And I said, Hear, I pray you, ye heads of Jacob, and princes of the house of Israel Is it not for you to know judgment?
Micah's third chapter turns from the nation as a whole to the men at the top: the heads of Jacob and the rulers of Israel. The question put to them is not whether they hold power. It is whether they know justice.
One writer traces the shape of the whole book:
The book is made up of three main divisions. Each one opens with a call to listen: "Hear, you peoples, all of you" (Micah 1:2); "Hear, you heads of Jacob and rulers of the house of Israel" (Micah 3:1); and "Hear what the LORD says" (Micah 6:1).
The reason leaders get a separate hearing is that responsibility is not spread evenly. The same act weighs differently depending on who does it:
All the people have their responsibility, but the main weight falls according to a person's position. Wickedness in a man who holds an office of trust is worse than the same evil in someone under him, and God rightly treats it as more serious. Sin in a judge, for instance, has a graver character than dishonesty in a stable-hand or his master. Corruption or tyranny in a king is deeper guilt than failings here or there in any of his subjects... God will surely judge according to His own unbending revelation... The first two chapters exposed the sin of the people. The sin of the heads comes forward here, and with them the wickedness of the prophets.
Older translations read, "Is it not for you to know judgment?" Judgment was the business of their office.
Knowing justice and loving it are two different things. One writer sums up the charge against these rulers in a single line:
First the prophet describes how low the nation has sunk: the moral corruption of the leaders and judges, and of the false prophets too. It is all summed up in one sentence: "you who hate the good and love the evil." The princes and judges robbed the people and treated them like cattle.
The chapter has a grim symmetry. Men called to hear God would find, in their own hour of trouble, that God had stopped speaking:
The prophet again denounces the heads and princes of Jacob. They would cry to Jehovah, but He would not hear them. No prophet would bring them the light of His word. The seers would be put to shame, and God would give no answer... Nothing offends Jehovah more than this. People who bear His name wrap themselves in the privilege of His presence. Then they use that claim to honour themselves and excuse evil.
Among all these leaders, one man could still speak. What set him apart was the Spirit:
Those who misled others shall be left to their own delusions. They preferred darkness to light because their deeds were evil. So Jehovah tells them plainly through Micah: "But as for me, I am filled with power, with the Spirit of the LORD, and with justice and might, to declare to Jacob his transgression and to Israel his sin."
The chapter's sentence fell on the city itself, and history bore it out:
He tells the heads and rulers that they build Zion with blood and Jerusalem with iniquity. He speaks of the influence of money: judges acted for reward, priests taught for hire, and prophets prophesied for money... This prophecy was fulfilled when Babylon conquered Jerusalem. And when the Jews who returned from exile later rejected the Lord of Glory, their King, Zion and Jerusalem became heaps once more.
- Called — Each of Micah's three sections opens with a call to listen. This one calls Israel's heads and rulers, not the nation as a whole.
- Charged — Responsibility follows position. Sin in a judge or a king carries heavier guilt than the same sin in someone with no office of trust.
- Convicted — These men knew justice and hated it. They robbed the people and treated them like cattle, while still claiming God's name to cover it.
- Cut off — They would cry to God and get no answer. No prophet would bring them light, and the seers would be put to shame.
- Confirmed — One man, filled with power by the Spirit, still declared their sin — and the ruin he announced for Zion and Jerusalem came to pass.
Ye who hate the good, and love evil; who pluck off their skin from them, and their flesh from off their bones;
Micah turns from the nation as a whole to the men at the top, and charges Israel's leaders with a settled taste for evil. Behind the butchery in this verse lies one question: what happens when the men who should know justice start to love the opposite?
Micah aims at a narrower target here. One commentator draws out why the same sin weighs more on a man in office:
In Micah 3 we have a still more solemn appeal directed to the heads and princes of the house of Israel. While all the people have their responsibility, the chief weight must fall according to the position each person holds. Wickedness in a man who holds an office of trust is worse than the same evil in a subordinate person. It rightly counts as more serious. Wrongdoing in a judge, for instance, is graver than dishonesty in a stable hand or his master... The first two chapters exposed the sin of the people; the sin of the heads comes forward here.
One commentator boils the whole charge against judges, princes and prophets down to what these men love and what they hate:
First the prophet describes how far the nation has fallen: the moral corruption of the leaders and judges, and of the false prophets. It is all summed up in one sentence, "who hate the good, and love the evil." The princes and judges robbed the people, treated them like cattle (verse 3). For these unjust deeds the Lord would not hear them when they cried in the hour of their need, and would hide His face from them.
A man can do wrong and still be ashamed of it. Hating the good goes one step further. The standard itself has flipped:
Many, whose unbroken will carries them away passionately, are sincerely ashamed of their intemperance and grieve over the excesses of these short fits of madness... Just as among the Jews, ungodliness destroys the moral landmarks: "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!" (Isaiah 5:20).
Skin torn off, flesh stripped from the bone — the verse describes what these rulers lived on. One commentator sets that beside ordinary greed:
Others might plunder their enemies and enrich their followers at the expense of their neighbours. But the civil and religious chiefs of Israel were so degraded and depraved that they preyed on the flesh and blood of their brothers for their own greed and gain.
