14 Those swearing by the guilt of Samaria, And have said, Live doth thy god, O Dan, And, Live doth the way of Beer-Sheba, And they have fallen -- and rise not again!'
And seek not Beth-El, and Gilgal enter not, And Beer-Sheba pass not through, For Gilgal doth utterly remove, And Beth-El doth become vanity.
did ask from him letters to Damascus, unto the synagogues, that if he may find any being of the way, both men and women, he may bring them bound to Jerusalem.
And the king taketh counsel, and maketh two calves of gold, and saith unto them, `Enough to you of going up to Jerusalem; lo, thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.' And he setteth the one in Beth-El, and the other he hath put in Dan,
and your sin, which ye have made -- the calf -- I have taken, and I burn it with fire, and beat it, grinding well till that it `is' small as dust, and I cast its dust unto the brook which is going down out of the mount.
Cast off hath thy calf, O Samaria, Burned hath Mine anger against them, Till when are they not capable of purity? For even it `is' of Israel; an artificer made it, And it `is' not God, For the calf of Samaria is fragments!
And there came, at that time, not a little stir about the way,
and when certain were hardened and were disbelieving, speaking evil of the way before the multitude, having departed from them, he did separate the disciples, every day reasoning in the school of a certain Tyrannus.
And those bowing themselves On the roofs to the host of the heavens, And those bowing themselves, Swearing to Jehovah, and swearing by Malcham,
`Fallen, not again to rise, hath the virgin of Israel, Left on her land -- she hath no raiser up.'
And now do they add to sin, And make to them a molten image of their silver, By their own understanding -- idols, A work of artizans -- all of it, Of them they say, who `are' sacrificers among men, `The calves let them kiss.'
For the calves of Beth-Aven fear do inhabitants of Samaria, Surely mourned on account of it hath its people, And its priests on account of it leap about, Because of its honour, for it hath removed from it,
Though a harlot thou `art', O Israel, Let not Judah become guilty, And come not ye in to Gilgal, nor go up to Beth-Aven, Nor swear ye, Jehovah liveth.
and said, Thus sink doth Babylon, and it doth not arise, because of the evil that I am bringing in against it, and they have been weary.' Hitherto `are' words of Jeremiah.
Who is bringing forth chariot and horse, A force, even a strong one: `Together they lie down -- they rise not, They have been extinguished, As flax they have been quenched.'
A man often reproved, hardening the neck, Is suddenly broken, and there is no healing.
There have workers of iniquity fallen, They have been overthrown, And have not been able to arise!
and they are mocking at the messengers of God, and despising His words, and acting deceitfully with His prophets, till the going up of the fury of Jehovah against His people -- till there is no healing.
and he buyeth the mount Samaria from Shemer, with two talents of silver, and buildeth `on' the mount, and calleth the name of the city that he hath built by the name of Shemer, lord of the hill -- Samaria.
and He giveth up Israel because of the sins of Jeroboam that he sinned, and that he caused Israel to sin.'
and turnest back and dost eat bread and drink water in the place of which He said unto thee, Thou dost not eat bread nor drink water -- thy carcase cometh not in unto the burying-place of thy fathers.' And it cometh to pass, after his eating bread, and after his drinking, that he saddleth for him the ass, for the prophet whom he had brought back, and he goeth, and a lion findeth him in the way, and putteth him to death, and his carcase is cast in the way, and the ass is standing near it, and the lion is standing near the carcase. And lo, men are passing by, and see the carcase cast in the way, and the lion standing near the carcase, and they come and speak `of it' in the city in which the old prophet is dwelling. And the prophet who brought him back out of the way heareth and saith, `It `is' the man of God who provoked the mouth of Jehovah, and Jehovah giveth him to the lion, and it destroyeth him, and putteth him to death, according to the word of Jehovah that he spake to him.' And he speaketh unto his sons saying, `Saddle for me the ass,' and they saddle `it'. And he goeth and findeth his carcase cast in the way, and the ass and the lion are standing near the carcase -- the lion hath not eaten the carcase nor destroyed the ass. And the prophet taketh up the carcase of the man of God, and placeth it on the ass, and bringeth it back, and the old prophet cometh in unto the city to mourn and to bury him, and he placeth his carcase in his own grave, and they mourn for him, `Oh, my brother!' And it cometh to pass, after his burying him, that he speaketh unto his sons, saying, `At my death -- ye have buried me in the burying-place in which the man of God is buried; near his bones place my bones; for the word certainly cometh to pass that he called by the word of Jehovah concerning the altar which `is' Beth-El, and concerning all the houses of the high places that `are' in cities of Samaria.' After this thing Jeroboam hath not turned from his evil way, and turneth back, and maketh of the extremities of the people priests of high places; he who is desirous he consecrateth his hand, and he is of the priests of the high places. And in this thing is the sin of the house of Jeroboam, even to cut `it' off, and to destroy `it' from off the face of the ground.
