Isaiah 1:24-28

1:24 Therefore, the sovereign Lord who commands armies, ¹ 

the powerful ruler of Israel, ²  says this:

“Ah, I will seek vengeance ³  against my adversaries,

I will take revenge against my enemies. ⁴ 

1:25 I will attack you; ⁵ 

I will purify your metal with flux. ⁶ 

I will remove all your slag. ⁷ 

1:26 I will reestablish honest judges as in former times,

wise advisers as in earlier days. ⁸ 

Then you will be called, ‘The Just City,

Faithful Town.’”

1:27 ⁹ Zion will be freed by justice, ¹⁰ 

and her returnees by righteousness. ¹¹ 

1:28 All rebellious sinners will be shattered, ¹² 

those who abandon the Lord will perish.

Isaiah 27:9

27:9 So in this way Jacob’s sin will be forgiven, ¹³ 

and this is how they will show they are finished sinning: ¹⁴ 

They will make all the stones of the altars ¹⁵ 

like crushed limestone,

and the Asherah poles and the incense altars will no longer stand. ¹⁶ 

Ezekiel 20:38-41

20:38 I will eliminate from among you the rebels and those who revolt ¹⁷  against me. I will bring them out from the land where they have been residing, but they will not come to the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord.

20:39 “‘As for you, O house of Israel, this is what the sovereign Lord says: Each of you go and serve your idols, ¹⁸  if you will not listen to me. ¹⁹  But my holy name will not be profaned ²⁰  again by your sacrifices ²¹  and your idols. 20:40 For there on my holy mountain, the high mountain of Israel, declares the sovereign Lord, all the house of Israel will serve me, all of them ²²  in the land. I will accept them there, and there I will seek your contributions and your choice gifts, with all your holy things. 20:41 When I bring you out from the nations and gather you from the lands where you are scattered, I will accept you along with your soothing aroma. I will display my holiness among you in the sight of the nations.

Ezekiel 44:9-16

44:9 This is what the sovereign Lord says: No foreigner, who is uncircumcised in heart and flesh among all the foreigners who are among the people of Israel, will enter into my sanctuary. ²³ 

44:10 “‘But the Levites who went far from me, straying off from me after their idols when Israel went astray, will be responsible for ²⁴  their sin. 44:11 Yet they will be ministers in my sanctuary, having oversight at the gates of the temple, and serving the temple. They will slaughter the burnt offerings and the sacrifices for the people, and they will stand before them to minister to them. 44:12 Because they used to minister to them before their idols, and became a sinful obstacle ²⁵  to the house of Israel, consequently I have made a vow ²⁶  concerning them, declares the sovereign Lord, that they will be responsible ²⁷  for their sin. 44:13 They will not come near me to serve me as priest, nor will they come near any of my holy things, the things which are most sacred. They will bear the shame of the abominable deeds they have committed. 44:14 Yet I will appoint them to keep charge of the temple, all of its service and all that will be done in it.

The Levitical Priests

44:15 “‘But the Levitical priests, the descendants of Zadok ²⁸  who kept the charge of my sanctuary when the people of Israel went astray from me, will approach me to minister to me; they will stand before me to offer me the fat and the blood, declares the sovereign Lord. 44:16 They will enter my sanctuary, and approach my table to minister to me; they will keep my charge.

Matthew 3:12

3:12 His winnowing fork ²⁹  is in his hand, and he will clean out his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the storehouse, ³⁰  but the chaff he will burn up with inextinguishable fire.” ³¹ 

John 15:2

15:2 He takes away ³²  every branch that does not bear ³³  fruit in me. He ³⁴  prunes ³⁵  every branch that bears ³⁶  fruit so that it will bear more fruit.

[1:24]  ¹ tn Heb “the master, the Lord who commands armies [traditionally, the Lord of hosts].” On the title “the Lord who commands armies,” see the note at v. 9.

[1:24]  ² tn Heb “the powerful [one] of Israel.”

