Text -- Micah 1:1-10 (NET)

Introduction

1:1 This is the prophetic message that the Lord gave to Micah of Moresheth. He delivered this message during the reigns of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. The prophecies pertain to Samaria and Jerusalem.

The Judge is Coming

1:2 Listen, all you nations! Pay attention, all inhabitants of earth! The sovereign Lord will testify against you; the Lord will accuse you from his majestic palace. 1:3 Look, the Lord is coming out of his dwelling place! He will descend and march on the earth’s mountaintops! 1:4 The mountains will disintegrate beneath him, and the valleys will be split in two. The mountains will melt like wax in a fire, the rocks will slide down like water cascading down a steep slope. 1:5 All this is because of Jacob’s rebellion and the sins of the nation of Israel. How has Jacob rebelled, you ask? Samaria epitomizes their rebellion! Where are Judah’s pagan worship centers, you ask? They are right in Jerusalem! 1:6 “I will turn Samaria into a heap of ruins in an open field– vineyards will be planted there! I will tumble the rubble of her stone walls down into the valley, and tear down her fortifications to their foundations. 1:7 All her carved idols will be smashed to pieces; all her metal cult statues will be destroyed by fire. I will make a waste heap of all her images. Since she gathered the metal as a prostitute collects her wages, the idols will become a prostitute’s wages again.” 1:8 For this reason I will mourn and wail; I will walk around barefoot and without my outer garments. I will howl like a wild dog, and screech like an owl. 1:9 For Samaria’s disease is incurable. It has infected Judah; it has spread to the leadership of my people and has even contaminated Jerusalem! 1:10 Don’t spread the news in Gath! Don’t shed even a single tear! In Beth Leaphrah sit in the dust!

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per phrase)

Wesley: Mic 1:1

The best son, of the worst father. How long Micah prophesied during his reign, we can but conjecture, possibly 'till the fourteenth year of Hezekiah. So this prophet may be supposed to have prophesied sixteen years in Jotham's time, as many under Ahaz, and fourteen under Hezekiah, in all forty - six years. And he survived the captivity of Israel ten years, which he lamented as well as foretold.

Wesley: Mic 1:2

This seems to be an appeal to the senseless creatures, or a summons to bring them in evidences for God against those kingdoms.

Wesley: Mic 1:2

Animate or inanimate creatures, all that are on the earth.

Wesley: Mic 1:2

Either from his temple at Jerusalem, or from heaven.

Wesley: Mic 1:3

He comes forth as a judge, to hear, determine, and punish.

Wesley: Mic 1:3

Heaven, the place of his glorious throne.

Wesley: Mic 1:3

Shew, by the effects of his power, justice, and wisdom, that he is more eminently present there.

Wesley: Mic 1:3

Trample under foot all that is high, excellent, and matter of your glorying.

Wesley: Mic 1:4

Or rent in sunder, broken up and slide away.

Wesley: Mic 1:5

The sons of Jacob, the ten tribes.

Wesley: Mic 1:5

Or, who is the spring, and cause of that overflowing transgression? Of Jacob - The kingdom of the ten tribes, the head of which was Samaria, where the kings had their residence, where they worshiped idols, and set an example to the rest of the Israelitish kingdom.

Wesley: Mic 1:5

Or, who is the cause of the high places, and the idolatry there practised? Jerusalem - Which was the chief city of that kingdom, and had the same influence over Judah, as Samaria had on the ten tribes.

Wesley: Mic 1:6

As a heap of ruins.

Wesley: Mic 1:6

In planting vineyards, they dig up the earth, and cast it up in hillocks; so shall they make this city.

Wesley: Mic 1:6

The city was built on a high hill, and a deep valley beneath it.

Wesley: Mic 1:6

I will raze the walls, fortresses, and public buildings of this city, to the very foundations.

Wesley: Mic 1:7

The rich gifts given for the honour and service of the idols by deceived idolaters.

Wesley: Mic 1:7

The kingdom of Samaria.

Wesley: Mic 1:7

Their wealth, or the rich presents made to their idols.

Wesley: Mic 1:7

As harlots get rich gifts of their lovers.

Wesley: Mic 1:7

These rich presents shall be turned by the Assyrians to the service and honour of their idols.

Wesley: Mic 1:8

Because of those dreadful slaughters in Israel and Samaria.

Wesley: Mic 1:8

As one that in bitterness of passion hath cast off his upper garment.

Wesley: Mic 1:8

Or rather, Jackals, which haunt desolate places, and make a great and hideous noise by night.

Wesley: Mic 1:9

The wounds of Samaria, her own sins, and God's just displeasure.

Wesley: Mic 1:9

The contagion of her sins, and the indignation of God against it, have reached to Judah also, yea, to Jerusalem.

Wesley: Mic 1:10

Lest the Philistines triumph.

Wesley: Mic 1:10

Make no public weeping.

Wesley: Mic 1:10

This was farther from the Philistines.

Wesley: Mic 1:10

Express thy sorrow.

JFB: Mic 1:2

Hebrew, "whatever fills it." Micaiah, son of Imlah, begins his prophecy similarly, "Hearken, O people, every one of you." Micah designedly uses the same preface, implying that his ministrations are a continuation of his predecessor's of the same name. Both probably had before their mind Moses' similar attestation of heaven and earth in a like case (Deu 31:28; Deu 32:1; compare Isa 1:2).

JFB: Mic 1:2

Namely, that none of you can say, when the time of your punishment shall come, that you were not forewarned. The punishment denounced is stated in Mic 1:3, &c.

JFB: Mic 1:2

That is, heaven (1Ki 8:30; Psa 11:4; Jon 2:7; compare Rom 1:18).

JFB: Mic 1:3

He shall destroy the fortified heights (compare Deu 32:13; Deu 33:29) [GROTIUS].

JFB: Mic 1:4

Imagery from earthquakes and volcanic agency, to describe the terrors which attend Jehovah's coming in judgment (compare Jdg 5:5). Neither men of high degree, as the mountains, nor men of low degree, as the valleys, can secure themselves or their land from the judgments of God.

JFB: Mic 1:4

(Psa 97:5; compare Isa 64:1-3). The third clause, "as wax," &c.; answers to the first in the parallelism, "the mountains shall be molten"; the fourth, "as the waters," &c.; to the second, "the valleys shall be cleft." As wax melts by fire, so the mountains before God, at His approach; and as waters poured down a steep cannot stand but are diffused abroad, so the valleys shall be cleft before Jehovah.

JFB: Mic 1:5

All these terrors attending Jehovah's coming are caused by the sins of Jacob or Israel, that is, the whole people.

JFB: Mic 1:5

Taking up the question often in the mouths of the people when reproved, "What is our transgression?" (compare Mal 1:6-7), He answers, Is it not Samaria? Is not that city (the seat of the calf-worship) the cause of Jacob's apostasy (1Ki 14:16; 1Ki 15:26, 1Ki 15:34; 1Ki 16:13, 1Ki 16:19, 1Ki 16:25, 1Ki 16:30)?

JFB: Mic 1:5

What city is the cause of the idolatries on the high places of Judah? Is it not Jerusalem (compare 2Ki 18:4)?

JFB: Mic 1:6

Samaria's punishment is mentioned first, as it was to fall before Jerusalem.

JFB: Mic 1:6

(Mic 3:12). Such a heap of stones and rubbish as is gathered out of fields, to clear them (Hos 12:11). Palestine is of a soil abounding in stones, which are gathered out before the vines are planted (Isa 5:2).

JFB: Mic 1:6

As a place where vines are planted. Vineyards were cultivated on the sides of hills exposed to the sun. The hill on which Samaria was built by Omri, had been, doubtless, planted with vines originally; now it is to be reduced again to its original state (1Ki 16:24).

JFB: Mic 1:6

Dash down the stones of the city into the valley beneath. A graphic picture of the present appearance of the ruins, which is as though "the buildings of the ancient city had been thrown down from the brow of the hill" [Scottish Mission of Inquiry, pp. 293,294].

JFB: Mic 1:6

Destroy it so utterly as to lay bare its foundations (Eze 13:14). Samaria was destroyed by Shalmaneser.

JFB: Mic 1:7

The wealth which Israel boasted of receiving from her idols as the "rewards" or "hire" for worshipping them (Hos 2:5, Hos 2:12).

JFB: Mic 1:7

That is, give them up to the foe to strip off the silver and gold with which they are overlaid.

JFB: Mic 1:7

Israel gathered (made for herself) her idols from the gold and silver received from false gods, as she thought, the "hire" of her worshipping them; and they shall again become what they had been before, the hire of spiritual harlotry, that is, the prosperity of the foe, who also being worshippers of idols will ascribe the acquisition to their idols [MAURER]. GROTIUS explains it, The offerings sent to Israel's temple by the Assyrians, whose idolatry Israel adopted, shall go back to the Assyrians, her teachers in idolatry, as the hire or fee for having taught it. The image of a harlot's hire for the supposed temporal reward of spiritual fornication, is more common in Scripture (Hos 9:1).

JFB: Mic 1:8

The prophet first shows how the coming judgment affects himself, in order that he might affect the minds of his countrymen similarly.

JFB: Mic 1:8

That is, of shoes, or sandals, as the Septuagint translates. Otherwise "naked" would be a tautology.

JFB: Mic 1:8

"Naked" means divested of the upper garment (Isa 20:2). "Naked and barefoot," the sign of mourning (2Sa 15:30). The prophet's upper garment was usually rough and coarse-haired (2Ki 1:8; Zec 13:4).

JFB: Mic 1:8

So JEROME. Rather, "the wild dogs," jackals or wolves, which wail like an infant when in distress or alone [MAURER]. (See on Job 30:29).

JFB: Mic 1:8

Rather, "ostriches," which give a shrill and long-drawn, sigh-like cry, especially at night.

JFB: Mic 1:9

Her case, politically and morally, is desperate (Jer 8:22).

JFB: Mic 1:9

The wound, or impending calamity (compare Isa 10:28).

JFB: Mic 1:9

The evil is no longer limited to Israel. The prophet foresees Sennacherib coming even "to the gate" of the principal city. The use of "it" and "he" is appropriately distinct. "It," the calamity, "came unto" Judah, many of the inhabitants of which suffered, but did not reach the citizens of Jerusalem, "the gate" of which the foe ("he") "came unto," but did not enter (Isa 36:1; Isa 37:33-37).

JFB: Mic 1:10

On the borders of Judea, one of the five cities of the Philistines, who would exult at the calamity of the Hebrews (2Sa 1:20). Gratify not those who exult over the falls of the Israel of God.

JFB: Mic 1:10

Do not betray your inward sorrow by outward weeping, within the cognizance of the enemy, lest they should exult at it. RELAND translates, "Weep not in Acco," that is, Ptolemais, now St. Jean d'Acre, near the foot of Mount Carmel; allotted to Asher, but never occupied by that tribe (Jdg 1:31); Acco's inhabitants would, therefore, like Gath's, rejoice at Israel's disaster. Thus the parallelism is best carried out in all the three clauses of the verse, and there is a similar play on sounds in each, in the Hebrew Gath, resembling in sound the Hebrew for "declare"; Acco, resembling the Hebrew for "weep"; and Aphrah, meaning "dust." While the Hebrews were not to expose their misery to foreigners, they ought to bewail it in their own cities, for example, Aphrah or Ophrah (Jos 18:23; 1Sa 13:17), in the tribe of Benjamin. To "roll in the dust" marked deep sorrow (Jer 6:26; Eze 27:30).

Clarke: Mic 1:1

The word of the Lord that came to Micah the Morasthite - For all authentic particulars relative to this prophet, see the introduction

Clarke: Mic 1:1

In the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah - These three kings reigned about threescore years; and Micah is supposed to have prophesied about forty or fifty years; but no more of his prophecies have reached posterity than what are contained in this book, nor is there any evidence that any more was written. His time appears to have been spent chiefly in preaching and exhorting; and he was directed to write those parts only that were calculated to profit succeeding generations.

Clarke: Mic 1:2

Hear, all ye people - The very commencement of this prophecy supposes preceding exhortations and predictions

Clarke: Mic 1:2

Hearken, O earth - ארץ arets , here, should be translated land, the country of the Hebrews being only intended

Clarke: Mic 1:2

And let the Lord God be Witness - Let him who has sent me with this message be witness that I have delivered it faithfully; and be a witness against you, if you take not the warning

Clarke: Mic 1:2

The Lord from his holy temple - The place where he still remains as your King, and your Judge; and where you profess to pay your devotions. The temple was yet standing, for Jerusalem was not taken for many years after this; and these prophecies were delivered before the captivity of the ten tribes, as Micah appears to have been sent both to Israel and to Judah. See Mic 1:5-9, Mic 1:12, Mic 1:13.

Clarke: Mic 1:3

For, behold, the Lord cometh forth - See this clause, Amo 4:13 (note). He represents Jehovah as a mighty conqueror, issuing from his pavilion, stepping from mountain to mountain, which rush down and fill the valleys before him; a consuming fire accompanying him, that melts and confounds every hill and dale, and blends all in universal confusion. God is here represented as doing that himself which other conquerors do by the multitude of their hosts; levelling the mountains, filling some of the valleys, and digging for waters in others, and pouring them from hills and dales for the use of the conquering armies, by pipes and aqueducts

And why is all this mighty movement? Mic 1:5. "For the transgression of Jacob is all this, and for the sins of the house of Israel."

Clarke: Mic 1:5

What is the transgression of Jacob? - Is it not something extremely grievous? Is it not that of Samaria? Samaria and Jerusalem, the chief cities, are infected with idolatry. Each has its high places, and its idol worship, in opposition to the worship of the true God. That there was idolatry practiced by the elders of Israel, even in the temple of Jehovah, see Eze 8:1, etc. As the royal cities in both kingdoms gave the example of gross idolatry, no wonder that it spread through the whole land, both of Israel and Judah.

Clarke: Mic 1:6

I will make Samaria - I will bring it to desolation: and, instead of being a royal city, it shall be a place for vineyards. Newcome observes, that Samaria was situated on a hill, the right soil for a vineyard

Clarke: Mic 1:6

I will discover the foundations thereof - I will cause its walls and fortifications to be razed to the ground.

Clarke: Mic 1:7

All the hires thereof shall be burned - Multitudes of women gave the money they gained by their public prostitution at the temples for the support of the priesthood, the ornamenting of the walls, altars, and images. So that these things, and perhaps several of the images themselves, were literally the hire of the harlots: and God threatens here to deliver all into the hands of enemies who should seize on this wealth, and literally spend it in the same way in which it was acquired; so that "to the hire of a harlot these things should return."

Clarke: Mic 1:8

I will make a wailing like the dragons - Newcome translates: -

I will make a wailing like the foxes, (or jackals)

And mourning like the daughters of the ostrich

This beast, the jackal or shiagal, we have often met with in the prophets. Travellers inform us that its howlings by night are most lamentable; and as to the ostrich, it is remarkable for its fearful shrieking and agonizing groanings after night. Dr. Shaw says he has often heard them groan as if they were in the greatest agonies.

Clarke: Mic 1:9

Her wound is incurable - Nothing shall prevent their utter ruin, for they have filled up the measure of their iniquity

Clarke: Mic 1:9

He is come - even to Jerusalem - The desolation and captivity of Israel shall first take place; that of Judah shall come after.

Clarke: Mic 1:10

Declare ye it not at Gath - Do not let this prediction be known among the Philistines, else they will glory over you

Clarke: Mic 1:10

House of Aphrah - Or, Beth-aphrah. This place is mentioned Jos 18:23, as in the tribe of Benjamin. There is a paronomasia, or play on words, here: בבית לעפרה עפר bebeith leaphrah aphar , "Roll thyself in the dust in the house of dust."

Calvin: Mic 1:1

This inscription, in the first place, shows the time in which Micah lived, and during which God employed his labors. And this deserves to be noticed: for at this day his sermons would be useless, or at least frigid, except his time were known to us, and we be thereby enabled to compare what is alike and what is different in the men of his age, and in those of our own: for when we understand that Micah condemned this or that vice, as we may also learn from the other Prophets and from sacred history, we are able to apply more easily to ourselves what he then said, inasmuch as we can view our own life as it were in a mirror. This is the reason why the Prophets are wont to mention the time in which they executed their office.

But how long Micah followed the course of his vocation we cannot with certainty determine. It is, however, probable that he discharged his office as a Prophet for thirty years: it may be that he exceeded forty years; for he names here three kings, the first of whom, that is Jotham, reigned sixteen years; and he was followed by Ahab, who also reigned as many years. If then Micah was called at the beginning of the first reign, he must have prophesied for thirty-two years, the time of the two kings. Then the reign of Hezekiah followed, which continued to the twenty-ninth year: and it may be, that the Prophet served God to the death, or even beyond the death, of Hezekiah. ⁵⁹ We hence see that the number of his years cannot with certainty be known; though it be sufficiently evident that he taught not for a few years, but that he so discharged his office, that for thirty years he was not wearied, but constantly persevered in executing the command of God.

I have said that he was contemporary with Isaiah: but as Isaiah began his office under Uzziah, we conclude that he was older. Why then was Micah joined to him? That the Lord might thus break down the stubbornness of the people. It was indeed enough that one man was sent by God to bear witness to the truth; but it pleased God that a testimony should be borne by the mouth of two, and that holy Isaiah should be assisted by this friend and, as it were, his colleague. And we shall hereafter find that they adopted the very same words; but there was no emulation between them, so that one accused the other of theft, when he repeated what had been said. Nothing was more gratifying to each of them than to receive a testimony from his colleague; and what was committed to them by God they declared not only in the same sense and meaning, but also in the same words, and, as it were, with one mouth.

Of the expression, that the word was sent to him, we have elsewhere reminded you, that it ought not to be understood of private teaching, as when the word of God is addressed to individuals; but the word was given to Micah, that he might be God’s ambassador to us. It means then that he came furnished with commands, as one sustaining the person of God himself; for he brought nothing of his own, but what the Lord commanded him to proclaim. But as I have elsewhere enlarged on this subject, I now only touch on it briefly.

This vision, he says, was given him against two cities Samaria and Jerusalem ⁶⁰ It is certain that the Prophet was specifically sent to the Jews; and Maresah, from which he arose, as it appears from the inscription, was in the tribe of Judah: for Morasthite was an appellative, derived from the place Maresah. ⁶¹ But it may be asked, why does he say that visions had been given him against Samaria? We have said elsewhere, that though Hosea was specifically and in a peculiar manner destined for the kingdom of Israel, he yet by the way mingled sometimes those things which referred to the tribe or kingdom of Judah: and such was also the case with our Prophet; he had a regard chiefly to his own kindred, for he knew that he was appointed for them; but, at the same time, he overlooked not wholly the other part of the people; for the kingdom of Israel was not so divided from the tribe of Judah that no connection remained: for God was unwilling that his covenant should be abolished by their defection from the kingdom of David. We hence see, that though Micah spent chiefly his labors in behalf of the Jews, he yet did not overlook or entirely neglect the Israelites.

But the title must be restricted to one part of the book; for threatenings only form the discourse here. But we shall find that promises, full of joy, are also introduced. The inscription then does not include all the contents of the book; but as his purpose was to begin with threatenings, and to terrify the Jews by setting before them the punishment that was at hand, this inscription was designedly given. There is, at the same time, no doubt but that the Prophet was ill received by the Jews on this account; for they deemed it a great indignity, and by no means to be endured, to be tied up in the same bundle with the Israelites; for Samaria was an abomination to the kingdom of Judah; and yet the Prophet here makes no difference between Samaria and Jerusalem. This was then an exasperating sentence: but we see how boldly the Prophet performs the office committed to him; for he regarded not what would be agreeable to men, nor endeavored to draw them by smooth things: though his message was disliked, he yet proclaimed it, for he was so commanded, nor could he shake off the yoke of his vocation. Let us now proceed —

Calvin: Mic 1:2

The Prophet here rises into an elevated style, being not content with a simple and calm manner of speaking. We hence may learn, that having previously tried the disposition of the people, he knew the stubbornness of almost all classes: for except he was persuaded that the people would be rebellious and obstinate, he would certainly have used some mildness, or have at least endeavored to lead them of their own accord rather than to drive them thus violently. There is then no doubt but that the obstinacy of the people and their wickedness were already fully known to him, even before he began to address one word to them. But this difficulty did not prevent him from obeying God’s command. He found it necessary in the meantime to add vehemence to his teaching; for he saw that he addressed the deaf, yea, stupid men, who were destitute of every sense of religion, and who had hardened themselves against God, and had not only fallen away through want of thought, but had also become immersed in their sins, and were wickedly and abominably obstinate in them. Since then the Prophet saw this, he makes here a bold beginning, and addresses not only his own nation, for whom he was appointed a Teacher; but he speaks to the whole world.

For what purpose does he say, Hear, all ye people? ⁶² It was not certainly his object to proclaim indiscriminately to all the truth of God for the same end: but he summons here all nations as witnesses or judges, that the Jews might understand that their impiety would be made evident to all, except they repented, and that there was no reason for them to hope that they could conceal their baseness, for God would expose their hidden crimes as it were on an open stage. We hence see how emphatical are the words, when the Prophet calls on all nations and would have them to be witnesses of the judgment which God had resolved to bring on his people.

He afterwards adds, Let also the earth give ear and its fullness We may take the earth, by metonymy, for its inhabitants; but as it is added, and its fullness, the Prophet, I doubt not, meant here to address the very earth itself, though it be without reason. He means that so dreadful would be the judgment of God, as to shake created things which are void of sense; and thus he more severely upbraids the Jews with their stupor, that they heedlessly neglected the word of God, which yet would shake all the elements by its power.

He then immediately turns his discourse to the Jews: after having erected God’s tribunal and summoned all the nations, that they might form as it were a circle of a solemn company, he says, There will be for me the Lord Jehovah against you for a witness — the Lord from the temple of his holiness. By saying that God would be as a witness for him, he not only affirms that he was sent by God, but being as it were inflamed with zeal, he appeals here to God, and desires him to be present, that the wickedness and obstinacy of the people might not be unpunished; as though he said, “Let God, whose minister I am, be with me, and punish your impiety; let him prove that he is the author of this doctrine, which I declare from his mouth and by his command; let him not suffer you to escape unpunished, if ye do not repent.”

We now then perceive the meaning of the Prophet, when he says that God would be for him a witness; as though he had said, that there was no room here to trifle; for if the Jews thought to elude God’s judgment they greatly deceived themselves; inasmuch as when he has given a command to his servants to treat with his people, he is at the same time present as a judge, and will not suffer his word to be rejected without immediately undertaking his own cause.

Nor is this addition superfluous, The Lord from the temple of his holiness: for we know how thoughtlessly the Jews were wont to boast that God dwelt in the midst of them. And this presumption so blinded them that they despised all the Prophets; for they thought it unlawful that any thing should be said to their disgrace, because they were the holy people of God, his holy heritage and chosen nation. Inasmuch then as the Lord had adopted them, they falsely boasted of his favors. Since then the Prophet knew that the people insolently gloried in those privileges, with which they had been honored by God, he now declares that God would be the avenger of impiety from his temple; as though he said, Ye boast that God is bound to you, and that he has so bound up his faith to you as to render his name to you a sport: he indeed dwells in his temple; but from thence he will manifest himself as an avenger, as he sees that you are perverse in your wickedness. We hence see that the Prophet beats down that foolish arrogance, by which the Jews were inflated; yea, he turns back on their own heads what they were wont boastingly to bring forward. After having made this introduction, to awaken slumbering men with as much vehemence as he could, he subjoins —

Calvin: Mic 1:3

The Prophet pursues the same subject; and he dwells especially on this — that God would be a witness against his people from his sanctuary. He therefore confirms this, when he says that God would come from his place Some interpreters do at the same time take this view — that the temple would hereafter be deprived of God’s presence, and would hence become profane, according to what Ezekiel declares. For as the Jews imagined that God was connected with them as long as the temple stood, and this false imagination proved to them an allurement, as it were, to sin, as on this account they took to themselves greater liberty, — this was the reason why the Prophet Ezekiel declares that God was no longer in the temple; and the Lord had shown to him by a vision that he had left his temple, so that he would no longer dwell there. Some, as I have said, give a similar explanation of this passage; but this sense does not seem to suit the context. I therefore take another view of this sentence — that God would go forth from his place. But yet it is doubted what place the Prophet refers to: for many take it to be heaven, and this seems probable, for immediately after he adds, Descend shall God, and he will tread on the high places of the earth This descent seems indeed to point out a higher place: but as the temple, we know, was situated on a high and elevated spot, on mount Zion, there is nothing inconsistent in saying that God descended from his temple to chastise the whole of Judea as it deserved. Then the going forth of God is by no means ambiguous in its meaning, for he means that God would at length go forth, as it were, in a visible form. With regard then to the place, I am inclined to refer it to the temple; and this clause, I have no doubt, has proceeded from the last verse.

But why is going forth here ascribed to God? Because the Jews had abused the forbearance of God in worshipping him with vain ceremonies in the temple; and at the same time they thought that they had escaped from his hand. As long then as God spared them, they thought that he was, as it were, bound to them, because he dwelt among them. Besides, as the legal and shadowy worship prevailed among them, they imagined that God rested in their temple. But now the Prophet says, “He will go forth: ye have wished hitherto to confine God to the tabernacle, and ye have attempted to pacify him with your frivolous puerilities: but ye shall know that his hand and his power extend much farther: he shall therefore come and show what that majesty is which has been hitherto a derision to you.” For when hypocrites set to sale their ceremonies to God, do they not openly trifle with him, as though he were a child? and do they not thus rob him of his power and authority? Such was the senselessness of that people. The Prophet therefore does not say without reason that God would go forth, that he might prove to the Jews that they were deluded by their own vain imaginations, when they thus took away from God what necessarily belonged to him, and confined him to a corner in Judea and fixed him there, as though he rested and dwelt there like a dead idol.

The particle, Behold, is emphatical: for the Prophet intended here to shake off from the Jews their torpidity, inasmuch as nothing was more difficult to them than to be persuaded and to believe that punishment was nigh at hand, when they flattered themselves that God was propitious to them. Hence that they might no longer cherish this willfulness, he says, Behold, come shall the Lord, forth shall he go from his place Isaiah has a passage like this in an address to the people, Isa 26:0; but the object of it is different; for Isaiah intended to threaten the enemies of the Church and heathen nations: but here Micah denounces war on the chosen people, and shows that God thus dwelt in his temple, that the Jews might perceive that his hand was opposed to them, as they had so shamefully despised him, and, by their false imaginations reduced, as it were, to nothing his power.

