Translation & Sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ The Redeemer Church of Manhattan, KS, 29 September 2024
Remember that God has just promised the Jews during Hezekiah’s reign in v.8 that the original kingship would surely come to them – that the Messiah would surely come and be with them and reign as king and keep them safe and get rid of evil and give them peace forever!
But even as Micah delivers this amazing promise, it’s like the people hearing it are too engrossed with their own present pain and agony to be very excited about that promise.
Let
me read Micah 4:9-13 from my translation while you follow along in
your Bibles:
Why are you raising a hue and cry now? Is
there no king with you, or has your counselor perished because
labor-pain has gotten hold of you like a woman giving birth? Go into
labor and deliver, daughter of Zion, like a woman giving birth, for
now you will go out from the walled-city and dwell in the field and
then go into Babylon. There you will be rescued; there Yahweh will
redeem you from the control of your enemies. But for now, many
nations have been assembled against you, who are saying, “Let her
be breached, then let our eyes look into Zion!” But, as for them,
they have not known the thoughts of Yahweh, nor have they understood
His counsel: that He has gathered them together like sheaves to the
threshing-floor. Get up and thresh, Daughter of Zion, for I will set
your horn with iron and I will set your hooves with bronze, and you
will crush many peoples, and {you} will devote their gain to Yahweh
and their resources to the Master of all the earth.
Verse nine in Hebrew starts with the word “now.” Micah has been looking out on the horizon of the future and the glorious age to come in verses 6-8, but here in v.9 he is drawn back to the “now” of what is currently going on around him.
His people are self-absorbed and groaning, even screaming, like a woman might do when she is having a baby.
This, by the way is not casting women or childbirth in a negative light; it is just a comparison to one of the most intense experiences known to the human race.
Micah has already used this comparison back in chapter 1 verse 12.1
The current painfulness and intensity of what is going on in the here-and-now can make it hard for God’s wonderful promises about the future to really sink in to our minds and do us any good.
Do you feel that way? I can sure relate. I fell out of a tree and injured my back a month or so ago, so, over the past few weeks, as I have been studying this chapter in Micah, the physical pain from my back has made it a struggle to be able to get out of my present pain and get excited about God’s future promises.
And the pain isn’t just physical. As the presidential campaign ads and news articles get more and more intense leading up to this year’s election, I find myself getting more and more uptight with the feeling that if this vote doesn’t turn out the way I want it to, everything I love about this country will be lost. (That is, of course, how the political manipulators want us to feel, so they keep saying these things to make us anxious, and that can be a real emotional drain that completely distracts me from God’s promises.)
So Micah, after delivering the most hope-filled message that could ever be shared about living with Jesus in heaven, looks back at his people and says, “Why are you crying now?”
Then he asks if they have a “king” or a “political advisor/counselor.”
Now, they obviously do have a king, because the first verse of Micah makes it clear that he wrote during the reigns of Kings Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, and there was no historical interruption in that line of kings.
Furthermore, they believed that God was king in their midst:
They had said that in chapter 3 verse 11 “Is not the LORD in our midst?”
and in Micah 4:7, Micah had assured them that “from now on, Yahweh will reign over them,” and in v.8 that “the kingdom... will come to you.”
So, yes, they had a king in both the physical and spiritual sense.2
The northern tribes of Israel, however, no longer had a king; they had been conquered by the Assyrians. The southern kingdom of Judah would face the same loss themselves in about a hundred years, and then they would have to remind themselves that their God had promised to still be their king.
Now, as for a royal “counselor,” the Bible doesn’t give us the name of anyone by that title in Israel at the time, but the same word “counselor” does show up in v. 12, clearly referring to wisdom from God,
and when we read the historical account of King Hezekiah in 2 Kings 19, it was the prophet Isaiah that the king immediately sent-for in a political crisis, so Isaiah himself was Hezekiah’s counselor, at least in some sense. And when we read Isaiah’s prophecies, chapter 41:28 confirms that God sent Isaiah to give good “counsel,”
but Isaiah chapter 9 also makes it clear that the ultimate “counselor” is not a mere prophet but the Messiah Himself, who will be the “wonderful counselor” who will reign forever as king3.
Perhaps the reason why Micah asks his people if they have a king or counselor is that a good king (like King Hezekiah in his best days) and a good counselor (like the prophet Isaiah) would be an important resource to turn-to for leadership when the present stresses are so great that you’re having trouble following God and believing His promises4.
Towards the end of Micah’s life, the Assyrian Army laid siege to Jerusalem, and their Rabshaqah army general mocked God in front of the people of Jerusalem and told them to stop trusting God, and he offered them a counterfeit peace to what God had already promised in Micah 4:4, saying, “Make peace with me… and each of you will eat of his vine and each of his fig-tree” (Isa. 36:16, NAW).
But King Hezekiah led the people of Judea to consult with God’s prophet Isaiah, using Micah 4’s comparison of the crisis to childbirth, saying, “...This day is a day of distress, of rebuke, and of disgrace; children have come to the breach, but there is no strength to give birth. It may be that Yahweh your God will hear the words of the Rabshaqah, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to mock the living God, and will rebuke [him]...; therefore lift up prayer for the remnant that can still be found.” (Isa. 37:3-4, NAW)
And King Hezekiah himself also prayed to God, saying, “So now, Yahweh our God, save us from his [the king of Assyria’s] control, so that all the kingdoms of the earth will know that you alone are the LORD.” (Isa. 37:20, NAW) And, of course, God dispersed the Assyrians and delivered Jerusalem.5
A good leader or a good advisor will help you when you feel distress, to trust God, remember God’s promises, and wait on His salvation.
