Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Isaiah 28:23
Give ye ear, and hear my voice; hearken, and hear my speech.
23. The introduction to the parable; cf. ch. Isa 32:9.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
23 29. A parable derived from husbandry. The motive of its insertion in this place was probably the different treatment meted out to Samaria and to Jerusalem. The precise point of the analogy is somewhat uncertain; but perhaps we may interpret the thought as follows. There are two parts. The first ( Isa 28:24-26) appears to justify Jehovah’s procedure by the end He has in view. As the farmer does not go on ploughing for ever out of a mere blind passion for ploughing, but ploughs in order to sow; so Jehovah’s work of judgment is to issue in the preparation of a seed-plot, and in due time ploughing will give place (in the case of Judah) to sowing. The second ( Isa 28:27-29) draws the lesson that the operation of threshing varies with the material to be operated on. The delicate fennel, e.g. would be destroyed by the rough implements used on coarser grain; and in Judah there is (what there was not in Samaria) the tender growth of the “holy seed,” the nucleus of the true Israel, for whose sake judgment must be tempered with mercy.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Give ye ear – In this verse the prophet introduces an important and striking illustration drawn from the science of agriculture. It is connected with the preceding part of the chapter, and is designed to show the propriety of what the prophet had said by an appeal to what they all observed in the cultivation of their lands. The previous discourse consists mainly of reproofs and of threatenings of punishment on Gods people for their profane contempt of the messengers of God. He had threatened to destroy their nation, and so remove them for a time to a distant land. This the prophet had himself said Isa 28:21 was his strange work. To vindicate this and to show the propriety of Gods adopting every measure, and of not always pursuing the same course in regard to his people, he draws an illustration from the farmer. He is not always doing the same thing. He adopts different methods to secure a harvest.
He adapts his plans to the soil and to the kind of grain; avails himself of the best methods of preparing the ground, sowing the seed, collecting the harvest, and of separating the grain from the chaff. He does not always plow; nor always sow; nor always thresh. He does not deal with all kinds of land and grain in the same way. Some land he plows in one mode, and some in another; and in like manner, some grain he threshes in one mode, and some in another – adapting his measures to the nature of the soil, and of the grain. Some grain he beats out with a flail; some he bruises; but yet he will be careful not to break the kernel, or destroy it in threshing it. However severe may appear to be his blows, yet his object is not to crush and destroy it Isa 28:28, but it is to remove it from the chaff, and to save it. In all this he acts the part of wisdom, for God has taught him what to do Isa 28:26, Isa 28:29. So, says the prophet, God will not deal with all of his people in the same manner, nor with them always in the same mode. He will vary his measures as a farmer does. When mild and gentle measures will do, he will adopt them. When severe measures are necessary, he will resort to them. His object is not to destroy his people, anymore than the object of the farmer in threshing is to destroy his grain. The general dedicate the propriety of Gods engaging in what the prophet calls his strange act, and strange work, in punishing his people. The allegory is one of great beauty, and its pertinency and keeping are maintained throughout; and it furnishes a most important practical lesson in regard to the mode in which God deals with his people.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Isa 28:23-29
The ploughman
The parable of the ploughman and the thresher
1.
The general drift of the parable is obvious. The husbandman does not forever vex and wound the tender bosom of the earth with the keen edge of the ploughshare or the sharp teeth of the harrow. He ploughs only that he may sow; he harrows the ground only that he may produce a level and unclodded surface on which to cast his seeds. And when he sows, he gives to every seed its appropriate place and usage. He scatters the dill and strews the cummin broadcast; but the wheat he sets, according to the Oriental fashion, in long rows, and the barley in a place specially marked out for it, so marked as to exclude the borders of the field: and here, along the edges of the field, where it is most likely to be bitten or trampled by passing beasts, he sows the less valuable spelt. And this he does because God has given him discretion. Is God, then, less wise than the husbandman whom He has taught? So, again, when the harvest is gathered in, the wise husbandman still varies and adapts his means to his end. He does not go on threshing forever; his single aim is to separate the chaff from the wheat, to save as much of the grain as he can, and to save it in the best condition he can, that it may be gathered into his garner. And he thus varies his modes of treatment, and adapts them to the several kinds of seeds, because God has given him sagacity and wisdom. Will God, then, who gave the husbandman this sagacity, be less observant of time and measure? Will He crush and waste the precious grain of His threshing floor?
2. Nor is the historical application of the parable difficult to recover. Isaiah had to warn and admonish the chosen nation at a period in which they were utterly corrupt, when the judges took bribes and the priests mocked at the Word of the Lord, and the very prophets saw lying visions, or pretended to see them, and the people had made a covenant with Death and Hades. He had to threaten them with disaster on disaster. So corrupt were they, however, that they made a jest of him for his fidelity to their King and God. In their drunken carousals the priests and prophets mimicked and burlesqued the simplicity and directness of his speech, and turned his warnings into a theme for laughter and derision. But even in this godless and scoffing age there was a remnant faithful among the faithless, who were true to God and to the Word which He sent by the prophet. Were they to be consumed in the fire of the Divine indignation against the popular sins? Or, if they were preserved, were they to stand by and see the elect nation destroyed out of its place? Was there no hope for them? none even for the nation at large! There was hope; and that they might see it and be sustained by it in the cloudy and dark day of judgment, Isaiah discloses to them, in his parable, the secret of the Divine administration, namely, that judgment is mercy, and that it prepares the way for a mercy more open and full than itself. But the prophet has a message to the faithful remnant, as well as to the nation at large. And to them his message is, that even the good grain must be threshed, that even those who are faithful to Jehovah must share in the judgments which are about to fall on the entire nation. They cannot be exempted from the misery of the time; they must suffer, as for their own sins, so also for the sins of their neighbours. But this is their comfort, that the Divine Husbandman measures out His strokes with wisdom and grace. God is but separating that which is good in those whom He loves from that which is evil and imperfect in them; and, even in this process of separation, He will not lay upon them more than they are able to bear.
3. So that, in this parable, the mystery of the Divine providence is laid open, its secret disclosed. All ploughing is for sowing; all threshing is intended for the preservation of the grain. When God chastens us, it is not because He means to destroy us, but because He has set His heart on saving us, because He has appointed us to life and not to death. Nor are the ordinances and chastening of His providence arbitrary and without discrimination. He employs various methods, sends sorrows of all sorts and sizes, that He may adapt Himself to every mans needs, and to all our varieties of place, time, and circumstance. Cure sin and you cure sorrow, say the reason and conscience of the world: and the sorrow comes that the sin may be cured, adds the prophet; the very miseries that spring from evil are intended to eradicate the evil from which they spring. It was in the strength of this sublime conception of the ministry of pain and sorrow that the Hebrew prophets met the terrible miseries they were called to endure and behold. (S. Cox, D. D.)
The spiritual power
A knowledge of agriculture is almost essential to the right appreciation of many portions of the Bible.
I. THE PROCESS OF SOWING IMPLIES A SOIL PREPARED FOR THE SEED. The reception of the Gospel implies preceding thought, reflection, and resolution; which may be beautifully and characteristically expressed by the agricultural term, cultivation.
II. THE PROCESS OF SOWING IMPLIES SEED ADAPTED TO THE SOIL. There is a variety of seed mentioned in the text, and modem as well as ancient agriculture verifies the truth of the prophets description.
1. Let the seed for the mind be marked as with a seal. As the ancients chose the best of their crops for seed, so let the truths selected for the mind be of the highest and holiest description.
2. Let the seed for the mind be varied. The Word of God, independent of other sources, furnishes a great variety of truths to suit the soul in every conceivable state. And the same truth is set forth in many different ways, and couched under many different figures, to fit all descriptions of minds.
III. THE PROCESS OF SOWING IMPLIES A SUITABLE SEASON. Men do not sow at all times. There k a time to sow, and a time to reap. So there is a season for sowing the good seed of the kingdom. Life is that season.
IV. THE SOWING PROCESS IMPLIES SKILL AND FAITH. All are sowers in the moral sense. Some, however, are not skilful sowers; and what an abundance of seed they destroy! They have great privileges, high immunities, transcendently over towering those of their fellow men; and yet it is to be feared they will reap but a poor harvest. But it is delightful to know, that others, with few privileges, and comparatively few opportunities, am sowing in their own minds, and the minds of others, the seeds of truth; and by their skilful sowing will reap a great harvest of future glory. (A. Gray, M. A.)
The discreet ploughman
The drift of these words is to comfort Gods children in afflictions; and, because when one is sorrowful, weak, taken up and over pressed with grief, we are then unfit and incapable of instruction, the anguish of the suffering destroying our attention, He therefore says, doubling it four times, Give ye ear, hear My voice, hearken ye, and hear My voice; wherein He insinuates that the matter He is about to deliver requires attention.
1. The only way to quiet ones heart, and pacify one in all distresses, is to hearken what God says.
(1) Because Gods Word will work faith, which does purify the heart, overcome the world, and quench the fiery darts of Satan.
(2) It will teach a man wisdom, whence and why it comes, and that struggling with God is in vain, and that in so doing we shall have the worse.
(3) It will be a means to work patience in the heart.
(4) It will make us go to God and pray, and prayer will bring comfort and ease to the heart ere long.
2. All Gods children must be ploughed.
3. God will make a sweet and seasonable end of afflicting His children. He doth correct us for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness.
4. When the Lord hath made us plain, and hath filled us with hearts to receive good seed, then is the time of rest.
5. When God hath humbled us by His Word, then He will furnish and arm us with His Word, and enable us with strength that way. Many heaths do meet with streams and floods of water, and yet are nothing the better nor more fruitful; but Gods arable, the saints, are ploughed and instructed, as the Psalmist speaks: Blessed is the man whom Thou correctest, and teachest in Thy law, etc. To have the one without the other is nothing, and does no good, but when correction and teaching go together, then one sees all the good of affliction, and why God sent it upon him.
6. Skill in husbandry is the gift of God; wisdom must come from Him.
7. All Gods grain needs threshing and ploughing, and as they need it, so they shall have it.
8. The best grain shall have the sorest trial and hardest pressure. The fitches are not threshed with a threshing instrument, but are beaten with a staff; neither is a cart wheel turned about upon the cummin, but beaten with a rod; but the wheat must have the wheel go on it. The meaning is an allusion unto that manner of the ancient Jews in treading their wheat, as appears by that precept: Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox or the ass that treadeth down thy corn (Deu 25:4), for then the oxen, drawing a wheel over the wheat, did so bruise it, but not break it.
9. God Almighty knows best, and He appoints what shall be the means, time, and measure of the trials of His children.
10. God, in the chastisements, trials, and afflictions of His elect, hath wonderful wisdom and power beyond our understanding. He knows not only which is the best way to lead us to Heaven, but also He is excellent in working, to bring His counsel to pass. See it in examples. As in Joseph, appointed to be the greatest, save Pharaoh, in all Egypt. So David, after he was anointed king, in a state of honour and all pomp and pleasure, how was he vexed and ploughed with many crosses!
11. Nothing can stay Him from working, to hinder our comfort and deliverance in due time. Why? Because He is the Lord of hosts, and all the creatures must do what He wills. (R. Sibbes, D. D.)
The voice of God in the tillage of the field
The Scriptures are full of the fresh air of the country; it is easy to see that many of the writers of them were country people, or, if not, at least went about the world with their eyes open, and had a keen interest in those matters of the street and the field that make up the life of the people. When Moses described the Land of Promise to the Israelites it was a husbandmans description that he gave of it. It was a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of oil olives and honey. The Psalmists looked out upon the open face of nature, and saw in it a world eloquent of God–the dew and the rain, the valleys and the hills, the lilies and the cedars spake of Him. He made the earth soft with showers, and blessed the springing thereof. One prophet describes the evil case of the people in this way: The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved. Another calls the same people to repentance: Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap according to mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the Lord, till He come and rain righteousness upon you The great Lord Himself, standing in the midst of His worlds, bade men consider the lilies of the field, and in His doctrine said, Behold, a sower went forth to sow. And when Isaiah, in the words before us, draws out a detailed account of the operations of husbandry, in order to drive home lessons in Divine things, he was well within a long line of precedents. (E. Medley, B. A.)