The punishment matches the crime. These men would not hear the cry of the poor, so God would not hear theirs:
The prophet again denounces the heads and princes of Jacob. They would cry to Jehovah. But He would not hear them. No prophet would give them light with His word. The seers would be put to shame; there would be no answer from God (v. 1-7). It was not so with the prophet. He was full of power by the Spirit of Jehovah to declare to Jacob his transgression and to Israel his sin (v. 8).
Micah's warning was not just words. What these men built with blood came down:
The princes and prophets are denounced for their iniquity. So Zion would be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem would become heaps. This prophecy has been literally fulfilled.
The abuse Micah names is not locked in the past. One writer turns the same demand on the courts of our own day:
The judges ought to judge on behalf of the poor and needy, not favour the wicked. They should defend them from those who persecute them (v. 3), and rescue them from cruel oppression. Many of our courts of justice need this same call today. So does the professing church of God, where those in outward honour are too often guilty of oppressing ordinary people.
- Office. Trust raises the stakes. The same wrong weighs more in a judge than in a servant, so God starts His case with the leaders.
- Inversion. The whole charge fits in one line: they hate the good and love the evil. Ungodliness had moved the moral landmarks until darkness passed for light.
- Appetite. Loving evil is never private. These leaders robbed the people, handled them like cattle, and preyed on their own brothers for gain.
- Silence. God answered rulers deaf to the poor in kind. He would not hear them, and no prophet would give them light.
- Ruin. Zion became a plowed field and Jerusalem a heap of ruins. The warning came true — and the same charge still reaches courts and church leaders today.
and who eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from off them, and break their bones, and chop them in pieces as for the pot, and as flesh within the cauldron.
Micah 3 opens with a summons to the heads and princes of Israel. Verse 3 spells out what their rule had become: butchery. Skin torn off, bones broken, flesh dropped into a cooking pot: the picture raises the question the chapter answers. What does God do with leaders who feed on the people they should protect?
The first two chapters exposed the sins of the nation at large. Here the focus narrows to the leaders. One writer explains why a person's position changes the weight of his guilt.
In Micah 3 we have a still more solemn appeal directed to the heads and princes of the house of Israel. Of course we know this. All the people have their responsibility. But the chief weight must fall according to a person's position. Wickedness in a man who holds an office of trust is worse, and rightly treated as more serious, than the same evil in a person under him. Iniquity, for instance, in a judge has a graver character than dishonesty in a stable hand or his master. Corruption or tyranny in a king is deeper guilt than misdeeds here or there in any of his subjects.
The prophet does not describe policy failures. He describes a slaughterhouse.
The second prophetic message of Micah contains the great Messianic prophecies. But first the prophet describes how low the nation has sunk. He shows the moral corruption of the leaders and judges, and of the false prophets too. It is all summed up in one sentence, "who hate the good, and love the evil." The princes and judges robbed the people, treated them like cattle (verse 3).
The word translated "flay" comes from the altar and the butcher's block. Micah turns it on the rulers.
'To strip off, to skin.' Applied to skinning the animals for the sacrifices. Lev. 1:6; 2 Chr. 29:34; 2 Chr. 35:11. Also used metaphorically for the ill-treatment of the Israelites by their rulers. Micah 3:3.
Rulers everywhere have plundered enemies. What makes this cruelty stand out is the victims. They were the rulers' own countrymen.
Others might plunder their enemies and enrich their followers at their neighbours' expense. But the civil and religious chiefs of Israel were so degraded and corrupt that they preyed on the flesh and blood of their own countrymen for their own greed and gain.
Verse 3 is one strand in a wider indictment. Every layer of the nation stands accused, and even the land is not what it was.
Princes, priests, prophets, and people are all challenged one by one by him, and are all found guilty and condemned. That land had been rescued out of the hand of the Amorites. It had been made the clean vessel among the nations, and the Lord's dwelling place. Now it has taken on a completely different character. Strange and humbling indeed! How the fine gold has become dim!
The sentence comes next in the chapter. Men who ignored the cries of the poor would get no answer when they cried themselves.
Micah 3. The prophet again denounces the heads and princes of Jacob. They would cry to Jehovah. But He would not hear them. No prophet would give them light from His word. The seers would be put to shame, and God would give no answer (v. 1-7).
The chapter ends with a sentence on the city itself. It did not stay a threat.
The prophet himself was full of power to declare the sin of Israel. So Zion would be ploughed like a field, and Jerusalem would become heaps of ruins. This prophecy has been fulfilled to the letter.
- Office — the higher the trust, the heavier the guilt; the same sin in a judge weighs more than in a servant.
- Appetite — skinning, breaking, chopping, boiling: these are butcher's words. The leaders treated God's people like cattle.
- Motive — this was not war against enemies but greed feeding on their own brothers, for gain.
- Silence — men deaf to the cries beneath them met a God who would not answer the cries above them.
- Ruin — the chapter ends with Zion ploughed like a field, a sentence that history carried out to the letter.