Micah 2:2

And they covet fields, and take them by violence; and houses, and take them away: so they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(2) And they covet fields.—The act of Ahab and Jezebel in coveting and acquiring Naboth’s vineyard by violence and murder was no isolated incident. The desire to accumulate property in land, in contravention of the Mosaic Law, was denounced by Micah’s contemporary, Isaiah: “Woe unto them that join house to house. that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth” (Isaiah 5:8).

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

2:1-5 Woe to the people that devise evil during the night, and rise early to carry it into execution! It is bad to do mischief on a sudden thought, much worse to do it with design and forethought. It is of great moment to improve and employ hours of retirement and solitude in a proper manner. If covetousness reigns in the heart, compassion is banished; and when the heart is thus engaged, violence and fraud commonly occupy the hands. The most haughty and secure in prosperity, are commonly most ready to despair in adversity. Woe to those from whom God turns away! Those are the sorest calamities which cut us off from the congregation of the Lord, or cut us short in the enjoyment of its privileges.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

And they covet fields and take them by violence - (rend them away) and houses, and take them away Still, first they sin in heart, then in act. And yet, with them, to covet and to rob, to desire and to take, are the same. They were prompt, instantaneous, without a scruple, in violence. So soon as they coveted, they took. Desired, acquired! Coveted, robbed! "They saw, they coveted, they took," had been their past history. They did violence, not to one only, but, touched with no mercy, to whole families, their little ones also; they oppressed a man and his house. They spoiled pot goods only, but life, a man and his inheritance; destroying him by false accusations or violence and seizing upon his inheritance . Thus, Ahab first coveted Naboth's vineyard, then, through Jezebel, slew him; and , "they who devoured widow's houses, did at the last plot by night against Him of whom they said, Come, let us kill Him, and the inheritance shall be our's; and in the morning, they practiced it, leading Him away to Pilate." : "Who of us desires not the villas of this world, forgetful of the possessions of Paradise? You see men join field to field, and fence to fence. Whole places suffice not to the tiny frame of one man." : "Such is the fire of concupiscence, raging within, that, as those seized by burning fevers cannot rest, no bed suffices them, so no houses or fields content these. Yet no more than seven feet of earth will suffice them soon . Death only owns, how small the frame of man."

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2. Parallelism, "Take by violence," answers to "take away"; "fields" and "houses," to "house" and "heritage" (that is, one's land).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

And they, who devised mischief, Micah 2:1,

covet fields; first set their minds upon their meaner neighbour’s estate, think how convenient it lieth to theirs, as Ahab thought Naboth’s did for him.

And take them by violence; by power wrest the estates out of their hands, at their own rate; or, if they will not so part with them, these mischievous oppressors will act a Jezebel’s part with Naboth, which was no hard matter to do in Israel, during the times that ran parallel with those of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah.

Houses, in which their poorer and innocenter neighbours dwelt; but perhaps these houses spoiled a prospect, or straitened the great ones, who, right or wrong, will have them, that they may enlarge their own houses, orchards, or gardens.

Take them away; they tear, devour, and swallow up the poor man.

His house; his family, which by this means is left to poverty and beggary.

His heritage: this explains the former, and addeth somewhat to the greatness of their sin, that this is done against ancient right and possession, which the oppressed plead, nay, in a case where God hath forbidden them to sell their heritage, Leviticus 25:23 Numbers 36:7 1 Kings 21:3.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And they covet fields, and take them by violence,.... The fields of their poor neighbours, which lie near them, and convenient for them; they wish they were theirs, and they contrive ways and means to get them into their possession; and if they cannot get them by fair means, if they cannot persuade them to sell them, or at their price, they will either use some crafty method to get them from them, or they will take them away by force and violence; as Ahab got Naboth's vineyard from him:

and houses, and take them away; they covet the houses of their neighbours also, and take the same course to get them out of their hands, and add them to their own estates:

so they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage; not only dispossess him of his house to dwell in, but of his paternal inheritance, what he received from his ancestors, and should have transmitted to his posterity, being unalienable; and so distressed a man and his family for the present, and his posterity after him. The Vulgate Latin version is, "they calumniate a man and his house"; which seems to be designed to make it agree with the story of Ahab, 1 Kings 21:13.