He shall tread, he says, on the high places of the earth By the high places of the earth I do not understand superstitious places, but those well fortified. We know that fortresses were then fixed, for the most part, on elevated situations. The Prophet then intimates, that there would be no place into which God’s vengeance would not penetrate, however well fortified it might be: “No enclosures,” he says, “shall hinder God from penetrating into the inmost parts of your fortresses; he shall tread on the high places of the earth.” At the same time, I doubt not but that he alludes, by this kind of metaphor, to the chief men, who thought themselves exempted from the common lot of mankind; for they excelled so much in power, riches, and authority, that they would not be classed with the common people. The Prophet then intimates, that those, who were become proud through a notion of their own superiority would not be exempt from punishment.

Calvin: Mic 1:4

And he afterwards adds, that this going forth of God would be terrible, Melt, he says, shall the mountains under him It hence appears, that the Prophet did not speak in the last verse of the departure of God, as though he was going to forsake his own temple, but that he, on the contrary, described his going forth from the temple, that he might ascend his tribunal and execute punishment on the whole people, and thus, in reality, prove that he would be a judge, because he had been very daringly despised. Hence he says, Melt shall the mountains under him, the valleys shall be rent, or cleave, as wax before the fire, as waters rolling into a lower place ⁶³ The Prophets do not often describe God in a manner so awful; but this representation is to be referred to the circumstance of this passage, for he sets forth God here as the judge of the people: it was therefore necessary that he should be exhibited as furnished and armed with powers that he might stake such vengeance on the Jews as they deserved. And other similar passages we shall hereafter meet with, and like to those which we found in Hosea. God then is said to melt the mountains, and he is said to strike the valleys with such terror that they cleave under him; in short, he is said so to terrify all elements, that the very mountains, however stony they may be, melt like wax or like waters which flow, — because he could not otherwise produce a real impression on a people so obstinate, and who, as it has been said, so flattered themselves even in their vices.

We may further easily learn what application to make of this truth in our day. We find the Papists boasting of the title Church, and, in a manner, with vain confidence, binding God to themselves, because they have baptism, though they have adulterated it with their superstitions; and then, they think that they have Christ, because they still retain the name of a Church. Had the Lord promised that his dwelling would be at Rome, we yet see how foolish and frivolous would be such boasting: for though the temple was at Jerusalem, yet the Lord went forth thence to punish the sins of the people, yea, even of the chosen people. We further know, that it is folly to bind God now to one place, for it is his will that his name should be celebrated without any difference through the whole world. Wheresoever, then, the voice of the Gospel sounds, God would have us to know that he is present there. What the Papists then proudly boast of — that Christ is joined to them — will turn out to their own condemnation; — why so? Because the Lord will prove that he is the avenger of so impious and shameful a profanation, as they not only presumptuously lay claim to his name, but also tear it in pieces, and contaminate it with their sacrilegious abominations.

Again, since God is said to melt the mountains with his presence, let us hence learn to rouse up all our feelings whenever God comes forth not that we may flee to a distance from him, but that we may reverently receive his word, so that he may afterwards appear to us a kind and reconciled Father. For when we become humble, and the pride and height of our flesh is subdued, he then immediately receives us, as it were, into his gentle bosom, and gives us an easy access to him, yea, he invites us to himself with all possible kindness. That the Lord then may thus kindly receive us, let us learn to fear as soon as he utters his voice: but let not this fear make us to flee away but only humble us, so that we may render true obedience to the word of the Lord. It follows —

Calvin: Mic 1:5

The Prophet teaches, in this verse, that God is not angry for nothing; though when he appears rigid, men expostulate with him, and clamor as though he were cruel. That men may, therefore, acknowledge that God is a just judge, and that he never exceeds moderation in punishments, the Prophet here distinctly states that there was a just cause, why God denounced so dreadful a judgment on his chosen people, — even because not only a part of the people, but the whole body had, through their impiety, fallen away; for by the house of Jacob, and by the house of Israel, he means that impiety had everywhere prevailed, so that no part was untainted. The meaning then is, — that the contagion of sin had spread through all Israel, that no portion of the country was free from iniquity, that no corner of the land could bring an excuse for its defection; the Lord therefore shows that he would be the judge of them all, and would spare neither small nor great.

We now then understand the Prophet’s object in this verse: As he had before taught how dreadful would be God’s vengeance against all the ungodly, so now he mentions their crimes, that they might not complain that they were unjustly treated, or that God employed too much severity. The Prophet then testifies that the punishment, then near at hand, would be just.

He now adds, What is the wickedness of Jacob? The Prophet, no doubt, indirectly reproves here the hypocrisy which ruled dominant among the people. For he asks not for his own satisfaction or in his own person; but, on the contrary, he relates, by way of imitation, (μιμητικῶς, — imitatively) what he knew to be ever on their lips, “Oh! what sort of thing is this sin? Why! thou assumest here a false principle, — that we are wicked men, ungodly and perfidious: thou does us a grievous wrong.” Inasmuch, then, as hypocrites thought themselves pure, having wiped, as it were, their mouths, whenever they eluded reproofs by their sophistries, the Prophet borrows a question, as it were, from their own lips, “Of what kind is this wickedness? Of what sort is that transgression?” As though he said, “I know what ye are wont to do, when any one of the Prophets severely reproves you; ye instantly contend with him, and are ready with your objections: but what do you gain? If you wish to know what your wickedness is, it is Samaria; and where your high places are, they are at Jerusalem.” It is the same as if he had said, “I do not here contend with the common people, but I attack the first men: my contest then is with the princes themselves, who surpass others in dignity, and are, therefore, unwilling to be touched.”

But it sometimes happens that the common people become degenerated, while some integrity remains among the higher orders: but the Prophet shows that the diseases among the people belonged to the principal men; and hence he names the two chief cities, Jerusalem and Samaria, as he had said before, in the first verse, that he proclaimed predictions against these: and yet it is certain, that the punishment was to be in common to the whole people. But as they thought that Jerusalem and Samaria would be safe, though the whole country were destroyed, the Prophet threatens them by name: for, relying first on their strength, they thought themselves unassailable; and then, the eyes of nearly all, we know, were dazzled with empty splendor, powers and dignity: thus the ungodly wholly forget that they are men, and what they owe to God, when elevated in the world. So great an arrogance could not be subdued, except by sharp and severe words, such as the Prophet, as we see, here employs. He then says, that the wickedness of Israel was Samaria; the fountain of all iniquities was the royal city, which yet ought to have ruled the whole land with wisdom and justice: but what any more remains, when kings and their counselors tread under foot all regard for what is just and right, and having cast away every shame, rise up in rebellion against God and men? When therefore kings thus fall from their dignity, an awful ruin must follow.

This is the reason why the Prophet says that the wickedness of Israel was Samaria, that thence arose all iniquities. But we must at the same time bear in mind, that the Prophet speaks not here of gross crimes; but, on the contrary, he directs his reproof against ungodly and perverted forms of worship; and this appears more evident from the second clause, in which he mentions transgressions in connection with the high places. We hence see, that all sins in general are not here reproved, but their vicious modes of worship, by which religion had been polluted among the Jews as well as the Israelites. But it might seem very unjust, that the Prophet should charge with sin those forms of worship in which the Jews laboriously exercised themselves with the object of pacifying God. But we see how God regards as nothing whatever men blend with his worship out of their own heads. And this is our principal contest at this day with the Papists; we call their perverted and spurious modes of worship abominations: they think that what is heavenly is to be blended with what is earthly. We diligently labor, they say, for this end — that God may be worshipped. True; but, at the same time, ye profane his worship by your inventions; and it is therefore an abomination. We now then see how foolish and frivolous are those delusions, when men follow their own wisdom in the duty of worshipping God: for the Prophet here, in the name of God, fulminates, as it were, from heaven against all superstitions, and shows that no sin is more detestable, than that preposterous caprice with which idolaters are inflamed, when they observe such forms of worship as they have themselves invented.

Now with regard to the high places, we must notice, that there was a great difference between the Jews and the Israelites at that time as to idolatry. The Israelites had so fallen, that they were altogether degenerated; nothing could be seen among them that had an affinity to the true and legitimate worship of God: but the Jews had retained some form of religion, they had not thus abandoned themselves; but yet they had a mixture of superstitions; such as one would find, were he to compare the gross Popery of this day with that middle course which those men invent, who seem to themselves to be very wise, fearing, forsooth, as they do, the offenses of the world; and hence they form for us a mixture, I know not what, from the superstitions of the Papacy and from the Reformation, as they call it. Something like this was the mixture at Jerusalem. We however see, that the Prophet pronounces the same sentence against the Jews and the Israelites and that is, that God will allow nothing that proceeds from the inventions of men to be joined to his word. Since then God allows no such mixtures, the Prophet here says that there was no less sin on the high places of Judea, than there was in those filthy abominations which were then dominant among the people of Israel. But the remainder we must defer until to-morrow.

Calvin: Mic 1:6

Though Micah intended especially to devote his services to the Jews, as we have said yesterday, he yet, in the first place, passes judgment on Samaria; for it was his purpose afterwards to speak more fully against Jerusalem and the whole of Judea. And this state of the case ought to be borne in mind; for the Prophet does not begin with the Israelites, because he directs his discourse peculiarly to them; but his purpose was briefly to reprove them, and then to address more especially his own people, for it was for this purpose that he was called. Now, as he threatens destruction to Samaria and the whole kingdom of Israel on account of their corrupted forms of worship, we may hence learn how displeasing to God is superstition, and that he regards nothing so much as the true worship of his name. There is no reason here for men to advance this position — that they do not designedly sin; for God shows how he is to be worshipped by us. Whenever, then, we deviate in any thing from the rule which he has prescribed, we manifest, in that particular, our rebellion and obstinacy. Hence the superstitious ever act like fools with regard to God, for they will not submit to his word, so as to be thereby alone made wise.

And he says, I will set Samaria as an heap of the field, that is, such shall be the ruins that they shall differ nothing from the heaps of the fields: for husband men, we know, when they find stones in their fields, throw them into some corner, that they may not be in the way of the slough. Like such heaps then, as are seen in the fields, Samaria would be, according to what God declared. He then says, that the place would be empty, so that vines would be planted there; and, in the third place, that its stones would be scattered through the valley; as when one casts stones where there is a wide plain, they run and roll far and wide; so would be the scattering of Samaria according to what the Prophet says, it was to be like the rolling of stones in a wide field. He adds, in the fourth place, I will uncover her foundations, that is, I will entirely demolish it, so that a stone, as Christ says, may not remain on a stone, (Mat 24:2.) We now perceive the import of the words; and we also perceive that the reason why the Prophet denounces on Samaria so severe a judgment was, because it had corrupted the legitimate worship of God with its own inventions; for it had devised, as we well know, many idols, so that the whole authority of the law had been abolished among the Israelites. It now follows —

Calvin: Mic 1:7

The Prophet goes on with the same subject, and says, that the ruin of Samaria was at hand, so that its idols would be broken, and also, that its wealth would be destroyed which she had gathered by illegitimate means, and which she thought to be the reward of her idolatry. But God mentions idols here expressly by his Prophet, in order to confirm what we noticed yesterday — that the cause of vengeance was, because Samaria had abandoned itself to ungodly forms of worship, and had departed from the Law. That the Israelites might then understand the cause for which God would so severely punish them, the Prophet here makes express mention of their graven images and idols. God is not indeed angry with stones and wood; but he observes the abuse and the perversion of them, when men pollute themselves by wickedly worshipping such things. This is the reason why God says here that the graven images of Samaria would be broken in pieces, and that its idols would be destroyed.

With regard to the wages, the Prophet no doubt designed to stamp with disgrace all the wealth of Samaria. אתנן , atanen, is properly a gift or a present. But as he twice repeats it, and says, that what Samaria possessed was the reward of an harlot, and then, that it would return to the reward of an harlot, he, in the first place, I have no doubt, upbraids the Israelites, because they, after the manner of harlots and strumpets, had heaped together their great riches: and this was done by Jeroboam, who constructed a new form of worship, in order to secure his own kingdom. The Israelites then began to flourish; and we also know how wealthy that kingdom became, and how proud they were on account of their riches. As, then, the Israelites despised the kingdom of Judah, and thought themselves in every way happy, and as they ascribed all this, as we have seen in Hosea, to their superstitions, Micah speaks here according to their view of things, when he says, Idolatry has been gainful to you, this splendor dazzles your eyes; but your rewards I have already doomed to the burning: they shall then be burnt, and thus perish. Hosea also, as we have seen, made use of the same comparison, — that the children of Israel felicitated themselves in their impiety, like a harlot, who, while she gains many presents from those who admire her beauty, seems not conscious of her turpitude and baseness: such were the Israelites. The Prophets therefore does not say, without reason, Behold, your rewards, by burning, shall perish, or, be consumed with fire. Why so? Because ye have gathered them, he says, from the reward of an harlot, and all this shall return to the reward of an harlot.

This last clause ought to be restricted to the gifts or wealth of Samaria; for it cannot properly be applied to idols or graven images. The import of the whole then is that God would be the avenger of idolatry with regard to the city of Samaria and the whole kingdom of Israel. Besides, as the Israelites boasted that their ungodly forms of worship turned out to their happiness and prosperity, God declares that the whole of this success would be evanescent, like that of the harlot, who amasses great wealth, which soon vanishes away: and we see that thus it commonly happens.

Some explain the passage thus, — that the gifts, with which the Israelites adorned their temples, would return to be the reward of an harlot, that is, would he transferred to Chaldea, and that the Babylonians would, in their turn, adorn with them their idols. But this view is not suitable to the place; for the Prophet does not say that what Samaria had gathered would be a prey or a spoil to enemies but that it would perish by fire. ⁶⁶ He speaks therefore, proverbially when he says that the produce, from the reward of an harlot, would return to be the reward of an harlot, that is, that it would become nothing; for the Lord sets a curse on such riches as strumpets gain by their baseness, while they prostitute themselves. Since, then, the whole of such wealth is under the curse of God, it must necessarily soon pass away like smoke: and this, in my view, is the real meaning of the Prophet. It now follows —

Calvin: Mic 1:8

The Prophet here assumes the character of a mourner, that he might more deeply impress the Israelites; for we have seen that they were almost insensible in their torpidity. It was therefore necessary that they should be brought to view the scene itself, that, seeing their destruction before their eyes they might be touched both with grief and fear. Lamentations of this kind are everywhere to be met with in the Prophets, and they ought to be carefully noticed; for we hence gather how great was the torpor of men, inasmuch as it was necessary to awaken them, by this form of speech, in order to convince them that they had to do with God: they would have otherwise continued to flatter themselves with delusions. Though indeed the Prophet here addresses the Israelites, we ought yet to apply this to ourselves; for we are not much unlike the ancient people: for however God may terrify us with dreadful threatening, we still remain quiet in our filth. It is therefore needful that we should be severely treated, for we are almost void of feeling.

But the Prophets sometimes assumed mourning, and sometimes they were touched with real grief: for when they spoke of aliens and also of the enemies of the Church, they introduce these lamentations. When a mention is made of Babylon or of Egypt, they sometimes say, Behold, I will mourn, and my bowels shall be as a timbrel. The Prophets did not then really grieve; but, as I have said, they transferred to themselves the sorrows of others, and ever with this object, that they might persuade men that God’s threatenings were not vain, and that God did not trifle with men when he declared that he was angry with them. But when the discourse was respecting the Church and the faithful, then the Prophets did not put on grief. The representation here is then to be taken in such a way as that we may understand that the Prophet was in real mourning, when he saw that a dreadful ruin was impending over the whole kingdom of Israel. For though they had perfidiously departed from the Law, they were yet a part of the holy race, they were the children of Abraham, whom God had received into favor. The Prophet, therefore, could not refrain from mourning unfeignedly for them. And the Prophet does here these two things, — he shows the fraternal love which he entertained for the children of Israel, as they were his kindred, and a part of the chosen people, — and he also discharges his own duty; for this lamentation was, as it were, the mirror in which he sets before them the vengeance of God towards men so extremely torpid. He therefore exhibits to them this representation, that they might perceive that God was by no means trifling with men, when he thus denounced punishment on the wicked and such as were apostates.

Moreover, he speaks not of a common lamentation, but says, I will wail and howl, and then, I will go spoiled The word אנושה , shulal, some take as meaning one out of his mind or insane, as though he said, “I shall be now as one not possessed of a sound mind.” But as this metaphor is rather unnatural, I prefer the sense of being spoiled; for it was the custom with mourners, as it is well known, to tear and to throw away their garments from them. I will then go spoiled and naked; and also, I will make wailing, not like that of men, but like the wailing of dragons: I will mourn, he says, as the ostriches are wont to do. In short, the Prophet by these forms of speech intimates, that the coming evil would by no means be of an ordinary kind: for if he adopted the usual manner of men, he could not have set forth the dreadfulness of God’s vengeance that was impending.

Calvin: Mic 1:9

He afterwards subjoins, that the wounds vault be grievous; but he speaks as of what was present, Grievous, he says, are the wounds Grievous means properly full of grief; others render it desperate or incurable, but it is a meaning which suits not this place; for אנושה , anushe, means what we express in French by douloureuse. The wounds, then, are full of grief: for it came, (something is understood; it may suitably be referred to the enemy, or, what is more approved, to the slaughter) — It came then, that is, the slaughter, ⁶⁸ to Judah; it has reached to the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem itself. He says first, to Judah, speaking of the land; and then he confines it to the cities; for when the gates are closed up against enemies, they are forced to stop. But the Prophet says, that the cities would be no hindrance to the enemies to approach the very gates and even the chief city of Judah, that is, Jerusalem; and this, we know, was fulfilled. It is the same then as though he said that the whole kingdom of Israel would be so laid waste, that their enemies would not he content with victory, but would proceed farther and besiege the holy city: and this Sennacherib did. For after having subverted the kingdom of Israel, as though it was not enough to draw the ten tribes into exile, he resolved to take possession of the kingdom of Judah; and Jerusalem, as Isaiah says, was left as a tent. We hence see that the threatening of the Prophet Micah were not in vain. It now follows —

Calvin: Mic 1:10

The Prophet seems here to be inconsistent with himself: for he first describes the calamity that was to be evident to all; but now he commands silence, lest the report should reach the enemies. But there is here nothing contradictory; for the evil itself could not be hid, since the whole kingdom of Israel would be desolated, the cities demolished or burnt, the whole country spoiled and laid waste, and then the enemies would enter the borders of Judah: and when Jerusalem should have been nearly taken how could it have been concealed? No, this could not have been. There is no wonder then that the Prophet had referred here to a solemn mourning. But he now speaks of the feeling of those who were desirous of hiding their own disgrace, especially from their enemies and aliens: for it is an indignity which greatly vexes us, when enemies taunt us, and upbraid us in our misfortunes; when no hope remains, we at least wish to perish in secret, so that no reproach and disgrace should accompany our death; for dishonor is often harder to be borne, and wounds us more grievously, than any other evil. The Prophet then means that the Israelites would not only be miserable, but would also be subject to the reproaches and taunts of their enemies. We indeed know that the Philistine were inveterate in their hatred to the people of God; and we know that they ever took occasion to upbraid them with their evils and calamities.

This then is the meaning of the Prophet, when he says, In Gath declare it not, by weeping weep not; as though he said, “Though extreme evils shall come upon you, yet seek to perish in silence; for you will find that your enemies will gape for the opportunity to cut you with their taunts, when they shall see you thus miserable. He then forbids the people’s calamities to be told in Gath; for the Philistine usually desired nothing more than the opportunity to torment the people of God with reproaches.

It now follows, In the house of Aphrah, in dust roll thyself There is here an alliteration which cannot be conveyed in Latin: for עפרה , ophre, means dusty, and עפר , opher, is dust. That city attained its name from its situation, because the country where it was, was full of dust; as if a city were called Lutosa, muddy or full of clay; and indeed many think that Lutetia (Paris) had hence derived its name. And he says, Roll thyself in dust, in the house full of dust; as though he had said that the name would be now most suitable, for the ruin of the city would constrain all neighboring cities to be in mourning to cast themselves in the dust; So great would be the extremity of their evils.

But we must ever bear in mind the object of the Prophet: for he here rouses the Israelites as it were with the sharpest goads, who entertained no just idea of the dreadfulness of God’s vengeance, but were ever deaf to all threatening. The Prophet then shows that the execution of this vengeance which he denounced was ready at hand; and he himself not only mourned, but called others also to mourning. He speaks of the whole country, as we shall see by what follows. I shall quickly run over the whole of this chapter; for there is no need of long explanation, as you will find.

Defender: Mic 1:1

Micah ("Who is like Jehovah?") was a contemporary of Isaiah in Judah, and some of his prophecies reflect the influence of Isaiah's Messianic writings.

Defender: Mic 1:1

Although Micah lived in Judah, coming from a small town south of Jerusalem, his prophecy was directed to both Samaria and Jerusalem (capitals of the northern and southern kingdoms, respectively), and centered particularly upon the coming invasion of Israel by Assyria, which in turn was a precursive foreshadowing of the judgments of the last days."

Defender: Mic 1:6

This prophecy was fulfilled when the Assyrians besieged Samaria for three years, finally defeating King Hoshea and his forces, and carrying them away to Assyria (2Ki 17:6). Since this event took place during the reign of Ahaz in Judah, the prophecy itself was evidently made during the previous reign of Jotham. Samaria, built to a state of opulence by Omri and Ahab, as the capital of Israel, was completely demolished by the Assyrian armies of Sargon. It stood on a hill, but its building stones were thrown down into the valley, just as prophesied, and its entire area eventually cultivated with vineyards, olive trees and fig trees."

Defender: Mic 1:9

Micah could also foresee the future time when the same Assyrian invaders would come to the very "gate of my people, even to Jerusalem" during the later reign of Hezekiah (2Ki 18:17)."

TSK: Mic 1:1

Micah : Mic 1:14, Mic 1:15; Jer 26:18

Jotham : 2Chr. 27:1-32:33; Isa 1:1; Hos 1:1

which : Amo 1:1; Hab 1:1

concerning : Mic 1:5; Hos 4:15, Hos 5:5-14, Hos 6:10,Hos 6:11, Hos 8:14, Hos 12:1, Hos 12:2; Amo 2:4-8, Amo 3:1, Amo 3:2, Amo 6:1

TSK: Mic 1:2

all ye people : Heb. ye people all of them

hearken : Mic 6:1, Mic 6:2; Deu 32:1; Psa 49:1, Psa 49:2, Psa 50:1; Isa 1:2; Jer 22:29; Mar 7:14-16; Rev 2:7, Rev 2:11, Rev 2:17, Rev 2:29, Rev 3:6, Rev 3:13, Rev 3:22

all that therein is : Heb. the fulness thereof, Psa 24:1, Psa 50:12

let : Psa 50:7; Jer 29:23; Mal 2:14, Mal 3:5

the Lord from : Psa 11:4, Psa 28:2; Jon 2:7; Hab 2:20

TSK: Mic 1:3

cometh : Isa 26:21, Isa 64:1, Isa 64:2; Eze 3:12; Hos 5:14, Hos 5:15

place : Psa 115:3

and tread : Job 40:12; Isa 2:10-19, Isa 25:10, Isa 63:3, Isa 63:4; Amo 4:13

the high : Deu 32:13, Deu 33:29; Hab 3:19

TSK: Mic 1:4

the mountains : Jdg 5:4; Psa 97:5; Isa 64:1-3; Amo 9:5; Nah 1:5; Hab 3:6, Hab 3:10; 2Pe 3:10-12; Rev 20:11

the valleys : Zec 14:4

as wax : Psa 68:2

a steep place : Heb. a descent

TSK: Mic 1:5

the transgression of Jacob : 2Kings 17:7-23; 2Ch 36:14-16; Isa 50:1, Isa 50:2, Isa 59:1-15; Jer 2:17, Jer 2:19; Jer 4:18, Jer 5:25, Jer 6:19; Lam 5:16; 1Th 2:15, 1Th 2:16

is it : 1Ki 13:32; Hos 7:1, Hos 8:5, Hos 8:6; Amo 6:1, Amo 8:14

they : 2Ki 16:3, 2Ki 16:4, 2Ki 16:10-12; 2Ch 28:2-4, 2Ch 28:23-25

TSK: Mic 1:6

I will make : Mic 3:12; 2Ki 19:25; Isa 25:2, Isa 25:12; Jer 9:11, Jer 51:37; Hos 13:16

and I will pour : Jer 51:25; Lam 4:1; Eze 13:14; Hab 3:13; Mat 24:2

TSK: Mic 1:7

all the graven : Lev 26:30; 2Ki 23:14, 2Ki 23:15; 2Ch 31:1, 2Ch 34:6, 2Ch 34:7; Isa 27:9; Hos 8:6, Hos 10:5, Hos 10:6

the hires : Jer 44:17, Jer 44:18; Hos 2:5, Hos 2:12

for : Deu 23:18; Joe 3:3; Rev 18:3, Rev 18:9, Rev 18:12, Rev 18:13

TSK: Mic 1:8

I will wail : Isa 16:9, Isa 21:3, Isa 22:4; Jer 4:19, Jer 9:1, Jer 9:10,Jer 9:19, Jer 48:36-39

I will go : Isa 20:2-4

a wailing : Job 30:29; Psa 102:6

owls : Heb. daughters of the owl

TSK: Mic 1:9

her wound is incurable : or, she is grievously sick of her wounds, Isa 1:5, Isa 1:6; Jer 15:18, Jer 30:11-15

it : 2Ki 18:9-13; Isa 8:7, Isa 8:8

he : Mic 1:12; 2Chr. 32:1-23; Isa 10:28-32, Isa 37:22-36

TSK: Mic 1:10

Declare : 2Sa 1:20; Amo 5:13, Amo 6:10

Aphrah : i.e. dust, Jos 18:23, Ophrah

roll : Job 2:8; Jer 6:26; Lam 3:29

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per Verse)

Barnes: Mic 1:1

The word of the Lord that came to Micah ... which he saw - No two of the prophets authenticate their prophecy in exactly the same way. They, one and all, have the same simple statement to make, that this which they say is from God, and through them. A later hand, had it added the titles, would have formed all upon one model. The title was an essential part of the prophetic book, as indicating to the people afterward, that it was not written after the event. It was a witness, not to the prophet whose name it bears, but to God. The prophet bare witness to God, that what he delivered came from Him. The event bare witness to the prophet, that he said this truly, in that he knew what God alone could know - futurity. Micah blends in one the facts, that he related in words given him by God, what he had seen spread before him in prophetic vision. His prophecy was, in one, "the word of the Lord which came to him,"and "a sight which he saw."

