Whose Vineyard Is This? — Isaiah 5:1-7 · Proper 22, Year A
from Monday To Sunday Hosted by Joe Stein
A man plants a vineyard and does everything right: good hill, stones cleared, a watchtower, a wine vat. At harvest it gives him grapes, just the wrong kind. Sour ones. All three readings this week turn on the same vineyard, and on a question none of us likes to ask out loud. This is the midweek show. You heard three readings on Sunday and a sermon on top of them, and by now most of it is gone. That is what a week does to things. So we go back and sit with the same readings again, slower. Proper 22, Year A: Isaiah 5:1-7, Psalm 80:7-15, Philippians 3:4b-14, Matthew 21:33-46. The Hebrew is a pun. In Isaiah 5:7 God looks for mishpat, justice, and finds mispach, bloodshed. He looks for tsedaqah, righteousness, and hears tse'aqah, a cry. The words sit a syllable apart, and Isaiah wrote it that way on purpose: counterfeit fruit can sound almost exactly like the real thing. Mispach appears nowhere else in the Hebrew Bible. Also in this episode: why the tenants in Jesus' parable weren't lazy, and what they were willing to kill to avoid admitting; how the crowd hands down their own sentence without noticing; Paul's résumé in Philippians 3 and why he's the only one in the three readings who catches himself; and four sour tomatoes on Joe's back porch. One thing to carry until Thursday: look at what you're producing this week and ask who it's for. Monday to Sunday is hosted by Joe Stein. New episodes Tuesday and Thursday. Full archive and written companions at mondaytosunday.life.
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