6 Thus says Yahweh: "For three transgressions of Israel, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; Because they have sold the righteous for silver, And the needy for a pair of shoes;
And have cast lots for my people, And have given a boy for a prostitute, And sold a girl for wine, that they may drink.
You who hate the good, And love the evil; Who tear off their skin, And their flesh from off their bones; Who also eat the flesh of my people, And flay their skin from off them, And break their bones, And chop them in pieces, as for the pot, And as flesh within the caldron.
Forasmuch therefore as you trample on the poor, And take taxes from him of wheat: You have built houses of hewn stone, But you will not dwell in them. You have planted pleasant vineyards, But you shall not drink their wine. For I know how many your offenses, And how great are your sins-- You who afflict the just, Who take a bribe, And who turn aside the needy in the courts.
because they didn't obey the voice of Yahweh their God, but transgressed his covenant, even all that Moses the servant of Yahweh commanded, and would not hear it, nor do it.
Now they sin more and more, And have made themselves molten images of their silver, Even idols according to their own understanding, All of them the work of the craftsmen. They say of them, "They offer human sacrifice and kiss the calves." Therefore they will be like the morning cloud, And like the dew that passes away early, Like the chaff that is driven with the whirlwind out of the threshing floor, And like the smoke out of the chimney.
Are there yet treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked, And a short ephah{An ephah is a measure of volume, and a short ephah is made smaller than a full ephah for the purpose of cheating customers.} that is accursed? Shall I be pure with dishonest scales, And with a bag of deceitful weights? Her rich men are full of violence, Her inhabitants speak lies, And their tongue is deceitful in their speech. Therefore I also have struck you with a grievous wound. I have made you desolate because of your sins. You shall eat, but not be satisfied. Your humiliation will be in your midst. You will store up, but not save; And that which you save I will give up to the sword. You will sow, but won't reap. You will tread the olives, but won't anoint yourself with oil; And crush grapes, but won't drink the wine. For the statutes of Omri are kept, And all the works of the house of Ahab. You walk in their counsels, That I may make you a ruin, And her inhabitants a hissing; And you will bear the reproach of my people."
Hear this, you who desire to swallow up the needy, And cause the poor of the land to fail, Saying, 'When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell grain? And the Sabbath, that we may market wheat, Making the ephah small, and the shekel large, And dealing falsely with balances of deceit; That we may buy the poor for silver, And the needy for a pair of shoes, And sell the sweepings with the wheat?'"
Those who put far away the evil day, And cause the seat of violence to come near; Who lie on beds of ivory, And stretch themselves on their couches, And eat the lambs out of the flock, And the calves out of the midst of the stall; Who strum on the strings of a harp; Who invent for themselves instruments of music, like David; Who drink wine in bowls, And anoint themselves with the best oils; But they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph. Therefore they will now go captive with the first who go captive; And the feasting and lounging will end.
It was so, because the children of Israel had sinned against Yahweh their God, who brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods, and walked in the statutes of the nations, whom Yahweh cast out from before the children of Israel, and of the kings of Israel, which they made. The children of Israel did secretly things that were not right against Yahweh their God: and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fortified city; and they set them up pillars and Asherim on every high hill, and under every green tree; and there they burnt incense in all the high places, as did the nations whom Yahweh carried away before them; and they worked wicked things to provoke Yahweh to anger; and they served idols, of which Yahweh had said to them, You shall not do this thing. Yet Yahweh testified to Israel, and to Judah, by every prophet, and every seer, saying, Turn you from your evil ways, and keep my commandments and my statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent to you by my servants the prophets. Notwithstanding, they would not hear, but hardened their neck, like the neck of their fathers, who didn't believe in Yahweh their God. They rejected his statutes, and his covenant that he made with their fathers, and his testimonies which he testified to them; and they followed vanity, and became vain, and [went] after the nations that were round about them, concerning whom Yahweh had charged those who they should not do like them. They forsook all the commandments of Yahweh their God, and made them molten images, even two calves, and made an Asherah, and worshiped all the host of the sky, and served Baal. They caused their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire, and used divination and enchantments, and sold themselves to do that which was evil in the sight of Yahweh, to provoke him to anger. Therefore Yahweh was very angry with Israel, and removed them out of his sight: there was none left but the tribe of Judah only.
They have set up kings, but not by me. They have made princes, and I didn't approve. Of their silver and their gold they have made themselves idols, That they may be cut off. Let Samaria throw out his calf-idol! My anger burns against them! How long will it be before the are capable of purity? For this is even from Israel! The workman made it, and it is no God; Indeed, the calf of Samaria shall be broken in pieces.
