1 The word of the Lord that came to aMicah of Moresheth in the days of bJotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem.

The Coming Judgment on Israel

2 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 cHis holy temple.

3 For behold, the Lord is coming out of His place;

He will come down

And tread on the high places of the earth.

4 dThe mountains will melt under Him,

And the valleys will split

Like wax before the fire,

Like waters poured down a steep place.

5 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 ehigh places of Judah?

Are they not Jerusalem?

6 “Therefore I will make Samaria fa heap of ruins in the field,

Places for planting a vineyard;

I will pour down her stones into the valley,

And I will guncover her foundations.

7 All her carved images shall be beaten to pieces,

And all her hpay 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 ipay of a harlot.”

Mourning for Israel and Judah

8 Therefore I will wail and howl,

I will go stripped and naked;

jI will make a wailing like the jackals

And a mourning like the ostriches,

9 For her wounds are incurable.

For kit has come to Judah;

It has come to the gate of My people—

To Jerusalem.