Delbert Hillers renders Mic 3:12 as:
Zion shall
be plowed as field,
Jerusalem shall become ruins,
And the temple mount shall belong to the wild animals. (Delbert R. Hillers, Micah
[Hermeneia—A Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible; Philadelphia:
Fortress Press, 1984], 47)
Hillers comments on v. 12 thusly:
The famous
prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem is cast in readily intelligible form.
That Zion should be plowed as a field, and become ruins, echoes the oracle on
Samaria, 1:6. The wild animals should live in the desert city is a frequent theme
in biblical literature, thus Isa 13:19-22; 34:11-17; Zeph 2:13-15; Jer 50:39,
and also in other ancient Near Eastern literature. A passage from the first
Sefire treaty (SF I A 32-33, from ca. 750 B.C,) illustrates the use of this
threat and also the sequence; the city becomes a ruin heap (tl, תל or עִם),
and then is infested by wild animals: “And may Arpad become a mound to [house
the desert animal and the] gazelle and the fox and the hare and the wild-cat and
the owl and the [ ] and the magpie.” (Hillers, Treaty Curses, 44) (Ibid.,
48)
Ralph L. Smith, in his commentary for
Micah for the Word Biblical Commentary, rendered the verse as:
Therefore,
on your account Zion
shall become a ploughed field
and Jerusalem shall become a ruin,
and the mount of the house
a forest high place. (Ralph L. Smith, Micah-Malachi [Word
Biblical Commentary 32; Waco, Tex.: Word Books, 1984], 34)
Smith then offers the following commentary:
Jerusalem
was not destroyed immediately. Micah spoke these words probably around 711 B.C.
or 701 B.C. at the latest. Jerusalem continued as it was for another hundred years.
Then in 609 B.C. Jeremiah preached in the gate of the temple that the time of
destruction of the temple had come. Jeremiah was arrested but some elders who
remembered what Micah had said a century earlier, quoted his words about the
destruction of Jerusalem (Jer 26:1-19). Perhaps there is a lesson here not only
for Micah’s and Jeremiah’s days but for our own as well. Any attempt to use the
service of God for one’s own glory and profit carries great risks. We cannot
accept God’s love and reject his lordship. We should be careful to see that our
creed and conduct are consistent. (Ibid., 35)
