Introduction: Complex Verses Requiring Careful Study
We continue in chapter 6 of Micha, from verse 9 onward. As noted previously, the verses in Micha are complex and cannot be understood through a superficial reading; one must sit and analyze every word. In this section of the chapter, the prophet rebukes the city for sins involving deceptive measures and weights, falsehood, and deceit, and announces the punishments that will follow. We will proceed verse by verse, citing the commentaries of Radak, Rashi, and the Malbim.
Verse 9: The Voice of Hashem Calls to the City
קוֹל ה' לָעִיר יִקְרָא וְתוּשִׁיָּה יִרְאֶה שְׁמֶךָ שִׁמְעוּ מַטֶּה וּמִי יְעָדָהּ׃ - The voice of Hashem calls to the city, and wisdom shall see Your Name: Hear the rod, and Who has appointed it.
Radak explains: "The voice of Hashem" refers to the word of the prophet. The prophet prophesies and proclaims that the Holy One, Blessed be He, calls out to the city - meaning the inhabitants of the city - telling them to repent. Which city? Either Shomron or Yerushalayim, as both were in need of repentance. Radak also brings another explanation: la'ir ("to the city") does not stem from ir (city), but rather from le'orer (to awaken), in the sense of spiritual awakening. The Holy One, Blessed be He, seeks to awaken the people to repentance.
This brings to mind a story that took place. Someone once approached the Brisker Rav wishing to share an interpretation of the piyyut, "I remember God and moan, when I see every city built upon its mound, while the city of God is degraded to the lowest depths." He said to him: I want to interpret "city" (ir) as an awakening (hitorerut). "Every city built upon its mound" - every awakening toward vanity stands firm: what fervor there is for soccer, what enthusiasm for going to movies, what excitement for traveling abroad on vacation! "While the city of God is degraded to the lowest depths" - the awakening toward the service of Hashem is cast down.
The Brisker Rav asked him: Have you ever been to France? He replied: Yes. The Rav asked: And is France in ruins? He answered: Certainly not, it is the City of Light. And London? It too is built up, magnificent, and attracts tourists. The Rav went over several other cities around the world with him, all beautifully built. He then said to him: If so, why not understand the words according to their plain meaning? "When I see every city built upon its mound" - the cities of the nations all stand firmly built, "while the city of God is degraded to the lowest depths." In plain terms: when there is a straightforward meaning (peshat), there is no need to look for inventive interpretations. This is worth noting because here Radak specifically felt compelled to interpret la'ir as awakening.
"And wisdom shall see Your Name" - what is tushiyyah (wisdom)? It refers to a person of wisdom and depth. When My voice calls out within the city, only the person of wisdom is awakened by the message and perceives Your Name, Master of the Universe. Note that this differs from Rashi, who explains that this refers to the prophet himself, who will see Your Name. According to Radak, only one who is wise takes the words to heart and understands the necessity of submitting before the Master of the Universe; the rest of the people neither hear nor understand, and are unworthy of being called people of wisdom. Furthermore, tushiyyah also signifies Torah; that is, only a person of Torah is genuinely moved by the message.
Reciting a Verse Corresponding to One's Name
Before proceeding to "Hear the rod, and Who has appointed it," we should mention an insight cited in an early edition of Rashi. Incidentally, it is very likely not Rashi himself, as it is well known that later additions were incorporated into the commentaries on the Prophets and mistakenly attributed to Rashi. In any case, it states there: From here we learn that whoever recites every day a verse that begins and ends with the letters that begin and end his name, the Torah rescues him from Gehennom. Indeed, Klal Yisrael has the custom at the conclusion of the Shemoneh Esreh prayer to recite a verse matching the first and last letters of one's name. For example, someone named Boaz says: "On the day I called, You answered me; You emboldened me with strength (oz) in my soul" - which begins with beit and ends with zayin. The reason for this is so that one will not forget his name on the Day of Judgment.