These days we don’t have the same setup of a divinely-appointed king with official prophets, but in Ephesians 4:11, we read concerning the church that “He [Jesus] Himself gave the apostles, and the prophets, and the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers toward the equipping of the saints to the work of service, to the building-up of the body of Christ…”
When you are self-absorbed in the stresses of the here-and-now, look to your pastor-teachers (which, in our church’s case are our church elders) and your evangelist, and let us help you keep trusting the Lord Jesus.
And that kind of spiritual leadership can be exercised among all of you. 1 Thessalonians 4:18 commands all of you to “comfort one another with these words.” With what words? “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words.” (1 Thess. 4:16-18, NKJV)
Now, if they thought they have problems then in Micah’s day, they were in for a rude awakening in another hundred years when Nebuchadnezzar came from Babylon and actually conquered Jerusalem and took them into exile. Like verse 9, verse 10 also uses the word “now,” but I believe the “now” in verse 9 refers to Micah’s time – perhaps when Sennacherib unsuccessfully laid siege to Jerusalem, but the “now” of verse 10, I think, is talking about that next prophecy-horizon of the overthrow and exile of Jerusalem (although many commentators consider both verses 9 and 10 to be referring to the exile, and that wouldn’t really change the application6).
Once again in v.10 we get the same metaphor of childbirth associated throughout the Bible with the distress of a siege, but this time, deliverance would not come to those within the walls of Jerusalem. (The Hebrew word for “city” in v.10 implies that it had a wall around it.) Instead, Micah’s people are going to be forced “out” of Jerusalem to “camp/dwell in the open country” and then be deported to a foreign country – to live in the Chaldean capitol city of “Babylon.”
It will only be after they have been conquered and deported to that foreign city that they will be “rescued” and “redeemed from the control of [their] enemies.” The rescue will occur “there” in Babylon!
Later, the prophet Isaiah said something similar to King Hezekiah in Jerusalem:
2 Kings 20:18 “And they shall take away some of your sons who will descend from you, whom you will beget; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.” (NKJV)
but Isaiah also prophesied of a time when the exiles would, “Go out from Babylon, hurry from the Chaldeans with a noise of shouting... ‘Yahweh has redeemed His servant Jacob’” (Isaiah 48:20) and “Burst out! Cheer together, dry places of Jerusalem, for Yahweh has comforted His people; He has redeemed Jerusalem!” (Isaiah 52:9-10, NAW)
Later on, Jeremiah reminded the exiles in Babylon of the second half of the prophecy, saying. “...I [will] relent concerning the disaster that I have brought upon you. Do not be afraid of the king of Babylon… for I am with you, to save you and deliver you from his hand. And I will show you mercy, that he may have mercy on you and cause you to return to your own land.” (Jeremiah 42:10-12, NKJV)
Mind you, Babylon was not a world power during Micah’s day; there were no world events hinting that such a thing would ever happen, but God is telling His people about the path from where they are to where He wants them to be, and He’s warning them that the path is going to go through tragedy before they get to glory.
You also have to know that. When you become a Christian, there are certainly great blessings you will experience, but God doesn’t promise that all your troubles will immediately go away or that you’ll be rich for the rest of your life. No, what He promises is7:
that “in this world, you will have tribulation” ~ John 16:33
that “you were appointed” to undergo “afflictions” ~ 1 Thessalonians 3:3,
that “you were called” to endure “suffering” as you “follow the example of Christ” ~1 Peter 2:19-20, (cf. Acts 14:22)
and then all your tears will be wiped away in His presence in heaven (Isa. 25:8/Rev. 21:4).
Romans 8:16-25 “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now. Not only that, but we also who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body. For we were saved in this hope, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.” (NKJV)
The “deliverance” and “redemption” prophecied by Micah is ultimately the work of Jesus Christ. The New Testament uses the same Greek words for “deliver” and “redeem” as the Greek translation of Micah 4:10 in passages like:
1 Peter 1:18-19 “...it was not by perishable things – silver or gold – that y'all were redeemed out of your empty lifestyle passed along from forefathers, but rather it was by the precious blood of Christ...” (NAW)
Colossians 1:13 “He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love” (NKJV)
1 Thessalonians 1:10 “...Jesus... delivers us from the wrath to come.” (NKJV)
2 Timothy 4:18 “And the Lord will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me for His heavenly kingdom...” (NKJV, cf. 2 Peter 2:9, Luke 1:67-75)
Therefore, Titus 2:12-14 “[W]e should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.” (NKJV, cf. Ps. 107)
In verses 11-13, the word “now” appears yet again a third time, bringing us to a time when foreigners have assembled against Jerusalem – the daughter of Zion, hoping to take advantage of her, unaware that God is about to disenfranchise them instead!
This fits with the event in Micah’s life when King Hezekiah prayed, and God delivered Jerusalem from Sennacherib’s siege, so I think the “now” at the beginning of v.11 returns us from the future deliverance spoken-of in v.10 and back to Micah’s present-day situation8.
Micah, along with many others from the hill country of Judea, have fled from their unfortified hometowns before the onslaught of the Assyrian army as it swept through the country from north to south, east to west, and now they are all holed-up in Jerusalem, the last holdout in Israel, while Rabshakah figures out how to conquer the city and then do as he wishes with the vulnerable people huddled inside. (Bible commentators are all over the map9 as to what specific event this describes, but this is what I think it’s describing.)
Contemporary commentator Bruce Waltke noted that the phrase “many nations” refers to the Assyrian army in Isaiah (8:9, 17:12-14) but never to the Babylonian army, adding that “‘the many nations’ in Micah’s historical context are best identified with the international horde of mercenaries that comprised Sennacherib’s standing army in his invasion of Jerusalem in 701 BC”10
The word translated “defiled/polluted” in v.11, literally means “to pierce through.” I don’t think it means that these foreigners are worrying about whether the Jews are morally pure or not11, I think they are simply trying to figure out how to pierce through the wall and see the inside of Jerusalem.
