Micah 6

1 contend thou before the mountains. Call them to listen to this controversy between Jehovah and Israel: cp. Deut. xxxii. 1; Isa. i. 2.

2 ye strong foundations. Better, as R.V., “ye enduring foundations.”

3 what have I done unto thee? For similar expostulations, showing the reasonableness of God’s commands, see Isa. xliii. 23; Jer. ii. 5, 31.

4. Moses, Aaron, and Miriam. Miriam was a prophetess: see Exod. xv. 20, and note.

5 what Balaam the son of Beor answered him. Being compelled to bless instead of cursing Israel.

from Shittim unto Gilgal. The meaning appears to be, And remember what happened to Israel from Shittim (where you might all justly have perished for your sin) to Gilgal (the headquarters of your nation upon your first entrance into Canaan).

6. Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, etc. ? The language of the people personified, addressing the prophet.

7 the fruit of my body, etc. See Lev. xx. 2; 2 Kings xvi. 3.

8 to do justly, etc. These things had always been insisted upon as the weightier matters of the law (see Deut. x. 12, from which these words are partly derived; 1 Sam. xv. 22 and Isa. i. 11-15).

9 shall see Thy name. Or, “and wisdom is theirs who regard (or fear) Thy name”; i.e., it is the part of wisdom to attend. Attend, then, to the rod (i.e., the threatened chastisement), and to Him who has appointed it.

10 the scant measure (ephah). See Amos viii. 5. 11 Shall I count [them] pure, etc. ? Lit., as R.V., “Shall I be pure,” etc. ? An ellipsis must be supplied: “Shall I [sayest thou],” etc. ? The French version has “Est il innocent, celui qui a de fausses balances?” (“Is he innocent, who has false balances?”).

14 and thy casting down, etc. Or, “and emptiness shall be within thee”; i.e., thy food shall not nourish thee.

and thou shalt take hold. Rather, “And thou shalt put away but shalt not save.”

15. And sweet wine, etc. Rather, “And [thou shalt tread out] the grape-juice (’the vintage,’ R.V.); but shalt not drink wine”; ep. Amos v. 11.

16 the statutes of Omri. See 1 Kings xvi. 25.

1. Woe is me! The prophet here speaks as the representative of the remnant of the faithful.

as when they have gathered the summer fruits. I look in vain for a godly man, as one looks in vain for fine grapes or early figs when the fruit has been gathered.

my soul desired the first-ripe fruit. Rather, “no early fig which my soul desireth” (see R.V. marg.).

3. That they may do evil with both hands earnestly. Or, “They prepare their hands for evil.”

they wrap it up. Or, “they weave it together”; i.e., elaborate their scheme.

4 the day of Thy watchmen. That is, the day of calamity predicted by Thy watchmen, the prophets: see Hos. ix. 7.

5. Trust ye not in a friend, etc. This warning shows the faithlessness of the people in all the relations of life. For “guide,” R.V. marg. rightly has “familiar friend.”

7. Therefore (But as for me), I will look unto the Lord. So desperate is the depravity, that God’s people can find solace only in Him and His purposes of saving mercy.

9 until He plead my cause. See Psa. lxxii. 3.

10 [she that is] mine enemy. A hostile people: hence the feminine.

11 shall the decree be far removed. This may be rendered, “the line shall be extended”; i.e., the city shall be enlarged to admit those who come from Assyria, etc. (12). The Church shall be greatly increased: ep. Isa. liv. 2.

12. In that day [also] he shall come, etc. Rather, “In that day shall they come unto thee from Assyria and the cities of Egypt, and from Egypt even to the River,” i.e., the Euphrates (R.V.): ep. Isa. xix. 18-23, and notes.

and from sea to sea, etc. The seas may be the Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf; the mountains, Lebanon and Sinai. Or the sense may be more general, indicating all parts of the world.

13. Notwithstanding the land shall be desolate, etc. For “land” read “earth,” i.e., the world that is condemned for its sons.

14 thy rod. The shepherd’s crook.

which dwell solitarily. The solitariness of Israel among the heathen was one mark of their being Jehovah’s people: ep. Numb. xxiii. 9; Deut. xxxiii. 28.

Carmel . . . Bashan . . . Gilead. Every fertile district of the land, from west to east, and on both sides of the Jordan.

15. According to the days, etc. This is God’s answer to ver. 14.

16 at all their might. Because reduced to impotence.

17. They shall move out of their holes. Rather, as R.V., “They shall come trembling out of their close places,” i.e., their fastnesses.

18. Who is a God like unto Thee? There may here be a reference by the prophet to his own name. The whole passage is a lyric “outburst of emotion,” in the review of God’s faithfulness and mercy.

20. Thou wilt perform the truth (or, wilt show Thy faithfulness) to Jacob, etc. This verse is applied with slight variation, in the inspired song of Zacharias, on the birth of his child, to Him whose herald and forerunner that child was to be (Luke i. 72, 73).

THE men of Nineveh repented at the preaching of Jonah. But Nahum’s prophecy shows that their repentance had not lasted, and it is with Nineveh that his Book is almost entirely concerned. The date of it is partly fixed by the reference to the fall of Thebes (No or No-Amon), which took place in 663 B.C. and is mentioned by Nahum as a past event (see note on iii. 8); and partly by the date of the fall of Nineveh, which took place about 606 B.C., after Nahum’s prophecy (see for fuller details the account of Scheil’s discoveries in 1895 in Hastings’ Dict. Bible: article “Nahum”). He prophesied, therefore, at a time when Israel was subject

to the Assyrian yoke, and his message is appropriate to his name, Nahum or “Comforter.”