Micah

Old Testament · 7 chapters · 105 verses.

Chapter 1

1:1The word of the LORD that came to Micah the Morashite in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem:
1:2Hear, O peoples, all of you; pay attention, O earth and all that fills it. Let Lord, the LORD, be a witness against you—the Lord from His holy temple.
1:3For behold, the LORD is going forth from His place; He will come down and tread upon the high places of the earth.
1:4The mountains will melt beneath Him, and the valleys will split open, like wax before the fire, like waters poured down a steep place.
1:5All 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?
1:6“I will make Samaria a heap in the open country, a place for planting a vineyard; I will pour her stones into the valley and uncover her foundations.
1:7All her carved images will be beaten down, and all her wages burned with fire; and I will make all her idols a desolation. For from a prostitute’s wages she gathered them, and to a prostitute’s wages they will return.”
1:8Because of this I will lament and wail; I will go barefoot and naked. I will make a lamentation like the jackals, and mourning like the ostriches.
1:9For her wound is incurable; it has come to Judah; it has reached the gate of My people—to Jerusalem.
1:10Do not tell it in Gath; do not weep at all. In Beth-Aphrah, roll yourself in dust.
1:11Pass on, O inhabitant of Shaphir, naked and ashamed. The inhabitant of Zaanan has not gone out; the lamentation of Beth-ezel takes from you its support.
1:12For the inhabitant of Maroth waits anxiously for good, because calamity has come down from the LORD to the gate of Jerusalem.
1:13Harness the chariot to the swift horse, O inhabitant of Lachish. She was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion, for in you were found the transgressions of Israel.
1:14Therefore you will give parting gifts to Moresheth-gath; the houses of Achzib will become a deception to the kings of Israel.
1:15Yet I will bring one who dispossesses you, O inhabitant of Mareshah; the glory of Israel will come to Adullam.
1:16Make yourself bald, and shave your head for the children of your delight. Enlarge your baldness like a vulture, for they have gone into exile from you.

Chapter 2

2:1Woe to those who devise iniquity and work evil upon their beds! At morning light they do it, because it is in the power of their hand.
2:2They covet fields and seize them, and houses and take them away. They oppress a man and his house, even a man and his inheritance.
2:3Therefore, thus says the LORD: “Behold, I am devising calamity against this family, from which you will not remove your necks; nor will you walk proudly, for it will be an evil time.
2:4In that day one will take up a proverb against you and wail a bitter lamentation. He will say, ‘We are utterly ruined. He changes the portion of my people. How He removes it from me! To the faithless He apportions our fields.’
2:5Therefore you will have no one casting a line by lot in the assembly of the LORD.
2:6“Do not preach,” they preach. “They should not preach of these things; disgrace will not overtake us.”
2:7Is this said, O house of Jacob? Has the Spirit of the LORD grown impatient? Are these His deeds? Do not My words do good to him who walks uprightly?
2:8Yet lately My people have risen up as an enemy. You strip the robe from those who pass by unsuspecting, those returning from war.
2:9The women of My people you cast out from their good houses; from their children you take away My splendor forever.
2:10Rise and go, for this is not the resting place. Because of uncleanness, it brings destruction—a grievous destruction.
2:11If a man walking after wind and falsehood lies, saying, ‘I will preach to you of wine and strong drink,’ he will be the preacher for this people.
2:12I will surely gather you, O Jacob, all of you; I will surely bring together the remnant of Israel. I will set them together like sheep in a fold, like a flock in its pasture; they will make a great noise because of the multitude of men.
2:13The breaker has gone up before them. They have broken through and passed through the gate; they have gone out by it. Their king passes on before them, and the LORD at their head.

