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23 Pay attention! Listen well;
    take care to hear my words.
24 Does a farmer constantly plow and turn the soil to plant his seed?
    No, of course not.
25 When he’s leveled and tilled the soil,
    doesn’t he plant each seed according to its specifications?
He scatters the dill, sows the cummin, plants the wheat in rows,
    puts barley and spelt where they grow best.
26 God instructs and directs the farmer
    in how best to manage the land.
27 For dill isn’t threshed with a sledge,
    and you don’t roll a cart over the cummin.
Dill is properly beaten free with one kind of stick,
    and cummin with another.
28 Similarly, you have to grind grain to have flour for bread,
    but you don’t grind it endlessly.
When the wheel on the cart and the horses go over the grain,
    you must be careful not to crush it.
29 The Eternal, Commander of heavenly armies,
    is the source of such wisdom.
    His advice is wonderful.

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23 Listen(A) and hear my voice;
    pay attention and hear what I say.
24 When a farmer plows for planting,(B) does he plow continually?
    Does he keep on breaking up and working the soil?
25 When he has leveled the surface,
    does he not sow caraway and scatter cumin?(C)
Does he not plant wheat in its place,[a]
    barley(D) in its plot,[b]
    and spelt(E) in its field?
26 His God instructs him
    and teaches(F) him the right way.

27 Caraway is not threshed(G) with a sledge,(H)
    nor is the wheel of a cart rolled over cumin;
caraway is beaten out with a rod,(I)
    and cumin with a stick.
28 Grain must be ground to make bread;
    so one does not go on threshing it forever.
The wheels of a threshing cart(J) may be rolled over it,
    but one does not use horses to grind grain.
29 All this also comes from the Lord Almighty,
    whose plan is wonderful,(K)
    whose wisdom is magnificent.(L)

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Footnotes

  1. Isaiah 28:25 The meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain.
  2. Isaiah 28:25 The meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain.

23 Give ye ear, and hear my voice; hearken, and hear my speech.

24 Doth the plowman plow all day to sow? doth he open and break the clods of his ground?

25 When he hath made plain the face thereof, doth he not cast abroad the fitches, and scatter the cummin, and cast in the principal wheat and the appointed barley and the rie in their place?

26 For his God doth instruct him to discretion, and doth teach him.

27 For the fitches are not threshed with a threshing instrument, neither is a cart wheel turned about upon the cummin; but the fitches are beaten out with a staff, and the cummin with a rod.

28 Bread corn is bruised; because he will not ever be threshing it, nor break it with the wheel of his cart, nor bruise it with his horsemen.

29 This also cometh forth from the Lord of hosts, which is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.

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