TOM · The Owner's Manual · Old Testament

Micah 1

Before you read Micah: who, when, why

BOOK 33 OF 66 · OLD TESTAMENT · MINOR PROPHETS

Who is like Yahweh?

AUTHOR: Micah of Moresheth, a farm town about 25 miles southwest of Jerusalem (1:1, 1:14). A small town preacher who took on the big city.
EVENTS TOOK PLACE: About 740 to 700 BC, while Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah ruled Judah.
DATE WRITTEN: About 735 to 700 BC.
WRITTEN TO: Samaria, capital of the northern kingdom of Israel, and Jerusalem, capital of Judah.
ANCIENT MANUSCRIPTS: Micah appears in several Dead Sea Scroll era copies of the Twelve Prophets, including the Hebrew scroll from Wadi Murabbaat and the Greek scroll from Nahal Hever, plus a commentary on Micah from Qumran Cave 1.
KEY VERSE: Micah 6:8. Act justly, love mercy, walk humbly with your God.

One of the Oldest Copies of Micah

This is a piece of the Greek Minor Prophets Scroll, first brought out by Bedouin in 1952 and traced to the Cave of Horror at Nahal Hever, near the Dead Sea. It was copied by hand about 50 BC to AD 50, around the time Jesus was born. This piece holds part of Micah 5, including the promise that a ruler would come out of Bethlehem Ephrathah, 5:2. Look for God's name, YHWH, written in the old Hebrew letters right in the middle of the Greek words. Hebrew pieces of Micah from about the same time were also found in Cave 4 at Qumran. A Hebrew scroll of the Minor Prophets from Wadi Murabba'at, copied around AD 100, holds most of Micah. Photo Shai Halevi, Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library, Israel Antiquities Authority.

The Setting

Assyria is the superpower of the day, and it is hungry. In 722 BC it wipes out Samaria and the northern kingdom, just as Micah warned in 1:6. In 701 BC King Sennacherib invades Judah, destroys the fortress city of Lachish and surrounds Jerusalem. Micah preaches through all of it, at the same time as Isaiah. The two even share a famous passage, Micah 4:1 to 3 and Isaiah 2:2 to 4.

What Was Going Wrong

Idols Everywhere. Samaria and Jerusalem were full of carved images, sacred pillars and Asherah poles (1:5 to 7, 5:12 to 14). God says He will smash every one.
Child Sacrifice. King Ahaz, who ruled during Micah's ministry, burned his own son as a sacrifice (2 Kings 16:3). That is why Micah 6:7 asks, Shall I present my firstborn for my transgression? God's answer in 6:8 is a hard no.
Witchcraft. Sorcery and fortune tellers were big business (5:12).
Land Grabs. The rich schemed at night to seize fields and houses from families (2:1 to 2).
Bought Judges And Preachers. Leaders took bribes, priests taught for a price, and prophets preached for money (3:11).
Fake Weights. Merchants cheated customers with rigged scales (6:10 to 11).

Where to Find Jesus

Micah 5:2. A Ruler born in Bethlehem whose origins are from eternity. Quoted to Herod in Matthew 2:5 to 6.
Micah 5:1. The Judge of Israel struck on the cheek. Compare Matthew 27:30.
Micah 5:4 to 5. The Shepherd who will be our peace. Compare John 10:11 and Ephesians 2:14.
Micah 7:6. Jesus quotes this line in Matthew 10:35 to 36.

Cool Stuff Most People Miss

A Sermon That Saved A Life. About a hundred years after Micah, Jeremiah was on trial for his life. The elders stood up and quoted Micah 3:12, and Jeremiah was spared. Read it in Jeremiah 26:18 to 19.
Swords Into Plowshares. The words of Micah 4:3 gave their name to a famous statue in the garden of the United Nations in New York, Let Us Beat Swords into Plowshares. It was a gift from the Soviet Union in 1959, so an officially atheist government ended up quoting the Bible.
A Prophet Who Puns. Micah 1:10 to 15 is a string of wordplays on town names. Beth Leaphrah means house of dust, so its people are told to roll in the dust.
His Name Is the Question. Micah is short for Micaiah, which means Who is like Yahweh? The book ends with the same question in 7:18. Who is a God like You?

Did Anybody Listen?

Yes. King Hezekiah took Micah seriously. He smashed the idols and sacred pillars and even broke up the bronze snake Moses had made, because people had started worshiping it (2 Kings 18:4). A century later Jeremiah 26:19 says Hezekiah feared Yahweh and God held back the disaster. One small town preacher helped turn a whole nation around.

Chapter 1 in 30 seconds

God files a lawsuit against His own people, and the whole earth is called in as a witness. Micah gets so upset he announces he will walk around barefoot and stripped, which is a lot for a Tuesday. Then he roasts about a dozen towns with puns on their own names, like a prophet doing crowd work.

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In this chapterField Notes · ArchaeologyThe Lachish Reliefs · after verse 13

Judgment to Come// Isaiah 7:17–25

¹This is the word of Yahweh that came to Micah the Moreshite in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah—what he saw regarding Samaria and Jerusalem:

²Hear, O peoples, all of you;

listen, O earth, and everyone in it!

May the Lord Yahweh bear witness against you,

the Lord from His holy temple.

³For behold, Yahweh comes forth

from His dwelling place;

He will come down and tread

on the high places of the earth.

