I heard the LORD of Hosts declare: "Surely many houses will become desolate, great mansions left unoccupied. Sermons
I. THE INSTITUTION OF LANDED PROPERTY IN ISRAEL. According to the Law, each of the twelve tribes was to have its landed possessions, and each particular household was to have its definite portion of the land belonging to the tribe; and this was to be an inalienable heritage. Among an agricultural people it is most necessary that each family should thus have a fixed foothold on the land, a home, a center of toil and acquisition; and that thus its members should be firmly bound to their native land and to their fellow-countrymen. In a conquered land, again, it was equitable that the fields should be divided among those who took part in the burdens of war, and who desired to cultivate the conquered land in peace. In many passages of the Law we find the impress of this institution of real property. In the year of jubilee every man was to be restored to his patrimony (Leviticus 25:13). The land was never to be sold, because in fact it belonged to Jehovah (ver. 23), and the people were but his stewards. In the interesting case of the daughters of Zelophehad (Numbers 27:1-11), who had died in the desert, we find it laid down that the children, or nearest relatives of one who had died without coming into his portion, were to possess it in his stead. Again, the men of Reuben and of Gad refused to go to war until every man of them had received his inheritance (Numbers 32:16, sqq.). And Moses agreed to their conditions. In the same book we read the direction, "Ye shall divide the land by lot for an inheritance among your families: and to the more ye shall give the more inheritance, and to the fewer ye shall give the less inheritance" (Numbers 33:54). The land, it will be seen, was considered as in tenure from Jehovah himself, the only landlord. And how attached an Israelite would become to his ancestral estate, is seen from the story of Naboth, who will not give up his even for a better one, and at the king's request (1 Kings 21:3, sqq.; 2 Kings 9:10, 25, sqq.). The virtues of patriotism struck deep root in this relation to the soil of Palestine. These facts help us to understand the moral and national evils springing from selfish greed, which threatened this institution of property, of which the prophet here complains. II. THE VICE OF COVETOUSNESS. The root of the vice is a thorough-going selfishness. The rich men use the means at their command unjustly to absorb the land into their own possession. The result must be the hopeless misery and degradation of the mass of the people. An instructive parallel to the state of things described by the prophet is to be found in the history of Sparta, at the time of the great lawgiver, Lycurgus. Plutarch tells us that the disorders which he found existing in the state arose in great measure from the gross inequality of property, and from the long avarice and rapacity of the rich, who had thus added house to house and field to field. The lawgiver, therefore, redistributed the whole territory of Sparta. In Roman letters we-read allusions to the habit of forming latifundia, or "broad farms," with its unsocial consequences. "How far," indignantly exclaims Seneca, "will ye extend the bounds of your possessions; not content to circumscribe the area of your estates by the sowing of provinces? The broad acres own one lord; the people crowd into a narrow field. The courses of bright streams flow through private estates; great rivers, bounds of great nations, from the source to the mouth, all are yours. And this is nothing unless you have girdled your broad farms with seas; unless across the Hadriatic, the Ionian, and the AEgean your bailiff reigns; unless islands, domiciles of great dukes, are reckoned amongst the commonest of things. Shall there be no lake over which the roofs of your villas hang not? no stream whose banks are not covered by your buildings?" (Ep. 88.). In his beautiful 'Deserted Village,' Goldsmith says - "Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, III. THE PUNISHMENT OF COVETOUSNESS. 1. Its folly is exposed. One would think, from their conduct, that these grasping men desired to dwell alone amidst a waste! But, as the old agricultural poet of Greece says, "The man who frames ills against another frames them against himself, and ill counsel turns out worst for him who devised it. The all-seeing eye of Zeus looks upon these things, and they escape him not" (Hesiod, 'Works and Days,' 265, 266). Judgment gets the better of injustice when it comes to the final issue, and the fool who suffers from his avarice knows it to his cost. Like a wronged woman, she passes through the city, bewailing the manners of the people, clothed in mist; for men see not her approach, and know not that she is the cause of their calamities, who have driven her forth by her unjust deeds. Those, continues the poet, who do right by the strangers and the natives of the land - their city flourishes, the people blossom therein; and peace, the nourisher of youths, prevails through the land. To them far-seeing Zeus appoints no bitter war; famine and curse are unknown. The earth produces abundance, the trees drop fruit and honey, the fleeces are heavy on the sheep; and mothers bear a noble offspring. But often a whole city suffers from an evil man, who is a sinner and devises haughty plans. Pestilence and famine come from the hands of the Supreme upon men; the houses are thinned and the people perish (ibid., 55. 217, etc.). These are close analogies to the great thoughts of our prophet. 2. The appropriate punishment. Those who have grasped at more than their right will find the coveted good dwindling in their hands, or, like a Dead Sea fruit, turning to ashes on their lips. One bucket only will be obtained from the "yoke" of vineyard; one bushel of corn from a quarter's seed. Thus may we find in nature a profound Scripture, a record and a testimony of Divine law not to be gainsaid. In this day of science perhaps we fix our thought too exclusively on the dependence of man on Nature. There is another side of truth equally important - the dependence of Nature on man. In moral energy, in compliance with the laws of right, we become more and more the masters of Nature, and she smiles back upon us with an aspect of recognition and blessing. In the sloth of our spirit and its corruption from truth we can no longer win the sympathy of the earth; and her groaning aspect reflects and represents a guilty decline of the soul These troths are general; only experience can teach where and how they must be modified in their application. - J.
