Attributed commentary excerpt
Barnes' Notes on Micah 1:9
A historical reference excerpt for this verse. Read it alongside the biblical text and other available sources.
Notes on the Whole Bible
Albert Barnes (1798–1870) · 19th-century historical commentary
Source: BibleWord.ai's local reference edition of this named work.
For her - Samaria’s Wound - o, (literally, her wounds, or strokes, (the word is used especially of those inflicted by God, (Leviticus 26:21; Numbers 11:33; Deuteronomy 28:59, Deuteronomy 28:61, etc.) each, one by one,) is incurable The idiom is used of inflictions on the body politic (Nahum 3:0 ult.; Jeremiah 30:12, Jeremiah 30:15) or the mind , for which there is no remedy. The wounds were very sick, or incurable, not in themselves or on God’s part, but on Israel’s. The day of grace passes away at last, when man has so steeled himself against grace, as to be morally dead, having deadened himself to all capacity of repentance. For it is come unto - (quite up to) Judah; he, (the enemy,) is come (literally, hath reached, touched,) to (quite up to) the gate of my people, even to (quite up to) Jerusalem Jerome: “The same sin, yea, the same punishment for sin, which overthrew Samaria, shall even come unto, quite up to Judah. Then the prophet suddenly changes the gender, and, as Scripture so often does, speaks of the one agent, the center and impersonation of the coming evil, as sweeping on over Judah, quite up to the gate of his people, quite up to Jerusalem. He does not say here, whether Jerusalem would be taken; and so, it seems likely that he speaks of a calamity short of excision. Of Israel’s wounds only he here says, that they are incurable; he describes the wasting of even lesser places near or beyond Jerusalem, the flight of their inhabitants. Of the capital itself he is silent, except that the enemy reached, touched, struck against it, quite up to it. Probably, then, he is here describing the first visitation of God, when 2 Kings 18:13 Sennacherib came up against all the fenced cities of Judah and took them, but Jerusalem was spared. God’s judgments come step by step, leaving time for repentance. The same enemy, although not the same king, came against Jerusalem who had wasted Samaria. Samaria was probably as strong as Jerusalem. Hezekiah prayed; God heard, the Assyrian army perished by miracle; Jerusalem was respited for 124 years. return to 'Top of Page'
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