Micah 1-3

Common English Bible

² Listen, all you peoples!
        Pay attention, earth, and all that fills it!
    May the Lord God be a witness against you,
            the Lord from his holy temple.
³ Look! The Lord is coming out from his place;
        he will go down and tread on the shrines of the earth.
⁴ Then the mountains will melt under him;
        the valleys will split apart,
            like wax yielding to the fire,
            like waters poured down a slope.
⁵ All this is for the crime of Jacob
        and the sins of the house of Israel.
        Who is responsible for the crime of Jacob?^[a]
                Isn’t it Samaria?
            Who is responsible for^[b] the shrines of Judah?
                Isn’t it Jerusalem?
⁶ So I will make Samaria a pile of rubble in the open field,
        a place for planting vineyards.
    I will pour her stones into the valley;
        her foundations I will lay bare.
⁷ All her images will be beaten to pieces;
        all her wages will be burned;
    I will make all her idols worthless.
        Since she gathered them from the wages of a prostitute,
            they will again become wages of a prostitute.
⁸ On account of this, I will cry out and howl;
        I will go about barefoot and stripped.
    I will cry out like the jackals,
        and mourn like the ostriches.

⁹ Indeed, Zion has been weakened by her wounds!
            It has come as far as Judah;
    he has struck as far as the gate of my people,
            as far as Jerusalem.
¹⁰ In Gath tell it not; no need to weep there!^[c]
        In Beth-le-aphrah, roll yourself in the dust!
¹¹ Pass by (for your sake),^[d] inhabitants of Shaphir!
        In nakedness and shame she will not go out, inhabitants of Zaanan.
The cry of Beth-ezel
        will take away from you^[e] any place to stand.
¹² How she longs for good, inhabitants of Maroth!
        Calamity has come down from the Lord to the gate of Jerusalem.
¹³ Harness the horses to the chariot, inhabitants of Lachish!
        It was the beginning of sin for Daughter Zion;
            the crimes of Israel have been found in you.
¹⁴ Therefore, you will give good-bye gifts to Moresheth-gath;
        the houses of Achzib have become a deception for the kings of Israel.
¹⁵ Again I will bring to you the one who conquers, inhabitants of Mareshah;
        the glory of Israel will come as far as Adullam.
¹⁶ Make yourself bald and cut off your hair
            because of your cherished children!
        Make yourself as bald as the vulture,
            for they have gone from you into exile.

2 Doom to those who devise wickedness,
        to those who plan evil when they are in bed.
    By the light of morning they do it,
        for they are very powerful.
² They covet fields and seize them,
        houses and take them away.
    They oppress a householder and those in his house,
        a man and his estate.
³ Therefore, the Lord proclaims:
    I myself am devising an evil against this family
        from which you will not be able to remove your necks!
    You will no longer be able to go about arrogantly,
        for it will be an evil time.
⁴ On that day, a taunt will be raised against you;
        someone will wail bitterly:
        “We are utterly destroyed!
        He exchanges the portion of my people;
            he removes what belongs to me;
            he gives away our fields to a rebel.”
⁵ Therefore, you will have no one to set boundary lines
    by lot in the Lord’s assembly.

⁶ “They mustn’t preach!” so they preach.
        “They mustn’t preach of such things!
            Disgrace won’t overtake us.”
⁷     (Should this be said, house of Jacob?)
        “Is the Lord’s patience cut short? Are these his deeds?”
            Don’t my words help the one who behaves righteously?
⁸ But yesterday, my people, the Lord rose up as an enemy.^[f]
        You strip off the glorious clothes^[g]
            from trusting passersby, those who reject war.
⁹ You drive out the women of my people,
        each from her cherished house;
        from their young children
            you take away my splendor forever.
¹⁰ Rise up and go! This can’t be the resting place;
        because of its uncleanness,
            it destroys and the destruction is horrific.
¹¹ If someone were to go about inspired and say deceitfully:
        “I will preach to you for wine and liquor,”
            such a one would be the preacher for this people!

¹² I’ll surely gather Jacob—all of you!
        I’ll surely assemble you, those who are left of Israel!
        I’ll put them together like sheep in Bozrah,^[h]
            like a flock in its pen,
            noisy with people.
¹³ The one who breaks out will go before them;
        they will break out and pass through the gate;
        they will leave by it.
        They will pass on,
            their king before them,
            the Lord at their head.

3 But I said:
Hear, leaders of Jacob,
        rulers of the house of Israel!
    Isn’t it your job to know justice?—
²         you who hate good and love evil,
            who tear the skin off them, and the flesh off their bones,
³         who devour the flesh of my people,
            tear off their skin,
            break their bones in pieces,
            and spread them out as if in a pot,
                like meat in a kettle.
⁴ Then they will cry out to the Lord,
        but he won’t answer them.
He will hide his face from them at that time,
        because of their evil deeds.
⁵ The Lord proclaims concerning the prophets,
        those who lead my people astray,
        those who chew with their teeth
            and then proclaim “Peace!”
            but stir up war against the one who puts nothing in their mouths:
⁶ Therefore, it will become night for you,
        without vision, only darkness
        without divination!
The sun will set on the prophets;
        the day will be dark upon them.
⁷ Those seeing visions will be ashamed,
        and the diviners disgraced;
    they will all cover their upper lips,^[i]
        for there will be no answer from God.
⁸ But me! I am filled with power,
            with the spirit of the Lord,
            with justice and might,
        to declare to Jacob his wrongdoing and to Israel his sin!
⁹ Hear this, leaders of the house of Jacob,
        rulers of the house of Israel,
    you who reject justice and make crooked all that is straight,
¹⁰         who build Zion with bloodshed and Jerusalem with injustice!
¹¹ Her officials give justice for a bribe,
        and her priests teach for hire.
Her prophets offer divination for silver,
        yet they rely on the Lord, saying,
            “Isn’t the Lord in our midst?
                Evil won’t come upon us!”
¹² Therefore, because of you, Zion will be plowed like a field,
        Jerusalem will become piles of rubble,
            and the temple mount will become an overgrown mound.