"... Just as Amos criticizes dishonest merchants who make the ephah “small” and the shekel “great” (Amos 8:5), Micah 6:10-11 also cautions them against cheating their customers with a false measure of grain ... A just society was one in which the government standardized and guaranteed honest weights and measures. The prologue to the law code of the Ur III king Ur-Nammu includes a list of the measures he had taken to insure justice and truth throughout his realm. This included the standardization of all the copper and stone weights used in commerce. The Egyptian Instruction of Amenemope warns against tampering with scales or the weights used for buying and selling. In a Babylonian Hymn to Shamash, Shamash as the god of justice will punish the merchant who uses deceptive practices with regard to the scales or the weights. The fact that Micah complains of false weights indicates a lawless period without strong government or a concern for covenant obligation (see Proverbs 11:1; 20:23) ..."