Isaiah28chapter 28

Isaiah 28:1-4

fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine: The crown of pride sits on Ephraim's drunkards in the fat valleys above Samaria, a glorious beauty already compared to a fading flower before judgment even falls. Verse two names the coming blow, a mighty and strong one like a hailstorm and a flood, and verse four turns the flower image into a piece of hasty fruit, gone the moment it is seen and eaten. Henry reads the whole unit as aimed first at Samaria's own political drunkenness, the northern kingdom's leadership as literally besotted as its feasts.

Isaiah 28:5-6

a crown of glory, and for a diadem of beauty: Against Ephraim's crown of pride the Lord of hosts sets himself as a different crown, a crown of glory and a diadem of beauty for whatever remnant of the people is left standing. Verse six names what that crown gives, a spirit of judgment for the one who sits in judgment and strength for those who turn back the battle at the gate. Gill reads the residue as the faithful remnant surviving Samaria's fall, and Calvin ties the promised spirit of judgment to right government itself, wisdom given rather than seized.

Isaiah 28:7-8

the priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink: The woe against Ephraim's drunkards widens here to include Judah's own leaders, the priest and the prophet erred through strong drink and swallowed up of wine, the very men charged to see visions and render judgment stumbling instead. Barnes reads erred in vision as the most damning phrase in the verse, prophets whose office was sight left unable to see straight. Henry reads the tables full of vomit in verse eight as deliberately coarse language, judgment described in terms crude enough to match the sin it answers.

Isaiah 28:9-10

Whom shall he teach knowledge: Verse nine asks who is fit to be taught, and the older writers read it two ways side by side, as the drunkards' own scornful mimicry of the prophet, mocking him as fit only to teach weaned infants, and as the Lord's own answer, that only the humble receive his doctrine. Precept upon precept, line upon line in verse ten carries the same double reading, either the drunkards' mocking sing-song aimed at Isaiah's preaching or the plain, patient method by which God actually teaches his people. Gill and Jamieson, Fausset and Brown both name the mocking reading as primary in the immediate context, the babble put in the scoffers' own mouths.

Isaiah 28:11-13

stammering lips and another tongue: Stammering lips and another tongue answer the mockery of the previous verse in kind, the Lord now speaking to a people who refused plain speech through the strange tongue of a foreign conqueror, Assyria's own language heard in the land. Paul quotes this very verse at First Corinthians fourteen verse twenty one of tongues as a sign to unbelievers, verified, carrying Isaiah's judgment forward into the church's own gift. Verse thirteen repeats precept upon precept as judgment rather than kindness now, the same patient teaching turned into a snare for those who would not hear it the first time, that they might go and fall backward and be broken and snared and taken.

Isaiah 28:14-15

ye scornful men: The scornful men who rule Jerusalem are named directly, the same erring drunkenness now become settled policy, a covenant made with death and hell for security against the overflowing scourge they expect from Assyria. Verse fifteen states their reasoning plainly, we have made lies our refuge, a foreign alliance and false confidence dressed up as a treaty with death itself. Henry reads the covenant with death as diplomatic language turned theological indictment, Judah's own treaties named for what they actually were.

Isaiah 28:16-17

a tried stone, a precious corner stone: Verse sixteen answers Judah's covenant with death with the Lord's own foundation, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation laid in Zion, quoted at First Peter two verse six of Christ and echoed at Romans nine verse thirty three, where Paul fuses this stone to the stumbling stone of chapter eight verse fourteen, verified at both ends. He that believeth shall not make haste closes the verse with the promise's own condition, calm trust rather than the panicked alliance-making just condemned. Delitzsch and Barnes both read the stone as messianic in its fullest sense while noting the immediate historical sense, a foundation Judah could have trusted instead of Egypt, standing beneath it without displacing it.

Isaiah 28:18-20

your covenant with death shall be disannulled: The covenant with death is disannulled by the very scourge Judah thought she had bought off, trodden down by the flood she meant to escape, morning by morning until the report itself becomes a vexation to hear. Verse twenty gives the chapter its proverb for the whole failed strategy, a bed too short to stretch on and a covering too narrow to wrap in, comfort promised by a lie that cannot actually cover the sleeper. Henry reads the proverb as Judah's own predicament pictured domestically, every human refuge shown too small the moment it is tested.

Isaiah 28:21-22

his strange work: The Lord's strange work and strange act name Mount Perazim, David's victory over the Philistines, and the valley of Gibeon, Joshua's long day, both battles fought for Israel now become battles fought against her, the same hand turned the other way. Barnes reads strange as the operative word, judgment on Jerusalem herself is not the Lord's usual work of defending his people but its reversal, alien to his own pattern of mercy. Verse twenty two warns against mockery precisely because the consumption determined is not local but upon the whole earth, wider than Judah's own borders.

Isaiah 28:23-26

Give ye ear, and hear my voice: The chapter turns from woe to parable without warning, an appeal to listen, hearken, and hear, before the plowman is asked whether he plows forever or eventually breaks his ground to sow. Verse twenty five answers with the plowman's own variety, fitches, cummin, wheat, barley, and rie each cast in their own place rather than scattered without order. Verse twenty six credits the plowman's skill to instruction from his God, ordinary farming knowledge named as a gift rather than mere trial and error, which Henry reads as the parable's premise, if God teaches a farmer this much care, his dealings with Judah carry no less design.

Isaiah 28:27-29

the fitches are not threshed with a threshing instrument: The parable's second half turns from sowing to threshing, and the same discretion governs both, fitches beaten out with a staff and cummin with a rod because a threshing instrument would crush what a stick can gather clean. Bread corn is bruised, but even that bruising has its limit, not endlessly ground under cart wheel or horse, the process suited to the grain rather than applied without measure. Verse twenty nine states the parable's own moral, this also cometh forth from the Lord of hosts, wonderful in counsel and excellent in working, the same measured wisdom Barnes reads as the answer to the whole chapter's threat of an overflowing scourge, judgment fitted to its purpose rather than unlimited.