Chapter 3

3:1And I said, “Now hear, O heads of Jacob, and you rulers of the house of Israel: Is it not for you to know judgment?
3:2You who hate good and love evil, who tear their skin from them and their flesh from their bones,
3:3who eat the flesh of My people, strip their skin from them, break their bones, and spread them out as in a pot, as flesh within a cauldron.”
3:4Then they will cry to the LORD, but He will not answer them; and He will hide His face from them at that time, because they have made their deeds evil.
3:5Thus says the LORD concerning the prophets who cause My people to err, who bite with their teeth and proclaim, “Peace,” but against one who puts nothing in their mouths they declare holy war:
3:6“Therefore night will be to you without vision, and darkness to you without divination. The sun will go down upon the prophets, and the day will become black over them.
3:7The seers will be ashamed, and the diviners confounded; all of them will cover their lips, for there is no answer from God.”
3:8But I am full of power by the Spirit of the LORD, and of judgment and might, to declare to Jacob his transgression and to Israel his sin.
3:9Now hear this, O heads of the house of Jacob, and you rulers of the house of Israel, who abhor judgment and pervert all uprightness,
3:10who build Zion with bloodshed and Jerusalem with iniquity.
3:11Her heads judge for a bribe, her priests teach for a price, and her prophets divine for silver; yet they lean upon the LORD, saying, “Is not the LORD among us? Calamity will not come upon us.”
3:12Therefore, because of you, Zion will be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem will become heaps, and the mountain of the house like the high places of a forest.

Chapter 4

4:1And it will come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the LORD’s house will be established as the highest of the mountains, and will be lifted above the hills; and peoples will flow to it.
4:2And many nations will go and say, “Come, and let us ascend to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us His ways, and we will walk in His paths.” For the Law will go forth from Zion, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
4:3He will judge between many peoples and decide disputes for mighty nations far away. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, nor will they learn war anymore.
4:4And each man will sit under his vine and under his fig tree, with none troubling him; for the mouth of the LORD of Hosts has spoken.
4:5For all the peoples walk, each in the name of its god; but we will walk in the Name of the LORD our God forever and ever.
4:6“In that day,” declares the LORD, “I will gather the lame and bring together the one driven away, and her whom I have afflicted.
4:7I will make the lame a remnant, and the one cast far off a mighty nation; and the LORD will reign over them on Mount Zion from now on and forever.
4:8And you, O Tower of Eder, stronghold of the daughter of Zion, to you it will come—even the former rule will come, the kingdom of the daughter of Jerusalem.”
4:9Now why do you cry aloud? Is there no king in you? Has your counselor perished, that pain like that of a woman in labor has seized you?
4:10Writhe and bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in labor; for now you will go forth from the city, dwell in the field, and go to Babylon. There you will be delivered; there the LORD will redeem you from the hand of your enemies.
4:11And now many nations are gathered against you, who say, “Let her be defiled, and let our eyes gaze upon Zion.”
4:12But they do not know the thoughts of the LORD, nor do they understand His counsel; for He has gathered them like sheaves to the threshing floor.
4:13Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion; for I will make your horn iron, and I will make your hooves bronze. You will beat many peoples small; and I will devote their gain to the LORD, and their wealth to the Lord of the whole earth.
4:14Now muster yourself in troops, O daughter of troops; they have laid siege against us. They strike the judge of Israel on the cheek with a rod.

Chapter 5

5:1“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you One will come forth for Me to be ruler in Israel; and His goings forth are from of old, from ancient days.”
5:2Therefore He will give them up until the time when she who is in labor gives birth; then the remnant of His brothers will return to the sons of Israel.
5:3And He will stand and shepherd in the strength of the LORD, in the majesty of the Name of the LORD His God; and they will dwell securely, for now He will be great to the ends of the earth.
5:4And this One will be peace. When Assyria comes into our land and treads in our palaces, we will raise against him seven shepherds and eight princes of men.
5:5They will shepherd the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod at its entrances; and He will deliver us from Assyria when he comes into our land and treads within our borders.
5:6And the remnant of Jacob will be among many peoples like dew from the LORD, like showers upon the grass, which do not wait for man nor linger for the sons of men.
5:7Indeed, the remnant of Jacob will be among the nations, among many peoples, like a lion among the beasts of a forest, like a young lion among the flocks of sheep, which, when it passes through, treads down and tears, with none to deliver.
5:8Your hand will be lifted high above your adversaries, and all your enemies will be cut off.
5:9“And it will come to pass in that day,” declares the LORD, “that I will cut off your horses from your midst and destroy your chariots.
5:10I will cut off the cities of your land and throw down all your fortifications.
5:11I will cut off sorcerers from your hand, and you will have no soothsayers.
5:12I will cut off your carved images and your pillars from your midst, and you will no longer bow yourself to the work of your hands.
5:13I will pluck up your sacred poles from your midst and destroy your cities.
5:14And I will execute vengeance in anger and fury upon the nations that have not obeyed.”

