Micah 6:1-2 KJV
Hear ye now what the Lord saith;
Arise, contend thou before the mountains,
and let the hills hear thy voice.
Hear ye, O mountains,
the Lord’s controversy,
and ye strong foundations of the earth:
for the Lord hath a controversy with his people,
and he will plead with Israel.
Now listen to what the Lord says: ‘Stand up! Explain in front of the mountains what I want to say. Speak loud so that the hills can hear your voice. Listen, you mountains. Hear this, you strong places that have always been there deep in the earth. The Lord has a quarrel with Israel’s people. Hear the reasons why the Lord is angry with you, his people.’
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Contend thou
Israel is called by Yahweh to struggle to surmount (a difficulty or danger) with Him in controversy.
Micah 5:11-13 suggested the transition from those happy times described in the fourth and fifth chapters, to the prophet’s own degenerate times and people.
Before the mountains
In their presence; personified as if they are the witnesses (compare Micah 1:2, Deuteronomy 32:1, Isaiah 1:2). Not as translated, or put in a Marginal note, in some Bibles, “with”; as God’s controversy is with Israel, not with the mountains.
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I think the word ‘contend’ is better translated with: to conduct a case or (legal) suit, judgment, or legal action.
What came in the first chapter returns here (Micah 1:2).
God challenges His people in judgment. This time, not only the indictment is pronounced, but also the judgment.
The strange thing is that God does not only judge His people, but according to verse 1, also the mountains and the hills.
The latter becomes understandable when we read this as part of the indictment.
With the prophets we read time and again that the people of Israel sacrificed on the heights for the idols. Everywhere in Israel, on mountains and hills, the temples and altars were found for the Baals and the Astartes. Israel acts as if Baal is her “lord,” her “owner.”
But the Lord says, They are My people.
Therefore the Lord also challenges the high places and the Baals.
The Baals have no right to God’s people.
After all grew crooked by idolatry, the relationships are put right again, by God.
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Amen God is the creator of mankind and the mountains and the sea and everything in it