and Jeroboam maketh a festival in the eighth month, in the fifteenth day of the month, like the festival that `is' in Judah, and he offereth on the altar -- so did he in Beth-El -- to sacrifice to the calves which he made, and he hath appointed in Beth-El the priests of the high places that he made.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Amos 8
Commentary on Amos 8 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
The Ripeness of Israel for Judgment - Amos 8:1-14
Under the symbol of a basket filled with ripe fruit, the Lord shows the prophet that Israel is ripe for judgment (Amos 8:1-3); whereupon Amos, explaining the meaning of this vision, announces to the unrighteous magnates of the nation the changing of their joyful feasts into days of mourning, as the punishment from God for their unrighteousness (Amos 8:4-10), and sets before them a time when those who now despise the word of God will sigh in vain in their extremity for a word of the Lord (Amos 8:11-14).
Vision of a Basket of Ripe Fruit. - Amos 8:1. “Thus did the Lord Jehovah show me: and behold a basket with ripe fruit. Amos 8:2. And He said, What seest thou, Amos? And I said, A basket of ripe fruit. Then Jehovah said to me, The end is come to my people Israel; I will not pass by them any more. Amos 8:3. And the songs of the palace will yell in that day, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah: corpses in multitude; in every place hath He cast them forth: Hush!” כּלוּב from כּלך , to lay hold of, to grasp, lit., a receiver, here a basket (of basket-work), in Jeremiah 5:27 a bird-cage. קיץ : summer-fruit (see at 2 Samuel 16:1); in Isaiah 16:9; Isaiah 28:4, the gathering of fruit, hence ripe fruit. The basket of ripe fruit ( qayits ) is thus explained by the Lord: the end ( qēts ) is come to my people (cf. Ezekiel 7:6). Consequently the basket of ripe fruit is a figurative representation of the nation that is now ripe for judgment, although qēts , the end, does not denote its ripeness for judgment, but its destruction, and the word qēts is simply chosen to form a paronomasia with qayits . לא אוסיף וגו as in Amos 7:8. All the joy shall be turned into mourning. the thought is not that the temple-singing to the praise of God (Amos 5:23) would be turned into yelling, but that the songs of joy (Amos 6:5; 2 Samuel 19:36) would be turned into yells, i.e., into sounds of lamentation (cf. Amos 8:10 and 1 Maccabees 9:41), namely, because of the multitude of the dead which lay upon the ground on every side. השׁליך is not impersonal, in the sense of “which men are no longer able to bury on account of their great number, and therefore cast away in quiet places on every side;” but Jehovah is to be regarded as the subject, viz., which God has laid prostrate, or cast to the ground on every side. For the adverbial use of הס cannot be established. The word is an interjection here, as in Amos 6:10; and the exclamation, Hush! is not a sign of gloomy despair, but an admonition to bow beneath the overwhelming severity of the judgment of God, as in Zephaniah 1:7 (cf. Habakkuk 2:20 and Zechariah 2:13).
