In chapter 3 we enter upon the body of Micah’s prophecy. Those directly responsible for the awful condition of the children of Israel, the heads and princes, and the prophets, seers and diviners are confronted with the truth about their own lives. What a picture these verses present! Was it not for the governors of the land to know and to practice judgment? but they hated the good, and loved the evil; they devoured the substance of those without power to resist them.
God is not mocked (verse 4): “Then shall they cry unto the Lord, but He will not hear them.” He will hide His face from them because of the working evil.
Verses 5-7 deal with the prophets, seers and diviners, —false, all of them, using their positions to deceive and to get advantage over their victims. The day drew near when they should be quite unable to pretend to get an answer from God; their trade would be gone.
In verses 8-12 Micah speaks as God’s messenger, closing with the prophecy, fulfilled in the time of Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel, that Zion should be plowed as a field and Jerusalem heaps. (See the reference to this part of his prophecy in Jeremiah 26:18).