prepared the soil, removed the stones, set out the choicest vines, built a watchtower to guard his property, and prepared equipment for transform-
he looked for justice [mishpat], and there was bloodshed mispah];
for righteousness [gedaqah], and there was outcry [ge’aqah]!
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of verse 8 is uncertain. The verse appears to denounce those whose ambition is to acquire property, house after house and field after field, “until there is no more space and you (~1.) dwell alone in the midst of the land.” If the people being condemned here are the same as those in 3:14-15, then Isaiah is denouncing the government officials and social leaders who, through money-lending, land foreclosures, and their status as political administrators, are amassing enormous wealth from the peasant and small landowning classes.
Isaiah here obviously satirizes these shrewd businessmen by caricaturing their ultimate goal-owning everything.
The opening of verse 9 may have suffered from scribal error in transmission. The Hebrew text now reads, “in my ears (or “in the ears of”) Yahweh Sebaoth,” which certainly suggests something is lacking. Had this line once begun with a phrase opening with “therefore,” then verses S-24 would have even greater symmetry than is now the case. There would have been the following pattern:
Isaiah 5%24a
In verses S-24u, Isaiah seeks to make clear and to illustrate two points. On the one hand, his goal is to demonstrate his contention that Israel and Judah, as the vineyard of Yahweh, have yielded bad fruit. He does this with a series of seven woe sections (assuming that originally verse 23 began with a
“woe”). On the other hand, he sought to show that, like the vineyard owner, Yahweh already had begun and would continue to tear apart the defenses of the vineyard, opening it to be devoured and trampled and leaving it uncared for and neglected to return to a “wild” state. This the prophet does primarily with three sections beginning with “therefore,”
which describe consequences brought about by God. The woe sections are verses 8, 11-12, 18-19, 20, 21, 22, 23. The
“therefore” sections, which describe actions and results sometimes past and sometimes future, are verses 13, 14-17, and 24~. Verses 9-10 functionally parallel the “therefore”
sections and are presented as a word of Yahweh. The actions described in the “therefore” sections include both events already past and events yet to come.
Although textual and translation problems plague the first woe section, its overall thrust is clear. The prophet condemns those accumulating immovable property (v. 8). Beyond this, difficulties cloud understanding. First of all, it is difficult to know the full impact of and exactly how to translate the opening expression hoy. Suggestions range from seeing it as only an attention-getting device (like beginning a hymn with
“0”) to viewing it as a form of curse that already anticipates death/judgment on the ones noted in the following phrases.
In the woe sections of Isaiah 5 and elsewhere, the woe is followed by participial forms. Following the hay and the participial construction, the verbs and pronouns may be either second person (v. Sb), which would suggest a translation like “Hey, you who join house to house. . . ,” or third person (v. ll), which would suggest a translation like
“Woe to (shame on or doom to) those who rise. . . .” Perhaps there was no single pattern of use for this expression except for its employment to call to attention or to call attention to (generally in a negative, reproachful manner) some particu- lar group or condition. Second, the translation of the last half
woe-section (v. 8)
therefore section (w. 9-10) woe section (w. 11-12) therefore sections (w. 13-17) five woe sections (w. 18-23) therefore section (v. 24~)
After the opening of verse 9a follows a pronouncement in oath form about some aspects of Yahweh’s judgment:
Numerous homes, big and beautiful, will be ravaged and without inhabitant; vineyards will yield only a gallon of wine per acre; and cereal crops will produce only one-tenth of the seed required to plant them (vv. 9b-10). The envisioned distress matches the offense, the punishment fits the crime;
as houses and fields were objects of acquisition, so houses and fields shall be cursed. If verse 9 once began with something like, “therefore, Yahweh Sebaoth swore in my ears,” then the judgment announced could refer to events that had already occurred. The homes were those destroyed in the earthquake, and the poor harvests were those attendant on the disaster.
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Isaiah
The second woe (w. 11-12) singles out those said to drink from early morning to late evening, to spend their time at parties and feasts, and thus to be oblivious to the work of Yahweh going on around them. The “deed of Yahweh and the work of his hands” should be understood as a reference to what was going on in international affairs in the area.
Isaiah claims that the ravaging of the population of Israelite and, perhaps, Judean territories was the work of Yahweh.
The drinking and partying crowd was incapable of discem- ing this work of Yahweh in the events around them.
Verses 13-17 expound upon and develop the claim of verse 12b, namely, that the ills befalling the people were the work of Yahweh. All of verses 13-17 in the Hebrew are in the perfect (past) tense and thus Isaiah is describing events already past as the deeds of Yahweh and the work of his hands. Two events are seen as Yahweh’s acts of judgment:
the exile of some of the people (v. 13) and the devastation of the recent earthquake (w. 14-17). Earlier, Isaiah had described the earthquake as a time when the pride and arrogance of human beings were brought low and Yahweh was exalted (2:6-22). Now he adds another dimension to God’s judgment: the carrying away of his people into exile.