They are all hot as an oven, And devour their judges. All their kings have fallen. There is no one among them who calls to me. Ephraim, he mixes himself among the nations. Ephraim is a pancake not turned over. Strangers have devoured his strength, And he doesn't realize it. Indeed, gray hairs are here and there on him, And he doesn't realize it. The pride of Israel testifies to his face; Yet they haven't returned to Yahweh their God, Nor sought him, for all this.
Prostitution, wine, and new wine take away understanding. My people consult with their wooded idol, And answer to a stick of wood. Indeed the spirit of prostitution has led them astray, And they have been unfaithful to their God. They sacrifice on the tops of the mountains, And burn incense on the hills, under oaks and poplars and terebinths, Because its shade is good. Therefore your daughters play the prostitute, And your brides commit adultery. I will not punish your daughters when they play the prostitute, Nor your brides when they commit adultery; Because the men consort with prostitutes, And they sacrifice with the shrine prostitutes; And the people that does not understand will come to ruin.
Hear the word of Yahweh, you children of Israel; For Yahweh has a charge against the inhabitants of the land: "Indeed there is no truth, Nor goodness, Nor knowledge of God in the land. There is cursing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery; They break boundaries, and bloodshed causes bloodshed.
Oholah played the prostitute when she was mine; and she doted on her lovers, on the Assyrians [her] neighbors, who were clothed with blue, governors and rulers, all of them desirable young men, horsemen riding on horses. She bestowed her prostitution on them, the choicest men of Assyria all of them; and on whoever she doted, with all their idols she defiled herself. Neither has she left her prostitution since [the days of] Egypt; for in her youth they lay with her, and they handled the bosom of her virginity; and they poured out their prostitution on her. Therefore I delivered her into the hand of her lovers, into the hand of the Assyrians, on whom she doted.
that make a man an offender in [his] cause, and lay a snare for him who reproves in the gate, and turn aside the just with a thing of nothing.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Amos 2
Commentary on Amos 2 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
Moab. - Amos 2:1. “Thus saith Jehovah: for three transgressions of Moab, and for four, I shall not reverse it, because it has burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime, Amos 2:2. I send fire into Moab, and it will devour the palaces of Kirioth, and Moab will perish in the tumult, in the war-cry, in the trumpet-blast. Amos 2:3. And I cut off the judge from the midst thereof, and all its princes do I strangle with it, saith Jehovah.” The burning of the bones of the king of Edom is not burning while he was still alive, but the burning of the corpse into lime, i.e., so completely that the bones turned into powder like lime (D. Kimchi), to cool his wrath still further upon the dead man (cf. 2 Kings 23:16). This is the only thing blamed, not his having put him to death. No record has been preserved of this event in the historical books of the Old Testament; but it was no doubt connected with the war referred to in 2 Kings 3, which Joram of Israel and Jehoshaphat of Judah waged against the Moabites in company with the king of Edom; so that the Jewish tradition found in Jerome, viz., that after this war the Moabites dug up the bones of the king of Edom from the grace, and heaped insults upon them by burning them to ashes, is apparently not without foundation. As Amos in the case of all the other nations has mentioned only crimes that were committed against the covenant nation, the one with which the Moabites are charged must have been in some way associated with either Israel or Judah, that is to say, it must have been committed upon a king of Edom, who was a vassal of Judah, and therefore not very long after this war, since the Edomites shook off their dependence upon Judah in less than ten years from that time (2 Kings 8:20). As a punishment for this, Moab was to be laid waste by the fire of war, and Keriyoth with its palaces to be burned down. הקּריּות is not an appellative noun ( τῶν πόλεων αὐτῆς , lxx), but a proper name of one of the chief cities of Moab (cf. Jeremiah 48:24, Jeremiah 48:41), the ruins of which have been discovered by Burckhardt ( Syr . p. 630) and Seetzen (ii. p. 342, cf. iv. p. 384) in the decayed town of Kereyat or Körriât . The application of the term מת to Moab is to be explained on the supposition that the nation is personified. שׁאון signifies war tumult, and בּתרוּעה is explained as in Amos 1:14 by בּקול שׁופר , blast of the trumpets, the signal for the assault or for the commencement of the battle. The judge with all the princes shall be cut off miqqirbâh , i.e., out of the land of Moab. The feminine suffix refers to Moab as a land or kingdom, and not to Keriyoth. From the fact that the shōphēt is mentioned instead of the king, it has been concluded by some that Moab had no king at that time, but had only a shōphēt as its ruler; and they have sought to account for this on the ground that Moab was at that time subject to the kingdom of the ten tribes (Hitzig and Ewald). But there is no notice in the history of anything of the kind, and it cannot possibly be inferred from the fact that Jeroboam restored the ancient boundaries of the kingdom as far as the Dead Sea (2 Kings 14:25). Shōphēt is analogous to tōmēkh shēbhet in Amos 1:5, and is probably nothing more than a rhetorical expression applied to the מלך , who is so called in the threat against Ammon, and simply used for the sake of variety. The threatening prophecies concerning all the nations and kingdoms mentioned from Amos 1:6 onwards were fulfilled by the Chaldeans, who conquered all these kingdoms, and carried the people themselves into captivity. For fuller remarks upon this point, see at Jeremiah 48 and Ezekiel 25:8.
