{"id":22629,"date":"2022-09-24T09:36:57","date_gmt":"2022-09-24T14:36:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/exegetical-and-hermeneutical-commentary-of-micah-310\/"},"modified":"2022-09-24T09:36:57","modified_gmt":"2022-09-24T14:36:57","slug":"exegetical-and-hermeneutical-commentary-of-micah-310","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/exegetical-and-hermeneutical-commentary-of-micah-310\/","title":{"rendered":"Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Micah 3:10"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 align='center'><b><i> They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity. <\/i><\/b><\/h3>\n<p><P STYLE=\"text-indent: 0.75em\"><B>They build up &#8211; <\/B>(literally, building, sing.) Zion with blood This may be taken literally on both sides, that, the rich built their palaces, with wealth gotten by bloodshed , by rapine of the poor, by slaughter of the saints, as Ezekiel says, her princes in the midst thereof are like wolves, to shed blood, to destroy souls, to get dishonest gain <span class='bible'>Eze 22:27<\/span>. Or by blood he may mean that they indirectly took away life, in that, through wrong judgments, extortion, usury, fraud, oppression, reducing wages or detaining them, they took away what was necessary to support life. So it is said; The bread of the needy is their life, he that defraudeth him thereof is a man of blood. He that taketh away his neighbors living slayeth him, and he that defraudeth the laborer of his hire is a bloodshedder (Ecclus. 34:21, 22). Or it may be, that as David prayed to God, Build Thou the walls of Jerusalem, asking Him thereby to maintain or increase its well-being <span class='bible'>Psa 51:18<\/span>, so these men thought to promote the temporal prosperity of Jerusalem by doings which were unjust, oppressive, crushing to their inferiors.<\/P> <P STYLE=\"text-indent: 0.75em\">So Solomon, in His degenerate days, made the yoke upon his people and his service grievious <span class='bible'>1Ki 12:4<\/span>. So ambitious monarchs by large standing-armies or filling their exchequers drain the life-blood of their people. The physical condition and stature of the poorer population in much of France was lowered permanently by the conscriptions under the first Emperor. In our wealthy nation, the term poverty describes a condition of other days. We have had to coin a new name to designate the misery, offspring of our material prosperity. From our wealthy towns, (as from those of Flanders,) ascends to heaven against us , the cry of pauperism that is, the cry of distress, arrived at a condition of system and of power, and, by an unexpected curse, issuing from the very development of wealth. The political economy of unbelief has been crushed by facts on all the theaters of human activity and industry.<\/P> <P STYLE=\"text-indent: 0.75em\">Truly we build up Zion with blood, when we cheapen luxuries and comforts at the price of souls, use Christian toil like brute strength, tempt men to dishonesty and women to other sin, to eke out the scanty wages which alone our selfish thirst for cheapness allows, heedless of every thing save of our individual gratification, or the commercial prosperity, which we have made our god. Most awfully was Zion built with blood, when the Jews shed the innocent Blood, that <span class='bible'>Joh 11:48<\/span> the Romans might not take away their place and nation. But since He has said, Inasmuch as ye did it not unto one of the least of these My brethren, ye did it not unto Me <span class='bible'>Mat 25:45<\/span>, and, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me? <span class='bible'>Act 9:4<\/span>, when Saul was persecuting Christs members, then, in this waste of lives and of souls, we are not only wasting the Price of His Blood in ourselves and others, but are slaying Christ anew, and that, from the same motives as those who crucified Him <span class='bible'>1Co 8:12<\/span>. When ye sin (against the members, ye sin against Christ. Our commercial greatness is the Price of His Blood <span class='bible'>Mat 27:6<\/span>. In the judgments on the Jews, we may read our own national future; in the woe on those through whom the weak brother perishes for whom Christ died <span class='bible'>1Co 8:11<\/span>, we, if we partake or connive at it, may read our own.<\/P> <\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Albert Barnes&#8217; Notes on the Bible<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p><span class='bible'>Mic 3:10-11<\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>Hear this . . . ye heads of the house of Jacob . . . that abhor judgment, and pervert all equity <\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Rectitude<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>I.