A Vineyard of Wine, Sing to It
1 In that day, Yahweh with his hard and great and strong sword will punish leviathan, the fleeing serpent, and leviathan, the twisted serpent; and he will kill the dragon that is in the sea. 2 In that day, sing to her, “A pleasant vineyard! 3 I, Yahweh, am its keeper. I will water it every moment. Lest anyone damage it, I will keep it night and day. 4 Wrath is not in me, but if I should find briers and thorns, I would do battle! I would march on them and I would burn them together. 5 Or else let him take hold of my strength, that he may make peace with me. Let him make peace with me.” 6 In days to come, Jacob will take root. Israel will blossom and bud. They will fill the surface of the world with fruit. 7 Has he struck them as he struck those who struck them? Or are they killed like those who killed them were killed? 8 In measure, when you send them away, you contend with them. He has removed them with his rough blast in the day of the east wind. 9 Therefore by this the iniquity of Jacob will be forgiven, and this is all the fruit of taking away his sin: that he makes all the stones of the altar as chalk stones that are beaten in pieces, so that the Asherah poles and the incense altars shall rise no more. 10 For the fortified city is solitary, a habitation deserted and forsaken, like the wilderness. The calf will feed there, and there he will lie down, and consume its branches. 11 When its boughs are withered, they will be broken off. The women will come and set them on fire, for they are a people of no understanding. Therefore he who made them will not have compassion on them, and he who formed them will show them no favor. 12 It will happen in that day that Yahweh will thresh from the flowing stream of the Euphrates to the brook of Egypt; and you will be gathered one by one, children of Israel. 13 It will happen in that day that a great trumpet will be blown; and those who were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and those who were outcasts in the land of Egypt, shall come; and they will worship Yahweh in the holy mountain at Jerusalem.
The vineyard song is sung again with the verdict reversed, and the keeper says he has no wrath in him.
In that day, Yahweh with his hard and great and strong sword will punish leviathan, the fleeing serpent, and leviathan, the twisted serpent; and he will kill the dragon that is in the sea.
The sea monster of the region's older poetry, used here for whatever stands behind the hostile powers. The last book of Scripture takes up the same figure and names it Revelation 12:9; this passage does not, and the profile given is the one the text supplies — fleeing, twisted, in the sea, and killed.
In that day, sing to her, “A pleasant vineyard!
The song of the fifth chapter, sung again. That one ended with the hedge taken away, the wall broken down and the rain stopped Isaiah 5:5–6. This one begins where that ended and reverses every clause.
I, Yahweh, am its keeper. I will water it every moment. Lest anyone damage it, I will keep it night and day.
The rain that was withheld is now continuous, and the protection that was withdrawn is round the clock. And the keeper is named — the first song had an unnamed beloved who owned the vineyard; here the owner says who he is.
Wrath is not in me, but if I should find briers and thorns, I would do battle! I would march on them and I would burn them together.
The first clause is startling in a book with this much judgment in it. What it says is that anger is not the settled condition — it is what happens when he finds thorns, and the thorns are what the vineyard produced in the first song.
Or else let him take hold of my strength, that he may make peace with me. Let him make peace with me.”
The alternative offered to the briers, and it is repeated. Instead of being burned, take hold — and what is to be taken hold of is God's own strength, which is offered to the thing he was about to march on.
In days to come, Jacob will take root. Israel will blossom and bud. They will fill the surface of the world with fruit.
The vineyard that yielded worthless grapes fills the earth.
Has he struck them as he struck those who struck them? Or are they killed like those who killed them were killed?
The question is about proportion, and the answer implied is no. In measure, when you send them away, you contend with them Isaiah 27:8 — the discipline was measured, which is what distinguishes it from the destruction of the nations that carried it out.
Therefore by this the iniquity of Jacob will be forgiven, and this is all the fruit of taking away his sin: that he makes all the stones of the altar as chalk stones that are beaten in pieces, so that the Asherah poles and the incense altars shall rise no more.
The evidence that the discipline worked is rubble — the altars of the false gods broken up like limestone.
It will happen in that day that a great trumpet will be blown; and those who were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and those who were outcasts in the land of Egypt, shall come; and they will worship Yahweh in the holy mountain at Jerusalem.
The section ends with a trumpet and a gathering, and the two places named are the two empires the book has been arguing about since chapter seven.
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