Isaiah 5:18

Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as it were with a cart rope: WOE UNTO THEM THAT DRAW INIQUITY - guilt, incurring punishment. The third woe-against obstinate perseverance in sin, as if they wished to provoke divine judgments. WITH CORDS OF VANITY, AND SIN AS IT WERE WITH A CART ROPE. Rabbis say, 'An evil inclination is at first like a fine hair-string, but the finishing like a cart rope.' The antithesis is between the slender cords of sophistry, like the spider's web (; ), with which one sin draws on another, until they at last bind themselves with great guilt as with a cart-rope. They strain every nerve in sin. VANITY - wickedness. SIN - substantive, not a verb; they draw on themse...

18._Wo unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity! _After having inserted a short consolation for the purpose of allaying the bitterness of punishments as regards the godly, he returns to threatenings, and proceeds to launch those thunderbolts of words which are fitted to awaken some degree of alarm. By _cords _he means nothing else than the allurements by which men suffer themselves to be deceived, and harden their heart in crimes; for either they ridicule the judgment of God, or they contrive vain excuses, and allege the plea of necessity. Any concealment, therefore, which they employ, he calls _cords_; for whenever men are prompted to sin by the lust of the flesh, they at first pause, and feel that something within restrains them, which would certainly keep them back, if they did not rush forward with opposing violence, and break through all opposition. When any man is tempted...

8-23 Here is a woe to those who set their hearts on the wealth of the world. Not that it is sinful for those who have a house and a field to purchase another; but the fault is, that they never know when they have enough. Covetousness is idolatry; and while many envy the prosperous, wretched man, the Lord denounces awful woes upon him. How applicable to many among us! God has many ways to empty the most populous cities. Those who set their hearts upon the world, will justly be disappointed. Here is woe to those who dote upon the pleasures and the delights of sense. The use of music is lawful; but when it draws away the heart from God, then it becomes a sin to us. God's judgments have seized them, but they will not disturb themselves in their pleasures. The judgments are declared. Let a man be ever so high, death will bring him low; ever so mean, death will bring him lower. The fruit of t...

Verse Isaiah 5:18. _WITH A CART-ROPE_ - "As a long cable"] The _Septuagint,_ _Aquila, Sym_., and _Theod_., for בחבלי _bechabley_, read כחבלי _kechahley_, ως σχοινιω, or σχοινιοις; and the _Septuagint_, instead of שוא _shau_, read some other word signifying _long_; ως σχοινιωμακρω; and so likewise the _Syriac_, אריכא arecha. _Houbigant_ conjectures that the word which the _Septuagint_ had in their copies was שרוע _sarua_, which is used Leviticus 21:18; Leviticus 22:23, for something in an animal body superfluous, lengthened beyond its natural measure. And he explains it of sin added to sin, and one sin drawing on another, till the whole comes to an en...

WO UNTO THEM ... - This is a new denunciation. It introduces another form of sin, and threatens its appropriate punishment. THAT DRAW INIQUITY WITH CORDS OF VANITY - The general idea in this verse and the next, is, doubtless, that of plunging deeper and deeper into sin. The word “sin” here, has been sometimes supposed to mean “the punishment” for sin. The word has that meaning sometimes, but it seems here to be taken in its usual sense. The word “cords” means strings of any kind, larger or smaller; and the expression “cords of vanity,” is supposed to mean “small, slender, feeble” strings, like the web of a spider. The word vanity שׁוא _shâv'_, May, perhaps, have the sense here of falsehood or deceit; and the cords of deceit may denote the schemes of evil, the plans for deceiving people, or of bringing them into a snare, as the fowler springs his deceitful snare upon th

EXPOSITION ISAIAH 5:1 ISRAEL REBUKED BY THE PARABLE OF A VINEYARD. This chapter stands in a certain sense alone, neither closely connected with what precedes nor with what follows, excepting that it breathes throughout a tone of denunciation. There is also a want of connection between its parts, the allegory of the first section being succeeded by a series of rebukes for sins, expressed in the plainest language, and the rebukes being followed by a threat of punishment, also expressed with plainness. The resemblance of the parable with which the chapter opens to one of those delivered by our Lord, and recorded in the three synoptic Gospels, has been frequently noticed....

WOE UNTO THEM THAT DRAW INIQUITY WITH CORDS OF VANITY,.... The prophet returns to the wicked again, and goes on with the account of their sin and punishment; and here describes such, not that are drawn into sin unawares, through the prevalence of their own hearts' lusts and corruptions, through the temptations of Satan, the snares of the world, or the persuasions of others; but such who draw it to themselves, seek after it, and willingly commit it; who rush and force themselves into it; who solicit it, and seek and take all occasions and opportunities of doing it; and take a great deal of pains about it; and make use of all arguments, reasonings, and pretences they can devise, to engage themselves and others in the practice of it; which are all cords of vanity, fallacious and deceitful. AND SIN AS IT WERE WITH A CART ROPE; using all diligence, wisdom, policy, and strength; labouring wit...

Isaiah 5:1. _Now will I sing to my well-beloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My Well-beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill:_ The Song of the Vineyard is by no means a joyful song. It is, indeed quite the reverse. It is pitched in the minor key and has a painful theme. This suffices to prove that all our hymns need not consist, as some affirm, of direct praise to God. Such a notion is not according to Scripture, for many of the Psalms are not of that character. There are songs that can be sung to the edification of one another, and that is, in part, the design of sacred song. We speak to ourselves, as well as to God, in Psalm and hymns and spiritual songs. «My well-beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill.» The members of the Church of God are placed in a position where they have very choice opportunities of glorifying God; they are like a vineyard in a ve

CHAPTER 5 The Song of the Vineyard and the Six Woes 1. _The song of the vineyard and Jehovah's lament (Isaiah 5:1)_ 2. _The judgment upon the vineyard (Isaiah 5:5)_ 3. _The wild grapes (Isaiah 5:8)_ 4. _First woe against covetousness (Isaiah 5:8)_ 5. _Second woe against fleshly lusts (Isaiah 5:11)_ 6. _Third woe against mockers (Isaiah 5:18)_ 7. Fourth woe against moral insensibility ...

A SERIES OF DENUNCIATIONS ON VARIOUS OFFENDERS. This section contains a collection of Woes, originally independent and even now not woven into a single symmetrical address. Whether they come from different periods of Isaiah's ministry is not so clear; no confidence can be felt in the attempts to date them. The text has not been very well preserved. ISAIAH 5:8. Woe to the grasping land-holders who drive the old possessors from their ancestral homesteads that they may have large estates all to themselves. Soon there will be a loneliness they will not desire, the solitude of desolation, and their lands will yield a harvest far less than the seed. With their land the dispossessed would lose their civil rights, to which the Hebrews hung tenaciously, as we see from the story of Naboth (1 Kings 21). Isa