Isaiah 28:25 - Exposition

When he hath made plain the face thereof ; i.e. leveled it—brought the ground to a tolerably even surface. Doth he not cast abroad the fitches? The Hebrew word translated "fitches"— i.e. "vetches"—is qetsach , which is generally allowed to represent the Nigella sativa , a sort of ranun-cuhs, which is cultivated in many parts of the East for the sake of its seeds. These are black, and have an aromatic flavor. Dioscorides (3:83) and Pliny ( Isaiah 19:8 ) say that they were sometimes mixed with bread. And scatter the cummin. "Cummin" ( Cuminum sativum ) is "an umbelliferous plant, something like fennel." The seeds—or rather, berries—have "a bitterish warm taste, with an aromatic flavor". They seem to have been eaten as a relish with various kinds of food. And cast in the principal wheat ; rather, and put in wheat in rows . Drill-ploughs, which would deposit grain in rows , were known to the Assyrians. And the rie in their place . Cussemeth , the word translated "rie," is probably the Holeus sorghum , or "spelt," which is largely cultivated in Palestine and other parts of the East, and is the ordinary material of the bread eaten by the poorer classes. For "in their place," Kay translates, "in its own border." The wheat and the barley and the spelt would all be sown separately, according to the direction of Le Isaiah 19:19 , "Thou shalt not sow thy field with mingled seed."