Micah 4:13

Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion: for I will make thine horn iron, and I will make thy hoofs brass: and thou shalt beat in pieces many people: and I will consecrate their gain unto the LORD, and their substance unto the Lord of the whole earth.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(13) Arise and thresh.—Micah, having likened Israel to the sheaves safely gathered, pursues the metaphor by calling upon the daughter of Zion to thresh her enemies after the manner of oxen treading out the corn; and under the symbolism of the horn—the weapon of strength—he promises that God will strengthen her for the work

I will consecrate.—The better reading is that of the LXX., Vulg., and some ancient versions, which give the second person, Thou shalt consecrate their gain unto the Lord. The termination, indicating the first person in our Hebrew Version, may be a form of the old second person feminine, of which there are other examples.

Benson Commentary

Micah 4:13. Arise and thrash, O daughter of Zion — The daughter of Zion means the Jewish people, whose power and victory over their enemies are here foretold. The expressions made use of are figurative, alluding to the manner of separating the corn from the chaff in Judea, which was done chiefly by treading it with the feet of oxen. The purport of the passage is, that the Jews are here called upon to arise and tread down their enemies. For I will make thy horn iron, and thy hoofs brass — Thou shalt be enabled to do this with ease and safety. And thou shalt beat in pieces — Or, shalt bruise, many people — This might be spoken of the victories which the Jewish people, some time after their return, were to gain over the neighbouring nations, especially under the Maccabees and their successors. But the prophecy does not appear to have had a full accomplishment in these victories: nor has any event yet occurred in the history of the Jewish people which fully answers to it. This consideration has induced some commentators to expound the passage in a spiritual sense, namely, of bringing the Gentiles into subjection to Christ and his gospel, and of the victory which the Christian Church should obtain over her persecuting enemies after the conversion of the Roman emperor Constantine to the faith of Christ. Thus Dr. Pocock, Lowth, and many others understand it. The nations thought to have ruined Christianity in its infancy, but it proved victorious over them; those that persisted in their enmity were broken to pieces, Matthew 21:44; particularly the Jewish nation: but multitudes, by divine grace, were gained to the church, and, as is signified in the next clause, they and their substance were consecrated to the Lord Jesus, the Lord of the whole earth. We have reason to believe, however, that this prophecy will have a still more eminent and evident accomplishment, when all the enemies of the church shall be subdued, and the saints reigning with Christ shall have complete power over the nations, and shall rule the refractory with a rod of iron, Revelation 2:26-27 : compare this text with Micah 5:8-15 of this prophecy, and with Isaiah 14:2; Isaiah 41:15; Isaiah 60:12; Isaiah 61:5; on which places see the notes.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

4:9-13 Many nations would assemble against Zion to rejoice in her calamities. They would not understand that the Lord had collected them as sheaves are gathered to be threshed; and that Zion would be strengthened to beat them to pieces. Nothing has yet taken place in the history of the Jewish church agreeing with this prediction. When God has conquering work for his people to do, he will furnish them with strength and ability for it. Believers should cry aloud under distresses, with the prayer of faith, not with despondency.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Arise - (It may be,) from the dust in which they were lying, "I will make thine horn iron, and I will make thy hoofs brass." Threshing in the East is partly with oxen, partly with wheels of iron, or with planks set with sharp flints on an open place made hard to this end. The prophet joins another image, with this and represents Judah as being by God endued with strength, first as with a "horn of iron" 1 Kings 22:11 to cast the enemy to the ground, and then with "hoofs of brass," wherewith to trample them to dust, as the stubble and chaff. "And I will consecrate their gain unto the Lord," that is, to Myself; the Lord gathered them into the floor by His Providence; the Lord gave His people strength to subdue them; and now, in His own Person, He says, I will complete My own work.

