1 The Word of Jehovah that was to Micah of Moresheth in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw on Samaria and Jerusalem:
2 Let the peoples hear, all of them. Pay attention, O earth, and its fullness. And let the Lord Jehovah be a witness against you, the Lord from His holy temple.
3 For, behold, Jehovah is coming out of His place, and He will come down and walk on the high places of the earth.
4 And the mountains shall melt under Him, and the valleys shall cleave themselves, as wax before the fire, as waters poured out on a slope.
5 All this is against the transgression of Jacob, and against the sins of the house of Israel. What is the transgression of Jacob? Is it not Samaria? And what are the high places of Judah? Are they not Jerusalem?
6 And I will make Samaria into ruins of the field, plantings of a vineyard. And I will pour down her stones into the valley, and I will uncover her foundations.
7 And all her graven images shall be beaten to pieces, and all her hires shall be burned with fire. And I will make all her idols a desolation. For she gathered from the hire of a prostitute, and they shall return to the hire of a prostitute.
8 On account of this I will wail and howl; I will go stripped and naked; I will make a wailing like the jackal, yea, mourn like the daughters of the ostrich.
9 For her wounds are incurable; for it has come to Judah; it has reached to the gate of My people, to Jerusalem.
10 Do not declare it in Gath; weeping do not weep. In the house of Leaphrah, wallow in dust.
11 Pass over to them, O one living in Shaphir, in nakedness of shame. The one living in Zaanan has not gone out; the mourning of Beth-ezel shall take from you its place of standing.
12 For the one living in Maroth grieved for good, for evil came down from Jehovah to the gate of Jerusalem.
13 One living in Lachish, tie the chariot to the stallion; she is the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion, for the transgressions of Israel were found in you.
14 So you shall give parting gifts to Moresheth-gath. The houses of Achzib are for a deceitful thing to the kings of Israel.
15 I will bring dispossessing to you again, O one living in Mareshah. The glory of Israel shall come to Adullam.
16 Make yourself bald, and shear for the sons of your delight. Make your baldness increase like the eagle, for they go into exile from you.
1 Woe to those plotting wickedness and preparing evil on their beds! In the light of the morning they do it, because it is in the power of their hand.
2 And they covet and seize fields and houses, and bear them off. And they oppress a man and his household, even a man and his possesion.
3 So thus says Jehovah: Behold, I am plotting an evil against this family, from which you shall not remove your necks from there; and you shall not go exalted, for it is an evil time.
4 In that day one shall lift up a parable against you and lament a lament of lamenting. He says, Devastating we shall be devastated. He has changed the portion of my people. How He has removed it for me! To the one turning back He has divided our fields.
5 So there shall not be for you one measuring a line by lot in the assembly of Jehovah.
6 Do not drop words as they drop! They shall not drop words about these; they shall not draw back reproaches.
7 House of Jacob, it is said, The Spirit of Jehovah is shortened, Are these His doings? Are not My words doing good with the walking of the upright one?
8 Even yesterday My people have risen up like an enemy. You strip off from before a garment, a cloak, from those passing by securely, those returning from war.
9 You have driven out the wives of My people from the house of her delight; you have taken away My majesty forever from her children.
10 Rise up and go! For because of destroying uncleanness, even a painful destruction, this is not your rest.
11 If a man walks with wind, and he lies in deceit, saying, I will drop words to you for wine and fermented liquor, he shall even be one who drops words for this people.
12 Gathering I will gather all of you, Jacob; collecting I will collect the remnant of Israel. I will set him together like the sheep of Bozrah, like a flock in the midst of its pasture. They shall be in commotion because of men.
13 He breaking through has come up before them; they have broken and have passed through the gate and have gone out by it. And their king shall pass through them, and Jehovah at their head.
1 And I said, Heads of Jacob and magistrates of the house of Israel, please hear. Is it not for you to know justice?
2 Those hating good and loving evil, who pull their skin off them, and their flesh from their bones;
3 and who eat the flesh of My people, and cause their skin to come off from them; yea, they break their bones and shatter them, like that which is in the pot, and as flesh in the midst of the kettle.
4 Then they shall cry out to Jehovah, but He will not answer them. He will even hide His face from them in that time, as they have done evil in their doings.
5 So says Jehovah concerning the prophets, those causing My people to err, those biting with their teeth and they call out, Peace! And whoever does not give for their mouth, they even sanctify a war against him.
6 Therefore a night shall be for you apart from vision; and darkness for you apart from divining. And the sun shall go in on the prophets, and the day shall be dark over them.