[1:24]  ³ tn Heb “console myself” (i.e., by getting revenge); NRSV “pour out my wrath on.”

[1:24]  ⁴ sn The Lord here identifies with the oppressed and comes as their defender and vindicator.

[1:25]  ⁵ tn Heb “turn my hand against you.” The second person pronouns in vv. 25-26 are feminine singular. Personified Jerusalem is addressed. The idiom “turn the hand against” has the nuance of “strike with the hand, attack,” in Ps 81:15 HT (81:14 ET); Ezek 38:12; Am 1:8; Zech 13:7. In Jer 6:9 it is used of gleaning grapes.

[1:25]  ⁶ tn Heb “I will purify your dross as [with] flux.” “Flux” refers here to minerals added to the metals in a furnace to prevent oxides from forming. For this interpretation of II בֹּר (bor), see HALOT 153 s.v. II בֹּר and 750 s.v. סִיג.

[1:25]  ⁷ sn The metaphor comes from metallurgy; slag is the substance left over after the metallic ore has been refined.

[1:26]  ⁸ tn Heb “I will restore your judges as in the beginning; and your counselors as in the beginning.” In this context, where social injustice and legal corruption are denounced (see v. 23), the “judges” are probably government officials responsible for making legal decisions, while the “advisers” are probably officials who helped the king establish policies. Both offices are also mentioned in 3:2.

[1:27]  ⁹ sn The third person reference to the Lord in v. 28 indicates that the prophet is again (see vv. 21-24a) speaking. Since v. 27 is connected to v. 28 by a conjunction, it is likely that the prophet’s words begin with v. 27.

[1:27]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “Zion will be ransomed with justice.” Both cola in this verse end with similar terms: justice and righteousness (and both are preceded by a בְּ [bet] preposition). At issue is whether these virtues describe the means or result of the deliverance and whether they delineate God’s justice/righteousness or that of the covenant people. If the righteousness of Israelite returnees is in view, the point seems to be that the reestablishment of Zion as a center of justice (God’s people living in conformity with God’s demand for equity and justice) will deliver the city from its past humiliation and restore it to a place of prominence (see 2:2-4; cf. E. Kissane, Isaiah, 1:19). Most scholars conclude that “righteousness and “justice” refers to God alone (J. Ridderbos, Isaiah [BSC], 50; J. Watts, Isaiah [WBC], 1:25; E. J. Young, Isaiah [NICOT], 1:89; cf. NLT, TEV) or serves as a double reference to both divine and human justice and righteousness (J. A. Motyer, The Prophecy of Isaiah, 51; J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah [NICOT], 1:10; H. Wildberger, Isaiah, 1:72). If it refers to both sides of the coin, these terms highlight the objective divine work of redemption and the subjective human response of penitence (Motyer, 51).

[1:27]  ¹¹ tc The Hebrew text has, “her repentant ones/returnees with righteousness.” The form שָׁבֶיהָ (shaveha, “her repentant ones”), as pointed in MT, is a masculine plural Qal participle from שׁוּב (shuv, “return”). Used substantivally, it refers to the “returning (i.e., repentant) ones.” It is possible that the parallel line (with its allusion to being freed by a ransom payment) suggests that the form be repointed to שִׁבְיָהּ (shivyah, “her captivity”), a reading that has support from the LXX. Some slightly emend the form to read וְשָׁבָה (vÿshavah, “and will return”). According to this view, the verb from the first line applies to the second line as well with the following translation as a result: “she will be released when fairness is restored.” Regardless, it makes best sense in the context to regard this as a reference to repentant Israelites returning to the land of promise. This understanding provides a better contrast with the rebels and sinners in 1:28.

[1:28]  ¹² tn Heb “and [there will be] a shattering of rebels and sinners together.”

[27:9]  ¹³ tn Or “be atoned for” (NIV); cf. NRSV “be expiated.”