As we noted in the introductory historical survey (see above, chap. 1, sect. 3B), portions of Israelite territory were being attacked and annexed to Syria and neighboring states already under Jeroboam II. The Gilead area in Transjordan, lying along the main north-south highway in the region, and the tribal areas of Zebulun and Naphtali, lying along the main highway route connecting Damascus with the southern Mediterranean coast, were the first areas affected (Amos l-2;
Isa. 9:l). Israel’s struggles to hold these areas gradually collapsed, and they were incorporated into Syria during the reign of Menahem. Even Judean territory was probably already being encroached on (II Kings 15:37). Israelite and Judean towns in these ‘areas were being devastated and ransacked (Isa. 5:13) and populations deported or placed on the slave market (Amos 1:6-12).
Isaiah says little about the deportation of his fellow citizens in verse 13 except to associate it with lack of understanding and to allude to the hunger and thirst associated with being
Isaiah’s Preaching and the lsaianic Narratives
captive. He is much more descriptive in speaking of the effects of the earthquake.
14. Therefore Sheol enlarged its throat,
and opened its mouth unbelievably wide;
and her Uerusalem’s? Sheol’s?] nobility and her masses went down,
her throng and whoever exulted in her.
15. And the human race was brought low, and arrogant looks were humbled;
16. And Yahweh Sebaoth was justly exalted,
and El the Holy righteously showed himself holy.
17. And lambs grazed as they wished,
and among the ruins [foreign] settlers are eating the fatlings.
The consequences of the earthquake are described in several ways in this section. Verse 14 notes the huge loss of life which resulted but describes this as Sheol, the underworld, consuming the people. The humiliation of humanity in verse 15 reiterates the theme of an earlier speech (see 2:9, 11, 17). The earthquake, which abased humanity, exalted the Deity, here referred to under the titles Yahweh of Hosts and El the Holy. As a consequence of the quake, sheep now graze where previously one would not have expected to see them (in the farmlands and town sites) and foreigners (gerim), or “squatters,” who have occupied Israelite territory eat from flocks not their own.
Woes three to five are given without any predicted or correlated calamity. Most interpreters see the people singled out in woe three (w. 18-19) as persons who deny the reality of God’s moral judgment of the world-that is, they mockingly declare that God will not execute his judgment and punish their wrongdoing. In fact, they challenge the belief in divine action. This may be the meaning of the text.
On the other hand, the passage could be taken in a more straightforward sense. The people Isaiah condemns are those who want a quick manifestation of the purpose of God and immediate divine action to make sense of the interna- tional situation that seems to become more and more complex with the passage of time. The refusal of Israel and
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For this reason, the anger of Yahweh was kindled against his people,
and he stretched out his hand against them and smote them;
and the mountains quaked and their corpses were as refuse in the streets;
in all this his anger was not abated and his hand is outstretched still.
Isaiah 5:25 Judah to join anti-Assyrian coalitions had been a policy for a
century, and under that policy things had gone well. Now international anarchy seemed to have broken out, and the very existence of Israel and Judah was being challenged. In such circumstances, one can see how people would become impatient and anxious to see God make known his work and purpose. Isaiah, however, senses that there will be no quick resolution of matters, that the people must live for a time in the pain and turmoil of unclarified issues when God and his work seem hidden (or, as he later argues, alien and strange; 28:21).
Those who demand haste and probably advocate a change in present policies, Isaiah describes as people who drag and pull their iniquity behind them like animals pulling carts.
Woes four through seven (w. 20-23) make good sense if given merely a surface reading. The opinions they express would be right at home in the book of Proverbs. However, in the form Isaiah has cast them, as woe sayings, he is probably accusing his hearers, at least indirectly, of the wrongs embodied in the sayings. To agree with general principles is one thing; to be accused of the actions condemned is another matter.
In verse 24u, Isaiah issues a summarizing pronouncement to the woes, opening with a “therefore”:
Therefore, as surely as a tongue of fire consumes stubble, and dry grass collapses in the flame;
so their root shall be as rot,
and their growth rise up like soot.
Isaiah 5:24b-30
In his conclusion to this powerful speech, Isaiah gives a summarizing statement condemning the people (v. 24b) and then declares the people’s wrongdoing to be the basis for God’s acts of judgment, one past (v. 25) and one future (w.
26-30). The condemnation accuses the people in terms already encountered in 1:lO: “Because they have rejected the torah of Yahweh Sebaoth and the word of the Holy One of Israel they have despised.”
The past action of Yahweh against his people was the devastation of the earthquake.
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The past judgment of God was severe and widespread.
The earthquake demolished much of the country. But Yahweh was not yet through. His anger was unabated and his hand was still stretched out-to strike again. The second blow was yet to come but was already on the horizon. Isaiah spoke of the coming calamity in terms of a nation from afar (“distant nations” appears to be a scribal error). The nation is unidentified. Its forces are described in frighteningly idealized terms. The army moves swiftly; none of its troops falter or grow faint; its military dress is impeccable; its weapons are ready and menacing; its horses and chariots dart like a whirlwind; its prey is without mercy; and like the roaring of the sea or the darkening of the day, it brings gloom and distress in its wake. When it comes, or when Yahweh brings it into the land, that day will be a day of judgment, a day the vineyard is trampled and devoured.
Undoubtedly, Isaiah’s depiction of the army Yahweh will bring against his vineyard draws on stereotypical terminolo- gy and paints the coming enemy with the colors of the traditional and legendary “foe from the north.”
8. A NEW TASK AND A NEW MESSAGE (6:1-13)