[1] Let me sing for my well beloved a song of my beloved touching his
vineyard. My well beloved had a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: [2] and
he dug it, and gathered out the stones of it, and planted it with the
choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also hewed out a
winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it
brought forth wild grapes. [3] Now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of
Judah, please judge between me and my vineyard. [4] What could have been
done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? why, when I looked
that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes? [5] Now I
will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge of
it, and it shall be eaten up; I will break down the wall of it, and it
shall be trodden down: [6] and I will lay it waste; it shall not be pruned
nor hoed; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command
the clouds that they rain no rain on it. [7] For the vineyard of Yahweh of
Hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and
he looked for justice, but, behold, oppression; for righteousness, but,
behold, a cry. [8] Woe to those who join house to house, who lay field to
field, until there be no room, and you be made to dwell alone in the midst
of the land! [9] In my ears [says] Yahweh of Hosts, Of a truth many houses
shall be desolate, even great and beautiful, without inhabitant. [10] For
ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath, and a homer of seed shall yield
[but] an ephah. [11] Woe to those who rise up early in the morning, that
they may follow strong drink; who stay late into the night, until wine
inflame them! [12] The harp and the lute, the tambourine and the pipe, and
wine, are [in] their feasts; but they don`t regard the work of Yahweh,
neither have they considered the operation of his hands. [13] Therefore my
people are gone into captivity for lack of knowledge; and their honorable
men are famished, and their multitude are parched with thirst. [14]
Therefore Sheol has enlarged its desire, and opened its mouth without
measure; and their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp, and he who
rejoices among them, descend [into it]. [15] The mean man is bowed down,
and the great man is humbled, and the eyes of the lofty are humbled: [16]
but Yahweh of Hosts is exalted in justice, and God the Holy One is
sanctified in righteousness. [17] Then shall the lambs feed as in their
pasture, and the waste places of the fat ones shall wanderers eat. [18] Woe
to those who draw iniquity with cords of falsehood, and sin as it were with
a cart rope; [19] who say, Let him make speed, let him hasten his work,
that we may see it; and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw near
and come, that we may know it! [20] Woe to those who call evil good, and
good evil; who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; who put
bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! [21] Woe to those who are wise in
their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight! [22] Woe to those who are
mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to mingle strong drink; [23] who
justify the wicked for a bribe, and take away the righteousness of the
righteous from him! [24] Therefore as the tongue of fire devours the
stubble, and as the dry grass sinks down in the flame, so their root shall
be as rottenness, and their blossom shall go up as dust; because they have
rejected the law of Yahweh of Hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One
of Israel. [25] Therefore is the anger of Yahweh kindled against his
people, and he has stretched forth his hand against them, and has struck
them; and the mountains tremble, and their dead bodies are as refuse in the
midst of the streets. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his
hand is stretched out still. [26] He will lift up an ensign to the nations
from far, and will hiss for them from the end of the earth; and, behold,
they shall come with speed swiftly. [27] None shall be weary nor stumble
among them; none shall slumber nor sleep; neither shall the belt of their
loins be loosed, nor the latchet of their shoes be broken: [28] whose
arrows are sharp, and all their bows bent; their horses` hoofs shall be
accounted as flint, and their wheels as a whirlwind: [29] their roaring
shall be like a lioness, they shall roar like young lions; yes, they shall
roar, and lay hold of the prey, and carry it away safe, and there shall be
none to deliver. [30] They shall roar against them in that day like the
roaring of the sea: and if one look to the land, behold, darkness [and]
distress; and the light is darkened in the clouds of it.