Gods processes of moral and spiritual husbandry
I. THERE IS AN ELEMENT OF TIMELINESS IN GODS WORKING. Doth the ploughman plough continually to sow? Doth he continually open and break the clods of his ground? That is, is the man always at one thing, forever engaged in one line of work? Is there not order, is there not succession, are there not appointed seasons? Men do not plough at midsummer, and reap at Christmas. There is a time, a day, an hour, and the careful husbandman, who would make the most of his opportunity, must submit to this element of timeliness. He must have his spells of hard work, and his days of comparative inaction. And herein he is not exceptional, this tidal system holds good in all spheres. Is it not so very evidently in the general life of man! Is there not there a sowing time, a most blessed spring tide; is there not a period of watching and waiting, and anxious carefulness, and then, by and by, the harvest? Ay; and when the spring time is neglected, then by no effort, and by no tears, can the loss be retrieved. It is so in the fife of the spirit. Looking at the facts as we find them, and they are of God, is there not the element of timeliness there? There are tides of the Spirit; seasons when repentance and faith are easy; seasons when Heaven seems very near to this world, and by a step we find ourselves in the presence of Christ. There are days of the Son of Man, the dew sparkles upon the grass, the sun rises without clouds, and sheds a tender light. God and Christ, indeed, are no more real, no more actual than they always are, but they are more real to us. And then all is different, we come into another world. But what are all these facts of life but so many expressions or the higher fact, that there is an element of timeliness in the working of God Himself? The urgent lesson from this fact is this–let us work while we work, let us catch the opportunity on the wing.
II. THERE IS AN ELEMENT OF VARIETY IN GODS WORKING. Through multiplied detail does the prophet enforce this fact. Different sorts of seed are sown in a different fashion. And a like variety obtains when the harvesting comes; one is dealt with after this manner and another after that. And has not the Creator therein given us a visible example of the methods He pursues in that great field wherein He is the husbandman, and we are me husbandry? He has no fear of precedent, He works out His end in every variety of method. The life of Christ, as that stands recorded in the Gospels, supplies the confirming illustration! Run over in your thought His dealings with Nathanael, and Peter, and Thomas, and John. See how He handled Nicodemus and Mary of Bethany. He cast truth into their minds in a different way, and wrought for the spiritual harvest just as variously. From all of which there comes the Divine voice that bids us, above all things, be simple, be natural, not striving after another type and style of experience than that which is our own. If we are true to ourselves and to our God, we shall have our own experience, that which for us is most fitting and the best.
III. GODS WORKING IS A PROCESS. Your parable is full of method, of succession, of processes. And every ploughing time, every sowing, and every reaping, are but visible examples of what happens in the higher field of Gods activity in the spirits of men. Conscience grows, character grows; light comes slowly, there is dawn, twilight, the mellow morning, and the golden day. There is no antagonism between nature and grace, between God speaking in nature and God speaking in the life and death of His Son. (E. Medley, B. A.)
Physical husbandry the effect and emblem of Divine teaching
I. THAT PHYSICAL HUSBANDRY IS THE EFFECT OF DIVINE TEACHING. How did man come to know that by depositing a seed in a soil which had been dressed after a certain fashion, that solitary seed would produce thirty, sixty, or a hundred, fold? We are familiar with the operation now, and the wonderfulness does not strike us; but, antecedently, nothing seems to us more marvellous. Whence, then, came this great agricultural truth? It is not innate, nor of necessary discovery. The text gives the most satisfactory answer: His God doth instruct him. The point suggested: and which we wish to insist upon, is that all true secular ideas, as well as spiritual, are from God. Christians refer true ideas of worship to God, but not true ideas of commerce, agriculture, navigation, medicine, architecture, and the like. In fact, they do not regard God as having much to do with the practical mind of this working world.
1. Our position is suggested by a priori reasoning. One might justly infer that He who gave us an organisation, which so connects us with the material world as to render a certain course of conduct indispensable to our physical well-being, would give us some ideas to guide us in the matter, and the more so when we remember that the welfare of the soul itself greatly depends upon the condition of the body.
2. Our position is sustained by Scripture. There are specific examples in the Bible, of Gods condescending to teach men secular work, such as the building of the ark and the tabernacle, and the passages are numerous which imply that God acts upon the genera mind of mankind.
3. Our position is implied in the doctrine of providence. How does God interpose on behalf of men now? Not miraculously, but by giving us directing ideas. A good man is brought to a painful crisis in his business. He is filled with anxiety. One step will decide his commercial fate. What will help him? A true directing idea would dispel his darkness and clear his path. Or, a government is brought to a solemn crisis in its history. The fate of nations depends upon the next act. How can providence help it at that moment? By suggesting an idea that will reveal the true and safe path.
Ideas are our guides in all the labyrinth walks of life, and all our true ones come from God. This doctrine should lead us–
(1) To recognise God in all the true developments of mind.
(2) To seek His aid in all secular undertakings.
II. THAT PHYSICAL HUSBANDRY IS THE EMBLEM OF DIVINE TEACHING. The prophet here describes the operations of the husbandman in order to illustrate Gods method of training humanity. Two thoughts are here implied–
1. That moral fruitfulness is the great end of Gods dealings with man. What is moral fruitfulness? Right heart qualities (Gal 5:22-23).
2. That to realise this end, God employs a variety of instrumentalities. Does not thin subject impress us with the divinity of life? Man is the organ of Divine thought, and the object of Divine operation. Away with all frivolous ideas of life! Life is solemn and sacred. We are ever in close connection with the Infinite: He besets us behind and before. (Homilist.)
Breaking clods
I. THE VARIOUS WAYS IN WHICH GOD DEALS WITH HIS PEOPLE.
1. He ploughs the ground, i.e., He breaks up the hard, natural heart. For this purpose He employs–
(1) The terrors of the law,
(2) Judgments in providence.
2. The second process is harrowing. Doth He open and break the clods of His ground? When He hath made plain the face thereof, etc. The object is to bring the ploughed ground into such a condition as will best secure me proper reception of the seed. There are many clods in the human heart, too, which need to be broken.
(1) The clod of prejudice.
(2) Of pride.
3. The third process is that or sowing the seed.
4. The threshing. In order that the Christian may become useful as well as fit for Heaven, affliction is necessary.
II. THE SKILL DISPLAYED IN THESE VARIOUS OPERATIONS.
1. The skill is not expressly referred to in connection with the ploughing. But it may nevertheless be seen. Farmers know that there is such a thing as ploughing too deep, and also ploughing too shallow. In the one case the gravel may be reached and turned up to the surface, and so render the seed to be afterwards sown comparatively useless. Or, the too cold soil may be turned up, and thus the seed sown will perish. In the other case, the proper depth of the soil is not reached, and the crop will therefore be but a thin and sickly one. So it is with God in His dealings with His people. Some natures need to be thoroughly aroused, some hearts to be opened up to their very depths, in order that the Word may take root and bring forth fruit. No superficial work will do here And although Gods messengers may and often do err, God Himself never will, for He is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working. Again, other natures need to be dealt with in a different way. They require to be dealt with gently and lovingly, and the wise Husbandman acts accordingly:
2. But the skill of the farmer is referred to in this passage in connection with the sowing of the seed. Different soils require different kinds of seed, if there is to be a good crop. So does God act too. Some souls need doctrine, others history. Some need words of Divine love and pity, others the Divine warnings and threatenings.
3. The skill of the farmer is seen, too, in employing different kinds of threshing instruments for the different kinds of grain. So also does God deal with His people. Some need only a comparatively light affliction, their natures being of such a kind that treatment of a different kind would utterly overwhelm them and drive them to despair. Others need to be put into the furnace seven times heated. And it is to be observed that as the bread corn, or most precious material, gets as it were the roughest treatment, so it is Gods choice ones that are subjected to the greatest trials. (D. Macaulay, M. A.)
Inspiration in common life
Observe–
I. HOW GOD GUIDES THE LOWLIEST OF HIS CHILDREN IN ALL THE AFFAIRS OF THEIR WORLDLY LIFE. Why should we be surprised to read of inspiration in common life!
1. It arises from the fact that we distinguish between intellectual life and vulgar life, and exclude God from the latter. Inspiration is not limited to the world of scholars, scientists, painters, and musicians; God is equally in the so-called vulgar world, giving the lowliest toiler mastery in all that relates to his sphere of life. The vulgar world is vulgar no more. The whole world of human duty is one kingdom, the working out of one Divine purpose.
2. Because of our habit of distinguishing between influential life and insignificant life, and excluding God from the latter. We are not surprised to hear of God inspiring princes; it seems quite in order when God gives to Solomon supernatural enlightenment. But the ploughman seems utterly insignificant, his affairs so few and simple. But is the ploughman so utterly insignificant! The fact is, he is one of the most important characters in the world: if things go wrongly with him, they go wrongly with us all We might do without a king; we could not do without a ploughman.
3. Because of our habit of distinguishing between sacred life and secular life, and excluding God from the latter. We readily think of God inspiring the prophet and the priest. Yet the passage before us makes us feel that the ploughmans realm is not lees spiritual than that of the prophet.
II. HOW GOD GUIDES THE LOWLIEST OF HIS CHILDREN IN ALL THE AFFAIRS OF THEIR INNER LIFE. There is a great spiritual nature in the lowliest of men. We have heard of the epitaph once put over s peasant: Only a clod. I do not know whether that epitaph was written in a pathetic or in a cynical temper, but it was really very full of suggestion. What wonderful things are in a clod! All possibilities of music, colour, light, fragrance, are there, So you think you know what a clod is, do you? archly asks Schopenhauer. Indeed, we do not. It will astonish you on the morning of the resurrection to see what God will bring out of that clod. And God is ever ready to guide and save His lowly children. He makes them to know the deepest truths of revelation and spiritual life (Mat 11:25-26). All through life God continues the same gracious guidance. The Lord preserveth the simple. (W. L.Watkinson.)
Agriculture
Agriculture is the most ancient o fall pursuits, for Adam was a gardener, Cain a farmer, Abel a herdsman, and Cain did not go to live in a city or attempt to build one until after he had committed his great crime. It is not only the most ancient, but also the most necessary, and all other pursuits could be more readily spared than this. The most careless observer who walks through an agricultural show must be forcibly struck with the great importance of agriculture. All kinds of inventions, yea, almost all sciences, are consecrated to this pursuit–the products of the mine, the forest, the quarry, the hammer, forge, saw, and engine have been pressed into its service. How many kinds of toilers and artisans have brought their inventions and labour to make tilling the ground profitable? How many sciences wait reverently upon husbandry? For it geology ransacks the bowels of the earth; chemistry proclaims what nutriment certain plants absorb from soil, and what enrichment certain alkalis will give; botany collects her varied grasses to make possible the permanent pasture, on the principle of the survival of the fittest; astronomy smiles on it, and causes the sun to do morn for its prosperity than any king, however gracious, and the clouds more than any landlord, however beneficent. (F. Standfast.)
The value of agricultural labour
How foolish and sinful it is for those who possess wealth acquired by the toil of others, and who are designated independent, to despise or oppress those on whose humble toil they are indeed most dependent. What would be the value of the broad acres, if left without culture? It is the toil of the peasant which makes them productive, and which wrings from the soil those ample revenues that sustain the proprietor in luxurious ease. Of what benefit would be those pieces of silver, gold, or paper which we call cash, without indefatigable industry producing the necessaries and comfort which money brings? Would shillings and sovereigns satisfy the cravings of hunger! No more than molten gold could assuage thirst. The painter must lay down his brush and palette, the poet his pen, the philosopher suspend his experiments, and the voice of the orator be dumb, the jewelled crown become a worthless bauble, the most stately palace become a region of desolation, but for the labour of the agriculturist and fisherman. (F. Standfast.)
Interdependence of the man of leisure and the son of toil
Labour is the foundation on which the mighty fabric of human society rests, and none but the vain, proud, and foolish will overlook their obligation to the toilers. Acknowledged reciprocity of advantage should bind all classes together in one strong common bond of mutual support; for if the man of leisure is dependent on those sons of toll for the very necessity of existence, it is equally certain that to such the toilers are indebted for the social order which preserves liberty and life, for the books which inspire to intellectual elevation, and for the sciences which indefinitely expand the compass of our being. If the arch be indebted to the foundation stone for its very existence, it could not retain its graceful sweep or strength one moment without its keystone. (F. Standfast.)
Doth the ploughman plough all day to sow?–
The ploughman
I. OUR TEXT MAY BE ANSWERED IN THE AFFIRMATIVE. Yes, the ploughman does plough all day to sow. When it is ploughing time he keeps on at it till his work is ache; if it requires one day, or two days, or twenty days to finish his fields, he continues at his task while the weather permits.
1. So doth God plough the heart of man, and herein is His patience. The team was in the field in the case of some of us very early in the morning, for our first recollections have to do with conscience and the furrows of pain which it made in our youthful mind. It is a dreadful thing to have remained all unbeliever all these years; but yet the grace of God does not stop short at s certain age.
2. The text teaches perseverance on our part. Doth the ploughman plough all day? Yes, he does.
(1) Then if I am seeking Christ, ought I to be discouraged because I do not immediately find Him?
