Albert Barnes Commentary Micah 6:14

"Thou shalt eat, but not be satisfied; and thy humiliation shall be in the midst of thee: and thou shalt put away, but shalt not save; and that which thou savest will I give up to the sword." — Micah 6:14 (ASV)

Thou shalt eat, but not be satisfied - The correspondence of the punishment with the sin will show that it is not by chance, but from the just judgment of God. The curse of God will go with what they eat, and it will not nourish them. The word 'thou' is repeated three times. As God had just said, 'I too,' so here, 'Thou.' You, the same who have plundered others, will yourself eat and not be satisfied; “thou shalt sow, and not reap; thou shalt tread the olive, and thou shalt not anoint thee with oil.” “Upon extreme but ill-gotten abundance, there follows extreme want.”

“And whoever,” adds one, “does not see this in our ways and our times is absolutely blind. For in no period have we ever read that there was so much gold and silver, or so much discomfort and indigence, so that those most true words of Christ Jesus seem to have been especially spoken of us, “Take heed, for a man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth” (Luke 12:15). And is not this true of us now?

Thy casting down shall be in the midst of thee - Where you have laid up your treasures, or rather your wickedness, there you will sink down, or give way, from inward decay, in the very center of your wealth and your sin.

They had said, “Is not the Lord in the midst of us? None evil can come upon us” (Micah 3:11). Micah tells them of a different indweller. God had departed from them, and left them to their inherent nothingness. God had been their stay; without God, human strength collapses. Scarcely any destruction is altogether hopeless except that which comes from within. Most storms pass over, tear off boughs and leaves, but the stem remains. Inward decay or excision alone are humanly irrecoverable. The political death of the people was, in God’s hands, to be the instrument of their regeneration.

Morally too, and at all times, inward emptiness is the fruit of unrighteous fullness. It is disease, not strength, as even pagan proverbs said: “the love of money is a dropsy; to drink increases the thirst,” and “amid mighty wealth, poor.” And Holy Scripture says, “The rich He sendeth empty away” (Luke 1:53, compare 1 Samuel 2:5). “And truly they must be empty. For what can fill the soul, except God?”

Ribera says: “This is true too of such as, like the Bishop of Sardis, ‘have a name that they live and are dead’ (Revelation 3:1).”

Dionysius adds: “such as do some good things, feed on the word of God, but attain to no fruit of righteousness; who corrupt natural and seeming good by inward decay; who appear righteous before men, are active and zealous for good ends, but spoil all by some secret sin or wrong motive, such as vainglory or seeking the praise of men, by which they lose the praise of God.” Their casting down shall be in the midst of them.

The meaning of the whole is the same, whether the word is interpreted as “casting down” (that is, downfall, literally sinking down) or “emptiness” (especially of the stomach, perhaps from the feeling of “sinking”).

Thou shalt take hold - To rescue or remove to a safe place from the enemy those whom he would take from you, “but shalt not” wholly deliver; “and that which thou deliverest for a time, will I give up to the sword.” This refers to the children for whose sake they pleaded that they accumulated this wealth; just as now, too, the idols for whose sake people toil wrongly all their lives are often suddenly taken away. Their goods also may be said to be given to the sword, that is, to the enemy.