Even though it’s the same story, the narrator changes during the first seven verses of Isaiah chapter 5. The first two verses is the start a love song! Is Isaiah the one to sing it?
“Let me sing, please, to my beloved, A song about my loved one and his vineyard, My beloved had a vineyard on a fruitful hillside. (1)
“He dug it up and rid it of stones, He planted it with a choice red vine, Built a tower in the middle of it, And hewed out a winepress in it. Then he kept hoping for it to produce grapes, But it produced only wild grapes.” (2)
Bummer. All that work for nothing! (The brother covering this portion at the mid-week meeting said that, if it were he, he would pave it over at this point and install a basketball court.)
But, then the narrator changes. It becomes God, who laments the outcome of the vineyard HE planted! And who or what is the vineyard? The nation of Israel itself! “For the vineyard of Jehovah of armies is the house of Israel.” (7)
“And now, you inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, Please judge between me and my vineyard. What more could I have done for my vineyard That I have not already done? Why, when I hoped for grapes, Did it produce only wild grapes?”(3-4)
“Now, please, let me tell you What I will do to my vineyard: I will remove its hedge, And it will be burned down. I will break down its stone wall, And it will be trampled on.” (5) This is where the speaker said he would construct a basketball court. I mean, if it’s going to be trampled on, one might as well have fun doing it.
So, what is it with the change of narrators, from Isaiah crooning a love song to Jehovah saying that his nation was no good? It looks as though the prophet is laying a trap!
Q: What if Nathan had approached David with the words: “I want to tell you a story about a big jerk: you!” Would he have been granted a listening ear? Maybe not. So Nathan led off with a story about a poor man who has just one little lamb that he loved and a king who needed one to roast and feed his visitor. “Oh, wow, a story!” David exclaims at its start, leaning forward. There’s nothing on TV, anyway. There never was back then. It’s not like today when I search for a murder mystery to watch after dinner and my wife restricts me to ones in which no one gets killed—or at least ones in which, if they do get killed, it is without too much unpleasantness.
Back then, you could sucker people in real easy with a story—but not one if you stated bluntly upfront that your audience was the villain.
So it is with Isaiah and the first seven verses of chapter five. At the promise of a love song, the Israelites get their hankies out. Who isn’t up for a love song? When it turns out to be dashed hopes over a vineyard, the audience says, “Yeah, that sucks. We’ve all been there. The poor guy.”
But then the mask drops. YOU are my vineyard, God grumbles, and I’m going to put you out of your misery for all the pissy wine that you are yieldng!
It is a very clever storytelling technique, which we have already seen with Nathan rebuking David. Even among textual scholars, that view prevails. All but the most hopeless acknowledge that it is a unified account, and not two separate narratives stapled together.
****** The bookstore
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