To this vision the prophet attaches the last admonition to the rich and powerful men of the nation, to observe the threatening of the Lord before it is too late, impressing upon them the terrible severity of the judgment. Amos 8:4. “Hear this, ye that gape for the poor, and to destroy the meek of the earth, Amos 8:5. Saying, When is the new moon over, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may open wheat, to make the ephah small, and the shekel great, and to falsify the scale of deceit? Amos 8:6. To buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes, and the refuse of the corn will we sell.” The persons addressed are the השּׁאפים אביון , i.e., not those who snort at the poor man, to frighten him away from any further pursuit of his rights (Baur), but, according to Amos 2:6-7, those who greedily pant for the poor man, who try to swallow him (Hitzig). This is affirmed in the second clause of the verse, in which שׁאפים is to be repeated in thought before להשׁבּית : they gape to destroy the quiet in the land ( ענוי־ארץ = ענוים , in Amos 2:7), “namely by grasping all property for themselves, Job 22:8; Isaiah 5:8” (Hitzig). Amos 8:5 and Amos 8:6 show how they expect to accomplish their purpose. Like covetous usurers, they cannot even wait for the end of the feast-days to pursue their trade still further. Chōdēsh , the new moon, was a holiday on which all trade was suspended, just as it was on the Sabbath (see at Numbers 28:11 and 2 Kings 4:23). השׁבּיר שׁבר , to sell corn, as in Genesis 41:57. פּתח בּר , to open up corn, i.e., to open the granaries (cf. Genesis 41:56). In doing so, they wanted to cheat the poor by small measure (ephah), and by making the shekel great, i.e., by increasing the price, which was to be weighed out to them; also by false scales ( ‛ivvēth , to pervert, or falsify the scale of deceit, i.e., the scale used for cheating), and by bad corn ( mappal , waste or refuse); that in this way they might make the poor man so poor, that he would either be obliged to sell himself to them from want and distress (Leviticus 25:39), or be handed over to the creditor by the court of justice, because he was no longer able to pay for a pair of shoes, i.e., the very smallest debt (cf. Amos 2:6).
Such wickedness as this would be severely punished by the Lord. Amos 8:7. “Jehovah hath sworn by the pride of Jacob, Verily I will not forget all their deeds for ever. Amos 8:8. Shall the earth not tremble for this, and every inhabitants upon it mourn? and all of it rises like the Nile, and heaves and sinks like the Nile of Egypt.” The pride of Jacob is Jehovah, as in Hosea 5:5 and Hosea 7:10. Jehovah swears by the pride of Jacob, as He does by His holiness in Amos 4:2, or by His soul in Amos 6:8, i.e., as He who is the pride and glory of Israel: i.e., as truly as He is so, will He and must He punish such acts as these. By overlooking such sins, or leaving them unpunished, He would deny His glory in Israel. שׁכח , to forget a sin, i.e., to leave it unpunished. In Amos 8:8 the negative question is an expression denoting strong assurance. “For this” is generally supposed to refer to the sins; but this is a mistake, as the previous verse alludes not to the sins themselves, but to the punishment of them; and the solemn oath of Jehovah does not contain so subordinate and casual a thought, that we can pass over Amos 8:7, and take על זאת as referring back to Amos 8:4-6. It rather refers to the substance of the oath, i.e., to the punishment of the sins which the Lord announces with a solemn oath. This will be so terrible that the earth will quake, and be resolved, as it were, into its primeval condition of chaos. Râgaz , to tremble, or, when applied to the earth, to quake, does not mean to shudder, or to be shocked, as Rosenmüller explains it after Jeremiah 2:12. Still less can the idea of the earth rearing and rising up in a stormy manner to cast them off, which Hitzig supports, be proved to be a biblical idea from Isaiah 24:20. The thought is rather that, under the weight of the judgment, the earth will quake, and all its inhabitants will be thrown into mourning, as we may clearly see from the parallel passage in Amos 9:5. In Amos 8:8 this figure is carried out still further, and the whole earth is represented as being turned into a sea, heaving and falling in a tempestuous manner, just as in the case of the flood. כּלּהּ , the totality of the earth, the entire globe, will rise, and swell and fall like waters lashed into a storm. This rising and falling of the earth is compared to the rising and sinking of the Nile. According to the Parallel passage in Amos 9:5, כּאר is a defective form for כּיאר , just as בּוּל is for יבוּל in Job 40:20, and it is still further defined by the expression כּיאור מצרים , which follows. All the ancient versions have taken it as יאור , and many of the Hebrew codd. (in Kennicott and De Rossi) have this reading. Nigrash, to be excited, a term applied to the stormy sea (Isaiah 57:20). נשׁקה is a softened form for נשׁקעה , as is shown by שׁקעה in Amos 9:5.
