Micah 6:14 - Exposition

Thou shalt eat, etc. The punishment answers to the sin (which proves that it comes from God), and recalls the threats of the Law (Le 26:25, etc.; Deuteronomy 28:29 , etc.; comp. Hosea 4:10 ; Haggai 1:6 ). Thy casting down shall be in the midst of thee; i.e. thy humiliation, thy decay and downfall, shall occur in the very centre of thy wealth and strength, where thou hast laid up thy treasure and practised thy wickedness. But the meaning of the Hebrew is very uncertain, and the text may be corrupt. The LXX . had a different reading, συσκοτάσει εν σοι , "darkness shall be in thee." The Syriac and Chaldee interpret the word rendered "casting down" ( ישח , which is found nowhere else) of some disease like dysentery. It is most suitable to understand this clause as connected with the preceding threat of hunger, and to take the unusual word in the sense of "emptiness." Thus, "Thy emptiness (of stomach) shall remain in thee." Jeremiah ( Jeremiah 52:6 )speaks of the famine in the city at the time of its siege. Thou shalt take hold; rather, thou shalt remove ( thy goods ) . This is the second chastisement. They should try to take their goods and families out of the reach of the enemy, but should not be able to save them. The LXX . interprets the verb of escaping by flight. That which thou deliverest. If by chance anything is carried away, it shall fall into the hands of the enemy.