[27:9]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “and this [is] all the fruit of removing his sin.” The meaning of the statement is not entirely clear, though “removing his sin” certainly parallels “Jacob’s sin will be removed” in the preceding line. If original, “all the fruit” may refer to the result of the decision to remove sin, but the phrase may be a corruption of לְכַפֵּר (lekhaper, “to atone for”), which in turn might be a gloss on הָסִר (hasir, “removing”).

[27:9]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “when he makes the stones of an altar.” The singular “altar” is collective here; pagan altars are in view, as the last line of the verse indicates. See also 17:8.

[27:9]  ¹⁶ sn As interpreted and translated above, this verse says that Israel must totally repudiate its pagan religious practices in order to experience God’s forgiveness and restoration. Another option is to understand “in this way” and “this” in v. 9a as referring back to the judgment described in v. 8. In this case כָּפַר (kafar, “atone for”) is used in a sarcastic sense; Jacob’s sin is “atoned for” and removed through severe judgment. Following this line of interpretation, one might paraphrase the verse as follows: “So in this way (through judgment) Jacob’s sin will be “atoned for,” and this is the way his sin will be removed, when he (i.e., God) makes all the altar stones like crushed limestone….” This interpretation is more consistent with the tone of judgment in vv. 8 and 10-11.

[20:38]  ¹⁷ tn See the note at 2:3.

[20:39]  ¹⁸ sn Compare the irony here to Amos 4:4 and Jer 44:25.

[20:39]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and after, if you will not listen to me.” The translation leaves out “and after” for smoothness. The text is difficult. M. Greenberg (Ezekiel [AB], 1:374) suggests that it may mean “but afterwards, if you will not listen to me…” with an unspoken threat.

[20:39]  ²⁰ sn A similar concept may be found in Lev 18:21; 20:3.

[20:39]  ²¹ tn Or “gifts.”

[20:40]  ²² tn Heb “all of it.”

[44:9]  ²³ sn Tobiah, an Ammonite (Neh 13:8), was dismissed from the temple.

[44:10]  ²⁴ tn Heb “will bear.”

[44:12]  ²⁵ tn Heb “a stumbling block of iniquity.” This is a unique phrase of the prophet Ezekiel (cf. also Ezek 7:19; 14:3, 4, 7; 18:30).

[44:12]  ²⁶ tn Heb “I lifted up my hand.”

[44:12]  ²⁷ tn Heb “will bear.”

[44:15]  ²⁸ sn Zadok was a descendant of Aaron through Eleazar (1 Chr 6:50-53), who served as a priest during David’s reign (2 Sam 8:17).

[3:12]  ²⁹ sn A winnowing fork was a pitchfork-like tool used to toss threshed grain in the air so that the wind blew away the chaff, leaving the grain to fall to the ground. The note of purging is highlighted by the use of imagery involving sifting though threshed grain for the useful kernels.

[3:12]  ³⁰ tn Or “granary,” “barn” (referring to a building used to store a farm’s produce rather than a building to house livestock).

[3:12]  ³¹ sn The image of fire that cannot be extinguished is from the OT: Job 20:26; Isa 34:8-10; 66:24.

[15:2]  ³² tn Or “He cuts off.”

[15:2]  ³³ tn Or “does not yield.”

[15:2]  ³⁴ tn Grk “And he”; the conjunction καί (kai, “and”) has been omitted in the translation in keeping with the tendency in contemporary English style to use shorter sentences.

[15:2]  ³⁵ tn Or “trims”; Grk “cleanses” (a wordplay with “clean” in v. 3). Καθαίρει (kaqairei) is not the word one would have expected here, but it provides the transition from the vine imagery to the disciples – there is a wordplay (not reproducible in English) between αἴρει (airei) and καθαίρει in this verse. While the purpose of the Father in cleansing his people is clear, the precise means by which he does so is not immediately obvious. This will become clearer, however, in the following verse.

[15:2]  ³⁶ tn Or “that yields.”