Season 6, Podcast 81, Isaiah 28:1-29, “Line upon Line.”

Season 6, Podcast 81, Isaiah 28:1-29, “Line upon Line.”

The coming of Christ is at the center of Chapter 28 as clearly defined by the last verse. The purpose of Isaiah is to lead us to Christ; therefore, his teachings are meant to prepare us for his coming.

 Clearly Isaiah has the eye of a poet. He looks for analogies in ordinary things. He is talking to an agricultural society; therefore, he uses the familiar images of farming to teach how the Lord works. God is a God of law and order. God organized both temporal laws and spiritual laws; therefore, both operate by the principle of causality. For every cause there is an effect; and for every effect there is a cause. Isaiah moves freely between the temporal and the spiritual. He compares the orderly work of the farmer with the orderly work of God. Law is at the center of everything God does. Violation of law brings a cursing. Obedience to law brings a blessing. 

 In addition, literal and figurative imagery often have multiple meanings. For example, his condemnation of drunkenness could mean literal drunkenness of the physical body which often leads to foolish behavior and the metaphorical drunkenness of the spirit which leads one to move away from the laws of God.  Isaiah 28 uses the physical disorientation caused by physical drunkenness to describe the spiritual disorientation caused by violating the laws and commandments of God.

Isaiah 28:1-3

Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine! Behold, the Lord hath a mighty and strong one, which as a tempest of hail and a destroying storm, as a flood of mighty waters overflowing, shall cast down to the earth with the hand. The crown of pride, the drunkards of Ephraim, shall be trodden under feet:

Even as Isaiah speaks, the ten northern tribes, who have separated from southern tribes of Judah and Benjamin, are soon to be conquered by the Assyrians. They will be assimilated among the Assyrians and eventually become lost to civilization. Ephraim refers to the Ten Lost tribes. Isaiah’s use of ‘crown of pride’ is ironic since the formal use of the term crown refers to royalty. 

2 Samuel 12:30

And he took their king’s crown from off his head, the weight whereof was a talent of gold with the precious stones: and it was set on David’s head. And he brought forth the spoil of the city in great abundance.

In Revelations John refers to the ‘crown of life.’

Revelation 2:10

Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.

The word ‘crown’ is also connected to many virtues.

Crowned with glory and honor. Psalm 8:5

Crowned with knowledge. Proverbs 14:18

Crown of righteousness. 2 Timothy 4:8

“Crown of pride,” as used by Isaiah, refers to drunkenness. It brings destruction. Their glorious beauty fades like a flower. They suffer famine: tempest of hail and destroying storm. They suffer defeat as indicated by the phrase, ’trodden under feet.’

The Lord emphasizes their fall by repeating the curse.

Isaiah 28:4

And the glorious beauty, which is on the head of the fat valley, shall be a fading flower, and as the hasty fruit before the summer; which when he that looketh upon it seeth, while it is yet in his hand he eateth it up.