A question was once posed to Rav Ratzabi on this topic. The classic works record that if one can find a verse containing his actual name, or alternatively find a verse that begins with the first letter of his name and ends with the last letter, preference is given to the verse that begins and ends with those letters. If one finds a verse containing both, all the better. The question was raised: Why? After all, beginning and ending with the letters is only an allusion, whereas a verse that explicitly contains the name would seem preferable! In the example above, instead of reciting "On the day I called, You answered me," it would seem preferable to recite "And Boaz said to the reapers, Hashem be with you." Today, there are even printed charts listing verses for virtually every name.
Rav Ratzabi replied: Tell me, how does it work? The questioner answered: What do you mean? It is a segulah. The Rav said: One does not ask logical questions about a segulah. You do not understand how it works, so why question the formulation? In other words, only if one understood the exact spiritual mechanics could one argue which is preferable; when one does not understand how it operates, there is no basis for such an objection. It is a matter of segulah: recite a verse that begins and ends with those letters, and its spiritual efficacy ensures that one will remember his name on the Day of Judgment.
Pay attention to the precise wording: "the Torah saves him from Gehinnom," and it does not say there that he will remember his name for the Day of Judgment. The matter of remembering one's name for the Day of Judgment appears in the holy Shelah. And where is all this hinted at in the verse? Rashi does not elaborate, nor is elaboration easily found in the books, other than the fact that it is derived from here. From where? From "and sound wisdom will see Your Name."
This can be explained in two ways. One: tushiyah is from the root of forgetting (neshiyah), as in "the abyss of oblivion" (tehom haneshiyah), "I have forgotten prosperity" (nashiti tovah), "God has made me forget all my hardship" (nashani Elokim et kol amali), and "You neglected the Rock Who begot you" (Tzur yeladkha teshi). A person fears forgetfulness, and by reciting the verse, "will see Your Name" - he will see his name and remember it. The second way, especially according to Rashi, who does not speak of forgetting one's name but of the Torah saving him: tushiyah in its plain sense, Torah. By reciting a verse from the Torah, through the power of Torah he will see his name and remember it in the World to Come, and by virtue of this he will be saved from judgment. And one could say that the continuation of the verse also hints at this: "Hear the rod and Who appointed it," where the rod is Gehinnom - a rod of destructive angels, the rod that strikes.
Why One's Name Is Forgotten on the Day of Judgment
The holy Zohar says that those condemned to Gehinnom forget their names on the Day of Judgment. The holy books cite a reason for this: a person has a name associated with holiness and a name associated with the kelipah (the unholy shell), Heaven forbid. When a person is not entirely immersed in holiness - meaning, he does not fulfill his purpose in holiness - he forgets his name from the side of holiness, and remembers only his name from the side of the kelipah, the side that he strengthened through his actions. And when they ask him what his name is, he is beaten and struck until he remembers his name.
The Chafetz Chaim offers a different explanation, and how fitting these words are for the one who said them, whose entire essence was shemirat halashon (guarding one's tongue). We have learned that when a person speaks lashon hara about his fellow, his own sins are transferred to the fellow he spoke about, and he takes his fellow's merits for himself. Now imagine: Yaakov arrives Above, and they begin showing him his sins. He sees a severe sin and says, "I never did such a thing!" Another sin: "Not me, that was Eisav." And yet another sin, and another. Then he begins to ask himself: Wait, perhaps I am not Yaakov at all; perhaps I am Eisav? He loses his identity and forgets who he is, because those sins bestow upon him a different identity.
Therefore, we recite a verse so that the verse will remind him. And although on a deep level this is a segulah beyond our comprehension, the underlying point is that the Torah is eternal. Your name and all earthly matters are fleeting, and only one thing endures forever and exists both here and Above: the holy Torah. And because the Torah is eternal, the Torah is remembered, and by virtue of recalling the verse, one also remembers his name.
On the topic of a person forgetting his identity, they tell of someone who arrived at a hotel abroad, in South Africa, where he was told that they only admit black guests and do not allow whites. It was the only hotel around, and having no choice, he took shoe polish, smeared it thoroughly over his face, and checked in. However, he had to wake up early the next morning, so he told the porter, "Wake me up at six in the morning - be careful, wake me and not the other guests." The porter came and woke him at six. The man got up, forgot what had happened the previous night, went to the sink to wash his face, looked in the mirror, and did not recognize himself. He said, "What a fool this porter is - he woke up someone else!" Similarly, a person arrives Above and suddenly discovers that perhaps he is someone else entirely. Therefore, recite the verse so there will be no surprises, and better yet, do not speak lashon hara, and thereby avoid unpleasant surprises Above.
