Texts in Conversation
Isaiah and Micah both walk around stripped and barefoot as a prophetic sign, the only two prophets in the Hebrew Bible to do so. Isaiah acts out the coming defeat of Egypt and Cush, while Micah acts out the exile of his own people.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Micah 1:8
Hebrew Bible
7 All her carved idols will be smashed to pieces; all her metal cult statues will be destroyed by fire. I will make a waste heap of all her images. Since she gathered the metal as a prostitute collects her wages, the idols will become a prostitute’s wages again.” 8 For this reason I will mourn and wail; I will walk around barefoot and without my outer garments. I will howl like a jackal and screech like an ostrich.33 9 For Samaria’s disease is incurable. It has infected Judah; it has spread to the leadership of my people and even to Jerusalem!
Isaiah 20:3
Hebrew Bible
2 At that time the Lord announced through Isaiah son of Amoz: “Go, remove the sackcloth from your waist and take your sandals off your feet.” He did as instructed and walked around in undergarments and barefoot. 3 Later the Lord explained, “In the same way that my servant Isaiah has walked around in undergarments and barefoot for the past three years, as an object lesson and omen pertaining to Egypt and Cush, 4 so the king of Assyria will lead away the captives of Egypt and the exiles of Cush, both young and old. They will be in undergarments and barefoot, with the buttocks exposed; the Egyptians will be publicly humiliated.
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Notes and References
"... For Isaiah 20:2, readers should therefore probably imagine that the prophet was concerned with repentance or mourning, which would not be surprising given the situation of his people from a prophetic point of view. Thus, Isaiah's nakedness and barefootedness can be seen as an intensification of his lamentation, paralleling Micah's lament over Samaria's destruction in Micah 1:8-9: 'So I will wail and howl, I will go barefoot and naked, I will make a howling like the jackals and a moaning like the ostriches.' ..."
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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