Micah 3

Leaders and Prophets Rebuked

¹Then I said,

“Listen, you leaders of Jacob,

you rulers of Israel.

Should you not embrace justice,

²you who hate good and love evil;

who tear the skin from my people

and the flesh from their bones;

³who eat my people’s flesh,

strip off their skin

and break their bones in pieces;

who chop them up like meat for the pan,

like flesh for the pot?”

⁴Then they will cry out to the Lord,

but he will not answer them.

At that time he will hide his face from them

because of the evil they have done.

⁵This is what the Lord says:

“As for the prophets

who lead my people astray,

they proclaim ‘peace’

if they have something to eat,

but prepare to wage war against anyone

who refuses to feed them.

⁶Therefore night will come over you, without visions,

and darkness, without divination.

The sun will set for the prophets,

and the day will go dark for them.

⁷The seers will be ashamed

and the diviners disgraced.

They will all cover their faces

because there is no answer from God.”

⁸But as for me, I am filled with power,

with the Spirit of the Lord,

and with justice and might,

to declare to Jacob his transgression,

to Israel his sin.

⁹Hear this, you leaders of Jacob,

you rulers of Israel,

who despise justice

and distort all that is right;

¹⁰who build Zion with bloodshed,

and Jerusalem with wickedness.

¹¹Her leaders judge for a bribe,

her priests teach for a price,

and her prophets tell fortunes for money.

Yet they look for the Lord’s support and say,

“Is not the Lord among us?

No disaster will come upon us.”

¹²Therefore because of you,

Zion will be plowed like a field,

Jerusalem will become a heap of rubble,

the temple hill a mound overgrown with thickets.