The very image of the "threshing" implies that this is no mere destruction. While the stubble is "beaten" or bruised to small pieces, and the chaff is far more than the wheat, and is carried out of the floor, there yet remains the seed-corn. So in the great judgments of God, while most is refuse, there yet remains over, what is severed from the lost heap and wholly "consecrated" to Him. Whatever things were the object of the חרם chêrem Leviticus 27:28 or "thing devoted to the Lord," could not be redeemed, but must remain wholly the Lord's. If it had life, it was to be put to death Leviticus 29. And so the use of the word here may the rather shew, how those converted to God, and who became gain, hallowed to Him, were to pass through death to life, to die to themselves that they might live to Him: what was evil was to be slain in them, that they themselves might live.

The Israelites and God's dealings with them are "ensamples of us upon whom the ends of the world are come" 1 Corinthians 10:11. And so the whole section fits wonderfully with the condition of the single soul. "She who halteth" (Rib.) "the soul, who would serve God, yet not so as wholly to give up the service of the world, which it had in Baptism renounced, who, after it had gone astray like a lost sheep, and been scattered amid the manifoldness of earthly things, was gathered again into the fold, to love One only, long for One only, give itself to One," its Good Shepherd, and over it the Lord reigneth forever, if, taught by experience the deceitfulness of Satan's promises, and stung by the sense of its own thanklessness and vileness, and conscious of the peril of self confidence, it abideth more closely than others with God. He shall gather her that is driven out, that is, , "He shall restore her, from whom He had, for the time, withdrawn His grace," and her that was afflicted, trouble being God's most effectual instrument, in recalling the soul to Himself. "For the Lord raiseth them that are bowed down" Psalm 146:8.

And will make her that halteth, a remnant, placing her among the elect and holy, and her that was cast off strong; for Christ giveth oft to such souls great richness of divine graces, so that "where sin abounded, grace" should "much more abound" Romans 5:20. Rib.: "To it, when enlightened and purified by affliction and by repentance, it is promised, that its Lord, the Great King, shall come to it, and again reign in it, which is the great bliss of souls in grace. For then doth the soul really reign, when it submits wholly to Christ, whom to serve is to reign, and so, under Him, receives power to command its wrong desires, and rule itself;" that great and wonderful power which the Evangelist expresses in words so brief, "To them gave He power to become the sons of God" John 1:12. Thus He maketh it strong, so that "neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, can separate it from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" Romans 8:38-39.

Then, "he describes the condition of the soul fluctuating between good and evil, called one way by God through inward inspirations, and another way by the enticements and habits of sin. And, wishing to follow God, yet not to be without its sinful pleasures, and knowing this to be impossible, it is in anguish and hesitates. Her the prophet justly rebukes, 'why thus cry aloud, as though thou must be led captive by the Devil, not knowing or unable to extricate thyself? Hast thou no King, aided by whose power, thou mayest fight against all enticements, habit, the flesh?' Paul felt this and cried aloud, "I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" Romans 7:23-24. You see his grief. But he despairs not. He knows that he has a King. I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Or why grievest thou, as if thou hadst no "counsellor," by whose counsels to free thee from these snares? "Thy Counsellor" indeed "perished" on the Cross, but for thy sake, that thou mayest live.

He died, to destroy him who hath the power of death. But He rose the third day and is still with thee; at the Right Hand of the Father He still reigns Immortal forever. See how many counsels He has left thee in the Gospel, how many admonitions, whereby thou mayest lead a happy and tranquil life. Now "pain seizes thee like a woman in travail." For such a soul travails, having conceived inspirations from God, which it wishes to obey, but that the flesh, overcome by concupiscence, resists, and so it never brings forth, nor experiences that joy, whereof the Lord speaketh, "When she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world" John 16:21. Wherefore he adds; be in pain, for thou art indeed in travail; thou wilt not cease to be in pain, until thou bring forth. Thou wilt go forth, etc. "God, by a provision of His great mercy, allows lukewarm souls, who will be at no pains to gain grace, to fall into foulest sins, in order that, owning at last their misery, they may cease to be lukewarm, and with great ardor of soul may embrace virtue. For, warned by the result, they understand that they themselves emboldened the tempter, (for he chiefly attacks the lukewarm and remiss,) and they become ardent in the conflict and in well-doing."

