Interpretation of the book of the prophet Micah

Between 412 and 418 St. Cyril of Alexandria wrote a series of interpretations on the minor prophets - a total of 12 parts, according to the number of prophetic books. The preface to each book describes the historical setting and purpose of the prophecies. The beginning of the preface to the interpretation of the Book of the Prophet Hosea is an introduction to the entire corpus of interpretations. Interpretations of St. Kirill are reduced to the unity of typological (proto-educational), spiritual (anagogical) and literal (historical) methods. In his opinion, the books of the prophets do not need allegorical interpretation to clarify their Christological meaning, since by their nature they prophesy about Christ. For St. Cyril of Alexandria, there are only two meanings of Holy Scripture: literal and spiritual, which seem to penetrate each other. The area of ​​spiritual interpretation certainly includes the disclosure of moral meaning, examples of which are contained in these comments. All the holy prophets have one God-loving goal - to convince Israel so that it courageously decides to renounce its errors and prefer to serve the living and true God, and to be adorned with the virtues of truth, removing as much as possible from itself the accusation of shameful deeds. Many prophets appeared in sequential order, when in some way God Himself testified and through so many lips clearly foretold that if they do not want to live righteously and do not even take care to finally make a conversion to the better; then they themselves will incite righteous punishment against themselves and, having been subjected to self-inflicted disaster, will have to assimilate the causes of their suffering to their own moods. If the speeches of the holy prophets state the same thing, then let no one condemn them, imputing them as identical words, but let him think carefully about this. It is impossible to find a single moment in time at which there would not be people capable of correcting sinners; and just as no one with common sense will accuse the fact that at any time there are doctors who avert the same of our diseases with appropriate medical remedies, so, I think, no one will dare to reproach the holy prophets if they turn out to speak with the same deeds and words; for there was only one Lord, who spoke to them all, and at all times pointed out to those who were mistaken the people who could return them to the right path. All of them predict wars, captivity, devastation of cities, suffering, sorrow, sobs for the dead, troubles with those left behind, and the cruelty of the devastators. In general, everyone can see that in their speeches there is a presentation of all kinds of cruelties everywhere, because this is necessary for the benefit of those who are mistaken. After all, sometimes even an unbridled tendency to apostasy and sin is suppressed by intimidation. So, the divine Micah prophesies during the reigns of Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah. During the reign of Jotham, Pekah, the son of Romelin, and Raason, king of Syria, fought against Jerusalem. After the death of Jotham, Ahaz reigned, who, as the war dragged on, bribed the Assyrian with money and called for help, because he was unable to repel the forces of the enemies. This one came, seized Damascus and killed Raason (Isa.7:1; 2Chron.28:5). Then after this, during the reign of Rehoboam, the son of Joash, in Samaria, and after him Azariah and, thirdly, Manaim, came Thula, the king of Assyria, who returned to his fatherland only for a lot of money, and then with difficulty (2 Kings 15:1). After Thula, the Assyrian Tiglath-pileser fought against the land of Judah and destroyed many cities of Samaria, and annexed all of Galilee to Naphtali to himself (2 Kings 15:29). But this was discussed in detail when we compiled the interpretation of blessed Hosea. Now they mentioned this out of necessity to determine the time of Micah’s prophecy; for an attentive and truth-loving listener must necessarily know the reason why the kings of Jerusalem were mentioned, I say to Jotham and Ahaz. However, the time of his prophecy extends to the reign of Hezekiah, during which Sennacherib, also the king of Assyria, again took possession of the Samaritans and devastated the cities of the Philistines, that is, the Palestinians. Then, having taken Lachish (this is a city of the kingdom of Judah), from here he sends Rapsak to besiege Jerusalem, who, with his arrogance and insolent words against God, incurs righteous punishment when one hundred and eighty-five thousand people in the Assyrian army died in one night. So, “the word of the Lord came to Micah the son of Morasth,” he says (Mic. 1:1). You might be interested in: