Isaiah 27

Key Terms

Translator Notes

1. Three descriptions of the enemy: livyatan nachash bariach ('Leviathan the fleeing/darting serpent'), livyatan nachash aqallaton ('Leviathan the twisting/coiling serpent'), and hattannin asher bayyam ('the dragon/sea-monster that is in the sea'). The sword (cherev) is itself described with three adjectives: qashah ('harsh, cruel'), gedolah ('great'), and chazaqah ('strong, mighty'). The triple sword matches the triple enemy.
2. The slaying of Leviathan is the final act of cosmic judgment. While chapters 24-26 dealt with the earth, its cities, and its peoples, chapter 27 begins by addressing the ultimate spiritual enemy — the chaos-power behind the chaos. The bayyom hahu ('on that day') formula ties this to the eschatological sequence.

Translator Notes

1. The vineyard song begins with the same formula: bayyom hahu ('on that day'). The kerem chemed ('vineyard of delight/desire') recalls the kerem of Isaiah 5:1, but where that vineyard disappointed, this one delights. The command annu-lah ('sing of it/respond to it') invites a song — this is the new vineyard song, replacing the bitter harvest of chapter 5.

Translator Notes

1. God speaks in first person: ani YHWH notsrah ('I, the LORD, am its keeper'). The frequency of care is extraordinary: lirga'im ('every moment, constantly') He waters it. Night and day (laylah veyomam) He guards it (etsorenah). In chapter 5, God removed the vineyard's hedge and let it be trampled. Here, the opposite: ceaseless, watchful, tender care. The reversal is complete.
2. The verb natsar ('to keep, to guard, to watch over') implies both protection and cultivation. God is simultaneously gardener and guardian.

Translator Notes

1. The astonishing declaration: chemah ein li ('wrath is not in Me'). God's posture toward His vineyard has changed from the fury of chapter 5 to the absence of wrath. The thorns and briers (shamir shayit — the same pair from 5:6 and 7:23-25) are potential enemies, not the vineyard itself. If they attack, God will burn them — but the burning is protective, not punitive toward the vineyard. God fights for His vineyard, not against it.

Translator Notes

1. Even the thorns and briers have a second option: instead of being burned, they can grasp God's ma'uzi ('My refuge, My stronghold') and make peace (shalom) with Him. The repetition — shalom ya'aseh li, shalom ya'aseh li ('let him make peace with Me, let him make peace with Me') — is emphatic. God prefers reconciliation to destruction. The offer of peace to the very enemies of the vineyard is remarkable: even thorns can become part of God's peace.

Translator Notes

1. The vineyard's purpose is revealed: Jacob takes root (yashrish), Israel buds and blossoms (yatsits ufarach), and the fruit fills the face of the world (umale'u fenei-tevel tenuvah). The progression — root, bud, blossom, fruit — describes complete agricultural fulfillment. The scope is global: not just Israel's land but the face of the world (tevel) is covered with Israel's fruit. The vineyard that was destroyed in chapter 5 now produces abundance that blesses all nations.

Translator Notes

1. Two rhetorical questions demand the answer 'No.' God's discipline of Israel is not the same as His destruction of Israel's enemies. The verb hikkahu ('He struck him') is used twice with different subjects — God strikes Israel differently from how He strikes the nations. Israel's punishment is measured, corrective; the nations' destruction is final. The distinction between discipline and destruction is crucial to the chapter's theology.

Translator Notes

1. The debated word besa'ase'ah may mean 'by measure' (i.e., measured discipline) or may relate to the word for a dry measure (se'ah), implying 'measure by measure.' The verb terivenah ('You contended with her') describes God's legal dispute with Israel — not arbitrary punishment but judicial process. The 'east wind' (qadim) is the sirocco from the desert, the instrument of exile. God's 'fierce wind' (rucho haqqashah) drives Israel into dispersion, but even this is measured, not total.

Translator Notes

1. The condition of atonement (yekhuppar avon Ya'aqov) is specific: the altar stones must be smashed to chalk dust (avnei gir menupatsot), and the Asherah poles (asherim) and incense altars (chammanim) must be permanently removed. The 'altar stones' likely refer to pagan altars or syncretistic worship sites. The word menupatsot ('ground to pieces, shattered') indicates total destruction — no reconstruction possible.
2. The phrase vezeh kol-peri ('and this is the full fruit') uses agricultural language: the 'fruit' of Israel's discipline is the complete removal of idolatry. Discipline produces the fruit that the original vineyard failed to yield (ch. 5).

Translator Notes

1. The fortified city (ir betsura) is now badad ('alone, solitary') — the word used for mourning isolation (cf. Lam 1:1, 'How lonely sits the city'). The once-populated habitation (naveh) is meshullach ('abandoned, sent away') and ne'ezav ('forsaken') like a wilderness (midbar). Calves graze freely in its ruins — a sign of total desolation. The branches (se'ifeiha) that the calf strips bare may be remnants of gardens or orchards that once adorned the city.

Translator Notes

1. The dried branches (qetsiraha) of the abandoned city are gathered by women for fuel — the final indignity of a destroyed settlement. The theological verdict is severe: lo am-binot hu ('this is not a people of understanding'). Because they lack discernment, their Maker (osehu) will not show compassion (racham) and their Former (yotsero) will not show favor (channan). The titles 'Maker' and 'Former' — creation language — heighten the tragedy: the Creator withdraws mercy from His own creatures.

Translator Notes

1. The verb yachbot ('He will thresh, beat out') describes the careful separation of grain from chaff — God will thresh the territory from the Euphrates (shibbolet hannahar, 'the flowing channel of the River') to the Brook of Egypt (nachal Mitsrayim, the Wadi el-Arish). These are the ideal borders of the promised land (Gen 15:18). Within this vast territory, Israelites will be gathered le'echad echad ('one by one') — individually, carefully, none overlooked.
2. The image of threshing conveys both judgment (separating chaff) and harvest (gathering grain). The Israelites are the grain; they will be individually gathered from among the nations.

Key Terms

Translator Notes

1. The Apocalypse concludes with the great trumpet (shofar gadol). Those 'perishing' (ha'ovedim) in Assyria and those 'driven out' (hanniddachim) to Egypt — representing the northern and southern diaspora respectively — hear the blast and come. The destination is singular and specific: the holy mountain (har haqqodesh) in Jerusalem. The final verb is vehishtachavu ('and they shall worship') — the entire four-chapter sequence resolves in worship on Zion.
2. This verse becomes foundational for Jewish and Christian eschatology. Jesus references the great trumpet in Matthew 24:31 ('He will send His angels with a great trumpet call, and they will gather His elect from the four winds'). Paul echoes it in 1 Corinthians 15:52 ('at the last trumpet') and 1 Thessalonians 4:16 ('with the trumpet call of God'). The Apocalypse that began with the earth emptied (24:1) ends with the earth's scattered people gathered home.