Micah 7 — Hebrew and Greek compared
Disparate in this chapter: 7:3, 7:4, 7:11, 7:12
Each card keeps the independently rendered source readings above their shared comparison and reception notes. The badge records the source’s governing classification; disparate readings are marked in red. Each reading retains its original reference.
Chapter 7
Lament, hope and incomparable mercy
Verse 7:1 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:1 Alas for me! I have become like the gatherings of summer fruit, like the gleanings of the vintage: no cluster to eat, no first-ripe fig that my life longs for.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:1 Alas! I have become like someone gathering stubble at harvest and a gleaning at vintage, with no cluster available to eat the first fruits. Alas, my soul,
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew summer-fruit gatherings become Greek stubble at harvest. Hebrew longs for first-ripe fruit; Greek gives an awkward eating/first-fruits construction and an address to the soul that continues into 7:2. Its second alas is retained.
Verse 7:2 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:2 The faithful person has perished from the land; there is no upright person among humankind. They all lie in wait for bloodshed; each hunts his brother with a net.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:2 for the devout person has perished from the earth, and no one acts rightly among people. They all litigate for bloodshed; each crushes his neighbor with crushing.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew ambush and net hunting becomes Greek litigation and crushing. The loss of upright people agrees; Hebrew brother becomes Greek neighbor.
Verse 7:3 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:3 Their hands are skilled at evil: the official demands, the judge acts for payment, and the great man speaks his own craving, and they weave it together.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:3 They prepare their hands for evil; the ruler asks, and the judge spoke peaceful words—it is his soul's desire. And I will remove
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew identifies paid judgment and coordinated craving; Greek gives the judge peaceful words and begins a first-person removal statement completed in 7:4. The Greek sentence must not be read as lacking its object; the object stands in the next source verse.
Verse 7:4 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:4 The best of them is like a brier, the most upright worse than a thorn hedge. The day of your watchmen, your visitation, has come; now will be their confusion.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:4 their good things like a moth eating away and walking upon a measuring rod on the day of watching. Woe, woe! Your punishments have arrived; now will be their weeping.
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew compares people to thorn plants; Greek completes I will remove their good things with a moth/measuring-rod image. Confusion becomes weeping, and Greek adds two woes. Greek walking upon a measuring rod is obscure and preserved provisionally; Hebrew's compact upright/hedge comparison also remains open to review.
Verse 7:5 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:5 Do not trust a neighbor; do not rely on a close companion. Guard the doors of your mouth from her who lies in your embrace.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:5 Do not put confidence in friends or hope in leaders. With your bed companion, beware of entrusting anything to her.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew close companion becomes Greek leaders. Both warn against confiding even to an intimate woman, but Hebrew keeps the mouth-door image while Greek expressly names entrusting something.
Verse 7:6 Same
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:6 For a son treats his father with contempt, a daughter rises against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man's enemies are the people of his own house.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:6 For a son dishonors his father, a daughter will rise against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man's enemies are all the men in his house.
Classification & Notes
Same. Text: The three family ruptures and household enemies correspond. Greek explicitly includes all and uses men where Hebrew's household expression can denote its members more generally. Saints: Matthew 10:35–36 reuses these household divisions in Jesus’ speech about the consequences of His mission, with an explicit I came to divide. That mission statement belongs to Matthew and is not added to Micah’s description [MAT10].
Verse 7:7 Same
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:7 But I will watch for YHWH; I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:7 But I will look toward the Lord; I will wait upon God my Savior. My God will listen to me.
Classification & Notes
Same. Text: The speaker turns to divine help, confident of a hearing in both texts.
Verse 7:8 Similar
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:8 Do not rejoice over me, my enemy! Though I have fallen, I will rise; though I sit in darkness, YHWH is a light for me.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:8 Do not rejoice over me, my enemy, because I have fallen! I will rise, for if I sit in darkness, the Lord will shine for me.
Classification & Notes
Similar. Text: Both address a feminine enemy and expect light and rising after a fall. Hebrew describes YHWH as light; Greek gives His shining future force.
Verse 7:9 Same
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:9 I will bear YHWH's indignation, for I have sinned against Him, until He pleads my case and executes justice for me. He will bring me out into the light; I will see His righteousness.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:9 I will bear the Lord's anger, for I sinned against Him, until He vindicates my case. He will execute my judgment and bring me out into the light; I will see His righteousness.
Classification & Notes
Same. Text: Both combine confession, accepted discipline and hope for divine vindication and light. Neither removes the speaker's admitted sin.