Wherefore he says, thou shalt go forth out of the city, that City of God, whereof He is the Builder and Maker Hebrews 11:10, which is gladdened by the river of His spirit; "and it dwells in the open field, unprotected, ready to be a prey, in the broad way of its own concupiscences, out of the narrow road which leadeth to life, and goeth even to Babylon, the city of 'confusion,' in tumult and din and unrest, and the distractions of this life." Yet even there shall it be delivered, like the poor Prodigal, who came to himself in a far country, when worn out by its hard service. Even there it must not despair, but remember, with him, its Father's house, its former home, the Heavenly Jerusalem. Its pains within or without, whereby it is brought back, are travail-pains. Though all is dark, it must not say, I have no Counsellor. For its Redeemer's Name is "Counsellor" Isaiah 9:6, "one Counsellor of a thousand" (Ecclesiasticus 6:6). : "Thine Intercessor never dies."

Out of the very depth of misery will the Divine Mercy draw thee. Though thou seem held by the strong hand of the enemy, and he seems to triumph over thee and to jeer thee, "There, there so would we have it, we have devoured him" Psalm 35:25, and hosts of devils seek thy utter destruction, and thou seem to be "delivered over" 1 Corinthians 5:5 to them to the destruction of the flesh; yet is it only that the spirit may be saved in the Day of the Lord. Even Satan, when he is tormenting souls, knows not the thoughts of the Lord, nor understands His counsels, how, by the very pain which he inflicts, God is bidding: them, Rise and (Rib.) "look up to heaven and long for heavenly things and trample on all which they had hitherto foully served, honor or vain glory or covetousness or lust;" how He will exalt their horn in the Lord, make it strong as iron that they should do all things through Christ in strengthening them, and conquer all through the might of Christ; how He should bruise Satan under their feet shortly, and they consecrate wholly to God their whole strength, every power of soul and body which hitherto had been the adversary's.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

13. thresh—destroy thy foes "gathered" by Jehovah as "sheaves" (Isa 41:15, 16).

thine horn—Zion being compared to an ox treading corn, and an ox's strength lying in the horns, her strength is implied by giving her a horn of iron (compare 1Ki 22:11).

beat in pieces many—(Da 2:44).

I will consecrate their gain unto the Lord—God subjects the nations to Zion, not for her own selfish aggrandizement, but for His glory (Isa 60:6, 9; Zec 14:20, with which compare Isa 23:18) and for their ultimate good; therefore He is here called, not merely God of Israel, but "Lord of the whole earth."

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Arise: this imperative may be read in the future tense, and so be an express promise; it is, however, an implicit promise made to the daughter of Zion, the Jewish church, type of the gospel catholic church, that she shall be raised out of a captive, low, and oppressed state, and this shall be by the reviving power of her God.

Thresh; so in a decorum to the metaphor, Micah 4:12, used to express the gathering of the enemy into the floor to be broken: the future strength of the church, employed successfully (more by the arm of her Redeemer than her own) in the subduing and breaking her enemies, is here foretold and promised, as it is also Isaiah 41:15. Christ will thus punish his enemies. So Babylon typical, as threatened Jeremiah 2:33, was beat to pieces; and so shall antitypical Babylon in due time be broken as straw that is thrashed into smallest pieces like chaff.

I will make thine horn iron: some taking this for the horny part of the hoof of the ox which did tread out the corn, make it to be in sense the same with the hoofs made brass; but they that take it as our version doth, for the horn properly taken, with which the horned beasts do push and thrust down, break, or wound, do express the power and strength of the church firm as iron to beat down her enemies. I will make thy hoofs brass: by this figurative speech is the strength of Zion expressed, by which she treads under foot, and breaks the power of enemies into pieces that it shall never be repaired, as straw that is thrashed in the floor and broken like chaff.

Thou shalt beat in pieces; in the times after the rebuilding of Jerusalem the Jews grew to such strength, that in their wars they did, especially in the Maccabees’ time, break their enemies in pieces. But here is a mystical and spiritual sense of these words, as they refer to the Messiah’s kingdom, in which he will break hard hearts by the power of his word, and convert sinners to himself; and by the power of his almighty arm will defend and support his own subjects, whilst he doth by invincible strength throw down and trample into dust his and their enemies. And this power he hath sometimes evidently exercised already, in the various deliverances he hath wrought for his people, which stand recorded in the church histories. Of this strength you may truly say what is reported of the inscription in the cross appearing to Constantine, In this thou shalt conquer.