Judah. - Amos 2:4. “Thus saith Jehovah: For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I shall not reverse it, because they have despised the law of Jehovah, and have not kept His ordinances, and their lies led them astray, after which their fathers walked, Amos 2:5. I send fire into Judah, and it will devour the palaces of Jerusalem.” With the announcement that the storm of the wrath of God will also burst upon Judah, Amos prepares the way for passing on to Israel, the principal object of his prophecies. In the case of Judah, he condemns its contempt of the law of its God, and also its idolatry. Toorגh is the sum and substance of all the instructions and all the commandments which Jehovah had given to His people as the rule of life. Chuqqı̄m are the separate precepts contained in the thōrâh , including not only the ceremonial commands, but the moral commandments also; for the two clauses are not only parallel, but synonymous. כּזביהם , their lies, are their idols, as we may see from the relative clause, since “walking after” ( bâlakh 'achărē ) is the standing expression for idolatry. Amos calls the idols lies , not only as res quae fallunt (Ges.), but as fabrications and nonentities ( 'ĕlı̄hı̄m and hăbhâlı̄m ), having no reality in themselves, and therefore quite unable to perform what was expected of them. The “fathers” who walked after these lies were their forefathers generally, since the nation of Israel practised idolatry even in the desert (cf. Amos 5:26), and was more or less addicted to it ever afterwards, with the sole exception of the times of Joshua, Samuel, David, and part of the reign of Solomon, so that even the most godly kings of Judah were unable to eradicate the worship upon the high places. The punishment threatened in consequence, namely, that Jerusalem should be reduced to ashes, was carried out by Nebuchadnezzar.
After this introduction, the prophet's address turns to Israel of the ten tribes, and in precisely the same form as in the case of the nations already mentioned, announces the judgment as irrevocable. At the same time, he gives a fuller description of the sins of Israel, condemning first of all the prevailing crimes of injustice and oppression, of shameless immorality and daring contempt of God (Amos 2:6-8); and secondly, its scornful contempt of the benefits conferred by the Lord (Amos 2:9-12), and threatening inevitable trouble in consequence (Amos 2:13-16). Amos 2:6. “Thus saith Jehovah: For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I shall not reverse it, because they sell the righteous for money, and the poor for a pair of shoes. Amos 2:7. They who pant after dust of the earth upon the head of the poor, and bend the way of the meek: and a man and his father go to the same girl, to desecrate my holy name. Amos 2:8. And they stretch themselves upon pawned clothes by every altar, and they drink the wine of the punished in the house of their God.” The prophet condemns four kinds of crimes. The first is unjust treatment, or condemnation of the innocent in their administration of justice. Selling the righteous for silver, i.e., for money, refers to the judges, who were bribed to punish a man as guilty of the crime of which he was accused, when he was really tsaddı̄q , i.e., righteous in a judicial, not in a moral sense, or innocent of any punishable crime. Bakkeseph , for money, i.e., either to obtain money, or for the money which they had already received, viz., from the accuser, for condemning the innocent. בּעבוּר , on account of, is not synonymous with ב pretii ; for they did not sell the poor man merely to get a pair of sandals for him, as the worst possible slave was certainly worth much more than this (cf. Exodus 21:32); but the poor debtor who could not pay for a pair of shoes, i.e., for the merest trifle, the judge would give up to the creditor for a salve, on the strength of the law in Leviticus 25:39 (cf. 2 Kings 4:1).
