Micah 1:9

For her wound [is] incurable,.... Or her "stroke [is] desperate" (e).

For her wound is incurable; for it is come unto Judah; he is come unto the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem. For her wound is incurable - her case, politically and morally, is desperate (Jeremiah 8:22).

Her wound is incurable; the wounds of Samaria and the ten tribes; her own sins, God’ s just displeasure, and the enemy’ s rage have deeply wounded her, she is senseless, impenitent, and furious against her Physician, and she shall at last die by sword, famine, pestilence, and captivity. It is come unto Judah; the contagion of her sins, and the indignation of God against it, and the enemy’ s successes, viz. Sennacherib’ s, or Nebuchadnezzar’ s, like a flood have reached to Judah also; and this is the reason why the prophet foretells such mourning, and is willing to personate it to awaken both kingdoms to repent and turn to God. He is come; the insulting, conquering, and cruel enemy, or, in the neuter gender, it, i.e. the evil, is come, i.e. in the prophetic style, will certainly and suddenly come. Unto the gate of my people; either signifying the Assyrians besieging Jerusalem, as Sennacherib son of Shalmaneser did some few years after the sack of Samaria, or else by gate of my people is meant the city where the sovereign court of judicature to the whole kingdom is, denoting the victories of the Assyrian over the rest of the kingdom of Judah, or else the victories of Nebuchadnezzar. Even to Jerusalem: this seems added to explain the former phrase.

Micah 1:9 For her wound [is] incurable; for it is come unto Judah; he is come unto the gate of my people, [even] to Jerusalem.Ver. 9. For her wound is incurable] Or, she is grievously sick of her wounds; or, her wounds are full of anguish, neither is there any to pour in balm of Gilead, to allay it; any to lick it whole, as the Lady Elinor did her husband Prince Edward’ s wound, traitorously given him in the Holy Land, by an assassin, with a poisoned knife. For it is come unto Judah] viz. Samaria’ s wound and plague is come, i.e. shall shortly come, though now they live as if out of the reach of God’ s rod, or as if they had a protection. He is come unto the gate of my people] Sennacherib (flushed with former successes at Samaria, which had been carried captive by his father) came up to the very gate of Jerusalem as an overflowing scourge; and thought to have cut off all the Jews at once, as if they had had all but one neck. He came up over all his channels, and went over all his banks. He passed through Judah, and overflowed, reaching even to the neck; and the stretching out of his wings filled the breadth of thy land, O Immanuel, Isaiah 8:8. But Immanuel soon took a course with him, Isaiah 37:33, so that though he came to the gates, yet he entered not into the city, nor shot an arrow there, nor cast a bank against it. "Look upon Zion," saith that prophet, "the city of our solemnities," and see if Jerusalem be not still "a quiet habitation," Isaiah 33:20. "Walk about Zion," saith the psalmist, "and go round about her: tell the towers thereof." See if any be missing since Sennacherib came up against them. "Mark ye well her bulwarks": are they diminished? "consider her palaces": are they at all defaced? Psalms 48:12-13. What if Jerusalem be wicked? yet Sennacherib is insolent. If therefore Jerusalem shall be smitten with the rod of Sennacherib’ s fear, Sennacherib shall be smitten with the sword of God’ s revenges, who of all things cannot endure a presumptuous and self-confident vaunter; but will deal with his people not according to his ordinary rule, but according to his prerogative. Surely "Israel hath not been forsaken, nor Judah of his God, of the Lord of hosts; though their land was filled with sin against the Holy One of Israel," Jeremiah 51:5.

(9) Her wound is incurable.—The state of Samaria is incurable: she is doomed: the destroyer is approaching—nay, he comes near, even to Jerusalem. The outlying towns are described as shuddering at the invader’s advance, but Jerusalem itself is spared.

Verse 9. Her wound is incurable] Nothing shall prevent their utter ruin, for they have filled up the measure of their iniquity. He is come - even to Jerusalem.] The desolation and captivity of Israel shall first take place; that of Judah shall come after.

9. her wound] Lit. her stripes. Samaria’s trouble is a chastisement (comp. Isaiah 1:3-4), but it is not Samaria’s trouble only. It has reached Jerusalem; hence the ‘incurableness’ of the ‘wound,’ for Jerusalem is the heart of the nation. The past tenses vividly express the certainty of the prophet’s intuition of the future. he is come] Or, it is come. The subject may be either the ‘stripe’ or the dealer of the stripe—Jehovah. the gate of my people] Jerusalem is to the chosen people in general what the gate is to the city itself. The shady space in the city gate was the favourite place of meeting; so Jerusalem is the scene of ‘our solemn meetings’ (Isaiah 33:20), our religious and political centre.

For her - Samaria’s Wound - o, (literally, her wounds, or strokes, (the word is used especially of those inflicted by God, (Leviticus 26:21; Numbers 11:33; Deuteronomy 28:59, Deuteronomy 28:61, etc.)

Micah 1:9 points to the impending ruin of Judah as one of the reasons for the grief and consternation of the prophet. He knows that, if Samaria falls, the enemy will sooner or later attack the south.