Verse 7:10 Same
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:10 My enemy will see, and shame will cover her who said to me, “Where is YHWH your God?” My eyes will look upon her; now she will be trampled like mud in the streets.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:10 My enemy will see and clothe herself in shame, she who says to me, “Where is the Lord your God?” My eyes will look upon her; now she will become a trampling place like mud in the streets
Classification & Notes
Same. Text: The mocking enemy's shame and trampling agree. Greek's mud comparison continues into the opening brick-plastering phrase of 7:11.
Verse 7:11 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:11 A day for building your walls! On that day the boundary will be far extended.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:11 on a day of brick plastering. That day is your obliteration, and it will rub away your ordinances—
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew anticipates wall building and a distant boundary; Greek continues the prior mud image and announces obliteration and erased ordinances. Hebrew ḥoq can also mean decree, so the adopted boundary reading and its classification are provisional. Greek's final subject, that day, occurs at the opening of 7:12.
Verse 7:12 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:12 On that day they will come to you from Assyria and the cities of Egypt, from Egypt as far as the River, from sea to sea and mountain to mountain.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:12 that day. Your cities will come to leveling and division among Assyrians, and your fortified cities to division from Tyre as far as Syria's river—a day of water and tumult.
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew coming from distant regions becomes Greek leveling and partition of cities. Hebrew Matsor, here Egypt, becomes Greek Tyre, while sea-to-sea and mountain-to-mountain becomes a day of water and tumult. The Greek sentence boundary follows its own source numbering rather than Hebrew's opening.
Verse 7:13 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:13 The land will become a desolation because of its inhabitants, because of the fruit of their deeds.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:13 The land will become an obliteration together with those inhabiting it, from the fruits of their practices.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew names inhabitants as the cause of desolation; Greek explicitly includes them with the land in destruction. Both connect the result to their deeds.
Verse 7:14 Similar
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:14 Shepherd Your people with Your staff, the flock of Your inheritance, dwelling alone in a forest amid Carmel. Let them graze in Bashan and Gilead as in days of old.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:14 Shepherd Your people with Your rod, the sheep of Your inheritance, camping by themselves in a forest amid Carmel. They will graze in Bashan and Gilead as in the days of old.
Classification & Notes
Similar. Text: The prayer for the inherited flock and the three regions agree. Hebrew's grazing request becomes Greek future grazing. Carmel is retained as a place name, while fertile country remains a possible Hebrew sense.
Verse 7:15 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:15 “As in the days when you came out from Egypt's land, I will show him wonders.”
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:15 And as in the days of your departure from Egypt, you will see wonderful things.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew promises I will show him, with a shift from second-person departure to a third-person recipient; Greek says plural you will see. Both recall Egypt. The Hebrew him is preserved without silently replacing it with you or them.
Verse 7:16 Same
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:16 Nations will see and be ashamed of all their might. They will put a hand over their mouth; their ears will become deaf.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:16 Nations will see and be ashamed of all their strength. They will place hands over their mouth; their ears will be deafened.
Classification & Notes
Same. Text: The nations' humbled strength, silenced mouths and deafened ears correspond.
Verse 7:17 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:17 They will lick dust like a snake; like creatures crawling on the earth they will tremble out of their enclosures. They will come in dread to YHWH our God and fear You.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:17 They will lick dust like snakes dragging along the earth; they will be confounded in their confinement. They will be astonished at the Lord our God and fear You.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew moves trembling creatures out of their enclosures toward God; Greek keeps them in confinement and describes astonishment. Both end by directly addressing You after naming our God.
Verse 7:18 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:18 Who is a God like You, bearing away iniquity and passing over rebellion for the remnant of His inheritance? He does not hold His anger forever, because He delights in steadfast love.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:18 Who is a God like You, removing injustices and passing over impieties for the remaining ones of His inheritance? He did not retain His anger as a testimony, because He desires mercy.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew forever becomes Greek as a testimony, changing the description of anger's retention. Both praise divine forgiveness for the inherited remnant and delight in kindness or mercy. The shift from You to His and He is retained in both.
Verse 7:19 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:19 He will again have compassion on us; He will subdue our iniquities. You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:19 He Himself will turn back and pity us; He will sink our injustices, and they will be thrown into the depths of the sea—all our sins.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew subduing becomes Greek sinking. Hebrew addresses You and ends with their sins; Greek uses passive casting and our sins. Neither pronoun shift is silently harmonized. Greek's final accusative phrase is retained as a clarifying afterthought despite its awkward agreement with the passive clause.
Verse 7:20 Same
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
7:20 You will grant faithfulness to Jacob, steadfast love to Abraham, as You swore to our fathers from days of old.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
7:20 You will grant truth to Jacob, mercy to Abraham, just as You swore to our fathers in the former days.
Classification & Notes
Same. Text: Both end with the ancestral oath, Jacob and Abraham, and divine fidelity expressed through corresponding truth/faithfulness and kindness/mercy terms.