The Malbim's Explanation of the Verse: Jerusalem's Name Is "Yir'eh"
The Malbim reads the verse as follows: The voice of Hashem and sound wisdom shall call to the city, "Yir'eh is your name." This is based on the verse, "And Avraham called the name of that place Hashem Yir'eh." Originally, Jerusalem was called Shalem, as it is written, "and Malki-Tzedek, king of Shalem." Avraham Avinu added to it the name "Yir'eh," which contains a plea that Hashem will see and watch over it constantly. Now the prophet comes and reminds them: Remember that its name is "Yir'eh," for the eyes of Hashem your God are upon it, and let the city guard itself against rebelling against the word of Hashem, for here Divine Providence is intimate and constant. This is the meaning of "the voice of Hashem and sound wisdom" - both the voice of Hashem and the Torah called this city by the name "Yir'eh": the voice of Hashem, as it occurred by the voice of Hashem, and the Torah, for the Holy One, Blessed is He, agreed to this name and it was inscribed in the Torah.
Therefore, he says to the people, "Hear the rod and Who appointed it": once you see that the Holy One, Blessed is He, watches over your actions, listen to the rod - the punishing staff that chastises for your sins - and take note of "Who appointed it," Who designated this punishment. The stiff-necked people have three possible claims, and the prophet responds to all three: If you think that the Holy One, Blessed is He, does not see your deeds, of this it is said, "Yir'eh is your name" - remember that Hashem sees all. And if you think He does not wish to punish, of this it is said, "Hear the rod" - hear the sound of the rod. And if you think He lacks the ability to punish, of this it is said, "and Who appointed it" - Who designated this punishment, the Holy One, Blessed is He, Who has the power to punish.
Verse 10: Treasures of Wickedness and a Scant Measure
עוֹד הַאִשׁ בֵּית רָשָׁע אֹצְרוֹת רֶשַׁע וְאֵיפַת רָזוֹן זְעוּמָה׃ - Are there still in the house of the wicked treasures of wickedness, and a scant, cursed measure?
"Ha'esh" is like "hayesh" (is there?), as in the phrase, "As your soul lives, my lord the king, if there is." And the question is: Are there still treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked? Is there still anyone in the home of the wicked person who does not fear Hashem's punishments and continues to do evil deeds?
"And the scant, cursed measure" - the Malbim explains that the roznim (rulers and officials) were the ones appointed to supervise measurements; they would establish the standard eifah and calibrate the scales so they would be exact. The prophet says that even the eifah established by the roznim is cursed and abhorred; Hashem's wrath burns against it because the officials enacted unjust decrees, laws rooted in falsehood. It turns out that both the judges who are supposed to enforce justice and the officials who are supposed to legislate enact wicked laws in advance. Consequently, the Holy One, Blessed be He, holds the roznim - the leaders - strictly accountable as well.
Rashi, on the other hand, explains "a scant measure" as a diminished measure with which your wealthy cheat the poor, bringing them to emaciation and poverty.
Verse 11: Scales of Wickedness and Deceitful Weights
הַאֶזְכֶּה בְּמֹאזְנֵי רֶשַׁע וּבְכִיס אַבְנֵי מִרְמָה׃ - Shall I acquit [a person] with scales of wickedness, and with a bag of deceitful weights?
A parable illustrates this well. A story is told of a baker who once brought the butter vendor to court. The baker claimed: "Your Honor, I buy a certain amount of butter from this man every day, supposed to be a kilogram. One day I decided to weigh it, and it turned out to be only nine hundred grams, not a kilogram! It appears he has been cheating me for twenty years." The judge turned to the butter maker and asked: "What do you have to say in your defense?" He answered: "Your Honor, I do not take money from him; we barter. I supply him with butter and he gives me bread, equal weight for equal weight. To tell you the truth, in my dairy I have no calibrated weight stone; I only have a balance scale with two pans, and I do not own a one-kilo weight." The judge asked: "If so, how do you measure out a kilo?" He replied: "Very simple. I take the one-kilo loaf of bread I buy from him, place it on the other side of the balance, and weigh out his butter according to that."
