Zion Vindicated and Magnificent

A glorious hope was extended for the Judahites. Zion would become more prominent than ever. But the people would have to go through a lot to get to that experience.

The Word of YHWH came to Micah of Moresheth in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah (ca. 742-680 BCE; cf. Micah 1:1). The Word of YHWH which Micah saw regarding Samaria pronounced its imminent doom (Micah 1:2-9). Moresheth was a village in southwestern Judah where the Shephelah met the Philistine coastal plains, and Micah had messages of warning for his fellow inhabitants in the Shephelah regarding the destruction and devastation which would soon come despite all the preparations the state had made (Micah 1:10-16). Micah had words for the elite and wealthy who developed schemes to dispossess poorer Judahites out of their ancestral lands, and it would not go well for them (Micah 2:1-5). Such people demeaned Micah and his message, presuming such things would never happen; Micah all the more denounced them and condemned them for their crimes (Micah 2:6-13). Similar denunciations were directed at the leaders and prophets of the nation; on account of their sinfulness, Zion would be plowed up like a field, and Jerusalem made a heap of ruins (Micah 3:1-12)!

Yet, just as in Micah 2:11-12, Micah of Moresheth would then turn and present a beautiful message of hope for Israel. In the “latter days,” the Temple Mount, Mount Zion, would gain prominence over the other hills (Micah 4:1). The nations would come to Mount Zion and the Temple of YHWH to learn of His ways and live by His laws; YHWH’s message would assuredly proceed from Zion (Micah 4:2). YHWH would arbitrate between the nations in all their disputes; swords would be beaten into plowshares, and spears into pruning hooks, for the nations would no longer fight against each other (Micah 4:3). Micah presented the stereotypical description of ease and prosperity: each person would dwell under their fig tree and grapevine without any fear (Micah 4:4). The nations all serve their respective gods, but the Israelites would serve YHWH forever (Micah 4:5).

Micah 4:1-5 receives praise as an extraordinary passage for many reasons. Micah 4:1-3 substantially represents the same oracle as Isaiah 2:2-4, with only minute differences between the two. We do not otherwise see this kind of close association of prophetic messages anywhere else in the prophetic corpus. Arguments, therefore, regarding the origin of the oracle remain legion: some suggest Micah was the original author, and Isaiah followed suit; others suggest the opposite, that Isaiah wrote it and Micah followed suit; some suggest YHWH spoke the same message through both prophets independently; some suggest the oracle is some kind of independent tradition from which both Isaiah and Micah drew inspiration.

We will set aside arguments regarding origin, remaining confident YHWH inspired Micah of Moresheth to direct this message to the Judahites of his day. But to what end?

Isaiah and Micah both imagined for the Judahites a magnificent future in which Zion stood supreme. Nations would no longer fight against one another, and all weapons of war had been refashioned into implements for farming. The nations, in fact, would come to learn of YHWH’s ways and to follow His laws. For Isaiah, this would be an invitation for the descendants of Jacob to follow in the light of YHWH’s ways (Isaiah 2:5). Micah, however, would continue with the hope of the kind of prosperity and stability for which all Israelites strove: to be able to sit under one’s fig tree and grapevine without fear. Micah did not imagine the nations would abandon their gods; but he did expect the Israelites to continue to serve YHWH as their God forever (Micah 4:5).

Whenever such messages of encouragement and hope are present in prophetic oracles, it means something far less pleasant and wonderful will soon come about. While Micah 4:6-13 overall does continue in the general spirit of encouragement, extending hope for Israel, within it Micah also made it known why Israel would require that kind of encouragement. YHWH promised on that same day to gather the lame and outcasts He injured and would make of them a new and mighty nation, ruling over them from Zion (Micah 4:6-7). Micah spoke to the old “sheep tower,” likely on the southern end of Zion where the Jebusites had built a fortress and where the palace and Temple complex stood: it would again be restored, displaying the return of power to Jerusalem (Micah 4:8). Micah would then speak to Jerusalem, asking why they shout and are in great pain, like a woman in labor, asking if their king has disappeared, imagining the effects of the downfall of the Kingdom of Judah (Micah 4:9). Zion was then considered as a woman undergoing the pains of labor: its inhabitants would leave the city for Babylon, but would be rescued there, and YHWH would deliver them from their enemies (Micah 4:10). Nations would assemble against Jerusalem and Zion, gloating over their downfall; they did not know what YHWH was doing, for He was gathering them like grain for threshing (Micah 4:11-12). Micah called upon Zion to get up and thresh them; YHWH would give them iron horns and bronze hooves and they would crush the nations, dedicating their spoils to YHWH (Micah 4:13).

