Discovery BoxIsaiah 4:2 
Contextthe crops given by the Lord will bring admiration and honor; 2
the produce of the land will be a source of pride and delight
to those who remain in Israel. 3
Isaiah 5:2
Context5:2 He built a hedge around it, 4 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. 5
Isaiah 7:22
Context7:22 From the abundance of milk they produce, 6 he will have sour milk for his meals. Indeed, everyone left in the heart of the land will eat sour milk and honey.
Isaiah 29:23
Context29:23 For when they see their children,
whom I will produce among them, 7
they will honor 8 my name.
They will honor the Holy One of Jacob; 9
they will respect 10 the God of Israel.
Isaiah 41:18
Context41:18 I will make streams flow down the slopes
and produce springs in the middle of the valleys.
I will turn the desert into a pool of water
and the arid land into springs.
Isaiah 41:22
Context41:22 “Let them produce evidence! Let them tell us what will happen!
Tell us about your earlier predictive oracles, 11
so we may examine them 12 and see how they were fulfilled. 13
Or decree for us some future events!
Isaiah 43:9
Context43:9 All nations gather together,
the peoples assemble.
Who among them announced this?
Who predicted earlier events for us? 14
Let them produce their witnesses to testify they were right;
let them listen and affirm, ‘It is true.’
Isaiah 55:10
Context55:10 15 The rain and snow fall from the sky
and do not return,
but instead water the earth
and make it produce and yield crops,
and provide seed for the planter and food for those who must eat.
Isaiah 61:11
Context61:11 For just as the ground produces its crops
and a garden yields its produce,
so the sovereign Lord will cause deliverance 16 to grow,
and give his people reason to praise him in the sight of all the nations. 17
Isaiah 62:8
Context62:8 The Lord swears an oath by his right hand,
by his strong arm: 18
“I will never again give your grain
to your enemies as food,
and foreigners will not drink your wine,
which you worked hard to produce.
1 tn Or “in that day” (KJV).
2 tn Heb “and the vegetation of the Lord will become beauty and honor.” Many English versions understand the phrase צֶמַח יְהוָה (tsemakh yÿhvah) as a messianic reference and render it, “the Branch of the Lord” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT, and others). Though צֶמַח (tsemakh) is used by later prophets of a royal descendant (Jer 23;5; 33:15; Zech 3:8; 6:12), those passages contain clear contextual indicators that a human ruler is in view and that the word is being used in a metaphorical way of offspring. However, in Isa 4:2 there are no such contextual indicators. To the contrary, in the parallel structure of the verse צֶמַח יְהוָה corresponds to “produce of the land,” a phrase that refers elsewhere exclusively to literal agricultural produce (see Num 13:20, 26; Deut 1:25). In the majority of its uses צֶמַח refers to literal crops or vegetation (in Ps 65:10 the Lord is the source of this vegetation). A reference to the Lord restoring crops would make excellent sense in Isa 4 and the prophets frequently included this theme in their visions of the future age (see Isa 30:23-24; 32:20; Jer 31:12; Ezek 34:26-29; and Amos 9:13-14).
3 tn Heb “and the fruit of the land will become pride and beauty for the remnant of Israel.”
4 tn Or, “dug it up” (so NIV); KJV “fenced it.’ See HALOT 810 s.v. עזק.
5 tn Heb “wild grapes,” i.e., sour ones (also in v. 4).
sn At this point the love song turns sour as the Lord himself breaks in and completes the story (see vv. 3-6). In the final line of v. 2 the love song presented to the Lord becomes a judgment speech by the Lord.
6 tn The verb that introduces this verse serves as a discourse particle and is untranslated, see note on 2:2.
7 tn Heb “for when he sees his children, the work of my hands in his midst.”
8 tn Or “treat as holy” (also in the following line); NASB, NRSV “will sanctify.”
9 sn Holy One of Jacob is similar to the phrase “Holy One of Israel” common throughout Isaiah; see the sn at Isa 1:4.
10 tn Or “fear,” in the sense of “stand in awe of.”
11 tn Heb “As for the former things, tell us what they are!”
12 tn Heb “so we might set [them to] our heart.”
13 tn Heb “and might know their outcome.”
14 tn Heb “and the former things was causing us to hear?”
15 tn This verse begins in the Hebrew text with כִּי כַּאֲשֶׁר (ki ka’asher, “for, just as”), which is completed by כֵּן (ken, “so, in the same way”) at the beginning of v. 11. For stylistic reasons, this lengthy sentence is divided up into separate sentences in the translation.
16 tn Or perhaps, “righteousness,” but the context seems to emphasize deliverance and restoration (see v. 10 and 62:1).
17 tn Heb “and praise before all the nations.”
18 tn The Lord’s right hand and strong arm here symbolize his power and remind the audience that his might guarantees the fulfillment of the following promise.