(2) The same is true in seeking the salvation of others. Ploughing is hard work; but as there will be no harvest without it let us put forth all our strength, and never flag till we have performed our Lords will, and by His Holy Spirit wrought conviction in mens souls. Some soils are very stiff, and cling together, and the labour is heart breaking; others are like the unreclaimed waste, full of roots and tangled bramble; they need a steam plough, and we must pray the Lord to make us such, for we cannot leave them untilled, and therefore we must put forth more strength that the labour may be done. I heard some time ago of a minister who called to see a poor man who was dying, but he was not able to gain admittance; he called the next morning, and some idle excuse was made so that he could not see him; he called again the next morning, but he was still refused; he went on till he called twenty times in vain, but on the twenty-first occasion he was permitted to see the sufferer, and by Gods grace he saved a soul from death. Why do you tell your child a thing twenty times? asked someone of a mother. Because, said she, I find nineteen times is not enough. We prize that which costs us labour and service, and we shall set all the higher value upon the saved ones when the Lord grants them to our efforts. It is good for us to learn the value of our sheaves by going forth weeping to the sowing. Start close to the hedge, and go right down to the bottom of the field. Plough as close to the ditch as you can, and leave small headlands. What though there are fallen women, thieves, and drunkards in the slums around, do not neglect any of them; for if you leave a stretch of land to the weeds they will soon spread amongst the wheat. When you have gone right to the end of the field once, what shall you do next? Why, just turn round, and make for the place you started from. And when you have thus been up and down, what next? Why, up and down again. And what next! Why, up and down again. You have visited that district with tracts; do it again, fifty-two times in the year–multiply your furrows. We must learn how to continue in well-doing.
II. THE TEXT MAY BE ANSWERED IN THE NEGATIVE. Doth the ploughman plough all day to sow? No, he does not always plough. After he has ploughed he breaks the clods, sows, reaps, and threshes. In the chapter before us you will see that other works of husbandry are mentioned. The ploughman has many other things to do beside ploughing. There is an advance in what he does.
1. On Gods part, there is an advance in what He does. He will not always make furrows by His chiding. He will come and cast in the precious corn of consolation, and water it with the dews of Heaven, and smile upon it with the sunlight of His grace; and there shall soon be in you, first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear, and in due season you shall joy as with the joy of harvest. But what if the ploughing should never lead to sowing; what if you should be disturbed in conscience, and should go on to resist it all? Then God will make another advance, but it will be to put up the plough, and to command the clouds that they rain no rain upon the land, and then its end is to be burned.
2. This advance is a lesson to us; for we, too, are to go forward. Dont be making furrows all day; get to your sowing. Let the ministers of Christ follow the rule of advance. Let us go from preaching the law to preaching the Gospel. You cannot get a harvest if you are afraid of disturbing the soil, nor can you save souls if you never warn them of hell fire. Still, we must not plough all day. The preaching of the law is only preparatory to the preaching of the Gospel.
3. Another lesson to those of you who are as yet hearers and nothing more. I want you to go from ploughing to something better, namely, from hearing and fearing to believing. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Spiritual husbandry
1. Never was seed or plant better adapted to the soil than the Word of God is adapted to universal man.
2. Since the Bible is adapted to our moral nature, it is ours to adapt our lives to its great teachings. If we find unseemly pride springing up in the soul, let us go and see the terrible effects of self-confidence by the Red Sea, as Pharaoh and his army sink into its depths; or by the plains of Babylon, as Nebuchadnezzar herds among the beasts. Ii you find any vice growing in rank deformity in your soul, go and look at the Deluge or the Dead Sea. If you find self-sufficiency springing up in the heart, and condemn the shortcomings of others, go and listen to the claims of God. How penetrating! far-reaching! and absolute! If everywhere around you, you see tokens and footprints of the king of terrors, in mourning garbs and joyless faces, in darkened earthly prospects, go listen to the promises of immortality, the doctrine of the resurrection. If you mark manifestation? of the being of an awful Deity, go find a near, visible, and all-beneficent Deity whose presence makes the earth itself a heaven; get proofs of His low by its being shed abroad in your own heart. Ii you see around you all nature in bondage, groaning and waiting for its redemption, go see a new heaven and a new earth, in which shall dwell righteousness. (F. Standfast.)
Beneficent ploughing
When the plough of Gods providence first cuts up a mans life, what wonder if the man should exclaim a little, yea, if he should give way to one hours grief, and say he thought he had escaped all that kind of treatment! But the man may come to himself ere eventide and say, Plough on, Lord; I want my life to be ploughed all over that it may be sown all over, and that in every corner there may be golden grain or beautiful flowers: pity me that I exclaimed when I first felt the ploughshare, Thou knowest my frame, Thou rememberest that I am but dust, but now I recollect, I put things together, I see Thy meaning; so drive on, Thou Ploughman of eternity! (J. Parker, D. D.)
The principal wheat
The principal wheat
I. The prophet mentions it as a matter of wisdom on the part of the husbandman that HE KNOWS WHAT IS THE PRINCIPAL THING TO CULTIVATE, and makes it his principal care. Here let us learn a lesson. Do keep things distinct in your minds. Sort things out, and divide and distinguish between the precious and the vile. The farmer, who finds that wheat ought to be his principal crop, makes it so, and lays himself out with that end in view: learn from this to have a main object, and to give your whole mind to it.
1. This farmer was wise, because he counted that to be principal which was the most needful. His family could do without cummin, which was but a flavouring. They certainly must have wheat, for bread is the staff of life. That which is necessary he regarded as the principal thing. Is not this common sense! A creature cannot be satisfied unless he is answering the end for which he is created; and the end of every intelligent creature is, first, to glorify God, and next, to enjoy God. Other things may he desirable, but this thing is needful Other herbs may take their place in due order, but grace is the principal wheat, and we must cultivate it.
2. This farmer was wise, because he made that to be the principal thing which was the most fit to be so. Of course, barley is useful as food, for nations have lived on barley bread, and lived healthily too; and rye has been the nutriment of millions: neither have they starved on oats and other grains. Still, give me a piece of wheaten bread, for it is the best staff for lifes journey. And what is there that is so fit for the heart, the mind, the soul of man, as to know God and His Christ! Other mental foods, such as the fruits of knowledge, and the dainties of science, excellent though they may be–are inferior nutriment and unsuitable to build up the inner manhood.
3. Moreover, this farmer was wise, because he made that the principal thing which was the most profitable. Our grandfathers to rely upon the wheat stack to pay their rent. The figure holds good with regard to spiritual religion. That is the most profitable thing.
II. The husbandman is a lesson to us because HE GIVES THIS PRINCIPAL THING THE PRINCIPAL PLACE. I find that the Hebrew is rendered by some eminent scholars, He puts the wheat into the principal place. That little handful of cummin for the wife to flavour the cakes with he grows in a corner; and the various herbs he places in their proper borders. The barley he sets in its plot, and the rye in its acre; but if there is a good hit of rich soil he appropriates it to the principal wheat. He gives his choicest fields to that which is to be the main means of his living. Hero Is a lesson for you and me. Let us give to true godliness our principal powers and abilities.
1. Let us give to the things of God our best and most intense thought.
2. Be sure, also, to yield to this subject your most earnest love.
3. Towards God and His Christ also turn your most fervent desires.
4. Then, let the Lord have the attentive respect of your life.
5. We should give to this principal wheat our most earnest labours.
6. This should also take possession of us so as to lead to our greatest sacrifices.
III. THE HUSBANDMAN SELECTS THE PRINCIPAL SEED CORN WHEN HE IS SOWING HIS WHEAT. When a farmer is setting aside wheat for sowing, he does not choose the tail corn and the worst of his produce, but if he is a sensible man he likes to sow the best wheat in the world. Let me learn that if I am going to sow to the Lord and to be a Christian, I should sow the best kind of Christianity.
1. I should try to do this by believing the weightiest doctrines. I would believe not this ism, nor that, but the unadulterated truth which Jesus taught; for a holy character will only grow by the Spirit of God out of true doctrine.
2. Next to that, we ought to sow the noblest examples.
3. We should sow the best wheat by seeing that we have the purest spirit.
4. And then, we should endeavour to live in closest communion with God. It should be our desire to rise to the highest form of spiritual life.
IV. THE HUSBANDMAN GROWS THE PRINCIPAL WHEAT WITH THE PRINCIPAL CARE. It is said that the large crops in Palestine in olden time were due to the fact that they planted the wheat. They set it in lines, so that it was not checked or suffocated by its being too thick in one place, neither was there any fear of its being too thin in another. The wheat was planted, and then streams of water were turned by the foot to each particular plant. No wonder, therefore, that the land brought forth abundantly. We should give our principal care to the principal thing. Our godliness should be carried out with discretion and care.
V. Do this, because FROM THIS YOU MAY EXPECT YOUR PRINCIPAL CROP. If religion be the principal thing, you may look to religion for your principal reward. The harvest will come to you in various ways. You will make the greatest success in this life if you wholly live to the glory of God. The Eastern farmers prosperity hinges on his wheat, and yours upon your devotion to God. In the world to come what a crop, what a harvest will come of serving the Lord! (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 23. Give ye ear, and hear my voice – “Listen ye, and hear my voice”] The foregoing discourse, consisting of severe reproofs, and threatenings of dreadful judgments impending on the Jews for their vices, and their profane contempt of God’s warnings by his messengers, the prophet concludes with an explanation and defence of God’s method of dealing with his people in an elegant parable or allegory; in which he employs a variety of images, all taken from the science of agriculture. As the husbandman uses various methods in preparing his land, and adapting it to the several kinds of seeds to be sown, with a due observation of times and seasons; and when he hath gathered in his harvest, employs methods as various in separating the corn from the straw and the chaff by different instruments, according to the nature of the different sorts of grain; so God, with unerring wisdom, and with strict justice, instructs, admonishes, and corrects his people; chastises and punishes them in various ways, as the exigence of the case requires; now more moderately, now more severely; always tempering justice with mercy; in order to reclaim the wicked, to improve the good, and, finally, to separate the one from the other.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Observe what I say, and do you judge if it be not reasonable.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
23. Calling attention to thefollowing illustration from husbandry (Psa 49:1;Psa 49:2). As the husbandman doeshis different kinds of work, each in its right time and dueproportion, so God adapts His measures to the varying exigenciesof the several cases: now mercy, now judgments; now punishing sooner,now later (an answer to the scoff that His judgments, being put offso long, would never come at all, Isa5:19); His object being not to destroy His people any morethan the farmer’s object in threshing is to destroy his crop; thisvindicates God’s “strange work” (Isa28:21) in punishing His people. Compare the same image, Jer 24:6;Hos 2:23; Mat 3:12.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Give ye ear, and hear my voice,…. So said the prophet, as the Targum introduces the words; and because what he was about to say was of importance, and delivered in a parabolical manner, and required attention, he makes use of a variety of words to the same purpose, to engage their attention:
hearken, and hear my speech; now about to be made; listen to it, and get the understanding of it.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The address of the prophet is here apparently closed. But an essential ingredient is still wanting to the second half, to make it correspond to the first. There is still wanting the fringe of promise coinciding with Isa 28:5, Isa 28:6. The prophet has not only to alarm the scoffers, that if possible he may pluck some of them out of the fire through fear (Jdg 5:23); he has also to comfort believers, who yield themselves as disciples to him and to the word of God (Isa 8:16). He does this here in a very peculiar manner. He has several times assumed the tone of the mashal , more especially in chapter 26; but here the consolation is dressed up in a longer parabolical address, which sets forth in figures drawn from husbandry the disciplinary and saving wisdom of God. Isaiah here proves himself a master of the mashal. In the usual tone of a mashal song, he first of all claims the attention of his audience as a teacher of wisdom. V. 23 “Lend me your ear, and hear my voice; attend, and hear my address!” Attention is all the more needful, that the prophet leaves his hearers to interpret and apply the parable themselves. The work of a husbandman is very manifold, as he tills, sows, and plants his field. Vv. 24-26 “Does the ploughman plough continually to sow? to furrow and to harrow his land? Is it not so: when he levels the surface thereof, he scatters black poppy seed, and strews cummin, and puts in wheat in rows, and barley in the appointed piece, and spelt on its border? And He has instructed him how to act rightly: his God teaches it him.” The ploughing ( c harash ) which opens the soil, i.e., turns it up in furrows, and the harrowing ( sidded ) which breaks the clods, take place to prepare for the sowing, and therefore not interminably, but only so long as it necessary to prepare the soil to receive the seed. When the seed-furrows have been drawn in the levelled surface of the ground ( shivvah ), then the sowing and planting begin; and this also takes place in various ways, according to the different kinds of fruit. Qetsach is the black poppy ( nigella sativa , Arab. habbe soda , so called from its black seeds), belonging to the ranunculaceae . Kammon was the cummin ( c uminum cyminum ) with larger aromatic seeds, Ar. kammun , neither of them our common carraway ( Kmmel , carum). The wheat he sows carefully in rows ( sorah , ordo ; ad ordinem , as it is translated by Jerome), i.e., he does not scatter it about carelessly, like the other two, but lays the grains carefully in the furrows, because otherwise when they sprang up they would get massed together, and choke one another. Nisman , like sorah , is an acc. loci : the barley is sown in a piece of the field specially marked off for it, or specially furnished with signs ( smanm ); and kussemeth , the spelt ( , also mentioned by Homer, Od. iv 604, between wheat and barley), along the edge of it, so that spelt forms the rim of the barley field. It is by a divine instinct that the husbandman acts in this manner; for God, who established agriculture at the creation (i.e., Jehovah, not Osiris), has also given men understanding. This is the meaning of v’yiss e ro lammishpat : and (as we may see from all this) He (his God: the subject is given afterwards in the second clause) has led him (Pro 31:1) to the right (this is the rendering adopted by Kimchi, whilst other commentators have been misled by Jer 30:11, and last of all Malbim Luzzatto, “ Cosi Dio con giustizia corregge ;” he would have done better, however, to say, con moderazione ).