Micah omits all mention of his father. His great predecessor was known as Micaiah son of Imlah. Micah, a villager, would be known only by the name of his native village. So Nahum names himself "the Elkoshite;"Jonah is related to be a native "of Gath-hepher;"Elijah, the Tishbite, a sojourner in the despised Gilead 1Ki 17:1; Elisha, of Abelmeholah; Jeremiah, of Anathoth; forerunners of Him, and taught by His Spirit who willed to be born at Bethlehem, and, since this, although too little to be counted "among the thousands of Judah,"was yet a royal city and was to be the birthplace of the Christ, was known only as Jesus of Nazareth, "the Nazarene."No prophet speaks of himself, or is spoken of, as born at Jerusalem, "the holy city."They speak of themselves with titles of lowliness, not of greatness.

Micah dates his prophetic office from kings of Judah only, as the only kings of the line appointed by God. Kings of Israel are mentioned in addition, only by prophets of Israel. He names Samaria first, because, its iniquity being most nearly full, its punishment was the nearest.

Barnes: Mic 1:2

Hear, all ye people - Literally, "hear, ye peoples, all of them."Some 140, or 150 years had flowed by, since Micaiah, son of Imlah, had closed his prophecy in these words. And now they burst out anew. From age to age the word of God holds its course, ever receiving new fulfillments, never dying out, until the end shall come. The signal fulfillment of the prophecy, to which the former Micalah had called attention in these words, was an earnest of the fulfillment of this present message of God.

Hearken, O earth, and all that therein is - The "peoples"or "nations"are never Judah and Israel only: the earth and the fullness thereof is the well-known title of the whole earth and all its inhabitants. Moses Deu 32:1, Asaph Psa 50:7, Isaiah Isa 1:2, call heaven and earth as witnesses against God’ s people. Jeremiah, Jer 6:19 as Micah here, summons the nations and the earth. The contest between good and evil, sin and holiness, the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan, everwhere, but most chiefly where God’ s Presence is nearest, is "a spectacle to the world, to angels and to men"1Co 4:9. The nations are witnesses of God against His own people, so that these should not say, that it was for want of faithfulness or justice or power Exo 32:12; Num 14:16; Jos 7:8-9, but in His righteous judgment, that He cast off whom He had chosen. So shall the Day of Judgment "reveal His righteousness"Rom 2:5. "Hearken, O earth."The lifeless earth Psa 114:7; Psa 97:5 trembles "at the Presence of God,"and so reproaches the dullness of man. By it he summons man to listen with great reverence to the Voice of God.

And let the Lord God be witness against you - Not in words, but in deeds ye shall know, that I speak not of myself but God in me, when, what I declare, He shall by His Presence fulfill. But the nations are appealed to, not merely because the judgments of God on Israel should be made known to them by the prophets. He had not yet spoken of Israel or Judah, whereas he had spoken to the nations; "hear, ye peoples."It seems then most likely that here too he is speaking to them. Every judgment is an earnest, a forerunner, a part, of the final judgment and an example of its principles. It is but "the last great link in the chain,"which unites God’ s dealings in time with eternity. God’ s judgments on one imply a judgment on all. His judgments in time imply a Judgment beyond time. Each sinner feels in his own heart response to God’ s visible judgments on another. Each sinful nation may read its own doom in the sentence on each other nation.

God judges each according to his own measure of light and grace, accepted or refused. The pagan shall be judged by "the law written in their heart"Rom 2:12-15; the Jew, by the law of Moses and the light of the prophets; Christians, by the law of Christ. "The word,"Christ saith, "that I have spoken, the same shall judge him at the last Day"Joh 12:48. God Himself foretold, that the pagan should know the ground of His judgments against His people. "All nations shall say, wherefore hath the Lord done thus unto this land? What meaneth the heat of this great anger? Then men shall say, Because they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord God of their fathers which He made with them, when He brought them forth out of the land of Egypt, ..."Deu 29:24-25. But in that the pagan knew why God so punished His people, they came so far to know the mind of God; and God, who at no time "left Himself without witness"Act 14:17, bore fresh "witness"to them, and, so far us they neglected it, against them. A Jew, wherever he is seen throughout the world, is a witness to the world of God’ s judgments against sin.

Dionysius: "Christ, the faithful Witness, shall witness against those who do ill, for those who do well."

The Lord from His holy temple - Either that at Jerusalem, where God shewed and revealed Himself, or Heaven of which it was the image. As David says, "The Lord is in His holy temple; the Lord’ s throne is in heaven"Psa 11:4; and contrasts His dwelling in heaven and His coming down upon earth. "He bowed the heavens also and came down"Psa 18:9; and Isaiah, in like words, "Behold, the Lord cometh out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity"Isa 26:21.

Barnes: Mic 1:3

For, behold, the Lord comth forth - that is, (as we now say,) "is coming forth."Each day of judgment, and the last also, are ever drawing nigh, noiselessly as the nightfall, but unceasingly. "Out of His Place."Dionysius: "God is hidden from us, except when He sheweth Himself by His Wisdom or Power of Justice or Grace, as Isaiah saith, ‘ Verily, Thou art a God who hidest Thyself’ Isa 45:15."He seemeth to be absent, when He doth not visibly work either in the heart within, or in judgments without; to the ungodly and unbelieving He is absent, "far above out of their sight"Psa 10:5, when He does not avenge their scoffs, their sins, their irreverence. Again He seemeth to go forth, when His Power is felt. Dionysius: "Whence it is said, ‘ Bow Thy heavens, O Lord, and come down’ Psa 144:5; Isa 64:1; and the Lord saith of Sodom, ‘ I will go down now and see, whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come unto Me’ Gen 18:21. Or, the Place of the Infinite God is God Himself. For the Infinite sustaineth Itself, nor doth anything out of Itself contain It. God dwelleth also in light unapproachable 1Ti 6:16. When then Almighty God doth not manifest Himself, He abideth, as it were, in ‘ His own Place.’ When He manifests His Power or Wisdom or Justice by their effects, He is said ‘ to go forth out of His Place,’ that is, out of His hiddenness. Again, since the Nature of God is Goodness, it is proper and co-natural to Him, to be propitious, have mercy and spare. In this way, the Place of God is His mercy. When then He passeth from the sweetness of pity to the rigor of equity, and, on account of our sins, sheweth Himself severe (which is, as it were, alien from Him) He goeth forth out of His Place."Jerome: "For He who is gentle and gracious, and whose Nature it is to have mercy, is constrained, on your account, to take the seeming of hardness, which is not His."

He comes invisibly now, in that it is He who punisheth, through whatever power or will of man He useth; He shews forth His Holiness through the punishment of unholiness. But the words, which are image-language now, shall be most exactly fulfilled in the end, when, in the Person of our Lord, He shall come visibly to judge the world. Jerome, Theoph.: "In the Day of Judgment, Christ ‘ shall come down,’ according to that Nature which He took, ‘ from His Place,’ the highest heavens, and shall cast down the proud things of this world."

And will come down - Not by change of place, or in Himself, but as felt in the punishment of sin; and tread upon the high places of the earth; to bring down the pride of those (see Amo 4:13; Job 9:8) who "being lifted up in their own conceit and lofty, sinning through pride and proud through sin, were yet created out of earth. For why is earth and ashes proud?"(Ecclesiasticus 10:9). What seems mightiest and most firm, is unto God less than is to man the dust under his feet. The high places were also the special scenes of an unceasing idolatry. "God treadeth in the good and humble, in that He dwelleth, walketh, feasteth in their hearts 2Co 6:16; Rev 3:20. But He treadeth upon the proud and the evil, in that He casteth them down, despiseth, condemneth them."

Barnes: Mic 1:4

And the mountains shall be molten under Him - It has been thought that this is imagery, taken from volcanic eruptions ; but, although there is a very remarkable volcanic district just outside of Gilead, it is not thought to have been active at times so late as these; nor were the people to whom the words were said, familiar with it. Fire, the real agent at the end of the world, is, meanwhile, the symbol of God’ s anger, as being the most terrible of His instruments of destruction: whence God revealed Himself as a consuming fire Deu 4:24, and at this same time said by Isaiah; "For behold, the Lord will come with fire ... to render His anger with fury, and His rebuke with flames of fire"Isa 66:15.

And the valleys shall be cleft as wax before the fire - It seems natural that the mountains should be cleft; but the valleys , so low already! This speaks of a yet deeper dissolution; of lower depths beyond our sight or knowledge, into the very heart of the earth. Sanch.: "This should they fear, who will to be so low; who, so far from lifting themselves to heavenly things, pour out their affections on things of earth, meditate on and love earthly things, and forgetful of the heavenly, choose to fix their eyes on earth. These the wide gaping of the earth which they loved, shall swallow: to them the cleft valleys shall open an everlasting sepulchre, and, having received them, shall never part with them."

Highest and lowest, first and last, shall perish before Him. The pride of the highest, kings and princes, priests and judges, shall sink and melt away beneath the weight and Majesty of His glory; the hardness of the lowest, which would not open itself to Him, shall be cleft in twain before Him.

As wax before the fire - (See Psa 97:5), melting away before Him by whom they were not softened, vanishing into nothingness. Metals melt, changing their form only; wax, so as to cease to be.

As the waters poured down - (As a stream or cataract, so the word means .)

A steep place - Down to the very edge, it is borne along, one strong, smooth, unbroken current; then, at once, it seems to gather its strength, for one great effort. But to what end? To fall, with the greater force, headlong, scattered in spray, foam and froth; dissipated, at times, into vapor, or reeling in giddy eddies, never to return. In Judea, where the autumn rains set in with great vehemence, the waters must have been often seen pouring in their little tumultuous brooklets down the mountain side , hastening to disappear, and disappearing the faster, the more vehemently they rolled along . Both images exhibit the inward emptiness of sinners, man’ s utter helplessness before God. They need no outward impulse to their destruction. Jerome: "Wax endureth not the nearness of the fire, and the waters are carried headlong. So all of the ungodly, when the Lord cometh, shall be dissolved and disappear."At the end of the world, they shall be gathered into bundles, and cast away.

Barnes: Mic 1:5

For the transgression of Jacob is all this - Not for any change of purpose in God; nor, again, as the effect of man’ s lust of conquest. None could have any power against God’ s people, unless it had been given him by God. Those mighty monarchies of old existed but as God’ s instruments, especially toward His own people. God said at this time of Assyria Isa 10:5, Asshur rod of Mine anger, and the staff in his hand is Mine indignation; and Isa 37:26, Now have I brought it to pass, that thou shouldest be to lay waste defensed cities into ruinous heaps. Each scourge of God chastised just those nations, which God willed him to chasten; but the especial object for which each was raised up was his mission against that people, in whom God most showed His mercies and His judgments Isa 10:6. I will send him against an ungodly nation and against the people of My wrath will I give him a charge.

Jacob and Israel, in this place, comprise alike the ten tribes and the two. They still bare the name of their father, who, wrestling with the Angel, became a prince with God, whom they forgat. The name of Jacob then, as of Christian now, stamped as deserters, those who did not the deeds of their father. "What, (rather who) is the transgression of Jacob?"Who is its cause? In whom does it lie? Is it not Samaria? The metropolis must, in its own nature, be the source of good or evil to the land. It is the heart whose pulses beat throughout the whole system. As the seat of power, the residence of justice or injustice, the place of counsel, the concentration of wealth, which all the most influential of the land visit for their several occasions, its manners penetrate in a degree the utmost corners of the land. Corrupted, it becomes a focus of corruption. The blood passes through it, not to be purified, but to be diseased. Samaria, being founded on apostasy, owing its being to rebellion against God, the home of that policy which set up a rival system of worship to His forbidden by Him, became a fountain of evil, whence the stream of ungodliness overflowed the land. It became the impersonation of the people’ s sin, "the heart and the head of the body of sin."

And what - Literally, who ( מי ) always relates to a personal object, and apparent exceptions may be reduced to this. So Ae. Kim. Tanch. Pococke.

Are the high places of Judah? are they not Jerusalem? - Jerusalem God had formed to be a center of unity in holiness; the tribes of the Lord were to go up there to the testimony of Israel; there was the unceasing worship of God, the morning and evening sacrifice; the Feasts, the memorials of past miraculous mercies, the foreshadowings of redemption. But there too Satan placed his throne. Ahaz brought thither that most hateful idolatry, the burning children to Moloch in the valley of the son of Hinnom 2Ch 28:3. There 2Ch 28:24, he made him altars in every corner of Jerusalem. Thence, he extended the idolatry to all Judah 2Ch 28:25. And in every several city of Judah he made high places to burn incense unto other gods, and provoked to anger the Lord God of his fathers. Hezekiah, in his reformation, with all Israel 2Ch 31:1, went out to the cities of Judah, and brake the images in pieces and bowed down the statues of Asherah, and threw down the high places and the altars out of all Judah and Benjamin, as much as out of Ephraim and Manasseh. Nay, by a perverse interchange, Ahaz took the Brazen Altar, consecrated to God, for his own divinations, and assigned to the worship of God the altar copied from the idol-altar at Damascus, whose fashion pleased his taste 2Ki 16:10-16.

Since God and mammon cannot be served together, Jerusalem was become one great idol-temple, in which Judah brought its sin into the very face of God and of His worship. The Holy City had itself become sin, and the fountain of unholiness. The one temple of God was the single protest against the idolatries which encompased and besieged it; the incense went up to God, morning and evening, from it; from every head of every street of the city Eze 16:31; 2Ch 28:24, and (since Ahaz had brought in the worship of Baalim 2Ch 28:2, and the rites of idolatry continued the same,) from the roofs of all their houses Jer 32:29, went up the incense to Baal; a worship which, denying the Unity, denied the Being of God.

Barnes: Mic 1:6

Therefore - (literally, "And") I will make Samaria as an heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard Jerome: "The order of the sin was the order or the punishment."Samaria’ s sins were the earliest, the most obstinate, the most unbroken, bound up with its being as a state. On it then God’ s judgments should first fall. It was a crown of pride Isa 28:1, resting on the head of the rich valleys, out of which it rose. Its soil is still rich . "The whole is now cultivated in terraces", "to the summits". Probably, since the sides of hills, open to the sun, were chosen for vineyards, it had been a vineyard, before Shemer sold it to Omri 1Ki 16:24. What it had been, that it was again to be. Its inhabitants cast forth, its houses and gorgeous palaces were to become heaps of stones, gathered out Isa 5:2 to make way for cultivation, or to become the fences of the vegetation, which should succeed to man.

There is scarce a sadder natural sight than the fragments of human habitation, tokens of man’ s labor or his luxury, amid the rich beauty of nature when man himself is gone. For they are tracks of sin and punishment, man’ s rebellion and God’ s judgment, man’ s unworthiness of the good natural gifts of God. A century or two ago, travelers "speak of the ground (the site of Samaria) as strewed with masses of ruins."Now these too are gone. : "The stones of the temples and palaces of Samaria have been carefully removed from the rich soil, thrown together in heaps, built up in the rude walls of terraces, and rolled down into the valley below.": "About midway of the ascent, the hill is surrounded by a narrow terrace of woodland like a belt. Higher up too are the marks of slighter terraces, once occupied perhaps by the streets of the ancient city."Terrace-cultivation has succeeded to the terraced streets once thronged by the busy, luxurious, sinful, population.

And I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley - Of which it was the crest, and which it now proudly surveyed. God Himself would cause it to be poured down (he uses the word which he had just used of the vehemence of the cataract Mic 1:4). : "The whole face of this part of the hill suggests the idea that the, buildings of the ancient city had been thrown down from the brow of the hill. Ascending to the top, we went round the whole summit, and found marks of the same process everywhere."

And I will discover the foundations thereof - The desolation is entire; not one stone left upon another. Yet the very words of threatening contain hope. It was to be not a heap only, but the plantings of a vineyard. The heaps betoken ruin; the vineyard, fruitfulness cared for by God. Destroyed, as what it was, and turned upside down, as a vineyard by the share, it should become again what God made it and willed it to be. It should again become a rich valley, but in outward desolation. Its splendid palaces, its idol temples, its houses of joy, should be but heaps and ruins, which are cleared away out of a vineyard, as only choking it. It was built in rebellion and schism, loose and not held together, like a heap of stones, having no cement of love, rent and torn in itself, having been torn both from God and His worship. It could be remade only by being wholly unmade. Then should they who believed be branches grafted in Him who said, "I am the Vine, ye are the branches"Joh 15:5.

Barnes: Mic 1:7

And all the graven images thereof shall be beaten to pieces - Its idols in whom she trusts, so far from protecting her, shall themselves go into captivity, broken up for the gold and silver whereof they were made. The wars of the Assyrians being religious wars , the idolatry of Assyria destroyed the idolatry and idols of Israel.

And all the hires thereof shall be burned with fire - All forsaking of God being spiritual fornication from Him who made His creatures for Himself, the hires are all which man would gain by that desertion of his God, employed in man’ s contact with his idols, whether as bribing his idols to give him what are the gifts of God, or as himself bribed by them. For there is no pure service, save that of the love of God. God alone can be loved purely, for Himself; offerings to Him alone are the creature’ s pure homage to the Creator, going out of itself, not looking back to itself, not seeking itself, but stretching forth to Him and seeking Him for Himself. Whatever man gives to or hopes from his idols, man himself is alike his object in both. The hire then is, alike what he gives to his idols, the gold whereof he makes his Baal , the offerings which the pagan used to lay up in their temples, and what, as he thought, he himself received back. For he gave only earthly things, in order to receive back things of earth. He hired their service to him, and his earthly gains were his hire. It is a strong mockery in the mouth of God, that they had these things from their idols. He speaks to them after their thoughts. Yet it is true that, although God overrules all, man does receive from Satan Mat 4:9, the god of this world 2Co 4:4, all which he gains amiss. It is the price for which he sells his soul and profanes himself. Yet herein were the pagan more religious than the Christian worldling. The pagan did offer an ignorant service to they knew not what. Our idolatry of mammon, as being less abstract, is more evident self-worship, a more visible ignoring and so a more open dethroning of God, a worship of a material prosperity, of which we seem ourselves to be the authors, and to which we habitually immolate the souls of men, so habitually that we have ceased to be conscious of it.

And all the idols thereof will I lay desolate - Literally, "make a desolation."They, now thronged by their worshipers, should be deserted; their place and temple, a waste. He thrice repeats all; all her graven images, all her hires, all her idols; all should be destroyed. He subjoins a threefold destruction which should overtake them; so that, while the Assyrian broke and carried off the more precious, or burned what could be burned, and, what could not be burned, nor was worth transporting, should be left desolate, all should come to an end. He sets the whole the more vividly before the mind; exhibiting to us so many separate pictures of the mode of destruction.

For from the hire of a harlot she gathered them, and to the hire of a harlot they shall return - Jerome: "The wealth and manifold provision which (as she thought) were gained by fornication with her idols, shall go to another harlot, Nineveh; so that, as they went a whoring in their own land, they should go to another land of idols and fornication, the Assyrians."They Rom 1:23 turned their glory into shame, changing the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like unto corruptible man; and so it should turn to them into shame. It sprung out of their shame, and should turn to it again. "Ill got, ill spent."Evil gain, cursed in its origin, has the curse of God upon it, and makes its gainer a curse, and ends accursedly. "Make not ill gains,"says even a pagan. (H. 354. L), "ill gains are equal to losses;"and another , "Unlawful sweetness a most bitter end awaiteth."

Probably, the most literal sense is not to be excluded. The degrading idolatrous custom, related of Babylon and Cyprus , still continued among the Babylonians at the date of the book of Baruch (Baruch 6:43), and to the Christian era . Augustine speaks of it as having existed among the Phoenicians, and Theodoret says that it was still practiced by some in Syria. The existence of the idolatrous custom is presupposed by the prohibition by Moses Deu 23:18; and, in the time of Hosea self-desecration was an idolatrous rite in Israel . In the day of Judgment, when the foundation of those who build their house upon the sand, shall be laid bare, the riches which they gained unlawfully shall be burned up; all the idols, which they set up instead of God , "the vain thoughts, and useless fancies, and hurtful forms and images which they picture in their mind, defiling it, and hindering it from the steadfast contemplation of divine things, will be punished. They were the hire of the soul which went astray from God, and they who conceived them will, with them, become the prey again of that infernal host which is unceasingly turned from God."

Barnes: Mic 1:8

Therefore I will - Therefore I would

Wail - (properly, beat, that is, on the breast).

And howl - " Let me alone,"he would say, "that I may vent my sorrow in all ways of expressing sorrow, beating on the breast and wailing, using all acts and sounds of grief."It is as we would say, "Let me mourn on,"a mourning inexhaustible, because the woe too and the cause of grief was unceasing. The prophet becomes in words, probably in acts too, an image of his people, doing as they should do hereafter. He mourns, because and as they would have to mourn, bearing chastisement, bereft of all outward comeliness, an example also of repentance, since what he did were the chief outward tokens of mourning.

I will (would) go stripped - despoiled .

And naked - He explains the acts, that they represented no mere voluntary mourning. Not only would he, representing them, go bared of all garments of beauty, as we say "half-naked"but despoiled also, the proper term of those plundered and stripped by an enemy. He speaks of his doing, what we know that Isaiah did, by God’ s command, representing in act what his people should thereafter do. : "Wouldest thou that I should weep, thou must thyself grieve the first."Micah doubtless went about, not speaking only of grief, but grieving, in the habit of one mourning and bereft of all. He prolongs in these words the voice of wailing, choosing unaccustomed forms of words, to carry on the sound of grief.

I will make a wailing like the dragons - (jackals).

And mourning as the owls - (ostriches). The cry of both, as heard at night, is very piteous. Both are doleful creatures, dwelling in desert and lonely places. "The jackals make a lamentable howling noise, so that travelers unacquainted with them would think that a company of people, women or children, were howling, one to another."

"Its howl,"says an Arabic natural historian , "is like the crying of an infant.""We heard them,"says another , "through the night, wandering around the villages, with a continual, prolonged, mournful cry."The ostrich, forsaking its young Job 39:16, is an image of bereavement. Jerome: "As the ostrich forgets her eggs and leaves them as though they were not her’ s, to be trampled by the feet of wild beasts, so too shall I go childless, spoiled and naked."Its screech is spoken of by travelers as "fearful, aftrighting.": "During the lonesome part of the night they often make a doleful and piteous noise. I have often heard them groan, as if they were in the greatest agonies."

Dionysius: "I will grieve from the heart over those who perish, mourning for the hardness of the ungodly, as the Apostle had Rom 9:1 great heaviness and continual sorrow in his heart for his brethren, the impenitent and unbelieving Jews. Again he saith, "who is weak and I am not weak? Who is offended, and I burn not?"2Co 11:29. For by how much the soul is nobler than the body, and by how much eternal damnation is heavier than any temporal punishment, so much more vehemently should we grieve and weep for the peril and perpetual damnation of souls, than for bodily sickness or any temporal evil."

Barnes: Mic 1:9

For her - Samaria’ s

Wound - o , (literally, her wounds, or strokes, (the word is used especially of those inflicted by God, (Lev 26:21; Num 11:33; Deu 28:59, Deu 28:61, etc.) each, one by one,) is incurable The idiom is used of inflictions on the body politic (Nahum 3 ult.; Jer 30:12, Jer 30:15) or the mind , for which there is no remedy. The wounds were very sick, or incurable, not in themselves or on God’ s part, but on Israel’ s. The day of grace passes away at last, when man has so steeled himself against grace, as to be morally dead, having deadened himself to all capacity of repentance.

For it is come unto - (quite up to) Judah; he, (the enemy,) is come (literally, hath reached, touched,) to (quite up to) the gate of my people, even to (quite up to) Jerusalem Jerome: "The same sin, yea, the same punishment for sin, which overthrew Samaria, shall even come unto, quite up to Judah. Then the prophet suddenly changes the gender, and, as Scripture so often does, speaks of the one agent, the center and impersonation of the coming evil, as sweeping on over Judah, quite up to the gate of his people, quite up to Jerusalem. He does not say here, whether Jerusalem would be taken; and so, it seems likely that he speaks of a calamity short of excision. Of Israel’ s wounds only he here says, that they are incurable; he describes the wasting of even lesser places near or beyond Jerusalem, the flight of their inhabitants. Of the capital itself he is silent, except that the enemy reached, touched, struck against it, quite up to it. Probably, then, he is here describing the first visitation of God, when 2Ki 18:13 Sennacherib came up against all the fenced cities of Judah and took them, but Jerusalem was spared. God’ s judgments come step by step, leaving time for repentance. The same enemy, although not the same king, came against Jerusalem who had wasted Samaria. Samaria was probably as strong as Jerusalem. Hezekiah prayed; God heard, the Assyrian army perished by miracle; Jerusalem was respited for 124 years.

Barnes: Mic 1:10

Tell it not in Gath - Gath had probably now ceased to be; at least, to be of any account . It shows how David’ s elegy lived in the hearts of Judah, that his words are used as a proverb, (just as we do now, in whose ears it is yearly read), when, as with us, its original application was probably lost. True, Gath, reduced itself, might rejoice the more maliciously over the sufferings of Judah. But David mentions it as a chief seat of Philistine strength ; now its strength was gone.

The blaspheming of the enemies of God is the sorest part of His chastisements. Whence David prays "let not mine enemies exult over me"Psa 25:2; and the sons of Korah, "With a sword in my bones, mine enemies reproach me, while they say daily unto me, where is thy God?"Psa 42:10; and Ethan; "Thou hast made all his enemies to rejoice. Remember, Lord, the reproach of Thy servant"Psa 89:42, Psa 89:50 - wherewith Thine enemies have reproached, O Lord, wherewith they have reproached the footsteps of Thine anointed. It is hard to part with home, with country, to see all desolate, which one ever loved. But far, far above all, is it, if, in the disgrace and desolation, God’ s honor seems to be injured. The Jewish people was then God’ s only home on earth. If it could be extinguished, who remained to honor Him? Victories over them seemed to their pagan neighbors to be victories over Him. He seemed to be dishonored without, because they had first dishonored Him within. Sore is it to the Christian, to see God’ s cause hindered, His kingdom narrowed, the empire of infidelity advanced. Sorer in one way, because he knows the price of souls, for whom Jesus died. But the world is now the Church’ s home. "The holy church throughout all the world doth acknowledge Thee!"Then, it was girt in within a few miles of territory, and sad indeed it must have been to the prophet, to see this too hemmed in. Tell it not in Gath, to the sons of those who, of old, defied God.

