Micheas 7:4
He that is best among them, is as a brier: and he that is righteous, as the thorn of the hedge. The day of thy inspection, thy visitation cometh: now shall be their destruction.
Open Micheas 7:4 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Qui optimus in eis est, quasi paliurus, et qui rectus, quasi spina de sepe. Dies speculationis tuæ, visitatio tua venit : nunc erit vastitas eorum.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- ὡς σὴς ἐκτρώγων καὶ βαδίζων ἐπὶ κανόνος ἐν ἡμέρᾳ σκοπιᾶς. οὐαὶ οὐαί, αἱ ἐκδικήσεις σου ἥκασιν, νῦν ἔσονται κλαυθμοὶ αὐτῶν.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- טוֹבָ֣ם כְּחֵ֔דֶק יָשָׁ֖ר מִמְּסוּכָ֑ה י֤וֹם מְצַפֶּ֨יךָ֙ פְּקֻדָּתְךָ֣ בָ֔אָה עַתָּ֥ה תִהְיֶ֖ה מְבוּכָתָֽם
Haydock's commentary
Brier. Hebrew chedek, or "thorn." Septuagint, "a consuming moth."
Inspection, or of thy chiefs (Haydock) and prophets. (Calmet)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Gregory Nazianzen In Defence of His Flight to Pontus, and His Return, After His Ordination to the Priesthood, with an Exposition of the Character of the Priestly Office
58. Hence again the divine Micah, unable to brook the building of Zion with blood, however you interpret the phrase, and of Jerusalem with iniquity, while the heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests teach for hire, and the prophets divine for money, what does he say will be the result of this? Zion shall be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem be as a lodge in a garden, and the mountain of the house be reckoned as a glade in a thicket. He bewails also the scarcity of the upright, there being scarcely a stalk or a gleaning grape left, since both the prince asketh, and the judge curries favour, so that his language is almost the same as the mighty David’s: Save me, O Lord, for the godly man ceaseth: and says that therefore their blessings shall fail them, as if wasted by the moth.