Chapter 6

6:1Now hear what the LORD is saying: “Rise, plead your case before the mountains, and cause the hills to hear your voice.
6:2Hear, O mountains, the case of the LORD, you enduring foundations of the earth; for the LORD has a case against His people, and with Israel He will reason.
6:3O My people, what have I done to you? And how have I wearied you? Testify against Me.
6:4For I brought you up from the land of Egypt, and ransomed you from the house of slavery; and I sent Moses, Aaron, and Miriam before you.
6:5O My people, please remember what Balak king of Moab counseled, and what Balaam son of Beor answered him—from Shittim to Gilgal—that you may know the righteous acts of the LORD.”
6:6With what will I come before the LORD? Will I bow myself before God on high? Will I come before Him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?
6:7Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Will I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
6:8He has declared to you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you, but to do justice, to love steadfast love, and to walk humbly with your God?
6:9The voice of the LORD calls to the city—and it is sound wisdom to fear Your Name: “Hear the rod, and the One who appointed it.
6:10Are there still treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked, and the abhorred meager ephah?
6:11Can I be pure with wicked balances and with a bag of deceitful stones?
6:12Her rich men are full of violence, and her inhabitants have spoken falsehood, and their tongue is deceitful in their mouth.
6:13Therefore I also have begun to strike you, to make you desolate because of your sins.
6:14You will eat, but will not be satisfied, and your emptiness will remain within you. You will remove goods, but will not deliver them; and what you deliver, I will give to the sword.
6:15You will sow, but will not reap; you will tread the olive, but will not anoint yourself with oil; and the new wine, but will not drink wine.
6:16For the statutes of Omri are kept, and all the works of the house of Ahab; and you walk in their counsels. Therefore I will give you over to desolation, and its inhabitants to hissing; and you will bear the reproach of My people.”

Chapter 7

7:1Woe is me! For I am like one gathering after the summer harvest, like one gleaning after the vintage. There is no cluster to eat, no first-ripe fig that my soul desires.
7:2The faithful have perished from the land, and there is no one upright among men. All of them lie in wait for blood; each hunts his brother with a net.
7:3Their hands are skilled at doing evil. The ruler makes demands; the judge asks for a bribe; the great man speaks the evil desire of his soul, and together they weave it.
7:4Their best is like a brier; the most upright is worse than a thorn hedge. The day of your watchmen, the day of your punishment, has come; now their confusion is here.
7:5Do not trust in a friend; do not rely on a close companion. Guard the doors of your mouth from her who lies in your embrace.
7:6For a son dishonors a father, a daughter rises against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; the enemies of a man are the men of his house.
7:7But I will watch for the LORD; I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me.
7:8Do not rejoice over me, O my enemy. Though I have fallen, I will rise; though I dwell in darkness, the LORD is a light to me.
7:9I will bear the indignation of the LORD, because I have sinned against Him, until He pleads my cause and executes justice for me. He will bring me forth to the light; I will look upon His righteousness.
7:10Then my enemy will see, and shame will cover her who says to me, “Where is the LORD your God?” My eyes will look upon her; now she will be trampled down like mire in the streets.
7:11A day for building your walls! In that day your boundary will be extended.
7:12In that day they will come to you from Assyria and the cities of Egypt, from Egypt even to the River, and from sea to sea and mountain to mountain.
7:13Yet the land will become a desolation because of its inhabitants, because of the fruit of their deeds.
7:14Shepherd Your people with Your rod, the flock of Your inheritance, dwelling alone in a forest in the midst of Carmel. Let them graze in Bashan and Gilead as in days of old.
7:15“As in the days when you came out of the land of Egypt, I will show him wonders.”
7:16Nations will see and be ashamed of all their might; they will lay a hand upon the mouth, and their ears will be deaf.
7:17They will lick dust like a serpent, like creeping things of the earth. They will come trembling from their strongholds; they will come in fear to the LORD our God, and they will be afraid of You.
7:18Who is a God like You, forgiving iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of His inheritance? He does not retain His anger forever, because He delights in steadfast love.
7:19He will again have compassion on us; He will tread our iniquities underfoot. You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.
7:20You will show faithfulness to Jacob and steadfast love to Abraham, as You swore to our fathers from days of old.