7:12 In that day people 1 will come to you 2
from Assyria as far as 3 Egypt,
from Egypt as far as the Euphrates River, 4
from the seacoasts 5 and the mountains. 6
1:16 Shave your heads bald as you mourn for the children you love; 7
shave your foreheads as bald 8 as an eagle, 9
for they are taken from you into exile.
1:11 Residents 10 of Shaphir, 11 pass by in nakedness and humiliation! 12
The residents of Zaanan can’t leave their city. 13
Beth Ezel 14 mourns, 15
“He takes from you what he desires.” 16
7:2 Faithful men have disappeared 17 from the land;
there are no godly men left. 18
They all wait in ambush so they can shed blood; 19
they hunt their own brother with a net. 20
7:17 They will lick the dust like a snake,
like serpents crawling on the ground. 21
They will come trembling from their strongholds
to the Lord our God; 22
they will be terrified 23 of you. 24
5:2 (5:1) As for you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, 25
seemingly insignificant 26 among the clans of Judah –
from you a king will emerge who will rule over Israel on my behalf, 27
one whose origins 28 are in the distant past. 29
6:5 My people, recall how King Balak of Moab planned to harm you, 30
how Balaam son of Beor responded to him.
Recall how you journeyed from Shittim to Gilgal,
so you might acknowledge that the Lord has treated you fairly.” 31
6:8 He has told you, O man, what is good,
and what the Lord really wants from you: 32
He wants you to 33 promote 34 justice, to be faithful, 35
and to live obediently before 36 your God.
1 tn Heb “they.” The referent has been specified as “people,” referring either to the nations (coming to God with their tribute) or to the exiles of Israel (returning to the
2 tn The masculine pronominal suffix suggests the
3 tc The MT reads וְעָרֵי (vÿ’arey, “and the cities [of Egypt]”), but the parallel line indicates this is a corruption of וְעַד (vÿ’ad, “even to”).
4 tn Heb “the River,” referring to the Euphrates River. This has been specified in the translation for clarity (so also NASB, NIV).
5 tn Heb “and sea from sea.” Many prefer to emend this to מִיָּם עַד יָם (miyyam ’ad yam, “from sea to sea”).
6 tn Heb “and mountain of the mountain.” Many prefer to emend this to וּמֵהַר עַד הַר (umehar ’ad har, “and mountain to mountain”).
7 tn Heb “over the sons of your delight.”
8 tn Heb “make wide your baldness.”
9 tn Or “a vulture” (cf. NIV, TEV); CEV “a buzzard.” The Hebrew term נֶשֶׁר (nesher) refers to the griffon vulture or eagle.
13 tn The Hebrew participial form, which is feminine singular, is here used in a collective sense for the all the residents of the town. See GKC 394 §122.s.
14 sn The place name Shaphir means “pleasant” in Hebrew.
15 tn The imperatival form is used rhetorically, emphasizing that the inhabitants of Shaphir will pass by into exile.
16 tn Heb “have not come out”; NIV “will not come out”; NLT “dare not come outside.”
17 sn The place name Beth Ezel means “house of nearness” or “house of proximity” in Hebrew.
18 tn Heb “the lamentation of Beth Ezel.” The following words could be the lamentation offered up by Beth Ezel (subjective genitive) or the mourning song sung over it (objective genitive).
19 tc The form עֶמְדָּתוֹ (’emdato) should be emended to חֲמַדְּתוֹ (khamadto, “his (the conqueror’s) desire”).
19 tn Or “have perished”; “have been destroyed.”
20 tn Heb “and an upright one among men there is not.”
21 tn Heb “for bloodshed” (so NASB); TEV “for a chance to commit murder.”
22 sn Micah compares these ungodly people to hunters trying to capture their prey with a net.
25 tn Heb “like crawling things on the ground.” The parallelism suggests snakes are in view.
26 tn Thetranslationassumesthatthe phrase אֶל־יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ (’el-yÿhvah ’elohenu, “to the
27 tn Heb “they will be in dread and afraid.”
28 tn The
31 sn Ephrathah is either an alternate name for Bethlehem or the name of the district in which Bethlehem was located. See Ruth 4:11.
32 tn Heb “being small.” Some omit לִהְיוֹת (lihyot, “being”) because it fits awkwardly and appears again in the next line.
33 tn Heb “from you for me one will go out to be a ruler over Israel.”
34 tn Heb “his goings out.” The term may refer to the ruler’s origins (cf. NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT) or to his activities.
35 tn Heb “from the past, from the days of antiquity.” Elsewhere both phrases refer to the early periods in the history of the world or of the nation of Israel. For מִקֶּדֶם (miqqedem, “from the past”) see Neh 12:46; Pss 74:12; 77:11; Isa 45:21; 46:10. For מִימֵי עוֹלָם (mimey ’olam, “from the days of antiquity”) see Isa 63:9, 11; Amos 9:11; Mic 7:14; Mal 3:4. In Neh 12:46 and Amos 9:11 the Davidic era is in view.
37 tn Heb “remember what Balak…planned.”
38 tn Heb “From Shittim to Gilgal, in order to know the just acts of the
43 sn What the
44 tn Heb “except.” This statement is actually linked with what precedes, “What does he want from you except….”
45 tn Heb “to do,” in the sense of “promote.”
46 tn Heb “to love faithfulness.”
47 tn Heb “to walk humbly [or perhaps, “carefully”] with.”