The song of the vineyard
1 Let me sing for my beloved
the love song of my beloved
about his vineyard.
My beloved had a vineyard
on a fertile hillside.
2 He dug it up, cleared the stones,
and planted the choicest vines.
He built there a watchtower
and hewed out a winepress as well.
Then he looked
for a crop of good grapes,
but it yielded only wild grapes.
3 Now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and people of Judah,
judge between me and my vineyard.
4 What more was there to do
that I have not done for my vineyard?
Good grapes was the yield I expected,
why did it yield only sour grapes?
5 Now I will let you know
what I am going to do
with my vineyard:
I will remove its hedge
and it will be burned;
I will break down its wall
and it will be trampled on.
6 I will make it a wasteland,
I will neither prune nor hoe it,
and briers and thorns will grow there.
I command the clouds, as well,
not to send rain on it.
7 The vineyard of Yahweh Sabaoth
is the people of Israel,
and the people of Judah
are his pleasant vine.
He looked for justice,
but found bloodshed;
He looked for righteousness
but heard cries of distress.
Woe to you rich!
8 Woe to you who join house to house,
who add field to field!
So no room will remain,
with you alone in the land?
9 Yahweh Sabaoth has sworn in my hearing:
“Many houses will remain in ruins,
beautiful mansions without occupants.
10 Ten acres of vineyard
will yield only a barrel of wine;
ten bushels of seed,
only a bushel of grain.”
11 Woe to those who rise early in the morning
to run after strong drink,
and tarry late in the evening
till they are inflamed with wine.
12 They have lyres and harps,
timbrels and flutes,
and wine at their banquets;
but they have no thought for the deeds of the Lord,
nor do they see his plans.
13 Thus my people will go into exile
for want of understanding,
their dignitaries dying of hunger,
their masses parched with thirst.
14 Therefore the grave has enlarged its throat
and opened its mouth to the full;
it swallows the upper crust of Zion,
their throngs and their revelry.
15 Man shall be humbled
and the mortal fallen,
and the eyes of the haughty cast down.
16 But Yahweh Sabaoth will be exalted
when he comes in judgment;
the sentences of the holy God
will reveal his holiness.
( 17 Then will the lambs graze as at pasture,
fatlings and kids will browse among the ruins.)
18 Woe to those who haul their wrongs with cords of deceit,
to those who pull a cart of sins,
19 to those who say, “Let God hurry,
let him speed up his work
so that we may see it.
Let the plans of the Holy One of Israel
draw near and come true,
which we are eager to learn about!”
20 Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil,
who change darkness for light
and light for darkness,
who give bitter for sweet
and sweet for bittter.
21 Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes
and take themselves for sage.
22 Woe to those who are champions in mixing drinks
and valiant at drinking bouts,
23 but acquit the guilty for a bribe
and deprive the innocent of his right.
24 Therefore, as the tongues of fire lick up stubble,
as dry grass sinks down in the flames,
so their roots will rot,
and their flowers be blown away like dust,
for they have rejected the law of Yahweh Sabaoth
and scorned the word of the Holy One of Israel.
25 Therefore the Lord,
his wrath burning against his people,
raises his hand against them
and strikes them down.
The mountains quake:
the corpses litter the streets.
Yet for all this his anger does not subside,
his hand is still raised, poised to strike.
26 He gives a signal to nations afar,
he whistles to them from the ends of the earth;
speedily and swiftly they come.
27 None of them is weary, none stumbles
none slumbers or sleeps;
not a waist belt is loosened,
not a sandal-thong broken.
28 Their arrows are sharp,
all their bows are strong:
their horses’ hoofs seem like flint,
their chariot wheels like the whirlwind.
29 They roar like young lions;
they growl as they seize their prey,
no one to rescue it as they carry it off.
30 On that day they will roar over these people
like the roaring of the sea.
Just look at the land –
darkness and distress,
the light flickering out in shadows,
darkened finally by the clouds.
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Comments Isaiah, Chapter 5
• 5.1 Song of the “love” of God who at the end, threatens to destroy those who despise him. Isaiah knows this well because he encountered God whose love is tender and terrible.
The prophets readily exchange the language of religion for the language of passionate love. Friend, Lover, Husband: The Lord does not resemble God as depicted by the Jews.
The vineyard is the people whom Yahweh nurtured over the centuries of their history and among whom so many prophets worked, watering it with their sweat, if not with their blood. Perhaps we should not look for a specific meaning in every detail of the parable: the tower, the wine press. In a somewhat similar text, in Micah 6:1-5, God reminds us of all he has done for his people.
After seeing how considerate the Lord has been, Isaiah denounces the injustice and oppression which rule daily life in Jerusalem. In that, he sees proof that the law, the miracles and the blessings of the Lord have been in vain. Their history shows that the kingdom of David is already a failure and Judah will be destroyed.
The same image of the vineyard appears in Isaiah 27:2 and in Jeremiah 2:21. Jesus will recall it in John 15.
• 8. God does not tolerate that some occupy all the land when many are with out a plot to live (see Lev 25:8). There is no justification either for a society leaving all the capital in the hands of owners so that most of the workers cannot benefit from the riches of their own country. Isaiah’s words also condemn those who take over all the real power in a society, preventing others from exercising their human re sponsibilities.
The six woes point to the same people: to the rich and the noble who are unwilling to shoulder their responsibilities towards their people and who squander money. Their own judgment has become corrupt.
When false values are imposed on a society it culminates in evil. This is the social scandal which Jesus addressed in Matthew 18:7.
Isaiah predicts the exile without hesitation. It would have been wiser to understand the will of God and the way in which he rules over events. The people unfortunately make use of their intelligence only to advance their own interests or to excel in the empty games of the rich. They allow their own people to sink into poverty.