Albert Barnes Commentary Micah 3:11

"The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money: yet they lean upon Jehovah, and say, Is not Jehovah in the midst of us? no evil shall come upon us." — Micah 3:11 (ASV)

Its heads judge for reward - Every class was corrupted. One sin, the root of all evil (1 Timothy 6:10), covetousness, entered into all they did. It, not God, was their one end, and so their God.

Her heads, the secular authority who (Acts 23:3) sat to judge according to the law, judged, contrary to the law, for rewards. They sat as the representatives of the Majesty of God, in whose Name they judged, whose righteous Judgment and correcting Providence the law exhibits and executes, and they profaned it.

“To judge for rewards” was in itself sin, forbidden by the law (Exodus 23:8; Deuteronomy 16:19). To refuse justice unless paid for it was unjust, degrading to justice. The second sin followed closely after it: to judge unjustly, absolving the guilty, condemning the innocent, justifying the oppressor, legalizing wrong.

And her priests teach for hire - The Lord was the portion and inheritance (Numbers 18:20; Deuteronomy 18:2) of the priest. He had his sustenance assigned him by God, and, with it, the duty to (Leviticus 10:10–11, and Deuteronomy 17:10-11; Deuteronomy 33:10; Haggai 2:11 and following) put difference between holy and unholy, and between clean and unclean, and to teach all the statutes which God had commanded. Their lips were to keep knowledge (Malachi 2:7).

This then, which they were bound to give, they sold. But “whereas it is said to the holy, ‘Freely ye have received, freely give’ (Matthew 10:8), these, producing the answer of God upon the receipt of money, sold the grace of the Lord for a covetous price.”

Probably too, their sin co-operated with and strengthened the sin of the judges. Authorized interpreters of the law, they, to please the wealthy, probably misinterpreted the law.

For wicked judges would not have given a price for a righteous interpretation of the law.

The civil authorities were entrusted by God with power to execute the law; the priests were entrusted by Him with the knowledge to expound it. Both employed in its perversion that which God gave them for its maintenance. The princes obtained by bribery the misjudgment of the priests and enforced it; the priests justified the injustice of the Princes. So Arian Bishops, themselves hirelings, by false expositions of Scripture, countenanced Arian Emperors in the oppression of the faithful. “They propped up the heresy by human patronage;” the Emperors “bestowed on” them their “reign of irreligion.” The Arian Emperors tried to efface the Council of Nice by councils of Arian Bishops. Emperors perverted their power, the Bishops their knowledge.

Not publicly only but privately also doubtless, these priests taught falsely for hire, lulling the consciences of those who wished to deceive themselves as to what God forbade, and to obtain from His priests answers in His Name, which might explain away His law in favor of laxity or sin.

So people now try to get ill-advised to do against God’s will what they are bent on doing; only they get ill-advised for nothing. One who receives money for giving an irresponsible opinion places himself in proximate peril of giving the answer which will please those who pay him.

“It is Simony to teach and preach the doctrine of Christ and His Gospel, or to give answers to quiet the conscience, for money. For the immediate object of these two acts is the calling forth of faith, hope, charity, penitence, and other supernatural acts, and the reception of the consolation of the Holy Spirit; and this is, among Christians, their only value. From this they are considered things sacred and supernatural, because their immediate end pertains to supernatural things, and they are done by man as he is an instrument of the Holy Spirit.”

Jerome says: “You are permitted, O Priest, to live (1 Corinthians 9:13), not to luxuriate, from the altar. The mouth of the ox which treadeth out the corn is not muzzled (1 Corinthians 9:9). Yet the Apostle (1 Corinthians 9:18) did not abuse this liberty, but having food and raiment, was therewith content (1 Timothy 6:8; compare 1 Thessalonians 2:6; 2 Thessalonians 3:8), laboring night and day that he might not be chargeable to anybody.

“And in his Epistles he calls God to witness that he lived holily and without avarice in the Gospel of Christ (1 Thessalonians 2:10). He asserts this too, not of himself alone but of his disciples, that he had sent no one who would either ask or receive anything from the Churches (2 Corinthians 12:17–18). But if, concerning the gifts of those who sent—the grace of God (2 Corinthians 8:6–7)—he does not gather for himself but for the poor saints at Jerusalem (Romans 15:26).

