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Miquéias 2

BLIVRE · Chapter 2/7

1Ai dos que planejam injustiça, e dos que tramam o mal em suas camas! Quando vem a manhã o efetuam, porque têm o poder em suas mãos.

2E cobiçam campos, e os roubam; cobiçam casas, e as tomam; oprimem ao homem e a sua casa, ao homem e a sua propriedade.

3Portanto, assim diz o SENHOR: Eis que eu planejo um mal contra esta família, da qual não conseguireis livrar vossos pescoços, nem andareis erguidos; porque o tempo será mau.

4Naquele tempo surgirá um provérbio sobre vós, e se lamentará um pranto de lamentação, dizendo: Fomos arruinados por completo; trocada foi a porção de meu povo. Como fomos saqueados! Nossos campos foram repartidos, passados a outros.

5Portanto a ninguém terás que delimite a propriedade de terra por meio de sortes na congregação do SENHOR.

6Não profetizeis! Falam eles. Não lhes profetizarão, [mas] a vergonha não se desviará deles.

7Por acaso se dirá, ó casa de Jacó: O espírito do SENHOR perdeu a paciência? São estas as suas obras? Por acaso minhas palavras não fazem bem ao que age corretamente?

8Mas recentemente meu povo se levantou como inimigo; tomastes da roupa a capa daqueles que passavam confiantes, voltando da batalha.

9Vós expulsais as mulheres de meu povo de suas queridas casas; de suas crianças tirastes minha glória para sempre.

10Levantai-vos, e ide embora, porque esta [terra] não serve mais para descanso; pois está contaminada, ela se destruirá, com grande destruição.

11Se houver alguém que siga o vento, e fale mentiras e falsidade, dizendo: Eu te profetizarei vinho e de bebida alcoólica, este tal será o profeta deste povo.

12Certamente eu te ajuntarei por completo, ó Jacó; reunirei o restante de Israel; eu o porei junto, como ovelhas de Bosra, como rebanho no meio de seu curral farão estrondo de [multidão de] pessoas.

13Aquele que rompe [obstáculos] subirá adiante deles; eles romperão, e passarão pela porta, e sairão por ela; e seu rei irá adiante deles, e o SENHOR estará em sua dianteira.

📖 Chapter study

Summary

Micah denounces the wealthy who plot at night to seize fields and houses from the poor, and confronts false prophets who only want to please the people with comfortable messages.

Explanation

The image of people who 'devise iniquity, and work evil upon their beds' suggests premeditation: the oppression of the poor was not impulsive but carefully planned, exploiting legal loopholes and economic power to seize family properties — a serious violation of Mosaic law, which protected every Israelite family's inherited land. In contrast to the corrupt prophets who only wanted to preach 'of wine and of strong drink,' Micah delivers a hard but necessary message. The chapter closes, however, on a note of hope: the promise to gather the scattered remnant of Israel like a protected flock. The application today: using legal or subtle means to take advantage of the most vulnerable remains a serious form of injustice in God's eyes.

Fun facts

  • The protection of a family's inherited land was so important under Israel's law that there was even a Year of Jubilee (Leviticus 25) every fifty years, when land sold out of necessity was to return to its original family — a law the elite of Micah's day clearly ignored.
  • The criticism of prophets who only want to speak 'of wine and of strong drink' (v. 11) is an irony: they preferred messages that sounded like celebration and prosperity rather than the uncomfortable truth about the people's sin.

Verse-by-verse explanation

  1. Miquéias 2:1A denunciation of the powerful who plan wickedness at night, in bed, and put it into practice as soon as morning comes — deliberate premeditation, not impulse.
  2. Miquéias 2:2Coveting fields and houses and simply taking them by force describes a real social problem of the time: powerful people driving families off land that was their inheritance for generations, a practice condemned by the law of Moses.
  3. Miquéias 2:3God's response: since they planned evil against others, He Himself will now plan a judgment against them, stripping away the arrogance of those who thought themselves untouchable.
  4. Miquéias 2:4Anticipates the day when the oppressors' own victims will sing an ironic lament, using the same words of total destruction the oppressors had caused others.
  5. Miquéias 2:5As punishment for the land-grabbing denounced earlier, these oppressors will lose the right to take part in the future division of land among God's people.
  6. Miquéias 2:6"Prophesy ye not" is what the powerful told the troublesome prophets to make them be quiet — the same reaction that appears in Amos against prophets who denounced injustice.
  7. Miquéias 2:7God asks whether He has changed, become "straitened" or less generous — in reality, His word is still good for those who walk uprightly; the problem is with the people, not with Him.
  8. Miquéias 2:8God's own people turned into enemies of themselves, stripping the robe even off people passing by peacefully, as if at war with their own neighbors.
  9. Miquéias 2:9An accusation of violent eviction: women driven out of their own homes, and children losing forever the blessing they should have received.
  10. Miquéias 2:10An ironic order for the people to "arise, and depart," since the land has become so polluted by injustice that it can no longer even serve as a resting place — exile as the natural consequence.
  11. Miquéias 2:11The "prophet" who promises "wine and of strong drink" is a criticism of preachers who said only what the people wanted to hear, instead of God's hard but true message.
  12. Miquéias 2:12"Sheep of Bozrah" (a city of Edom) is an image of a large, gathered flock; the verse promises to gather Israel's survivors the way that flock is brought together safely.
  13. Miquéias 2:13A promise of restoration: a leader will open the way for the people to leave captivity, breaking through the exit, with the Lord Himself leading the group at the front.

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