Micah 3:2

Who hate the good, and love the evil,.... Instead of knowing and doing what was just and right; or, directly contrary to their light and knowledge, and the duty of their office, they hated that which

Who hate the good, and love the evil; who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones; Who pluck off them skin from off them, and their flesh - rob their

Who hate the good: in practice and affection these rulers were directly contrary to what they should have been and done, they hated not only to do good, but they hated the good which was to be done, and those that did it; and what kind of men may we judge they were who hated good men, and what was good, and by consequence hated also God himself? Love the evil; choose, embrace, encourage, delight in, and prefer both evil works and evil workers, and take pleasure to do evil yourselves: the worst character that can be given of any sort of men. Who pluck off their skin from off them: you by office are shepherds, and should feed, guide, heal, protect, and love the flock, but you use them as cruelly as the shepherd, who, instead of shearing of the fleece, would pluck off the skin, arid flay them. And their flesh from off their bones; another proverbial speech of the same import, and chargeth highest injustice and inhumanity upon these princes and rulers: see .

Micah 3:2 Who hate the good, and love the evil; who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones;Ver. 2. Who hate the good, and love the evil] q.d. That you know not judgment, but are men ignorant of the truth which is according to godliness, appeareth by your wicked practices. For you stand across to what God requireth, hating what you should love, and loving where you should hate, Homo est inversus decalogus. Goodness is in itself amiable and attractive but you are perfect strangers to it, and therefore hate it and those that profess it. Evil is of the devil, and must therefore needs be loathsome; and yet you love it, allow it, and wallow in it; whereas you should "abhor that which is evil," hate it as hell, αποστυγουντες, "and cleave," or be fast glued, κολλωμενοι, "to that which is good," Romans 12:9. You are direct antipodes to the godly, Psalms 15:4, and have nothing in you of the Divine nature, 2 Peter 1:4, or of the spot of God’ s children, but are a "perverse and crooked generation," Deuteronomy 32:3. Who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones] Like so many carnivorous cannibals or truculent wild beasts. As the ossifrage, or breakbone, pursueth the prey, tears off the flesh, breaks the bones, and sucks out the marrow: such were these griping tyrants, their furious rapacity surmounted all bounds of humanity. Such a one was Verres among the Romans, as Cicero describeth him; that tiger, Tiberius, those Romish usurers in King John’ s time here, called Caursini, quasi capientes ursi (quoth Paris), devouring bears, who left not so much money in the whole kingdom as they either carried with them or sent to Rome before them. Money and lands are here called men’ s skin, flesh, and bones; and a poor man’ s substance is his life. See Mark 12:44 Luke 8:48. Hence oppression is called a bony sin, Amos 5:12; Amos 5:18, and oppressors, men eaters, Psalms 14:4, and murderers, Habakkuk 2:12. Cyprian cries out, Ferae parcunt Danieli, Ayes pascunt Eliam, homines saeviunt; Lions spare Daniel, ravens feed Elias, but men rage and are worse than both. Melancthon makes mention of a certain prince, some few years before his time, who, to get money out of his subjects, would send for them, and by knocking out first one tooth, and then another (threatening to leave them toothless else), would extort from them what sums soever he pleased. Our King John’ s exactors received from his subjects no less sums of curses than of coin, saith the chronicler; and so did Cardinal Woisey, under Henry VIII, by his importable subsidies, which caused Suffolk to rise up in arms, making poverty their captain.

(2, 3) Who hate the good.—The judges, instead of fulfilling the obligations of their office, whereby they should be “for the people to God-ward,” perpetrated the most flagrant cruelty upon them. Micah compares it to the process of preparing food, in which every part of the animal, even to the bones, is utilised. So the judges robbed the people until there was nothing left to them.

2. who pluck off their skin from off them] The description is figurative. We may infer that cannibalism was not unknown to the Israelites by hearsay or tradition, but not necessarily that it was practised by the ancestors of the Israelites, much less by the Israelites themselves. The meaning of the figure plainly is that the peasantry had lost their old independence, and fallen into a condition like that of the peasants of the Turkish empire. This arose from a change in the social organism. “The nobles of Israel were no longer great farmers, as Saul and Nabal had been, living among the peasantry and sharing their toil … The introduction of such a commerce, throwing the Hebrews into immediate relations with the great emporium of international traffic (Tyre), necessarily led to accumulation of wealth in a few hands, and to the corresponding impoverishment of the class without capital, as exportation raised the price of the necessaries of life” (Prof. Robertson Smith, The Old Testament in the Jewish Church, p. 347). their skin] i.e. the skin of the house of Israel.

Who hate the good and love the evil - that is, they hate, for its own sake, that which is good, and love that which is evil.

Outrages committed by civil rulers, Micah 3:1-4.The denunciation in Micah 3:1-4, is addressed to the nobles, called “heads” and “princes” or “magistrates” (compare Isaiah 1:10).