However, there are, as usual, multiple layers of fulfillment of this prophecy, and the scenario of “many nations” gathered against God’s people followed by a surprising reversal where the victimized people become victors with Christ’s intervention, shows up again in the end-times, in Revelation 16 & 17, and until that final day, whenever we encounter a threatening situation with folks who hate God, we need to remember how the story goes when God’s people keep trusting Him to save.
We also need to remember this historical pattern, that God generally allows things to get bad before He brings correction12.
He leads us like a “good shepherd,” but Psalm 23 tells us that the paths on which He leads us go not only through “green pastures… beside still waters,” but also through the “valley of the shadow of death” and “the presence of enemies.” We are not promised a perfect, undisturbed life.
God knows our weak human nature (Psalm 103:14) and our tendency to forget what is not in front of our faces. How seriously would the citizens of Jerusalem have taken God’s power to save if they had never experienced Him actually saving them from anything?
How much more did the power of God impress them simply because they went through the terrifying experience of an army surrounding them, blaspheming their God and offering a counterfeit peace and trying to break through the city wall, and then to see Hezekiah pray and to see the army decimated by a plague and running away!
Experiences like that, when we look death or disaster or disease in the face, and then see God deliver – when we experience the bondage of addiction and oppression of sin and then get freed from it by God’s power – these experiences give us a greater intimacy with God than we ever would have had without them, even though they were horrible, painful experiences.
God had to bring us through these bad things in order to get to the more wonderful fulfillments of His promises. So don’t let go and deny God and avoid the church when life gets crazy; hunker down and trust God and love Him with all your might, (That’s the first and greatest commandment, right? “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength” ~Mathew 32:37-38) and He will lead you through the present painful circumstances into greater fellowship with Him and greater fulfillment of His promises.
But in verse 12, the dramatic irony of God’s sovereignty is revealed:
Those enemy nations thought that they had gathered themselves together, but God says, “No, actually, I gathered them to the front gate of Jerusalem for my own purposes.”
The enemy nations had come to conquer Jerusalem, but God says He actually assembled them there to clean their clocks!
Now, for those city-slickers who don’t know what happens to “sheaves on a threshing floor,” (v.12) let me tell you: sheaves are bundles of cut grain stalks brought in from the field.
At the threshing floor, they are untied and piled on the hard, clay floor.
Then, in the old days (before combine machines), the farm hands would lead in an ox or a heifer and have them walk back and forth over those sheaves of grain until the wheat kernels had all been squashed out of the hulls.
They might harness a threshing sledge behind the beast of burden and drag the heavy crushing weight and wheels over the grain stalks.
Sometimes they would beat the wheat stalks with heavy flail-rods to knock the wheat berries out of the sheaves that the oxen missed.
Then they would winnow and throw away the straw and hulls, and what was left was the good wheat kernels they would keep to make flour and bread with.
So when God says He has gathered that threatening enemy like sheaves on a threshing floor, it means they are about to receive a thrashing from which they are never going to recover!
And that is basically what happened to the Assyrian army in Micah’s day.
Isaiah 37:36 relates the official history: “And the angel of Yahweh went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. And when they arose in the morning, ‘Look at all these dead bodies!’ Then Sennacherib king of Assyria pulled out and went away and returned home and stayed in Nineveh.” (NAW)
David also talked of a triumph like that in Psalm 18, and Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel (and Micah) also predicted similar triumphs for the remnant that would return from exile and morph into the New Testament church and bring the world into submission to Christ!13
“The designs of enemies for the ruin of the church often prove ruining to themselves; and thereby they prepare themselves for destruction and put themselves in the way of it; they are ‘snared in the work of their own hands.’ Zion shall have the honour of being victorious over them.” ~M. Henry, 1714 AD
“Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!” (Romans 11:33, NKJV)
1 Cor. 2:7-8 “...GOD'S wisdom... has been hidden in a mystery, which God predetermined before the ages for our glory, [and] which none of the rulers of this age have known (for if they had known, they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory)” (NAW)
Isaiah 55:6-13 So, “Y'all seek Yahweh while He is to be found, call Him while He is to be near. Let the wicked forsake his way, and a man of iniquity his thoughts, and let him turn to Yahweh and He will have compassion on him, and to our God, for He will be great to pardon. For y'all's thoughts are not my thoughts, and my way is not y'all's way, declares Yahweh. As the heavens are exalted from the earth, thus my ways are exalted from y'all's ways, and my thoughts from y'all's thoughts.” (NAW, cf. Isa. 10:7)
“[W]hen the wicked rise up so cruelly against us… their reproaches and slanders immediately take possession of our minds and thoughts, so that we in a manner measure God’s judgment by their words. Hence when the ungodly deride our faith, and boast that we are forsaken by God, we succumb, being as it were filled with amazement: and nothing is easier than to shake off from us faith and the memory of God’s promises, whenever the ungodly are thus insolent. The Prophet then does not without cause apply a remedy which ought to be carefully observed by us… When, therefore, we understand this design of God, — that he chastens his Church with temporal evils, and that the issue will ever be most salutary, — when this is known by us, there is then no reason why the slanders of the ungodly should deject our minds; and when they vomit forth all their reproaches, we ought to adhere firmly to this counsel of God.” ~J. Calvin 1569 AD
You may think God is ignoring you or maybe even making you miserable and unsuccessful, but that’s not it at all; He is thinking about “having compassion” on you and “saving” you, so trust that this is what He’s thinking and “call on” Him, and “He will be great to pardon” and save.
