† 2:2: Sheol is the place of the dead.
Micah
The Book of Micah
1
1 The LORD’s† word that came to Micah of Morasheth in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem.
2 Hear, you peoples, all of you!
Listen, O earth, and all that is therein.
Let the Lord‡ GOD be witness against you,
the Lord from his holy temple.
3 For behold,§ the LORD comes out of his place,
and will come down and tread on the high places of the earth.
4 The mountains melt under him,
and the valleys split apart like wax before the fire,
like waters that are poured down a steep place.
5 “All this is for the disobedience of Jacob,
and for the sins of the house of Israel.
What is the disobedience of Jacob?
Isn’t it Samaria?
And what are the high places of Judah?
Aren’t they Jerusalem?
6 Therefore I will make Samaria like a rubble heap of the field,
like places for planting vineyards;
and I will pour down its stones into the valley,
and I will uncover its foundations.
7 All her idols will be beaten to pieces,
all her temple gifts will be burnt with fire,
and I will destroy all her images;
for of the hire of a prostitute has she gathered them,
and to the hire of a prostitute shall they return.”
8 For this I will lament and wail.
I will go stripped and naked.
I will howl like the jackals
and mourn like the ostriches.
9 For her wounds are incurable;
for it has come even to Judah.
It reaches to the gate of my people,
even to Jerusalem.
10 Don’t tell it in Gath.
Don’t weep at all.
At Beth Ophrah† I have rolled myself in the dust.
11 Pass on, inhabitant of Shaphir, in nakedness and shame.
The inhabitant of Zaanan won’t come out.
The wailing of Beth Ezel will take from you his protection.
12 For the inhabitant of Maroth waits anxiously for good,
because evil has come down from the LORD to the gate of Jerusalem.
13 Harness the chariot to the swift steed, inhabitant of Lachish.
She was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion;
for the transgressions of Israel were found in you.
14 Therefore you will give a parting gift to Moresheth Gath.
The houses of Achzib will be a deceitful thing to the kings of Israel.
15 I will yet bring a conqueror to you, inhabitants of Mareshah.
The glory of Israel will come to Adullam.
16 Shave your heads,
and cut off your hair for the children of your delight.
Enlarge your baldness like the vulture,
for they have gone into captivity from you!
2
1 Woe to those who devise iniquity
and work evil on their beds!
When the morning is light, they practise it,
because it is in the power of their hand.
2 They covet fields and seize them,
and houses, then take them away.
They oppress a man and his house,
even a man and his heritage.
3 Therefore the LORD says:
“Behold, I am planning against these people a disaster,
from which you will not remove your necks,
neither will you walk haughtily,
for it is an evil time.
4 In that day they will take up a parable against you,
and lament with a doleful lamentation, saying,
‘We are utterly ruined!
My people’s possession is divided up.
Indeed he takes it from me and assigns our fields to traitors!’ ”
5 Therefore you will have no one who divides the land by lot in the LORD’s assembly.
6 “Don’t prophesy!”—they prophesy—
“Don’t prophesy about these things.
Disgrace won’t overtake us.”
7 Shall it be said, O house of Jacob,
“Is the LORD’s Spirit angry?
Are these his doings?
Don’t my words do good to him who walks blamelessly?”
8 But lately my people have risen up as an enemy.
You strip the robe and clothing from those who pass by without a care, returning from battle.
9 You drive the women of my people out from their pleasant houses;
from their young children you take away my blessing forever.
10 Arise, and depart!
For this is not your resting place,
because of uncleanness that destroys,
even with a grievous destruction.
11 If a man walking in a spirit of falsehood lies, saying,
“I will prophesy to you of wine and of strong drink,”
he would be the prophet of this people.
12 I will surely assemble all of you, Jacob.
I will surely gather the remnant of Israel.
I will put them together as the sheep of Bozrah,
as a flock in the middle of their pasture.
They will swarm with people.
13 He who breaks open the way goes up before them.
They break through the gate, and go out.
Their king passes on before them,
with the LORD at their head.
3
1 I said,
“Please listen, you heads of Jacob,
and rulers of the house of Israel:
Isn’t it for you to know justice?
2 You who hate the good,
and love the evil;
who tear off their skin,
and their flesh from off their bones;
3 who also eat the flesh of my people,
and peel their skin from off them,
and break their bones,
and chop them in pieces, as for the pot,
and as meat within the cauldron.