7 And the seers shall be ashamed, and those divining shall blush, all of them; yea, they shall cover over their mustache, for there is no answer from God.
8 But by the Spirit of Jehovah I am full of power and justice and might, to declare to Jacob his transgression, and his sin to Israel.
9 Please hear this, heads of the house of Jacob, and magistrates of the house of Israel, you who abhor justice and pervert all uprightness,
10 those building up Zion with blood and Jerusalem with iniquity:
11 Her heads judge for a bribe, and her priests teach for a price, and her prophets divine for silver; yet they will lean on Jehovah, saying, Is not Jehovah in our midst? Evil shall not come on us!
12 Therefore, on account of you, Zion shall be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become a heap of ruins, and the mountain of the house into high places of the forest.
1 But it shall be in the end of the days, the mountain of the house of Jehovah shall be founded on the head of the mountains; and it shall be lifted up from the hills; and peoples shall flow on it.
2 And many nations shall come and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of Jehovah, and to the house of the God of Jacob. And He will teach us from His ways, and we will walk in His paths. For the Law shall go forth out of Zion, and the Word of Jehovah from Jerusalem.
3 And He shall judge between many peoples, and will decide for strong nations far distant. And they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning knives. Nation shall not lift up a sword against a nation, and not shall they learn war still.
4 But they shall each man sit under his vine and under his fig tree, and there shall be no trembling; for the mouth of Jehovah of Hosts has spoken.
5 For all the peoples walk, each one in the name of his god; but we will walk in the name of Jehovah our God forever and ever.
6 In that day I will gather the lame one, a statement of Jehovah, and I will gather the one banished, and she whom I have broken.
7 And I will set the lame one into a remnant, and she having been removed far off into a strong nation. And Jehovah shall reign over them in Mount Zion from now on, and to forever.
8 And you, tower of the flock, the hill of the daughter of Zion, it shall happen to you. And the dominion of the chief ones shall come, the kingdom of the daughter of Jerusalem.
9 Now why do you cry aloud, an outcry? Is there not a king among you? Has one advising you perished? For pain has seized you like one giving birth.
10 Be in pain and deliver, daughter of Zion, like one giving birth. For now you shall go out from the city, and you shall live in the field. And you shall come to Babylon. There you shall be snatched back. There Jehovah shall redeem you from the palm of your enemies.
11 And now many nations are gathered against you, saying, Let her be defiled, and let our eyes look on Zion.
12 But they do not know the thoughts of Jehovah, nor do they understand His counsel. For He has gathered them like the sheaf to the threshing-floor.
13 Rise up and thresh, O daughter of Zion, for I will make your horn iron, and I will make your hoofs bronze, and you shall crush many peoples. And I will dedicate their gain to Jehovah, and their wealth to the Lord of all the earth.
1 Now gather yourself together, daughter of a troop; one sets a siege against us. They shall strike the One judging Israel with a rod on the cheek.
2 And you, Bethlehem Ephratah, being least among the thousands of Judah, out of you He shall come forth to Me to become One ruling in Israel; and His goings forth have been from aforetime, from the days of eternity.
3 Therefore He will give them until the time the one giving birth has given birth. And the rest of His brothers shall return to the sons of Israel.
4 And He shall stand and shepherd us in the strength of Jehovah, in the majesty of the name of Jehovah His God. And they shall sit, for now He is great to the ends of the earth.
5 And this One shall be peace. Assyria, when he shall come into our land, and when he shall walk in our palaces, then we shall raise against him seven shepherds and eight anointed of man.
6 And they shall feed upon the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod at her entrances. And He shall deliver us from Assyria, when he comes into our land, and when he treads within our border.
7 And the remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many peoples as dew from Jehovah, as showers on a blade of grass, which does not wait for man, and not delay for the sons of men.
8 And the remnant of Jacob shall be among the nations, in the midst of many peoples, like a lion among the beasts of the forest, like a young lion among the flocks of sheep (who both tramples and tears in pieces if he passes through, and there is none snatching back).
9 Your hands shall be high above your foes, and all your enemies shall be cut off.
10 And it shall be in that day, I will cut off your horses out of your midst, and I will cause to perish your chariots, a statement of Jehovah.
11 And I will cut off the cities of your land and pull down all your fortresses.
12 And I will cut off sorceries out of your hand, and there shall not be ones divining for you.
13 And I also will cut off your graven images and your pillars from your midst. And you shall not any more bow down to the work of your hands.