As a second crime, Amos reproves in v. 7 a their thirst for the oppression of the quiet in the land. דּלּים , ταπεινοί , and ענוים , πραεῖς . The address is carried on in participles, in the form of lively appeal, instead of quiet description, as is frequently the case in Amos (cf. Amos 5:7; Amos 6:3., 13, Amos 8:14), and also in other books (cf. Isaiah 40:22, Isaiah 40:26; Psalms 19:11). In the present instance, the article before the participle points back to the suffix in מכרם , and the finite verb is not introduced till the second clause. שׁאף , to gasp, to pant, to long eagerly for earth-dust upon the head of the poor, i.e., to long to see the head of the poor covered with earth or dust, or to bring them into such a state of misery, that they scatter dust upon their head (cf. Job 2:12; 2 Samuel 1:2). The explanation given by Hitzig is too far-fetched and unnatural, viz., that they grudge the man in distress even the handful of dust that he has strewn upon his head, and avariciously long for it themselves. To bend the way of the meek, i.e., to bring them into a trap, or cast them headlong into destruction by impediments and stumblingblocks laid in their path. The way is the way of life, their outward course. The idea that the way refers to the judgment or legal process is too contracted. The third crime is their profanation of the name of God by shameless immorality ( Amos 2:7 ); and the fourth , desecration of the sanctuary by drinking carousals (Amos 2:8). A man and his father, i.e., both son and father, go to the girl, i.e., to the prostitute. The meaning is, to one and the same girl; but 'achath is omitted, to preclude all possible misunderstanding, as though going to different prostitutes was allowed. This sin was tantamount to incest, which, according to the law, was to be punished with death (cf. Leviticus 18:7, Leviticus 18:15, and Leviticus 20:11). Temple girls ( q e dēshōth ) are not to be thought of here. The profanation of the name of God by such conduct as this does not indicate prostitution in the temple itself, such as was required by the licentious worship of Baal and Asherah (Ewald, Maurer, etc.), but consisted in a daring contempt of the commandments of God, as the original passage (Leviticus 22:32) from which Amos took the words clearly shows (cf. Jeremiah 34:16). By l e ma‛an , in order that (not “so that”), the profanation of the holy name of God is represented as intentional, to bring out the daring character of the sin, and to show that it did not arise from weakness or ignorance, but was practised with studious contempt of the holy God. B e gâdı̄m chăbhulı̄m , pawned clothes, i.e., upper garments, consisting of a large square piece of cloth, which was wrapt all around, and served the poor for a counterpane as well. If a poor man was obliged to pawn his upper garment, it was to be returned to him before night came on (Exodus 22:25), and a garment so pawned was not to be slept upon (Deuteronomy 24:12-13). But godless usurers kept such pledges, and used them as cloths upon which they stretched their limbs at feasts ( yattū , hiphil , to stretch out, sc. the body or its limbs); and this they did by every altar, at sacrificial meals, without standing in awe of God. It is very evident that Amos is speaking of sacrificial feasting, from the reference in the second clause of the verse to the drinking of wine in the house of God. עמוּשׁים , punished in money, i.e., fined. Wine of the punished is wine purchased by the produce of the fines. Here again the emphasis rests upon the fact, that such drinking carousals were held in the house of God. 'Elōhēhem , not their gods (idols), but their God; for Amos had in his mind the sacred places at Bethel and Dan, in which the Israelites worshipped Jehovah as their God under the symbol of an ox (calf). The expression col - mizbēăch (every altar) is not at variance with this; for even if col pointed to a plurality of altars, these altars were still bāmōth , dedicated to Jehovah. If the prophet had also meant to condemn actual idolatry, i.e., the worship of heathen deities, he would have expressed this more clearly; to say nothing of the fact, that in the time of Jeroboam II there was no heathenish idolatry in the kingdom of the ten tribes, or, at any rate, it was not publicly maintained.
And if this daring contempt of the commandments of God was highly reprehensible even in itself, it became perfectly inexcusable if we bear in mind that Israel was indebted to the Lord its God for its elevation into an independent nation, and also for its sacred calling. For this reason, the prophet reminds the people of the manifestations of grace which it had received from its God (Amos 2:9-11). Amos 2:9. “And yet I destroyed the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars, and who was strong as the oaks; and I destroyed his fruit from above, and his roots from beneath. Amos 2:10. And yet I brought you up from the land of Egypt, and led you forty years in the desert, to take possession of the land of the Amorite.” The repeated ואנכי is used with peculiar emphasis, and serves to bring out the contrast between the conduct of the Israelites towards the Lord, and the fidelity of the Lord towards Israel. Of the two manifestations of divine grace to which Israel owed its existence as an independent nation, Amos mentions first of all the destruction of the former inhabitants of Canaan (Exodus 23:27., Exodus 34:11); and secondly, what was earlier in point of time, namely, the deliverance out of Egypt and guidance through the Arabian desert; not because the former act of God was greater than the latter, but in order to place first what the Lord had done for the nation, that he may be able to append to this what He still continues to do (Amos 2:11). The nations destroyed before Israel are called Amorites, from the most powerful of the Canaanitish tribes, as in Genesis 15:16; Joshua 24:15, etc. To show, however, that Israel was not able to destroy this people by its own strength, but that Jehovah the Almighty God alone could accomplish this, he proceeds to transfer to the whole nation what the Israelitish spies reported as to their size, more especially as to the size of particular giants (Numbers 13:32-33), and describes the Amorites as giants as lofty as trees and as strong as trees, and, continuing the same figure, depicts their utter destruction or extermination as the destruction of their fruit and of their roots. For this figure of speech, in which the posterity of a nation is regarded as its fruit, and the kernel of the nation out of which it springs as the root, see Ezekiel 17:9; Hosea 9:16; Job 18:16. These two manifestations of divine mercy Moses impressed more than once upon the hearts of the people in his last addresses, to urge them in consequence to hold fast to the divine commandments and to the love of God (cf. Deuteronomy 8:2., Deuteronomy 9:1-6; Deuteronomy 29:1-8).
But Jehovah had not only put Israel into possession of Canaan; He had also continually manifested Himself to it as the founder and promoter of its spiritual prosperity. Amos 2:11. “And I raised up some of your sons as prophets, and some of your young men as dedicated ones (Naziraeans). Ah, is it not so, ye sons of Israel? is the saying of Jehovah. Amos 2:12. But ye made the dedicated drink wine, and ye commanded the prophets, saying, Ye shall not prophesy.” The institution of prophecy and the law of the Nazarite were gifts of grace, in which Israel had an advantage over every other nation, and by which it was distinguished above the heathen as the nation of God and the medium of salvation. Amos simply reminds the people of these, and not of earthly blessings, which the heathen also enjoyed, since the former alone were real pledges of the covenant of grace made by Jehovah with Israel; and it was in the contempt and abuse of these gifts of grace that the ingratitude of the nation was displayed in the most glaring light. The Nazarites are placed by the side of the prophets, who proclaimed to the nation the counsel and will of the Lord, because, although as a rule the condition of a Nazarite was merely the consequence of his own free will and the fulfilment of a particular vow, it was nevertheless so far a gift of grace from the Lord, that the resolution to perform such a vow proceeded from the inward impulse of the Spirit of God, and the performance itself was rendered possible through the power of this Spirit alone. (For a general discussion of the law of the Nazarite, see the commentary on Numbers 6:2-12, and my biblical Antiquities ,
This base contempt of their covenant mercies the Lord would visit with a severe punishment. Amos 2:13. “Behold, I will press you down, as the cart presses that is filled with sheaves. Amos 2:14. And the flight will be lost to the swift, and the strong one will not fortify his strength, and the hero will not deliver his soul. Amos 2:15. And the carrier of the bow will not stand, and the swift-footed will not deliver, and the rider of the horse will not save his soul. Amos 2:16. And the courageous one among the heroes will flee away naked in that day, is the saying of Jehovah.” The Lord threatens as a punishment a severe oppression, which no one will be able to escape. The allusion is to the force of war, under which even the bravest and most able heroes will succumb. העיק , from עוּק , Aramaean for צוּק , to press, construed with tachath , in the sense of κατὰ , downwards, to press down upon a person, i.e., to press him down (Winer, Ges., Ewald). This meaning is established by עקה in Psalms 55:4, and by מוּעקה in Psalms 66:11; so that there is no necessity to resort to the Arabic, as Hitzig does, or to alterations of the text, or to follow Baur, who gives the word the meaning, “to feel one's self pressed under another,” for which there is no foundation in the language, and which does not even yield a suitable sense. The comparison instituted here to the pressure of a cart filled with sheaves, does not warrant the conclusion that Jehovah must answer to the cart; the simile is not to be carried out to this extent. The object to תּעיק is wanting, but may easily be supplied from the thought, namely, the ground over which the cart is driven. The להּ attached to המלאה belongs to the latitude allowed in ordinary speech, and gives to מלאה the reflective meaning, which is full in itself, has quite filled itself (cf. Ewald, §315, a ). In Amos 2:14-16 the effects of this pressure are individualized. No one will escape from it. אבד מנוס , flight is lost to the swift, i.e., the swift will not find time enough to flee. The allusion to heroes and bearers of the bow shows that the pressure is caused by war. קל בּרגליו belong together: “He who is light in his feet.” The swift-footed will no more save his life than the rider upon a horse. נפשׁו .esroh in Amos 2:15 belongs to both clauses. אמּץ לבּו , the strong in his heart, i.e., the hearty, courageous. ערום , naked, i.e., so as to leave behind him his garment, by which the enemy seizes him, like the young man in Mark 14:52. This threat, which implies that the kingdom will be destroyed, is carried out still further in the prophet's following addresses.