Psalms 44:2

44:2 You, by your power, ¹  defeated nations and settled our fathers on their land; ² 

you crushed ³  the people living there ⁴  and enabled our ancestors to occupy it. ⁵ 

Psalms 78:54-55

78:54 He brought them to the border of his holy land,

to this mountainous land ⁶  which his right hand ⁷  acquired.

78:55 He drove the nations out from before them;

he assigned them their tribal allotments ⁸ 

and allowed the tribes of Israel to settle down. ⁹ 

Psalms 80:8

80:8 You uprooted a vine ¹⁰  from Egypt;

you drove out nations and transplanted it.

Isaiah 5:1-4

A Love Song Gone Sour

5:1 I ¹¹  will sing to my love –

a song to my lover about his vineyard. ¹² 

My love had a vineyard

on a fertile hill. ¹³ 

5:2 He built a hedge around it, ¹⁴  removed its stones,

and planted a vine.

He built a tower in the middle of it,

and constructed a winepress.

He waited for it to produce edible grapes,

but it produced sour ones instead. ¹⁵ 

5:3 So now, residents of Jerusalem, ¹⁶ 

people ¹⁷  of Judah,

you decide between me and my vineyard!

5:4 What more can I do for my vineyard

beyond what I have already done?

When I waited for it to produce edible grapes,

why did it produce sour ones instead?

Jeremiah 2:21

2:21 I planted you in the land

like a special vine of the very best stock.

Why in the world have you turned into something like a wild vine

that produces rotten, foul-smelling grapes? ¹⁸ 

Jeremiah 32:41

32:41 I will take delight in doing good to them. I will faithfully and wholeheartedly plant them ¹⁹  firmly in the land.’

[44:2]  ¹ tn Heb “you, your hand.”

[44:2]  ² tn Heb “dispossessed nations and planted them.” The third masculine plural pronoun “them” refers to the fathers (v. 1). See Ps 80:8, 15.

[44:2]  ³ tn The verb form in the Hebrew text is a Hiphil preterite (without vav [ו] consecutive) from רָעַע (ra’a’, “be evil; be bad”). If retained it apparently means, “you injured; harmed.” Some prefer to derive the verb from רָעַע (“break”; cf. NEB “breaking up the peoples”), in which case the form must be revocalized as Qal (since this verb is unattested in the Hiphil).

[44:2]  ⁴ tn Or “peoples.”

[44:2]  ⁵ tn Heb “and you sent them out.” The translation assumes that the third masculine plural pronoun “them” refers to the fathers (v. 1), as in the preceding parallel line. See Ps 80:11, where Israel, likened to a vine, “spreads out” its tendrils to the west and east. Another option is to take the “peoples” as the referent of the pronoun and translate, “and you sent them away,” though this does not provide as tight a parallel with the corresponding line.

[78:54]  ⁶ tn Heb “this mountain.” The whole land of Canaan seems to be referred to here. In Exod 15:17 the promised land is called the “mountain of your [i.e., God’s] inheritance.”

[78:54]  ⁷ tn The “right hand” here symbolizes God’s military strength (see v. 55).

[78:55]  ⁸ tn Heb “he caused to fall [to] them with a measuring line an inheritance.”

[78:55]  ⁹ tn Heb “and caused the tribes of Israel to settle down in their tents.”

[80:8]  ¹⁰ sn The vine is here a metaphor for Israel (see Ezek 17:6-10; Hos 10:1).

[5:1]  ¹¹ tn It is uncertain who is speaking here. Possibly the prophet, taking the role of best man, composes a love song for his friend on the occasion of his wedding. If so, יָדִיד (yadid) should be translated “my friend.” The present translation assumes that Israel is singing to the Lord. The word דוֹד (dod, “lover”) used in the second line is frequently used by the woman in the Song of Solomon to describe her lover.

[5:1]  ¹² sn Israel, viewing herself as the Lord’s lover, refers to herself as his vineyard. The metaphor has sexual connotations, for it pictures her capacity to satisfy his appetite and to produce children. See Song 8:12.

[5:1]  ¹³ tn Heb “on a horn, a son of oil.” Apparently קֶרֶן (qeren, “horn”) here refers to the horn-shaped peak of a hill (BDB 902 s.v.) or to a mountain spur, i.e., a ridge that extends laterally from a mountain (HALOT 1145 s.v. קֶרֶן; H. Wildberger, Isaiah, 1:180). The expression “son of oil” pictures this hill as one capable of producing olive trees. Isaiah’s choice of קֶרֶן, a rare word for hill, may have been driven by paronomastic concerns, i.e., because קֶרֶן sounds like כֶּרֶם (kerem, “vineyard”).

[5:2]  ¹⁴ tn Or, “dug it up” (so NIV); KJV “fenced it.’ See HALOT 810 s.v. עזק.

[5:2]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “wild grapes,” i.e., sour ones (also in v. 4).

[5:3]  ¹⁶ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[5:3]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “men,” but in a generic sense.

[2:21]  ¹⁸ tc Heb “I planted you as a choice vine, all of it true seed. How then have you turned into a putrid thing to me, a strange [or wild] vine.” The question expresses surprise and consternation. The translation is based on a redivision of the Hebrew words סוּרֵי הַגֶּפֶן (sure haggefen) into סוֹרִיָּה גֶּפֶן (soriyyah gefen) and the recognition of a hapax legomenon סוֹרִיָּה (soriyyah) meaning “putrid, stinking thing.” See HALOT 707 s.v. סוֹרִי.

[32:41]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “will plant them in the land with faithfulness with all my heart and with all my soul.” The latter expressions are, of course, anthropomorphisms (see Deut 6:5).