Weep not at all - (Literally, weeping, weep not). Weeping is the stillest expression of grief. We speak of "weeping in silence."Yet this also was too visible a token of grief. Their weeping would be the joy and laughter of God’ s enemies.

In the house of Aphrah - (probably, In Beth-leaphrah) roll thyself in the dust (Better, as the text, I roll myself in dust). The prophet chose unusual names, such as would associate themselves with the meanings which he wished to convey, so that thence forth the name itself might recall the prophecy. As if we were to say, "In Ashe I roll myself in ashes."- There was an Aphrah near Jerusalem . It is more likely that Micah should refer to this, than to the Ophrah in Benjamin Jos 18:23; 1Sa 13:17. He showed them, in his own person, how they should mourn, retired out of sight and hidden, as it were, in the dust. Jer. Rup.: "Whatever grief your heart may have, let your face have no tears; go not forth, but, in the house of dust, sprinkle thyself with the ashes of its ruins."

All the places thenceforth spoken of were in Judah, whose sorrow and desolation are repeated in all. It is one varied history of sorrow: The names of her cities, whether in themselves called from some gifts of God, as Shaphir, (beautiful; we have Fairford, Fairfield, Fairburn, Fairlight,) or contrariwise from some defect, Maroth, Bitterness (probably from brackish water) Achzib, lying, (doubtless from a winter-torrent which in summer failed) suggest, either in contrast or by themselves, some note of evil and woe. It is Judah’ s history in all, given in different traits; her "beauty"turned into shame; herself free neither to go forth nor to "abide;"looking for good and finding evil; the strong (Lachish) strong only to flee; like a brook that fails and deceives; her inheritance (Mareshah) inherited; herself, taking refuge in dens and caves of the earth, yet even there found, and bereft of her glory. Whence, in the end, without naming Judah, the prophet sums up her sorrows with one call to mourning.

Poole: Mic 1:1

The word of the Lord that came: thus Hosea begins his prophecy, Hos 1:1 , and Joe 1:1 , and Jon 1 :, and Zep 1:1 , which see.

Micah: though Hierom, Epiphanius, and Dorotheus are said to report this Micah to be the same with the son of Imlah, 1Ki 22:8 , yet R. Sol. Jarchi’ s reason why this could not be is satisfactory, for one generation and almost a half intervened between Ahab and Jotham; Ahab died about A.M. 3046, Jotham began to reign about A.M. 3190, by which it appears there were one hundred and forty-four years between Micaiah the son of Imlah and Micah our prophet.

The Morasthite: whether Mareshah, rebuilt by Rehoboam 2Ch 11:8 , (called also Beth-gebarim in after-time,) of which 2Ch 11:14 of this chapter, or whether Moresheth, of which 2Ch 11:15 , gave him this surname, and whether because Micah was born there or else did dwell there, is not easily resolved, nor material if it were resolved.

In the days of Jotham: it is not said what year of Jotham this prophet begun, it is probable it was about the beginning of Jotham’ s reign, A.M. 3190, of which we have this character, 2Ki 15:34,35 , He did right , &c., yet the high places were not removed . Religion was not wholly corrupted as in Israel, yet was it exceedingly abased with their own mixtures.

Ahaz the very worst of all Judah’ s kings, all things considered; he brought the Baalitical idolatry into Judah.

Hezekiah the best son of the worst father, who reformed Judah. How long Micah prophesied during his reign we can but conjecture, possibly till the fourteenth year of Hezekiah. So this prophet may be supposed to have prophesied sixteen years in Jotham’ s time, as many under Ahaz, and fourteen under Hezekiah, in all forty-six years, and survived the captivity of Israel ten years, which he lamented as well as foretold.

Kings of Judah Judah only named, but Benjamin is included.

Which he saw: see Amo 1:1 .

Concerning Samaria the metropolis of the kingdom of the ten tribes, and by a well-known figure put for the whole kingdom, as Jerusalem, chief city of Judah, is, by the same figure, put for the whole kingdom. As both had linked together in sinning, God doth link them together in suffering, and commands Micah to do so.

Poole: Mic 1:2

Hear: the prophet here by proclamation requires earnest attention to his word. So Moses, Deu 4:26 30:19 32:1 ; so the psalmist, Psa 50:1,4 ; and so Isaiah, Isa 1:2 34:1 .

All ye people either all the people of both kingdoms, all Israel and Judah, or else universally all people of all kingdoms whatever, both of that present age and all of future ages. Hearken, O earth : it may be taken for the meaner sort of people, the commonalty; but I rather incline to interpret it as both a tacit reproof of the deafness of this sinful and hardened people, with whom Micah now contends, and an appeal to the senseless creatures, or a summons to bring them in evidences for God against those kingdoms.

All that therein is animate or inanimate creatures, all that are on the earth. If we interpret earth for the meaner sort of people, then this fulness of the earth will be the whole multitude of the people. It is a lofty strain, such as those of Moses, Deu 32:1 , David, Psa 1:1, Isa 1:1,2 , and Jer 6:19 .

Let the Lord God the mighty, holy, gracious, and faithful God, Lord of heaven and earth; who knows all your ways, who is a just judge, and a severe avenger of obdurate sinners.

Be witness against you by his word, the voice of his law, by his prophets whom he hath sent, by the judgments he doth execute according to his menaces; as by his sovereignty he is supreme judge, so by his omniscience and truth he is an authentic witness against you, O house of Jacob.

From his holy temple either from his temple at Jerusalem, or else from heaven, as Psa 11:4 Hab 2:20 .

Poole: Mic 1:3

For, behold there is great reason for my earnestness with all people, and therefore once more I advise you to consider it well. Behold, attend to what is said.

The Lord cometh forth who is Judge himself, Psa 50:1,4 , whose holy majesty you have provoked to displeasure, who is a jealous God, and hath an almighty power to dash his enemies into pieces. He cometh forth as a judge prepared to hear, determine, and punish. Now when God, who is in all places at all times, is said to come forth, it is not to be meant of his leaving a place where he was, to come to a place where before he was not; but it is to be understood of his discovering his presence by some effects of it, which before in that place were not, discovered.

Out of his place heaven, the place of his glorious throne.

Come down show by the effects of his power, justice, and wisdom that he is more eminently present there.

Tread upon trample under foot, stain, abase, and break.

The high places of the earth all that is high, excellent, and matter of your glorying, whether the flourishing state of your kingdoms, or the power of your kings, or strength of your fortresses, temples, and altars, or cities and palaces. In that day the haughtiness of man shall be laid low, and the pride of man shall be brought down, Isa 2:17 . Your sins will procure this to you, O Samaria and Jerusalem, of which God is my witness I have plainly told you.

Poole: Mic 1:4

The mountains shall be molten: if literally understood, we know it hath been so: when God will kindle that fire which shall burn up the earth, and the works of it, as he will when he cometh finally to judge the world, it shall be done again. But figuratively mountains are mighty states and kingdoms, flourishing with prosperity, and which do think the foundation of this sure as mountains. So Amo 6:1,2 Hab 3:6 Isa 2:14 , Or possibly these mountains may be, by a synecdoche, put for those who dwell on them, mountaineers, who were usually more fierce, secure hardy, and of difficult access, and therefore less regardful of threats and punishments.

Shall be molten under him : which way soever you take mountains, yet the effect of God’ s powerful anger and justice shall be this, they shall be no more able to bear his indignation, or withstand it, than that which like wax melts before a strong fire.

The valleys which either are emblems of the lower sort of men, or the men that dwell in the valleys with their cities built there, which might hope to escape the storm, lying more under covert. But such shall be the sweeping, searching, and rapid storm of God’ s judgments, that no places, no persons shall either withstand or divert them.

Shall be cleft or rent in sunder, broken up, as the word Gen 7:11 , and slide away.

As wax which doth easily and speedily dissolve, and run before the fire.

And as the waters that are poured down a steep place which immediately spreads itself and runs down the precipice, not able to keep together in one body, but scattered one part from other, loseth itself without remedy; so shall the glory and strength of Samaria melt away before the fire of God’ s displeasure executed by Shalmaneser, and by Sennacherib and Nebuchadnezzar on Judah.

Poole: Mic 1:5

For the transgression the singular for the plural, the many transgressions committed amongst them; but especially that flood of iniquity which, springing up in Samaria, did overflow the whole kingdom, idolatry, pride, luxury, cruelty, and oppression.

Of Jacob the sons of Jacob: the ten tribes most likely are here meant by Jacob.

Is all this all these, many and great, inevitable and irresistible, judgments of God foretold. and which will overtake and utterly ruin these sinners.

The house of Israel the people of the kingdom of Judah, called here by the name of Israel. Or else this and the former phrase may comprehend the twelve tribes, which were fallen from God’ s law and worship, and be an elegant ingemination to confirm the thing spoken.

What is the transgression? or, who is , i.e. the spring and cause of that overflowing transgression? who brought in the abominable idolatry?

Of Jacob: here is meant the kingdom of the ten tribes, (he head of which was Samaria, where the kings of that kingdom had their royal residence, where they worshipped idols, whence they issued out their edicts, and which became example to the rest of the Israelitish kingdom.

What are the high places? or, who is , i.e. cause of the high places, and the idolatry there practised?

Jerusalem which was chief city of that kingdom, and place where their kings dwelt; had the same influence on that kingdom as Samaria had on the ten tribes; there was the example they imitated, thence the laws they obeyed contrary to God’ s law.

Poole: Mic 1:6

Therefore for these sins of Samaria, and the kingdom of Israel.

I will make not by an immediate hand from heaven, but by the Assyrians under the conduct of Shalmaneser, they shall do it as my servants, saith the Lord.

Samaria as a heap of the field much like Isa 25:2 ; that beautiful city shall be made, and so left, as a ruinous heap in the field.

And as plantings of a vineyard: in planting vineyards, they did dig up the earth, and cast it up in hillocks, cast out all the stones; so shall they make this city.

I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley: the city was built on a high hill, and a deep valley beneath it; now when it was sacked by the Assyrians, they pulled down the buildings, and cast the stones thereof into that valley; so God did by them throw down the stones of Samaria.

And I will discover the foundations thereof raze the walls, fortresses, and public buildings of this city to the very foundations of it, nor leave one stone upon another, as Mat 24:2 Luk 19:44 desolation upon Samaria for her sin such a desolation as shall not leave the least footsteps of Samaria in the place where once it stood.

Poole: Mic 1:7

All the graven images erected in honour to the idols they worshipped, which usually were the images or similitudes resembling their idols, their gods of silver, gold, or stone and brass, or wood.

Shall be beaten to pieces pulled out of their chapels, shrines, or repositories by the conquering Assyrians, who would as was customary with such nations, deal with the gods as with enemies conquered, trample upon them, and use them most contemptibly; and when they break into pieces idols of rich materials, it was to carry them away with them as their booty; others were broken in contempt of them.

All the hires or rewards, or gifts, which idolaters thought their idols gave them, as Hos 2:5 ; or the rich gifts given for the honour and service of the idols by deceived idolaters; or all the wealth Israel got by leagues with idolaters.

Shall be burnt with the fire when their cities or temples are burnt, as no doubt many were burnt by the Assyrian before he could reduce them to obedience, in which conflagrations many rich donatives belonging to idols were consumed to ashes, or melted down.

And all the idols thereof will I lay desolate thus shall the idols of Samaria be made desolate, i.e. their temples burnt, their images either beaten in pieces in contempt, or to be carried away (if the materials they were made of were worth the carriage); however, they shall neither remain, nor be worshipped any more in Israel or Samaria, but be carried away captives with their captive worshippers.

For she the kingdom of the ten tribes, or Samaria, gathered it, their wealth, or the rich presents made to their idols, or both, of the hire of a harlot; as harlots get rich gifts of their lovers, so did this deceived people think, and say, that their idols gave them the wealth they had; or else as impudent adulteresses, that hire lewd men to come in to them; so this hire was that these blind idolaters (like shameless adulteresses) gave to their idols.

And they these rich presents,

shall return to the hire of an harlot shall be either turned by the Assyrians to the service and honour of their idols, presented as gifts in acknowledgment of their greatness and prosperity, to be the blessings their idols have. given to them, as Hos 10:6 ; or else thus, as what is got by harlots brings shame and a curse with it, and never continues long, but is as basely wasted as it was gotten, so shall it be with all the ill-gotten goods of these Samaritan idolaters, and all their wealth.

Poole: Mic 1:8

Therefore because of those dreadful slaughters and devastations made in Israel and Samaria,

I will wail solemnly, as when they who are skilful in lamentation do at funerals bewail in most affective manner to stir up the like sorrow in others: see Amo 5:16 .

And howl the same in a word of like sense, to ascertain the thing, and to intimate the doubled sorrow, the multiplied miseries of this people.

I will go stripped and naked as one spoiled of his clothes by force, or as one that in bitterness of passion hath cast off his upper garment, or as if discomposed in mind through the greatness of his vexations; now this the prophet either speaks as fellow sufferer with them, or as intimating what they should be reduced to at last: so Isa 20:2,3 : whether of these, or whether both, I determine not.

Dragons : see Mal 1:3 : rather jackals , which haunt desolate places, and make great and hideous noise by night, by their wailing, or doleful cries, in which it is said they answer one another, and fill the air with the sound and travellers with fear: these creatures are between a fox and wolf for bigness, and seem somewhat like each in qualities, and probably their noise may be as mixed of the barking of the fox and howling of the wolf. It is possible the prophet by this kind of wailing would intimate the near approach of the Assyrian lion, hungering and thirsting, and pursuing the prey; as the jackal runs a little before the lion, so this wailing of the prophet should be followed very suddenly with the roaring of the lion.

Owls ; a melancholy creature, and loves night, and makes a most unpleasant noise, haunts desolate places, and so fitly is an emblem of Israel’ s doleful, desolate state: others render it ostrich, which makes a doleful cry in the deserts: either will fit the place.

Poole: Mic 1:9

Her wound is incurable the wounds of Samaria and the ten tribes; her own sins, God’ s just displeasure, and the enemy’ s rage have deeply wounded her, she is senseless, impenitent, and furious against her Physician, and she shall at last die by sword, famine, pestilence, and captivity.

It is come unto Judah the contagion of her sins, and the indignation of God against it, and the enemy’ s successes, viz. Sennacherib’ s, or Nebuchadnezzar’ s, like a flood have reached to Judah also; and this is the reason why the prophet foretells such mourning, and is willing to personate it to awaken both kingdoms to repent and turn to God.

He is come the insulting, conquering, and cruel enemy, or, in the neuter gender, it, i.e. the evil, is come, i.e. in the prophetic style, will certainly and suddenly come.

Unto the gate of my people either signifying the Assyrians besieging Jerusalem, as Sennacherib son of Shalmaneser did some few years after the sack of Samaria, or else by

gate of my people is meant the city where the sovereign court of judicature to the whole kingdom is, denoting the victories of the Assyrian over the rest of the kingdom of Judah, or else the victories of Nebuchadnezzar.

Even to Jerusalem: this seems added to explain the former phrase.

Poole: Mic 1:10

Declare ye it not at Gath do what you can to keep your griefs to yourselves, let them not be public, that the Philistines, your bitter enemies, should know how sad it is with you and rejoice at it. Gath was a principal city of the Philistines, and though this only is mentioned the rest are understood: such phrase you have 2Sa 1:20 . Weep ye not at all; you that are of Israel or Judah, make no public weeping, that your cries and tears should inform your enemies in Palestine how deplorable your state is, let not your griefs be their joys.

In the house of Aphrah: we render it as a proper name of some city or town; though of no great note, yet we meet with one, 1Sa 13:23 , in the tribe of Benjamin; a second we find in Manasseh’ s lot, and was the place where Gideon’ s father dwelt, Jud 6:11 : these towns were somewhat remote from the Philistines, and there the prophet does direct then, to weep with the greatest expressions of it, and to keep it private from the Philistines. Others account the word to be a common name denoting

dust and so give the sense, in the house of dust roll thyself in dust . Roll thyself, or, I have rolled myself, viz. in compassion to the miserable Israelites, or as a pattern to which they shall conform; so the word as written, but as by direction of the Masorets it is read, and as there it is rendered,

roll thyself it directs and foretells; it foretells what they shall do at last, and directs what they should do at present. They shall be brought to sit, nay, to wallow in the dust, and in foresight of this it would become them to sit in the dust now.

Haydock: Mic 1:1

Gate. That is, the destruction of Samaria shall be followed by the invasion of my people of Juda, and the Assyrian shall come and lay all waste even to the confines of Jerusalem. (Challoner) ---

Juda received the worship of Baal from Israel. It shared in the punishment of that kingdom. The prophet alludes to the ravages of Sennacherib, ver 13. Yet Juda was much afflicted by Razin and Phacee, before that invasion: which caused Achaz to call in the aid of Theglathphalassar, 2 Paralipomenon xxviii., and 4 Kings xvi. (Calmet)

Haydock: Mic 1:1

Morasthite, "of Maresa," (Chaldean; chap. i. 14.; Calmet) a village near Eleutheropolis. (St. Jerome) ---

Kings. They reigned about sixty years. (Calmet)

Haydock: Mic 1:2

Witness. Deuteronomy xxxii., Isaias i., and vi.. The prophet discharges his duty, and will not be blameable, if people die in their sins, Jeremias iii. 18. (Worthington) ---

This sublime address shews the importance of the subject, and how deep an impression the sins of Israel had made in his breast.

Haydock: Mic 1:3

Earth, to subdue the rebels, Amos iv. 13., and Habacuc iii. 3. (Calmet)

Haydock: Mic 1:4

Melted. Septuagint, "moved." (Haydock) ---

Cleft, as it was to swallow up Core, (Numbers xvi. 31.) with the greatest ease.

Haydock: Mic 1:5

Jerusalem. High places were left there under Joathan, 4 Kings xv. 35. Achab had introduced the worship of Baal into Samaria, and though the family of Jehu repressed this worship, it gained ground when Micheas appeared. (Calmet) ---

This conduct excited God's indignation. (Haydock) ---

He came to punish the most guilty. (Calmet)

Haydock: Mic 1:6

Heap. Septuagint, "hut to keep the fruit." Hebrew, "hillock of the field," (Haydock) to be cultivated. (Grotius) ---

Bare, by Salmanasar, 4 Kings xvii. 6. It was afterwards rebuilt, (Calmet) but completely levelled by Hircan. (Josephus, Antiquities xiii. 18.)

Haydock: Mic 1:7

Her wages. That is, her donaries or presents offered to her idols; or the hire of all her traffic and labour. (Challoner) ---

Samaria had trafficked with infidels, and thus grew rich, but imitated their idolatry; (Worthington) and therefore was ruined, and her citizens and riches (Haydock) removed into Assyria. (Worthington) ---

Harlot. They were gathered together by one idolatrous city, viz., Samaria: and they shall be carried away to another idolatrous city, viz., Ninive. (Challoner) ---

The hire of prostitution was not to be received in God's temple, (Deuteronomy xxiii. 18.) which prohibition shews the antiquity of this abominable custom, Baruch vi. 9. (St. Augustine, City of God iv. 10.) (Calmet)

Haydock: Mic 1:8

Naked. Ill clothed, (Haydock) to shew the approaching calamity of the Israelites, Isaias xx. (Menochius) ---

Septuagint and Chaldean explain all of the people, (Calmet) or of Samaria. "Therefore shall she lament and howl, go barefoot and naked, bewail like," &c. (Haydock) ---

Dragons, when they are crushed by the elephant. (Solin xxxviii.) (Menochius) ---

Tannim means also (Haydock) whales, &c., which make a horrible noise. ---

Ostriches, or swans, Isaias xiii. 21. Both have a mournful note. (Calmet)

Haydock: Mic 1:10

Geth. Amongst the Philistines, lest they rejoice at your calamity. (Challoner) (2 Kings i. 20., and Amos iii. 9.) (Calmet) ---

Tell not these calamities, which I foresee, among your enemies, lest they rejoice. But lament in your own houses, which shall be filled with dust. St. Jerome prays for the light of the Holy Ghost to understand this passage. (Worthington) ---

Weep ye not. Keep in your tears, that you may not give your enemies an occasion of exulting over you: but in your own houses, or in your house of dust, your earthly habitation, sprinkle yourselves with dust, and put on the habit of penitents. Some take the house of dust (in Hebrew Haphra ) to be the proper name of a city. (Challoner) ---

With tears. Hebrew, "at all," (Protestants; Haydock) "in Acco," or Ptolemais, (Reland) or Bochim, (Haydock) a place near Jerusalem, Judges ii. 1. But no reference to this place, or to "the Enakim," (who appear in some copies of the Septuagint) seems to be made. ---

Of dust. Samaria, ver. 6. (Calmet)

Gill: Mic 1:1

The word of the Lord that came to Micah the Morasthite,.... So called, either from Mareshah, mentioned Mic 1:15; and was a city in the tribe of Judah, Jos 15:44; as the Targum, Jarchi, Kimchi, and Zacutus ⁱ; or rather from Moresheth, from which Moreshethgath, Mic 1:14; is distinguished; which Jerom ^k says was in his time a small village in the land of Palestine, near Eleutheropolis. Some think these two cities to be one and the same; but they appear to be different from the account of Jerom ^l elsewhere. The Arabic version reads it, Micah the son of Morathi; so Cyril, in his commentary on this place, mentions it as the sense of some, that Morathi was the father of the prophet; which can by no means be assented to:

in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah; by which it appears that he was contemporary with Isaiah, Hoses, and Amos, though they began to prophesy somewhat sooner than he, even in the days of Uzziah; very probably he conversed with these prophets, especially Isaiah, with whom he agrees in many things; his style is like his, and sometimes uses the same phrases: he, being of the tribe of Judah, only mentions the kings of that nation most known to him; though he prophesied against Israel, and in the days of Zachariah, Shallum, Menahem, Pekahiah, Pekah, and Hoshea:

which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem; in the vision of prophecy; Samaria was the metropolis of the ten tribes of Israel, and is put for them all; as Jerusalem was of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, and is put for them Samaria is mentioned first, because it was the head of the greatest body of people; and as it was the first in transgression, it was the first in punishment.

Gill: Mic 1:2

Hear, all ye people,.... Or, "the people, all of them" ^m; not all the nations of the world, but the nations of Israel, so called from their several tribes; though some ⁿ think the rest of the inhabitants of the earth are meant: thee are the same words which are used by Micaiah the prophet in the times of Ahab, long before this time, from whom they might be borrowed, 1Ki 22:28. The phrase in the Hebrew language, as Aben Ezra observes, is very wonderful, and serves to strike the minds and excite the attention of men; it is like the words of a crier, in a court of judicature, calling for silence:

hearken, O earth, and all that therein is; or, "its fulness" ^o; the land of Israel and Judah, the whole land of promise, and all the inhabitants of it; for to them are the following words directed:

and let the Lord God be witness against you; or, "in you" ^p; the Word of the Lord, as the Targum; let him who is the omniscient God, and knows all hearts, thoughts, words, and actions, let him bear witness in your consciences, that what I am about to say is truth, and comes from him; is not my own word, but his; and if you disregard it, and repent not, let him be a witness against you, and for me, that I have prophesied in his name; that I have faithfully delivered his message, and warned you of your danger, and reproved you for your sins, and have kept back nothing I have been charged and entrusted with: and now, you are summoned into open court, and at the tribunal of the great God of heaven and earth; let him be a witness against you of the many sins you have been guilty of, and attend while the indictment is read, the charge exhibited, and the proof given by

the Lord from his holy temple, from heaven, the habitation of his holiness; whose voice speaking from thence should be hearkened to; who from thence beholds all the actions of men, and from whence his wrath is revealed against their sins, and he gives visible tokens of his displeasure; and especially when he seems to come forth from thence in some remarkable instances of his power and providence, as follows:

Gill: Mic 1:3

For, behold, the Lord cometh out of his place,.... Out of heaven, the place of the house of his Shechinah or Majesty, as the Targum; where his throne is prepared; where he keeps his court, and displays his glory; from whence he removes, not by local motion, since he is everywhere; but by some manifest exertion of his power, either on the behalf of his people, or in taking vengeance on his and their enemies; or on them sinning against him, in which sense it is probably to be understood. It signifies not change of place, but of his dispensations; going out of his former customary method into another; removing, as Jarchi has it, from the throne of mercies to the throne of judgment; doing not acts of mercy, in which he delights, but exercising judgment, his strange work. So the Cabalistic writers ^q observe on the passage, that

"it cannot be understood of place properly taken, according to Isa 40:12; for God is the place of the world, not the world his place; hence our wise men so expound the text, he cometh forth out of the measure of mercy, and goes into the measure of justice;''

or property of it. Some understand this of his leaving the temple at Jerusalem, and giving it up into the hands of the Chaldeans; but the former sense is best:

and will come down, and tread upon the high places of the earth; which are his footstool; Samaria and Jerusalem, built on mountains, and all other high towers and fortified places, together with men of high looks and haughty countenances, who exalt themselves like mountains, and swell with pride: these the Lord can easily subdue and humble, bring low and tread down like the mire of the street; perhaps there may be an allusion to the high places where idols were worshipped; and which were the cause of the Lord's wrath and vengeance, and of his coming forth, in this unusual way, in his providences.

Gill: Mic 1:4

And the mountains shall be molten under him,.... As Sinai was when he descended on it, and as all nations will be at the general conflagration; but here the words are to be taken, not literally, but figuratively, for the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, and for the kings, and princes, and great men in them, that lifted up their heads as high, and thought themselves as secure, as mountains; yet when the judgments of God should fall upon them, their hearts would melt through fear under him; as well as all their glory and greatness depart from them, and they be no more what they were before, but levelled with the meanest subject:

and the valleys shall be cleft: have chasms made in them by the melting of the mountains, or by the flow of water from the hills: these may design the lower sort of people, who shall have their share in this calamity; the inhabitants of the valleys and country villages; who, though mean and low, shall be lower still, and lose that little substance, that liberty and those privileges, they had; as valleys may be cleft, and open, and sink into the lower parts of the earth; so it is signified that these people should be in a more depressed state and condition:

as wax before the fire; melts, and cannot stand the force of it; so the mountains should melt at the presence of the Lord; and kingdoms and states, and the greatest and mightiest of men in them, would not be able to stand before the fierceness of his wrath; see Psa 68:2;

and as the waters that are poured down a steep place; that run with great swiftness, force, and rapidity, and there is no stopping them; so should the judgments of God come down upon the lower sort of people, the inhabitants of the valleys; neither high nor low would escape the indignation of the Lord, or be able to stand against it, or stand up under it.

