Micah 2

¹ Woe to those who devise wickedness
and plot evil on their beds!
At morning's light they carry it out,
because it is in the power of their hand.

² They covet fields and seize them,
houses, and take them away.
They oppress a man and his household,
a person and his inheritance.

³ Therefore thus says the LORD:
Look, I am devising disaster against this clan,
from which you will not remove your necks,
and you will not walk haughtily,
for it will be an evil time.

⁴ On that day they will take up a taunt against you
and wail with bitter lamentation and say:
"We are utterly ruined!
He changes the portion of my people.
How he removes it from me!
To the apostate he allots our fields."

⁵ Therefore you will have no one
to cast a measuring line by lot
in the assembly of the LORD.

⁶ "Do not preach"—so they preach.
"One should not preach of such things;
disgrace will not overtake us."

⁷ Should it be said, O house of Jacob:
"Is the Spirit of the LORD impatient?
Are these his deeds?"
Do not my words do good
to the one who walks uprightly?

⁸ But lately my people have risen up as an enemy.
You strip the cloak from the garment
of those who pass by trustingly,
returning from war.

⁹ The women of my people you drive out
from their pleasant homes;
from their young children you take away
my splendor forever.

¹⁰ Arise and go,
for this is no place of rest!
Because of uncleanness that destroys—
a grievous destruction.

¹¹ If a man walking in wind and falsehood should lie:
"I will preach to you of wine and strong drink"—
he would be the preacher for this people!

¹² I will surely gather all of you, O Jacob;
I will surely assemble the remnant of Israel.
I will set them together like sheep in a pen,
like a flock in its pasture—
a noisy throng of people.

¹³ The one who breaks through goes up before them;
they break through, pass the gate, and go out by it.
Their king passes before them,
the LORD at their head.