Geneva Study Bible

And they covet fields, and take them by violence; and houses, and take them away: so they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

2. And they covet fields, &c.] ‘To covet’ is itself a gross offence against the law of God, as the deepest of all the Ten Commandments shews (Exodus 20:17). Large additions to one’s estates were diametrically opposed to the spirit, if not always to the letter, of the law of land-tenure among the Israelites. See Numbers 27:1-11; Numbers 33:54, 1 Kings 21:4, Leviticus 25:8-17. These rich men would have had a perfect right to purchase the lease of another man’s property, subject indeed to the law of redistribution in the 49th year (the year of Jubilee)—a relic of the old Village Community system, which seems to have prevailed anciently among Semitic as well as Aryan races (comp. Sir R. Maine’s Village Communities, and Mr Fenton’s article on the Law of Jubilee, in the Theological Review, 1878). But, as the account of Naboth the Jezreelite (1 Kings 21.) shews, the small Israelitish proprietors were too sturdy and too law-abiding to accede to proposals of purchasers when they could possibly avoid it. Hence, on the immoral principle that ‘might is right’ (or, as the prophet says, ‘because it is in the power of their hands’), they followed the example of Ahab, and used fraudulent or openly violent means—fraud is suggested by the language of Micah 2:1, open violence by that of Micah 2:2. Isaiah denounces the same offences in Micah 5:8; Amos, probably, in Micah 4:1.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 2. - They carry out by open violence the fraud which they have devised and planned (comp. Isaiah 5:8; Amos 4:1). Covet fields. Compare the case of Ahab and Naboth (1 Kings 21.). The commandment against coveting (Exodus 20:17) taught the Jews that God regarded sins of thought as well as of action. The Law forbade the alienation of landed property and the transfer of estates from tribe to tribe (Leviticus 25:23-28; Numbers 36:7). A rich man might buy a poor man's estate subject to the law of jubilee; but these grandees seem to have forced the sale of property, or else seized it by force or fraud. Oppress; Vulgate, calumniabantur. The Hebrew word involves the idea of violence. Micah 2:2

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The violent acts of the great men would be punished by God with the withdrawal of the inheritance of His people, or the loss of Canaan. Micah 2:1. "Woe to those who devise mischief, and prepare evil upon their beds! In the light of the morning they carry it out, for their hand is their God. Micah 2:2. They covet fields and plunder; them, and houses and take them; and oppress the man and his house, the man and his inheritance." The woe applies to the great and mighty of the nation, who by acts of injustice deprive the common people of the inheritance conferred upon them by the Lord (cf. Isaiah 5:8). The prophet describes them as those who devise plans by night upon their beds for robbing the poor, and carry them out as soon as the day dawns. חשׁב און denotes the sketching out of plans (see Psalm 36:5); and פּעל רע, to work evil, the preparation of the ways and means for carrying out their wicked plans. פּעל, the preparation, is distinguished from עשׁה, the execution, as in Isaiah 41:4, for which יצר and עשׂה are also used (e.g., Isaiah 43:7). "Upon their beds," i.e., by night, the time of quiet reflection (Psalm 4:5; cf. Job 4:13). "By the light of the morning," i.e., at daybreak, without delay. כּי ישׁ וגו, lit., "for their hand is for a god," i.e., their power passes as a god to them; they know of no higher power than their own arm; whatever they wish it is in their power to do (cf. Genesis 31:29; Proverbs 3:27; Habakkuk 1:11; Job 12:6). Ewald and Rckert weaken the thought by adopting the rendering, "because it stands free in their hand;" and Hitzig's rendering, "if it stands in their hand," is decidedly false. Kı̄ cannot be a conditional particle here, because the thought would thereby be weakened in a manner quite irreconcilable with the context. In Micah 2:2 the evil which they plan by night, and carry out by day, is still more precisely defined. By force and injustice they seize upon the property (fields, houses) of the poor, the possessions which the Lord has given to His people for their inheritance. Châmad points to the command against coveting (Exodus 20:14-17; cf. Deuteronomy 5:18). The second half of the verse (Micah 2:2) contains a conclusion drawn from the first: "and so they practise violence upon the man and his property." Bēth answers to bottı̄m, and nachălâh to the Sâdōth, as their hereditary portion in the land - the portion of land which each family received when Canaan was divided.