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I said, “Please listen, you heads of Jacob, and rulers of the house of Israel: Isn’t it for you to know justice?
Verse 1. I. Hebrew and Septuagint “He, the Lord, said;” or, Micheas addressed the princes of both kingdoms, under Ezechias. verse 12. Jeremiah 26:18.—To know and practice. Osee 6:3. Calmet.—Both rich and poor strove to extort from each other. Worthington.
You who hate the good, and love the evil; who tear off their skin, and their flesh from off their bones;
Verse 2. Skins. When some exhorted Tiberius to lay on more taxes, he replied: “a good shepherd must shear the flock, and not tear off the skin.” Suet. xxxii.
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.
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.”
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:
Verse 5. Peace. They pretend goodness, while they do the greatest mischief.—Prepare. Lit. “sanctify,” ( Bible.) or denounce war. Calmet.—False prophets seek their private lucre. Worthington.
“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.
Verse 6. Vision. Impostors shall skulk through fear, when the people shall see that they were not sent. verse 7.
The seers shall be disappointed, and the diviners confounded. Yes, they shall all cover their lips, for there is no answer from God.”
The Hebrew word rendered “God” is “אֱלֹהִ֑ים” (Elohim).
But as for me, I am full of power by the LORD’s Spirit, and of judgment, and of might, to declare to Jacob his disobedience, and to Israel his sin.
Verse 8. Spirit. I am no impostor. Calmet. 2:11.
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,
who build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.
Verse 10. Iniquity. You offer victims unjustly procured, or build your palaces with what belongs to the poor.
Her leaders judge for bribes, and her priests teach for a price, and her prophets tell fortunes for money; yet they lean on the LORD, and say, “Isn’t the LORD among us? No disaster will come on us.”
Verse 11. Hire. It is not lawful to refuse instruction to those who have nothing; nor must priests act solely for a temporal reward, though reason shews that they should be supported by those whom they have to teach. Matthew 10:8, 10. Galatians 6:6 and 1 Timothy 5:18. Calmet.—The judges grew rich by other people’s quarrels; and, as all ranks offended, they were justly involved in ruin. verse 12. Worthington.
Therefore Zion for your sake will be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem will become heaps of rubble, and the mountain of the temple like the high places of a forest.
Verse 12. Forests, after its destruction by Nabuchodonosor. Calmet.—In the space of three years’ neglect, shrubs were growing in the courts of the temple. 1 Maccabees 4:38. Bible.—Rufus ploughed up the spot where the temple had stood, after the Romans had burnt it down. Saint Jerome Jos. Bel. vii. 20.—This prediction made a deep impression on the minds of the people. It caused them to refrain from killing Jeremias. verse 1. Calmet.