Many houses shall be desolate, even great and fair, without inhabitant. (To children): — Empty houses! We all know what they look like. From afar we can see the bills in the windows — "This house to let," or "To be let," or, still more curtly, "To let"; and when we come nearer, the black windows, without blinds or curtains, gape and yawn at us. In the garden the long matted grass has overrun the lawn, and covered nearly all the beds. The door creaks on its hinges as we enter, as though it had been asleep and did not wish to be wakened. There are other houses that are not quite empty. They are comfortably furnished; but the family has gone to the seaside. A servant or an old lady has been kept in the house as caretaker, and as she usually lives in the back part of the house she is often not seen from one week's end to the other.I. This world is like a house comfortably and beautifully furnished, and in which we men and women have been placed "to dress it and to keep it." But THE WORLD WITHOUT GOD IS LIKE AN EMPTY HOUSE. God is the builder of this house; and He is the tenant too. Cowper, in his "Task," speaks of some men who "untenant the Creator of His universe." There are some who say that God made this house, and put us in it as caretakers, and then went to live in His own grand mansion in heaven; and there He sits, receiving our letters, which are our prayers, and sending His servants to do His commands. But we believe that God always lives in this house. He is in every room, in England, and in the Continent, and in Africa, and in America. It is God's name that is woven into the beautiful carpet of grass and flowers, that is carved into the rocks, and worked into the mossy couches, and painted in the beautiful landscape pictures, and reflected in the mirror-like lakes and ponds and rivers. If God were not in the world it would be like a desolate house, though great and fair. II. But there is another kind of house that is sometimes found to be empty. Life is like a house. Its length, however, is measured, not by feet and yards, but by days and months and years. Some lives are long and some are very short. Its breadth is measured by its sympathy and influence. Sometimes the tenant is not a good one. A selfish purpose takes possession, and then the house is like the house of a miser, long, and narrow, and low. And sometimes the house is like a house of feasting, from which there comes the sound of music and dancing, and the clink of glasses and of plates. That is when the desire for pleasure becomes a tenant. But there are some of these houses that are without an inhabitant. For A LIFE WITHOUT A PURPOSE IS LIKE AN EMPTY HOUSE. Some people do not know why they live. They eat and drink and sleep; but they have no great aims, no noble purposes. Their lives are like empty houses. Take Christ with you into your life. And then your life will grow up like a grand temple, upon which there will be inscribed: "Holiness unto the Lord"; in which there will be perpetual peace and happiness; and from which there will ever come the sound of holy chant and psalm. III. And then there is another house of which I thought. It was a small house, but large enough to accommodate one man. It was built in the face of a rock, and a great stone door was placed before it. It belonged to a man named Joseph; but another tenant was put in. He did not remain there long: it was too dark, and cold, and dreary. That house was the tomb of Jesus. And A TOMB WITHOUT A SAVIOUR IS LIKE AN EMPTY HOUSE. There are many houses of that kind built in these days; and they are all full. But a time is coming when a trumpet shall sound, and the doors of these dreary houses shall be opened, and the tenants shall all come out. And then their houses shall be empty like the tomb of Jesus. (W. V. Robinson, B. A.) People Ephah, IsaiahPlaces Jerusalem, Mount ZionTopics Armies, Assuredly, Beautiful, Declared, Desolate, Desolation, Ears, Excellent, Fair, Fine, Hearing, Hosts, Houses, Inhabitant, Large, Mansions, Numbers, Occupants, Ones, Says, Secretly, Surely, Sworn, Truly, Truth, Unoccupied, Waste, WeaponsOutline 1. Under the parable of a vineyard, God excuses his severe judgment8. His judgments upon covetousness 11. Upon lasciviousness 13. Upon impiety 20. And upon injustice 26. The executioners of God's judgments Dictionary of Bible Themes Isaiah 5:8-23Library A Prophet's Woes'Woe unto them that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may he placed alone in the midst of the earth! 9. In mine ears said the Lord of hosts, Of a truth many houses shall he desolate, even great and fair, without inhabitant. 10. Yea, ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath, and the seed of an homer shall yield an ephah. 11. Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame … Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture Holy Song from Happy Saints The Well-Beloved's vineyard. Of Confession and Self-Examination God's Last Arrow Dishonest Tenants Miracles no Remedy for Unbelief. The Knowledge that God Is, Combined with the Knowledge that He is to be Worshipped. The Barren Fig-Tree. A Sermon on a Text not Found in the Bible. Religion Pleasant to the Religious. "For to be Carnally Minded is Death; but to be Spiritually Minded is Life and Peace. " a survey of the third and closing discourse of the prophet Eleventh Day. The Holy one of Israel. The Harbinger Letter Xlviii to Magister Walter De Chaumont. In Reply to the Questions as to his Authority, Jesus Gives the Third Great Group of Parables. The Third Day in Pasion-Week - the Last Series of Parables: to the Pharisees and to the People - on the Way to Jerusalem: the Parable Of Orders. And thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, too little to be among the thousands of Judah An Analysis of Augustin's Writings against the Donatists. The Gateway into the Kingdom. Links Isaiah 5:9 NIVIsaiah 5:9 NLT Isaiah 5:9 ESV Isaiah 5:9 NASB Isaiah 5:9 KJV Isaiah 5:9 Bible Apps Isaiah 5:9 Parallel Isaiah 5:9 Biblia Paralela Isaiah 5:9 Chinese Bible Isaiah 5:9 French Bible Isaiah 5:9 German Bible Isaiah 5:9 Commentaries Bible Hub |