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><em> <\/em><\/strong>There is an eternal law of right that should govern man in all his relations. Right, as a sentiment, is one of the deepest, most ineradicable and operative sentiments in humanity. All men feel that there is such a thing as right. What the right is is a subject on which there has been and is a variety of opinion. Right implies a standard, and men differ about the standard. Some say the law of your country is the standard; some say public sentiment is the standard; some say temporal expediency is the standard. All these are fearfully mistaken. Philosophy and the Bible teach that there is but one standard, that is the will of the Creator. That will He reveals in many ways&#8211;in nature, in history, in conscience, in Christ. Conformity to that will is right.<\/p>\n<p><strong>1. <\/strong>The law of Christ should govern man in his relations with God. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, etc.<\/p>\n<p><strong>2. <\/strong>The law of right should govern man in his relation to his fellow men&#8211;Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them. This law of right is immutable. It admits of no modification. It is universal. It is binding alike on all moral beings in the universe. It is benevolent. It seeks the happiness of all.<\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>II. <\/strong>That a practical disregard of this law leads to fraud and violence. For they know not to do right, saith the Lord, who store up violence and robbery in their palaces. The magnates of Samaria had no respect for the practice of right, hence they stored up violence and robbery in their palaces. Fraud and violence are the two great primary crimes in all social life.<\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>III. <\/strong>That fraud and violence must ultimately meet with condign punishment. Therefore thus saith the Lord God: An adversary there shall be even round about the land; and he shall bring down thy strength from thee, and thy palaces shall be spoiled. How was this realised? Against him came up Shalmaneser, king of Assyria; and Hoshea became his servant, and gave him presents. In the ninth year of Hoshea the king of Assyria took Samaria and carried Israel away into Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozan and in the cities of the Medes (2Ki 17:3; <span class='bible'>2Ki 17:6<\/span>; <span class='bible'>2Ki 18:9-11<\/span>). The cheats and murderers of mankind will, as sure as there is justice in the world, meet with a terrible doom. Punishment is the recoil of crime; and the strength of the backstroke is in proportion to the original blow. (<em>Homilist.<\/em>)<\/p>\n<p>.<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/><\/strong><\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p><P> Verse <span class='bible'>10<\/span>. <I><B>They build up Zion with blood<\/B><\/I>] They might cry out loudly against that butchery practised by Pekah, king of Israel, and Pul coadjutor of Rezie, against the Jews. See on <span class='bible'>Mic 2:9<\/span>. But these were by no means clear themselves; for if they <I>strengthened<\/I> <I>the city<\/I>, or <I>decorated the temple<\/I>, it was by the produce of their <I>exactions<\/I> and <I>oppressions<\/I> of the people.<\/P> <P> <\/P> <P> I do not know a text more applicable than this to <I>slave-dealers<\/I>; or to any who have <I>made their fortunes<\/I> by such <I>wrongs<\/I> as affect the <I>life<\/I> of man; especially the former, who by the gains of this diabolic traffic have <I>built houses<\/I>, c. for, following up the prophet&#8217;s <I>metaphor<\/I>, the <I>timbers<\/I>, c., are the <I>bones<\/I> of the hapless Africans and the <I>mortar<\/I>, the blood of the defenceless progeny of Ham. What an account must all those who have any hand in or profit from this detestable, degrading, and inhuman traffic, give to Him who will shortly judge the quick and dead!