Gill: Mic 1:5

For the transgression of Jacob is all this, and for the sins of the house of Israel,.... All this evil, all these calamities and judgments, signified by the above metaphorical phrases, these did not come by chance, nor without, reason; but were or would be inflicted, according to the righteous judgment of God, upon the people of Israel and Judah, for their manifold sins and transgressions, especially their idolatry: and should it be asked,

what is the transgression of Jacob? what notorious crime has he been guilty of? or what is the iniquity the two tribes are charged with, that is the cause of so much severity? the answer is,

is it not Samaria? the wickedness of Samaria, the calf of Samaria? as in Hos 7:1; that is, the worship of the calf of Samaria; is not that idolatry the transgression of Jacob, or which the ten tribes have given into? it is; and a just reason for all this wrath to come upon them: or, "who is the transgression of Jacob?" ^r who is the spring and source of it; the cause, author, and encourager of it? are they not the kings that have reigned in Samaria from the times of Omri, with their nobles, princes, and great men, who, by their edicts, influence, and example, have encouraged the worship of the golden calves? they are the original root and motive of it, and to them it must be ascribed; they caused the people to sin: or, as the Targum,

"where have they of the house of Jacob sinned? is it not in Samaria?''

verily it is, and from thence, the metropolis of the nation, the sin has spread itself all over it:

and what are the high places of Judah? or, "who are they?" ^s who have been the makers of them? who have set them up, and encouraged idolatrous worship at them?

are they not Jerusalem? are they not the king, the princes, and priests, that dwell at Jerusalem? certainly they are; such as Ahaz, and others, in whose times this prophet lived; see 2Ki 16:4; or, as the Targum,

"where did they of the house of Judah commit sin? was it not in Jerusalem?''

truly it was, and even in the temple; here Ahaz built an altar like that at Damascus, and sacrificed on it, and spoiled the temple, and several of the vessels in it, 2Ki 16:10.

Gill: Mic 1:6

Therefore I will make Samaria as an heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard,.... As a field ploughed, and laid in heaps; see Mic 3:12; or as stones gathered out of a field, and out of a vineyard planted, and laid in a heap; so should this city become a heap of stones and rubbish, being utterly demolished; and this being done according to the will of God, and through his instigation of Shalmaneser king of Assyria to it, and by his providence succeeding his army that besieged it, is said to be done by him. With this agrees the Vulgate Latin version,

"I will make Samaria as a heap of stones in a field, when a vineyard is planted;''

see Isa 5:2; for the city, being destroyed, cannot be compared to the plants of a vineyard set in good order, beautiful and thriving; but, as to heaps of stones in a field, so to such in a vineyard; or to hillocks raised up there for the plants of vines; and if the comparison is to plants themselves, it must be to withered ones, that are good for nothing. The note of similitude as is not in the text; and the words may be read without it, "I will make Samaria an heap of the field, plantings of a vineyard" ^t; that is, it shall be ploughed up, and made a heap of; turned into a field, and vines planted on it; for which its situation was very proper, being on a hill where vines used to be planted, and so should no more be inhabited as a city:

and I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley; the stones of the buildings and walls of the city, which, being on a hill, when pulled down, rolled into the valley; and with as much swiftness and force as waters run down a steep place, as in Mic 1:4; where the same word is used as here:

and I will discover the foundations thereof; which should be fused up, and left bare; not one stone should be upon another; so that there should be no traces and footsteps of the city remaining, and it should be difficult to know the place where it stood. This is expressive of the total desolation and utter destruction of it: this was not accomplished by Shalmaneser when he took it; for though he carried captive the inhabitants thereof, he put others in their room; but this was entirely fulfilled, not by Jonathan Maccabeus, though he is said ^u to besiege it, and level it with the ground; but by John Hyrcanus; and the account of the destruction of it by him, as given by Josephus ^w, exactly answers to this prophecy, and, to Hos 13:16; where its desolation is also predicted; he says that Hyrcanus, having besieged it a year, took it; and, not content with this only, he utterly destroyed it, making brooks to run through it; and by digging it up, so that it fell into holes and caverns, insomuch that there were no signs nor traces of the city left. It was indeed afterwards rebuilt by Gabinius the Roman proconsul of Syria, and restored by Augustus Caesar to Herod, who adorned and fortified it, and called it by the name of Sebaste, in honour of Augustus ^x; though Benjamin of Tudela pretends that Ahab's palace might be discerned there in his time, or the place known where it was, which is not likely; excepting this, his account is probable.

"From Luz (he says ^y) is one day's journey to Sebaste, which is Samaria; and still there may be perceived there the palace of Ahab king of Israel; and it is a fortified city on a very high hill, and in it are fountains; and is a land of brooks of water, and gardens, orchards, vineyards, and olive yards;''

but, since his time, it is become more ruinous. Mr. Maundrell, who some years ago was upon the spot, gives a fuller account of it;

"this great city (he says ^z) is now wholly converted into gardens; and all the tokens that remain, to testify that there has ever been such a place, are only on the north side, a large square piazza, encompassed with pillars; and, on the east, some poor remains of a great church, said to be built by the Empress Helena, over the place where St. John Baptist was both imprisoned and beheaded.''

So say others ^a,

"the remains of Sebaste, or the ancient Samaria, though long ago laid in ruinous heaps, and a great part of it turned into ploughed land and garden ground, do still retain some monuments of its ancient grandeur, and of those noble edifices in it, with which King Herod caused it to be adorned;''

and then mention the large square piazza on the north, and the church on the east. It was twelve miles from Dothaim, and as many from Merran, and four from Atharoth, according to Eusebius ^b; and was, as Josephus ^c says, a day's journey from Jerusalem. Sichem, called by the Turks Naplus, is now the metropolis of the country of Samaria; Samaria, or Sebaste, being utterly destroyed, as says Petrus a Valle ^d, a traveller in those parts.

Gill: Mic 1:7

And all the graven images thereof shall be beaten to pieces,.... By the Assyrian army, for the sake of the gold and silver of which they were, made, or with which they were adorned, as was usually done by conquerors to the gods of the nations they conquered; these were the calf of Samaria, and other idols; and not only those in the city of Samaria, but in all the other cities of Israel which fell into the hands of the Assyrian monarch; see Isa 10:11;

and all the hires thereof shall be burnt with fire; this the Targum also interprets of idols; such as escaped the plunder of the soldiers should be burnt with fire: Kimchi, by "hires", understands the beautiful garments, and other ornaments, with which they adorned their idols, which were gifts unto them; and they committing spiritual adultery with them, these are compared to the hire of a harlot: or it may design their fine houses, and the furniture of them, all their substance and riches, which they looked upon as obtained by entering into alliances with idolatrous nations, and as the hire and reward of their idolatry; all these should be consumed by fire when the city was taken:

and all the idols thereof will I lay desolate; such as were not broke to pieces, nor burnt, should be thrown down, and trampled upon, and made no account of, or carried away with other spoil. The Targum interprets it of the houses or temples of their idols, which should be demolished. By this and the preceding clause it appears, that, besides the golden calf, there were other idols worshipped in Samaria. In the times of Ahab was the image of Baal, with others, for which he built an altar and a temple in Samaria, and a grove, 1Ki 16:31; and at the time it was taken by Shalmaneser there were idols in it, as appears from Isa 10:10; and there were still more after a colony of the Babylonians and others were introduced into it; the names of which were Succothbenoth, Nergal, Ashima, Nibhaz, Tartak, Adrammelech, and Anammelech. The first of these is thought, by Selden ^e to be Venus; and the two last, both by him and Braunius ^f, to be the same with Mo, having the signification of a king in them, as that word signifies, and children being burnt unto them: they are all difficult to be understood. The account the Jews ^g give of them is, that "Succothbenoth" were images of a hen and chickens; "Nergal", a cock; "Ashima", a goat without hair; "Nibhaz", or "Nibchan", as sometimes read, a dog; and "Tartak", an ass; "Adrammelech", a mule, or a peacock; and "Anammelech", a horse, or a pheasant. And it was not unusual for some of these creatures to be worshipped by the Heathens, as a cock by the Syrians, and others; a goat by the Mendesians; and the dog Anubis, perhaps the same with Nibhaz, by the Egyptians ^h. And though the inhabitants of Samaria might be better instructed, after Manasseh and other Jews came to reside among them in later times, still they retained idolatrous practices; and, even in the times of our Lord, they were ignorant of the true object of religious worship, Joh 4:22; and they are charged by the Jewish writers ⁱ with worshipping the image of a dove on Mount Gerizim, and also such strange gods, the teraphim, which Jacob hid under the oak at Sichem; however, let their idols be what they will they worshipped, they are now utterly destroyed, according to this prophecy;

for she gathered it of the hire of an harlot, and they shall return to the hire of an harlot; as all the riches of Samaria and its inhabitants were gathered together as the reward of their idolatry, as they imagined, so they should return to idolaters, the Assyrians; to Nineveh, called the well favoured harlot, Nah 3:4; the metropolis of the Assyrian empire; and to the house or temple of those that worshipped idols, as the Targum; with which they should adorn their idols, or use them in idolatrous worship: or the sense in general is, that as their riches were ill gotten, as the hire of a harlot, and which never prospers, so theirs should come to nothing; as it came, so it should go: according to our proverb, "lightly come, lightly go". The allusion seems to be to harlots prostituting themselves in the temples of idols, which was common among the Heathens, as at Comana and Corinth, as Strabo ^k relates; and particularly among the Babylonians and Assyrians, which may be here referred to: for Herodotus ^l says, it was a law with the Babylonians that every woman of that country should once in her life sit in the temple of Venus, and lie with a strange man: here women used to sit with a crown upon their heads: nor might they return home until some stranger threw money into their laps, and took them out of the temple, and lay with them; and he that cast it must say, I implore the goddess Mylitta for thee; the name by which the Assyrians call Venus; nor was it lawful to reject the price or the money, be it what it would, for it was converted to holy uses, and Strabo ^m affirms much the same. So the Phoenician women used to prostitute themselves in the temples of their idols, and dedicate there the hire of their bodies to their gods, thinking thereby to appease their deities, and obtain good things for themselves ⁿ.

Gill: Mic 1:8

Therefore I will wail and howl, I will go stripped and naked,.... To his shut, putting off his upper garment; the rough one, such as the prophets used to wear; which he did as the greater sign of his mourning: sometimes, in such cases, they rent their garments; at other times they stripped themselves of them, and walked naked, as Isaiah did, Isa 20:3; he went about like a madman, one disturbed in his mind, bereft of his senses, because of the desolation coming upon Israel; and without his clothes, as such persons often do: so the word rendered "stripped" signifies, as the Jewish commentators observe. This lamentation, and with these circumstances, the prophet made in his own person, to show the reality and certainty of their ruin, and to represent to them the desolate condition they would be in, destitute of all good things, and to them with it; as well as to express the sympathy of his heart, and thereby to assure them that it was not out of ill will to them, or a spirit of revenge, that he delivered such a message: or this he did in the person of all the people, showing what they would do, and that this would be their case shortly. So the Targum,

"for this they shall wail and howl, and go naked among the spoilers;''

I will make a wailing like the dragons; as in their fight with elephants, at which time they make a hideous noise ⁿ; and whose hissings have been very terrible to large bodies of men. Aelianus ^o speaks of a dragon in India, which, when it perceived Alexander's army near at hand, gave such a prodigious hiss and blast, that it greatly frightened and disturbed the whole army: and he relates ^p of another, that was in a valley near Mount Pellenaeus, in the isle of Chios, whose hissing was very terrible to the inhabitants of that place; and Bochart ^q conjectures that this their hissing is here referred to; and who observes of the whale, that it has its name from a word in the Hebrew tongue, which signifies to lament; and which word is here used, and is frequently used of large fishes, as whales, sea calves, dolphins, &c. which make a great noise and bellowing, as the sea calf; particularly the balaena, which is one kind of a whale, and makes such a large and continued noise, as to be heard at the distance of two miles, as Rondeletius ^r says; and dolphins are said to make a moan and groaning like human creatures, as Pliny ^s and Solinus ^t report: and Peter Gillius relates, from his own experience, that lodging one night in a vessel, in which many dolphins were taken, there were such weeping and mourning, that he could not sleep for them; he thought they deplored their condition with mourning, lamentation, and a large flow of tears, as men do, and therefore could not help pitying their case; and, while the fisherman was asleep, took that which was next him, that seemed to mourn most, and cast it into the sea; but this was of no avail, for the rest increased their mourning more and more, and seemed plainly to desire the like deliverance; so that all the night he was in the midst of the most bitter moaning: wherefore Bochart, who quotes these instances, elsewhere ^u thinks that the prophet compares his mourning with the mourning of these creatures, rather than with the hissing of dragons. Some ^w think crocodiles are here meant; and of them it is reported ^x, that when they have eaten the body of a creature, which they do first, and come to the head, they weep over it with tears; hence the proverb of crocodiles tears, for hypocritical ones; but it cannot well be thought, surely, that the prophet would compare his mourning to that of such a creature. The learned Pocock thinks it more reasonable that the "jackals" are meant, called by the Arabians "ebn awi", rather than dragons; a creature of a size between a fox and a wolf, or a dog and a fox, which makes a dreadful howling in the night; by which travellers, unacquainted with it, would think a company of women or children were howling, and goes before the lion as his provider;

and mourning as the owls; or "daughters of the owl" ^y; which is a night bird, and makes a very frightful noise, especially the screech owl. The Targum interprets it of the ostrich ^z; and it may be meant either of the mourning it makes when its young are about to be taken away, and it exposes itself to danger on their account, and perishes in the attempt. Aelianus ^a reports that they are taken by sharp iron spikes fixed about their nest, when they are returning to their young, after having been in quest of food for them; and, though they see the shining iron, yet such is their vehement desire after their young, that they spread their wings like sails, and with great swiftness and noise rush into the nest, where they are transfixed with the spikes, and die: and not only Vatablus observes, that these creatures have a very mournful voice; but Bochart ^b has shown, from the Arabic writers, that they frequently cry and howl; and from John de Laet, who affirms that those in the parts about Brazil cry so loud as to be heard half a mile; and indeed they have their name from crying and howling. The Targum renders it by a word which signifies pleasant; and so Onkelos on Lev 11:16, by an antiphrasis, because its voice is so very unpleasant. Or, since the words may be rendered, "the daughters of the ostrich" ^c, it may be understood of the mourning of its young, when left by her, when they make a hideous noise and miserable moan, as some observe ^d.

Gill: Mic 1:9

For her wound is incurable,.... Or her "stroke is desperate" ^e. The ruin of Samaria, and the ten tribes, was inevitable; the decree being gone forth, and they hardened in their sins, and continuing in their impenitence; and their destruction was irrevocable; they were not to be restored again, nor are they to this day; nor will be till the time comes that all Israel shall be saved: or "she is grievously sick of her wounds"; just ready to die, upon the brink of ruin, and no hope of saving her; this is the cause and reason of the above lamentation of the prophet: and what increased his grief and sorrow the more was,

for it is come unto Judah; the calamity has reached the land of Judah; it stopped not with Israel or the ten tribes, but spread itself into the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin; for the Assyrian army, having taken Samaria, and carried Israel captive, in a short time, about seven or eight years, invaded Judea, and took the fenced cities of Judah in Hezekiah's time, in which Micah prophesied;

he is come unto the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem; Sennacherib, king of Assyria, having taken the fenced cities, came up to the very gates of Jerusalem, and besieged it, where the courts of judicature were kept, and the people resorted to, to have justice done them; and Micah, being of the tribe of Judah, calls them his people, and was the more affected with their distress.

Gill: Mic 1:10

Declare ye it not at Gath,.... A city of the Philistines, put for all the rest: the phrase is borrowed from 2Sa 1:20; where the reason is given, and holds good here as there; and the sense is, not that the destruction of Israel, or the invasion of Judea, or the besieging of Jerusalem, could be hid from the Philistines; but that it was a thing desirable, was it possible, since it would be matter of rejoicing to them, and that would be an aggravation of the distress of Israel and Judah:

weep ye not at all; that is, before the Philistines, or such like enemies, lest they should laugh and scoff at you; though they had reason to weep, and did and ought to weep in secret; yet, as much as in them lay, it would be right to forbear it openly, because of the insults and reproach of the enemy. The learned Reland ^f suspects that it should be read, "weep not in Acco": which was another city in Palestine, to the north from the enemy, as Gath was to the south; and observes, that there is a like play on words ^g in the words, as in the places after mentioned. Acco is the same with Ptolemais, Act 21:7; See Gill on Act 21:7. It had this name from Ptolemy Lagus king of Egypt, who enlarged it, and called it after his own name; but Mr, Maundrell ^h observes,

"now, since it hath been in the possession of the Turks, it has, according to the example of many other cities in Turkey, cast off its Greek, and recovered some semblance of its old Hebrew name again, being called Acca, or Acra. As to its situation (he says) it enjoys all possible advantages, both of sea and land; on its north and east sides it is compassed with a spacious and fertile plain; on the west it is washed by the Mediterranean sea; and on the south by a large bay, extending from the city as far as Mount Carmel;''

in the house of Aphrah roll thyself in the dust; as mourners used to do, sit in the dust, or cover their heads with it, or wallow in it; this is allowed to be done privately, in houses or in towns distinct from the Philistines, as Aphrah or Ophrah was, which was in the tribe of Benjamin, Jos 18:23; called here "Aphrah", to make it better agree with "Aphar", dust, to which the allusion is: and it may be rendered, "in the house of dust roll thyself in the dust"; having respect to the condition houses would be in at this time, mere heaps of dust and rubbish, so that they would find enough easily to roll themselves in. Here is a double reading; the "Keri", or marginal reading, which the Masora directs to, and we follow, is, "roll thyself": but the "Cetib", or writing, is, "I have rolled myself" ⁱ; and so are the words of the prophet, who before says he wailed and howled, and went stripped and naked; here he says, as a further token of his sorrow, that he rolled himself in dust, and as an example for Israel to do the like. This place was a village in the times of Jerom ^k and was called Effrem; it was five miles from Bethel to the east.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Mic 1:1

¹ tn Heb “The word of the Lord which came to.”

² tn The words “he delivered this message” are not in the Hebrew text, but are supplied in the translation for clarification.

³ tn Heb “in the days of” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV).

⁴ tn Heb “which he saw concerning.”

⁵ map For location see Map2 B1; Map4 D3; Map5 E2; Map6 A4; Map7 C1.

⁶ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

NET Notes: Mic 1:2

¹ tn Heb “O peoples, all of them.”

² tn Heb “O earth and all its fullness”; KJV “and all that therein is.”

³ tn Heb “May the sovereign Lord testify against you.” The verb וִיהִי (vihiy) is jussive, which normally conveys a volitional sense of an urgent request or prayer (“may he testify!”). However, GKC 325-26 §109.k notes that here the jussive form is used without any volitional sense for the ordinary imperfect, as a rhythmic shortening at the beginning of a sentence, thus removed as far as possible from the principal accent (cf. Gen 49:17; Deut 28:8; 1 Sam 10:5; 2 Sam 5:24; Hos 6:1; 11:4; Amos 5:14; Zeph 2:13; Zech 9:5; Pss 72:16-17; 104:31; Job 18:12; 20:23, 26, 28; 27:8; 33:21; 34:37; Ruth 3:4). Thus, the translation here renders the jussive as an ordinary imperfect. Some translations render it in a traditional jussive sense: (1) urgent request: “And let my Lord God be your accuser” (NJPS); or (2) dependent purpose/result: “that the Sovereign Lord may witness against you” (NIV).

⁴ tn Heb “the Lord from his majestic palace.” Since the verb is omitted it is unclear whether the implied term be supplied from the preceding line (“he will testify against you”) or the following line (“he is leaving”). So the line may be rendered “the Lord will accuse you from his majestic temple” or “the Lord will come forth from his majestic temple.” Most translations render it literally, but some remove the ambiguity: “the Lord God accuses you from his holy temple” (CEV); “He speaks from his holy temple” (TEV).

⁵ tn Or “his holy temple” (KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT). This refers to the Lord’s dwelling in heaven, however, rather than the temple in Jerusalem (note the following verse, which describes a theophany).

NET Notes: Mic 1:3

¹ tn Or “For look.” The expression כִּי־הִנֵּה (ki-hinneh) may function as an explanatory introduction (“For look!”; Isa 26:21; 60:2; 65:17, 18: 66:15; Jer 1:15; 25:29; 30:10; 45:5; 46:27; 50:9; Ezek 30:9; 36:9; Zech 2:10; 3:8), or as an emphatic introduction (“Look!”; Jdgs 3:15; Isa 3:1; Jer 8:17; 30:3; 49:15; Hos 9:6; Joel 3:1 [HT 4:1]; Amos 4:2, 13; 6:11, 14; 9:9; Hab 1:6; Zech 2:9 [HT 2:13]; Zech 3:9; 11:16).

² tn Or “high places” (KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

NET Notes: Mic 1:4

¹ tn Or “melt” (NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT). This is a figurative description of earthquakes, landslides, and collapse of the mountains, rather than some sort of volcanic activity (note the remainder of the verse).

² sn The mountains will disintegrate…the valleys will be split in two. This imagery pictures an earthquake and accompanying landslide.

³ tn The words “the mountains will melt” are supplied in the translation for clarification. The simile extends back to the first line of the verse.

⁴ tn The words “the rocks will slide down” are supplied in the translation for clarification. This simile elaborates on the prior one and further develops the imagery of the verse’s first line.

NET Notes: Mic 1:5

¹ tn Heb “and because of.” This was simplified in the translation for stylistic reasons.

² tn Heb “house.”

³ tn Heb “What is the rebellion of Jacob?”

⁴ tn Heb “Is it not Samaria?” The negated rhetorical question expects the answer, “It certainly is!” To make this clear the question has been translated as a strong affirmative statement.

⁵ tn Heb “What are Judah’s high places?”

⁶ tn Heb “Is it not Jerusalem?” The rhetorical question expects the answer, “It certainly is!”

sn In vv. 2-5 Micah narrows the scope of God’s judgment from the nations (vv. 2-4) to his covenant people (v. 5). Universal judgment is coming, but ironically Israel is the focal point of God’s anger. In v. 5c the prophet includes Judah within the scope of divine judgment, for it has followed in the pagan steps of the northern kingdom. He accomplishes this with rhetorical skill. In v. 5b he develops the first assertion of v. 5a (“All of this is because of Jacob’s rebellion”). One expects in v. 5c an elaboration of the second assertion in v. 5a (“and the sins of the nation of Israel”), which one assumes, in light of v. 5b, pertains to the northern kingdom. But the prophet specifies the “sins” as “high places” and makes it clear that “the nation of Israel” includes Judah. Verses 6-7 further develop v. 5b (judgment on the northern kingdom), while vv. 8-16 expand on v. 5c (judgment on Judah).

map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

NET Notes: Mic 1:6

¹ map For location see Map2 B1; Map4 D3; Map5 E2; Map6 A4; Map7 C1.

² tn Heb “into a planting place for vineyards.”

³ tn Heb “pour” (so NASB, NIV); KJV, NRSV “pour down”; NAB “throw down”; NLT “roll.”

⁴ tn Heb “her stones.” The term stones is a metonymy for the city walls whose foundations were constructed of stone masonry.

⁵ tn Heb “I will uncover her foundations.” The term “foundations” refers to the lower courses of the stones of the city’s outer fortification walls.

NET Notes: Mic 1:7

¹ tn Heb “and all her prostitute’s wages will be burned with fire.”

sn The precious metal used by Samaria’s pagan worship centers to make idols are here compared to a prostitute’s wages because Samaria had been unfaithful to the Lord and prostituted herself to pagan gods, such as Baal.

² tn Heb “I will make desolate” (so NASB).

³ tn Or “for” (KJV, NASB, NRSV).

⁴ tn No object is specified in the Hebrew text; the words “the metal” are supplied from the context.

⁵ tn Heb “for from a prostitute’s wages she gathered, and to a prostitute’s wages they will return.” When the metal was first collected it was comparable to the coins a prostitute would receive for her services. The metal was then formed into idols, but now the Lord’s fiery judgment would reduce the metal images to their original condition.

NET Notes: Mic 1:8

¹ tn The prophet is probably the speaker here.

² tn Or “stripped.” The precise meaning of this Hebrew word is unclear. It may refer to walking barefoot (see 2 Sam 15:30) or to partially stripping oneself (see Job 12:17-19).

³ tn Heb “naked.” This probably does not refer to complete nudity, but to stripping off one’s outer garments as an outward sign of the destitution felt by the mourner.

⁴ tn Heb “I will make lamentation.”

⁵ tn Or “a jackal”; CEV “howling wolves.”

⁶ tn Heb “[make] a mourning.”

⁷ tn Or perhaps “ostrich” (cf. ASV, NAB, NASB, NRSV, NLT).

NET Notes: Mic 1:9

¹ tn Heb “her”; the referent (Samaria) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

² tc The MT reads the plural “wounds”; the singular is read by the LXX, Syriac, and Vg.

tn Or “wound.”

³ tn Heb “come to.”

⁴ tn Or “reached.”

⁵ tn Heb “the gate.” Kings and civic leaders typically conducted important business at the city gate (see 1 Kgs 22:10 for an example), and the term is understood here to refer by metonymy to the leadership who would be present at the gate.

⁶ tn Heb “to Jerusalem.” The expression “it has contaminated” do not appear in the Hebrew text, but have been supplied to fill out the parallelism with the preceding line.

map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

NET Notes: Mic 1:10

¹ tn Heb “Tell it not in Gath.” The Hebrew word for “tell” (נָגַד, nagad) sounds like the name of the city, Gath (גַּת, gat).

² tn The Hebrew infinitive absolute before the negated jussive emphasizes the prohibition.

³ tc The translation assumes a masculine plural imperative. If one were to emend בְּבֵית (bÿvet) to בֵית (vet), Beth Leaphrah would then be the addressee and the feminine singular imperative (see Qere) could be retained, “O Beth Leaphrah, sit in the dust.”

tn Heb “roll about in mourning in the dust”; or “wallow about in mourning in the dust.” The verb פָּלַשׁ (palash, “roll about in mourning [in dust]”; HALOT 935 s.v. פלשׁ) is figurative (metonymy) for sitting as an outward sign of mourning.

sn To sit in the dust was an outward sign of mourning. The name Beth Leaphrah means “house of dust.”

Geneva Bible: Mic 1:1

The word of the LORD that came to Micah the ^{( a )} Morasthite in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, [and] Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem.

