The reprobation of the Jews is foreshewn under the parable of a
vineyard. A woe is pronounced against sinners: the army of God shall
send against them.
5:1. I will sing to my beloved the canticle of my cousin concerning his
vineyard. My beloved had a vineyard on a hill in a fruitful place.
My cousin. . .So the prophet calls Christ, as being of his family and
kindred, by descending from the house of David. Ibid. On a hill,
etc. . .Literally, in the horn, the son of oil.
5:2. And he fenced it in, and picked the stones out of it, and planted
it with the choicest vines, and built a tower in the midst thereof, and
set up a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth
grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.
5:3. And now, O ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, and ye men of Juda, judge
between me and my vineyard.
5:4. What is there that I ought to do more to my vineyard, that I have
not done to it? was it that I looked that it should bring forth grapes,
and it hath brought forth wild grapes?
5:5. And now I will shew you what I will do to my vineyard. I will take
away the hedge thereof, and it shall be wasted: I will break down the
wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down.
5:6. And I will make it desolate: it shall not be pruned, and it shall
not be digged: but briers and thorns shall come up: and I will command
the clouds to rain no rain upon it.
5:7. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel: and
the man of Juda, his pleasant plant: and I looked that he should do
judgment, and behold iniquity: and do justice, and behold a cry.
5:8. Woe to you that join house to house and lay field to field, even
to the end of the place: shall you alone dwell in the midst of the
earth?
5:9. These things are in my ears, saith the Lord of hosts: Unless many
great and fair houses shall become desolate, without an inhabitant.
5:10. For ten acres of vineyard shall yield one little measure, and
thirty bushels of seed shall yield three bushels.
5:11. Woe to you that rise up early in the morning to follow
drunkenness, and to drink in the evening, to be inflamed with wine.
5:12. The harp, and the lyre, and, the timbrel and the pipe, and wine
are in your feasts: and the work of the Lord you regard not, nor do you
consider the works of his hands.
5:13. Therefore is my people led away captive, because they had not
knowledge, and their nobles have perished with famine, and their
multitude were dried up with thirst.
5:14. Therefore hath hell enlarged her soul, and opened her mouth
without any bounds, and their strong ones, and their people, and their
high and glorious ones shall go down into it.
5:15. And man shall be brought down, and man shall be humbled, and the
eyes of the lofty shall be brought low.
5:16. And the Lord of hosts shall be exalted in judgment, and the holy
God shall be sanctified in justice.
5:17. And the lambs shall feed according to their order, and strangers
shall eat the deserts turned into fruitfulness.
5:18. Woe to you that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as
the rope of a cart.
5:19. That say: Let him make haste, and let his work come quickly, that
we may see it: and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel come, that
we may know it.
5:20. Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness
for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet
for bitter.
5:21. Woe to you that are wise in your own eyes, and prudent in your
own conceits.
5:22. Woe to you that are mighty to drink wine, and stout men at
drunkenness.
5:23. That justify the wicked for gifts, and take away the justice of
the just from him.
5:24. Therefore as the tongue of the fire devoureth the stubble, and
the heat of the flame consumeth it: so shall their root be as ashes,
and their bud shall go up as dust: for they have cast away the law of
the Lord of hosts, and have blasphemed the word of the Holy One of
Israel.
5:25. Therefore is the wrath of the Lord kindled against his people,
and he hath stretched out his hand upon them, and struck them: and the
mountains were troubles, and their carcasses became as dung in the
midst of the streets. For after this his anger is not turned away, but
his hand is stretched out still.
5:26. And he will lift up a sign to the nations afar off, and will
whistle to them from the ends of the earth: and behold they shall come
with speed swiftly.
5:27. There is none that shall faint, nor labour among them: they shall
not slumber nor sleep, neither shall the girdle of their loins be
loosed, nor the latchet of their shoes be broken.
5:28. Their arrows are sharp, and all their bows are bent. The hoofs of
their horses shall be like the flint, and their wheels like the
violence of a tempest.
5:29. Their roaring like that of a lion, they shall roar like young
lions: yea they shall roar, and take hold of the prey, and they shall
keep fast hold of it, and there shall be none to deliver it.
5:30. And they shall make a noise against them that day, like the
roaring of the sea; we shall look towards the land, and behold darkness
of tribulation, and the light is darkened with the mist thereof.