I will sing to my well-beloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard My well-beloved had a vineyard upon a fruitful hill.
Isaiah 5 opens with a song about a vineyard planted on the best possible ground. The gentle start hides a courtroom: before the chapter ends, God will ask the hearers to judge between Himself and His vineyard.
Isaiah's song is not the first song sung to Israel.
In Isaiah 5 the prophet sings a song of Jehovah, his well beloved, about His vineyard. Moses had already (Deut. 32) spoken a song in the ears of Israel. In magnificent language it celebrates the sovereign choice and blessing of God, the sins and punishment of the people, and also His final mercy to His land and people... Our chapter takes in a narrower field of view.
God's aim is to make the people stop and look at themselves.
God calls His people to consider their state. He would reveal His judgments to them, but He begins by making them pay attention... It is the complaint of God as He reminds His people of what He has done for them.
Two words of affection appear in this one verse, and commentators differ over whom they point to.
Two terms of affection open Jehovah's song about His vineyard: "My wellbeloved" and "My beloved." There seems to be prophetic reference in them to the love within the Godhead... Jehovah sings the song (Isa. 5:1), and the vineyard, the house of Israel, belongs to Him (Isa. 5:7), and to His beloved also (Isa. 5:1). The title "wellbeloved" (y'deed) points to the Messiah. It stands inside Jehovah's name for Solomon (Jedidiah), the "beloved of his God" (2 Sam. 12:25; Neh. 13:26). Solomon is a picture of Him who was the true Heir of Jehovah's vineyard (Mark 12:6, 7).
The same title reappears when Jesus tells His own version of this story, which is why some see the deity of Christ shining through here.
In Isaiah 5 the wellbeloved is very clearly Jehovah; it is His vineyard. In the parable in Mark's gospel the one sent by the householder into the vineyard is his wellbeloved son. There is a remarkable testimony to the deity of Christ here. It has often been said that the Jehovah of the Old Testament is the Jesus of the New.
The song is not left as a riddle. Isaiah supplies the answer himself a few lines later.
The key to the interpretation of the song is found in verse 7, "For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah His pleasant plant."
The "very fertile hill" is the whole point of the picture. God chose the site and supplied every advantage.
There was no failure on God's part. He had established Israel in the most favourable position and separated them to Himself. He removed stumbling-blocks, crowned them with favours, and granted not only protection but every means of blessing. "And now, inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, between me and my vineyard. What could have been done more to my vineyard that I have not done in it?"... Yet all was in vain. The result was only bad fruit.
The vine was a pointed choice of plant, since it exists for one purpose only.
They go back to the deliverance out of Egypt, in which He had separated them to Himself for fruit. The vine is good for nothing else but fruit, and with its trailing branches is the very image of dependence.
The complaint was aimed at one nation, but the standard it uses is not limited to them.
This applies to our consciences. God has a right to look for fruit in proportion to the pains He took, and if there were none, judgment must follow. God never stops at what is spoiled to patch up the gaps. He looks at what He did at the beginning, and compares it with the present state. That is why the Lord says to the angel of the church in Ephesus, "You have abandoned the love you had at first."
The ruined vineyard is not God's last word about it.
Then at last Israel will be no longer a fruitless vine but rather "A vineyard of red wine." Then peace will follow. Israel will be like a tree full of blossom, and will fill the face of the world with fruit. Israel will become what God from the outset intended them to be. This will never come about as the result of their efforts.
- Sung — Isaiah delivers judgment as a love song. God wants attention first, then conscience.
- Beloved — commentators differ over the words of affection in verse 1: some hear the Lord Himself, others the Messiah, the true Heir of the vineyard.
- Vineyard — verse 7 unlocks the song. The vineyard is the house of Israel, and Judah His choice planting.
- Fertile — the hill, the clearing, the choicest vine: God's side of the case is flawless, so the failure can only be on ours.
- Fruit — a vine exists for fruit alone. God measures us by what He gave at the beginning, and He will yet make His vineyard bear fruit.
And he dug it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine; and he built a tower in the midst of it, and also hewed out a winepress therein; and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, but it brought forth wild grapes.
This song opens as a love song about a well-tended vineyard. By verse 7 the vineyard turns out to be God's own people. Verse 2 holds the shock. After every possible care, the harvest was worthless. So what fruit was God looking for, and what happens when it never comes?
The verse piles up work: digging, clearing, planting, building, hewing. One writer reads that list as God's full answer to any charge against Him.
There was no failure on God's part. He had established Israel in the most favourable position. He separated them to Himself, removed obstacles, and crowned them with favours. He gave them not only protection but every means of blessing.
Each item in the vineyard stands for something God gave Israel. One writer takes the fence as the law, and the "choicest vine" as the nation's ancestry.
The law, given through Moses, fenced them in. It was there to protect them from outside contamination, if they kept it. What is more, they were a "choicest vine," for they had descended from Abraham, one of God's choicest saints.
Another writer gives each part its own sense: the tower watches, and the winepress receives what the vineyard owes its owner.
The hedge speaks of her separation from the nations. The place for the winepress tells of the provision God had made, so that Israel could give Him some return for His great goodness. The tower shows watchfulness against evil getting in.
Verse 7 names the fruit God had been waiting for. It was not religious performance.
There was a result, but it was completely worthless and evil. Where there should have been justice, there was oppression; where there should have been righteousness, only a cry of distress. Again we must notice this: the charge against them is moral corruption, not a failure to keep religious ceremonies.
(Verse 7 in the ESV: "he looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold, an outcry!")
The failure was not one bad season. Israel was the test case, farmed under ideal conditions. The sour fruit exposed the vine itself.
But it was a natural vine. It was only the vine of earth, given every chance to show what fruit it could produce. Israel was the best nation on earth. So we, and all humanity, are under review.
Kelly traces the failure back to Adam:
They, like Adam, broke the covenant. It was the old story over again. Human responsibility ends in total ruin.
Jesus later called Himself the vine. One writer sets the two pictures side by side.
In Isaiah the reason for the desolation is made plain. Israel as the vine brought forth nothing but wild and worthless grapes. There was no fruit for God. Jesus Himself was the Branch made strong for Jehovah, and He now presents Himself as the real Source of all fruit for God on the earth.
God does not begin His case by listing sins. He begins by recalling what He planted — and that method is not limited to Israel.
God has a right to look for fruit, in keeping with the trouble He took. If there is none, judgment must follow. God never stops at what is spoilt in order to repair the damage. He looks at what He did at the beginning, and compares it with the present state. That is why the Lord says to the angel of the church in Ephesus, "You have abandoned the love you had at first." What God asks of us is this. We must look at what He did at the beginning. Then we compare ourselves with the fruits and testimonies given at the start, not with the spoilt state we are in now.
- Planted. God chose the best site, the best stock, and every protection. Israel stood in "the most favourable position," so the blame cannot fall on the Planter.
- Equipped. Fence, tower and winepress each meant something: separation from the nations, watch against evil, and a place to give God His return.
- Expected. The grapes He wanted were justice and righteousness. The charge is moral, not ceremonial: oppression grew where justice should have.
- Exposed. Perfect conditions still produced wild fruit. That exposed the vine itself. It is Adam's story again: human responsibility ending in ruin.
- Replaced. Christ, the Branch God made strong for Himself, steps in as the true Vine. He is now the only source of fruit for God on earth, and God still asks us to compare ourselves with the fruit He looked for at the start.