This message from the LORD came to Micah of Moresheth during the reigns of the Judean kings Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah concerning the vision he saw about Samaria and Jerusalem:

Hear, all ye people; hearken, O earth, and all that therein is: and let the Lord GOD be witness against you, the Lord from his holy temple.

For lo, Jehovah is going out from His place, And He hath come down, And hath trodden on high places of earth.

Melted have been the mountains under Him, And the valleys do rend themselves, As wax from the presence of fire, As waters cast down by a slope.

For the transgression of Jacob is all this, and for the sins of the house of Israel. Whence is the transgression of Jacob? is it not from Samaria? And whence are the high places of Judah? are they not from Jerusalem?

And all her graven images are beaten down, And all her gifts are burnt with fire, And all her idols I make a desolation, For, from the hire of a harlot she gathered, and unto the hire of a harlot they return.

Pass away, O inhabitant of Shaphir, in nakedness and shame: the inhabitant of Zaanan is not come forth; the wailing of Beth-ezel shall take from you the stay thereof.

For the inhabitant of Maroth waited carefully for good: but evil came down from the LORD unto the gate of Jerusalem.

Make thee bald, and poll thee for thy delicate children; enlarge thy baldness as the eagle; for they are gone into captivity from thee.

Therefore thus saith the LORD; Behold, against this family do I devise an evil, from which ye shall not remove your necks; neither shall ye go haughtily: for this time is evil.

In that day shall one take up a parable against you, and lament with a doleful lamentation, and say, We be utterly spoiled: he hath changed the portion of my people: how hath he removed it from me! turning away he hath divided our fields.

Even of late my people is risen up as an enemy: ye pull off the robe with the garment from them that pass by securely as men averse from war.

The women of my people have ye cast out from their pleasant houses; from their children have ye taken away my glory for ever.

I will surely gather all of you, O Jacob; I will surely gather together the remainder of Israel. I will set them like sheep of Bozrah. Like a herd in the midst of their pasture they will be in tumult from people.

Who hate the good, and love the evil; who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones;

Who also eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from off them; and they break their bones, and chop them in pieces, as for the pot, and as flesh within the caldron.

Then shall they cry unto the LORD, but he will not hear them: he will even hide his face from them at that time, as they have behaved themselves ill in their doings.

This is what the Lord has said about the prophets by whom my people have been turned from the right way; who, biting with their teeth, say, Peace; and if anyone puts nothing in their mouths they make ready for war against him.

For this, night to you from a vision, and darkness to you from divining; and the sun went down upon the prophets, and the day was dark upon them.

The seers shall be ashamed
And the diviners discredited and embarrassed;
Indeed, they shall all cover their mouths [in shame]
Because there is no answer from God.

And many nations shall come, and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.

And I will make her that halted a remnant, and her that was cast far off a strong nation: and the LORD shall reign over them in mount Zion from henceforth, even for ever.

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.

"Get up and thresh, Daughter Zion! For I will give you iron horns; I will give you bronze hooves, and you will crush many nations." You will devote to the Lord the spoils you take from them, and dedicate their wealth to the sovereign Ruler of the whole earth.

But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.

"Then he will take his stand, shepherding by means of the strength of the LORD, by the power of the name of the LORD his God. And they will be firmly established; indeed, from then on he will become great to the ends of the earth.

And this One shall be peace. When Assyria shall come into our land; and when he shall walk in our palaces, then we shall raise against him seven shepherds and eight anointed ones from men.

And they shall waste the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod in the entrances thereof: thus shall he deliver us from the Assyrian, when he cometh into our land, and when he treadeth within our borders.

And the remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many people as a dew from the LORD, as the showers upon the grass, that tarrieth not for man, nor waiteth for the sons of men.

Those survivors from Jacob will live among the nations, in the midst of many peoples. They will be like a lion among the animals of the forest, like a young lion among the flocks of sheep, which attacks when it passes through; it rips its prey and there is no one to stop it.

And it hath come to pass in that day, An affirmation of Jehovah, I have cut off thy horses from thy midst, And I have destroyed thy chariots,

“I will cut off witchcrafts and sorceries from your hand,
And you shall have no more fortune-tellers.

And I will cut off your idols and your stone pillars from among you, and you will no longer bow down to the work of your hands.

And I will uproot your Asherahs from among you, and I will destroy your cities.

For I brought thee up from the land of Egypt, And from the house of servants I have ransomed thee, And I send before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam.

O my people, remember now what Balak king of Moab consulted, and what Balaam the son of Beor answered him from Shittim unto Gilgal; that ye may know the righteousness of the LORD.

He has told you, O mortal, what [is] good, and what does Yahweh ask from you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

“You shall sow but you shall not reap;
You shall tread olives, but shall not anoint yourself with oil,
And [you will extract juice from] the grapes, but you shall not drink the wine.

The godly person [who is faithful and loyal to God] has perished from the earth,
And there is no upright person [one with good character and moral integrity] among men.
They all lie in wait to shed blood;
Each hunts the other with a net.

Trust ye not in a friend, put ye not confidence in a guide: keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in thy bosom.

In that day also he shall come even to thee from Assyria, and from the fortified cities, and from the fortress even to the river, and from sea to sea, and from mountain to mountain.

And the land was for a desolation upon its inhabitants from the fruit of their doings.

“As in the days when you came out from the land of Egypt,
I shall show you marvelous and miraculous things.”

The nations shall see and be ashamed from all their strength: they shall put the hand upon the mouth, their ears shall be deaf.

They shall lick dust like the serpent; like crawling things of the earth, they shall come trembling forth from their close places. They shall turn with fear to Jehovah our God, and shall be afraid because of thee.

Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham, which thou hast sworn unto our fathers from the days of old.