⁴The mountains will melt beneath Him,

and the valleys will split apart,

like wax before the fire,

like water rushing down a slope.

⁵All this is for the transgression of Jacob

and the sins of the house of Israel.

What is the transgression of Jacob?

Is it not Samaria?

And what is the high place of Judah?

Is it not Jerusalem?

⁶Therefore I will make Samaria

a heap of rubble in the open field,

a planting area for a vineyard.

I will pour her stones into the valley

and expose her foundations.

MIC 1:6[PROPHECY]Samaria would become a heap of rubble and her stones poured into the valley → 2KI 17:5-6; 2KI 18:9-10

⁷All her carved images will be smashed to pieces;

all her wages will be burned in the fire,

and I will destroy all her idols.

Since she collected the wages of a prostitute,

they will be used again on a prostitute.

MIC 1:7[DEMONIC]God will smash Samaria's carved images and burn her idols

Weeping and Mourning

⁸Because of this I will lament and wail;

I will walk barefoot and naked.

I will howl like a jackal

and mourn like an ostrich.

⁹For her wound is incurable;

it has reached even Judah;

it has approached the gate of my people,

as far as Jerusalem itself.

MIC 1:9[PROPHECY]Samaria's wound would reach Judah and come to the gate of Jerusalem → 2KI 18:13-17; IS 36:1-2MEDIUM

¹⁰Do not tell it in Gath; do not weep at all.

Roll in the dust in Beth-leaphrah.

¹¹Depart in shameful nakedness,

O dwellers of Shaphir.

The dwellers of Zaanan

will not come out.

Beth-ezel is in mourning;

its support is taken from you.

¹²For the dwellers of Maroth pined for good,

but calamity came down from Yahweh,

even to the gate of Jerusalem.

¹³Harness your chariot horses,

O dweller of Lachish.

You were the beginning of sin to the Daughter of Zion,

for the transgressions of Israel were found in you.

MIC 1:13[PROPHECY]Lachish would have to flee with chariots from the enemy → HISTORY: Sennacherib of Assyria besieged and took Lachish in 701 BC. Found on his Lachish wall carvings from Nineveh, now in the British Museum, and in the burned ruins of Lachish.MEDIUM
MIC 1:13[ARCHAEOLOGY]Lachish Reliefs of Sennacherib

Field Notes · Archaeology

The Lachish Reliefs

Micah 1:9 to 16 · 2 Kings 18:13 to 14 · Isaiah 36:1 to 2 · 2 Chronicles 32:9

Photo: Mike Peel (www.mikepeel.net). Lachish Relief, British Museum, Room 10. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike (CC BY-SA 4.0). Source: Wikimedia Commons, File: Lachish_Relief,_British_Museum_10.jpg. Used unaltered except for size.

WHAT IT IS: A series of carved stone panels from the palace of the Assyrian king Sennacherib. They show his army attacking the walled city of Lachish in Judah: siege ramps, battering rams, archers, and families of Judah being led away into exile.
HOW OLD IT IS: Carved about 700 to 690 BC for Sennacherib's palace, soon after his army captured Lachish in 701 BC.
WHAT MICAH WARNED VS WHAT THE STONE SHOWS: Micah 1:13 tells Lachish to hitch up the chariot horses and run. The reliefs show Lachish under attack and falling. Micah 1:16 says the people will go into exile. The reliefs show families of Judah marched away. Micah 1:9 says the disaster reaches the gate of Jerusalem. Sennacherib's own record says he trapped Hezekiah in Jerusalem but never says he took it.
WHERE AND WHEN FOUND: Dug up by the British explorer Austen Henry Layard in the 1840s in the ruins of Sennacherib's palace at Nineveh, in modern Iraq.
WHERE IT IS TODAY: The British Museum in London, Room 10.
WHAT IT CONFIRMS: The Bible says the king of Assyria attacked Lachish and sent messengers from there to Hezekiah in Jerusalem. Sennacherib was so proud of taking Lachish that he put it on his palace walls.
THE DIRT AGREES: Archaeologists at Tel Lachish in Israel found the actual Assyrian siege ramp, arrowheads, and sling stones from the battle.
THE PART HE LEFT OUT: Sennacherib's prism brags that he shut Hezekiah up in Jerusalem like a bird in a cage, but it never claims he took the city. The Bible explains why in 2 Kings 19:35 to 36.
WHAT IT DOES NOT PROVE: Micah never names Sennacherib or gives a date. Most scholars read Micah 1:10 to 16 as the Assyrian march through the Judean foothills, and the reliefs show that march at Lachish.

CONFIDENCE: HIGH

¹⁴Therefore, send farewell gifts to Moresheth-gath;

the houses of Achzib will prove deceptive

to the kings of Israel.

¹⁵I will again bring a conqueror against you,

O dweller of Mareshah.

The glory of Israel will come to Adullam.

¹⁶Shave yourselves bald and cut off your hair

in mourning for your precious children;

make yourselves as bald as an eagle,

for they will go from you into exile.

Micah 1

One of the Oldest Copies of Micah

The Setting

What Was Going Wrong

Where to Find Jesus

Cool Stuff Most People Miss

Did Anybody Listen?

Judgment to Come// Isaiah 7:17–25

Weeping and Mourning

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