Who Join House to House
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!
The Death of Home ownership in America
Private equity buying single family homes
Seriously? Let's dig deeper:
In place of the small freeholders there rose up a class of large proprietors, often the novi homines of the state (e.g., Shebna in Isaiah 22:16), while the original owners sank into slavery (Nehemiah 5:5) or became tenants at will, paying exorbitant rents in kind or money, and liable at any moment to be evicted.
That join house to house — That add new purchases of houses and lands to their former possessions. Not that this was in itself absolutely unlawful, but because they did it from an inordinate desire of riches, and with the injury of their brethren. That they may be placed alone — That they alone may be the lords and owners, and all others only their tenants and servants.
8–10. The first woe, against the absorption of small properties by the wealthy landowners. Cruel evictions, by which the smaller peasant proprietors lost not only their homes but the rights of citizenship, were common in the age of Isaiah, both in Judah and Israel. Cf. Micah 2:2; Micah 2:9; Amos 2:6 f. “The old Israelite state was so entirely based on the participation of every freeman in the common soil, and so little recognised the mere possession of capital, that men were in danger of losing civil rights along with house and fields, and becoming mere hirelings or even slaves”
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