Ultimately what we need Him to save us from is not just the uncomfortable things in our lives right now; ultimately what we need is for Him to save us from being punished in the final judgment for having offended God.
The gospel of Matthew 3:12 says that Jesus’ “winnowing shovel is in His hand, and He will thoroughly cleanse His threshing-floor, and He will gather together His grain into the storehouse, but the chaff He will burn in an unquenchable fire.” (NAW, cf. Matt. 21:44) That is the unquenchable fire of hell he’s talking about.
The “grain” that He “gathers into His storehouse” are those who have “repented” of disobeying God and have “turned to” Jesus for “compassion” and “pardon” from their sin and salvation before that great Judgment Day.
And when it says God will fortify His people’s “hooves” and “horns” with metal, it means God’s people will be super-equipped to really be efficient at crushing the wheat berries out of their hulls on the threshing floor. This, of course is figurative language, where the wheat stalks represent the nations.
God gives His people a role to play in extracting from the heathen nations something that He values. What is it that God wants that is bound up in the nations of the world? It is people who love God.
Micah says, “you will consecrate/devote to Yahweh their gain” – the stuff the nations have acquired (the Hebrew word doesn’t really speak to how they got it) “and their substance/ wealth/resources to the Master of all the earth.”
Isaiah said something similar in Isaiah 23:18 “...her merchandise and her wage14 will be holiness to Yahweh. It will not be stored or hoarded, For her merchandise will be for those who dwell before the face of Yahweh, for eating... and for clothing...” (NAW)
Devoting people and things to the LORD was a concept from the Levitical law which reads, “...any devoted item which a man causes to be devoted to Yahweh out of anything which belongs to him – whether human or cattle or field of his possession – it may not be sold, nor may it be redeemed. Every devoted thing is a holy thing among holy things; it belongs to Yahweh.” (Leviticus 27:28, NAW)
And when you lead disciples to give of their lives and possessions to the kingdom of Christ, you are consecrating them to the LORD in fulfillment of Micah’s prophecy!
This role of “threshing nations” – and extracting from them people
who will join us in looking to the Jesus for salvation from God’s wrath against our sin,
who will offer their lives and their possessions to the Lord (Rom. 12:1),
and who will join us in “threshing” more nations until there are some from every tribe and language and nation in Christ’s body –
that is the task which God has equipped us to do (2 Peter 1:1-5 explains some of that “equipping” with “faith… grace… peace... knowledge... promises... and divine power” which God gives us.)
and that is the same task which Jesus commanded us to do when He said, “going into all the world, make disciples of every nation...”
“[W]e must look forward to the last day... to see the complete fulfillment of this prophecy.” ~J. Calvin
But now God will give us the mettle to share the gospel and disciple those who believe, and as we do that, if we are doing it to glorify God15, we are seeing the fulfillment of Micah’s prophecy. “Arise and thresh!”
DouayC (Vulgate) |
LXXD |
BrentonE (Vaticanus) |
KJVF |
NAW |
Masoretic HebrewG |
9
Now,
why art thou drawn
together
with grief? Hast thou no king in
thee, or is thy counselor
perished, because sorrow
hath |
9
[Καὶ] νῦν
ἵνα τί ἔγνωςH
κακά; μὴ βασιλεὺς
οὐκ |
9
[And]
now,
why hast thou known
calamities? was there not a king
to thee? or has thy counsel
perished that pang[s]
as of a woman |
9
Now
why dost thou cry
out aloud? is
there no king in thee? X
is thy counsellor
perished? for pang[s]
ha |
9 Why are you raising a hue and cry now? Is there no king with you, or has your counselor perished because labor-pain has gotten hold of you like a woman giving birth? |
(ט) עַתָּה לָמָּה תָרִיעִיK רֵעַL הֲמֶלֶךְ אֵין בָּךְ אִםM יוֹעֲצֵךְ אָבָד כִּיN הֶחֱזִיקֵךְ חִיל Oכַּיּוֹלֵדָה. |
10 Be in pain and labour, O daughter of Sion, as a woman that bringeth forth: for now shalt thou go out of the city, and shalt dwell in the country, and shalt come even to Babylon, there thou shalt be delivered: there the Lord will redeem thee out of the hand of thy enemies. |
10
ὤδινε καὶ
ἀνδρίζου [καὶ
ἔγγιζεP],
θύγατερ Σιων, ὡς
τίκτουσα· διότι νῦν
ἐξελεύσῃ ἐκ πόλεως καὶ κατασκηνώσεις
ἐν πεδίῳ καὶ ἥξεις ἕως Βαβυλῶνος·
ἐκεῖθεν ῥύσ |
10
Be in
pain, and
|
10 Be in pain, and labour to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail: for now shalt thou go forth out of the city, and thou shalt dwell in the field, and thou shalt go even to Babylon; there shalt thou be delivered; there the LORD shall redeem thee from the hand of thine enemies. |
10 Go into labor and deliver, daughter of Zion, like a woman giving birth, for now you will go out from the walled-city and dwell in the field and then go into Babylon. There you will be rescued; there Yahweh will redeem you from the control of your enemies. |