4 Then they will cry to the LORD,
but he will not answer them.
Yes, he will hide his face from them at that time,
because they made their deeds evil.”
5 The LORD says concerning the prophets who lead my people astray—for those who feed their teeth, they proclaim, “Peace!” and whoever doesn’t provide for their mouths, they prepare war against him:
6 “Therefore night is over you, with no vision,
and it is dark to you, that you may not divine;
and the sun will go down on the prophets,
and the day will be black over them.
7 The seers shall be disappointed,
and the diviners confounded.
Yes, they shall all cover their lips,
for there is no answer from God.Ӡ
8 But as for me, I am full of power by the LORD’s Spirit,
and of judgement, and of might,
to declare to Jacob his disobedience,
and to Israel his sin.
9 Please listen to this, you heads of the house of Jacob,
and rulers of the house of Israel,
who abhor justice,
and pervert all equity,
10 who build up Zion with blood,
and Jerusalem with iniquity.
11 Her leaders judge for bribes,
and her priests teach for a price,
and her prophets of it tell fortunes for money;
yet they lean on the LORD, and say,
“Isn’t the LORD amongst us?
No disaster will come on us.”
12 Therefore Zion for your sake will be ploughed like a field,
and Jerusalem will become heaps of rubble,
and the mountain of the temple like the high places of a forest.
4
1 But in the latter days,
it will happen that the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established on the top of the mountains,
and it will be exalted above the hills;
and peoples will stream to it.
2 Many nations will go and say,
“Come! Let’s go up to the mountain of the LORD,
and to the house of the God of Jacob;
and he will teach us of his ways,
and we will walk in his paths.”
For the law will go out of Zion,
and the LORD’s word from Jerusalem;
3 and he will judge between many peoples,
and will decide concerning strong nations afar off.
They will beat their swords into ploughshares,
and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will not lift up sword against nation,
neither will they learn war any more.
4 But every man will sit under his vine and under his fig tree.
No one will make them afraid,
for the mouth of the LORD of Armies has spoken. 5 Indeed all the nations may walk in the name of their gods,
but we will walk in the name of the LORD our God forever and ever.
6 “In that day,” says the LORD,
“I will assemble that which is lame,
and I will gather that which is driven away,
and that which I have afflicted;
7 and I will make that which was lame a remnant,
and that which was cast far off a strong nation:
and the LORD will reign over them on Mount Zion from then on, even forever.”
8 You, tower of the flock, the hill of the daughter of Zion,
to you it will come.
Yes, the former dominion will come,
the kingdom of the daughter of Jerusalem.
9 Now why do you cry out aloud?
Is there no king in you?
Has your counsellor perished,
that pains have taken hold of you as of a woman in travail?
10 Be in pain, and labour to give birth, daughter of Zion,
like a woman in travail;
for now you will go out of the city,
and will dwell in the field,
and will come even to Babylon.
There you will be rescued.
There the LORD will redeem you from the hand of your enemies.
11 Now many nations have assembled against you, that say,
“Let her be defiled,
and let our eye gloat over Zion.”
12 But they don’t know the thoughts of the LORD,
neither do they understand his counsel;
for he has gathered them like the sheaves to the threshing floor.
13 Arise and thresh, daughter of Zion,
for I will make your horn iron,
and I will make your hoofs bronze.
You will beat in pieces many peoples.
I will devote their gain to the LORD,
and their substance to the Lord of the whole earth.
5
1 Now you shall gather yourself in troops,
daughter of troops.
He has laid siege against us.
They will strike the judge of Israel with a rod on the cheek.
2 But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah,
being small amongst the clans of Judah,
out of you one will come out to me who is to be ruler in Israel;
whose goings out are from of old, from ancient times.
3 Therefore he will abandon them until the time that she who is in labour gives birth.
Then the rest of his brothers will return to the children of Israel.
4 He shall stand, and shall shepherd in the strength of the LORD,
in the majesty of the name of the LORD his God.
They will live, for then he will be great to the ends of the earth.
5 He will be our peace when Assyria invades our land
and when he marches through our fortresses,
then we will raise against him seven shepherds,
and eight leaders of men.
6 They will rule the land
