1883 Haydock Douay Rheims Bible
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| Micah 3:1 | And I said: Hear, O ye princes of Jacob, and ye chiefs of the house of Israel: Is it not your part to know judgment, | 1:Hebrew and Septuagint, "He, the Lord, said;" or, Micheas addressed the princes of both kingdoms, under Ezechias, ver. 12., and Jeremias 26:18. --- To know and practice, Osee 6:3. (Calmet) --- Both rich and poor strove to extort from each other. (Worthington) |
| Micah 3:2 | You that hate good, and love evil: that violently pluck off their skins from them, and their flesh from their bones? | Skins. When some exhorted Tiberius to lay on more taxes, he replied: "a good shepherd must shear the flock, and not tear off the skin." (Suetorius xxxii.) |
| Micah 3:3 | Who have eaten the flesh of my people, and have flayed their skin from off them: and have broken, and chopped their bones as for the kettle, and as flesh in the midst of the pot. | |
| Micah 3:4 | Then shall they cry to the Lord, and he will not hear them: and he will hide his face from them at that time, as they have behaved wickedly in their devices. | |
| Micah 3:5 | Thus saith the Lord concerning the prophets that make my people err: that bite with their teeth, and preach peace: and if a man give not something into their mouth, they prepare war against him. | Peace. They pretend goodness, while they do the greatest mischief. --- Prepare. Literally, "sanctify," (Haydock) or denounce war. (Calmet) --- False prophets seek their private lucre. (Worthington) |
| Micah 3:6 | Therefore night shall be to you instead of vision, and darkness to you instead of divination: and the sun shall go down upon the prophets, and the day shall be darkened over them. | Vision. Impostors shall skulk through fear, when the people shall see that they were not sent, ver. 7. |
| Micah 3:7 | And they shall be confounded that see visions, and the diviners shall be confounded: and they shall all cover their faces, because there is no answer of God. | |
| Micah 3:8 | But yet I am filled with the strength of the spirit of the Lord, with judgment and power: to declare unto Jacob his wickedness, and to Israel his sin. | Spirit. I am no impostor, Micheas 2:11. |
| Micah 3:9 | Hear this, ye princes of the house of Jacob, and ye judges of the house of Israel: you that abhor judgment, and pervert all that is right. | |
| Micah 3:10 | You that build up Sion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity. | Iniquity. You offer victims unjustly procured, or build your palaces with what belongs to the poor. |
| Micah 3:11 | *Her princes have judged for bribes: and her priests have taught for hire, and her prophets divined for money: and they leaned upon the Lord, saying: Is not the Lord in the midst of us? no evil shall come upon us. Ezechiel 22:27.; Sophonias 3:3. | Hire. It is not lawful to refuse instruction to those who have nothing; nor must priests act solely for a temporal reward, though reason shews that they should be supported by those whom they have to teach, Matthew 10:8, 10., Galatians 6:6., and 1 Timothy 5:18. (Calmet) --- The judges grew rich by other people's quarrels; and, as all ranks offended, they were justly involved in ruin, ver. 12. (Worthington) |
| Micah 3:12 | Therefore, because of you, *Sion shall be ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall be as a heap of stones, and the mountain of the temple as the high places of the forests. Jeremias 26:18. | Forests, after its destruction by Nabuchodonosor. (Calmet) --- In the space of three years' neglect, shrubs were growing in the courts of the temple, 1 Machabees 4:38. (Haydock) --- Rufus ploughed up the spot where the temple had stood, after the Romans had burnt it down. (St. Jerome; Josephus, Jewish Wars 7:20.) --- This prediction made a deep impression on the minds of the people. It caused them to refrain from killing Jeremias, ver. 1. (Calmet) |