< Micah 1 >
1 A word of YHWH that has been to Micah the Morashite in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, kings of Judah, that he has seen concerning Samaria and Jerusalem:
2 Hear, O peoples, all of them! Attend, O earth, and its fullness, And Lord YHWH is against you for a witness, The Lord from His holy temple.
3 For behold, YHWH is going out from His place, And He has come down, And has trodden on high places of earth.
4 The mountains have been melted under Him, And the valleys split themselves, As wax from the presence of fire, As waters cast down by a slope.
5 For the transgression of Jacob [is] all this, And for the sins of the house of Israel. What [is] the transgression of Jacob? Is it not Samaria? And what the high places of Judah? Is it not Jerusalem?
6 “And I have set Samaria for a heap of the field, For plantations of a vineyard, And poured out into a valley her stones, And her foundations I uncover.
7 And all her carved images are beaten down, And all her wages are burned with fire, And all her idols I make a desolation, For from the wage of a harlot she gathered, and to the wage of a harlot they return.”
8 For this I lament and howl, I go spoiled and naked, I make a lamentation like dragons, And a mourning like daughters of an ostrich.
9 For mortal [are] her wounds, For it has come to Judah, It has come to a gate of My people—to Jerusalem.
10 In Gath do not tell—in Acco do not weep, In Beth-Aphrah, roll yourself in dust.
11 Pass over for you, O inhabitant of Shaphir, Naked one of shame. The inhabitant of Zaanan has not gone out, The lamentation of Beth-Ezel takes from you its standing.
12 For the inhabitant of Maroth has stayed for good, For calamity has come down from YHWH to the gate of Jerusalem.
13 Bind the chariot to a swift beast, O inhabitant of Lachish, The beginning of sin [is] she to the daughter of Zion, For in you have been found the transgressions of Israel.
14 Therefore you give presents to Moresheth-Gath, The houses of Achzib become a lying thing to the kings of Israel.
15 Yet I bring the possessor to you, O inhabitant of Mareshah, The glory of Israel comes to Adullam.
16 Make bald and shave, for your delightful sons, Enlarge your baldness as an eagle, For they have removed from you!
