Verse-by-Verse Commentary
The Book of Isaiah
Chapter 5: The Song of the Vineyard
Isaiah sings a love song that turns to lament. God is the keeper of a vineyard, His people; He cleared the ground, planted the choicest vine, and did everything a vineyard could need, then came looking for good grapes, and found only wild ones. 'He looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.' Then follow a series of woes against a people who have gone morally blind, who 'call evil good, and good evil,' and who are 'wise in their own eyes.' It is a chapter about God's tender care for His people, their bitter disappointment of Him, and the moral confusion that invites judgment.
About This Commentary
This is a verse-by-verse study of Isaiah chapter 5. For each section you will find the KJV text, the Hebrew words that sharpen the meaning, plain explanation, and a Gospel Focus. The chapter sings the Song of the Vineyard, then pronounces woes on a people who call evil good and are wise in their own eyes. Every Scripture quotation is from the King James Version.
Setting the Stage
He Did Everything
God cleared, planted, and tended His vineyard, sparing no care to make it fruitful.
He Looked for Good Fruit
He looked for judgment and righteousness, but found oppression and a cry instead.
Evil Called Good
Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, turning light to darkness.
Wise in Their Own Eyes
Woe to those wise in their own eyes, who lean on their own judgment against God.
The Song of the Vineyard (Isaiah 5:1-7)
God tended His vineyard with every care and looked for good fruit, but it brought forth only wild grapes, and He looked for justice but found oppression.
He Looked for Judgment, but Behold Oppression
"Now will I sing to my wellbeloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes. And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard. What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes? And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down: And I will lay it waste: it shall not be pruned, nor digged; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it. For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry. Woe unto them that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth! In mine ears said the LORD of hosts, Of a truth many houses shall be desolate, even great and fair, without inhabitant. Yea, ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath, and the seed of an homer shall yield an ephah. Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them! And the harp, and the viol, the tabret, and pipe, and wine, are in their feasts: but they regard not the work of the LORD, neither consider the operation of his hands. Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge: and their honourable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst. Therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure: and their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp, and he that rejoiceth, shall descend into it. And the mean man shall be brought down, and the mighty man shall be humbled, and the eyes of the lofty shall be humbled: But the LORD of hosts shall be exalted in judgment, and God that is holy shall be sanctified in righteousness. Then shall the lambs feed after their manner, and the waste places of the fat ones shall strangers eat. Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as it were with a cart rope: That say, Let him make speed, and hasten his work, that we may see it: and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw nigh and come, that we may know it!"
Hebrew Study
a play on words. The Hebrew of verse 7 turns on two pairs of near-identical sounds: God looked for mishpat (justice) but found mispach (bloodshed), for tsedaqah (righteousness) but heard tse'aqah (a cry of distress). The words sound almost the same but mean the opposite, catching in sound the bitter difference between what God sought and what He found.
Explanation
Isaiah sings a song about his "wellbeloved" and His vineyard. God planted it on a fruitful hill, cleared away the stones, set in "the choicest vine," built a tower and a winepress, and did everything a vineyard could need. Then He came looking for grapes, "and it brought forth wild grapes." What more could have been done that He had not done? So the vineyard would be laid waste. Then Isaiah names the meaning plainly: "the vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel." God had lavished care on His people and looked for good fruit, "and he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry." He sought justice and found violence; He looked for righteousness and heard the cry of the wronged.
Gospel Focus
The Song of the Vineyard reveals both the tenderness and the disappointment of God. He did everything for His people and had every right to expect good fruit; their barrenness was not for lack of His care but in spite of it. Jesus took up this very image in His parable of the vineyard let out to wicked husbandmen (Matthew 21:33), applying it to a people who rejected the messengers God sent, and at last His Son. And He gave the vineyard its true center: "I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman" (John 15:1). The fruit God still looks for is real, righteousness and justice, love that shows in how we treat others, and He looks for it in us. It is a searching question: after all God has done for us, what fruit is He finding? Barrenness in a well-tended vineyard is a grief to God. Abide in Christ the true Vine, for only in Him can we bear the good fruit the Keeper of the vineyard seeks.
Woe to Those Who Call Evil Good (Isaiah 5:20)
Among the woes stands the woe on moral blindness: calling evil good and good evil, putting darkness for light.
Darkness for Light, and Light for Darkness
"Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!"
Hebrew Study
The heart of this woe is the deliberate inversion of morality: "Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter." This is not weakness that stumbles into sin but a settled campaign to relabel it — to rebrand what God condemns as acceptable and to condemn what He calls good. A society that swaps the very names of right and wrong has reached a deep stage of corruption, and it stands under God's woe.
Explanation
Isaiah pronounces a series of woes on the sins of the people: on those who join house to house and field to field until they stand alone in the land, on those who rise early to chase strong drink, on those who drag sin along like a cart rope. Among them is this woe on moral confusion: "Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness." This is a deep corruption, not merely doing wrong but renaming it, overturning the very categories of right and wrong so that evil is praised and good is condemned. When a people reach this point, they have lost the ability to tell the difference, and they are ripe for judgment.
Gospel Focus
This woe describes a society that has lost its moral bearings, and it speaks powerfully to every age, including our own. It is one thing to do evil while still knowing it is evil; it is far worse to call it good, to celebrate as light what God calls darkness and to condemn as darkness what God calls light. When wrong is renamed right and right is branded wrong, conscience is silenced and repentance becomes impossible, for no one repents of what he has been taught to call good. God's warning is sharp: "He that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both are abomination to the LORD" (Proverbs 17:15). God's people are called to keep His categories, to love what He loves and hate what He hates, and not to let the world rename good and evil. In a day that constantly pressures us to call darkness light, hold fast to what God has called good, and refuse to bless what He has called evil.
