Therefore will I make Samaria as a heap of the field, as plantings of a vineyard; and I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley, and I will lay bare the foundations thereof.
Samaria was the capital of the kingdom of Israel, and God here sentences the city to become farmland. Two questions follow: why start with His own people's city, and did it really happen?
Samaria was a new city, not an old holy site. A king of Israel bought the hill and built his capital on it. One writer reads that account and points straight at us.
Omri had another place in mind, so he bought the hill of Samaria from Shemer. There he built a city and called it Samaria. This is like the energy of many people today in the professing Christian world. They think up a believable center of gathering that is not Christ. It may be baptism, or a pentecostal, presbyterian or catholic name — any label that suits their purpose. But if Christ is not our Center, we will face dangers of the worst kind. This is even more so if we are proud of a party name.
What man raises on a hill of his own choosing, God can pour into the valley.
The verse opens with a "therefore." The reason lies in what the two capital cities had become.
It is useless for Israel to build themselves up in the idea that they will escape. That cannot happen where Jehovah is the judge. "All this is for the transgression of Jacob and for the sins of the house of Israel." Sin is always evil, but never so humiliating as in the people of God… Samaria was the chief seat of Israel, as Jerusalem was of Judah, where the house of David reigned. Yet both were high places of iniquity against Jehovah — Samaria completely, and Jerusalem more and more.
The city and its images fall in one act. One writer traces the ruin back to its root.
The sin of Israel was Samaria; it started there and consisted of idol worship. The sins of Judah were the high places in Jerusalem. This announced judgment would destroy Samaria completely. All her graven images would be broken to pieces.
Another writer states the cause plainly:
Samaria's sin and her graven images are the cause of the terrible blow. This is the just judgment of God. And the waves of this flood reach even to Judah.
God named the outcome. Assyria carried it out.
The king of Israel was now a prisoner. Then "the king of Assyria overran the whole land, and went up against Samaria, and besieged it three years." But Shalmaneser did not take the city himself. We read, "And at the end of three years they took it." By then Sargon had succeeded Shalmaneser, or at least led the army during a short gap in the reign. The fate of this rebellious city was terrible. It matched the word of Micah, who prophesied "concerning Samaria and Jerusalem."
One writer takes two of Micah's predictions and looks for them on the ground.
In the prophecies of this book, Jerusalem the religious and Samaria the proud, the capitals of Judea and Israel, receive special judgment. These predictions have come true to the very letter. Zion was to be "plowed as a field" (Micah 3:12), and Samaria made "a heap in the open country" (Micah 1:6). Turnus Rufus verified the first: under imperial orders he drove the Roman plow over Zion after its destruction in AD 70. Dr. Keith, M'Cheyne and others witnessed the second, and saw the stones of Samaria gathered in heaps.
Yet the fallen stones are not the whole story. The events of Micah's own day serve a second purpose:
Notice here that the events of the prophet's own day have the same moral character as the final judgment of the last days. So they introduce the great action of that judgment. They also served as a warning to the people of that time.
- Built — a king bought the hill and built Samaria for his own strength. Any center that is not Christ leaves people exposed.
- Blamed — the "therefore" rests on the transgression of Jacob. Sin is always evil, but never so humiliating as in the people of God.
- Broken — the idols fell with the city; the walls and the images came down together.
- Besieged — Assyria was the tool. Three years at the gates, and the city fell just as Micah said.
- Beyond — the stones lay in heaps, just as the word said. That same judgment points to the greater day still ahead.
And all her graven images shall be beaten to pieces, and all her harlot-gifts shall be burned with fire, and all her idols will I make a desolation; for of the hire of a harlot hath she gathered [them], and to a harlot's hire shall they return.
Micah names why Samaria falls: her wealth and her worship were tied together, and both go into the fire. Her idols were bought with a prostitute's fee, and God says that fee is where they will end up again.
This ruin is not blind bad luck. It has a cause, and it does not stop at Samaria's border.
The sin of Samaria and her carved images are the cause of this terrible punishment, according to the just judgment of God. And the waves of this flood reach even as far as Judah.
Being God's own people gave Israel no cover.
It is useless, then, for Israel to build themselves up in the belief that they will get away with it. That cannot happen where Jehovah is the judge. "All this is for the transgression of Jacob and for the sins of the house of Israel." Sin is always evil, but never so humiliating as in the people of God. Samaria and Jerusalem were both high places of sin against Jehovah — Samaria completely, and Jerusalem more and more.
Each kingdom's sin had an address.
The sin of Israel was Samaria; it started there and consisted of idol worship. The sins of Judah were the high places in Jerusalem. This announced judgment would destroy Samaria completely. All her carved images would be smashed to pieces, and the earnings of her prostitution burned with fire.
Why a prostitute's fee, and not simply theft or rebellion? Israel already stood in a marriage bond.
Adultery, or idolatry — "with their idols they have committed adultery" (Ezekiel 23:37) — is the special sin charged against Israel of old, because Israel was the married wife of Jehovah (Jeremiah 3:14; Isaiah 54:1). For this she was divorced. But in the purpose and grace of Jehovah, Israel will be restored to her former blessed relationship, one she will never lose again as long as the sun and moon last.
Hosea describes the same trade, and names what it cost Israel.
Hosea 9 sets out the joyless doom of Israel for their shameless desertion of their God. They had taken their grain as a prostitute's fee from their false gods. All such outward mercies would fail, and they would no longer live in the land of Jehovah.
The verse ends where the money started. Nothing gained that way stays.
"As the partridge sits on eggs and does not hatch them, so is he who gets riches, but not by right. It will leave him in the middle of his days, and at his end he will be a fool." What is gained wrongly flies away. Things last only in God, even the things He gives.
This kind of idolatry once began inside a single family. Its modern form is easy to miss.
She joined Jehovah's name to her idols, a worse thing than mere idolatry, and her conscience was silent. She set up a form of worship of her own, with which her guilty son fully identified himself. The so-called worship of the religious world today differs less from this than it first appears. People mix the Lord's name with many things the natural heart wants. About all of them Scripture says: "Little children, keep yourselves from idols" (1 John 5:21). Art, music, gold, silver and costly objects decorate what people call divine worship, and man makes room for what the world admires and chases after: wealth, influence and worldly wisdom.
- Cause. Samaria's ruin was not blind disaster. Her sin and her carved images brought God's just judgment, and the flood reached Judah too.
- Location. Israel's sin started in Samaria as idol worship; Judah's stood in the high places of Jerusalem. Sin is always evil, but never so humiliating as in the people of God.
- Character. Israel was the married wife of Jehovah, so going after idols was adultery. She took her grain as a prostitute's fee from her false gods.
- Outcome. What is gained wrongly flies away. Things last only in God, even the things He gives.
- Warning. The worst idolatry is not open paganism. It is the Lord's name mixed with what the heart already wants — so "keep yourselves from idols."