Micah 1:2

The Judge is Coming

1:2 Listen, all you nations! ¹ 

Pay attention, all inhabitants of earth! ² 

The sovereign Lord will testify ³  against you;

the Lord will accuse you ⁴  from his majestic palace. ⁵ 

Micah 1:1

Introduction

1:1 This is the prophetic message that the Lord gave to ⁶  Micah of Moresheth. He delivered this message ⁷  during the reigns of ⁸  Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. The prophecies pertain to ⁹  Samaria ¹⁰  and Jerusalem. ¹¹ 

Micah 1:16

1:16 Shave your heads bald as you mourn for the children you love; ¹² 

shave your foreheads as bald ¹³  as an eagle, ¹⁴ 

for they are taken from you into exile.

Jeremiah 13:15

13:15 Then I said to the people of Judah, ¹⁵ 

“Listen and pay attention! Do not be arrogant!

For the Lord has spoken.

Amos 3:1

Every Effect has its Cause

3:1 Listen, you Israelites, to this message which the Lord is proclaiming against ¹⁶  you! This message is for the entire clan I brought up ¹⁷  from the land of Egypt:

Hebrews 3:7-8

Exposition of Psalm 95: Hearing God’s Word in Faith

3:7 Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, ¹⁸ 

“Oh, that today you would listen as he speaks! ¹⁹ 

3:8 “Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of testing in the wilderness.

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).

⁶ tn Heb “The word of the Lord which came to.”

⁷ tn The words “he delivered this message” are not in the Hebrew text, but are supplied in the translation for clarification.

⁸ tn Heb “in the days of” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV).

⁹ tn Heb “which he saw concerning.”

¹⁰ map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.

¹¹ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

¹² tn Heb “over the sons of your delight.”

¹³ tn Heb “make wide your baldness.”

¹⁴ tn Or “a vulture” (cf. NIV, TEV); CEV “a buzzard.” The Hebrew term נֶשֶׁר (nesher) refers to the griffon vulture or eagle.

¹⁵ tn The words “Then I said to the people of Judah” are not in the text but are implicit from the address in v. 15 and the content of v. 17. They are supplied in the translation for clarity to show the shift from the Lord speaking to Jeremiah.

¹⁶ tn Or “about.”

¹⁷ tn One might expect a third person verb form (“he brought up”), since the Lord apparently refers to himself in the third person in the preceding sentence. This first person form, however, serves to connect this message to the earlier indictment (2:10) and anticipates the words of the following verse.

¹⁸ sn The following quotation is from Ps 95:7b-11.

¹⁹ tn Grk “today if you hear his voice.”