(י) חוּלִי וָגֹחִיR בַּת צִיּוֹן כַּיּוֹלֵדָה כִּי עַתָּה תֵצְאִי מִקִּרְיָה וְשָׁכַנְתְּ בַּשָּׂדֶה וּבָאת עַד בָּבֶל שָׁם תִּנָּצֵלִי שָׁם יִגְאָלֵךְ יְהוָה מִכַּף אֹיְבָיִךְ. |
11 And now many nations are gathered together against thee, [and] they say: Let her be stoned: and let our eyeX look upon Sion. |
11
καὶ νῦν
ἐπισυνήχθη ἐπὶ σὲ ἔθνη πολλὰ οἱ
λέγοντες |
11
And now
have many nations X gathered
against thee, X saying,
|
11 Now also many nations are gathered against thee, that say, Let her be defiled, and let our eyeX look upon Zion. |
11 But for now, many nations have been assembled against you, who are saying, “Let her be breached, then let our eyes look into Zion!” |
(יא) וְעַתָּה נֶאֶסְפוּ עָלַיִךְ גּוֹיִם רַבִּיםT הָאֹמְרִים תֶּחֱנָףU וְתַחַזV בְּצִיּוֹן עֵינֵינוּW. |
12 But they have not known the thoughts of the Lord, and have not understood his counsel: because he hath gathered them together as the hay of the floor. |
12
αὐτοὶ δὲ οὐκ ἔγνωσαν τὸν λογισμ |
12 But they know not the thoughtX of the Lord, and have not understood his counsel: for he has gathered them as sheaves of the floor. |
12 But they know not the thoughts of the LORD, neither understand they his counsel: for he shall gather them as the sheaves into the floor. |
12 But, as for them, they have not known the thoughts of Yahweh, nor have they understood His counsel: that He has gathered them together like sheaves to the threshing-floor. |
(יב) וְהֵמָּה לֹא יָדְעוּ מַחְשְׁבוֹת יְהוָה וְלֹא הֵבִינוּ עֲצָתוֹ כִּיY קִבְּצָם כֶּעָמִירZ גֹּרְנָהAA. |
13
Arise, and tread,
O daughter of Sion: for I will |
13
ἀνάστηθι καὶ ἀλόα αὐτούς,
θύγατερ Σιων, ὅτι τὰ κέρατ |
13
Arise, and thresh them, O daughter of Sion: for I will |
13
Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion: for I will |
13 Get up and thresh, Daughter of Zion, for I will set your horn with iron and I will set your hooves with bronze, and you will crush many peoples, and {you} will devote their gain to Yahweh and their resources to the Master of all the earth. |
(יג) קוּמִי וָדוֹשִׁיAE בַת צִיּוֹן כִּי קַרְנֵךְAF אָשִׂים בַּרְזֶל וּפַרְסֹתַיִךְ אָשִׂים נְחוּשָׁה וַהֲדִקּוֹת עַמִּים רַבִּים וְהַחֲרַמְתִּי לַיהוָהAG בִּצְעָם וְחֵילָם לַאֲדוֹן כָּל הָאָרֶץ. |
1And so would Jeremiah later on in 6:24 & 30:6.
2Waltke quoted Renaud as follows: “If there is a reproach it rather bears on the despair of the Daughter of Zion, and the latter is vigorously invited to put her confidence in the true King, who is God, as the rest of the text shows well. There is an obvious connection between this reproach of her despair and this promise of salvation: you do not have the right to cry this way, because there is somebody to save you and to buy you back…. Of course there is a king; of course there is a counselor.”
3Keil and Waltke, however, used this as proof that “counselor” & “king” were parallel words meaning the same person. Waltke underscored that God is intended as the counselor, as He is in v.12.
4Gilby’s commentary agreed that Israel had kings and counselors in Micah’s day, but offered the alternative interpretations that their kings and counselors just weren’t “good” during Micah’s time (which would not be historically accurate since Hezekiah was king and Isaiah was counselor) or that “now” referred to the Babylonian exile when they had no king (the position which M. Henry, C.F. Keil, and B. Waltke also held, but which would also not be entirely accurate since there was a Babylonian king over them, and they had good counselors in the Prophets Daniel and Ezekiel). Kimchi asserted that it was “present distress.” Calvin interpreted it to mean that Micah’s prophecy of exile had brought anxiety to his contemporaries a century before the fact.
5Later on, when Jerusalem was taken into exile by the Babylonians, Jeremiah would use some of this same wording to describe the doubts of the exiles of that day: “...The cry of the daughter of my people From a far country: ‘Is not the LORD in Zion? Is not her King in her?’ Why have they provoked Me to anger With their carved images With foreign idols?” (Jer. 8:19, NKJV)
6“עַתָּה (now) ... is the ideal present, which the prophet sees in spirit, but which is in reality the near or more remote future.” ~C.F. Keil (Waltke also considered the “now” in v.9 to be the same time as the “now” in v.10, both referring to the events surround the Babylonian captivity a century future to Micah.)
7John
16:33 “These things I have spoken... that in Me you may have
peace. In the world you will have tribulation”
Acts 14:22b
“We must through many
tribulations enter the kingdom of God.”
1 Thes. 3:3
“...no one should be shaken by these afflictions; for you
yourselves know that we are appointed to this.” (NKJV)
1
Peter 2:19-20 “...if, when you do good you also endure
suffering, this is gracefulness alongside God. Why, it is for this
purpose that y'all were called, because even the Christ suffered on
our behalf, leaving behind an example for you...” (NAW)
8Keil agreed that Micah switches back in time, although he placed it at a different time than I do: “[T]he prophet comes back in ve‛attâh from the more remote to the more immediate future.”