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| Husbandry a Divine Art. | B. C. 725. |
23 Give ye ear, and hear my voice; hearken, and hear my speech. 24 Doth the plowman plow all day to sow? doth he open and break the clods of his ground? 25 When he hath made plain the face thereof, doth he not cast abroad the fitches, and scatter the cummin, and cast in the principal wheat and the appointed barley and the rie in their place? 26 For his God doth instruct him to discretion, and doth teach him. 27 For the fitches are not threshed with a threshing instrument, neither is a cart wheel turned about upon the cummin; but the fitches are beaten out with a staff, and the cummin with a rod. 28 Bread corn is bruised; because he will not ever be threshing it, nor break it with the wheel of his cart, nor bruise it with his horsemen. 29 This also cometh forth from the LORD of hosts, which is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.
This parable, which (like many of our Saviour’s parables) is borrowed from the husbandman’s calling, is ushered in with a solemn preface demanding attention, He that has ears to hear, let him hear, hear and understand, v. 23.
I. The parable here is plain enough, that the husbandman applies himself to the business of his calling with a great deal of pains and prudence, secundum artem–according to rule, and, as his judgment directs him, observes a method and order in his work. 1. In his ploughing and sowing: Does the ploughman plough all day to sow? Yes, he does, and he ploughs in hope and sows in hope, 1 Cor. ix. 10. Does he open and break the clods? Yes, he does, that the land may be fit to receive the seed. And when he has thus made plain the face thereof does he not sow his seed, seed suitable to the soil? For the husbandman knows what grain is fit for clayey ground and what for sandy ground, and, accordingly, he sows each in its place–wheat in the principal place (so the margin reads it), for it is the principal grain, and was a staple commodity of Canaan (Ezek. xxvii. 17), and barley in the appointed place. The wisdom and goodness of the God of nature are to be observed in this, that, to oblige his creatures with a grateful variety of productions, he has suited to them an agreeable variety of earths. 2. In his threshing, Isa 28:27; Isa 28:28. This also he proportions to the grain that is to be threshed out. The fitches and the cummin, being easily got out of their husk or ear, are only threshed with a staff and a rod; but the bread-corn requires more force, and therefore that must be bruised with a threshing instrument, a sledge shod with iron, that was drawn to and fro over it, to beat out the corn; and yet he will not be ever threshing it, nor any longer than is necessary to loosen the corn from the chaff; he will not break it, or crush it, into the ground with the wheel of his cart, nor bruise it to pieces with his horsemen; the grinding of it is reserved for another operation. Observe, by the way, what pains are to be taken, not only for the earning, but for the preparing of our necessary food; and yet, after all, it is meat that perishes. Shall we then grudge to labour much more for the meat which endures to everlasting life? Bread-corn is bruised. Christ was so; it pleased the Lord to bruise him, that he might be the bread of life to us.
II. The interpretation of the parable is not so plain. Most interpreters make it a further answer to those who set the judgments of God at defiance: “Let them know that as the husbandman will not be always ploughing, but will at length sow his seed, so God will not be always threatening, but will at length execute his threatenings and bring upon sinners the judgments they have deserved; but in wisdom, and in proportion to their strength, not that they may be ruined, but that they may be reformed and brought to repentance by them.” But I think we may give this parable a greater latitude in the exposition of it. 1. In general, that God who gives the husbandman this wisdom is, doubtless, himself infinitely wise. It is God that instructs the husbandman to discretion, as his God, v. 26. Husbandmen have need of discretion wherewith to order their affairs, and ought not undertake that business unless they do in some measure understand it; and they should by observation and experience endeavour to improve themselves in the knowledge of it. Since the king himself is served of the field, the advancing of the art of husbandry is a common service to mankind more than the cultivating of most other arts. The skill of the husbandman is from God, as every good and perfect gift is. This takes off somewhat of the weight and terror of the sentence passed on man for sin, that when God, in execution of it, sent man to till the ground, he taught him how to do it most to his advantage, otherwise, in the greatness of his folly, he might have been for ever tilling the sand of the sea, labouring to no purpose. It is he that gives men capacity for this business, an inclination to it, and a delight in it; and if some were not by Providence cut out for it, and mad to rejoice (as Issachar, that tribe of husbandmen) in their tents, notwithstanding the toil and fatigue of this business, we should soon want the supports of life. If some are more discreet and judicious in managing these or any other affairs than others are, God must be acknowledged in it; and to him husbandmen must seek for direction in their business, for they, above other men, have an immediate dependence upon the divine Providence. As to the other instance of the husbandman’s conduct in threshing his corn, it is said, This also comes forth from the Lord of hosts, v. 29. Even the plainest dictate of sense and reason must be acknowledged to come forth from the Lord of hosts. And, if it is from him that men do things wisely and discreetly, we must needs acknowledge him to be wise in counsel and excellent in working. God’s working is according to his will; he never acts against his own mind, as men often do, and there is a counsel in his whole will: he is therefore excellent in working, because he is wonderful in counsel. 2. God’s church is his husbandry, 1 Cor. iii. 9. If Christ is the true vine, his Father is the husbandman (John xv. 1), and he is continually by his word and ordinances cultivating it. Does the ploughman plough all day, and break the clods of his ground, that it may receive the seed, and does not God by his ministers break up the fallow ground? Does not the ploughman, when the ground is fitted for the seed, cast in the seed in its proper soil? He does so, and so the great God sows his word by the hand of his ministers (Matt. xiii. 19), who are to divide the word of truth and give every one his portion. Whatever the soil of the heart is, there is some seed or other in the word proper for it. And, as the word of God, so the rod of God is thus wisely made use of. Afflictions are God’s threshing-instruments, designed to loosen us from the world, to separate between us and our chaff, and to prepare us for use. And, as to these, God will make use of them as there is occasion; but he will proportion them to our strength; they shall be no heavier than there is need. If the rod and the staff will answer the end, he will not make use of his cart-wheel and his horsemen. And where these are necessary, as for the bruising of the bread-corn (which will not otherwise be got clean from the straw), yet he will not be ever threshing it, will not always chide, but his anger shall endure but for a moment; nor will he crush under his feet the prisoners of the earth. And herein we must acknowledge him wonderful in counsel and excellent in working.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
Vs. 23-29: GOD’S ACTIONS ARE PURPOSEFUL AND BENEFICIENT
1. Isaiah calls for the attention of those who are suffering because of their loyalty to the Lord, Who surely has not forgotten His covenant or promise, (vs. 23; Psa 49:1-2; 2Ki 13:23; Psa 89:34).
2. He illustrates the wisdom of God’s action by likening the covenant people to farm land, and a threshing-floor, (vs. 24-29).
a. Harrow and plowshare stand for God’s judgments upon His people.
b. Just as the farmer does not go on plowing and harrowing after the soil is smooth, neither does the Lord indefinitely stretch out His hand against them.
c. There is a holy purpose in every act of divine discipline.
d. As the farmer plants various seed in prepared soil – the methods of each differing in both planting and harvesting – so, the Lord deals with his people as is necessary to gain the highest yield from their lives, (vs. 24-28, Heb 12:5-12).
3. All may safely entrust the direction of their lives unto Him who is “wonderful in counsel” and “excellent” in the wisdom of His effectual working, (vs. 29b; Isa 9:6; Isa 31:2; Rom 11:33).
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
23. Give ear and hear my voice. Isaiah makes use of a preface, as if he were about to speak of something important and very weighty; for we are not wont to demand attention from our hearers, unless when we are about to say what is very important. And yet he seems here to speak of common and ordinary subjects, as for example, about agriculture, sowing, thrashing, and such like operations. But the Prophet intended to direct the minds of his hearers to higher matters; for when he discourses about the judgments of God, and shews with what wisdom God governs the world, though wicked men think that everything moves by chance and at random, he intended to lay down and explain a difficult subject, in a plain style, by metaphors drawn from objects which are well known and understood. We often complain that God winks too much at the crimes of wicked men, because he does not immediately punish them agreeably to our wish; but the Prophet shews that God appoints nothing but what is just and proper.
The design of this preface therefore is, that men may perceive their stupidity in carping at the judgments of God, and putting an unfavourable construction on them, while even in the ordinary course of nature they have a very bright mirror, in which they may see them plainly. There is an implied expostulation with men who shut their eyes amidst so clear light. He shews that they are dull and stupid in not understanding the works of God which are so manifest, and yet are so rash and daring that they presume to judge and censure what is hidden. In like manner Paul also, when speaking of the resurrection, pronounces that those who do not perceive the power of God in the seeds which are thrown into the earth are madmen.
“
Thou fool, that which thou sowest does not grow or vegetate till it has rotted.” (1Co 15:36.)
Thus Isaiah here declares that those who do not see the wisdom of God in things so obvious are stupid, and, in short, that men are blind and dull in beholding the works of God.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(23) Give ye ear . . .The words remind us of the style of the wisdom books of the Old Testament (Pro. 2:1; Pro. 4:1; Pro. 5:1; Psa. 34:11) in which Isaiah had been trained. Isaiah is about to set before those who have ears to hear a parable which he does not interpret, and which will, therefore, task all their energies. The idea that lies at the root of the parable is like that of Mat. 16:2-4, that men fail to apply in discerning the signs of the times the wisdom which they practise or recognise in the common phenomena of nature and the tillage of the soil. As that tillage presents widely varied processes, differing with each kind of grain, so the sowing and the threshing of Gods spiritual husbandry presents a like diversity of operations. What that diversity indicates in detail the prophet proceeds to show with what may again be called a Dante-like minuteness.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
23. Give ye ear hear my speech It might seem, and properly, that the prophet’s address has closed, and he enters here on a new view, a relieving side to the woe. He calls attention to a parable taken from the common work of the husbandman, to illustrate that it is not always God’s way merely to punish. He does this only to the wholly incorrigible; these he destroys. Those less so, he corrects simply to benefit.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
The Parable of the Farmer and his Crops ( Isa 28:23-29 ).
The point behind this parable is that the wise farmer thinks carefully about what he is doing and does not get bogged down in one activity. He looks at things as a whole, and does each thing in its proper course, ready to change as the occasion demands. He is fully flexible. In the same way these men of Jerusalem should consider that now is the time for a change. They should cease to look to other nations and should look instead to Yahweh, as the farmer does. For now is Yahweh’s day, and God has great purposes for Israel if only they will take note of what He is saying.
We must remember that the purpose behind all Isaiah’s words is not to ‘foretell the future’. It is to speak of the future in order that it might stir to action. Every revelation should cause his hearers to think again of what God would do through them if only they would respond rightly to Him.
Analysis.
a Give ear, and hear my voice. Listen, and hear what I say (my speech) (Isa 28:23).
b Does the ploughman plough continually in order to sow? Does he continually open and break the clods of the ground? (Isa 28:24).
c When he has levelled and broken up its surface (literally ‘made plain its face’), does he not cast abroad the dill, and scatter the cummin (Isa 28:25 a).
d And put the wheat in rows and the barley in its appointed place, and the spelt in its border? (Isa 28:25 b).
e For his God instructs him aright and teaches him (Isa 28:26).
d For the dill are not threshed with a sharp instrument, nor is a threshing wheel revolved over the cummin (Isa 28:27 a).
c But the dill are beaten out with a staff, and the cummin with a rod (Isa 28:27 b)..
b Bread corn is ground, for he will not be ever threshing it, and though the wheel of his cart and his horses scatter it, it does not grind it (Isa 28:28).
a This also comes from Yahweh of hosts, which is wonderful in counsel and excellent in wisdom (Isa 28:29).
