Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Argumentum
"Micah," says St. Jerome to Paulinus, "of Moresheth, co-heir of Christ, announces the devastation of the daughter of the robber, and lays siege against her, because she struck the jaw of the judge of Israel." About the same prophet, St. Epiphanius writes in his Life: "Micah the Marathite, a prophet from the tribe of Ephraim, after he had denounced many things to Ahab, king of Judah, was thrown down a precipice by his son named Joram and perished, because he had rebuked him for his own iniquities and those of his ancestors, which he had perpetrated. He, freed from the prison of death, in Marathi his own land, quite solitary, obtained a tomb near the public cemetery. His monument is indeed most famous up to the present day." Dorotheus relates the same in his Life of Micah. These authors therefore believe that this Micah lived in the time of Ahab and Jezebel.
But note: First, this Micah is different from Micaiah son of Imlah, who predicted the slaughter and death of Ahab, 3 Kings 21:14; whom Eusebius in his Chronicle says began to prophesy in the fifth year of Jehoshaphat (although some think that in Eusebius, "Elijah" should be read instead of "Micah"): for that one lived under Ahab and Jehoshaphat; but our prophet lived under Jotham and Ahaz: therefore he was later than the former by two hundred, or one hundred fifty years. Again, the former lived in Israel, the latter in Judah. Micah prophesied under Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, as he himself says in chapter 1:1; therefore not under Josiah, as Isidore states: for between Jotham and Josiah, one hundred and twenty years elapsed.
Note second: This Micah was from Moresheth, which was a small village in the tribe of Judah near Eleutheropolis, to the east of it. The Chaldean, Clarius, Arias, and Vatablus think it is the same as Mareshah. For from Mareshah or Moreset the Hebrew patronymic name Morasthi, that is Moreshethite, which is attributed to this Micah, seems to be derived. But St. Jerome teaches that Moresheth is the name of a place distinct from Mareshah. Hence he writes in the Epitaph of Paula that in his time the tomb of Micah existed there, and it had been converted into a church, which St. Paula visited for the sake of religion. So also Adrichomius and others in the Description of the Holy Land;
so also Remigius, Haymo, Rupert, Hugh, and Lyranus here. Micah was therefore from the tribe of Judah, not Ephraim, as Epiphanius, Isidore, and Dorotheus in the Synopsis thought; whence in chapter 1:9 he says: "It has come even to Judah, it has touched the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem." Of Mareshah, however, as if of a foreign place, he says in verse 15: "I will yet bring an heir to you, who dwell in Mareshah."
Micah died a martyr, slain by the sword, says Theophylact; whence, enrolled in the catalogue of the Saints, he is read in the Martyrology on January 15. For there we read thus: "In Judea, the holy prophets Habakkuk and Micah, whose bodies were found under Theodosius the Elder by divine revelation." This revelation is narrated by Sozomen, book 7, last chapter; Cassiodorus in the Tripartite History, book 1, chapter 49; Nicephorus, book 12, chapter 48. Hear Sozomen: "But not these things alone honored religion, for both Habakkuk, and not long after him Micah, the foremost among the Prophets, appeared around this time. The bodies of both were indicated through a divine vision in a dream to Sebennus, then bishop of Eleutheropolis. The name of his city was Cala, which was formerly called Cila, in which Habakkuk was found. But Baratsatia is a place about ten stades distant from that city, in which was the sepulcher of Micah, which the natives called 'the faithful monument,' not knowing what they were saying, calling it in their native tongue Nephasa neemana (that is, 'faithful soul' or 'faithful body': for 'soul' is taken metonymically for 'body,' even a dead one, that is, for a corpse, as I showed in Leviticus)."
The subject of Micah is to censure idolatry, and the vices born from it, and especially the oppression of the poor both of Samaria and Jerusalem; that is, of both the ten tribes and the two. And because Samaria first introduced the idolatry of the calves and communicated it to Judah under the impious king Ahaz, he first threatens the destruction of Samaria by the Assyrians, then the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans, and foretells the slaughter and captivity of the people, especially of the leaders both lay and ecclesiastical, who were the leaders of the people in wickedness. After these sorrowful things, he adds joyful ones as is customary, and consoles them, promising a happy return from Babylon through Cyrus, and a happier return from sin, death, and hell to grace, life, and the Church both militant and triumphant through Christ, whom he predicts will be born in Bethlehem.
Note: Micah in style and spirit is similar to Isaiah, and as it were his rival; whence he also cites him word for word from time to time, as will be evident in chapter 4:1 and chapter 5:1. See Canon 6 in the Prooemium.
With Kilber we can divide the prophecies of Micah into three parts. The first part contains a prophecy that is, as it were, legal, presenting judicial proceedings against both kingdoms of the Hebrews, chapters 1-3; the second part, an evangelical prophecy, setting forth the promise of the Christian Church, chapters 4-5; the third part, a mixed prophecy of legal contention and evangelical consolation, chapters 6-7.
Micah employs a style that is brief, concise, rapid, most similar to that of Hosea, to whom nevertheless De Wette prefers Micah, as being more sublime and more vehement than Hosea. His figures of speech are varied and elegant, and his rebukes of vices most sharp. But since he blazes with a certain vivid fire and suddenly flies from one thing to another, he is rather obscure and less accessible to readers. (From Rosenmuller, De Wette, Lowth.) Whoever desires more should consult Eichhorn, who portrayed the poetic character of Micah, but as merely natural, in vivid colors (Eichhorn, Einleit. sect. 582).