This is precisely what the Malbim explains here. The sellers established a diminished eifah - giving only nine hundred grams instead of a full kilo - and consequently, the buyers began using debased shekels as well. The buyer knew that what he was receiving was not a full measure, so he paid with a shekel that was not a full weight. In our days, counterfeit paper currency has no intrinsic value, but in those days, silver coins were made of real silver, copper of copper, and gold of gold. It was crucial to verify that a coin had not been clipped or worn down, since a debased coin was invalid currency. Because the buyer knew he was receiving less merchandise, he brought diminished coins from the outset, paying proportionally to what he received. Fraud permeated both sides: the merchants dispensed undersized goods using a diminished measure, and the buyers paid with debased coins.
Regarding this, the prophet proclaims: "Shall I acquit with scales of wickedness" - do you imagine that I will hold you blameless for possessing wicked scales, "and with a bag of deceitful weights" - for keeping deceitful weights in your pouch to lighten the shekel in response to the diminished measure? Scripture declares: "Diverse weights and diverse measures, both of them are an abomination to Hashem" (Mishlei 20:10). What is meant by "both of them"? The Malbim explains: even when both occur together - when one sells with deceitful weights and the other reciprocates with a diminished measure, so that the lighter payment precisely matches the smaller quantity - it remains an abomination before Hashem. Even if you claim, "We broke even; I only gave according to what I received," the Torah tells you: absolutely not. Dishonesty is strictly forbidden, and one cannot justify deceit by saying, "I cheated because he cheated me." Do not patronize him, or openly agree to pay less in honest currency, but his fraud is unjust and your fraud is unjust.
Verse 12: Violence, Falsehood, and Deceit
אֲשֶׁר עֲשִׁירֶיהָ מָלְאוּ חָמָס וְיֹשְׁבֶיהָ דִּבְּרוּ שָׁקֶר וּלְשׁוֹנָם רְמִיָּה בְּפִיהֶם׃ - For her rich men are full of violence, and her inhabitants have spoken falsehood, and their tongue is deceitful in their mouth.
"For her rich men" refers to the wealthy of the city - whether Shomron or Yerushalayim - who "are full of violence," filling their homes with the spoils of what they extort and steal from the city's inhabitants. The Malbim explains that they distorted both the measure of the eifah and the measure of the shekel, as it says elsewhere: "To diminish the eifah and to enlarge the shekel" (Amos 8:5).
"And her inhabitants have spoken falsehood" - besides the rich, the ordinary inhabitants, the rest of the populace, sinned as well. And what is the distinction between "spoke falsehood" (dibru sheker) and "their tongue is deceitful" (leshonam remiyah), which appears to be redundant? The Malbim explains, as he frequently elaborates in his commentary on Mishlei: ordinary speech (dibbur) refers to simple, blatant lies. In contrast, when one speaks with calculated cunning and intellect, Scripture attributes it to the tongue (lashon). The tongue is more internal, expressing subtle, sophisticated thoughts, whereas basic speech is external and conveys straightforward matters.
According to this, "its inhabitants have spoken falsehood" refers to blatant lying, where people lied openly without any fear. Meanwhile, "and their tongue is deceit" refers to more sophisticated and cunning speech, where a person surrounds you with deception and creates a false appearance of truth, such that all of his words sound plausible, and unless you examine them carefully, you do not detect the lie at all. Therefore Scripture specifies the "tongue", which is more internal, and with this tongue "in his heart he lays his ambush", "in their mouth", concealed within the mouth.
Verse 13: I Have Made You Sick by Striking You
וְגַם אֲנִי הֶחֱלֵיתִי הַכּוֹתֶךָ הַשְׁמֵם עַל חַטֹּאתֶךָ׃ - And I too have made you sick by striking you, making you desolate because of your sins.
