Micah 1

Ver/2. Hear, alt ye people; and hearken, O earth, and all that therein is. Or, Hearken, O land [of Israel], and all its inhabitants. A form of speech bespeaking men’s attention. (See Deut. xxxii. 1. Isa. i. 2.) The prophets sometimes address their speech to inanimate things, to upbraid the stupidity of men. (Sec below, vi. 1,2. Ezek. vi. 2.) And let the Lord be witness against you.] I call him to witness, that I have forewarned you of the judgments that hang over your heads, unless you speedily repent. And he himself will become a witness against you, and convince youof your sins, in such a manner, that you shall not be able to deny the charge. (Compare Psal. 1. 7. Itfal. iii. 5.) The Lord from his holy temple.] From heaven his holy habitation. (See the following verse, and the note upon Jonah ii. 7.) Vcr. 3. For, behold, the Lord cameth out of his place.] God is described as coming from heaven to judgment, because of the visible effects of his power and presence upon earth. (See Isa. xxvi. 21.) And he will come down, and tread upon the high places of the earth.] When he comes to execute his judgments, he will subdue places of the greatest strength, and bring down the men of the highest rank. (See Amos iv. 13.) Vcr. 4. And the mountains shall be molten under him, and the valleys shall be cleft, &c] An allusion to God’s coming upon Mount Sinai, when thunder and lightning shook the mountain, and violent rains, which accompanied this tempest, made the hills look as if they were melted down. (Compare Judg. iv. 4, 5. Psal. lxviii. 8. xcvii. 5. Isa. lxiv. 1, 2. Habak. iii. 6. 9, 10.) Or the words may be referred to the general judgment, of which all particular judgments arc an earnest; when the heavens and the earth shall be dissolved at God’s appearing. (Compare Nahum i. 5. Isa. Ii. 6.) Vcr. 5. What is the transgression of Jacob? is it not Samaria?] Where is the chief cause of Jacob’s or Israel’s sin and apostacy? Is it not in Samaria, the chief seat of that kingdom, the residence of the king and his princes, who have set up the idolatry of the golden calves, and made it the established religion of thekingdom? And what are the high places ofJudah? are they not Jerusalem?] Doth not the idolatrous worship, practised in the high places, receive its chief encouragement from Ahaz, and the great men that join with him in that idolatry? (See 2 Kings xvi. 4.) Vcr. 6. Therefore I will make Samaria as a heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard.] It shall be turned into a heap of ruins. (Compare iii. 12. 2 Kings xix. 25. Nchem. iv. 2.) It shall be reduced into such heaps of stones as arc laid up together in a field lately ploughed, or a vineyard newly planted, after the stones have been gathered out of it (Compare Isa. v. 2. Hos. xii. 11.) The Vulgar Latin translates the sentence thus: I will make Samaria as a heap of stones in a field, when a vineyard is planted. And I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley y and I will discover the foundations thereof] Samaria stood upon a hill; (1 Kings xvi. 24.) so, when it was demolished, many stones would fall down from the high and stately buildings into the valley beneath, and leave tho* foundations naked and bare. (Compare Jcr. Ii. 25;)

Micah 1:7

All the hires thereof shall be burnt with fire. L e. The city shall be destroyed; all its wealth and substance shall be consumed in the fire; the increase of which they looked upon as so many rewards of their idolatry. (Sec Hos. ii. 5. 12.) For she gathered it of the hire of a harlot, and it shall return to the hire of a harlot.] She imagines that she gaineth her wealth as a reward of her idolatry, and it shall return or be made a prey to idolatrous Assyrians. Nothing is more abominable than the hire of a harlot, implying two great wickednesses, covetousness and impurity. (See Deui.xxiii. 18.)

Micah 1:8

Tlierefore I will wail and howl; I will go stripped and naked. I will sympathize with the calamities of my countrymen. (Compare Isa. xxii. 4. Jer. iv. 19.) I will put on the habit and dress of mourners, whose custom it was to go without their upper garments; or with those they wore, rent and torn. This will fitly denote the naked condition to which the ten tribes will be reduced by their enemies. (See Isa. xx. 2—4. and the notes there.) I will make a wailing like the dragons.] The Avord tannin is often translated a dragon by our interpreters; but it signifies most commonly some great fish, such as a whale, or crocodile. (See the note upon Isa. xxvii. 1. Ezek.xxix. 3.) It seems to be taken for a land-animal here, as Dr. Pocock observes upon the place; and so it is taken Lam. iv. 3. where our English reads, The sea-monsters draw out the breast, they give suck to their young ones: but the text must be understood of a land-animal, sea-monsters having no breasts. And mourning as the owls.] Compare Job xxx. 29. Psal. cii. 6. Bochart (de Animal, lib. ii. cap. 14.) thinks the word translated owls signifies properly an ostrich. It is generally supposed, that the Hebrew yaanih is derived from the loud noise this bird maketh. The LXX. translate it here by ^tiprjvtcy sirens; by which Vossius understands a sort of wasp or hornet, of a melancholy note; which kind never goes in swarms, but wanders about in a solitary manner. (See his Dissert, de Orac. Sibyll. cap. 13.) Vcr. 9. For her wound is incurable; it is come to Judah: lie is come to the gate of my people, even fo Jerusalem.] The captivity and desolation of the ten tribes can neither be prevented, because they persist in their impenitence; nor can any relief be applied to it, because it will end in their utter destruction. And one aggravating circumstance attends it, that it is the forerunner of those evils which will befal Judah and Jerusalem; whose gates Sennacherib shall attempt to besiege, with a design to make himself master of that city and the kingdom. (See 2 Kings xviii. 17. 2 Chron. xxxii. 2. compare vcr. 12. of this chapter.) Vcr. 10. Declare it not in Gath.] The words arc taken out of David’s lamentation over Saul and Jonathan, 2 Sam. i. 20. This manner of speech does not imply, in either place/that such ill tidings could be concealed; but only cxpTcsseth the prophet’s concern, lest the Philistines should take occasion from thence to rejoice over the calamities of his people. In the house ofAphrahroll thyself in the dust.] Or, Wallow in the ashes; as was commonly practised in times of great mourning. (See Esther iv. 3. Jer. vi. 20.) Tho word Aphrah signifies dust; and the prophet, it is likely, put?* 2B