Isaiah 28: A Precious Corner Stone

"Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower… In that day shall the Lord of hosts be for a crown of glory, and for a diadem of beauty, unto the residue of his people" (28:1–5).

"But they also have erred through wine… the priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink… For all tables are full of vomit… Whom shall he teach knowledge?… For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little: For with stammering lips and another tongue will he speak to this people" (vv. 7–11).

"Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement… Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste. Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet" (vv. 15–17).

"Doth the plowman plow all day to sow?… For his God doth instruct him to discretion… For the fitches are not threshed with a threshing instrument… This also cometh forth from the Lord of hosts, which is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working" (vv. 24–29).

"Tsav la-tsav, qav la-qav"

The KJV's "precept upon precept; line upon line" takes tsav as "command" and qav as "measuring line." Many scholars think the drunken leaders are mimicking Isaiah as a schoolteacher droning letters to children (tsade and qof follow each other in the alphabet), or making nonsense sounds ("blah blah, yada yada"). Isaiah turns their mockery around: God will speak to them in the unintelligible language of Assyrian soldiers (v. 11; compare Deuteronomy 28:49). The library's Greek reads "expect affliction upon affliction, hope upon hope; yet a little while" (Giguet: "affliction sur affliction, espérance sur espérance"). In the transcription the Great Isaiah Scroll writes the word with yod in place of vav (tsi rather than tsav); vav and yod are often hard to tell apart in this scroll, so the site does not treat it as a real variant until the photographs are checked.

The cornerstone (28:16)

"Behold, I lay in Zion… a precious corner stone… he that believeth shall not make haste (lo yachish)." The Greek reads "shall not be put to shame," and in that form Paul quotes it in Romans 9:33 (joined with 8:14) and 10:11, and 1 Peter 2:6 (joined with 8:14 and Psalm 118:22), applying the stone to Christ. The Qumran Community Rule (1QS 8:7–8) applies the "tested wall, the precious cornerstone" to the community's council: an earlier Jewish application of the verse to a living community. The Targum reads "a king, a mighty king" (reported). In Isaiah the stone is Zion's foundation of God's promise and justice, against the rulers' false refuges. The Great Isaiah Scroll differs in the verb's form (described from a transcription).

A covenant with death

Scholars have read the "covenant with death" as the rulers' treaty with Egypt (see chapters 30–31), sarcastically called a pact with Mot, the god of death; or as necromancy and a cult of the dead (compare 8:19; 29:4); or simply as a boast of invulnerability. The phrase answers itself: what is made with death ends in death (v. 18).

1 Corinthians 14:21

Paul quotes 28:11–12 as "the law": "With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this people; and yet for all that will they not hear me." He applies it to speaking in tongues as a sign for unbelievers. The wording differs from both the Hebrew and the library's Greek (later quotation).