Radak explains: Just as you made the poor and oppressed sick through the deceits you perpetrated, measure for measure, "I too have made you sick by striking you" - I struck you until you became ill. And "making you desolate because of your sins" means that I will reduce you to desolation for the sins you have committed. Radak brings another explanation: I will cause others to be appalled and astonished at the punishments you receive. People will see what has befallen you and wonder in amazement: "Could such a thing have been done to him?"
The Malbim explains: "I have made you sick by striking you" - I persistently struck you with the rod, the very rod we saw earlier in "Hear the rod and Who appointed it", until through this I made you sick. And since all of this was to no avail, "making you desolate because of your sins" - I must desolate you until you are left in complete ruin. Thus, according to the Malbim, there are two stages here: first blows, in the hope that you might awaken, and if that proved ineffective, desolation.
Verse 14: You Shall Eat and Not Be Satisfied
אַתָּה תֹאכַל וְלֹא תִשְׂבָּע וְיֶשְׁחֲךָ בְּקִרְבֶּךָ וְתַסֵּג וְלֹא תַפְלִיט וַאֲשֶׁר תְּפַלֵּט לַחֶרֶב אֶתֵּן׃ - You shall eat and not be satisfied, and your sickness shall be within you; and you shall take hold but not rescue, and that which you rescue I will give over to the sword.
Here the prophet begins to detail the nature of the affliction about which he said, "I have made you sick by striking you." Even though you will eat and have food, you will not be satisfied, and despite it all, "and your illness [veyeshchecha] shall be within you" - the food will bend you low and sicken you from within. The Malbim explains that this refers to a type of illness brought about by overeating and excess. In other words, the problem will not be a lack of food, but rather that the eating itself will cause sickness.
"And you shall reach but not rescue [ve-tasseg velo taflit]" - according to the Malbim, you will try to recover the property and grain that your enemies took from you; you will pursue them and overtake them, but you will not succeed in rescuing and retrieving the plunder from their hands. And "that which you rescue", even whatever you do manage to pry from the enemy's grasp, "I will give over to the sword", and people will be slain over it by the sword. As for the word "tasseg", it can be interpreted as deriving from overtaking [lehasig] the enemies, even though here it is spelled with a samech, for we often see in the Prophets that samech and sin are interchangeable. In truth, however, according to the Malbim's explanation, it derives from separation or turning back, as in "turned back [nasog achor]": you will attempt to separate from the enemies what they took from you, and yet you will not succeed in wresting it from their hands.
Radak brings a different explanation, and Rashi similarly explains in the name of Rabbeinu Menachem: "ve-tasseg" is related to conception [hasagah], that a woman will conceive and become pregnant, "velo taflit", but will not successfully deliver; rather, the fetus will die in her womb, God forbid. We find this usage in the verse, "His bull breeds and does not fail [velo yag'il]", meaning the bull impregnates the cow and the cow does not cast out its fetus, for hag'alat keilim (purging vessels) is the expelling of what was absorbed in the vessel. In other words, she did not miscarry her young, but gave birth in due season. And here, "and that which you bring forth", even what a woman manages to deliver through a viable birth, will nevertheless be given over to the sword.
Verse 15: You Shall Sow, but You Shall Not Reap
אַתָּה תִזְרַע וְלֹא תִקְצוֹר אַתָּה תִדְרֹךְ זַיִת וְלֹא תָסוּךְ שֶׁמֶן וְתִירוֹשׁ וְלֹא תִשְׁתֶּה יָּיִן׃ - You shall sow, but you shall not reap; you shall tread olives, but you shall not anoint yourself with oil; and sweet wine, but you shall not drink wine.
The prophet tells them of further curses: a curse on the fruit of the ground and a curse on the fruit of the tree. You will sow grain and legumes and not merit to reap them; you will tread olives and not merit to anoint yourselves with oil; and you will tread sweet wine and not drink wine. And why? Because the enemies will consume everything.