“But these poor saints were those Jews who first believed in Christ and, being cast out by parents, kinsmen, and connections, had lost their possessions and all their goods, as the priests of the temple and the people were destroying them.

“Let such poor receive. But if, on the plea of helping the poor, a few houses are enriched, and we eat in gold, glass, and china, let us either with our wealth change our attire, or let not the attire of poverty seek the riches of Senators. What does the attire of poverty avail, while a whole crowd of poor longs for the contents of our purse?

“Therefore, for the sake of us who are like this—‘who build up Zion with blood and Jerusalem with iniquity, who judge for gifts, give answers for rewards, divine for money’—and then, claiming for ourselves a fictitious sanctity, say, ‘Evil will not come upon us,’ let us hear the sentence of the Lord which follows.

“Zion and Jerusalem and the mountain of the temple, that is, the temple of Christ, shall, in the consummation and the end, when ‘love shall wax cold’ (Matthew 24:12) and faith shall be rare , ‘be plowed as a field and become heaps as the high places of a forest’; so that, where once were ample houses and countless heaps of corn, there should only be a poor cottage, keeping up the show of fruit which has no refreshment for the soul.”

The three places, Zion, Jerusalem, and the Temple, describe the whole city in its political and religious aspects.

Locally, Mount Zion, which occupies the southwest, “had upon it the Upper city,” and “was by much the loftier, and length-ways the straighter.” Jerusalem, as contrasted with Zion, represented the lower city, “supported” on the East by Mount Acra, and including the valley of Tyropoeon.

South of Mount Acra and lower than it, at the southeastern corner of the city, lay Mount Moriah or the Mount of the Lord’s House. At this time, it was separated from Mount Acra by a deep ravine, which was filled up by the Asmonaean princes, who also lowered Mount Acra. It was joined to the northeast corner of Mount Zion by Solomon’s causeway across the Tyropoeon.

The whole city then, in all its parts, was to be desolated.

And her prophets divine for money - The word rendered “divine” is always used in a bad sense. These prophets then were false prophets, “her prophets” and not God’s, who “divined,” in reality or appearance, giving the answer which their employers, the rich men, wanted, as if it were an answer from God.

Yet they also “judge for rewards,” who look rather to earthly than to spiritual good. They also “teach for hire,” who seek in the first place the things of this world, instead of teaching for the glory of God and the good of souls, and regarding earthly things in the second place only, as the support of life.

And say, Is not the Lord among us? - And after all this, not understanding their sin, as though by their guilt they purchased the love of God, they said in their impenitence that they were judges, prophets, and priests of God.

They do all this, and yet lean on the Lord; they stay and trust, not in themselves, but in God—good in itself, if only they had not been evil! “And say, Is not the Lord among us? None evil can come upon us.”

So Jeremiah says, “Trust ye not in lying words, saying, The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, The temple of the Lord, are these” (Jeremiah 7:4).

Sanchez comments: “He called them lying words, as being often repeated by the false prophets, to entice the credulous people to a false security against the threats of God.”

As though God could not forsake His own people, nor cast away Zion which He had chosen for a habitation for Himself, nor profane His own holy place! Yet it was true that God “was among them,” in the midst of them, as our Lord was among the Jews, though they knew Him not.

Yet if not in the midst of His people so as to hallow, God is in the midst of them to punish. But what else do we do than these Jews did, if we lean on the Apostolic line, the possession of Holy Scripture, Sacraments, and pure doctrine, without setting ourselves to win for God the souls of our pagan population?

Or what else is it for a soul to trust in having been made a member of Christ, or in any gifts of God, unless it is bringing forth fruit with patience?

John H. says: “Let us also learn from this that all trust in the Merits of Christ is vain, so long as any willfully persist in sin.”

Mich. says: “Let us know that God will also be in us, if we do not have faith alone, nor on this account rest, as it were, on Him, but if to faith is also added excelling in good works. For faith without works is dead. But when works concur with the riches of faith, then God will indeed be with us, and will strengthen us mightily, and account us friends, and gladden us as His true sons, and free us from all evil.”