Woe to you who add house to house and join field to field until no place is left and you live alone in the land.
Parallel translations
- WEB Woe to those who join house to house, who lay field to field, until there is no room, and you are made to dwell alone in the middle of the land!
- KJV Woe unto them that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth!
- NKJV Woe to those who join house to house; They add field to field, Till there is no place Where they may dwell alone in the midst of the land!
- NASB ¶Woe to those who attach house to house and join field to field, Until there is no more room, And you alone are a landowner in the midst of the land!
- NLT What sorrow for you who buy up house after house and field after field, until everyone is evicted and you live alone in the land.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The first woe condemns the greedy who seize house after house and field after field until they crowd out everyone else. It denounces oppressive accumulation that violates God's design for the land.
Overview
In Israel, land was an inheritance meant to remain within families (Leviticus 25), so monopolizing it trampled the poor and defied God's law. This covetous land-grabbing is one of the 'wild grapes' the previous verse condemned. The woe warns that injustice and greed do not escape God's notice but bring His judgment.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Mic 2:2They covet fields and seize them; they take away houses. They deprive a man of his home, a fellow man of his inheritance.
- Hab 2:9–12Woe to him who builds his house by unjust gain, to place his nest on high and escape the hand of disaster!
- Jer 22:13–17“Woe to him who builds his palace by unrighteousness, and his upper rooms without justice, who makes his countrymen serve without pay, and fails to pay their wages,
- Luke 12:16–24Then He told them a parable: “The ground of a certain rich man produced an abundance.
- 1 Kgs 21:16–20And when Ahab heard that Naboth was dead, he got up and went down to take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite.
- Matt 23:13Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in men’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let in those who wish to enter.
- Ezek 11:15“Son of man, your brothers—your relatives, your fellow exiles, and the whole house of Israel—are those of whom the people of Jerusalem have said, ‘They are far away from the LORD; this land has been given to us as a possession.’
- Ezek 33:24“Son of man, those living in the ruins in the land of Israel are saying, ‘Abraham was only one man, yet he possessed the land. But we are many; surely the land has been given to us as a possession.’
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Isaiah sees him most clearly: the virgin's son Immanuel, the child on David's throne, the shoot from Jesse, the light to the nations, and above all the Suffering Servant pierced for our transgressions (ch. 53).
How Isaiah 5:8 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.