The Argument - Micah the prophet of the tribe of Judah served in the work of the Lord concerning Judah and Israel at least thirty years: during which time Isaiah prophesied. He declares the destruction first of the one kingdom, and then of the other, because of their manifold wickedness, but chiefly because of their idolatry. And to this end he notes the wickedness of the people, the cruelty of the princes and governors, and the allowing of the false prophets, and the delighting in them. Then he sets forth the coming of Christ, his kingdom, and the felicity of it. This Prophet was not that Micah who resisted Ahab and all his false prophets, (1Ki 22:8) but another with the same name.

^{( a )} Born in Mareshah, a city of Judah.

Geneva Bible: Mic 1:2

Hear, ^{( b )} all ye people; hearken, O earth, and all that therein is: and let the Lord GOD be witness against you, the Lord from his holy temple.

^{( b )} Because of the malice and obstinacy of the people, whom he had so often exhorted to repentance, he summons them to God's judgments, taking all creatures, and God himself as witness, that the preaching of the Prophets, which they have abused, will be avenged.

Geneva Bible: Mic 1:3

For, behold, the LORD cometh forth out of his place, and will come ^{( c )} down, and tread upon the high places of the earth.

^{( c )} Meaning by this that God will come to judgment against the strong cities and strongholds.

Geneva Bible: Mic 1:5

For the transgression of Jacob [is] all this, and for the sins of the house of Israel. What [is] the transgression of Jacob? [is it] not ^{( d )} Samaria? and what [are] the high ^{( e )} places of Judah? [are they] not Jerusalem?

^{( d )} Samaria, which should have been an example to all Israel of true religion and justice, was the dirty pool and the tank that all idolatry and corruption was kept alive in, and who prided themselves in their father Jacob, and boasted of him.

^{( e )} That is, the idolatry and infection.

Geneva Bible: Mic 1:7

And all the graven images thereof shall be beaten to pieces, and all the ^{( f )} hires thereof shall be burned with the fire, and all the idols thereof will I lay desolate: for she gathered [it] of the hire of an harlot, and they shall return ^{( g )} to the hire of an harlot.

^{( f )} Which they gathered by evil practices, and thought that their idols had enriched them with these wages because of their service to them.

^{( g )} The gain that came by their idols will be consumed as a thing of nothing: for as the wages or riches of harlots are wickedly gotten, so are they vilely and quickly spent.

Geneva Bible: Mic 1:10

Declare ye [it] not at ^{( h )} Gath, weep ye not at all: in the house of ^{( i )} Aphrah roll thyself in the dust.

^{( h )} Lest the Philistines our enemies rejoice at our destruction.

^{( i )} Which was a city near to Jerusalem (Jos 18:23), there called Ophrah, and signifies dust: therefore he wants them to mourn and roll themselves in the dust, for their dusty city.

Commentary -- Verse Range Notes

TSK Synopsis: Mic 1:1-16

1 The time when Micah prophesied.

2 He shews the wrath of God against Jacob for idolatry.

10 He exhorts to mourning.

MHCC: Mic 1:1-7

The earth is called upon, with all that are therein, to hear the prophet. God's holy temple will not protect false professors. Neither men of high degree, as the mountains, nor men of low degree, as the valleys, can secure themselves or the land from the judgments of God. If sin be found in God's people he will not spare them; and their sins are most provoking to him, for they are most reproaching. When we feel the smart of sin, it behoves us to seek what is the sin we smart for. Persons and places most exalted, are most exposed to spiritual diseases. The vices of leaders and rulers shall be surely and sorely punished. The punishment answers the sin. What they gave to idols, never shall prosper, nor do them any good. What is got by one lust, is wasted on another.

MHCC: Mic 1:8-16

The prophet laments that Israel's case is desperate; but declare it not in Gath. Gratify not those that make merry with the sins or with the sorrows of God's Israel. Roll thyself in the dust, as mourners used to do; let every house in Jerusalem become a house of Aphrah, " a house of dust." When God makes the house dust it becomes us to humble ourselves to the dust under his mighty hand. Many places should share this mourning. The names have meanings which pointed out the miseries coming upon them; thereby to awaken the people to a holy fear of Divine wrath. All refuges but Christ, must be refuges of lies to those who trust in them; other heirs will succeed to every inheritance but that of heaven; and all glory will be turned into shame, except that honour which cometh from God only. Sinners may now disregard their neighbours' sufferings, yet their turn to be punished will some come.

Matthew Henry: Mic 1:1-7

Here is, I. A general account of this prophet and his prophecy, Mic 1:1. This is prefixed for the satisfaction of all that read and hear the prophecy of this book, who will give the more credit to it when they know the author and his authority. 1. The prophecy is the word of the Lord; it is a divine revelation. Note, What is written in the Bible, and what is preached by the ministers of Christ according to what is written there, must be heard and received, not as the word of dying men, which we may be judges of, but as the word of the living God, which we must be judged by, for so it is. This word of the Lord came to the prophet, came plainly, came powerfully, came in a preventing way, and he saw it, saw the vision in which it was conveyed to him, saw the things themselves which he foretold, with as much clearness and certainty as if they had been already accomplished. 2. The prophet is Micah the Morasthite; his name Micah is a contraction of Micaiah, the name of a prophet some ages before (in Ahab's time, 1Ki 22:8); his surname, the Morasthite, signifies that he was born, or lived, at Moresheth, which is mentioned here (Mic 1:14), or Mareshah, which is mentioned Mic 1:15, and Jos 15:44. The place of his abode is mentioned, that any one might enquire in that place, at that time, and might find there was, or had been, such a one there, who was generally reputed to be a prophet. 3. The date of his prophecy is in the reigns of three kings of Judah - Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. Ahaz was one of the worst of Judah's kings, and Hezekiah one of the best; such variety of times pass over God's ministers, times that frown and times that smile, to each of which they must study to accommodate themselves, and to arm themselves against the temptations of both. The promises and threatenings of this book are interwoven, by which it appears that even in the wicked reign he preached comfort, and said to the righteous then that it should be well with them; and that in the pious reign he preached conviction, and said to the wicked then that it should be ill with them; for, however the times change, the word of the Lord is still the same. 4. The parties concerned in this prophecy; it is concerning Samaria and Jerusalem, the head cities of the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah, under the influence of which the kingdoms themselves were. Though the ten tribes have deserted the houses both of David and Aaron, yet God is pleased to send prophets to them.

II. A very solemn introduction to the following prophecy (Mic 1:2), in which, 1. The people are summoned to draw near and give their attendance, as upon a court of judicature: Hear, all you people, Note, Where God has a mouth to speak we must have an ear to hear; we all must, for we are all concerned in what is delivered. " Hear, you people " ( all of them, so the margin reads it), "all you that are now within hearing, and all others that hear it at second hand."It is an unusual construction; but those words with which Micah begins his prophecy are the very same in the original with those wherewith Micaiah ended his, 1Ki 22:28. 2. The earth is called upon, with all that therein is, to hear what the prophet has to say: Hearken, O earth! The earth shall be made to shake under the stroke and weight of the judgments coming; sooner will the earth hear than this stupid senseless people; but God will be heard when he pleads. If the church, and those in it, will not hear, the earth, and those in it, shall, and shame them. 3. God himself is appealed to, and his omniscience, power, and justice, are vouched in testimony against this people: " Let the Lord God be witness against you, a witness that you had fair warning given you, that your prophets did their duty faithfully as watchmen, but you would not take the warning; let the accomplishment of the prophecy be a witness against your contempt and disbelief of it, and prove, to your conviction and confusion, that it was the word of God, and no word of his shall fall to the ground."Note, God himself will be a witness, by the judgments of his hand, against those that would not receive his testimony in the judgments of his mouth. He will be a witness from his holy temple in heaven, when he comes down to execute judgment (Mic 1:3) against those that turned a deaf ear to his oracles, wherein he witnessed to them, out of his holy temple at Jerusalem.

III. A terrible prediction of destroying judgments which should come upon Judah and Israel, which had its accomplishment soon after in Israel, and at length in Judah; for it is foretold, 1. That God himself will appear against them, Mic 1:3. They boasted of themselves and their relation to God, as if that would secure them; but, though God never deceives the faith of the upright, he will disappoint the presumption of the hypocrites, for, behold, the Lord comes forth out of his place, quits his mercy-seat, where they thought they had him fast, and prepares his throne for judgment; his glory departs, for they drive it from them. God's way towards this people had long been a way of mercy, but now he changes his way, he comes out of his place, and will come down. He had seemed to retire, as one regardless of what was done, but now he will show himself, he will rend the heavens, and will come down, not as sometimes, in surprising mercies, but in surprising judgments, to do things not for them, but against them, which they looked not for, Isa 64:1; Isa 26:21. 2. That when the Creator appears against them it shall be in vain for any creature to appear for them. He will tread with contempt and disdain upon the high places of the earth, upon all the powers that are advanced in competition with him or in opposition to him; and he will so tread upon them as to tread them down and level them. High places, set up for the worship of idols or for military fortifications, shall all be trodden down and trampled into the dust. Do men trust to the height and strength of the mountains and rocks, as if they were sufficient to bear up their hopes and bear off their fears? They shall be molten under him, melted down as wax before the fire, Psa 68:2. Do they trust to the fruitfulness of the valleys, and their products? They shall be cleft, or rent, with those fiery streams that shall come pouring down from the mountains when they are melted. They shall be ploughed and washed away as the ground is by the waters that are poured down a steep place. God is said to cleave the earth with rivers, Hab 3:9. Neither men of high degree, as the mountains, nor men of low degree, as the valleys, shall be able to secure either themselves or the land from judgments of God, when they are sent with commission to lay all waste, and, like a sweeping rain, to leave no food, Pro 28:3. This is applied particularly to the head city of Israel, which they hoped would be a protection to the kingdom (Mic 1:6.) I will make Samaria, that is now a rich and populous city, as a heap of the field, as a heap of dung laid there to be spread, or as a heap of stones gathered together to be carried away, and as plantings of a vineyard, as hillocks of earth raised to plant vines in. God will make of that city a heap, of that defenced city a ruin, Isa 25:2. Their altars had been as heaps in the furrows of the fields (Hos 12:11) and now their houses shall be so, as ruinous heaps. The stones of the city are poured down into the valley by the fury of the conqueror, who will thus be revenged on those walls that so long held out against him. They shall be quite pulled down, so that the very foundations shall be discovered, that had been covered by the superstructure; and not one stone shall be left upon another.

IV. A charge of sin upon them, as the procuring cause of these desolating judgments (Mic 1:5): For the transgression of Jacob is all this. If it be asked, "Why is God so angry, and why are Jacob and Israel thus brought to ruin by his anger?"the answer is ready: Sin has done all the mischief; sin has laid all waste; all the calamities of Jacob and Israel are owing to their transgressions; if they had not gone away from God, he would never have appeared thus against them. Note, External privileges and professions will not secure a sinful people from the judgments of God. If sin be found in the house of Israel, if Jacob be guilty of transgression and rebellion, God will not spare them; no, he will punish them first, for their sins are of all others most provoking to him, for they are most reproaching. But it is asked, What is the transgression of Jacob? Note, When we feel the smart of sin it concerns us to enquire what the sin is which we smart for, that we may particularly war against that which wars against us. And what is it? 1. It is idolatry; it is the high places; that is the transgression, the great transgression which reigns in Israel; that is spiritual whoredom, the violation of the marriage-covenant, which merits a divorce. Even the high places of Judah, though not so bad as the transgression of Jacob, were yet offensive enough to God, and a remaining blemish upon some of the good reigns. Howbeit the high places were not taken away. 2. It is the idolatry of Samaria and Jerusalem, the royal cities of those two kingdoms. These were the most populous places, and where there were most people there was most wickedness, and they made one another worse. These were the most pompous places; there men lived most in wealth and pleasure, and they forgot God. These were the places that had the greatest influence upon the country, by authority and example; so that from them idolatry and profaneness went forth throughout all the land, Jer 23:15. Note, Spiritual distempers are most contagious in persons and places that are most conspicuous. If the head city of a kingdom, or the chief family in a parish, be vicious and profane, many will follow their pernicious ways, and write after a bad copy when great ones set it for them. The vices of leaders and rulers are leading ruling vices, and therefore shall be surely and sorely punished. Those have a great deal to answer for indeed that not only sin, but make Israel to sin. Those must expect to be made examples that have been examples of wickedness. If the transgression of Jacob is Samaria, therefore shall Samaria become a heap. Let the ringleaders in sin hear this and fear.

V. The punishment made to answer the sin, in the particular destruction of the idols, Mic 1:7. 1. The gods they worshipped shall be destroyed: The graven images shall be beaten to pieces by the army of the Assyrians, and all the idols shall be laid desolate. Samaria and her idols were ruined together by Sennacherib (Isa 10:11), and their gods cast into the fire, for they were no gods (Isa 37:19); and this was the Lord's doing: I will lay the idols desolate. Note, If the law of God prevail not to make men in authority destroy idols, God will take the work into his own hands, and will do it himself. 2. The gifts that passed between them and their gods shall be destroyed; for all the hires thereof shall be burnt with fire, which may be meant either of the presents they made to their idols for the replenishing of their altars, and the adorning of their statues and temples (these shall become a prey to the victorious army, which shall rifle not only private houses, but the houses of their gods), or of the corn, and wine, and oil, which they called the rewards, or hires, which their idols, their lovers, gave them (Hos 2:12); these shall be taken from them by him whom (by ascribing them to their dear idols) they had defrauded of the honour due to him. Note, That cannot prosper by which men either are hired to sin or hire others to sin; for the wages of sin will be death. She gathered it of the hire of the harlot, and it shall return to the hire of a harlot. They enriched themselves by their leagues with the idolatrous nations, who gave them advantages, to court them into the service of their idols, and their idols' temples were enriched with gifts by those who went a whoring after them. And all this wealth shall become a prey to the idolatrous nations, and so be the hire of a harlot again, wages to an army of idolaters, who shall take it as a reward given them by their gods. It shall be a present to king Jareb, Hos 10:6. What they gave to their idols, and what they thought they got by them, shall be as the hire of a harlot; the curse of God shall be upon it, and it shall never prosper, nor do them any good. It is common that what is squeezed out by one lust is squandered away upon another.

Matthew Henry: Mic 1:8-16

We have here a long train of mourners attending the funeral of a ruined kingdom.

I. The prophet is himself chief mourner (Mic 1:8, Mic 1:9): I will wail and howl; I will go stripped and naked, as a man distracted with grief. The prophets usually expressed their own grief for the public grievances, partly to mollify the predictions of them, and to make it appear that is was not out of ill-will that they denounced the judgments of God (so far were they from desiring the woeful day that they dreaded it more than any thing), partly to show how very dreadful and mournful the calamities would be, and to stir up in the people a holy fear of them, that by repentance they might turn away the wrath of God. Note, We ought to lament the punishments of sinners as well as the sufferings of saints in this world; the weeping prophet did so (Jer 9:1); so did this prophet. He makes a wailing like the dragons, or rather the jackals, ravenous beasts that in those countries used to meet in the night, and howl, and make hideous noises; he mourns as the owls, the screech-owls, or ostriches, as some read it. Two things the prophet here thus dolefully laments: - 1. That Israel's case is desperate: Her wound is incurable; it is ruin without remedy; man cannot help her; God will not, because she will not by repentance and reformation help herself. There is indeed balm in Gilead and a physician there; but they will not apply to the physician, nor apply the balm to themselves, and therefore the wound is incurable. 2. That Judah likewise is in danger. The cup is going round, and is now put into Judah's hand: The enemy has come to the gate of Jerusalem. Soon after the destruction of Samaria and the ten tribes, the Assyrian army, under Sennacherib, laid siege to Jerusalem, came to the gate, but could not force their way any further; however, it was with great concern and trouble that the prophet foresaw the fright, so dearly did he love the peace of Jerusalem.

II. Several places are here brought in mourning, and are called upon to mourn; but with this proviso, that they should not let the Philistines hear them (Mic 1:10): Declare it not in Gath; this is borrowed from David's lamentation for Saul and Jonathan (2Sa 1:20), Tell it not in Gath, for the uncircumcised will triumph in Israel's tears. Note, One would not, if it could be helped, gratify those that make themselves and their companions merry with the sins or with the sorrows of God's Israel. David was silent, and stifled his griefs, when the wicked were before him, Psa 39:1. But, though it may be prudent not to give way to a noisy sorrow, yet it is duty to admit a silent one when the church of God is in distress. " Roll thyself in the dust "(as great mourners used to do) "and so let the house of Judah and every house in Jerusalem become a house of Aphrah, a house of dust, covered with dust, crumbled into dust."When God makes the house dust it becomes us to humble ourselves under his mighty hand, and to put our mouths in the dust, thus accommodating ourselves to the providences that concern us. Dust we are; God brings us to the dust, that we may know it, and own it. Divers other places are here named that should be sharers in this universal mourning, the names of some of which we do not find elsewhere, whence it is conjectured that they are names put upon them by the prophet, the signification of which might either indicate or aggravate the miseries coming upon them, thereby to awaken this secure and stupid people to a holy fear of divine wrath. We find Sennacherib's invasion thus described, in the prediction of it, by the impressions of terror it should make upon the several cities that fell in his way, Isa 10:28, Isa 10:29, etc. Let us observe the particulars here, 1. The inhabitants of Saphir, which signifies neat and beautiful ( thou that dwellest fairly, so the margin reads it), shall pass away into captivity, or be forced to flee, stripped of all their ornaments and having their shame naked. Note, Those who appear ever so fine and delicate know not what contempt they may be exposed to; and the more grievous will the shame be to those who have been inhabitants of Saphir. 2. The inhabitants of Zaanan, which signifies the country of flocks, a populous country, where the people are as numerous and thick as flocks of sheep, shall yet be so taken up with their own calamities, felt or feared, that they shall not come forth in the mourning of Bethezel, which signifies a place near, shall not condole with, nor bring any succour to, their next neighbours in distress; for he shall receive of you his standing; the enemy shall encamp among you, O inhabitants of Zaanan! shall take up a station there, shall find footing among you. Those may well think themselves excused from helping their neighbours who find they have enough to do to help themselves and to hold their own. 3. As for the inhabitants of Maroth (which, some think, is put for Ramoth, others that it signifies the rough places ), they waited carefully for good, and were grieved for the want of it, but were disappointed; for evil came from the Lord unto the gate of Jerusalem, when the Assyrian army besieged it, Mic 1:12. The inhabitants of Maroth might well overlook their own particular grievances when they saw the holy city itself in danger, and might well overlook the Assyrian, that was the instrument, when they saw the evil coming from the Lord. 4. Lachish was a city of Judah, which Sennacherib laid siege to, Isa 36:1, Isa 36:2. The inhabitants of that city are called to bind the chariot to the swift beast, to prepare for a speedy flight, as having no other way left to secure themselves and their families; or it is spoken ironically: "You have had your chariots and your swift beasts, but where are they now?"God's quarrel with Lachish is that she is the beginning of sin, probably the sin of idolatry, to the daughter of Zion (Mic 1:13); they had learned it from the ten tribes, their near neighbours, and so infected the two tribes with it. Note, Those that help to bring sin into a country do but thereby prepare for the throwing of themselves out of it. Those must expect to be first in the punishment who have been ringleaders in sin. The transgressions of Israel were found in thee; when they came to be traced up to their original they were found to take rise very much from that city. God knows at whose door to lay the blame of the transgressions of Israel, and whom to find guilty. Lachish, having been so much accessory to the sin of Israel, shall certainly be reckoned with: Thou shalt give presents to Moresheth-gath, a city of the Philistines, which perhaps had a dependence upon Gath, that famous Philistine city; thou shalt send to court those of that city to assist thee, but it shall be in vain, for (Mic 1:14) the houses of Achzib (a city which joined to Mareshah, or Moresheth, and is mentioned with it, Jos 15:44) shall be a lie to the kings of Israel; though they depend upon their strength, yet they shall fail them. Here there is an allusion to the name. Achzib signifies a lie, and so it shall prove to those that trust in it. 5. Mareshah, that could not, or would not, help Israel, shall herself be made a prey (Mic 1:15): " I will bring a heir (that is, an enemy) that shall take possession of thy lands, with as much assurance as if he were heir at law to them, and he shall come to Adullam, and to the glory of Israel, that is, to Jerusalem the head city;"or " The glory of Israel shall come to be as Adullam, a poor despicable place;"or, "The king of Assyria, whom Israel had gloried in, shall come to Adullam, in laying the country waste."6. The whole land of Judah seems to be spoken to (Mic 1:16) and called to weeping and mourning: " Make thee bald, by tearing thy hair and shaving thy head; poll thee for thy delicate children, that had been tenderly and nicely brought up; enlarge thy baldness as the eagle when she casts her feathers and is all over bald; for they have gone into captivity from thee, and are not likely to return; and their captivity will be the more grievous to them because they have been brought up delicately and have not been inured to hardship."Or this is directed particularly to the inhabitants of Mareshah, as Mic 1:15. That was the prophet's own city, and yet he denounces the judgments of God against it; for it shall be an aggravation of its sin that it had such a prophet, and knew not the day of its visitation. Its being thus privileged, since it improved not the privilege, shall not procure favour for it either with God or with his prophet.

Keil-Delitzsch: Mic 1:1-4

The heading in Mic 1:1 has been explained in the introduction. Mic 1:2-4 form the introduction to the prophet's address. Mic 1:2. "Hear, all ye nations: observe, O earth, and that which fills it: and let the Lord Jehovah be a witness against you, the Lord out of His holy palace. Mic 1:3. For, behold, Jehovah cometh forth from His place, and cometh down, and marcheth over the high places of the earth. Mic 1:4. And the mountains will melt under Him, and the valleys split, like wax before the fire, like water poured out upon a slope." The introductory words, "Hear, ye nations all,"are taken by Micah from his earlier namesake the son of Imlah (1Ki 22:28). As the latter, in his attack upon the false prophets, called all nations as witnesses to confirm the truth of his prophecy, so does Micah the Morashite commence his prophetic testimony with the same appeal, so as to announce his labours at the very outset as a continuation of the activity of his predecessor who had been so zealous for the Lord. As the son of Imlah had to contend against the false prophets as seducers of the nation, so has also the Morashtite (compare Mic 2:6, Mic 2:11; Mic 3:5, Mic 3:11); and as the former had to announce to both kingdoms the judgment that would come upon them on account of their sins, so has also the latter; and he does it by frequently referring to the prophecy of the elder Micah, not only by designating the false prophets as those who walk after the rūăch and lie, sheqer (Mic 2:11), which recals to mind the rūăch sheqer of the prophets of Ahab (1Ki 22:22-23), but also in his use of the figures of the horn of iron in Mic 4:13 (compare the horns of iron of the false prophet Zedekiah in 1Ki 22:11), and of the smiting upon the cheek in Mic 5:1 (compare 1Ki 22:14). ‛Ammı̄m kullâm does not mean all the tribes of Israel; still less does it mean warlike nations. ‛Ammı̄m never has the second meaning, and the first it has only in the primitive language of the Pentateuch. But here both these meanings are precluded by the parallel ארץ וּמלאהּ ; for this expression invariably signifies the whole earth, with that which fills it, except in such a case as Jer 8:16, where 'erets is restricted to the land of Israel by the preceding hâ'ârets , or Eze 12:19, where it is so restricted by the suffix 'artsâh . The appeal to the earth and its fulness is similar to the appeals to the heaven and the earth in Isa 1:2 and Deu 32:1. All nations, yea the whole earth, and all creatures upon it, are to hear, because the judgment which the prophet has to announce to Israel affects the whole earth (Mic 1:3, Mic 1:4), the judgment upon Israel being connected with the judgment upon all nations, or forming a portion of that judgment. In the second clause of the verse, "the Lord Jehovah be witness against you,"it is doubtful who is addressed in the expression "against you."The words cannot well be addressed to all nations and to the earth, because the Lord only rises up as a witness against the man who has despised His word and transgressed His commandments. For being a witness is not equivalent to witnessing or giving testimony by words, - say, for example, by the admonitory and corrective address of the prophet which follows, as C. B. Michaelis supposes, - but refers to the practical testimony given by the Lord in the judgment (Mic 1:3 ff), as in Mal 3:5 and Jer 42:5. Now, although the Lord is described as the Judge of the world in Mic 1:3 and Mic 1:4, yet, according to Mic 1:5., He only comes to execute judgment upon Israel. Consequently we must refer the words "to you"to Israel, or rather to the capitals Samaria and Jerusalem mentioned in Mic 1:1, just as in Nah 1:8 the suffix simply refers to the Nineveh mentioned in the heading, to which there has been no further allusion in Nah 1:2-7. This view is also favoured by the fact that Micah summons all nations to hear his word, in the same sense as his earlier namesake in 1Ki 22:28. What the prophet announces in word, the Lord will confirm by deed, - namely, by executing the predicted judgment, - and indeed "the Lord out of His holy temple,"i.e., the heaven where He is enthroned (Psa 11:4); for (1Ki 22:3) the Lord will rise up from thence, and striding over the high places of the earth, i.e., as unbounded Ruler of the world (cf. Amo 4:13 and Deu 32:13), will come down in fire, so that the mountains melt before Him, that is to say, as Judge of the world. The description of this theophany is founded upon the idea of a terrible storm and earthquake, as in Psa 18:8. The mountains melt (Jdg 5:4 and Psa 68:9) with the streams of water, which discharge themselves from heaven (Jdg 5:4), and the valleys split with the deep channels cut out by the torrents of water. The similes, "like wax,"etc. (as in Psa 68:3), and "like water,"etc., are intended to express the complete dissolution of mountains and valleys. The actual facts answering to this description are the destructive influences exerted upon nature by great national judgments.

