52:24 The captain of the royal guard took Seraiah the chief priest, Zephaniah the priest who was second in rank, and the three doorkeepers. 1 52:25 From the city he took an official who was in charge of the soldiers, seven of the king’s advisers who were discovered in the city, an official army secretary who drafted citizens 2 for military service, and sixty citizens who were discovered in the middle of the city. 52:26 Nebuzaradan, the captain of the royal guard, took them and brought them to the king of Babylon at Riblah. 52:27 The king of Babylon ordered them to be executed 3 at Riblah in the territory of Hamath.
So Judah was taken into exile away from its land.
3:2 yet you 4 hate what is good, 5
and love what is evil. 6
You flay my people’s skin 7
and rip the flesh from their bones. 8
3:3 You 9 devour my people’s flesh,
strip off their skin,
and crush their bones.
You chop them up like flesh in a pot 10 –
like meat in a kettle.
1 sn See the note at Jer 35:4.
2 tn Heb “men, from the people of the land” (also later in this verse).
3 tn Heb “struck them down and killed them.”
4 tn Heb “the ones who.”
5 tn Or “good.”
6 tn Or “evil.”
7 tn Heb “their skin from upon them.” The referent of the pronoun (“my people,” referring to Jacob and/or the house of Israel, with the
8 tn Heb “and their flesh from their bones.”
sn Micah compares the social injustice perpetrated by the house of Jacob/Israel to cannibalism, because it threatens the very lives of the oppressed.
9 tn Heb “who.”
10 tc The MT reads “and they chop up as in a pot.” The translation assumes an emendation of כַּאֲשֶׁר (ka’asher, “as”) to כִּשְׁאֵר (kish’er, “like flesh”).