He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God? He (Yahweh) hath showed thee - long ago, so that thou needest not ask the question, "Wherewith shall I come before the Lord?" etc., as if thou hadst never heard (Micah 6:6: cf. Deuteronomy 10:12; Deuteronomy 30:11-14).
O man - Hebrew, 'Adam:' the universal race of man, Jew and Gentile alike.
What is good - the 'good things to come' under Messiah, of which 'the law had the shadow.' The Mosaic sacrifices were but suggestive foreshadowings of His better sacrifice (Hebrews 9:23, 'It was necessary that the heavenly things themselves (should be purified) with better sacrifices than these;' Hebrews 10:1, "The law having a shadow of good things to come"). To have this "good" first "showed," or revealed by the Spirit, is the only basis for the superstructure of the moral requirements which follow. Thus the way was prepared for the Gospel. The banishment of the Jews from Palestine is designed to preclude the possibility of their looking to the Mosaic rites for redemption, and shuts them up to Messiah.
And what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy - preferred by God to sacrifices. For the latter, being positive ordinances, are only means designed with a view to the former, which being moral duties, are the ends, and of everlasting obligation (1 Samuel 15:22; Hosea 6:6; Hosea 12:6; Amos 5:22; Amos 5:24). Two duties toward man are specified-justice, or strict equity; and mercy, or a kindly abatement of what we might justly demand, and a hearty desire to do good to others.
And to walk humbly with thy God? - passive and active obedience toward God. The three moral duties here are summed up by our Lord (Matthew 23:23), "judgment, mercy, and faith" (in Luke 11:42, "the love of God"). Compare James 1:27, "Pure religion [religious service or worship, threeskeia (G2356)] and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction (mercy), and to keep himself unspotted from the world." (justice and faith). To walk with God is a walking by faith-implies constant prayer and watchfulness-familiar, yet "humble" converse with God (Genesis 5:24, "Enoch walked with God;" and Hebrews 11:5 states that faith was the principle of his walk with God; Genesis 17:1, "The Lord said unto Abram, I am the Almighty God: walk before me, and be thou perfect"). Henderson translates, 'be diligent in walking with thy God:' so the Septuagint, and Vulgate and Michaelis, 'with conscientious solicitude.' [But tsaana` (H6800), according to the Rabbis and Kimchi, Buxtorf, etc., means, to act humbly.] The cognate participial noun is translated "lowly" in Proverbs 11:2. Jerome's comment, though he probably errs in interpreting the word as implying anxious preparation, is worthy of note, 'We are enjoined to be prepared to walk with the Lord our God, never to be asleep at any hour, at no time to be secure, but always to expect the Master of the house as coming, and to fear the day of judgment, and in the night of this world to say, I sleep, but my heart waketh.'