Isaiah

¹ I will sing for the one I love a song about his vineyard: My loved one had a vineyard on a fertile hillside.

² and planted it with the choicest vines. He built a watchtower in it and cut out a winepress as well. Then he looked for a crop of good grapes, but it yielded only bad fruit.

³ judge between me and my vineyard.

⁴ than I have done for it? When I looked for good grapes, why did it yield only bad?

⁵ what I am going to do to my vineyard: I will take away its hedge, and it will be destroyed; I will break down its wall, and it will be trampled.

⁶ neither pruned nor cultivated, and briers and thorns will grow there. I will command the clouds not to rain on it.”

⁷ is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are the garden of his delight. And he looked for justice, but saw bloodshed; for righteousness, but heard cries of distress.

⁸ Woe to you who add house to house and join field to field till no space is left and you live alone in the land.

⁹ “Surely the great houses will become desolate, the fine mansions left without occupants.

¹⁰ a homer of seed only an ephah of grain.”

¹¹ to run after their drinks, who stay up late at night till they are inflamed with wine.

¹² tambourines and flutes and wine, but they have no regard for the deeds of the Lord, no respect for the work of his hands.

¹³ for lack of understanding; their men of rank will die of hunger and their masses will be parched with thirst.

¹⁴ and opens its mouth without limit; into it will descend their nobles and masses with all their brawlers and revelers.

¹⁵ and mankind humbled, the eyes of the arrogant humbled.

¹⁶ and the holy God will show himself holy by his righteousness.

¹⁷ lambs will feed among the ruins of the rich.

¹⁸ and wickedness as with cart ropes,

¹⁹ let him hasten his work so we may see it. Let it approach, let the plan of the Holy One of Israel come, so we may know it.”

²⁰ and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.

²¹ and clever in their own sight.

²² and champions at mixing drinks,

²³ but deny justice to the innocent.

²⁴ and as dry grass sinks down in the flames, so their roots will decay and their flowers blow away like dust; for they have rejected the law of the Lord Almighty and spurned the word of the Holy One of Israel.

²⁵ his hand is raised and he strikes them down. The mountains shake, and the dead bodies are like refuse in the streets. Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away, his hand is still upraised.

²⁶ he whistles for those at the ends of the earth. Here they come, swiftly and speedily!

²⁷ not one slumbers or sleeps; not a belt is loosened at the waist, not a sandal thong is broken.

²⁸ all their bows are strung; their horses’ hoofs seem like flint, their chariot wheels like a whirlwind.

²⁹ they roar like young lions; they growl as they seize their prey and carry it off with no one to rescue.

³⁰ like the roaring of the sea. And if one looks at the land, he will see darkness and distress; even the light will be darkened by the clouds.