14 And I will pluck your Asherahs from your midst, and I will destroy your cities.
15 And I will execute vengeance in anger and in fury on the nations, such as they have not heard.
1 Hear, I pray, that which Jehovah is saying: Rise up, contend with the mountains, and let the hills hear your voice.
2 Mountains, and the enduring foundations of the earth, hear the contention of Jehovah, for Jehovah has a contention with His people, and He will argue with Israel.
3 My people, what have I done to you? And how have I made you weary? Answer against Me.
4 For I brought you up out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you out of the house of slaves; and I sent Moses, Aaron, and Miriam before you.
5 My people, remember now what Balak, king of Moab, planned; and what Balaam, the son of Beor, answered him from Shittim to Gilgal, so that you may know the righteousnesses of Jehovah.
6 With what shall I come before Jehovah, to bow down before the loftiness of God? Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings, with calves, sons of a year?
7 Will Jehovah be pleased with thousands of rams, with myriads of torrents of oil? Shall I give my first-born for my transgression, the fruit of my womb for the sin of my soul?
8 O man, He has declared to you what is good. And what does Jehovah require of you, but to do justice, and to love mercy, and to be humble to walk with your God?
9 The voice of Jehovah calls out to the city; and one of sound wisdom will see Your name. Hear the rod, and Him who appointed it.
10 Are there yet in the house of the wicked the treasures of wickedness, and a cursed ephah of leanness?
11 Shall I declare scales of wickedness to be pure, or a bag of stones of fraud?
12 Whose rich ones are full of violence, and ones living in her speak a lie, and their tongue is deceit in their mouth.
13 And I also have made you sick, to strike you, to desolate you because of your sins.
14 You shall eat, but not be satisfied, and your emptiness shall be in your midst; and you will draw back, but shall not keep safe; and that which you keep safe, I will give to the sword.
15 You shall sow, but you shall not reap. You shall tread the olive, but you shall not anoint with oil; and new wine, but shall not drink wine.
16 And one has kept himself as to the statutes of Omri and all the works of the house of Ahab. And you walk in their counsels, so that I may give you for a horror, and ones living in her for a hissing. And you shall bear the reproach of My people.
1 Woe to me! For I am like the gatherings of summer fruit, like the gleanings of the vintage. There is no cluster to eat; my soul craves the early fig.
2 The godly one has perished from the earth, and the upright one is not among mankind. All of them lie in wait for blood; each man hunts his brother with a net.
3 Both palms are on evil, to do it well. The ruler is asking for a bribe, also the judge. And the great man speaks the lust of his soul; he acts, and they weave it together.
4 Their best is like a thorn; the upright one more than a hedge of thorns. The day of your watchers, your visitation is coming; now shall be their confusion.
5 Put no faith in a companion; put no trust in a friend; guard the opening of your mouth from her who lies in your bosom;
6 for a son is despising his father; a daughter rises up against her mother; the bride against her mother-in-law; a man's enemies are the men of his house.
7 But I will look to Jehovah; I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me.
8 Rejoice not against me, my enemy; for if I fall, I shall arise. For if I sit in darkness, Jehovah is a light to me.
9 I will bear the rage of Jehovah because I have sinned against Him, until that He contends for my case and executes my judgment. He will bring me out to the light; I shall see His righteousness.
10 And my enemy shall see; and shame shall cover her, the one saying to me, Where is He, Jehovah your God? My eyes shall see her. Now she shall be for a trampling, as the mud of the streets.
11 A day of building your walls, that day the limit shall be removed.
12 Even that day he shall come to you from Assyria, and the cities of siege, and from the siege even to the River, and from sea and sea, and hill to hill.
13 But the land shall become a desolation because of those dwelling in it, from the fruit of their doings.
14 Shepherd Your people with Your rod, the flock of Your possession, dwelling alone in the thicket, in the midst of Carmel. Let them feed in Bashan and Gilead, as in days of old.
15 As the days of your coming out from the land of Egypt, I will cause him to see extraordinary things.
16 The nations shall see and be ashamed from all their forces. They shall set the hand on the mouth; their ears shall be deaf.
17 They shall lick the dust like a snake; they shall tremble out of their fastnesses like crawlers of the earth; they shall dread Jehovah our God; they shall fear You.
18 Who is a God like You, lifting off iniquity and passing by the transgression of the remnant of His possession? He does not make strong His anger forever, for He delights in mercy.
19 He will return to pity us; He will subdue our iniquities. Yea, You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.
20 You will give faithfulness to Jacob, mercy to Abraham, which You have sworn to our fathers from the days of old.