Commentaires bibliques

Am 5:1-27.

ELEGY OVER THE PROSTRATE KINGDOM: RENEWED EXHORTATIONS TO REPENTANCE: GOD DECLARES THAT THE COMING DAY OF JUDGMENT SHALL BE TERRIBLE TO THE SCORNERS WHO DESPISE IT: CEREMONIAL SERVICES ARE NOT ACCEPTABLE TO HIM WHERE TRUE PIETY EXISTS NOT: ISRAEL SHALL THEREFORE BE REMOVED FAR EASTWARD.

1. lamentation--an elegy for the destruction coming on you. Compare

Eze 32:2,

"take up," namely, as a mournful burden

(Eze 19:1; 27:2).

2. virgin of Israel--the Israelite state heretofore unsubdued by foreigners. Compare

Isa 23:12; Jer 18:13; 31:4, 21; La 2:13;

may be interpreted, Thou who wast once the "virgin daughter of Zion." Rather, "virgin" as applied to a state implies its beauty, and the delights on which it prides itself, its luxuries, power, and wealth [CALVIN].

no more rise--in the existing order of things: in the Messianic dispensation it is to rise again, according to many prophecies. Compare

2Ki 6:23; 24:7,

for the restricted sense of "no more."

forsaken upon her land--or, "prostrated upon," &c. (compare

Eze 29:5; 32:4)

[MAURER].

3. went out by a thousand--that is, "the city from which there used to go out a thousand" equipped for war. "City" is put for "the inhabitants of the city," as in

Am 4:8.

shall leave . . . hundred--shall have only a hundred left, the rest being destroyed by sword and pestilence

(De 28:62).

4. Seek ye me, and ye shall live--literally, "Seek . . . Me, and live." The second imperative expresses the certainty of "life" (escape from judgment) resulting from obedience to the precept in the first imperative. If they perish, it is their own fault; God would forgive, if they would repent

(Isa 55:3, 6).

5. seek not Beth-el--that is, the calves at Beth-el.

Gilgal--(See on

Am 4:4).

Beer-sheba--in Judah on the southern frontier towards Edom. Once "the well of the oath" by Jehovah, ratifying Abraham's covenant with Abimelech, and the scene of his calling on "the Lord, the everlasting God"

(Ge 21:31, 33),

now a stronghold of idolatry

(Am 8:14).

Gilgal shall surely go into captivity--a play on similar sounds in the Hebrew, Gilgal, galoh, yigleh: "Gilgal (the place of rolling) shall rolling be rolled away."

Beth-el shall come to naught--Beth-el (that is, the "house of God"), called because of its vain idols Beth-aven (that is, "the house of vanity," or "naught,"

Ho 4:15; 10:5, 8),

shall indeed "come to naught."

6. break out like fire--bursting through everything in His way. God is "a consuming fire"

(De 4:24; Isa 10:17; La 2:3).

the house of Joseph--the kingdom of Israel, of which the tribe of Ephraim, Joseph's son, was the chief tribe (compare

Eze 37:16).

none to quench it in Beth-el--that is, none in Beth-el to quench it; none of the Beth-el idols on which Israel so depended, able to remove the divine judgments.

7. turn judgment to wormwood--that is, pervert it to most bitter wrong. As justice is sweet, so injustice is bitter to the injured. "Wormwood" is from a Hebrew root, to "execrate," on account of its noxious and bitter qualities.

leave on righteousness in . . . earth--MAURER translates, "cast righteousness to the ground," as in

Isa 28:2; Da 8:12.

8. the seven stars--literally, the heap or cluster of seven larger stars and others smaller

(Job 9:9; 38:31).

The former whole passage seems to have been in Amos' mind. He names the stars well known to shepherds (to which class Amos belonged), Orion as the precursor of the tempests which are here threatened, and the Pleiades as ushering in spring.

shadow of death--Hebraism for the densest darkness.

calleth for the waters of the sea--both to send deluges in judgment, and the ordinary rain in mercy

(1Ki 18:44).