Micah 3:12 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Micah 3:12
Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest.
Tsijon (as a permanent capital) · proper noun, a place name
sake
בִּגְלַלְכֶ֔םbig.lal.Khem
H1558
a circumstance (as rolled around) · preposition + noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine plural
plowed
תֵֽחָרֵ֑שׁte.cha.Resh
H2790
to scratch · verb, niphal imperfect, 3rd person feminine singular
field
שָׂדֶ֣הsa.Deh
H7704
a field (as flat) · noun, common masculine singular absolute
Jerusalem
וִירוּשָׁלִַ֙ם֙vi.ru.sha.Lim
H3389
Jerushalaim or Jerushalem · conjunction + proper noun, a place name
heaps
עִיִּ֣ין'i.Yin
H5856
a ruin (as if overturned) · noun, common masculine plural absolute
mountain
וְהַ֥רve.Har
H2022
a mountain or range of hills (sometimes used figurative… · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular construct
house
הַבַּ֖יִתha.Ba.yit
H1004
a house (in the greatest variation of applications · definite article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
places
לְבָמ֥וֹתle.va.Mot
H1116
an elevation · preposition + noun, common feminine plural construct
forest
יָֽעַרYa.'ar
H3293
a copse of bushes · noun, common masculine singular absolute
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Jeremiah 26:18 Micah the Morasthite prophesied in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, and spake to all the people of Judah, saying, Thus saith the LORD of…
Psalms 79:1 O God, the heathen are come into thine inheritance; thy holy temple have they defiled; they have laid Jerusalem on heaps.
Micah 4:1-2 But in the last days it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the house of the LORD shall be established in the top of the mountains, and…
Psalms 107:34 A fruitful land into barrenness, for the wickedness of them that dwell therein.
Micah 1:6 Therefore I will make Samaria as an heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard: and I will pour down the stones thereof into the vall…
Matthew 24:2 And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shal…
Isaiah 2:2-3 And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the LORD’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shal…
Acts 6:13-14 And set up false witnesses, which said, This man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place, and the law:
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Micah 3:8–end
Here, I. The prophet experiences a divine power going along with him in his work, and he makes a solemn profession and protestation of it, as that which would justify him, and bear him out, in his plain dealing with the princes and rulers. He would not, he durst not, make thus bold with the great men, but that he was carried out to do it by a prophetical impulse and impression. It was not he that said it, but God by him, and he could not but speak the word that God put into his mouth. It comes in likewise by way of opposition to the false prophets, who were full of shame when they lived to see themselves proved liars, and who never had courage to deal faithfully with the people, but flattere…
mic 3:12Jer 26:18 quotes this verse. The Talmud and MAIMONIDES record that at the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans under Titus, Terentius Rufus, who was left in command of the army, with a ploughshare tore up the foundations of the temple.
mountain of the house--the height on which the temple stands.
as the high places of the forest--shall become as heights in a forest overrun with wild shrubs and brushwood.
Next: Micah Chapter 4
Adam Clarke on Micah 3:12
Therefore shall Zion - be ploughed as a field - It shall undergo a variety of reverses and sackages, till at last there shall not be one stone left on the top of another, that shall not be pulled down; and then a plough shall be drawn along the site of the walls, to signify an irreparable and endless destruction. Of this ancient custom Horace speaks, Odar. lib. i., Od. 16, ver. 18.
Altis urbibus ultimae
Stetere causae cur perirent
Funditus, imprimeretque muris
Hostile aratrum exercitus insolens.
"From hence proud cities date their utter falls;
When, insolent in ruin, o'er their walls
The wrathful soldier drags the hostile plough,
That haughty mark of total overthrow."
Francis.
Thus did the R…
Isaiah lived almost a thousand years ago and saw Zion in its primitive form. The city was still standing, beautified with public squares and clothed in honor; yet he says, "Zion shall be plowed like a field." He was foretelling what has been fulfilled in our day. Observe the exactness of the prophecy; for he said, "Daughter Zion shall be left like a hut in a vineyard, like a shed in a cucumber patch." Now the place is full of cucumber patches. Do you see how the Holy Spirit enlightens the saints? Therefore do not be distracted by a common term but hold fast to what is exactly true.
Hence again the divine Micah was unable to brook the building of Zion with blood, however you interpret the phrase, and of Jerusalem with iniquity. Meanwhile, these heads of the house of Jacob abhorred justice. The priests were teaching for hire. The prophets were prophesying for money! What does Micah say will be the result of this? "Zion shall be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall be as a storehouse of fruit, and the mountain of the house shall be as the grove of the forest." He bewails also the scarcity of the upright, there being scarcely a stalk or a gleaming grape left, since both the prince asks and the judge curries favor, so that his language is almost the same as the mighty David's: "Save me, O Lord, for the godly man ceases." Their blessings shall fail them, for "you consume like a moth what is dear to him."
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Temple, The First · Complete destruction of, predicted — Complete destruction of, predicted
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Therefore shall Zion for your sake be ploughed as a field,.... That is, for your sins, as the Targum; for the bloodshed, injustice, and avarice of the princes, priests, and prophets; not that the common people were free from crimes; but these are particularly mentioned, as being ringleaders into sin, and who ought to have set better examples; as also to take off their vain confidence in themselves, who thought that Zion and Jerusalem would be built up and established by them, and preserved for their sakes; as well as to show the prophet's boldness and intrepidity in his rebukes and menaces of them: now this was prophesied of in the days of Hezekiah, before the invasion of Judea and siege of…
Micah 3:11-12
11. The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money: yet will they lean upon the Lord, and say, Is not the Lord among us? none evil can come upon us.
11. Principes ejus pro munere judicant, et sacerdotes ejus mercede docent, et prophetae ejus pecunia divinant, et super Jehova nituntur, dicendo, Annon Jehova in medio nostri? Non veniet super nos malum.
12. Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest.
12. Itaque propter vos Sion ut ager arabitur, et Jerusalem acervus erit, et mons domus in excelsa…
"Therefore will Zion for your sake be ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem become stone heaps, and the mountain of the house become forest heights." Lâkhēn (therefore) applies primarily to Mic 3:11, directing the threat of punishment by בּגללכם to all the sinners mentioned there; but it also points back to Mic 3:9, Mic 3:10, expressing what is there indicated by "this." Zion is not "the site on which the city stood," or Jerusalem, "the mass of houses in the city," as Maurer and Caspari suppose; but Zion is that portion of the city which contained the royal palace, and Jerusalem the rest of the city (cf. Mic 4:8). The mountain of the house, i.e., the temple hill, is also specially mentioned,…
Mount Zion, where the Lord once lived, would become a thicket, an uninhabitable wilderness. Utter destruction awaited the fallen Jerusalem. Jeremiah later quoted this passage (Jer 26:18). • Just as a field needs to be cleared to prepare it for cultivation, Jerusalem had to be reduced to ruins in judgment.