Many people; such as were enemies in disposition and carriage towards the Jews though neighbours in their situation; these were both many and mighty enemies: such Christ’s church hath to contest with, and such Christ will conqueror for his church, for he it is who goeth forth conquering and to conquer, Revelation 6:2; and all his enemies shall be made his footstool, Psalm 110:1.

I will consecrate: some refer this to the church, and so it may well enough be applied: the redeemed of the Lord should by their own act and deed become the Lord’s. Others refer it to the Lord, he will consecrate; this is best: but both together, the Lord will, and therefore the church will; God requires it, they consent to it.

Their gain; the spoils of their conquered enemies, what they get out of their hand. So the tabernacle was enriched with the spoils of Egypt, and the temple built with that which David did dedicate of the spoils of enemies; and Persian bounty built the second temple.

Unto the Lord; to the true God, for his honour and in his service.

Their substance; their power, glory, and wealth, all they have and are.

Unto the Lord of the whole earth; with humility and low thoughts of all we do, as done to him that doth not need it, being Lord of all.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Arise, and thresh, O daughter of Zion,.... The nations gathered against her, and now laid together on the floor as sheaves to be threshed. Here the people of God are aroused, and called out of a low and weak estate, and are animated and encouraged to exert themselves, and fall upon their enemies, and destroy them; alluding to the threshing of grain on the floor, the metaphor being here carried on from Micah 4:12. The Targum is,

"arise, and kill, O congregation of Zion;''

for I will make thine horn iron, and I will make thy hoofs brass; signifying that the Lord would give them strength sufficient to such work, and such power their enemies should not be able to resist and overcome; and that they should into their hands, and be crushed, trod, and trampled on by them, and utterly subdued. The allusion is to oxen that have horns and hoofs; and it suggests that they should be as strong as they; have horns like them, that is, power to push down their enemies and hoofs to trample upon them: or as these creatures have a horny substance on their feet, or hoofs, which are strong, and fit for the purposes of treading out corn, for which they were used in the eastern countries, drawing after them iron wheels, or planks stuck with flints; so horses and oxen that have strong feet, and hard hoofs, are said to have feet of brass (b); thus the Lord's people should have such courage, force, and power, as not only to withstand their enemies, but to obtain a conquest over them The Targum is,

"I will make the people in them strong as iron, and their remnant firm as brass;''

which was true of, and accomplished in, Judas Maccabeus and his brethren; and will be more clearly fulfilled in the Christian kings and princes in the latter day, when engaged with the antichristian states;

and thou shalt beat in pieces many people; as the Maccabees did subdue many people and nations, as all Palestine, Moab, Idumea, Samaria, and Iturea, as Josephus (c) relates; and as the Christian princes will beat in pieces, and utterly destroy, all the antichristian kings of the earth, their states and kingdoms, and bring them into subjection to them:

and I will consecrate their gain unto the Lord, and their substance unto the Lord of the whole earth; that is, to Christ, who in the last day will appear to be King and Lord of the whole earth; and all the riches of the antichristian nations, Pagan, Papal, and Mahometan, will be devolved to, and employed in, his interest and service; see Revelation 21:24; these are the words of God the Father, with respect to his Son Jesus Christ; who will now have a dominion, glory, and kingdom given him, by the ancient of days, that so all people, nations, and languages, shall serve him, Daniel 7:14; of which there might be some type and shadow in the times of the Maccabees.

(b) "aeripedes equos", Homer. Iliad. 8. v. 41. (c) Antiqu. l. 13. c. 15. sect. 4.

Geneva Study Bible

Arise and thresh, {n} O daughter of Zion: for I will make thine horn iron, and I will make thy hoofs brass: and thou shalt beat in pieces many people: and I will consecrate their gain unto the LORD, and their substance unto the Lord of the whole earth.