9Gilby commented that these verses “declare the state of the Iewes in the dayes of Messiah, for of that tyme all [the Bible commentators before the mid 1500’s] do take it.” However, in the 1200’s, Isaiah de Trani suggested that it referred to the Assyrian assault in Micah’s day, as I did (and so did B. Waltke). Cohen commented, “[T]he age to which this prophecy refers cannot be the Messianic age described in verses 1-4, for there the nations will be at peace.” He followed Metsudath David in assigning the time to “the wars of God and Magog… of the pre-Messianic period” (cf. Zech. 9:13?). Ibn Ezra (along with Keil) assigned it to the “end of days.” Matthew Henry referred it to the Samaritan resistance to Ezra’s and Nehemiah's reconstruction of Jerusalem, to the intertestamental Maccabean war (also supported by Theodoret, Calvin and Hengstenberg, but debunked by Keil on the grounds that “the gōyı̄m rabbı̄m who have assembled against Zion... point to a much greater event than the attacks made by the Syrians and the surrounding tribes upon Jerusalem in the time of the Maccabees… [and] the defeat which they suffer before Jerusalem is much greater than the victory which the Maccabees achieved over their enemies.”), and (following Dr. Pocock) to the growth of the church in the New Testament. Renaud referred it oddly to the time of the Babylonian exile. Because of the cyclical nature of God’s historical deliverances, it could indeed be applied to all of the above to some extent. Calvin expressed this when he commented, “But they have refined too much in allegories, who have thought that this prophecy ought to be confined to the time of Christ: for the Prophet no doubt meant to extend consolation to the whole kingdom of Christ, from the beginning to the end.” Keil initially attempted to disconnect it from any time and place, commenting, “Micah... predicts the carrying away of the daughter Zion to Babel... because Babel, from its very origin, was a type and symbol of the imperial power,” then a few pages later he wrote, “We must therefore understand these verses as referring to the events already predicted by Joel (ch. 3), and afterwards by Ezekiel (Ezekiel 38, 39) and Zechariah (12:1-14), and in Rev. 20:8.: i.e., to the last great attack which the nations of the world will make upon the church of the Lord... to which the [other historical] attacks... furnished but a feeble prelude.”
10He went on to quote J. Lindblom that “various national units made up the imperial Assyrian army.”
11Calvin and Waltke interpreted it in a more forensic manner: “condemned by the nations.” Matthew Henry framed it more in moral terms. Cohen related the various positions together in his commentary, saying that it would be “desecrated” if it were “overrun by heathen hordes.”
12cf. Gilby: “Vnto vs it shall be enoughe whyles that tyme do trye the truthe further too consyder the ennemyes of Israell all mooste tryumphynge ouer it soddenly by the mighty hand of God, destroied such as Pharao, Sanherib, Rabsace, Nebuchadnezer, Antiochus, Herod. And oure ennemyes whyche are the spirituall Israel, wonderfullye vanquished and by Christe and hys woorde put too confusion The Romyshe Antichrist...[T]he Lorde... suffered theym too rage that hee myghte be glorified in the ende.”
132
Samuel 22:40,
43
&
50
“...You really equipped me with resource[s] for the battle; You
caused those who rose up against me to kneel under me... So I
pulverized
them like the dust on the ground; like mud on the streets I
crushed them… Therefore I will
respond to You, Yahweh, along with the nations, and I will make
music about Your name.”
Isaiah
41:15-16
“Behold, I will
make
you
into
a threshing flail, new, sharp, and serrated; you shall thresh the
mountains and crush
them, and you shall make the hills like chaff; you shall winnow
them, and the wind shall carry them away, and the tempest shall
scatter them. And you shall rejoice in Yahweh; in the Holy One of
Israel you shall glory.”
(NAW)
Jeremiah
51:20, 33
“You are My battle-ax and weapons of war: For with you I will
break the nation in pieces; With you I will destroy kingdoms…
The daughter of Babylon is like a threshing
floor
When it is time to thresh
her; Yet a little while And the time of her harvest will come.”
Daniel
2:44
“And in the days of these kings the God of heaven will set up a
kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not
be left to other people; it shall break
in pieces
and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand
forever.”
Micah
5:8
“And the remnant of Jacob Shall be among the Gentiles, In the
midst of many peoples, Like a lion among the beasts of the
forest, Like a young lion among flocks of sheep, Who, if he
passes through, Both treads down and tears in pieces, And none
can deliver.”
(NKJV)
14Isaiah’s סַחְרָ֜הּ וְאֶתְנַנָּ֗הּ are synonyms to Micah’s בִּצְעָ֔ם וְחֵילָ֖ם.
15“[D]ominion is not to be hoped for by the children of God, that they may abound in worldly pleasures, and appropriate every thing to themselves and also abuse their power, as ungodly men are wont to do; but that all is to be applied to the worship and the glory of God. For what purpose, then does God design his Church to become eminent? That he himself may alone shine forth...” ~J. Calvin
AHebrew Verse 14 will be considered as the first verse of chapter 5 in the English tradition.
BMy
original chart includes the following copyrighted English versions:
NASB, NIV, ESV, Bauscher’s version of the Peshitta, and Cathcart’s
version of the Targums, but I remove these columns from my public,
non-copyrighted edition of this chart so as not to infringe on their
copyrights. NAW is my translation. When a translation adds words not
in the Hebrew text, but does not indicate it has done so by the use
of italics or greyed-out text, I put the added words in [square
brackets]. When one version chooses a wording which is different
from all the other translations, I underline it. When a
version chooses a translation which, in my opinion, either departs
too far from the root meaning of the Hebrew word or departs too far
from the grammar form of the original text, I use strikeout.
And when a version omits a word which is in the original text, I
insert an X. I also place an X at the end of a word if the original
word is plural but the English translation is singular. I
occasionally use colors to help the reader see correlations between
the various editions and versions when there are more than two
different translations of a given word. The only known Dead Sea
Scrolls containing Micah 4 are 4Q82 containing part of verses 1-2
and dated between 30-1 BC, The Nahal Hever Greek scroll,
containing parts of vs. 3-10 and dated around 25BC and the Wadi
Muraba’at Scroll, containing parts verses 1-13 and dated around
135 AD. Where the DSS is legible and in agreement with the MT, the
MT is colored purple. Where the DSS
supports the LXX/Vulgate/Peshitta with omissions or text not in the
MT, I have highlighted with
yellow the LXX and its translation into English, and where I
have accepted that into my NAW translation, I have marked it with
{pointed brackets}.