<\/P> <\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Adam Clarke&#8217;s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p><P> They; heads, princes, judges, and great ones among them. <\/P> <P>Build up; enlarge or beautify, and fortify. <\/P> <P>Zion; the houses in Zion, or perhaps may be meant the temple and its buildings, and the royal palace of the kings of Judah. <\/P> <P>With blood; with wealth and gifts which these builders made themselves masters of by violence, taking away the life of the owners, or else fining and amercing them. By this course they wrested part of their estates from them, by the other they seized all; they also for gain sometimes acquitted the guilty, and freed them in capital cases, and so sold the blood of the innocent. <\/P> <P>And Jerusalem with iniquity; by such injustice Jerusalem was brought to ruin at last, though some particular persons and families did raise themselves, their houses and palaces, to a present largeness and stateliness. <\/P> <\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p><P><B>10. They<\/B>change of person from&#8221;ye&#8221; (<span class='bible'>Mic 3:9<\/span>); thethird person puts them to a greater distance as estranged from Him.It is, literally, &#8220;<I>Whosoever<\/I> builds,&#8221; <I>singular.<\/I><\/P><P>       <B>build up Zion withblood<\/B>build on it stately mansions with wealth obtained by thecondemnation and murder of the innocent (<span class='bible'>Jer 22:13<\/span>;<span class='bible'>Eze 22:27<\/span>; <span class='bible'>Hab 2:12<\/span>).<\/P><\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown&#8217;s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible <\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p><strong>They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.<\/strong> Or, &#8220;O thou that buildest up&#8221; g, c. or &#8220;everyone of them that buildeth up&#8221; h, c. for the word is in the singular number but, be fire words rendered either of these ways, they respect the heads and princes of the people who either repaired the temple on Zion, or ornamented the king&#8217;s palace, or built themselves fine stately houses in Jerusalem, or large streets there, by money they took of murderers to save them, as Kimchi; or by money got by rapine and oppression, by spoiling the poor of their goods and their livelihood, for them and their families, which was all one as shedding innocent blood; and by money obtained by bribes, for the perversion of justice, and such like illegal proceedings, truly called iniquity. The Targum is,<\/p>\n<p> &#8220;who build their houses in Zion with bloodshed, and Jerusalem with deceits.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>g  &#8220;aedificans&#8221;, Montanus, Munster, Burkius. h &#8220;Quisque eorum aedificat&#8221;, Vatablus, Piscator, Drusius.<\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: John Gill&#8217;s Exposition of the Entire Bible<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p> Then when he says, that Zion  was built by blood, and Jerusalem by iniquity,  it is the same as though the Prophet had said, that whatever the great men expended on their palaces had been procured, and, as it were, scraped together from blood and plunder. The judges could not have possibly seized on spoils on every side, without being bloody, that is, without pillaging the poor: for the judges were for the most part corrupted by the rich and the great; and then they destroyed the miserable and the innocent. He then who is corrupted by money will become at the same time a thief; and he will not only extort money, but will also shed blood. There is then no wonder that Micah says, that Zion was  built by blood  He afterwards extends wider his meaning and mentions  iniquity,  as he wished to cast off every excuse from hypocrites. The expression is indeed somewhat strong, when he says, that Zion was built by blood. They might have objected and said, that they were not so cruel, though they could not wholly clear themselves from the charge of avarice. &#8220;When I speak of blood,&#8221; says the Prophet, &#8220;there is no reason that we should contend about a name; for all iniquity is blood before God: if then your houses have been built by plunder, your cruelty is sufficiently proved; it is as though miserable and innocent men had been slain by your own hands.&#8221; The words,  Zion  and  Jerusalem,  enhance their sin; for they polluted the holy city and the mount on which the temple was built by the order and command of God. <\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Calvin&#8217;s Complete Commentary<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p>(10) <strong>They build up Zion with blood<\/strong><em>i.e.<\/em>, they acquire money for the erection of splendid buildings by spoliation and robbery, not stopping short of murder. So also Habakkuk (<span class='bible'>Mic. 2:12<\/span>) denounces the king of Babylon for the bloody wars with which he obtained wealth for the enlargement of the city.<\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Ellicott&#8217;s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p> Mic 3:10 They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.