(n) God gives his Church this victory, as often as he overcomes their enemies: but the accomplishment of this will be at the last coming of Christ.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

13. thresh] A figurative expression for ‘conquer’ (comp. Isaiah 41:15, Jeremiah 51:33), based on the barbarous custom of torturing those who had been taken captives in war (2 Samuel 12:31, Amos 1:3). It may be called a phraseological ‘survival.

horn] Another figure for victorious might; comp. Deuteronomy 33:17.

hoofs] Alluding to the custom of employing oxen to tread out the corn; comp. Deuteronomy 25:4, 1 Corinthians 5:9. Sometimes however a machine was used (see above).

many people] Rather, many peoples.

I will consecrate] Rather, thou shalt (so the ancient versions rightly render, comp. Gesenius, Hebr. Gram. § 47, Rem. 5) devote. See Leviticus 27:28, “every devoted thing is most holy unto the Lord.” The term ‘devoted thing’ is applied sometimes to lifeless objects (e.g. Leviticus 27:21), and sometimes to living (e.g. 1 Samuel 15:21, 1 Kings 20:42). In the latter case, devotion, strictly speaking, involved destruction, i.e. the restitution to the Lord of life of that breath which He for a time had granted.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 13. - Arise. Shake off thy sorrow and fear and despair. And thresh. Tread thine enemies underfoot, now that they are gathered in the floor, as the oxen tread out the corn (Isaiah 41:15, etc.; Jeremiah 51:33.) Thine horn. The horn is an emblem of power and victory, as appertaining to the wild ox, the most powerful animal in Canaan (Deuteronomy 33:17; 1 Kings 22:11.) The metaphor of threshing is dropped for the moment, but resumed in the next clause. Hoofs. In allusion to the mode of threshing mentioned above (Deuteronomy 25:4; 1 Corinthians 9:9). People; peoples. Israel shall crush all the nations that rise up against her. I (God) will consecrate. So the Masoretic text; but the second person, which the ancient versions give, is preferable. Septuagint, ἀναθήσεις, "thou shalt dedicate;" Vulgate, interficies. Thou, Zion, shalt devote their gain unto the Lord. This consecration, or devotion, to the Lord in the case of living things involved death, the restitution to the Lord of the life which he had given (see Leviticus 27:21, 28, 29; Zechariah 14:21). Thus the spiritual Israel, purified by suffering, and redeemed, shall consecrate to the Lord the power of the world; and all the wealth and might of earth shall be subservient to the glory of the kingdom of God,