CDouay Old Testament first published by the English College at Douay, A.D. 1609, Revised and Diligently Compared with the Latin Vulgate by Bishop Richard Challoner, Published in 1582, 1609, 1752. As published on E-Sword.
D“Septuagint” Greek Old Testament, edited by Alfred Rahlfs. Published in 1935. As published on E-Sword.
EEnglish translation of the Septuagint by Sir Lancelot Charles Lee Brenton, 1851, “based upon the text of the Vaticanus” but not identical to the Vaticanus. As published electronically by E-Sword.
F1769 King James Version of the Holy Bible; public domain. As published electronically by E-Sword.
GFrom
the Wiki Hebrew Bible
https://he.wikisource.org/wiki/%D7%9E%D7%99%D7%9B%D7%94_%D7%91/%D7%A9%D7%95%D7%A8%D7%95%D7%AA
.
DSS text comes from https://downloads.thewaytoyahuweh.com
HAquilla = εκακωσας (“done harm”) cf. Peshitta.
ILXX is Imperfect tense (“was”), but every other manuscript and version reads present tense (“is”).
JThe word “in” is not in the Hebrew; the Hebrew word that is there is more related to the meaning of “child” than to the meaning of “labor/travail.”
KAccording to the Westminster morphology and Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible morphology, this is Hiphil 2nd feminine singular imperfect of רוע (“cheering/shout” – Isa. 16:10, or “war-whoop/alarm” – Isa. 42:13, or “cry of mourning” – Isa. 15:4). Vulgate and Targums, however, interpreted it as from the root רעה (“draw together/associate”), but the LXX must have misread the resh for daleth and gotten the root ידע (“know”), while the Peshitta and Aquila interpreted it as from the root רעע (“do wrong”). The only one of these roots associated with any form of the word רע elsewhere in the HOT is רעע (“do wrong” – found in 2Sa. 19:7; 1Ki. 16:25; Neh. 2:10; Pro. 11:15, and Jon. 4:1). “Crying out,” however, parallels more closely the sounds of pain in childbirth.
LThis word is only used to denote “noise/shouting” in two other places in the HOT: Exo. 32:17 and Job 36:33. Without the Masoretic pointing introduced in the 900’s AD, it is spelled the same as the Hebrew word for “evil,” and all the ancient versions (Vulgate maerore, LXX κακα, Aquilla εκακωσας, and Peshitta בישׁתא) interpreted it in that sense. This meaning of the word is the only one found in connection with any of the roots for the previous Hebrew word in this sentence. Targums produce the outlier meaning “nations.”
M“expects a negative answer” ~Waltke
NBoth Keil and Waltke considered this a causal (“for” – cf. KJV) rather than an indirect discourse indicator (“that” – cf. NASB, NIV, and ESV). In other words, “Your pain doesn’t mean you have no king!”
OThere is actually a definite article here, but it doesn’t translate well into English. Waltke called it an “article of class.”
PThis phrase is not in the MT or other ancient versions, neither is it in the Nahal Hever Greek manuscript.
QThe Greek does not move the subject from the following phrase up into this phrase, but Brenton did so in his English translation because the Greek is active instead of passive (“He will save you”), unlike the Hebrew which is passive (“You will be saved”), but the practical upshot is the same.
RRare verb usually translated “burst forth” – also found in Jdg. 20:33; Job 38:8; 40:23; and Ezek. 32:2, often to describe the moment of birth. The ancient versions took it that way as second-stage labor – the expulsive stage. The contemporary English versions that translated it in terms of “groaning” or “agony” are off-base, as are the Targums which translated it “tremble.” See Waltke’s commentary for extensive treatment of the etymology of this word.
SPerhaps the LXX translator confused חדה (“rejoice”) for חנף? cf. Aquilla = “will fall in fury,” Symmachus = κατακριθησεται (“will be condemned” – Waltke’s preference too). At any rate, the ancient versions did not see this in terms of moral compromise, but in terms of literal military purposes.
TCompare to the “many peoples” who are crushed in v.13. Although “great nations” would be a fair translation, every one of the 16 versions I consulted reads “many,” except that Waltke went both ways in his translation.
UUncommon
word translated “corrupt/pollute/profane/defile” in Num. 35:33;
Ps. 106:38; Isa. 24:5; Jer. 3:1-2, 9; 23:11; and Dan. 11:32. In many
cases, the profanation is by means of sexual violation. Many
commentators assumed that this was a moral profanation, but multiple
comentators pointed out that it seems unlikely for foreign nations
to be concerned with Israel’s moral purity. I think these are the
ones laying siege to Jerusalem, hoping to “breach” its walls and
get what’s inside, in other words, a physical, rather than a moral
infiltration. This would comort with the Targum’s paraphrase “fall
of Jerusalem.”
Keil took a slightly different approach:
“[P]rofaned: not by the sins or bloodguiltiness of her inhabitants
(Jer. 3:2; Isa. 24:5), for this is not appropriate in the mouths of
heathen; but through devastation or destruction let her holiness
be taken from her…” Waltke followed along those lines: “to
profane the sacral relationship between I AM and His holy city… by
exposing its sacred sanctuary…” (a convoluted idea but one which
seems possible for a pagan) Waltke also quoted the following salient
insight from J. L. Mays, “When nations see themselves as the
centre of history and seek a destiny that fulfills their power, they
can tolerate no Zion; they are gripped with a compelling need to
destroy whatever stands in judgment and restraint on their pride.”