In ‘a’ they are to listen to Yahweh’s voice, and in the parallel the wisdom and counsel comes from Yahweh. In ‘b’ the ploughman does not restrict himself to the initial action of ploughing, and in the preparation of the grain in the parallel he does not restrict himself to the initial threshing. In ‘c’ he does not sow the dill and cummin, and in the parallel the dill and cummin are beaten out with a rod. In ‘d’ everything is put in its appointed place, and in the parallel the dill and cummin are treated in the appointed way. And in ‘e’ all is done according to the wisdom provided by Yahweh.
Isa 28:23-24
‘Give ear, and hear my voice.
Listen, and hear what I say (my speech).
Does the ploughman plough continually in order to sow?
Does he continually open and break the clods of the ground?’
Isaiah calls for careful attention to what he will now say. His first question is, does the farmer never do anything but plough? Does he only ever break up the ground? The answer he expects is, “Of course not.” Otherwise he would never achieve anything.
Isa 28:25-26
‘When he has levelled and broken up its surface (literally ‘made plain its face’),
Does he not cast abroad the dill, and scatter the cummin,
And put the wheat in rows and the barley in its appointed place, and the spelt in its border?
For his God instructs him aright and teaches him.’
We must remember that each farmer had only a comparatively small patch in which he had to grow his different crops, somewhat like a large market garden. He had to decide what to plant in each section and arrange carefully so that he produced all the crops he needed using all available space, which would come to fruition at different times. Thus he takes each type of seed and carefully sows it in the place which he has determined, different types of herbs or different types of grain in different places, even planning which will be sown on the border. This is because God gives him wisdom and shows him what to do. The hint is that that too is what these men of Jerusalem should be doing. Listening to God’s voice and planning accordingly.
‘In rows’ and ‘in its appointed place’ are two Hebrew technical farming terms and any translations are simply guesswork. (Even LXX omitted them not knowing what they meant). We do not know exactly what they mean, but the idea is clear. Each crop is dealt with in the appropriate way.
Isa 28:27-29
‘For the dill are not threshed with a sharp instrument,
Nor is a threshing wheel revolved over the cummin.
But the dill are beaten out with a staff,
And the cummin with a rod.
Bread corn is ground, for he will not be ever threshing it,
And though the wheel of his cart and his horses scatter it, it does not grind it.
This also comes from Yahweh of hosts,
Which is wonderful in counsel and excellent in wisdom.’
But once he has planted it the farmer does not leave matters like that. He plans ahead. Later he will deal with each crop as it requires. He does not thresh the dill with a sharp instrument like a threshingsledge, rather he beats it with a staff. He does not revolve a threshing wheel over the cummin, he beats it with a rod. He threshes the corn (with his sharp instrument), but he does not go on threshing it forever. He then grinds it ready for use. The wheel of his cart and his horses scatter the seed, but the wheel does not grind it. (Something was probably fitted to the wheel to aid the process of threshing).
So each thing is dealt with according to requirements, and each is dealt with differently. Each instrument has its purpose and must be used correctly. And all this, as guided by God, is extremely good advice and very wise. In the same way should the men of Jerusalem consider whether they are using the right instruments for what they are about to do, whether trust in Egypt or trust in Yahweh. For that too is wise advice.
There is possibly also an indirect threat here that God will have to plough up Judah if it is not responsive to His guidance. Unlike Samaria it still had the option, and God is pointing out that as the Great Farmer He is quite ready to deal differently with Judah if the situation warrants it.
It has been objected that horses would not be used for this kind of work and that the text should be amended. But Isaiah was not an experienced agriculturalist or zoologist and was probably speaking loosely. In his world in Jerusalem horses were what he came across, and he may well have meant ‘horse-like animals’. e.g. asses. Nor can we in fact be sure that they did not use horses in this way.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
The Chastisement of the Lord of Hosts
v. 23. Give ye ear and hear My voice; hearken and hear My speech, v. 24. Doth the plowman plow all day to sow? v. 25. When he hath made plain the face thereof, v. 26. For his God doth instruct him to discretion, v. 27. For the fitches are not threshed with a threshing-instrument, v. 28. Bread-corn is bruised, v. 29. This also cometh forth from the Lord of hosts, which is wonderful In counsel and excellent in working,
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
Isa 28:23-29. Give ye ear, &c. We have here the fourth member of this section, in which this severe judgment of God denounced in the preceding verses, is defended by a parable taken from agriculture, wherein the prophet represents allegorically the intentions and method of the divine judgments; asserting that God acts in different ways, but at the same time with the greatest wisdom in punishing the wicked: laying judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet, and weighing with the greatest exactness the differences of time, of men, and of things, together with every necessity, for severity or mercy. These are represented under a continued allegory, borrowed from agriculture and threshing; which images are in a manner appropriated and consecrated to this topic, and have been already explained in the course of the work. See Bishop Lowth’s 10th Prelection, and Vitringa; who has very copiously elucidated this parable. Bishop Lowth reads Isa 28:28. The bread-corn [is beaten out] with the threshing-wain. But not for ever will he continue thus to thresh it; nor to vex it with the wheel of his wain; nor to bruise it with the hoofs of his cattle.
REFLECTIONS.1st, Though judgments are denounced on all God’s enemies, yet they will first begin at the house of God, and the sinners in Zion must feel the heaviest scourge. Such is the woe pronounced here on Ephraim, and Samaria the capital of the ten revolted tribes.
1. The sins charged upon them are pride and drunkenness. Their country being rich and fertile, abundance swelled their vain hearts, and sensual appetite abused their distinguished mercies. Carousing at the festal board, their heads with garlands crowned, they proudly defied sorrow, fearless of the wrath they provoked. Note; (1.) Pride on God’s gifts is the sure way to provoke him to deprive us of them. (2.) A drunkard is a monster in nature; and he who thus basely chooses to degrade himself into a brute justly deserves to be made a companion of devils.
2. Heavy is the curse which the prophet is commissioned to pronounce on these proud drunkards. As they gave up their senses to the base servitude of lust, and drowned their reason in excess, in just judgment they should be delivered to their foes. The king of Assyria, Salmanezer, like a resistless hail-storm, or winter’s flood, should bear down all before him. The crown of pride, their king and his mighty men, or Samaria the metropolis, or the crowns of garlands on the drunkard’s head, when they were surprised in this defenceless and intoxicated state, he would cast down, and would tread the drunkards under his feet, reducing them to a state of most abject wretchedness. Their glorious beauty, their numerous inhabitants, or their country decked with vineyards, and valleys thick with corn, shall fade as quickly as the flower’s bloom departs, and be devoured by the hosts of Assyria as greedily as the first ripe fruit; so that nothing but desolation should be seen. Note; (1.) They who give the reins to their appetites, and to drunkenness especially, are voluntary slaves, and court a servitude most wretched even now; issuing at present in the ruin of their health, fortune, and families, and bringing them hastily to that place of torment where a drop of water will be sought in vain to cool a flaming tongue. (2.) God’s ministers must denounce his woes against men’s sins freely and plainly. (3.) Whatever the sinner here is proud of, it is but a fading flower, and at death at farthest, if not before, will vanish.
3. In the midst of the desolations of Ephraim, Judah and Benjamin, the residue of God’s people, have a gracious promise made to them. The Lord shall be a crown of glory and a diadem of beauty to them, eminently distinguishing, and protecting them from the power of the Assyrians, under Hezekiah, a type of that son of David, in whom the offices of King and Priest should be united: and for a spirit of judgment to him that sitteth in judgment, which God would bestow on the king and his magistrates, to execute righteous judgment, which is the great happiness of every state; and for strength to them that turn the battle to the gate, enduing their generals and soldiers with courage to vanquish their enemies, and pursue them to the gates of their city. Note; (1.) Christ is his faithful people’s glory, and in his wisdom, righteousness, and strength, they are made more than conquerors over all their enemies. (2.) Whatever the Lord is to us, or does for us, we are bound to ascribe the praise of all to him.
4. A heavy complaint is lodged against Judah for her sins. In her were found the sins of Israel, and the same drunkenness led them astray from God. Yea, so generally had their scandalous sins spread, that priest, prophet, and people were alike infected with them. The consequence of which was, that the pretended prophet uttered the fancies of his inflamed brains for visions, deceiving, and being deceived; the priests, instead of the conscientious discharge of their office, mistook God’s law, misinterpreted his oracles, and led their hearers into fatal errors: or on the bench decided wrong, to the great injury of truth and justice. Yea, so common and infamous was their drunkenness, that every table was full of vomit, and no place clean; a scene as loathsome (if possible) in the eyes of sober men, as it is detestable in the sight of God. Note; Drunkenness is vile and brutish in every man; but in a priest, a minister of the sanctuary, what words can express the infamy, impiety, and scandalousness of the crime!
2nd, Drunkenness necessarily brought stupidity upon their minds, and steeled them against all the warnings of God.
1. In vain were all the teachings of the prophets, solicitous as they were to make them understand; waiting upon them with patient perseverance, and daily inculcating their lessons; and plainly, and affectionately withal, shewing them how nearly they were interested in the matter, as being the only way for them to obtain deliverance from the threatened evils, or pardon and refreshing to their guilty consciences. Yet as soon might a child at the breast be taught, so stupified were they with their drunkenness, and so obstinate, they would not hear; though the word was ever sounding in their ears, it never reached their hearts; and they seem to have turned it into ridicule, repeating it after the prophet in mockery, Tsav latsav, kav lakav, or at their drunken feasts jesting with the most sacred words of scripture. Note; (1.) God condescends to teach us as babes; his word is the sincere milk; and, as a nurse cherishes her children, his ministers are sent to wait upon us with unwearied patience. (2.) Children’s minds must not be over-burthened; a little, as they are able to receive it, will be the most profitable instruction. (3.) There is rest for the weary in Jesus, and refreshing for the miserable: it argues our folly to be as great as our wickedness, to reject our own mercies, and refuse his calls to come to him, that we may find rest to our souls. (4.) Many hear the word of God, whose hearts continue impenetrable; yea, they will not understand, and none so blind as these. (5.) The last step of hardened wickedness is making a jest of things sacred.
2. In just judgment God gives them up to the ruin they have chosen. With stammering lips and another tongue will he speak to this people, when foreign armies shall waste their country; so that their destruction was determined; that they might go and fall backward and be broken, and snared, and taken, as the punishment of their apostacy from God, first given up to the Babylonians, and at last their country utterly destroyed by the Romans. Note; They who will not attend to God’s calls to repentance, will hear his terrible voice of judgment, when their ruin is past recovery.
3rdly, The prophesy beginning at the 14th verse some apply to the desolation of Judaea by the Assyrians; but it seems to belong especially to the Jews in Christ’s day, and the desolations which the Romans shortly after brought upon them.
1. The scornful men who rejected the prophetic admonition, too great to take rebuke, and infatuated to their ruin, boasted themselves secure. The death and hell which the prophet threatened, they feared not: they thought themselves as safe as if they had made a compact with the grave, and were confident, whatever overflowing scourge passed through the land, it would not come to them; making lies their refuge, and hiding themselves under falsehood, they trusted in the lying prophets who encouraged them, or in their own strength, wealth, and policy, to overcome or over-reach their adversaries. By the overflowing scourge, the Roman army seems intended, against which they thought themselves safe, but found, too late, their sad delusion. Note; (1.) When we are in covenant with God through a Redeemer, and at peace with him through the blood of sprinkling; then, and only then, have we made a covenant with death, and cannot be hurt thereby. (2.) Vain confidence buoys up sinners to the last, but there will then be found a lie in their right hand.
2. The prophet admonishes them where alone they can safely place their confidence. Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, the Lord Jesus Christ, other foundation than whom no man can lay; a stone, a rock, firm, and immoveable; a tried stone, who has been proved the sure support of his saints in every age; or a stone of trial, by whom men’s states are discovered, and their characters determined; a precious corner-stone, supporting the whole spiritual building, and inestimably prized by every believer who knows the value of such a Redeemer; a sure foundation, which will stand for eternity, and on which the faithful may safely trust body and soul: he that believeth shall not make haste, but under every trial patiently wait the Lord’s leisure; and thus never will be confounded, or ashamed, as it is rendered, 1Pe 2:6 for he has never failed those who trusted him, and never can or will disappoint the hopes of those who perseveringly rely upon him.
3. He warns them of the folly, sin, and danger of their conduct, in trusting on lying vanities. For when the Lord shall lay judgment to the line, and righteousness to the plummet, as builders to prove their work straight, their ways will be found perverse, and their judgment ensue; then their vain hopes shall fail, and the hail-storm sweep away their refuge of lies. The army of the enemy shall as easily and utterly overwhelm them, their lying prophets, their riches and temple together, or whatever else they trust in, as the waters of the deluge did the sinners of old. Then their covenant with death would be proved a delusion; and the sword of the Chaldeans, or rather of the Romans, as an overflowing scourge, pass through, and as mire in the streets they should be trodden down. From the time that it goeth forth, neither policy nor power will be able to oppose it; it shall take you as prisoners for captivity, or seize you as criminals for the sword; and this continually and thoroughly, till God’s judgments are executed. Morning by morning, shall it pass over, by day and by night, without interruption the siege would be carried on, and the devastations increase; and it shall be a vexation only to understand the report, so terrible would the tidings be which those who fled into Jerusalem should carry of the ravages of the Chaldean or Roman army. For the bed is shorter than that a man can stretch himself on it: and the covering narrower than that he can wrap himself in it; which either describes the insufficiency of their projects, and the uncomfortableness of their state, when their beds would give them no repose; or the case of Jerusalem, crowded with those who fled thither, whose useless number increased the miseries of the besieged. For the Lord shall rise up as in mount Perazim, and against his arm resistance is vain; he shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon; two eminent instances wherein he displayed his terrible majesty against his enemies, 2Sa 5:20. 1Ch 14:11. Jos 10:10-13 that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pass his act, his strange act; he used to fight for them, but now is turned to be their enemy, and their fall is sure. Note; (1.) If God lay judgment to the line, and righteousness to the plummet, who can stand, or bear the scrutiny? (2.) It is the folly of the self-righteous and the hypocrite that they cry peace, when there is no peace. (3.) If sinners cannot bear the report of God’s terrors without vexation, nor hear of hell, and torments, and eternal despair, without commotion, how will they endure them? (4.) They who think their moral duties will yield them a covering in the day of God, and seek repose in their own righteousnesses, will find the bed too short, the covering too narrow, and perish in their own deceivings. (5.) Vengeance is God’s strange work; he delighteth not in the death of a sinner.
4. The whole is pressed upon their consciences for their conviction and reformation. Now therefore, to-day, whilst it is called to-day, and yet there is mercy, be ye not mockers, despising these divine notices; lest your bands be made strong, and aggravated guilt provoke a heavier judgment: for I have heard from the Lord of Hosts, who cannot lie, and is able to make good his word, a consumption, even determined upon the whole earth, or on the land of Judaea; it shall be swept as with the besom of destruction. See Dan 9:27. Note; (1.) It is merciful in God to give sinners warning; he leaves them then without excuse. (2.) Mockers will be strangely disappointed, when the terrors which they despised seize them, and the warnings that they ridiculed are proved dreadful realities.
4thly, The prophet, in God’s name, calls on them for attention, and gives them a parable of warning.
1. He bids them regard the husbandman; what various methods he uses; how prudently he plows and sows, casting the seed into the proper soil, and in the appointed season; and when he has gathered his fruits, how wisely he manages them, using more force with the seeds which are more firm and difficult to be beat out of the ear, and less with such as would be liable to be bruised. And when the bread-corn is beat out with the threshing instrument, (which was a kind of low cart, drawn by horses or oxen, with iron spikes at the bottom) he does not suffer it to be trampled on too much, or broken with the wheel on the floor, but carries it to the mill to be ground. So,
2. God would not always be warning, and making preparations for the execution of his judgments, but inflict them according to the several deserts of sinners. Note; (1.) All wisdom cometh from above. If the husbandman be taught to plow and sow aright, he owes it to God wonderful in counsel. (2.) The heart of man is as the fallow-ground, obdurate and unfruitful, till God in his word breaks up the stubborn soil, and awakens the sinner’s conscience. (3.) Christ is the living seed; the heart which receives him will yield fruit unto God. (4.) God knows the several dispositions of his believing people, and dispenses his word and providences in such a way towards them, as may most effectually answer the purposes of his grace. (5.) In proportion to their guilt and provocations will be the execution of the divine vengeance on the wicked. (6.) In all his ways and works God will manifest his own glory, and appear wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
THE CHASTISEMENT IN MEASURE
Isa 28:23-29
23Give ye ear, and hear my voice;
Hearken, and hear my speech.
24Doth the plowman plow all day to sow?
Doth he open and break the clods of his ground?
25When he hath made plain the face thereof,
Doth he not cast abroad the fitches,
And scatter the cummin,
And cast in 21 22the principal wheat,
And the appointed barley,
And the 23rie in their 24place?
2625 26For his God doth instruct him to discretion,
And doth teach him.
27For the fitches are not threshed with a threshing instrument,
Neither is a cartwheel turned about upon the cummin;
But the fitches are beaten out with a staff,
And the cummin with a rod.
2827Bread corn is bruised;
Because he will not ever be threshing it,
Nor break it with the wheel of his cart,
Nor bruise it with his horsemen.
29This also cometh forth from the Lord of hosts,
Which is wonderful in counsel,
And excellent in 28working.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
Isa 28:25. is . . It seems to be part. Niphal which denotes marked off, designated by . This is to be considered as accus. loci in the place marked off.
Isa 28:28. , if there be not a clerical mistake, is to be derived from a form , which does not elsewhere occur.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. As the Prophet could not leave the brief word concerning Ephraim (Isa 28:1-4) without a consolatory conclusion (Isa 28:5-6), so he cannot conclude the word directed against Jerusalem (Isa 28:14) without making at the close of its rebukes an announcement of salvation. This he does by employing a parable drawn from agriculture. He does not interpret the parable in clear terms. Therefore, before uttering it, he calls for attentive reflection (Isa 28:23). Then he sets forth the parable. It has, we may say, a double point. First, the Prophet makes us observe that the farmer does not always plough, does not always as it were lacerate the ground with sharp coulter or pointed harrow (Isa 28:24). No, he casts into the bosom of the earth good seed of various kinds (Isa 28:25). Moreover, the fruit produced from the seed, which can be divested of its integuments only by the application of a certain force, is yet not too severely handled by him, nor is equal force applied to all kinds of fruit, but he is careful in his treatment as the nature of things appointed by God teaches him (Isa 28:26). For, not a threshing sledge, or threshing roller is applied to the more tender kinds of fruit, as the cummin, but only a staff (Isa 28:27). Even the corn-fruits that yield bread are not so threshed that the grain is crushed thereby (Isa 28:28). That, too, has been arranged by the Lord, that His wonderful wisdom in counsel, and His great power to help may be known (Isa 28:29). The operations of ploughing and threshing, which are necessary for seed time and harvest, should therefore teach Israel in symbol the certainty that the temporal judgments which they must endure are only correctives in the hand of God, from which Israel will come forth as glorious fruit cleansed and purified.
2. Give ye earin their place.
Isa 28:23-25. The summons to pay attention (comp. as to the words 1, 2 and Isa 32:9), is owing to the character of the following speech. As it is an ingenious parable, it is necessary for the hearer to consider it with attention and reflection, that its meaning may be apparent to him. Isa 28:24, i.e., continually, perpetually. The expression is found in Isaiah usually in this signification Isa 51:13; Isa 52:5; Isa 62:6; Isa 65:2; Isa 65:5. The addition might appear superfluous. But the Prophet wishes to intimate that the end in view is cultivation of the soil, and not merely clearing away of vegetation for any other purpose, such as for building a house. This expression conveys a pre-intimation that the Lords procedure towards His people is not simply of a destructive character, no mere negation without positively designing their salvation. is to be connected also with the second half of Isa 28:24 (Jer 49:7). is only here used of opening, turning over, ploughing the earth. Yet its use to denote engraving in wood or stone is analogous: Comp. Exo 28:9; Exo 28:36; 1Ki 7:36, et saepe.occare, to harrow, besides here only Job 39:10; Hos 10:11. The suffix in delicately expresses the affection which the farmer cherishes to his own land. Because it is dear to him, he will not wish to injure it. occurs in the sense of aequavit, complanavit only here (Piel besides in Isa 38:13). The Prophet has evidently before his mind a large farm regularly laid out in various kinds of fruits. [not fitches as in E. V., but] black cummin (nigella arvensis, common black cummin, or more probably nigella damascena, garden black cummin, which grows wild near the Mediterranean) occurs only in this place. cummin, common cummin, carum carvi, which belongs to a different order from that of the black cummin (namely to the umbelliferae, while the other belongs to the ranunculaceae), is mentioned in the Old Testament only here. is the proper expression for the placing or planting of the wheat, in reference to which Gesenius remarks: Industrious farmers in the Orient plant as they do garden plants, many kinds of grain which with us are only sown (NiehbuhrsArabien, p. 157); they thrive when planted much better. (Comp. Plinius,Hist. Nat. 18:21). , . . is identical with the Talmudic and Arabic series, row, order. The planting of wheat spoken of, is done in rows (accus. loci). [rye E. V.], according to an excursus of Consul Wetzstein, in Delitzschs Commentary on Isaiah, is a variety of the common vetch (vicia sativa) the Kursenne. According to the passage before us this plant, which is eaten by cattle much less readily than barley, would be planted around the corn fields as a border or enclosure, in order to serve to protect the nobler kinds of grain, as according to Wetzstein,ut supra, the Ricinus is at present employed for this purpose. (Sing. only here, Plur. Isa 10:13) confinium, the border, enclosure. The Suffix in is to be referred to some such term as a piece of ground () which is not expressed, but is supposed in what has been previously said.
3. For his Godteach him.
Isa 28:26-29. [Dr. Naegelsbach renders this verse: He (the farmer, beats (corrects) it properly, his God so teaches him. But the E. V. is correct (comp. Pro 31:1) D.M.]. The Prophet does not think of the heathen fables of Isis and Osiris, Bacchus and Ceres, etc. In what follows the way and manner in which the farmer takes fruits from their husks is spoken of. And here there is a two-fold procedure, a part of the fruits is not threshed in the oriental manner, by means of a threshing sledge or threshing roller, but is beaten out with a staff. To this class belong black cummin and cummin, acutus, (the full designation is Isa 40:15) is the threshing instrument, which consisted either of planks only, or of planks with rollers among them. Those planks and rollers were fitted with sharp iron or stones, which tore the ears of grain (comp. Herzog, R.-Encycl. iii. p. 504). The word is found besides only Job 41:22; Amo 1:3. [Comp. the Latin tribute, a similar threshing machine, whence tribulation, lit, a subjection to the tribula.D.M.]. , wheel of the wagon, denotes the last mentioned sort of threshing instrument; whether its rollers were themselves movable, and therefore at the same time wheels, or were immovable, and were drawn by the wheels. denotes not the turning round of the wagon, its going in a circle, but the turning of the wheels. For is also used of the turning of a door on its hinge (Pro 26:14; Eze 41:24). comp. on Isa 27:12. must be taken as a question (Hitzig, Knobel, Delitzsch); Is bread-corn crushed? Answer; No! For not incessantly, i.e., till the grain is completely bruised does he thresh it, or drive the wheels of his wagon, and his horses over it. He does not crush it. The other explanation: it is crushed into bread, (i.e., afterwards in the mill, but not in the threshing), for not incessantly, etc.is refuted by the necessity of understanding before the words indicated as required to complete the sense; while according to our explanation only the simple no must be supplied, and it is implied in the question. is here as bread-corn comp. Isa 30:23; Isa 36:17; Gen 47:17; Psa 104:14. The Prophet distinguishes from the various species of cummin the proper bread-corn, whose grains are harder to separate from the husk. besides in Isaiah only Isa 41:15. , concitare, to drive, only here in Isaiah. Isa 28:29 namely, this procedure of the farmer, comp. ver, 26, . That the punishments spoken of Isa 28:14-22 proceed from Jehovah, needed not to be particularly affirmed. But that this so simple, unpretending, customary procedure of the farmer is a shell wherein a kernel of divine wisdom is concealed, and therefore according to Gods intention a means of teaching men such wisdomthis might well be set forth and emphatically affirmed. in Isaiah only here and Isa 29:14. God manifests wonderfully wise counsel, both in the ordinances of nature, and in His direction of history, for which latter the former work serves as a type full of instruction and comfort. But the aim of this wonderful wisdom is salvation ( only here in Isaiah). It seems to me more appropriate to take the word in the meaning salvation (Job 6:13; Job 30:22; Pro 2:7; Mic 6:9), because the idea of wisdom is so nearly related to that of counsel, that almost a tautology would arise from the translation wisdom. It is certainly reasonable to expect that the Prophet in a place like the present, in which the whole fulness of his thoughts is compressed. should in significant, closing words combine in two different words two specifically different thoughts.
[But Gods counsel and wisdom, as nearly related ideas, can be very properly extolled together at the close of this chapter. The rendering of the last word by working in the E. V. is warranted neither by the usus loquendi nor by etymology. The Prophet here simply magnifies the Lords counsel and wisdom.D. M.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. On Isa 28:1-4. A glorious city on a hill overlooking a broad, fertile plain, when the Lord is not its foundation and crown. What is it else than one of the vanities over which the preacher laments (Sir 2:4 sqq.)? Samaria and Jerusalem, Nineveh and Babylon have fallen. Cannot Paris, and London, and Berlin [and New York] also fall? How vain and transitory is the pomp of men! [All travellers unite in praising the situation of Samaria for its fertility, beauty and strength. But the crown of pride has been trodden under foot.D. M.]
2. On Isa 28:7-8. Those words of Solomon are therefore to be remembered: it is not for kings to drink wine; nor for princes strong drink; lest they drink and forget the law, and pervert the judgment of any of the afflicted (Pro 31:4-5), Most of all is drunkenness unseemly in preachers and teachers. Scripture enjoins that they should be sober and not given to wine (1Ti 3:2-3). Renner. Can. Apost. Isaiah 53 : Si clericus in caupona comedens deprehensus fuerit, segregetur, paeterquam si in diversorio publico in via propter necessitatem diverterit. Song of Solomon 1 : Episcopus aut presbyter aut diaconus aleae et ebrietati deserviens aut desinat, aut condemnetur. [What! a priest, a prophet, a minister, and yet drunk! Tell it not in Gath. Such a scandal are they to their coat. Isa 28:8. All tables are full of vomit, etc. See what an odious thing the sin of drunkenness iswhat an affront it is to human society; it is rude and ill-mannered enough to sicken the beholders.Henry.D. M.] In accordance with the rabbinical usage, which not seldom puts by a metonymy for God, the expression here employed, is translated in Pirke Aboth iii. Isaiah 3 : without God. [The passage of the Mishna referred to runs thus: Rabbi Simeon says, Three who have eaten at one table, and have not spoken at it words of the law, are as if they ate of sacrifices to the dead; for it is said, for all their tables tire full of vomit and filth, without , i.e., place, God the place of all things, or who contains all things. Of course this is only an ingenious diversion of the language of Isaiah from its real meaning.D. M.]
3. Isa 28:9 sqq. This is the language of scorners and the ungodly, who have always mocked and railed at Gods word and its ministers. Job, Jeremiah and David must be their song and mocking-stock (Job 30:9; Lam 3:63; Psa 69:13). If such dear men of God could not render all the people more pious, what will happen in our age in which there will be no lack of mockers (2Pe 3:3)? Cramer.
4. Isa 28:13. The severe and yet well-deserved punishment for contempt of the word of God is that they who are guilty of it fall, and not only fall, but also are broken, and not only are broken, but also are snared and taken. For when they have not the love of the truth, God sends them strong delusions that they should believe a lie, that they all might be condemned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness (2Th 2:10). Cramer.
5. On Isa 28:15. This is the direct reverse of trust in God. The people of whom the Prophet here speaks believe themselves secure from death and hell because they had made a friendly alliance with them. And the sign of this covenant is their setting their hope on lies and hypocrisy. For the devil is the father of lies (Joh 8:44). He who is in league with him must lie, and learns to lie to the highest perfection. But the fools who have built their hope on this master and their mastery in lyingmust at last, as their righteous punishment, see that they are themselves deceived. For the devil urges a man into the swamp of wickedness, and when he sticks so deep in it that he cannot get out, then he leaves the deluded being in the lurch, and appears as an accuser against him. Hence he is called not only tempter (), but also accuser (, , Revelation 7-10).
6. On Isa 28:16. Christ is the head and foundation-stone of the Christian Church, and another foundation cannot be laid (1Co 3:11; Act 4:11). There is, moreover, no other means of laying hold of Christ than faith, whose effect and property it is to be confident of what we hope for, and not to doubt of what we do not see (Heb 11:1). Cramer. [The image of faith here given is that of a stone resting on a foundation by which it is supported and sustained. When we are told that he that believeth shall not make haste or flee, we are taught the confidence, composure and peace which trust in the Lord Jesus Christ imparts.D. M.]
7. On Isa 28:17 sqq. He who relies on his own wisdom, strength, riches, or righteousness, on the help of man, on the intercession of the saints, on letters of indulgence and such like, he makes to himself a false refuge, and cannot endure, but builds his house on a quicksand. Cramer. [They that make any thing their hiding-place but Christ, the waters shall overflow it, as every shelter but the ark was overtopped and overthrown by the waters of the deluge. Henry.D. M.]
8. On Isa 28:19. People who are not tried are inexperienced, and have a merely speculative religion, which is of no advantage to them. Meditatio, oratio, tentatio faciunt Theologum. Luther. As long as all is well with us, and we have the enjoyment of life, there is too much noise around us, and we cannot hear the voice of God. Every affliction is a wilderness, in which a man is in solitude and stillness, so that he understands better the word of God. Every tribulation is a power of the soul. In the noisy day we have hearkened so much to the voices of men. In the wilderness there is quiet, and when human voices are silent, the voice of God begins to sneak. Tholuck.
9. On Isa 28:20. Vexatio seu crux perinde est atque brevis lectus, in quo contrahendum est corpus, nisi algere velimus. Hoc est: Solus verbi auditus retinendus ac sequendus est. Tribulatio autem continet nos ceu in brevi lecto, nec sinit nos evagrari in nostra studia. Luther.
10. On Isa 28:21. [This will be His strange work, His strange act, His foreign deed; it is work that He is backward to; He rather delights in showing mercy, and does not afflict willingly; it is work that He is not used to; as to His own people, He protects and favors them; it is a strange work indeed if He turn to be their enemy and fight against them (Isa 63:10); it is a work that all the neighbors will stand amazed at. Deu 29:24. Henry.D. M.]
11. On Isa 28:22. Nolite evangelium et verbum habere pro fabula, alioquin fiet, ut magis constringamini et implicemini efficacioribus erroribus ut fiatis improbi ad omne bonum opus. Luther.
12. On Isa 28:23 sqq. God Himself is the husbandman. The field is the Church on earth. Before it can bring forth fruit, it must be ploughed and prepared. The plough is the cross of trial, when the ploughers make their furrows long upon our backs (Psa 129:3). The seed is the imperishable word of God (1Pe 1:23). The rain is the Holy Ghost who gives the increase (Isa 44:3; 1Co 3:6). Further, when the fruit is gathered in, if men will bake bread out of it, it must be threshed. This is done not for its destruction, but with such moderation as the nature of the grain can bear. The practical application is that we learn to yield ourselves to such husbandry of God, and bear with patience what God does to us. For He knows according to His supreme wisdom to order every thing, that we may be His grain, and good, pure bread upon His table of shew-bread. Cramer.
13. [We see (1) The reason of afflictions. It is for the same reason which induces the farmer to employ various methods on his farm. (2) We are not to expect the same unvarying course in Gods dealings with us. (3) We are not to expect always the same kind of afflictions. We may lay it down as a general rule that the divine judgments are usually in the line of our offences; and by the nature of the judgment we may usually ascertain the nature of the sin. (4) God will not crush or destroy His people. The farmer does not crush or destroy his grain. (5) We should therefore bear afflictions and chastisements with patience. God is good and wise. Barnes.D. M.]
14. On Isa 28:26. [Where men do not cultivate the corn-plants, wheat, rye, barley, etc., the cerealia, as they are called, they are in the condition of savages. Savages live on what comes to hand without patient culture. Man could never have learned the cultivation of the corn-plants without being taught by God. The cerealia do not grow as other annuals, spontaneously or by the dispersion and germination of their seed. If left to themselves, they quickly become extinct. They do not grow wild in any part of the world. Their seed must be sown by man in ground carefully prepared to receive it. But while human culture is necessary for the growth and propagation of corn-plants, man is naturally ignorant of their use and value. It would never have occurred to man to prepare the soil for wheat-seed at a particular time of the year, and to wait many months for the grain that would ripen in the ear; and then to grind the hard seeds, and to mix them with water, and to bake this paste is what man, left to himself, would never have thought of. The fact that we have corn-plants alive on the earth at this day demonstrates that they must have been called into existence when man was on the earth to cultivate them, and that man must have been taught by a Higher Power to do so, and to use them for his support. It is then a matter that can be established by the clearest and most convincing evidence, that God, as the Prophet here tells us, instructed the plowman to plow, to open and break the clods of the ground, and to cast in the wheat and barley. (Isa 28:24-25) These may appear to us now simple operations. But they must have been at first taught to man by God in order that wheat and barley, and the other cereals, which He had made for the use of man, might be preserved on the earth. Beside the natural powers furnished us by God, to whom we owe the capacity of knowledge and the lessons given by Providence in external nature, God still teaches the husbandman through that primeval revelation of the art of agriculture made to man when He put him into the garden to dress it and to keep itD. M.]
HOMILETICAL HINTS
1. On Isa 28:1-6. In the light of this word of God let the glorious acts of God (the fall of Paris, etc.) be to us a mighty proclamation: 1) of Gods judgment, 2) of Gods grace. Frommel, Zeitpredigten, Heidelberg, 1873.
2. On Isa 28:11-12. An earnest warning voice to our people. It bids us consider 1) What the Lord has hitherto in kindness offered to us (How rest may be had is preached to us Mat 11:28 sq.); 2) How we have received what has been offered to us (We will not have such preaching); 3) What the Lord for our punishment will hereafter offer to us (He will speak with mocking lips and with another tongue unto this people).
3. On Isa 28:14-20. Text for a political sermon such as might be delivered before a Christian court, or before an assembly of those who have influence on the direction of public affairs. Gods word to those who direct the affairs of the State: 1) The false foundation: a. as to its nature (Isa 28:15), b. as to its consequences (Isa 28:17 b20). 2) The true foundation: a. wherein it consists (Isa 28:16), b. the conditions of its efficacy (giving heed to the word, believing), c. its effects.
4. On Isa 28:16-17. The foundation and corner-stone of the Christian Church: 1) Who He is (Mat 21:42; Act 4:11; Rom 9:33; 1Pe 2:6 sq.). 2) How we partake of His blessing (He who believes flees not). 3) What salvation He brings us (Isa 28:17). Isa 28:16 is often used as a text for discourses at the laying of the foundation-stone of churches.
5. On Isa 28:19. Affliction teaches us to give heed to the word. Affliction is the best instructress of the foolish heart of man; for it teaches us to know: 1) the vanity of earthly things, 2) the power to comfort and to save which lies solely in the benefits offered to us in the word of God.
6. On Isa 28:22. Warning to scoffers. God will accomplish in the whole world the triumph of His cause. Woe then to the scoffers. Their bands will only become the harder. They hurt themselves by their scoffing.
7. On Isa 28:23 sqq. Consolatory discourse. God does not always chastise. Chastisement is with Him only a means to an end, as with the husbandman ploughing and threshing. When the chastisement has reached its aim, it ceases. Let us therefore give heed unto the word, and the trial will not be continued.
8. [The Church is Gods tilled land. 1Co 3:9. Paul tells the Corinthians: Ye are Gods , Gods tilled land. Christ has called His Father the , the husbandman, Joh 15:1. God does not leave us without culture. He treats us as the farmer does his field. He gives us, too, what corresponds to the rain and sunshine, in the influences of His Spirit. He employs means for making us fruitful. Comp. Heb 6:7-8 as to the doom of those who fail to bring forth fruitset forth by a metaphor taken from agriculture.D. M.]
Footnotes:
[21]Or, the wheat in the principal place, and barley in the appointed place.
[22]Wheat in rows and barley in the appointed place.
[23]Or, spelt.
[24]Heb. border.
[25]Or, and he bindeth it in such sort as his God doth teach him.
[26]and he beats it properly; his God teaches him this.
[27]Is bread com crushed?
[28]helping.
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
The chapter ends very graciously, in showing the Church, under the similitude of the husbandman, how the Lord takes care of his household. And as Jesus hath sweetly set forth the same blessed truths, under the same imagery; we cannot be at a loss to apprehend the whole of the instruction. Ye are God’s husbandry, said the apostle; and Jesus himself saith, I am the vine, ye are the branches. Oh! for grace to be thus favoured, and to know that we are brought into the vineyard, the Church of the Lord of hosts. Isa 5:7 ; 1Co 3:9 ; Joh 15:1 , etc.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Isa 28:23 Give ye ear, and hear my voice; hearken, and hear my speech.
Ver. 23. Give ear, and hear my voice; hearken, &c. ] Being to assure the faithful of God’s fatherly care of their safety and indemnity amidst all those distractions and disturbances of the times; he calleth for their utmost attention, as knowing how slow of heart and dull of hearing the best are; how backward to believe, Luk 24:25 and apt to “forget the consolation,” . Heb 12:5 See Trapp on “ Mat 13:3 “
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Isaiah
THE HUSBANDMAN AND HIS OPERATIONS
Isa 28:23 – Isa 28:29
The prophet has been foretelling a destruction which he calls God’s strange act. The Jews were incredulous, ‘scornful men.’ They did not believe him; and the main reason for their incredulity was that a divine destruction of the nation was so opposite to the divine conservation of it as to amount to an impossibility. God had raised up and watched over the people. He had planted it in the mountain of His inheritance, and now was it going to be thrown down by the same hand which had built it up? Impossible.