Micah 4:13

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The daughter Zion, when rescued from Babel, overcomes all hostile powers in the strength of her God. Micah 4:11. "And now many nations have assembled together against thee, who say, Let her be profaned, and let our eyes look upon Zion. Micah 4:12. But they know not the thoughts of Jehovah, and understand not His counsel; for He has gathered them together like sheaves for the threshing-floor. Micah 4:13. Rise up and thresh, O daughter Zion: for I make thy horn iron, and I make thy hoofs brass; and thou wilt crush many nations: and I ban their gain to Jehovah, and their substance to the Lord of the whole earth." With ועתּה, corresponding to עתּה in Micah 4:9, there commences a new scene, which opens to the prophet's mental eye. Many nations have assembled together against the daughter Zion (עליך pointing back to בּת ציּון in Micah 4:10), with the intention of profaning her, and feasting their eyes upon the profaned one. It is the holiness of Zion, therefore, which drives the nations to attack her. תּחנף, let her be or become profaned: not by the sins or bloodguiltiness of her inhabitants (Jeremiah 3:2; Isaiah 24:5), for this is not appropriate in the mouths of heathen; but through devastation or destruction let her holiness be taken from her. They want to show that there is nothing in her holiness, and to feast their eyes upon the city thus profaned. חזה with ב, to look upon a thing with interest, here with malicious pleasure. On the singular tachaz, followed by the subject in the plural, see Ewald 317, a. To this design on the part of the heathen, the prophet (Micah 4:12) opposes the counsel of the Lord. Whilst the heathen assemble together against Zion, with the intention of profaning her by devastation, the Lord has resolved to destroy them in front of Zion. The destruction which they would prepare for Zion will fall upon themselves, for the Lord gathers them together like sheaves upon the threshing-floor, to thresh, i.e., destroy, them. כּי does not mean "that," but "for." The sentence explains the assertion that they do not understand the counsel of the Lord. כּעמיר, with the generic article, equivalent to "like sheaves." This judgment Zion is to execute upon the heathen. The figurative expression, "Rise up, and thresh," etc., rests upon the oriental custom of threshing out corn with oxen, i.e., of having it trodden out with their hoofs (see Paulsen, Ackerbau der Morgenlnder, 41). In this, of course, only the strength of the hoofs was considered. But as the horn of the ox is a figure frequently used for destructive power (see Deuteronomy 33:17; 1 Kings 22:11; Amos 6:13, etc.), the prophet combines this figure, to strengthen the idea of crushing power, and express the thought that the Lord will equip Zion perfectly with the strength requisite to destroy the nations. והחרמתּי is the first person, and must not be altered into or regarded as the second, as it has been in the lxx and Syriac, and by Jerome. The prophet does not speak in the name of the theocratic nation, as Jerome supposes, but continues to represent Jehovah as speaking, as in אשׂים, with which, however, instead of לי, the noun ליהוה is used, to give greater clearness to the thought that it is Jehovah, the God and Lord of the whole earth, who will destroy the nations that have rebelled against Him and His kingdom, wresting their possessions from them, and taking them back to Himself. For everything laid under the ban belonged to the Lord, as being most holy (Leviticus 27:28). חיל, property, wealth, the sum and substance of the possessions. Israel is not to enrich itself by plundering the defeated foe, but Jehovah will sanctify the possessions of the heathen to Himself, to whom they belong as Lord of the whole earth, by laying them under the ban: that is to say, He will apply them to the glorification of His kingdom.

There has been a diversity of opinion as to the historical allusion, or the fulfilment of these verses. So much, however, is obvious at the very outset, namely, that they cannot be made to refer to the same event as Micah 4:9, that is to say, to the siege of Jerusalem by the Assyrians, without bringing the prophet into the most striking contradiction to himself. For, since Micah 4:10 predicts not a partial deportation, but the complete carrying away of Israel to Babel, and Micah 4:13 the perfect deliverance of Jerusalem, the people wandering out of Jerusalem into captivity (Micah 4:10) cannot possibly be the enemies who lead it away, beating it utterly before Jerusalem, and banning their possessions to the Lord. There is more to favour the allusion to the victorious conflicts of the Maccabees with the Syrians, for which Theodoret, Calvin, Hengstenberg, and others decide, since these conflicts occurred in the period intervening between the return of the Jews from the Babylonian captivity (Micah 4:10) and the coming of the Messiah (Micah 5:12). But even this allusion corresponds far too little to the words of the promise for us to be able to regard it as correct. Although, for example, the war of the Maccabees was a religious war in the strict sense of the word, since the Syrians, and with them the small neighbouring nations of the Jews, set themselves to attack Judah as the nation of God, and to exterminate Judaism, the gōyı̄m rabbı̄m who have assembled against Zion, and whom the Lord gathers together thither (Micah 4:11, Micah 4:12), point to a much greater even than the attacks made by the Syrians and the surrounding tribes upon Jerusalem in the time of the Maccabees. Gōyı̄, rabbı̄m (many nations) points back to gōyı̄m rabbı̄m and ‛ammı̄m rabbı̄m in Micah 4:2 and Micah 4:3, so that, both here and there, all the nations of the world that are hostile to God are included. Again, the defeat which they suffer before Jerusalem is much greater than the victory which the Maccabees achieved over their enemies. On the other hand, the circumstance that the Babylonian captivity is predicted in Micah 4:10, and the birth of the Messiah in Micah 5:1-2, and that the victorious conflicts of the Maccabees with the Syrians and the heathen neighbours of the Jews lie in the interim between these events, furnishes no sufficient proof that these conflicts must be referred to in Micah 4:11-13, simply because the assumption that, in Micah 4:9 -14, the attacks of the Chaldaeans, the Graeco-Syrians, and the Romans upon Zion are foretold in the order in which they followed one another in history, has no firm basis in the threefold recurrence of ‛attâh (now) in Micah 4:9, Micah 4:11, and Micah 5:1. As an event is introduced with ‛attâh in Micah 5:9, which does not follow the one predicted in Micah 5:8 in chronological sequence, but, on the contrary, the prophet comes back in ve‛attâh from the more remote to the more immediate future, it cannot be inferred from the ‛attâh in Micah 5:1 that the oppression mentioned there must follow the victory over many nations predicted in Micah 4:11-13 in chronological order, or that the siege and capture of Jerusalem by the Romans are referred to in Romans 5:1. Moreover, the proclamation in Romans 5:10 already goes beyond the Chaldaean catastrophe, and the liberation of the Jews from the Chaldaean exile, so that if the ve‛attâh in Romans 5:12 announces a conflict with Zion which will follow the events predicted in Romans 5:9 and Romans 5:10, we must not restrict the conflict to the wars of the Maccabees. We must therefore understand these verses as referring to the events already predicted by Joel (ch. 3), and afterwards by Ezekiel (Ezekiel 38, 39) and Zechariah (Zechariah 12:1-14), and in Revelation 20:8.: i.e., to the last great attack which the nations of the world will make upon the church of the Lord, that has been redeemed from Babel and sanctified, with the design of exterminating the holy city of God from the face of the earth, and to which the attacks of the Syrians, and the rest of the nations surrounding Judah, upon the covenant nation in the times of the Maccabees, furnished but a feeble prelude. This view is favoured by the unmistakeable similarity between our verses and both Joel and Ezekiel.

