John Calvin Commentary Micah 1:6

"Therefore I will make Samaria as a heap of the field, [and] as places for planting vineyards; and I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley, and I will uncover the foundations thereof." — Micah 1:6 (ASV)

Although Micah especially intended to devote his services to the Jews, as we said yesterday, he nevertheless, in the first place, passes judgment on Samaria, for it was his purpose afterwards to speak more fully against Jerusalem and the whole of Judea.

This situation ought to be kept in mind, for the Prophet does not begin with the Israelites because he directs his discourse particularly to them. Rather, his purpose was to briefly reprove them and then to address his own people more especially, for it was for this purpose that he was called.

Now, as he threatens destruction to Samaria and the whole kingdom of Israel on account of their corrupted forms of worship, we may therefore learn how displeasing superstition is to God, and that he regards nothing so much as the true worship of his name.

There is no reason here for people to claim that they do not intentionally sin, for God shows how we are to worship him.

Whenever, then, we deviate in any way from the rule which he has prescribed, we manifest, in that respect, our rebellion and obstinacy.

Therefore, the superstitious always act like fools with regard to God, for they will not submit to his word, so as to be made wise by it alone.

And he says, I will set Samaria as an heap of the field; that is, the ruins will be such that they will differ in no way from the heaps in the fields.

For farmers, we know, when they find stones in their fields, throw them into some corner so that they are not in the way of the plow.

Therefore, like such heaps as are seen in the fields, Samaria would be, according to what God declared. He then says that the place would be empty, so that vines would be planted there;

In the third place, he says that its stones would be scattered through the valley. This would be just as when one casts stones onto a wide plain, where they run and roll far and wide; so would be the scattering of Samaria, according to what the Prophet says it was to be: like the rolling of stones in a wide field.

He adds, in the fourth place, I will uncover her foundations; that is, I will entirely demolish it, so that, as Christ says, a stone may not remain on a stone (Matthew 24:2).

We now perceive the meaning of these words. We also perceive that the reason the Prophet denounces so severe a judgment on Samaria was because it had corrupted the legitimate worship of God with its own inventions.

For it had devised, as we well know, many idols, so that the whole authority of the law had been abolished among the Israelites.