“And it will come to pass on that day, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I cause the sun to set at noon, and make it dark to the earth in clear day. Amos 8:10. And turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation: and bring mourning clothes upon all loins, and baldness upon every head; and make it like mourning for an only one, and the end thereof like a bitter day.” The effect of the divine judgment upon the Israelites is depicted here. Just as the wicked overturn the moral order of the universe, so will the Lord, with His judgment, break through the order of nature, cause the sun to go down at noon, and envelope the earth in darkness in clear day. The words of the ninth verse are not founded upon the idea of an eclipse of the sun, though Michaelis and Hitzig not only assume that they are, but actually attempt to determine the time of its occurrence. An eclipse of the sun is not the setting of the sun ( כּוא ). But to any man the sun sets at noon, when he is suddenly snatched away by death, in the very midst of his life. And this also applies to a nation when it is suddenly destroyed in the midst of its earthly prosperity. But it has a still wider application. When the Lord shall come to judgment, at a time when the world, in its self-security, looketh not for Him (cf. Matthew 24:37.), this earth's sun will set at noon, and the earth be covered with darkness in bright daylight. And every judgment that falls upon an ungodly people or kingdom, as the ages roll away, is a harbinger of the approach of the final judgment. Amos 8:10. When the judgment shall burst upon Israel, then will all the joyous feasts give way to mourning and lamentation (compare Amos 8:3 and Amos 5:16; Hosea 2:13). On the shaving of a bald place as a sign of mourning, see Isaiah 3:24. This mourning will be very deep, like the mourning for the death of an only son (cf. Jeremiah 6:26 and Zechariah 12:10). The suffix in שׂמתּיה (I make it ) does not refer to אבל (mourning), but to all that has been previously mentioned as done upon that day, to their weeping and lamenting (Hitzig). אחריתהּ , the end thereof, namely, of this mourning and lamentation, will be a bitter day ( כ is caph verit. ; see at Joel 1:15). This implies that the judgment will not be a passing one, but will continue.
And at that time the light and comfort of the word of God will also fail them. Amos 8:11. “Behold, days come, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, that I send a hungering into the land, not a hungering for bread nor a thirst for water, but to hear the words of Jehovah. Amos 8:12. And they will reel from sea to sea; and from the north, and even to the east, they sweep round to seek the word of Jehovah, and will not find it.” The bitterness of the time of punishment is increased by the fact that the Lord will then withdrawn His word from them, i.e., the light of His revelation. They who will not now hear His word, as proclaimed by the prophets, will then cherish the greatest longing for it. Such hunger and thirst will be awakened by the distress and affliction that will come upon them. The intensity of this desire is depicted in Amos 8:12. They reel ( נוּע as in Amos 4:8) from the sea to the sea; that is to say, not “from the Dead Sea in the east to the Mediterranean in the west,” for Joel 2:20 and Zechariah 14:8 are not cases in point, as the two seas are defined there by distinct epithets; but as in Psalms 72:8 and Zechariah 9:10, according to which the meaning is, from the sea to where the sea occurs again, at the other end of the world, “the sea being taken as the boundary of the earth” (Hupfeld). The other clause, “from the north even to the east,” contains an abridged expression for “from north to south and from west to east,” i.e., to every quarter of the globe.
“In that day will the fair virgins and the young men faint for thirst. Amos 8:14. They who swear by the guilt of Samaria, and say, By the life of thy God, O Dan! and by the life of the way to Beersheba; and will fall, and not rise again.” Those who now stand in all the fullest and freshest vigour of life, will succumb to this hunger and thirst. The virgins and young men are individualized, as comprising that portion of the nation which possessed the vigorous fulness of youth. עלף , to be enveloped in night, to sink into a swoon, hithp. to hide one's self, to faint away. הנּשׁבּעים refers to the young men and virgins; and inasmuch as they represent the most vigorous portion of the nation, to the nation as a whole. If the strongest succumb to the thirst, how much more the weak! 'Ashmath Shōm e rōn , the guilt of Samaria, is the golden calf at Bethel, the principal idol of the kingdom of Israel, which is named after the capital Samaria (compare Deuteronomy 9:21, “the sin of Israel”), not the Asherah which was still standing in Samaria in the reign of Jehoahaz (2 Kings 13:6); for apart from the question whether it was there in the time of Jeroboam, this is at variance with the second clause, in which the manner of their swearing is given, - namely, by the life of the god at Dan, that is to say, the golden calf that was there; so that the guilt of Samaria can only have been the golden calf at Bethel, the national sanctuary of the ten tribes (cf. Amos 4:4; Amos 5:5). The way to Beersheba is mentioned, instead of the worship, for the sake of which the pilgrimage to Beersheba was made. This worship, again, was not a purely heathen worship, but an idolatrous worship of Jehovah (see Amos 5:5). The fulfilment of these threats commenced with the destruction of the kingdom of Israel, and the carrying away of the ten tribes into exile in Assyria, and continues to this day in the case of that portion of the Israelitish nation which is still looking for the Messiah, the prophet promised by Moses, and looking in vain, because they will not hearken to the preaching of the gospel concerning the Messiah, who appeared as Jesus.