Israel - A People Laden with Iniquity

Having laid out His first complaint with Israel, that they are a sinful people, having missed the mark of His holy and righteous standard and owing a debt, Jehovah now goes on to a second complaint here in Isaiah 1:4:

Alas, sinful nation, 
A people laden with iniquity…

“People” is another non-specific reference a familial or tribal relationship. We tend to think of a family in terms of the small unit around which our society is built. The Hebrews, though certainly valuing the immediate family, also placed great value on the extended family, the tribe. That is an emphasis that is prevalent in Middle Eastern society even to this day. In many instances, tribe comes before immediate family. This is something that makes it difficult for us this country, who value personal family above the greater group, to understand that culture.

The word translated “laden” properly denotes anything “heavy,” or burdensome; it is from a word that means “to be heavy.” It speaks of the quality of having actual weight. The “actual” idea is important as opposed to perceived.  It is not so much that that it is thought to have weight as it actually does have weight! 

Of course, in this context, it is not referring to physical weight, but to metaphorical weight. The prior reference to sin and guilt associated with it would indicate that this is the burden of guilt and the resulting wrath and judgment of God. This is another instance of the great “context is King rule” that goes a long way toward making the meaning of the Scripture clear.

At its root, we ought to note that the word can also be used to refer to the grape vine, fruit tree or olive tree that is laden or weighed down with fruit when the time of harvest in near. That is the time when the fruit is both the largest and the most plentiful. The connection to the prior context, the sinfulness of the nation, is still present and the fruit borne is the fruit of sin, both in immediate defilement as well as in long-term effect.

We might also say that it indicates that they were oppressed or borne down with the “weight” of their sins. Thus we say, Sin sits “heavy” on the conscience. Cain said,

‘My punishment is greater than I can bear;’ (Gen. 4:13).

The word is applied to an “employment” as being burdensome; (Exo. 18:18): ‘This thing is too “heavy” for thee.’ (Num. 11:14): ‘I am not able to bear this people alone; it is too “heavy” for me.’ It is applied also to a “famine,” as being heavy, severe, distressing. (Gen. 12:10): ‘For the famine was “grievous” in the land;’ (Gen. 41:31). It is also applied to “speech,” as being heavy, dull, unintelligible. (Exo. 4:10): ‘I am “slow (heavy)” of speech, and of a slow (heavy) tongue.’ It is not applied to sin in the Scriptures, except in this place, or except in the sense of making atonement for it. The idea however, is very striking - that of a nation - an entire people, bowed and crushed under the enormous weight of accumulated crimes.

“Iniquity” speaks of wickedness, iniquity, i.e., wrongdoing, with a focus of liability or guilt for this wrong incurred^[1]

…keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.” (Ex 34:7)

The iniquity of the people was a major issue in the OT system. Christ had not come to actually pay for sin, hence the elaborate system that symbolically required the giver as well as the Priest to fulfill exhaustive and detailed requirements seemingly filled with minutiae. But all of that detail had meaning and was significant. It all pointed to the qualification and work of Christ in satisfying the wrath of God. Much of what the Priest wore when working in the Tabernacle and Temple was often significant of the Priest’s action as the symbolic bearer of the iniquity of the people, by bearing it, as if it were a heavy burden. a good example is, for instance Exodus 28:38:

So it shall be on Aaron’s forehead, that Aaron may bear the iniquity of the holy things which the children of Israel hallow in all their holy gifts; and it shall always be on his forehead, that they may be accepted before the Lord.

This was a major part of the Priest’s role as the Priest foreshadowed the work of Jesus Christ…‘That Aaron may bear the iniquity of the holy things.’

(Lev. 10:17): ‘God hath given it you to bear the iniquity of the congregation.’

(Lev. 22:9; 16:22; Num. 18:1; Isa. 53:6): ‘Jehovah hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.’

(Isa. 53:11): ‘He shall bear their iniquities.’

(1 Pet. 2:24): ‘Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree.’

Remember that these were the people of God, the ones to whom God had give the means of the covering of sin. They had the Tabernacle, and then the Temple. They had the Alter and all of the accompanying pieces of hardware and implements. They had the Priests and all of the Levites and the elaborate rituals and profound services. They had the Revelation of the Word and the ministry of the Prophets. If anyone in all of history to that point should have been a holy people at that point in history, it ought to have been the Israelites. But instead, they were as the orchard at the time of harvest, boughs heavy with the fruit of iniquity, the guilt of sin. Not just guilty, as the nations were, but heavy laden with that guilt!

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^[1] Swanson, J. (1997). Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains : Hebrew (Old Testament) (electronic ed.) (DBLH 6411, #1). Oak Harbor: Logos Research Systems, Inc.