Isaiah 10:1
Woe to those who enact unjust statutes and issue oppressive decrees,
BSB
ASV
Woe unto them that decree unrighteous decrees, and to the writers that write perverseness;
KJV
Woe unto them that decree unrighteous decrees, and that write grievousness which they have prescribed;
"Woe to those who establish unjust laws and write injustice." Most people still believe that these things are said against the ten tribes who lived in Samaria, because they too joined in the previous crimes. But to us it seems that the prophetic word is crying out against the judges of the tribe of Judah and Jerusalem, namely the Scribes and the Pharisees, because they have written unjust laws against God's law and have undermined the truth of justice with their traditions.
Wo unto them that decree unrighteous decrees - To those who frame statutes that are oppressive and iniquitous. The prophet here refers, doubtless, to the rulers and judges of the land of Judea. A similar description he had before given; Isa 1:10, Isa 1:23, ... And that write ... - Hebrew, ‘And to the writers who write violence.’ The word translated “grievousness,” עמל ‛âmâl, denotes properly “wearisome labor, trouble, oppression, injustice.” Here, it evidently refers to the judges who declared oppressive and unjust sentences, and caused them to be recorded.
Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread: the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.
The walk8
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
Matthew 23:23Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You pay tithes of mint, dill, and cumin. But you have disregarded the weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faithfulness. You should have practiced…
leads to
Woe to you Pharisees! You pay tithes of mint, rue, and every herb, but you disregard justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter without neglecting the former.
He has shown you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?
For I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.
But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
So then, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do likewise will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever practices and teaches them will be…
Through
Luke 11:52Woe to you experts in the law! For you have taken away the key to knowledge. You yourselves have not entered, and you have hindered those who were entering.”
leads to
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in men’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let in those who wish to enter.
For the lips of a priest should preserve knowledge, and people should seek instruction from his mouth, because he is the messenger of the LORD of Hosts.
But to keep this message from spreading any further among the people, we must warn them not to speak to anyone in this name.”