VInterchangeable
with the more common word for “see” [ראה],
but also used in special senses, such as of prophetic visions (Amos,
Micah, Habakkuk, and Isaiah 1:1). It is hard to tell whether
contemporary English versions read more than is warranted into the
meaning of this by translating it “gloat over/gaze upon” when
the basic meaning “look at/into” is just as reasonable,
especially in light of the fact that the more-common word for “see”
is used in this more loaded way in other passages like:
Obadiah
1:12 “But you should not have gazed [ראה]
on the day of your brother In the day of his captivity; Nor should
you have rejoiced over the children of Judah In the day of their
destruction; Nor should you have spoken proudly In the day of
distress.”
Lamentations 2:16 “All your enemies have
opened their mouth against you; They hiss and gnash their teeth.
They say, ‘We have swallowed her up! Surely this is the day we
have waited for; We have found it, we have seen [ראה]
it!’”
Micah 7:10 “Then she who is my enemy will
see [ראה], And shame will cover her who
said to me, ‘Where is the LORD your God?’ My eyes will see [ראה]
her; Now she will be trampled down Like mud in the streets.”
(NKJV)
WThe plural “eyes” is supported only by LXX. Vulgate, Syriac, and Targum are all singular “eye.” It is universally acknowledged that this noun is the subject of the singular verb “see.”
Xcf. Aquilla and Symmachus αχνη (“chaff”) and Theodotion καλαμη (“straw”), implying with the Vulgate that the grain has already been removed and that this is the last step before disposing of the chaff, but the next verse seems to support the LXX and Aramaic versions, since the threshing – the separation of the grain from the chaff – is yet to come in the next verse.
YAll the older versions render this causal (“for”), supported by commentaries from Keil and Waltke. ESV and NLT Bibles are the only ones who translate it as indirect discourse (“that”). NIV and NET Bibles drop this word entirely.
ZRare word (only here and Jer. 9:21; Amos 2:13, and Zech. 12:6) with a root meaning of “heap/pile,” denoting grain stalks after they have been mown down in the field. Waltke translated it “newly-cut grain,” noting that “stalks were cut off just under the ears so that the word does not mean ‘sheath’”[sic]. The English word “sheaves” refers to this cut wheat after it has been bound together in bundles, but on the threshing floor, it would be unbound and laid in piles.
AAThe he at the end of this word is a directional, translated “to” in most versions.
ABThis appears to be a note of commentary, further defining how they would melt away (after being pounded into fragments) and who they were (the nations). It was not in Fields’ edition of the LXX, but in alternate readings in other mss.
ACFields cites “other” Greek versions that read αναθηματισεις (“you will anathematize”) – a meaning related to consecration to the corban ban, consistent with the MT.
ADcf. Symmachus = κερδος (“gain”), Theodotian = ξωρα (“shavings?”), and E = ωφελειαν (“benefits”).
AEWaltke
noted that this verb would normally be spelled with a “u” class
vowel, but since it is spelled here with an “o” class vowel, he
suggested it might be an “intensifying variant” following the
“u” class vowel in “arise.”
Regarding this figurative
use of “threshing” nations, cf. 2 Ki. 13:7; Isa. 25:10; 41:15;
Jer. 50:11; Amos 1:3; Hab. 3:12. The meaning is parallel to
“crush/pulverize/beat to peaces” later in the verse.
AFAlthough this word can certainly refer to the horns on the heads of cattle (cf. similar statement in Deut. 33:17), the HOT uses this word more frequently in other figurative meanings. Perhaps oxen use the horns on their head to scatter the stalks, resulting in more-thorough threshing, or perhaps “horn” can simply refer to “keratinous substance” and mean the same thing as “hooves” since they are made of the same physical material and since two words are in parallel. Waltke commented that it “symbolizes her power” while the Targums interpereted it figuratively as “her people… her remnant.” Concerning the “iron” and “bronze,” the transition from bronze to iron in commonly-used tools was only a few hundred years before Micah’s time, so both were in use. The widespread use of steel was still future to Micah.
AGThe
verb is first person “I will” in the MT. (Westminster morphology
claims it is 2nd person, but OSHB Parsing,
Beal/Banks/Smith parsing guide, Keil, and others agree it is 1st
person). Waltke suggested it could be an “archaizing” 2fs after
all, but I doubt that is actually an archaic form. No DSS has
preserved this part of this verse, so the oldest manuscripts we have
are the ancient versions (LXX, Vulgate, Peshitta), which all render
it 2nd person (“you will”), so they could have been
following an original which was spelled differently. Targums,
however, are divided between a first person and a second person
spelling. Among the old commentators, Theodoret, Marckius, Dathius,
Newcome, Henderson, Calvin, and Owen of Thrussington also adopted
the 2nd person, the latter of which commented, however,
that the meaning could be the same since it is Hiphil, “I will
cause [you] to consecrate.”
Such consecration could involve
dedicated service of a person to temple work or the death of that
person. Similarly, of inanimate objects, it could involve dedicated
use in the temple or burning it up on the altar. Malbim applied it
in the former sense, noting that the temple treasures looted by the
Babylonian army were returned to the temple by Ezra. Waltke took the
second meaning by insisting that all the loot recovered by the
Israelites after the Assyrian army’s ignominious exit was to be
completely destroyed. Gilby’s application was a warning of God’s
disfavor on those who take the resources of other nations for their
own self-agrandizement rather than dedicating spoils “to the
fyndyng of the pore, to the setting forth of godlye learnynge and
vertue…”