Wise in Their Own Eyes (Isaiah 5:21-30)
Woe rests on those who are wise in their own eyes, and judgment gathers like a storm against a people who despise the word of the LORD.
Wise in Their Own Eyes
"Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight! Woe unto them that are mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to mingle strong drink: Which justify the wicked for reward, and take away the righteousness of the righteous from him! Therefore as the fire devoureth the stubble, and the flame consumeth the chaff, so their root shall be as rottenness, and their blossom shall go up as dust: because they have cast away the law of the LORD of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel. Therefore is the anger of the LORD kindled against his people, and he hath stretched forth his hand against them, and hath smitten them: and the hills did tremble, and their carcases were torn in the midst of the streets. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still. And he will lift up an ensign to the nations from far, and will hiss unto them from the end of the earth: and, behold, they shall come with speed swiftly: None shall be weary nor stumble among them; none shall slumber nor sleep; neither shall the girdle of their loins be loosed, nor the latchet of their shoes be broken: Whose arrows are sharp, and all their bows bent, their horses' hoofs shall be counted like flint, and their wheels like a whirlwind: Their roaring shall be like a lion, they shall roar like young lions: yea, they shall roar, and lay hold of the prey, and shall carry it away safe, and none shall deliver it. And in that day they shall roar against them like the roaring of the sea: and if one look unto the land, behold darkness and sorrow, and the light is darkened in the heavens thereof."
Hebrew Study
The chain of woes closes on those "wise in their own eyes," and on the "mighty to drink wine" who "justify the wicked for reward, and take away the righteousness of the righteous." Self-conceit and corrupt courts go together — judges who, muddled with drink and bribes, acquit the guilty and condemn the innocent. So the LORD summons a distant nation that will come "with speed swiftly," roaring "like a lion," to execute His anger — a terrifying picture of Assyria as the rod of judgment.
Explanation
Behind the moral inversion lies a deeper root: "Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight." A people convinced of their own wisdom no longer listen to God; they trust their own judgment against His word. Isaiah adds a woe on those who are heroes at drinking and who acquit the guilty for a bribe, and then declares the reason judgment must come: "they have cast away the law of the LORD of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel." So God's anger is kindled, and He beckons a far nation to sweep down on them like a roaring lion, swift and unstoppable, until the land is dark with distress.
Gospel Focus
Being "wise in their own eyes" is the root sin beneath so many others, for the person who trusts his own wisdom above God's word will soon call evil good and cast away God's law. Self-conceit is a kind of blindness that thinks itself sight. Scripture sets the opposite path before us: "Be not wise in thine own eyes: fear the LORD, and depart from evil" (Proverbs 3:7). True wisdom begins in the fear of the Lord and in a humble submission to His word above our own opinions. The world prizes those who are confident in their own reason and dismissive of God's revelation, but God calls that folly, for "the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God." The safe place is not lofty self-assurance but lowly trust in the Lord, listening to His word rather than leaning on our own understanding. Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord, hold fast His word, and let His wisdom, not your own, be the ground you stand on.
Chapter 5 in Review
Isaiah 5 begins with the Song of the Vineyard: God tended His people with every care, planted the choicest vine, and looked for good fruit, but found only wild grapes. "He looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry." Then come the woes, on greed, on drunkenness, and above all on moral and spiritual corruption: on those who "call evil good, and good evil," and those who are "wise in their own eyes." Because they had cast away the law of the LORD, judgment would sweep down like a lion.
For the Apostolic reader, the chapter searches the heart. God still tends His people and looks for the fruit of righteousness, which we can bear only by abiding in Christ, the true Vine. It warns us to keep God's categories of good and evil in a world that constantly renames them, and to fear the Lord rather than be wise in our own eyes. The root of every woe is a heart that trusts itself above God's word. Abide in the Vine, hold fast what God calls good, and walk in humble fear of the Lord rather than the conceit of your own wisdom.
- God tended His vineyard with every care and looked for good fruit (5:1-7).
- Fruit is borne only in Christ the true Vine (John 15:1; Matthew 21:33).
- Woe to those who "call evil good, and good evil," overturning God's categories (5:20; Proverbs 17:15).
- The root sin is being "wise in their own eyes," trusting self above God's word (5:21).
- "Be not wise in thine own eyes: fear the LORD, and depart from evil" (Proverbs 3:7).
Questions for Reflection
- After all God has done for you, what fruit is He finding in your life?
- Are you keeping God's categories of good and evil, or letting the world rename them?
- Do you fear the Lord and submit to His word, or lean on your own wisdom?
References & Sources
Scripture is quoted from the King James Version (KJV). The Hebrew terms are standard and can be checked in any Hebrew lexicon. Supporting passages are listed so every claim can be verified in its own setting. If anything here does not look right, a verse, a reference, or a wording, please tell us at info@FruitBearers.net. Thank you for helping us keep Bible Learning error free.
- The Song of the Vineyard; Christ the true Vine: Isaiah 5:1-7; Matthew 21:33; John 15:1.
- Calling evil good and good evil: Isaiah 5:20; Proverbs 17:15.
- Wise in their own eyes: Isaiah 5:21-30; Proverbs 3:7.