We do well to remember how these oracles feature what YHWH will do “in the latter days” (Micah 4:1, 6). We often insist on prophecy as YHWH’s messages to His people, and all of them require some kind of contextual level understanding. Yet messages regarding “the latter days” will often present a very different world and imaginary than the Israelites to whom the prophets are speaking would recognize. And so it goes with Micah 4:1-13: its message might seem a bit remote to Judahites living in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah (cf. Micah 1:1). In their days, Zion stood as it had since the days of David and Solomon; kings of their descent still ruled on the throne.

But Micah of Moresheth had just warned about the coming days during which Zion would be plowed up like a field, and Jerusalem would become a heap of ruins (Micah 3:12). In 732, 722, and 701 BCE, the Assyrians would come and eliminate the Kingdoms of Aram and Israel as going concerns and devastate Judah and most of its cities save Jerusalem; Micah’s prophecy would not yet be fulfilled, but Judah should have perceived what it might look like to see it come about.

And then, a little over a century later, Judah would see the fulfillment of all Micah had warned about. The Babylonians besieged Jerusalem, captured it, and destroyed the city and Temple (586 BCE; cf. 2 Kings 25:1-21). A descendant of David was no longer ruling over Jerusalem and Judah. There was no more Temple. The enemies of the people of God gloated over their distress. And most of them were exiled to Babylon, all as Micah of Moresheth had imagined.

The power of the promises of Micah 4:6-13 become apparent during this exilic period: YHWH had spoken of how all these things would take place, but YHWH would not abandon His people. He would restore them to their land. Dominion would return to Zion. They would get vengeance on their enemies.

We can see the fulfillment of these promises in Micah 4:6-13 during the Second Temple Period. Jewish people returned to Judah and rebuilt Jerusalem and its Temple (ca. 539-515 BCE; cf. Ezra 1:1-6:22). In turn, Babylon and Persia would fall to even stronger enemies. For a brief moment, the Jewish people overcame persecution and established an independent Jewish state (the Hasmonean period, ca. 150-63 BCE; cf. 1 Maccabees, Josephus).

But no one confused the Hasmonean kingdom with the glorious promises of the prophets. They were no David or Solomon; the second and first century BCE were far away from the halcyon days of the 10th century BCE Israelite Empire. The nations certainly were not turning their weapons into farming implements, and they were not really learning from YHWH. Nevertheless, the fulfillment of all YHWH promised Israel through Micah of Moresheth drew near.

It would not be as anyone would have expected, probably not even Micah himself. It would come from a Man with humble origins in the backwoods of Galilee, Jesus of Nazareth. He would go about doing good and fulfilled all which YHWH had spoken regarding the Christ. Yet His victory would come through suffering and death, but God would vindicate Him by raising Him from the dead, and granting Him an everlasting kingdom.

Through Jesus and His Kingdom God would fulfill all He spoke through Micah of Moresheth. Zion stands above every mountain because the Zion in which God dwells and reigns in Christ is the heavenly one (Hebrews 12:18-25). In Christ God welcomes people of any and all the nations to share in the faith and promise of Abraham and to learn of His ways and follow them (cf. Galatians 3:1-28, Ephesians 2:1-3:12). In Christ God has killed the hostility which existed between the nations, and so faithful Christians do not learn war against each other anymore; instead, they cast the seed of the Gospel of the Kingdom to everyone (Ephesians 2:1-3:12). In Christ, the nations renounce their gods and learn of the God of heaven and follow after Him (e.g. Acts 17:22-32).

The Judahites living in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah kings of Judah truly experienced challenging, tempestuous times; what they experienced should have led them to repentance, but all their main institutions remained in place. Therefore, Micah of Moresheth’s prophetic oracles in Micah 4:1-13 would have been able to be understood but would have seemed remote. A little over a century later, Micah’s messages would have proven more salient: they experienced the devastation and exile about which Micah had warned, and YHWH’s encouragement of restoration and vindication would prove necessary to sustain them through the difficult days ahead. Yet Zion’s vindication and magnificence would not come about how any of them would expect. It would not come for the physical location in the hill country of Judah, but it would come for those who follow the Way of Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ of God, who has been given a dominion without end, who in Himself made peace for those near and far off, and who will receive glory and honor for all eternity. May we follow the ways of the Christ and jointly participate in His vindicated and magnificent Zion as His people!

Ethan R. Longhenry