I THE PEASANT PROPHET OF JUDAH
While the prophet Isaiah was studying his country’s need from the point of view of a broad-minded statesman conversant with her ambitions and in close touch with her leaders, there arose in the obscure village of Moresheth, near the border of Philistia, a man of God who surveyed the tendencies and dangers of the time from the standpoint of a man of the people. Realizing even more keenly than his aristocratic colleague the bitter and heartless tyranny of the upper classes, Micah proposed a more drastic requital. In his earliest prophecies, when he probably was yet a young man, and before he had gained his broadest outlook, his message of judgment was as unreserved as that of Amos. It is an interesting illustration of the fact that God gradually revealed his purposes even to his servants the prophets, to note that, while Micah, viewing only the immediate situation, affirmed in a way that carried conviction to the heart of his hearers[22] the certain ruin of Jerusalem, Isaiah, his thoughts directed to the plans of Jehovah for his people, affirmed with equal confidence that Jerusalem was secure from hostile attack. Each was a true prophet, but not a prophet of the whole truth.
[22] Compare withMicah 3:12the explanation inJeremiah 26:17-19. The conditions of Judah, when Micah first began to prophesy, were, indeed, such as to stir a prophet’s soul. If Hezekiah ascended the throne about 727 B. C. he had not been reigning long. Isaiah’s work as a social reformer had met with scant success. Unable even to prevent Ahaz and the people from entering into alliance with Tiglath-pileser, he had, in the main, given himself for the last dozen years to the instruction of his disciples. The social wrongs, which he had first attacked, became more and more marked. Misuse of power, indifference to the claims of human brotherhood, and wanton luxury, characterized the daily life of the city. To Micah, the villager, the unjust treatment of the helpless poor by men of wealth and power is the sin that cries aloud to heaven. He has but little to say about idolatry or display or immorality. Were the first three chapters all we have of Micah’s utterances, it would be easy to draw the prophet’s portrait He would be much like Amos—brusk, earnest, eloquent,—a rugged, simple, clear-eyed messenger of judgment So strongly marked are these characteristics that some scholars are inclined to deny that chapters 4–7 are from Micah. When we recognize, however, the probability that Micah and Isaiah would become known to each other, and that the younger prophet would gradually come into sympathy with the broader and more spiritual tone of his predecessors, especially of Hosea, it is no longer difficult to understand his change of tone and outlook. While it is not likely that such different messages as those of chapters 1–3 and chapters 4–5, would be uttered in direct succession, it is wholly probable that they would spring from the varied prospect of two distinct periods of his life. The Book of Micah represents utterances of very different dates. Chapters 1–3 can be dated with reasonable assurance not far from 722 B. C., since the first chapter represents the fall of Samaria as either imminent or recent, while the other two supplement and explain the first. Verses 12 and 13 of chapter 2 are evidently out of place. They are a fragment of some separate sermon, and break, in their present position, the very close connection of thought They seem to belong with verses 6 and 7 of chapter 4, which refer to the restoration from exile. Chapters 4 and 5 refer consistently to Judah’s future, but are made up from a number of separate prophecies. If they were gathered up by Micah himself, they probably represent sermons delivered not far from 701 B. C. Chapter 6 is not easily dated. By many it is referred to the reign of Manasseh, but the grounds for the judgment are very slight It may quite as well be earlier. The first six verses of chapter 7 reflect a condition of persecution which can hardly be earlier than Manasseh’s time. The remainder of the chapter can hardly have been put together earlier than the close of the exile. It is usually considered a late appendix to Micah’s prophecies. The prophecies of Micah are remarkable for independence of thought, and for beauty and force of expression. Like Amos, he is a peasant only in his surroundings and his point of view; he is a master of artistic and effective rhetoric. His use of paranomasia is unique, and his reminiscences of earlier prophetic writings unobtrusive. If it is safe, with the majority of students of his writings, to consider that the bulk of this book can be ascribed to him, it follows that he was fully worthy of a place by the side of Amos, Hosea, and Isaiah. Unsparing in criticism when plain speech was needed, he could discriminate. Beginning as a prophet of judgment, he became a prophet of restoration, of divine forgiveness, and of Israel’s future glory. No man of God in the days before the exile did more than Micah to give his people confidence in the gracious purpose and the loving care of Jehovah. As he came to maturity in his village home, he could look across the busy Philistine plain and observe the currents of commerce and war which flowed from the coast region toward Jerusalem. With his keen appreciation of the abnormal social conditions in Judah, and his grasp of the true ideals of Jehovah, and his acquaintance with the movements of the day, we can understand why he felt sure that the time had come to utter a warning message to his countrymen before it should be too late to save their land from God’s invading army.