The prophet’s answer to that question is this parable of the husbandman, who has to perform a great variety of operations. He ploughs, but that is not all. He lays aside the plough when it has done its work, and takes up the seed-basket, and, in different ways, sows different seeds, scattering some broadcast, and dropping others carefully, grain by grain, into their place-’dibbling’ it in, as we should say. But seedtime too, passes, and then he cuts down what he had so carefully sown, and pulls up what he had so sedulously planted, and, in different ways, breaks and bruises the grain. Is he inconsistent because he ploughs in winter and reaps in harvest? Does his carrying the seed-basket at one time make it impossible that he shall come with flail and threshing-oxen at another? Are not all the various operations co-operant to one end? Does not the end need them all? Is not one purpose going steadily forward through ploughing, sowing, reaping, threshing? Is not that like the work of the great Husbandman, who changes His methods and preserves His plan through them all, who has His ‘time to sow’ and His ‘time to reap,’ and who orders the affairs of men and kingdoms, for the one purpose that He may gather His wheat into His garner, and purge from it its chaff?
This parable sets forth a philosophy of the divine operations very beautiful and true, and none the less impressive for the simple garb in which it is clothed.
I. All things come from one steady, divine purpose.
What a picture the parable gives of sedulous and patient labour for a far-off result!
It insists on the thought of one steady divine purpose ever directing the movements of the divine hand.
That is the negation of the godless theory that the affairs of men are merely the work of men, or are merely the result of impersonal causes. The world is not a jungle where any or every plant springs of itself, but it is cultivated ground which has an Owner who looks after it.
It is the affirmation that God’s action is regulated by a purpose which is intelligent, unchanging, all-embracing to us because revealed.
II. That steady purpose is man’s highest good.
Neither His own ‘glory’ nor man’s ‘happiness,’ which are taken by different schools of thought to be the divine aim in creation and providence, is an object worthy of Him or adequate to explain the facts of every man’s experience, unless both are regarded as needing man’s perfecting, for their attainment. God’s glory is to make men godlike. Man’s happiness cannot be secured without His holiness.
God has larger and nobler designs for us than merely to make us happy.
‘This is the will of God concerning you, even your sanctification.’
Nothing short of that end would be worthy of God, or would explain His methods.
III. That purpose needs great variety of processes.
Different stages of growth need different treatment.
The parable names three operations:-
Ploughing, which is preparation;
Sowing, or casting in germinating principles;
Threshing, which is effected by tribulation, a word which means driving a ‘tribulum’ or threshing-sedge over ears of grain.
So sorrow is indispensable for our perfecting.
By it earthly affections are winnowed away, and our dependence on God increased. A certain refinement of spirit results, like the pallor on the face of a chronic invalid, which has a delicate beauty unattainted by ruddy health. A capacity for sympathy, too, is often the result of one’s own trials. Rightly borne, they tend to bend or break the will, and they teach how great it is to suffer and be strong.
But sorrow is not enough; joy is indispensable too. The crop is threshed in tribulation, but is grown mostly in sunshine. Calm, uneventful hours, continuous possession of blessings, have a ministry not less than afflictions have. The corn in the furrow, waving in the western wind, and with golden sunlight among its golden stems, is preparing for the loaf no less than when bound in bundles and lying on the threshing-floor, or cut and bruised by sharp teeth of dray or heavy hoofs of oxen, or blows of swinging flails.
So do not suppose that sorrow is the only instrument for perfecting character, and see that you do not miss the sanctifying and ripening effect of your joyous hours.
Again, different types of character require different modes of treatment. In the parable, ‘the fitches’ are sown in one fashion, and ‘the cummin’ in another the ‘wheat’ and ‘barley’ in still another; and similar variety marks the methods of separating the grain from the husk, one kind of crop being threshed another having a wheel turned upon it. Thus each of us gets the kind of joys and pains that will have most effect on us. God knows where is the tenderest spot, and makes no mistakes in His dealing. He sends us ‘afflictions sorted, sorrows of all sizes.’
Let us see that we trust to His loving and wise adaptation of our trials to our temperaments and needs. Let us see that we never let clouds obscure the clearness of our perception, or, failing perception, the serenity of our trust, that all things work together, and all work for our highest good-our being made like our Lord. We should less often complain of the mysteries of Providence if we had learned the meaning of Isaiah’s parable.
IV. All the processes end in garnering the grain.
There is a barn or storehouse for the ripened and threshed crops. The farmer’s toil and careful processes would be absurd and unintelligible if, after them all, the crop, so sedulously ripened and cultivated and cleansed, was left to rot where it fell. And no less certainly does the discipline of this life cry aloud for heaven and a conscious personal future life, if it is not to be all set down as grim irony or utterly absurd. There must be a heaven if we are not to be put to intellectual bewilderment.
What was needed for growth here drops away there, as blossoms fall when their work is done. Sunshine and rain are no more necessary when the fields are cleared and the barn-yard is filled. Much in our nature, in our earthly condition, in God’s varying processes, will drop away. When school-time is done the rod is burned. But nothing will perish that can contribute to our perfecting.
So let us ask Him to purge us with His fan in His hand now, lest we should be found at last fruitless cumberers of the ground or chaff which is rootless, and fit only to be swept out of the threshing-floor.
Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Isa 28:23-29
23Give ear and hear my voice,
Listen and hear my words.
24Does the farmer plow continually to plant seed?
Does he continually turn and harrow the ground?
25Does he not level its surface
And sow dill and scatter cummin
And plant wheat in rows,
Barley in its place and rye within its area?
26For his God instructs and teaches him properly.
27For dill is not threshed with a threshing sledge,
Nor is the cartwheel driven over cummin;
But dill is beaten out with a rod, and cummin with a club.
28Grain for bread is crushed,
Indeed, he does not continue to thresh it forever.
Because the wheel of his cart and his horses eventually damage it,
He does not thresh it longer.
29This also comes from the LORD of hosts,
Who has made His counsel wonderful and His wisdom great.
Isa 28:23-29 This is a parable using agricultural metaphors on how to sow and reap certain crops. This speaks of the fact that God knows what He is doing. He is working with His people in appropriate purposeful ways. He has an eternal redemptive plan that is working itself out in human history!
Isa 28:23 This verse has a series of IMPERATIVES from God (cf. Isa 28:29) through His prophet to His people.
1. give ear, BDB 24, KB 27, Hiphil IMPERATIVE
2. hear my voice, BDB 1033, KB 1570, Qal IMPERATIVE, cf. Isa 28:12; Isa 28:14; Isa 28:22
3. listen, BDB 904, KB 1151, Hiphil IMPERATIVE
4. hear my words, same as #2
But they would not; they could not (cf. Isa 6:9-10)!
Isa 28:28 he does not continue to thresh it forever This is the INFINITIVE ABSOLUTE and IMPERFECT VERB of the same root (BDB 190, KB 218) used for intensity. YHWH administers just the right amount of judgment, not too much, not too little!
Isa 28:29 Hope, help, and happiness come in hearing and honoring God’s Word!
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
Isa 28:23-29
Isa 28:23-29
“Give ye ear, and hear my voice; hearken, and hear my speech. Doth he that ploweth to sow plow continually? doth he continually open and harrow his ground? When he hath leveled the face thereof, doth he not cast abroad the fitches, and scatter the cummin, and put in the wheat in rows, and the barley in the appointed place, and the spelt in the border thereof?. For his God doth instruct him aright, and doth teach him. For the fitches are not threshed with a sharp threshing instrument, neither is a cart wheel turned about upon the cummin; but the fitches are beaten out with a staff, and the cummin with a rod. Bread grain is ground; for he will not be always threshing it; for though the wheel of his cart and his horses scatter it, he doth not grind it. This also cometh forth from Jehovah of hosts, who is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in wisdom.”
This is a beautiful little parable drawn from the agricultural industry, the point being that such things as plowing and threshing have their specific purposes; therefore God’s punishments of people, whether his own, or his enemies is purposeful, always looking forward to the projected results.
Fitches were a common herb, cultivated as a forage plant, or `black cummin,’ whose aromatic seeds were a favorite condiment of the Greeks and Romans.” “Spelt was what we would call rye, or an inferior kind of wheat.” Even the farmer who belonged to a class of people probably despised by the drunken leaders of the people, knew that all of God’s law must be respected and obeyed if one is to reap a harvest from the earth; yet those foolish leaders fancied that they could wantonly forsake all honor and morality, live in shame and debauchery, and that somehow, in spite of all that, God would enable them to go on unhindered in their licentious ways. What a terrible awakening awaited them!
Isa 28:23-29 FACTS: Not only were the rulers of Jerusalem building on a false foundation, they were not even using good common sense and logic in their thinking. They did not have their facts straight. They must not only build on a stable foundation, they must think sensibly. It is tragic to watch sin throttle a mans ability to think logically and properly. Isaiah begins by calling for close attention to his words. Then he attempts to penetrate the calloused and crooked thinking of the rulers by illustrations from everyday experience. This is the way things work, says Isaiah; men do not continually plow a field. Once the field is plowed and prepared a man sows seed and later reaps a crop. God is going to plow His field to prepare it. But He will not continually plow it. The plowing is preparatory. Then He will sow and reap. But the plowing must be done. Isa 28:26 indicates preparing the soil; sowing and reaping is a systematic way things are done by men because such a systematic order of things comes from God. It certainly is a fact of experience that a man does not first go out and sow seed on fallow ground and then break up the sod and harrow it.
The same common sense and discretion is used in threshing. A man threshes the crop only as much as it needs to be threshed to extract the grain. He does not go on threshing it after the grain is separated and grind the grain into dust. God certainly will use the same reasonableness and discretion in dealing with His people. He will plow and thresh-this is needful-but He will not do so forever. He will reap also.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Isa 1:2, Deu 32:1, Jer 22:29, Rev 2:7, Rev 2:11, Rev 2:14, Rev 2:29
Reciprocal: 2Ch 24:19 – but they would Isa 32:9 – give ear Isa 46:12 – Hearken Mar 4:3 – there
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Isa 28:23-25. Give ye ear Observe what I say, and do you judge if it be not reasonable. We have here the last member of this section, in which this severe judgment of God, denounced in the preceding verses, is defended by a parable taken from agriculture, wherein the prophet represents allegorically the intentions and methods of the divine judgments. As the husbandman uses various methods in preparing his land, and adapting it to the several kinds of seed to be sown, with a due observation of times and seasons; and when he hath gathered in his harvest, employs methods as various in separating the corn from the straw and the chaff by different instruments, according to the nature of the different sorts of grain; so God, with unerring wisdom and with strict justice, instructs, admonishes, and corrects his people; chastises and punishes them in various ways, as the exigence of the case requires; now more moderately, now more severely; always tempering judgment with mercy; in order to reclaim the wicked, to improve the good; and finally, to separate the one from the other. Bishop Lowth.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Isa 28:23-29. The Husbandman Adapts his Methods to the Circumstances of Each Case.This parable may perhaps not have been spoken to the same audience as Isa 28:7-22, but there is no valid reason for denying it to Isaiah. When the ploughman has finished, does he begin to plough over again? Of course not. He does not go on ploughing indefinitely; he levels the surface of the ground, and then sows, putting each kind of seed in the soil adapted for it. For so God has taught him. In threshing, he uses the measures suited to each particular kind of grain. The tenderer seeds are beaten with a rod, for they would be crushed or spoiled by large or sharp implements. Bread corn is not crushed; it is threshed, it is true, with a cart wheel, but, once it has been threshed, the husbandman does not keep on driving the cart over it. Such wisdom is inspired by Yahweh, and thus, the prophet suggests, Yahweh will deal with His people; He will temper the severity of His methods to suit each case, and even where harsher methods have to be used, He does not persist in them to the point of extermination.
Isa 28:25. fitches: read mg.
Isa 28:28. Read mg.
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
A call for repentance 28:23-29
How would the leaders of Judah respond? Would they continue in their chosen course of action and so suffer the fate of the Northern Kingdom, or would they repent and experience a milder judgment? Isaiah ended this "woe" by illustrating the alternatives and urging repentance (cf. chs. 5-6).
"Isaiah here proves himself a master of the mashal [proverb]. In the usual tone of a mashal song, he first of all claims the attention of his audience as a teacher of wisdom." [Note: Delitzsch, 2:14.]
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
The prophet appealed to his audience to listen to him (cf. Mar 4:3; Mar 4:9), even though some of them were scoffers. What he had to say was very important for them. Failure to listen to God’s Word had been the fatal flaw of the leaders, but they could still hearken and respond. The prophet used two illustrations.