Micah 1–3

¹A word of Jehovah that hath been unto Micah the Morashite in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, kings of Judah, that he hath seen concerning Samaria and Jerusalem: ²Hear, O peoples, all of them! Attend, O earth, and its fulness, And the Lord Jehovah is against you for a witness, The Lord from His holy temple. ³For lo, Jehovah is going out from His place, And He hath come down, And hath trodden on high places of earth. ⁴Melted have been the mountains under Him, And the valleys do rend themselves, As wax from the presence of fire, As waters cast down by a slope. ⁵For the transgression of Jacob is all this, And for the sins of the house of Israel. What is the transgression of Jacob? Is it not Samaria? And what the high places of Judah? Is it not Jerusalem? ⁶And I have set Samaria for a heap of the field, For plantations of a vineyard, And poured out into a valley her stones, And her foundations I uncover. ⁷And all her graven images are beaten down, And all her gifts are burnt with fire, And all her idols I make a desolation, For, from the hire of a harlot she gathered, and unto the hire of a harlot they return.

⁸For this I lament and howl, I go spoiled and naked, I make a lamentation like dragons, And a mourning like daughters of an ostrich. ⁹For mortal are her wounds, For it hath come unto Judah, It hath come to a gate of My people—to Jerusalem. ¹⁰In Gath tell ye not—in Acco weep not, In Beth-Aphrah, in dust roll thyself. ¹¹Pass over for thee, O inhabitant of Shaphir, Naked one of shame. Not gone out hath the inhabitant of Zaanan, The lamentation of Beth-Ezel doth take from you its standing. ¹²For stayed for good hath the inhabitant of Maroth, For evil hath come down from Jehovah to the gate of Jerusalem. ¹³Bind the chariot to a swift beast, O inhabitant of Lachish, The beginning of sin is she to the daughter of Zion, For in thee have been found the transgressions of Israel. ¹⁴Therefore thou givest presents to Moresheth-Gath, The houses of Achzib become a lying thing to the kings of Israel. ¹⁵Yet the possessor I do bring in to thee, O inhabitant of Mareshah, To Adullam come in doth the honour of Israel. ¹⁶Make bald and shave, for thy delightful sons, Enlarge thy baldness as an eagle, For they have removed from thee!

Chapter 2

¹Woe to those devising iniquity, And working evil on their beds, In the light of the morning they do it, For their hand is—to God. ²And they have desired fields, And they have taken violently, And houses, and they have taken away, And have oppressed a man and his house, Even a man and his inheritance. ³Therefore, thus said Jehovah: Lo, I am devising against this family evil, From which ye do not remove your necks, Nor walk loftily, for a time of evil it is. ⁴In that day doth one take up for you a simile, And he hath wailed a wailing of woe, He hath said, We have been utterly spoiled, The portion of my people He doth change, How doth He move toward me! To the backslider our fields He apportioneth. ⁵Therefore, thou hast no caster of a line by lot In the assembly of Jehovah.

⁶Ye do not prophesy—they do prophesy, They do not prophesy to these, It doth not remove shame. ⁷Doth the house of Jacob say, ‘Hath the Spirit of Jehovah been shortened? Are these His doings?’ Do not My words benefit the people that is walking uprightly? ⁸And yesterday My people for an enemy doth raise himself up, From the outer garment the honourable ornament ye strip off, From the confident passers by, Ye who are turning back from war. ⁹The women of My people ye cast out from its delightful house, From its sucklings ye take away My honour to the age. ¹⁰Rise and go, for this is not the rest, Because of uncleanness it doth corrupt, And corruption is powerful. ¹¹If one is going with the wind, And with falsehood hath lied: ‘I prophesy to thee of wine, and of strong drink,’ He hath been the prophet of this people!

¹²I do surely gather thee, O Jacob, all of thee, I surely bring together the remnant of Israel, Together I do set it as the flock of Bozrah, As a drove in the midst of its pasture, It maketh a noise because of man. ¹³Gone up hath the breaker before them, They have broken through, Yea, they pass through the gate, Yea, they go out through it, And pass on doth their king before them, And Jehovah at their head!

Chapter 3

¹And I say, ‘Hear, I pray you, heads of Jacob, And ye judges of the house of Israel, Is it not for you to know the judgment? ²Ye who are hating good, and loving evil, Taking violently their skin from off them, And their flesh from off their bones, ³And who have eaten the flesh of My people, And their skin from off them have stript, And their bones they have broken, And they have spread them out as in a pot, And as flesh in the midst of a caldron. ⁴Then do they cry unto Jehovah, And He doth not answer them, And hideth His face from them at that time, As they have made evil their doings. ⁵Thus said Jehovah concerning the prophets Who are causing My people to err, Who are biting with their teeth, And have cried ‘Peace,’ And he who doth not give unto their mouth, They have sanctified against him war. ⁶Therefore a night ye have without vision, And darkness ye have without divination, And gone in hath the sun on the prophets, And black over them hath been the day. ⁷And ashamed have been the seers, And confounded have been the diviners, And covered their lip have all of them, For their is no answer, O God.

⁸And yet I have been full of power by the Spirit of Jehovah, And of judgment, and of might, To declare to Jacob his transgression, And to Israel his sin. ⁹Hear this, I pray you, heads of the house of Jacob, And ye judges of the house of Israel, Who are making judgment abominable, And all uprightness do pervert. ¹⁰Building up Zion with blood, And Jerusalem with iniquity. ¹¹Her heads for a bribe do judge, And her priests for hire do teach, And her prophets for silver divine, And on Jehovah they lean, saying, ‘Is not Jehovah in our midst? Evil doth not come in upon us.’ ¹²Therefore, for your sake, Zion is ploughed a field, and Jerusalem is heaps, And the mount of the house is for high places of a forest!

Chapter 4