Isaiah 28:24

Does the plowman plow for planting every day? Does he continuously loosen and harrow the soil?

BSB

Parallel translations

4 additional translations

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KJV

Doth the plowman plow all day to sow? doth he open and break the clods of his ground?

ASV

Doth he that ploweth to sow plow continually? doth he continually open and harrow his ground?

YLT

The whole day plougheth the ploughman to sow? He openeth and harroweth his ground!

DBT

Doth the ploughman plough all day to sow? Is he [all day] opening and breaking the clods of his land?

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Commentary voices

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Voices6

On this verse

I praise wedlock, I praise marriage, but it is because they give me virgins. I gather the rose from the thorns, the gold from the earth, the pearl from the shell. "Does the plowman plow all day to sow?" Shall he not also enjoy the fruit of his labor? Wedlock is the more honored, the more what is born of it is loved. Why, mother, do you grudge your daughter her virginity? She has been reared on your milk, she has come from your womb, she has grown up in your bosom. Your watchful affection has kept her a virgin.

Jerome· LETTER 22.20, 420patristic

Related commentary

(Vers. 23 seqq.) Pay attention and listen to my voice: listen and hear my speech. Does the plowman plow all day to sow, break up the soil, and harrow it? When he has leveled its surface, does he not sow dill, scatter cumin, plant wheat in rows, barley, millet, and rye in their proper place? For his God instructs him and teaches him the right way.

Jerome· Commentary on Isaiah, 420patristic

Doth the ploughman plough all day to sow?.... Or, "every day"; he ploughs in order to sow; by ploughing he prepares the ground for sowing, that is his end in ploughing; and he may plough a whole day together when he is at it, but he does not plough every day in the year; he has other work to do besides ploughing, as is later mentioned; such as breaking of clods, sowing seed, and threshing the grain after it is ripe, and reaped, and gathered.

John Gill· Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763)reformed

Doth the plowman ... - The question here asked implies that he does not plow all the day. The interrogative form is often the most emphatic mode of affirmation. All day - The sense is, does he do nothing else but plow? Is this the only thing which is necessary to be done in order to obtain a harvest? The idea which the prophet intends to convey here is this. A farmer does not suppose that he can obtain a harvest by doing nothing else but plow. There is much else to be done.

Albert Barnes· Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)evangelical

Therefore those scoffing Israelites were guilty of great folly, in flattering themselves, because of God's long patience towards them; for God will certainly take a time to thresh, and break them with his judgments, as at present he plowed and harrowed them, and so prepared them for it by his threatenings.

John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament, 1765evangelical

8 For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness, so that there is no place clean. The prophet warns the kingdom of the ten tribes of the judgments that were coming upon them for their sins, which were soon after executed by the king of Assyria, who laid their country waste, and carried the people into captivity.

Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710puritan

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Cross-references

9 linked verses

The verses this one reaches9

2 Timothy 2:6
The hardworking farmer should be the first to partake of the crops.
Hosea 10:11–12
Ephraim is a well-trained heifer that loves to thresh; but I will place a yoke on her fair neck. I will harness Ephraim, Judah will plow, and Jacob will break the hard ground.
Jeremiah 4:3
For this is what the LORD says to the men of Judah and Jerusalem: “Break up your unplowed ground, and do not sow among the thorns.
Exodus 28:3
You are to instruct all the skilled craftsmen, whom I have filled with a spirit of wisdom, to make garments for Aaron’s consecration, so that he may serve Me as priest.
Mark 4:26
Jesus also said, “The kingdom of God is like a man who scatters seed on the ground.
1 Corinthians 3:9
For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building.
Genesis 9:20
Now Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded to plant a vineyard.
Genesis 47:23
Then Joseph said to the people, “Now that I have acquired you and your land for Pharaoh this day, here is seed for you to sow in the land.
Exodus 35:34
And the LORD has given both him and Oholiab son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan, the ability to teach others.

Cross-references

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The quotation web

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Around this verse

Word doors

Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread — the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.

About this book

The Prophet Isaiah — Gustave Doré, Doré's English Bible (1866), public domain

Isaiah — The gospel prophet — a Judean court-prophet across Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah (c. 740–700 BC) who sees past Assyria to Babylon and past Babylon to the Messiah. Sixty-six chapters divided into the Book of Judgment (1–39) and the Book of Comfort (40–66), climaxing in the Servant wounded for our transgressions.

Canon: Old Testament
Author: Isaiah ben Amoz — Heb. Yəša'yāhû, 'Yahweh saves' (1:1); Jewish tradition (b. Megillah 10b; b. Yevamot 49b) holds he was of royal blood and was martyred 'sawn asunder' under Manasseh — a tradition, not Scripture
Date: Ministry c. 740–700 BC — call 'in the year that king Uzziah died' (6:1) through Sennacherib's 701 BC siege of Jerusalem (36–37); spanning the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah (1:1)

Where the connections lead

Follow this verse’s cross-references two steps out. Each card is a verse this one points to, and beneath it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several different paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first — the text keeps returning to it. Every stop shows its own words, and every stop is a page.

Through
Jeremiah 4:3
For this is what the LORD says to the men of Judah and Jerusalem: “Break up your unplowed ground, and do not sow among the thorns.
leads to
- Hosea 10:12
  Sow for yourselves righteousness and reap the fruit of loving devotion; break up your unplowed ground. For it is time to seek the LORD until He comes and sends righteousness upon you like rain.
- Luke 8:7
  Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up with it and choked the seedlings.
- Luke 8:14
  The seeds that fell among the thorns are those who hear, but as they go on their way, they are choked by the worries, riches, and pleasures of this life, and their fruit does…
- Galatians 6:7–8
  Do not be deceived: God is not to be mocked. Whatever a man sows, he will reap in return.
- Mark 4:18–19
  Others are like the seeds sown among the thorns. They hear the word,

The whole web at once: see the Arc.

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