Pasuk 16: The Decrees of Omri and the Deeds of the House of Achav
וְיִשְׁתַּמֵּר חֻקּוֹת עָמְרִי וְכֹל מַעֲשֵׂה בֵית אַחְאָב וַתֵּלְכוּ בְּמֹעֲצוֹתָם לְמַעַן תִּתִּי אֹתְךָ לְשַׁמָּה וְיֹשְׁבֶיהָ לִשְׁרֵקָה וְחֶרְפַּת עַמִּי תִּשָּׂאוּ׃ - "For the statutes of Omri are kept, and all the deeds of the house of Achav, and you walk in their counsels, so that I should make you a desolation and its inhabitants an object of hissing; and you shall bear the disgrace of My people."
Radak explains: Even so, you will not accept reproof; these tribulations will not convince you to repent, and the statutes of Omri are still preserved. Incidentally, in the text of Radak as printed before us, it reads: "And the statute of Omri is still preserved בכסות [in a covering] they abandoned My statutes," using the singular form "yishtamer." One might puzzle over what this word "kesut" means here. Checking an early Venice edition of Tanach from several centuries ago, the text appears that way as well. However, upon consulting the Aleppo Codex (Keter Aram Tzova), where the manuscript tradition is far more accurate, it turns out that a final mem was mistaken for a samech. The text should not read "bechesut" [בכסות], but rather "bachem vata'azvu chukotai" [בכם ותעזבו חוקותי - "among you, and you abandoned My statutes"]. The word "bachem" and the vav and tav of "vata'azvu" were joined together, and a copyist misunderstood, misreading the final mem as a samech and writing "bechesut." Radak's true meaning is therefore: The statute of Omri is still preserved among you, while you have abandoned My statutes.
The Malbim explains that here the prophet elaborates on what he said earlier, "to make you desolate because of your sins": Although I struck you with illness, see that it availed you nothing - the decrees of Omri were still preserved, for Omri added wicked decrees beyond the laws enacted by Yerovam. Furthermore, "and all the deeds of the house of Achav" - you also follow the practices of the house of Achav, who worshipped the Baal. You are not satisfied with the decrees of Omri alone, but continue and adopt the deeds of the house of Achav as well. Therefore, "that I should make you a desolation" - you will become completely desolate, because you were not content with evil alone, but continually added to it.
"And you shall bear the disgrace of My people" - you will suffer punishment for the disgrace of My people, since you caused My people to become a disgrace. As has been noted several times, a person is punished even for the very fact that the Holy One, Blessed be He, is compelled to punish him. For when Hashem punishes the people, it causes sorrow to the Holy One, Blessed be He, and furthermore, His Name is desecrated. After all, the nations say: Look at the people of Israel, Hashem's people, driven out of His land; see what punishments they receive and how they are constantly persecuted. Thus, a chilul Hashem is created. Therefore, beyond the punishment due to a person for his own wicked deeds, he has also desecrated Hashem's Name by forcing the Holy One, Blessed be He, to punish him, thereby causing His Name to be disgraced among the nations, and for this too there is a punishment.
In Summary:
In this part of the chapter, the prophet calls upon the city to awaken and reminds it that the Holy One, Blessed be He, watches over it constantly, for Avraham called the place "Hashem yir'eh" (Hashem will see). The three claims of the stubborn-hearted are refuted: Hashem sees, Hashem wills to punish, and Hashem has the power to punish. From here, the prophet proceeds to detail the sins: treasures of wickedness, a diminished ephah and deceptive weights, wealthy people filled with violence, overt falsehood, and covert deceit of the tongue - and the Malbim teaches that "both are an abomination to Hashem," even when the deception is mutual. Afterward come the punishments in two stages: first, afflictions that bring illness, and if those do not avail, total desolation - eating without satisfaction, sowing without reaping, and possessions slipping from one's grasp. All this occurs because the statutes of Omri and the deeds of the house of Achav are still preserved among them. Along with all this, the lesson examined the practice of reciting a verse that begins and ends with the letters of one's name, its connection to the eternity of the Torah, and the Chafetz Chaim's warning that lashon hara can cause a person to lose his very identity and forget who he is.