<\/p>\n<p> Ver. 10. <strong> They build up Zion with blood<\/strong> ] Heb. bloods, that is, with goods gotten by rapine and robbery, to the utter undoing of many poor oppressed, whose livelihood is their life, <span class='bible'>Mar 12:44<\/span> <span class='bible'>Luk 8:43<\/span> . How much better Selimus, the Great Turk, who, being upon his death bed moved by Pyrrhus, the basha, to bestow the great wealth taken by him from the Persian merchants upon some notable hospital for relief of the poor, took order that those evil gotten goods should be forthwith restored again to the right owners, to the shame of many Christians who will not be drawn to do so. Our Henry VII, indeed, in his last will and testament, devised and willed restitution should be made of all such moneys as had unjustly been levied by his officers. But how few such princes are to be found! It is held a goodly thing to build Zion, though it be with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity. But God, as he will not have <em> ex rapina holocaustum,<\/em> so he infinitely abhorreth all those who, under pretext of religion in building some poor hospital with the fragments of their accursed wealth, seek to make him a party, a partaker of their cruelty, as those did, <span class='bible'>Isa 66:8<\/span> ; <span class='bible'>Isa 66:4<\/span> Mar 7:11 <span class='bible'>Mat 23:14<\/span> . Our Henry III, when he had, after his many great exactions, sent the friar minors a load of frieze <em> a<\/em> to clothe them, had the same sent back again with this message, That he ought not to give alms of what he had rent from the poor, neither would they accept of that abominable gift. Zion is not to be builded or beautified with bloods. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><em> a<\/em> A kind of coarse woollen cloth, with a nap, usually on one side only D<\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: John Trapp&#8217;s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p>iniquity = deceit. Hebrew. &#8216;aval. App-44. Not the same word as in Mic 2:1. <\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p>build up Zion: Jer 22:13-17, Eze 22:25-28, Hab 2:9-12, Zep 3:3, Mat 27:25, Joh 11:50 <\/p>\n<p>blood: Heb. bloods <\/p>\n<p>Reciprocal: Deu 27:25 &#8211; General Pro 1:19 &#8211; every Isa 26:10 &#8211; in the Isa 59:3 &#8211; your hands Eze 11:6 &#8211; General Eze 12:19 &#8211; because Eze 21:24 &#8211; your transgressions Eze 23:37 &#8211; and blood Mic 3:1 &#8211; Hear Hab 2:12 &#8211; him Joh 18:28 &#8211; and they<\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p>Mic 3:10. Since Zion and Jerusalem were names of the capital of the 2 tribe kingdom, this indicates that the prophet was considering the whole nation somewhat in his book. See the comments on this subject in verse 8 and also at chapter 1:1.<\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p>3:10 They build up Zion with {h} blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.<\/p>\n<p>(h) They will say that they are the people of God, and abuse his name, as a pretence to disguise their hypocrisy.<\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n<p>He further described his audience of leaders as those who built Jerusalem by sacrificing the lives of innocent people. Micah used &quot;Zion&quot; and &quot;Jerusalem&quot; as synonyms to describe the same place (cf. Mic 3:12; Mic 4:2; Mic 4:8; Psa 149:2; Isa 4:3; Isa 40:9; Amo 6:1). However sometimes, as here, Zion carries theological overtones meaning not just the city but what the city represented, namely, the kingdom of God on earth.<\/p>\n<p>The judges gave favorable verdicts to those who bribed them (cf. Exo 23:8; Deu 27:25), and the priests only taught those who would pay them. The prophets likewise only prophesied for a price (cf. Deu 16:19). Yet they all claimed to trust in the Lord and encouraged themselves with the false hope that since the Lord was among them He would allow no evil to overtake them (cf. Psa 46:4-5; Jer 7:4).<\/p>\n<h4 align='right'><i><b>Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity. They build up &#8211; (literally, building, sing.) Zion with blood This may be taken literally on both sides, that, the rich built their palaces, with wealth gotten by bloodshed , by rapine of the poor, by slaughter of the saints, as Ezekiel says, her princes &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/exegetical-and-hermeneutical-commentary-of-micah-310\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Micah 3:10&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22629"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22629\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/bible-commentary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}