Keil-Delitzsch: Mic 1:5-7

This judicial interposition on the part of God is occasioned by the sin of Israel. Mic 1:5. "For the apostasy of Jacob (is) all this, and for the sins of the house of Israel. Who is Jacob's apostasy? is it not Samaria? And who Judah's high places? is it not Jerusalem? Mic 1:6. Therefore I make Samaria into a stone-heap of the field, into plantations of vines; and I pour her stones into the valley, and I will lay bare her foundations. Mic 1:7. And all her stone images will be beaten to pieces, and all her lovers' gifts be burned with fire, and all her idols will I make into a waste: for she has gathered them of prostitute's hire, and to prostitute's hire shall they return." "All this"refers to the coming of Jehovah to judgment announced in Mic 1:3, Mic 1:4. This takes place on account of the apostasy and the sins of Israel. ב (for) used to denote reward or wages, as in 2Sa 3:27 compared with 2Sa 3:30. Jacob and Israel in Mic 1:5 are synonymous, signifying the whole of the covenant nation, as we may see from the fact that in Mic 1:5 Jacob and not Israel is the epithet applied to the ten tribes in distinction from Judah. מי , who? - referring to the author. The apostasy of Israel originates with Samaria; the worship on the high places with Jerusalem. The capitals of the two kingdoms are the authors of the apostasy, as the centres and sources of the corruption which has spread from them over the kingdoms. The allusion to the bâmōth of the illegal worship of the high places, which even the most godly kings were unable to abolish (see at 1Ki 15:14), shows, moreover, that פּשׁע denotes that religious apostasy from Jehovah which was formally sanctioned in the kingdom of the ten tribes by the introduction of the calf-worship. But because this apostasy commenced in the kingdom of the ten tribes, the punishment would fall upon this kingdom first, and Samaria would be utterly destroyed. Stone-heaps of the field and vineyard plantations harmonize badly, in Hitzig's view: he therefore proposes to alter the text. But there is no necessity for this. The point of comparison is simply that Samaria will be so destroyed, that not a single trace of a city will be left, and the site thereof will become like a ploughed field or plain. השּׂדה is added to עי , a heap of ruins or stones, to strengthen it. Samaria shall become like a heap, not of ruins of building stones, but of stones collected from the field. למטּעי כרם , i.e., into arable land upon which you can plant vineyards. The figure answers to the situation of Samaria upon a hill in a very fruitful region, which was well adapted for planting vineyards (see at Amo 3:9). The situation of the city helps to explain the casting of its stones into the valley. Laying bare the foundations denotes destruction to the very foundation (cf. Psa 137:7). On the destruction of the city all its idols will be annihilated. P^e sı̄lı̄m , idols, as in Isa 10:10; not wooden idols, however, to which the expression yukkattū , smitten to pieces, would not apply, but stone idols, from pâsal (Exo 34:1). By the lovers' gifts ( 'ethnân , see at Hos 9:1) we are to understand, not "the riches of the city or their possessions, inasmuch as the idolaters regarded their wealth and prosperity as a reward from their gods, according to Hos 2:7, Hos 2:14"(Rashi, Hitzig, and others), but the temple gifts, "gifts suspended in the temples and sacred places in honour of the gods"(Rosenmüller), by which the temple worship with its apparatus were maintained; so that by 'ethnân we may understand the entire apparatus of religious worship. For the parallelism of the clauses requires that the word should be restricted to this. עצבּים are also idolatrous images. "To make them into a waste,"i.e., not only to divest them of their ornament, but so utterly to destroy them that the place where they once stood becomes waste. The next clause, containing the reason, must not be restricted to the ‛ătsabbı̄m , as Hitzig supposes, but refers to the two clauses of the first hemistich, so that p^e sı̄lı̄m and ‛ătsabbı̄m are to be supplied as objects to qibbâtsâh (she gathered), and to be regarded as the subject to yâshūbhū (shall return). Samaria gathered together the entire apparatus of her idolatrous worship from prostitute's gifts (the wages of prostitution), namely, through gifts presented by the idolaters. The acquisition of all this is described as the gain of prostitute's wages, according to the scriptural view that idolatry was spiritual whoredom. There is no ground for thinking of literal wages of prostitution, or money which flowed into the temples from the voluptuous worship of Aphrodite, because Micah had in his mind not literal (heathenish) idolatry, but simply the transformation of the Jehovah-worship into idolatry by the worship of Jehovah under the symbols of the golden calves. These things return back to the wagers of prostitution, i.e., they become this once more (cf. Gen 3:19) by being carried away by the enemies, who conquer the city and destroy it, and being applied to their idolatrous worship. On the capture of cities, the idols and temple treasures were carried away (cf. Isa 46:1-2; Dan 1:3).

Keil-Delitzsch: Mic 1:8-10

The judgment will not stop at Samaria, however, but spread over Judah. The prophet depicts this by saying that he will go about mourning as a prisoner, to set forth the misery that will come upon Judah (Mic 1:8, Mic 1:9); and then, to confirm this, he announces to a series of cities the fate awaiting them, or rather awaiting the kingdom, by a continued play upon words founded upon their names (Mic 1:10-15); and finally he summons Zion to deep mourning (Mic 1:16). Mic 1:8. "Therefore will I lament and howl, I will go spoiled and naked: I will keep lamentation like the jackals, and mourning like the ostriches. Mic 1:9. For her stripes are malignant; for it comes to Judah, reaches to the gate of my people, to Jerusalem." על־זאת points back to what precedes, and is then explained in Mic 1:9. The prophet will lament over the destruction of Samaria, because the judgment which has befallen this city will come upon Judah also. Micah does not speak in his own name here as a patriot (Hitzig), but in the name of his nation, with which he identifies himself as being a member thereof. This is indisputably evident from the expression אילכה שׁילל וערום , which describes the costume of a prisoner, not that of a mourner. The form אילכה with י appears to have been simply suggested by אילילה . שׁילל is formed like הידד in Isa 16:9-10, and other similar words (see Olshausen, Gramm . p. 342). The Masoretes have substituted שׁלל , after Job 12:17, but without the slightest reason. It does not mean "barefooted," ἀνυπόδετος (lxx), for which there was already יחף in the language (2Sa 15:30; Isa 20:2-3; Jer 2:25), but plundered, spoiled. ערום , naked, i.e., without upper garment (see my comm. on 1Sa 19:24), not merely vestitu solido et decente privatus . Mourners do indeed go barefooted ( yâchēph , see 2Sa 15:30), and in deep mourning in a hairy garment ( saq , 2Sa 3:31; Gen 37:34, etc.), but not plundered and naked. The assertion, however, that a man was called ̀ârōm when he had put on a mourning garment ( saq , sackcloth) in the place of his upper garment, derives no support from Isa 20:2, but rather a refutation. For there the prophet does not go about ‛ârōm v^e yâchēph , i.e., in the dress of a prisoner, to symbolize the captivity of Egypt, till after he has loosened the hairy garment ( saq ) from his loins, i.e., taken it off. And here also the plundering of the prophet and his walking naked are to be understood in the same way. Micah's intention is not only to exhibit publicly his mourning fore the approaching calamity of Judah, but also to set forth in a symbolical form the fate that awaits the Judaeans. And he can only do this by including himself in the nation, and exhibiting the fate of the nation in his own person. Wailing like jackals and ostriches is a loud, strong, mournful cry, those animals being distinguished by a mournful wail; see the comm. on Job 30:29, which passage may possibly have floated before the prophet's mind. Thus shall Judah wail, because the stroke which falls upon Samaria is a malignant, i.e., incurable (the suffix attached to מכּותיה refers to Shōm^e rōn , Samaria, in Mic 1:6 and Mic 1:7. For the singular of the predicate before a subject in the plural, see Ewald, §295, a , and 317, a). It reaches to Judah, yea, to Jerusalem. Jerusalem, as the capital, is called the "gate of my people,"because in it par excellence the people went out and in. That עד is not exclusive here, but inclusive, embracing the terminus ad quem , is evident from the parallel "even to Judah;"for if it only reached to the border of Judah, it would not have been able to come to Jerusalem; and still more clearly so from the description in Mic 1:10. The fact that Jerusalem is not mentioned till after Judah is to be interpreted rhetorically, and not geographically. Even the capital, where the temple of Jehovah stood, would not be spared.

Constable: Mic 1:1

I. Heading 1:1

Prophetic revelation from Yahweh came to Micah concerning Samaria (the Northern Kingdom) and Jerusalem (the Southern Kingdom). These capital cities represent their respective nations and the people in them. These capital cities also suggest the leaders of the nations, which Micah targeted for special responsibility. Micah "saw" these revelations (rather than "heard" them) because the Lord revealed them to him in visions and or dreams (Num. 12:6; cf. Isa. 1:1; Obad. 1; Nah. 1:1). Micah ("Who is like Yahweh?") was a Morashtite, a resident of Moresheth-gath (v. 14), which was a Judean town in the Shephelah (foothills) of Judah west and a bit south of Jerusalem.⁶ Micah received and delivered his prophetic messages during the reigns of three of the kings of his nation: Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. This dates his ministry between 750 and 686 B.C.⁷

Constable: Mic 1:2--3:1

II. The first oracle: Israel's impending judgment and future restoration 1:2--2:13

This is the first of three messages that compose the Book of Micah (cf. chs. 3-5; 6-7). In each one, promises of restoration follow predictions of ruin.

Constable: Mic 1:2-7

A. The judgment coming on Israel 1:2-7

This opening pericope sets the tone and forms the backdrop for the rest of the book. All people were to hear God's indictment against His people (v. 2). Punishment was coming (vv. 3-4) that would be both reasonable (v. 5) and certain (vv. 6-7).

1:2 Micah cried, "Hear ye, hear ye!" to the people of the earth, as a clerk summons a courtroom jury to pay attention to the testimony that will follow. Sovereign Yahweh was about to give His witness against His people ("you," Micah's audience; cf. Deut. 31:19-21, 26). This appeal assumes that those called on to listen will agree with the testimony to be given. The Lord would come out of His temple to give His testimony. This appears to be a reference to His heavenly temple in view of the following verses (cf. Ps. 11:4; Isa. 3:13-14; Hab. 2:20).

1:3-4 The Lord was about to intervene in the affairs of His people. He is not only transcendent above all but immanent in the world, one of the most basic concepts in Old Testament theology. When He came, all the earth would melt, split, and quake before His awesome power (cf. Judg. 5:4-5). Since He could affect the physical creation so drastically, His people needed to fear Him. Treading on the high places of the land, where the Israelites worshipped in idolatry (cf. 2 Chron. 33:17), probably also implies that He would crush pagan worship.⁸

1:5 The Lord's intervention was due to the Israelites' sins and rebellion against their sovereign lord. Samaria personified the rebellion of the Israelites, and Jerusalem had become a high place for idolatry rather than for holy worship. These capital cities had become leaders in wickedness rather than in holiness.

Micah liked to use "Jacob" as a title for all Israel (2:7, 12; 3:1, 8, 9; 4:2; 5:7, 8), though he also used it to describe the Northern Kingdom (here) and the patriarch Jacob (7:20). This name recalls the rebelliousness that marked the patriarch for most of his early life and that had subsequently marked his descendants.

1:6 Israel's capital, Samaria, stood atop a mountain, but Yahweh said He would make it a pile of ruins in a field. That is, He would both destroy and humiliate it. It would become a rural rather than an urban place, suitable for planting vineyards. He would topple the stones of its buildings into the valley below and expose their foundations by destroying their superstructures. The fulfillment came with the Assyrian overthrow of Samaria in 722 B.C. Even today the foundations of Samaria's buildings lie exposed.

1:7 God would smash Samaria's idols proving them incapable of defending themselves much less helping others. He would burn the luxurious ornaments that the people offered as temple gifts in the conflagration that would accompany Samaria's overthrow. All the pagan images that the people had made would perish. The Lord viewed these physical treasures as the earnings of harlot Israel who had been unfaithful to Him. The Israelites had committed adultery with temple prostitutes, but the Assyrians would destroy the gifts that they had brought into their temples and use them for their own idolatrous worship.

"The reference is probably to the gold and silver plating on the images, melted down from the dirty money handed over for the use of religious brothels. Invading soldiers are to tear it off as loot and spend it as currency for further prostitution, as soldiers will."⁹

Constable: Mic 1:8-9

1. Micah's personal response 1:8-9

1:8 In view of this coming judgment, Micah said he felt compelled to lament and wail. He would express his sorrow by going barefoot and naked, a common way of expressing it in his culture (cf. 2 Sam. 15:30; Isa. 20:2; 22:12; Jer. 25:34). Jackals and ostriches (or owls) were nocturnal animals that lived alone and were notable for their wailing sounds, and Micah said he would mimic them.

1:9 Samaria had a wound from which she could not recover, namely, a wound of punishment caused by her sin. This sin and its consequence had also infected Judah, even the capital city of Jerusalem (cf. Isa. 1:5-6). Jerusalem should have been specially holy because of the temple and God's presence there, but it was alike polluted. Punishment reached the gate of Jerusalem in 701 B.C. when Sennacherib attacked the city, but the Lord turned back the invader (cf. 2 Kings 18-19).

Constable: Mic 1:10-16

2. Micah's call for the people's response 1:10-16

The prophet used several clever wordplays in this poem to describe the desolation that God would bring on Judah. He selected towns and villages near his own hometown in Judah's Shephelah whose names were similar to the coming devastations or to other conditions that he described.

"Interestingly Sennacherib too used wordplays when recording his conquests."¹⁰

1:10 Micah urged the Israelites not to report the Assyrian invasion of Jerusalem in Gath (cf. 2 Sam. 1:20), not even to indicate a crisis by weeping publicly. Why Gath? It was an enemy (Philistine) town, and news of Jerusalem's siege would encourage Israel's enemies. Specifically, "Gath" (gat) may have been chosen because of its similar sound in Hebrew to the verb "tell" (taggidu; cf. 2 Sam. 1:20).

However, in the cities of Israel, like Beth-le-aphrah (Beth Ophrah, house of dust), the inhabitants should roll in the dust expressing their distress (cf. Josh. 7:6; Job 16:15; Isa. 47:1; Jer. 25:34).

1:11 Residents of Shaphir ("beautiful," "pleasant") would become the opposite of their name, shamefully naked, when the invasion came. Inhabitants of Zaanan, a town name that sounds like the Hebrew word translated "come out," would not be able to come out of their town to escape. The people of Beth-ezel ("house of removal") would lament because the Lord would remove its support.

1:12 Residents of Maroth, which sounds like the Hebrew word translated "bitterness," would become weak as they waited for help that would not come. Their expectation would become bitter because God would send calamity to the gates of Jerusalem. Before Sennacherib besieged Jerusalem in 701 B.C., he defeated 46 other towns in Judah (2 Kings 18-19).¹¹

1:13 Sarcastically, Micah urged the people of Lachish (Heb. lakish), a town known for its horses, to hitch a team (Heb. rekesh) of horses to a chariot to escape from the enemy. They would not be able to escape, however, because Lachish had led Jerusalem, as horses lead a chariot, into the sin of idolatry.

1:14 Zion (Jerusalem) would give Moresheth-gath as a portion of a parting gift to the invader. Jerusalem would not be able to prevent the Assyrians from taking Moresheth-gath captive. The people of Achzib (Heb. akzib), represented here by their houses, would become deceitful (Heb. akzab) to the kings of Israel because they could not fend off the enemy.

1:15 The Lord would bring on the inhabitants of Mareshah ("possessor") one who would take possession of them. The glory of Israel, probably her leaders, would flee ashamedly for safety to Adullam, as David had done earlier (1 Sam. 22:1).¹²

1:16 Micah called on the Judeans to cut their hair very short as a sign of sorrow over the departure of their children into exile. The eagle appeared to be bald because its head was white.

"This section (vv. 10-16) begins with words that recall David's lament at the death of Saul and ends with the name of the cave where David hid from Saul. These dark moments in David's life form a gloomy backdrop to the description of the fall of the towns Micah spoke of. Though he is never directly mentioned, the figure of David appears hauntingly in the tapestry of destruction--not a David standing tall in triumph, but a David bowed down by humiliation. It is as if Micah saw in the fall of each town and the eventual captivity of the two kingdoms the final dissolution of the Davidic monarchy. Like David, the glory of Israel would come to Adullam."¹³

Guzik: Mic 1:1-16

Micah 1 - Coming Judgment on Israel and Judah

A. Coming judgment on Israel.

1. (1) Introduction to the prophecy of Micah.

The word of the LORD that came to Micah of Moresheth in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem.

a. Micah of Moresheth: The city of Moresheth (also called Moresheth Gath in Micah 1:14) was about 25 miles southwest of Jerusalem on the border lands between Judah and the Philistines. This means that the prophet Micah was like the prophet Amos, a man from the country sent to the city to bring the word of the LORD.

i. We really don't know anything about Micah's background or call, but we do know that he had a strong sense of his own calling as a prophet, and he says so in Micah 3:8.

b. In the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah: This means that Micah ministered as a prophet some time between the years 739 B.C. (the start of the reign of Jotham) and 686 B.C. (the end of the reign of Hezekiah). Since Hezekiah was a noted reformer, we can surmise that the sin Micah confronted mainly concerns the time before the important reforms of Hezekiah (2 Kings 18-20).

c. Concerning Samaria and Jerusalem: The city of Samaria was the capital of the northern kingdom of Israel, and Jerusalem was the capital of the southern kingdom of Judah. Micah looks to both the northern and southern kingdoms in his prophecy.

i. In Judah during this time, King Ahaz was a particularly evil ruler. In Israel, there were a succession of evil kings.

2. (2-5) The LORD comes to judge Israel and Judah.

Hear, all you peoples! Listen, O earth, and all that is in it! Let the Lord GOD be a witness against you, the Lord from His holy temple. For behold, the LORD is coming out of His place; He will come down and tread on the high places of the earth. The mountains will melt under Him, and the valleys will split like wax before the fire, like waters poured down a steep place. All this is for the transgression of Jacob and for the sins of the house of Israel. What is the transgression of Jacob? Is it not Samaria? And what are the high places of Judah? Are they not Jerusalem?

a. The LORD is coming out of His place: With vivid images, Micah sees the LORD descending from heaven to earth, and coming with judgment. If the mountains and valleys cannot stand before Him, what hope does sinful, rebellious man have?

b. All this is for the transgression of Jacob and for the sins of the house of Israel: This dramatic, powerful descent of the LORD is only because of the sins of His people.

i. It is easy to imagine that the people of Judah and Israel thought this was unfair. They looked around at the pagan nations surrounding them and saw that they were even more corrupt than themselves. Nevertheless, the principle stands: For the time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God (1 Peter 4:17). However, we also do well to remember the second part of that verse: And if it begins with us first, what will be the end of those who do not obey the gospel of God?

3. (6-7) Samaria left desolate in judgment.

"Therefore I will make Samaria a heap of ruins in the field, places for planting a vineyard; I will pour down her stones into the valley, and I will uncover her foundations. All her carved images shall be beaten to pieces, and all her pay as a harlot shall be burned with the fire; all her idols I will lay desolate, for she gathered it from the pay of a harlot, and they shall return to the pay of a harlot."

a. I will make Samaria a heap of ruins in the field: Micah prophesies the coming judgment on Samaria, the capital city of Israel. This was fulfilled in 722 B.C. when Samaria fell to the Assyrians and was completely destroyed.

b. All her pay as a harlot shall be burned with the fire: Micah combines the ideas of idolatry and spiritual adultery. Money spent on idols and their worship will be brought to nothing when the mighty army of the Assyrians destroys Samaria.

i. "Golden images, of such monetary value yet so spiritually and politically worthless, were constructed from the wages of cult prostitutes. The conquerors will break them up and use the money to repeat the same cycle. Only the heart of depraved man could worship gods like that!" (Waltke)

B. Coming judgment on Judah.

1. (8-9) The agony of announcing judgment on the nation of Judah.

Therefore I will wail and howl, I will go stripped and naked; I will make a wailing like the jackals and a mourning like the ostriches, for her wounds are incurable. For it has come to Judah; it has come to the gate of my people; to Jerusalem.

a. I will wail and howl: Micah can't prophesy in a dispassionate, detached way. When he sees judgment coming upon his people, it makes him wail and howl like the jackals.

i. Micah didn't just announce judgment and then yawn. He cared so deeply that he wept with God's people. The preacher's duty is more than to just announce judgment and to walk away. He has to care. "Many who have rejected a Christian's logic have been won by his tears." (Boice)

b. For her wounds are incurable: Our only incurable wounds are the ones we refuse to bring to God. With Him, all things are possible (Luke 18:27), but when we refuse to bring our sin to Him, then our wounds are incurable.

2. (10-16) The shame of Judah's judgment is evident among the nations.

Tell it not in Gath, weep not at all; in Beth Aphrah roll yourself in the dust. Pass by in naked shame, you inhabitant of Shaphir; the inhabitant of Zaanan does not go out. Beth Ezel mourns; its place to stand is taken away from you. For the inhabitant of Maroth pined for good, but disaster came down from the LORD to the gate of Jerusalem. O inhabitant of Lachish, harness the chariot to the swift steeds (she was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion), for the transgressions of Israel were found in you. Therefore you shall give presents to Moresheth Gath; the houses of Achzib shall be a lie to the kings of Israel. I will yet bring an heir to you, O inhabitant of Mareshah; the glory of Israel shall come to Adullam. Make yourself bald and cut off your hair, because of your precious children; enlarge your baldness like an eagle, for they shall go from you into captivity.

a. Tell it not in Gath: The city of Gath belonged to the Philistines, and it hurts Micah to think that the Philistines will rejoice at the pain of God's people.

b. In Beth Aphrah roll yourself in the dust: Following to the end of the chapter, Micah uses puns and plays on words to talk about the judgment coming upon the cities of Judah. These towns are clustered in the Shephelah - the lowlands between the coastal region and the mountains of Judah.

i. Though Micah uses puns, this isn't about clever word games - it goes back to the ancient idea that a name isn't just your "handle" but describes - sometimes prophetically - your character and your destiny. In showing how the name of these cities is in some way a prophecy of their destiny, Micah shows how our character becomes our future.

c. Beth Aphrah: To Micah, Aphrah sounds like the Hebrew word for dust, so he told the citizens of Beth Aphrah to roll in the dust in anticipation of coming judgment.

d. Shaphir: The name of this town sounds like the word for beautiful. It won't be beautiful for long, and Micah warns the citizens of Shaphir to prepare for judgment.

e. Zaanan: The name of this town sounds like the Hebrew word for exit or go out. When the siege armies come, they won't exit at all - they will be shut up in the city until it falls.

f. Beth Ezel: The name of this town means the nearby city. When the army of judgment comes, it won't be near and helpful to any other city.

g. Maroth: The name of this town means bitterness, and when the army of judgment comes the citizens of Maroth will know plenty of bitterness.

h. Lachish: The name of this town sounds like the Hebrew word for to the horses. Lachish was an important fortress city, and they should go to the horses to fight, but ironically they will go to the horses to flee the army of judgment.

i. Moresheth: The name of this - Micah's hometown - sounds like the Hebrew word for betrothed. Here he speaks of giving the city wedding gifts as she passes from the rule of one "husband" (Judah) to another (the invading army).

j. Aczib: The name of this town sounds like the Hebrew word for deceitful or disappointing. This city will fall so quickly it will be a deception and a disappointment for Israel.

k. Mareshah: The name of this town is related to the Hebrew word for possessor or heir. The invading army will soon possess this city.

l. Adullam: The was the place of refuge for David when he fled from King Saul. It will again be a place of refuge for the high and mighty among Israel, when they are forced to hide out in Adullam.

© 2001 David Guzik - No distribution beyond personal use without permission

Commentary -- Other

Evidence: Mic 1:1-4

Notice the word "let" in verse 2. Those who allow God to speak to them will understand that He has witnessed every transgression of His Law. Those who refuse to hear will find to their horror that He has witnessed every secret sin, but then it will be too late to partake in His mercy. They will drink the wine of His wrath. They will see Him when He comes in flaming fire. How we must mediate on verses that warn us of that day, when mountains will melt under Him and great valleys will split like wax before the fire, like waters pouring down a steep place. In the light of these thoughts, do we plead with sinners? Are we horrified at their fate? Do our eyes run with water as we pray for them? If they don't, it may be because we have never truly mediated on the terror they must face at the coming of Almighty God.

Introduction / Outline

JFB: Micah (Book Introduction)

MICAH was a native of Moresheth, not the same as Mareshah in Mic 1:15, but the town called Moresheth-gath (Mic 1:14), which lay near Eleutheropolis, west of Jerusalem, on the border of the Philistine country; so called to distinguish it from Moresheth of Judah. His full name is Micaiah (not the Micaiah mentioned 1Ki 22:8, the son of Imlah), signifying, Who is like Jehovah? The time of his prophesying is stated in the introduction to be in the reigns of Jotham. Ahaz, and Hezekiah, that is, between 757 and 699 B.C. Jeremiah (Jer 26:18) quotes Mic 3:12, as delivered in the reign of Hezekiah. He was thus a contemporary of Isaiah and Hosea. The idolatries practised in the reign of Ahaz accord with Micah's denunciations of such gross evils, and confirm the truth of the time assigned Mic 1:1. His prophecies are partly against Israel (Samaria), partly against Judah. As Samaria, Israel's metropolis, was taken first, and Jerusalem, the capital of Judah subsequently, in the introductory heading, Mic 1:1, Samaria is put first, then Jerusalem. He prophesies the capture of both; the Jews captivity and restoration; and the coming and reign of Messiah. His style is full, round, and perspicuous; his diction pure, and his parallelisms regular. His description of Jehovah (Mic 7:18-19) is not surpassed by any elsewhere in Scripture. The similarity between Isaiah and Micah in some passages (compare Mic 4:1-3, with Isa 2:2-4) is to be accounted for by their being contemporaries, acquainted with each other's inspired writings, and having the same subjects for their theme. HENGSTENBERG maintains that the passage in Micah is the original. Isaiah was somewhat the older, being a prophet in the reign of Uzziah, Jotham's predecessor, whereas Micah began his prophecies under Jotham.

The book consists of two parts: (1) the first through fifth chapters; (2) the sixth and seventh chapters, a dialogue or contestation between Jehovah and His people, in which He reproaches them with their unnatural and ungrateful conduct, and threatens judgment for their corruptions, but consoles them with the promise of restoration from captivity.

Micah stands sixth of the minor prophets in the Hebrew canon, but third in the Septuagint.

