Micah 6:6

Wherewith shall I come before the Lord,.... These are not the words of the people of Israel God had a controversy with, and now made sensible of their sin, and humbled for it; and willing to appease

Wherewith shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before the high God? shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old? Wherewith shall I come before the Lord?

In the foregoing part of the chapter you have God’ s resolution to have a hearing, ,2, and his plea for himself against an ungrateful people, . Now in this verse you have the result, which is either an unfeigned submission, and justification of God’ s just proceedings, made by some of the best of this people, or else an inquiry made by men among them, who did yet retain some opinion of their own integrity; much like those , they were ready to say, We have offered sacrifices as required, &c.; what would God have us do more? Or else it is an inquiry what the prophet would further direct them to do in this case, with an intimation that they were ready to offer any sacrifices God should require of them. Or else this verse is the prophet’ s supposition, that some among them would be ready to inquire how they should in this case behave themselves, and so this prosopoeia fairly makes way for further direction to this people. Wherewith? Heb. With what? what preparation shall I make for a due and right address unto God? Shall I, in the person of all the people, or else in the person of the most thinking among them: this I is the people of the Jews. Come before the Lord: it is a temple phrase, and contains the solemn attendance on God in his worship; well paraphrased in the Chaldee paraphrase, With what shall I serve before the Lord? And bow myself before: this is exegetical to the former phrase, When I come to bow myself and worship the Lord, with what shall I appear? The high God; such was the God of Israel, heaven his throne, the earth his footstool; idols are dunghill gods, our God alone is the God who dwells on high. Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings? shall these suffice for testimony that I owe my all to God, or appease his displeasure, which justly might devour me as the fire the sacrifice? With calves of a year old: it is probable this repeats (as is usual in Scripture, to confirm and affect us the more) the thing before mentioned.

Micah 6:6 Wherewith shall I come before the LORD, [and] bow myself before the high God? shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old?Ver. 6. Wherewith shall I come before the Lord?] This is vox populi, the voice of the people now convinced in part; or at least of some one for them. Praestat herbam dare quam turpiter pugnare: Better yield than disgracefully hold out the contest. God, say they, hath the better of us; neither need he now call upon heaven and earth to arbitrate, nor on the mountains and strong foundations to hear the quarrel, for we are self-condemned, Titus 3:11. Our own consciences read the sentence against us, we have deserved to be destroyed; but O, what may we do to avert and avoid his wrath? "what shall we do that we might work the works of God?" John 6:28. Lo, this is the guise of graceless men; fain they would pacify God, and work themselves into his grace and favour by ceremonies and frivolous businesses; yea, they offer largely for a dispensation to live in their sins, which they had as lief be knocked on the head as part with. Interea per flexuosos circuitus fingunt se ad Deum accedere, a quo tamen semper cupiant esse remoti, saith Calvin; they fetch a compass about God, but care not to come near him. Heaven they would either steal if they could, or buy at any hand, if they might; fain would they pass e coeno ad coelum, a deliciis ad delicias, from Delilah’ s lap to Abraham’ s bosom; fain they would (as one saith) dance with the devil all day, and then sup with Christ at night. They seem here very inquisitive and solicitous about their soul’ s health; they give the half turn, sed ad Deum usque non revertuntur, but they return not even to God; like a horse in a mill, they move much, but remove not at all; like those silly women, 2 Timothy 3:6-7, or as ants that run to and fro about a mole hill, but grow not greater. And bow myself before the high God] Or, shall I bow myself, will that, or any like bodily exercise, please him or pacify him? If cringing or crouching will do it, if sackcloth and ashes, if hanging down the head and going softly, if penances and pilgrimages, &c., hypocrites do usually herein outdo the upright. Doth the publican look with his eye on the ground? the hypocritical Jews will hang down their heads like bulrushes. Doth Timothy weaken his constitution by abstinence? the Pharisee will never give over till his complexion be wholly withered and waned. Doth Paul correct his body with milder correction, as it were a blow on the cheek? the Jesuit will martyr his sides with the severe discipline of scorpions.

(6) Wherewith shall I come . . .?—This has been taken by some commentators as Balak’s question to Balaam, who gives his reply in Micah 6:8. Dean Stanley writes, after his picturesque manner, of “the short dialogue preserved, not by the Mosaic historian, but by the Prophet Micah, which at once exhibits the agony of the king and the lofty conceptions of the great Seer” (Jewish Church, Lect. 8). But it is rather in harmony with the context to understand it as the alarmed and conscience-stricken reply of the Jewish people impersonated in some earnest speaker to the pleading brought before them by the prophet in the Lord’s name.

Verse 6. Wherewith shall I come before the Lord] Now the people, as defendants, appear; but instead of vindicating themselves, or attempting to dispute what has been alleged against them, they seem at once to plead guilty; and now anxiously inquire how they shall appease the wrath of the Judge, how they shall make atonement for the sins already committed. Bow myself before the high God] They wish to pray, and to make supplication to their Judge; but how shall they come before him? They have no right to come into his presence. Some offering must be brought; but of what kind, or of what value? Their sin is unprecedented, and usual methods of access will not avail. They are distracted in their minds, and make a variety of proposals to themselves, some rational, some absurd and impossible, and some even sinful. Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings] This is reasonable, and according to the law; but this will be insufficient.

6–8. The people, feeling its need of atonement, anxiously (note the repeated questions) inquires of the prophet how it is to propitiate Jehovah. Bishop Butler, in his Sermon on the Character of Balaam, adopts the view that Micah 6:6-7 represent the question of Balak, and Micah 6:8 the answer of Balaam. This was probably suggested by 2 Kings 3:27, where it is recorded that the king of Moab offered up his eldest son as a burnt-offering. But the inference is hasty; human sacrifices were one of the abominations of Israel (see below), which most excited the reprobation of the prophets. Bishop Butler, too, had probably not realized the amount of personification which exists in the prophetic writings. It is the people personified which speaks in these two verses (6 and 7).

Wherewith shall I come before the Lord? - The people, thus arraigned, bursts in, as men do, with professions that they would be no more ungrateful; that they will do anything, everything - but what they ought.

JEHOVAH AND ISRAEL IN — THE , Micah 6:1 to Micah 7:20.With Micah 6:1, begins a new series of utterances.