The נאספוּ עליך גּויים רבּים in Micah 4:11, compared with קבּצם in Micah 4:12, points clearly back to וקבּצתּי את־הגּוים in Joel 3:2, compared with ונקבּצוּ in Micah 4:11; and the figure in Micah 4:12, of the gathering together of the nations like sheaves for the threshing-floor, to the similar figures of the ripening of the harvest and the treading of the full wine-press in Joel 3:13. And the use of gōyı̄m rabbı̄m in Micah is no reason for supposing that it differs in meaning from the kol-haggōyı̄m of Joel, since Micah uses gōyı̄m rabbı̄m in Micah 4:2 and Micah 4:3 for the totality of the nations of the world. Ezekiel, also, simply speaks of gōyı̄m rabbı̄m as assembling together with Gog to attack the mountains of Israel (Ezekiel 38:6, Ezekiel 38:9, Ezekiel 38:15); and in his case also, this attack of the nations upon Jerusalem is appended to the redemption of Israel effected at Babel. Again, the issue of this attack is the same in Micah as in Joel, Ezekiel, and Zechariah, - namely, the complete overthrow of the hostile nations by the people of Israel, who fight in the strength of the Lord, by which Jehovah manifests Himself to all nations as Lord of the whole earth, and proves Himself to be the Holy One (compare Micah 4:13 with Joel 3:12-13, and Ezekiel 38:16; Ezekiel 39:3.). Lastly, a decisive proof of the correctness of this allusion is to be found in the circumstance, that the attack of the nations is directed against Zion, which has now become holy, that it proceeds from hatred and enmity to His holiness, and has for its object the desecration of the city of God. This feature is by no means applicable to Jerusalem and Judah in the time of the Maccabees, but can only apply to the time when Israel, redeemed from Babel, forms a holy church of God, i.e., to the last period of the development of the kingdom of God, which began with Christ, but has not yet reached its fullest manifestation. "From the fact, however, that Zion, when sanctified, is to be delivered out of much greater danger than that from which it will not be delivered in the immediate future, and also that the refined and sanctified Zion will conquer and destroy an incomparably greater hostile force than that to which it will now soon succumb, it follows, in the clearest and most conclusive way, that in the nearest future it must be given up to the power of the world, because it is now unholy" (Caspari). This thought prepares the way for the transition to Micah 5:1, where the prophecy returns to the oppression foretold in Micah 4:9 and Micah 4:10.