JFB: Micah (Outline)

• GOD'S WRATH AGAINST SAMARIA AND JUDAH; THE FORMER IS TO BE OVERTHROWN; SUCH JUDGMENTS IN PROSPECT CALL FOR MOURNING. (Mic. 1:1-16)
• DENUNCIATION OF THE EVILS PREVALENT: THE PEOPLE'S UNWILLINGNESS TO HEAR THE TRUTH: THEIR EXPULSION FROM THE LAND THE FITTING FRUIT OF THEIR SIN: YET JUDAH AND ISRAEL ARE HEREAFTER TO BE RESTORED. (Mic 2:1-13)
• THE SINS OF THE PRINCES, PROPHETS, AND PRIESTS: THE CONSEQUENT DESOLATION OF ZION. (Mic 3:1-12)
• TRANSITION TO THE GLORY, PEACE, KINGDOM, AND VICTORY OF ZION. (Mic 4:1-13) Almost identical with Isa 2:2-4.
• THE CALAMITIES WHICH PRECEDE MESSIAH'S ADVENT. HIS KINGDOM, CONQUEST OF JACOB'S FOES, AND BLESSING UPON HIS PEOPLE. (Mic 5:1-15)
• APPEAL BEFORE ALL CREATION TO THE ISRAELITES TO TESTIFY, IF THEY CAN, IF JEHOVAH EVER DID AUGHT BUT ACTS OF KINDNESS TO THEM FROM THE EARLIEST PERIOD: GOD REQUIRES OF THEM NOT SO MUCH SACRIFICES, AS REAL PIETY AND JUSTICE: THEIR IMPIETIES AND COMING PUNISHMENT. (Mic. 6:1-16)
• THE UNIVERSALITY OF THE CORRUPTION; THE CHOSEN REMNANT, DRIVEN FROM EVERY HUMAN CONFIDENCE, TURNS TO GOD; TRIUMPHS BY FAITH OVER HER ENEMIES; IS COMFORTED BY GOD'S PROMISES IN ANSWER TO PRAYER, AND BY THE CONFUSION OF HER ENEMIES, AND SO BREAKS FORTH INTO PRAISES OF GOD'S CHARACTER. (Mic. 7:1-20)

TSK: Micah 1 (Chapter Introduction)

Overview

Mic 1:1, The time when Micah prophesied; Mic 1:2, He shews the wrath of God against Jacob for idolatry; Mic 1:10, He exhorts to mourning.

Poole: Micah (Book Introduction)

THE ARGUMENT

IT is by custom become necessary, in writing the arguments on the several prophets, to tell of what country the prophet was; and where the Holy Ghost observes it we may not slight it. Our prophet was, no doubt, of the tribe of Judah, but of what note his family was for riches, authority, or credit appears not to us; these might be eminent for any thing I know, but not mentioned, because his call to, his abilities for, and his discharge of the prophetic office, needed no credentials or countenance from any such external advantages. It is unquestionable he came from God; and his whole prophecy is of Divine authority; Jeremiah gave testimony to it, and cites some considerable authority from the opinion of certain elders of that time who held him to be a prophet sent of God, Jer 26:17-19 . He was not, as some were, confined to one kingdom, but had his commission enlarged to preach to the kingdom of Israel and Judah, which were now grown old in sin, and universally corrupted with idolatry and impiety, with inhumanity and cruel oppression, with falsehood and deceits, ingratitude to God and forgetfulness of him, vain confidences in the lying promises of false prophets and in their ceremonial services; all which Micah doth (as faithful in his office) openly, severely, and impartially discover, reprove, and threaten in princes, prophets, and all the people of both kingdoms; which are So closely joined by the prophet, that it requires a very steady and quick eye to discern which of the two is most directly concerned in the prophet’ s discourse, or whether both are equally intended, yet so as in order of time Israel first, and Judah next. His phrase, and connexions, and transitions are many times obscure, and fairly capable of different accounts, as every one will see, who can and will read the Hebrew text, and the paraphrases or commentaries of men learned in that kind of learning. The prophet’ s style is very lofty, as is his contemporary Isaiah, many times, and I little doubt they were acquainted and conversed with each other: his discourses have a very particular respect to the temper of those times he lived in, and will be clearest understood by those that do distinctly read over and digest the history of Israel and Judah, as they are reported in 1 Kings and 2 Kings from the first apostacy of Israel from God and their revolt from the house of David. But more especially the stories of Judah, through the reigns of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah; and of Israel: through the times of Zachariah, Shallum, Menahem, Pekah, and Hoshea; in which most of the sins here reproved and threatened did reign, and which were, whilst Micah lived, punished according to his word with sword, famine, pestilence, and captivity: he lived to see Israel made a desolation and a hissing, and survived this dead kingdom about ten years. Judah’ s calamity followed surely, and not slowly, for within one hundred and thirty or one hundred and thirty-three years Jerusalem was ruined and the Jews carried captives to Babylon. Many passages of our prophet have both their literal and historical reference, and their spiritual and mystical: in this latter I have been sparing, because the design of the present work was to give the plain literal sense, yet I have seldom (if ever) omitted to point out the mystery. If any one see more into this, and be larger in it than the author, let such one know, the author had his reasons why he said so little, though he saw more, of the mystical reference of the words to the Messiah, his birth, his kingdom, the redemption of the elect, the calling of the Gentiles, and other evangelical truths contained in our prophet, who did certainly preach the gospel as well as the law to his hearers.

Poole: Micah 1 (Chapter Introduction)

MICAH CHAPTER 1

The time when Micah prophesied, Mic 1:1 . Micah showeth the wrath of God against Israel and Judah for idolatry, Mic 1:2-9 A lamentation for them, Mic 1:10-16 .

MHCC: Micah (Book Introduction)

Micah was raised up to support Isaiah, and to confirm his predictions, while he invited to repentance, both by threatened judgments and promised mercies. A very remarkable passage, Mic 5:1-15 contains a summary of prophecies concerning the Messiah.

MHCC: Micah 1 (Chapter Introduction)

(Mic 1:1-7) The wrath of God against Israel.

(Mic 1:8-16) Also against Jerusalem and other cities, Their precautions vain.

Matthew Henry: Micah (Book Introduction)

An Exposition, with Practical Observations, of The Prophecy of Micah

We shall have some account of this prophet in the first verse of the book of his prophecy; and therefore shall here only observe that, being contemporary with the prophet Isaiah (only that he began to prophesy a little after him), there is a near resemblance between that prophet's prophecy and this; and there is a prediction of the advancement and establishment of the gospel-church, which both of them have, almost in the same words, that out of the mouth of two such witnesses so great a word might be established. Compare Isa 2:2, Isa 2:3, with Mic 4:1, Mic 4:2. Isaiah's prophecy is said to be concerning Judah and Jerusalem, but Micah's concerning Samaria and Jerusalem; for, though this prophecy be dated only by the reigns of the kings of Judah, yet it refers to the kingdom of Israel, the approaching ruin of which, in the captivity of the ten tribes, he plainly foretels and sadly laments. What we find here in writing was but an abstract of the sermons he preached during the reigns of three kings. The scope of the whole is, I. To convince sinners of their sins, by setting them in order before them, charging both Israel and Judah with idolatry, covetousness, oppression, contempt of the word of God, and their rulers especially, both in church and state, with the abuse of their power; and also by showing them the judgments of God ready to break in upon them for their sins. II. To comfort God's people with promises of mercy and deliverance, especially with an assurance of the coming of the Messiah and of the grace of the gospel through him. It is remarkable concerning this prophecy, and confirms its authority, that we find two quotations out of it made publicly upon very solemn occasions, and both referring to very great events. 1. One is a prediction of the destruction of Jerusalem (Mic 3:12), which we find quoted in the Old Testament, by the elders of the land (Jer 26:17, Jer 26:18), in justification of Jeremiah, when he foretold the judgments of God coming upon Jerusalem, and to stay the proceedings of the court against him. " Micah (say they) foretold that Zion should be ploughed as a field, and Hezekiah did not put him to death; why then should we punish Jeremiah for saying the same?" 2. Another is a prediction of the birth of Christ (Mic 5:2) which we find quoted in the New Testament, by the chief priests and scribes of the people, in answer to Herod's enquiry, where Christ should be born (Mat 2:5, Mat 2:6); for still we find that to him bear all the prophets witness.

Matthew Henry: Micah 1 (Chapter Introduction)

In this chapter we have, I. The title of the book (Mic 1:1) and a preface demanding attention (Mic 1:2). II. Warning given of desolating judgments hastening upon the kingdoms of Israel and Judah (Mic 1:3, Mic 1:4), and all for sin (Mic 1:5). III. The particulars of the destruction specified (Mic 1:6, Mic 1:7). IV. The greatness of the destruction illustrated, 1. By the prophet's sorrow for it (Mic 1:8, Mic 1:9). 2. By the general sorrow that should be for it, in the several places that must expect to share in it (Mic 1:10-16). These prophecies of Micah might well be called his lamentations.

Constable: Micah (Book Introduction)

Introduction

Title and Writer

The title, as usual in the prophetical books of the Old Testament, comes from the name of the traditional writer.

The name "Micah" is a shortened form of "Micaiah," which means "Who is like Yahweh?" The prophet's hometown was Moresheth-gath, which stood about 25 miles southwest of Jerusalem in Judah (1:1). It was called Moresheth-gath (1:14) because it was fairly close to the Philistine town of Gath, the exact location of which is uncertain today. Moresheth-gath was also about six miles northeast of Lachish, an important Judean town in Micah's day because it stood on an international trade route.

Unity

Critics of the book have tried to prove that it is the product of several writers or editors (redactors). The reason for this view is its lack of apparent coherence. Chapters 4-7 have become the target of most critical attack, yet the book is obviously coherent in its basic structure.¹

Date and Place of Composition

Micah prophesied during the reigns of the Judean kings Jotham (750-732 B.C.), Ahaz (732-715 B.C.), and Hezekiah (715-686 B.C.; 1:1). This made him a late eighth-century contemporary of Isaiah, who also ministered in the Southern Kingdom of Judah (cf. Isa. 1:1), and Amos and Hosea, who ministered in the Northern Kingdom of Israel (cf. Amos 1:1; Hos. 1:1). These were years of economic affluence and international peace but spiritual decadence for both kingdoms, especially Israel.

However, Micah witnessed the fall of the Northern Kingdom to Assyria in 722 B.C. He also lived through the invasion of Judah by the Assyrians under King Sennacherib in 701 B.C. According to Sennacherib's own records he captured 46 of King Hezekiah's strong cities, walled forts, and countless small villages. He claimed to have taken captive over 200,000 Judahites plus innumerable animals. Two of the Judean cities taken were Lachish, second only to Jerusalem in importance, and Moresheth-gath, Micah's hometown. Micah referred to the distress that this foreign invasion produced in Judah (1:10-16; 5:6).

Audience and Purpose

Micah ministered to the people of Judah, the Southern Kingdom. He predicted the destruction of the Northern Kingdom of Israel by the Assyrians and warned the Judeans that God would discipline them too for their sins. As in all the prophetical books, the standard by which God measured His people was the Mosaic Covenant. If they obeyed, they would enjoy blessing, but if they disobeyed, they could expect punishment (cf. Lev. 26; Deut. 28). Micah, too, pointed out how the Israelites had broken the covenant and that judgment was inevitable, but he also promised ultimate restoration in view of God's promises to the patriarchs.²

Structure and Emphases

The Book of Micah consists of three messages. In each one the theme of judgment is prominent, but there is also mention of restoration and a remnant (2:12; 4:7; 5:7-8; 7:18). Eventually God would restore the Israelites to a position of world prominence under their Messiah.

Distinctive characteristics

The main aspects of God that Micah emphasized were His sovereignty, self-consistency, and His leadership of all events and His people toward His ultimate plans and purposes for them.

Like the other eighth-century prophets, Micah attacked the idolatry that accompanied the acceptance of Canaanite worship. However, his distinctive burden was the social injustices that marked the ruling class (2:1, 8-9; 3:11; 6:11; cf. Amos). He was a champion of civil rights.

Micah wrote about the coming Messiah. He predicted His birthplace, lineage, and origin (5:2), His future reign (4:1-7; 5:4), and referred to Him as Israel's king (2:13) and ruler (5:2).

"Micah's doctrine of the remnant is unique among the Prophets and is perhaps his most significant contribution to the prophetic theology of hope. The remnant is a force in the world, not simply a residue of people, as the word remnant' (she'erit) may seem to imply. It is a force that will ultimately conquer the world (4:11-13). This triumph, while presented in apparently militaristic terminology (4:13; 5:5-6), is actually accomplished by other than physical force [cf. Matt. 5:3-12]. By removing everything that robs his people of complete trust in him (5:10-15), the Ruler from Bethlehem will effect the deliverance of his people. The source of power for God's people in the world is their absolute trust in him and his resources."³

As many of the prophetical books, Micah is primarily poetry. One of the prominent features of Hebrew poetry is parallelism of thought, and this marks Micah. Micah used his native language as a craftsman. He utilized puns, wordplays, and probing questions. This book, like the other Prophets, is a collection of messages that Micah delivered.

There is one citation from Micah in the Old Testament and two in the New. The elders of Jerusalem in Jeremiah's day referred to Micah to support not persecuting Jeremiah for predicting judgment on Jerusalem (Jer. 26:17-19). Matthew quoted Micah 5:2 as predicting the birthplace of Messiah (Matt. 2:5-6), and he recorded Jesus' quotation of Micah 7:6 regarding conflict within families (Matt. 10:35-36).

"In OT study Micah has tended to be overshadowed by Amos and Hosea and especially by his great contemporary Isaiah, whose prophetic material has been preserved in much greater quantity. Stylistically, to be sure, he sometimes has more of the qualities of an orator than of a poet. But his message is proclaimed with no uncertain sound, as with passionate forthrightness he attacks the social evils of his day. His stubborn refusal to float on the tide of his social environment, and his courageous stand for his convictions of God's truth, must commend Micah to believers in every age."⁴

Message⁵

Micah called all the nations to observe God's judgment of His Chosen People. He wanted the people of the earth to learn that Yahweh is sovereign by observing His dealings with Judah. If Israel had been faithful to God's purpose for her, all the nations would have learned how wonderful it can be to live under the government of Yahweh. But Israel had failed in her calling. Therefore, Micah pointed out, for the benefit of all people, that those who serve under God's government can expect judgment when they fail in their calling.

Micah was very much aware of the throne in heaven, God's throne, His eternal sovereignty over all people, including His chosen people. He was also aware of the failure of the throne on earth, the failure of King Ahaz of Judah.

Micah was a contemporary of Isaiah, and both these prophets ministered in the Southern Kingdom during Ahaz's reign. But Micah's emphasis was different from Isaiah's. Isaiah focused on the throne in heaven. He saw the Lord high and lifted up above the earth ruling in sovereign majesty and providing salvation for all people. Micah focused on the human rulers under the divine sovereign. He spoke of "the powers that be" that are ordained of God (Rom. 13:1). His eyes were on the earth. He saw the sin and corruption, the sighing and crying of the people, their agony and tears, and he traced these tragedies to the misrule of people in authority in Judah.

The unique contribution of Micah is twofold. First, he unmasked and denounced the false rulers. Second, he unveiled and proclaimed the true Ruler. The false rulers were the princes, priests, and prophets that surrounded him. The true Ruler was someone whom Micah saw coming in the future to rule and reign properly.

Let's look first at Micah's picture of false authority. We see it clearly in 3:11: "Israel's leaders pronounce judgment for a bribe, her priests instruct for a price, and her prophets divine for money." Micah identified all three major types of Judahite rulers as corrupt: civil leaders (the princes), religious leaders (the priests), and moral leaders (the prophets). The judges were judging according to who paid them best. The priests were teaching the people but only for what they could get out of it. The prophets were not really prophesying messages from the Lord but were divining; they were practicing sorcery and witchcraft for money and passing these revelations off as the word of the Lord. In every case, ministry was being conducted, but for selfish motives, for what the ministers could get out of ministering. Let's look more closely at these leaders and the effects of their actions.

The judges were passing judgment in legal cases because they hated good and loved evil (3:2a). They should have "known" judgment (3:1). That is, they should have practiced justice, ruled justly, and shown no partiality. Instead they were, as Micah described them, tearing the skin off the people, eating their flesh, and chopping up their bones like butchers (3:2b-3). They were robbing the people like soldiers who took the spoils of war. They were not impartial. They did not represent God, the true judge of His people. They were corrupt.

The priests were no better. When we think of Israel's priests, we probably think of them offering the sacrifices that the people brought to the temple. But one of the primary responsibilities of the priests in Israel was to teach the people the Word of God (Deut. 17:8-13). This was really a more important ministry than cutting up animals. This manward duty was more significant than their Godward duty. God scattered the priests in Israel, rather than giving them one geographic region to inhabit, so they could teach the people God's will. Yet the priests in Micah's day were just telling the people what the Judahites wanted to hear, not what God had said. And they were doing it for money. They distorted their messages to get a favorable response to their messages.

The prophets claimed to have received fresh messages from the Lord for the people. But most of the prophets in Micah's day delivered favorable "words from the Lord" only if they received adequate compensation. If the people did not pay them well, they either gave a message of doom or no message at all. They were getting messages for the people all right, but they were messages from the wrong source. Their "prophecies" amounted to sorcery and witchcraft. Micah wrote of them in 5:3, "When they have something to bite with their teeth, they cry, Peace.' But against him who puts nothing in their mouths, they declare holy war." The people had to pay for good prophecies. Otherwise they would get prophecies of gloom and doom.

Wherever you find distressed and suffering people, the cause is usually their leaders. If the leaders are out of harmony with God, if they love evil and hate good, if they are selfish rather than servants, the people suffer. This is true no matter what form of government exists. Every form of government has the equivalent of princes, priests, and prophets: civil, religious, and moral leaders. Corrupt authorities rule for their own benefit, not for the benefit of the people.

Yet Micah saw through the smog of his own day to a ruler on the distant horizon beyond.

He saw this One coming out of human obscurity, not out of a position of power. He would arise from the obscure town of Bethlehem in Judah, but His real origin was eternity (5:2).

He would arise and shepherd His flock in the strength of the Lord (5:4). He would faithfully represent Yahweh and act in His strength. He would not serve Himself but the Lord. He would not be a crooked judge but impartial. He would not pervert the truth to glorify Himself but would tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. He would not pass deceitful and destructive messages to the people but only the true words of the Lord.

The result of His ministry would be peace, not distress and suffering (5:5a). The negative side of His rule would be the destruction of all the things the people's false rulers had encouraged them to trust in: horses, chariots, cities, strongholds, treaties, witchcraft, images, and idols. The strength of a nation is never in these things but in its leaders. Israel would one day have a Ruler that would provide adequate strength for her. He would not abuse her but glorify her.

The permanent value of Micah is that it reminds us that the test of authority is its motive. If the motive of leaders is self-aggrandizement, self-service, and self-glory, their leadership is corrupt and pernicious.

The strength of leaders is in their recognition of Yahweh. We see this clearly in that One whom Micah saw arising out of obscure human conditions, yet with the authority of eternity behind Him, to take the reigns of power and produce peace. When He came the first time, the obscurity of His human background so blinded the eyes of His contemporaries that they rejected Him and said, "We will not have this man reign over us!" But when He comes the second time, no one will be able to resist His eternal authority, and He will reign over the whole world. He will provide the perfect civil, religious, and moral leadership that this world has longed for but has never yet enjoyed.

In the meantime, our duty is to obey Him because our eyes of faith have seen Him and our hearts know Him. As His disciples we must serve, as He will serve, in whatever sphere of leadership or position of authority we may occupy. And we must eagerly await His return in power and great glory.

Micah is a great book because it contrasts imperfect leaders with the perfect leader. It uncovers present corruption, but it also gives us hope of future celebration. It assures us that God will replace selfish leadership with selfless leadership. It provides negative and positive leadership models for church leaders and individual Christians today.

Constable: Micah (Outline)

Outline

I. Heading 1:1

II. The first oracle: Israel's impending judgment and future restoration 1:2-2:13

A. The judgment coming on Israel 1:2-7

B. Lamentation over the coming judgment 1:8-16

1. Micah's personal response 1:8-9

2. Micah's call for the people's response 1:10-16

C. The sins of Judah 2:1-11

1. Sins of the wealthy 2:1-5

2. Sins of the false prophets and the greedy 2:6-11

D. A prediction of future regathering and leadership 2:12-13

III. The second oracle: the guilt of Israel's leaders and her future hope chs. 3-5

A. Condemnation of Israel's leaders ch. 3

1. The guilt of Israel's civil leaders 3:1-4

2. The guilt of Israel's religious leaders 3:5-8

3. The indictment of Israel's leaders 3:9-12

B. Blessing for Israel in the future chs. 4-5

1. The exaltation of Zion 4:1-8

2. The might of Zion 4:9-5:1

3. The King of Zion 5:2-5a

4. The peace of Zion 5:5b-6

5. The vindication of Zion 5:7-9

6. The purification of Zion 5:10-15

IV. The third oracle: God's case against Israel and the ultimate triumph of His kingdom chs. 6-7

A. The Lords' indictment against His people 6:1-5

B. Micah's response for the Israelites 6:6-8

C. The Lord's sentence of judgment 6:9-16

1. Israel's sins 6:9-12

2. Israel's punishment 6:13-16

D. Micah's lament over his decadent society 7:1-7

E. Micah's confidence in the Lord 7:8-20

1. Advice to the ungodly 7:8-13

2. Prayer for deliverance 7:14-17

3. Praise for forgiveness 7:18-20

Constable: Micah

Micah

Bibliography

Aharoni, Y. The Land of the Bible. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1967.

Allen, Leslie C. The Books of Joel, Obadiah, Jonah and Micah. The New International Commentary on the Old Testament series. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1976.

Chisholm, Robert B., Jr. "A Theology of the Minor Prophets." In A Biblical Theology of the Old Testament, pp. 397-433. Edited by Roy B. Zuck. Chicago: Moody Press, 1991.

Dyer, Charles H., and Eugene H. Merrill. The Old Testament Explorer. Nashville: Word Publishing, 2001.

Martin, John A. "Micah." In The Bible Knowledge Commentary: Old Testament, pp. 1475-92. Edited by John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck. Wheaton: Scripture Press Publications, Victor Books, 1985.

Mays, J. Micah: A Commentary. Old Testament Library series. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1976.

McComiskey, Thomas Edward. "Micah." In Daniel-Minor Prophets. Vol. 7 of The Expositor's Bible Commentary. 12 vols. Edited by Frank E. Gaebelein and Richard P. Polcyn. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1985.

The New Bible Dictionary, 1962. S.v. "Shepherd," by R. A. Stewart.

Thomas, D. W., ed. Documents from Old Testament Times. New York: Harper & Row, 1958.

Copyright 2003 by Thomas L. Constable

Haydock: Micah (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION.

THE PROPHECY OF MICHEAS.

Micheas, of Morasti, a little town in the tribe of Juda, was cotemporary with the prophet Isaias, whom he resembles both in his spirit and his style. He is different from the prophet Micheas, mentioned in the Third Book of Kings, (chap. xxii.) for that Micheas lived in the days of king Achab, one hundred and fifty years before the time of Ezechias, under whom this Micheas prophesied, (Challoner) as he did in the two preceding reigns. (Haydock) --- He addresses both Israel and Juda, and predicts the happiness of the Jews after the captivity, as a figure of what the church should enjoy. (Calmet) --- The Jews shall embrace the faith at last, after the Gentiles. (Worthington) --- We have only a small part of the predictions of Micheas, though he may have written no more. His style is obscure, like that of Osee. (Calmet) --- His name signifies "humility," or "who is like." (St. Jerome)

Gill: Micah (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO MICAH

This book is called, in the Hebrew copies, "Sepher Micah", the Book of Micah; in the Vulgate Latin version "the Prophecy of Micah"; and in the Syriac version "the Prophecy of the Prophet Micah". This prophet is not the same with Micaiah the son of Imiah, who lived in the times of Ahab and Jehoshaphat, 1Ki 22:8; for, as Aben Ezra observes, there were many generations between them, at least many reigns of kings, as Jehoram, Ahaziah, Joash, Amaziah, and Uzziah, all which made up a hundred and thirty years; their names indeed seem to be the same, since he that is called Micaiah, 1Ki 22:8; is called Micah, 2Ch 18:14; and this our prophet is named Micaiah in Jer 26:18; which is with some of the same signification with Michael. So Abarbinel interprets, it, "who [is] as God"; see Mic 7:18; which Hillerus ^a confutes, and renders it, "the contrition, attrition, attenuation, and depauperation, of the Lord"; deriving it from Kwm, which signifies to be depressed, humbled, weakened, and impoverished, as others do; which name, some think, was given him by his parents, because of their low estate, their meanness and poverty; but of them we have no account: however, this is much more probable than the reason Cornelius a Lapide gives of his name, that he was so called because he prophesied of Christ, who was poor, and that he should be born in a poor country village. As for his country, and the place of his birth, and the time in which he lived, they may be gathered from Mic 1:1; by which it will appear that he was not of the tribe of Ephraim, as Pseudo-Epiphanius ^b says but of the tribe of Judah; whose kings' reigns in which he prophesies are only made mention of; though his prophecies concerned both Israel and Judah, and he reproves both for their sins, and foretells their various captivities; and, for the comfort of God's people, says many things concerning the Messiah, his incarnation the place of his birth, which no prophet so clearly points at as he, the execution of his offices, prophetic, priestly, and kingly; the blessings of grace that came by him, pardon of sin, atonement, &c. and the happiness and glory of his church in the latter day. The authority of this book is confirmed both by the elders of Judah in the times of Jeremiah, who quote a passage out of it; Mic 3:12; which they improve in favour of that prophet, Jer 26:17; and by the chief priests and Scribes in the time of Herod, who refer that prince to a prophecy in this book for the place of the Messiah's birth, Mic 5:2; see Mat 2:4. He is thought to have prophesied thirty or forty years, Bishop Usher ^c places him in the year of the world 3291 A.M., and 713 B.C.; but, according to Mr. Whiston ^d, he prophesied 750 B.C., and so Mr. Bedford ^e, and three after the building of the city of Rome; and he foretells the captivity of the ten tribes thirty years, and the coming of Sennacherib forty years, before they came to pass; but when and where he died, and was buried, no certain proof can be given. Pseudo-Epiphanius, confounding him with Micaiah in Ahab's time, says ^f he was killed by his son Joram, who cast him down from a precipice, and was buried at Morathi, his native place, near the burying ground of Enakeim, and his grave was well known to that day. And, according to Jerom ^g, the grave of this our prophet was at Morasthi, and in his time turned into a church or temple. Sozomen ^h reports, that, in the times of Theodosius the elder, the body of Micah was found by Zebennus bishop of Eleutheropolis at Berathsalia, a mile and a quarter from the city, near which was the grave of Micah, called by the common people the faithful monument, and in their country language Nephsameemana.

Gill: Micah 1 (Chapter Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO MICAH 1

This chapter treats of the judgments of God on Israel and Judah for their idolatry. It begins with the title of the whole book in which is given an account of the prophet, the time of his prophesying, and of the persons against whom he prophesied, Mic 1:1; next a preface to this chapter, requiring attention to what was about to be delivered, urged from the consideration of the awful appearance of God, which is represented as very grand and terrible, Mic 1:2; the cause of all which wrath that appeared in him was the transgression of Jacob; particularly their idolatry, as appears by the special mention of their idols and graven images in the account of their destruction, Mic 1:5; which destruction is exaggerated by the prophet's lamentation for it, Mic 1:8; and by the mourning of the inhabitants of the several places that should be involved in it, which are particularly mentioned, Mic 1:10.