إشعياء ٥:٨

"Woe unto them that join house to house, who lay field to field, till there is no more room, and ye alone are dwelling in the midst of the land." The participle is continued in the finite verb, as in Isa 5:23; Isa 10:1; the regular syntactic construction is cases of this kind (Ges. 134, Anm. 2). The preterites after "till" (there are to such preterites, for 'ephes is an intensified אין enclosing the verbal idea) correspond to future perfects: "They, the insatiable, would not rest till, after every smaller piece of landed property had been swallowed by them, the whole land had come into their possession, and no one beside themselves was settled in the land" (Job 22:8). Such covetousness was all the more reprehensible, because the law of Israel and provided so very stringently and carefully, that as far as possible there should be an equal distribution of the soil, and that hereditary family property should be inalienable. All landed property that had been alienated reverted to the family every fiftieth year, or year of jubilee; so that alienation simply had reference to the usufruct of the land till that time. It was only in the case of houses in towns that the right of redemption was restricted to one year, at least according to a later statute. How badly the law of the year of jubilee had been observed, may be gathered from Jer 34, where we learn that the law as to the manumission of Hebrew slaves in the sabbatical year had fallen entirely into neglect. Isaiah's contemporary, Micah, makes just the same complaint as Isaiah himself (vid., Mic 2:2).

The world and the flesh are the two great enemies that we are in danger of being overpowered by; yet we are in no danger if we do not ourselves yield to them. Eagerness of the world, and indulgence of the flesh, are the two sins against which the prophet, in God's name, here denounces woes. These were sins which then abounded among the men of Judah, some of the wild grapes they brought forth (Isa 5:4), and for which God threatens to bring ruin upon them. They are sins which we have all need to stand upon our guard against and dread the consequences of. I. Here is a woe to those who set their hearts upon the wealth of the world, and place their happiness in that, and increase it to themselves by indirect and unlawful means (Isa 5:8), who join house to house and lay field to field, till there be no place, no room for anybody to live by them. If they could succeed, they would be placed alone in the midst of the earth, would monopolize possessions and preferments, and engross all profits and employments to themselves. Not that it is a sin for those who have a house and a field, of they have wherewithal, to purchase another; but 1. Their fault is, (1.) That they are inordinate in their desires to enrich themselves, and make it their whole care and business to raise an estate, as if they had nothing to mind, nothing to seek, nothing to do, in this world, but that. They never know when they have enough, but the more they have the more they would have; and, like the daughters of the horseleech, they cry, Give, give. They cannot enjoy what they have, nor do good with it, but are constantly contriving and studying to make it more. They must have variety of houses, a winter-house, and a summer-house, and if another man's house or field lie convenient to theirs, as Naboth's vineyar…

5:8-23 This section contains six pronouncements of sorrow—six threats of dreadful judgment (5:8, 11, 18, 20, 21, 22). The sorrows identify some of the “bitter grapes” produced by the vineyard of Israel (5:1-7). 5:8-10 What sorrow: The first threat of judgment was against oppressive greed. Properties (house and field) were being taken by illegal means. The new owners were thugs who used every avenue to enrich themselves at the expense of the poor (see 1 Kgs 21:1-29; Amos 2:6-7).