Michah (Book of Micah), Unknown
Michah (Book of Micah)
Category: Judaism
0:23 h
The Jewish Publication Society of America Version (JPS) of the Tanakh (the Hebrew Bible) was the first Bible translation published by the Jewish Publication Society of America and the first translation of the Tanakh into English by a committee of Jews. The full publication title is The Holy Scriptures According to the Masoretic Text: A New Translation with the Aid of Previous Versions and with Constant Consultation of Jewish Authorities.

Michah
(Book of Micah)

מִיכָה

Nevi’im - נביאים

Michah - Chapter 1

The word of the LORD that came to Micah the Morashtite in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem.

Hear, ye peoples, all of you; Hearken, O earth, and all that therein is; and let the Lord GOD be witness against you, the Lord from His holy temple.

For, behold, the LORD cometh forth out of His place, and will come down, and tread upon the high places of the earth.

And the mountains shall be molten under Him, and the valleys shall be cleft, as wax before the fire, as waters that are poured down a steep place.

For 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 are the high places of Judah? are they not Jerusalem?

Therefore I will make Samaria a heap in the field, a place for the planting of vineyards; and I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley, and I will uncover the foundations thereof.

And all her graven images shall be beaten to pieces, and all her hires shall be burned with fire, and all her idols will I lay desolate; for of the hire of a harlot hath she gathered them, and unto the hire of a harlot shall they return.

For this will I wail and howl, I will go stripped and naked; I will make a wailing like the jackals, and a mourning like the ostriches.

For her wound is incurable; for it is come even unto Judah; it reacheth unto the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem.

Tell it not in Gath, weep not at all; at Beth-le-aphrah roll thyself in the dust.

Pass ye away, O inhabitant of Saphir, in nakedness and shame; the inhabitant of Zaanan is not come forth; the wailing of Beth-ezel shall take from you the standing-place thereof.

For the inhabitant of Maroth waiteth anxiously for good; because evil is come down from the LORD unto the gate of Jerusalem.

Bind the chariots to the swift steeds, O inhabitant of Lachish; she was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion; for the transgressions of Israel are found in thee.

Therefore shalt thou give a parting gift to Moresheth-gath; the houses of Achzib shall be a deceitful thing unto the kings of Israel.

I will yet bring unto thee, O inhabitant of Mareshah, him that shall possess thee; the glory of Israel shall come even unto Adullam.

Make thee bald, and poll thee for the children of thy delight; enlarge thy baldness as the vulture; for they are gone into captivity from thee. {S}

Michah - Chapter 2

Woe to them that devise iniquity and work evil upon their beds! When the morning is light, they execute it, because it is in the power of their hand.

And they covet fields, and seize them; and houses, and take them away; thus they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage. {P}

Therefore thus saith the LORD: Behold, against this family do I devise an evil, from which ye shall not remove your necks, neither shall ye walk upright; for it shall be an evil time.

In that day shall they take up a parable against you, and lament with a doleful lamentation, and say: ‘We are utterly ruined; he changeth the portion of my people; how doth he remove it from me! Instead of restoring our fields, he divideth them.’

Therefore thou shalt have none that shall cast the line by lot in the congregation of the LORD.

‘Preach ye not’, they preach; ‘They shall not preach of these things, that they shall not take shame.’

Do I change, O house of Jacob? Is the spirit of the LORD straitened? Are these His doings? Do not My words do good to him that walketh uprightly?

But of late My people is risen up as an enemy; with the garment ye strip also the mantle from them that pass by securely, so that they are as men returning from war.

The women of My people ye cast out from their pleasant houses; from their young children ye take away My glory for ever.

Arise ye, and depart; for this is not your resting-place; because of the uncleanness thereof, it shall destroy you, even with a sore destruction.

If a man walking in wind and falsehood do lie: ‘I will preach unto thee of wine and of strong drink’; he shall even be the preacher of this people.

I will surely assemble, O Jacob, all of thee; I will surely gather the remnant of Israel; I will render them all as sheep in a fold; as a flock in the midst of their pasture; they shall make great noise by reason of the multitude of men.

The breaker is gone up before them; they have broken forth and passed on, by the gate, and are gone out thereat; and their king is passed on before them, and the LORD at the head of them. {P}

Michah - Chapter 3

And I said: Hear, I pray you, ye heads of Jacob, and rulers of the house of Israel: is it not for you to know justice?

Who hate the good, and love the evil; who rob their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones; Who also eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from off them, and break their bones; yea, they chop them in pieces, as that which is in the pot, and as flesh within the caldron.

Then shall they cry unto the LORD, but He will not answer them; yea, He will hide His face from them at that time, according as they have wrought evil in their doings. {P}

Thus saith the LORD concerning the prophets that make my people to err; that cry: ‘Peace’, when their teeth have any thing to bite; and whoso putteth not into their mouths, they even prepare war against him: Therefore it shall be night unto you, that ye shall have no vision; and it shall be dark unto you, that ye shall not divine; and the sun shall go down upon the prophets, and the day shall be black over them.

And the seers shall be put to shame, and the diviners confounded; yea, they shall all cover their upper lips; for there shall be no answer of God.

But I truly am full of power by the spirit of the LORD, and of justice, and of might, to declare unto Jacob his transgression, and to Israel his sin. {S}

Hear this, I pray you, ye heads of the house of Jacob, and rulers of the house of Israel, that abhor justice, and pervert all equity; That build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.

The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money; yet will they lean upon the LORD, and say: ‘Is not the LORD in the midst of us? No evil shall come upon us’?

Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of a forest. {P}

Michah - Chapter 4

But in the end of days it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the LORD’S house shall be established as the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and peoples shall flow unto it.

And many nations shall go and say: ‘Come ye, and let us 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 out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.

And He shall judge between many peoples, and shall decide concerning mighty nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.

But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig-tree; and none shall make them afraid; for the mouth of the LORD of hosts hath spoken.

For let all the peoples walk each one in the name of its god, but we will walk in the name of the LORD our God for ever and ever. {P}

In that day, saith the LORD, will I assemble her that halteth, and I will gather her that is driven away, and her that I have afflicted; And I will make her that halted a remnant, and her that was cast far off a mighty nation; and the LORD shall reign over them in mount Zion from thenceforth even for ever. {P}

And thou, Migdal-eder, the hill of the daughter of Zion, unto thee shall it come; yea, the former dominion shall come, the kingdom of the daughter of Jerusalem.

Now why dost thou cry out aloud? Is there no King in thee, is thy Counsellor perished, that pangs have taken hold of thee as of a woman in travail?

Be in pain, and labour to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail; for now shalt thou go forth out of the city, and shalt dwell in the field, and shalt come even unto Babylon; there shalt thou be rescued; there shall the LORD redeem thee from the hand of thine enemies.

And now many nations are assembled against thee, that say: ‘Let her be defiled, and let our eye gaze upon Zion.’