1 Commentaries: Hear this word which I take up for you as a dirge, O house of Israel: (2024)

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Amos 5:1-3. Hear ye, &c. — It is justly observed by Grotius, that this verse would be translated more according to the Hebrew thus; Hear ye this word, even a lamentation, which I take up over you — It alludes to the lamentations made at funerals: so here the prophet bemoans the state of the kingdom of Israel as dead. The virgin of Israel — Such she was when first espoused to God, a chaste virgin to a husband: she was then peculiarly beloved and delighted in, and was under the peculiar protection and care of her heavenly Lord; but she is now fallen from her glory and felicity, and for her idolatries and other sins delivered up to the will of her enemies. She shall no more rise — That is, says Grotius, non iterum surget; she shall not rise again, namely, if she so goes on in the wicked way in which she now walks: for it was always understood in God’s threatenings against the Jewish people, that if they turned to him in true repentance they might, by that means, avert the judgments threatened. And there are repeated promises of the restoration of Israel as well as Judah; but these were all made on the condition of their repentance and reformation, which as they never performed in general, so they have not been restored in general, as the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin were. She is forsaken upon her land — She is abandoned of all, and there is none to assist her to rise up again: like an infant that is fallen upon the ground and hath none to take it up; or, broken to pieces upon her own land; and so left, as a broken vessel. The city that went out by a thousand, &c. — A city which was able to send out a thousand men fit for war, shall have but a hundred of them left. And so it shall be in proportion for any less number; only one in ten of them shall escape the sword and other chances of war.

5:1-6 The convincing, awakening word must be heard and heeded, as well as words of comfort and peace; for whether we hear or forbear, the word of God shall take effect. The Lord still proclaims mercy to men, but they often expect deliverance from such self-invented forms as make their condemnation sure. While they refuse to come to Christ and to seek mercy in and by him, that they may live, the fire of Divine wrath breaks forth upon them. Men may make an idol of the world, but will find it cannot protect.

In order to impress Israel the more, Amos begins this his third appeal by a "dirge" over its destruction, mourning over those who were full of joy, and thought themselves safe and enviable. As if a living man, in the midst of his pride and luxury and buoyant recklessness of heart, could see his own funeral procession, and hear, as it were, over himself the "earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust." It would give solemn thoughts, even though he should impatiently put them from him. So must it to Israel, when after the tide of victories of Jeroboam II, Amos said, "Hear this word which I am lifting up," as a heavy weight, to cast it down "against" or "upon you," a funeral "dirge," O house of Israel. Human greatness is so unstable, human strength so fleeting, that the prophet of decay finds a response in man's own conscience, however he may silence or resent it. He would not resent it, unless he felt its force.

Dionysius: "Amos, an Israelite, mourneth over Israel, as Samuel did over Saul 1 Samuel 15:35, or as Isaiah says, "I will weep bitterly; labor not to comfort me, because of the spoiling of the daughter of my people" Isaiah 22:4; images of Him who wept over Jerusalem." "So are they bewailed, who know not why they are bewailed, the more miserable, because they know not their own misery."

CHAPTER 5

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).A lamentation for Israel, Amos 5:1-3. An exhortation to repentance, Amos 5:4-20. God rejecteth their hypocritical service, Amos 5:21-27. This preface you have in the same words Amos 3:1, and in part also Amos 4:1; to which I now add, that the person here speaking may refer to the prophet and to the Lord who sent him, both speak this word. A lamentation; which is very sad and mournful to all concerned in it, woeful news to the kingdom of the ten tribes.

Hear ye the word which I take up against you,.... And which was not his own word, but the word of the Lord; and which he took up, by his direction as a heavy burden as some prophecies are called, and this was; and which, though against them, a reproof for their sins, and denunciation of punishment for them, yet was to be heard; for every word of God is pure, and to be hearkened to, whether for us or against us; since the whole is profitable, either for doctrine and instruction in righteousness, or for reproof and correction. It may be rendered, "which I take up concerning you", or "over you" (z):

even a lamentation, O house of Israel; a mournful ditty, an elegiac song over the house of Israel, now expiring, and as it were dead. This word was like Ezekiel's roll, in which were written "lamentation, and mourning, and woe", Ezekiel 2:10; full of mournful matter, misery, and distress, as follows:

(z) "de vobis", Tigurine version, Mercerus, Piscator, Cocceius; "super vos", Pagninus, Montanus; "pro vobis", Vatablus.

Hear ye this word which I take up against you, even a lamentation, O house of Israel.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

1. a dirge] Heb. ḳînâh, which signifies, not a spontaneous effusion of natural emotion, but a composition, longer or shorter as the case might be, constructed with some art in a definite poetical form, and chanted usually by women, whose profession it was to attend mourning ceremonies for the purpose (cf. Jeremiah 9:17; and see below on Amos 5:16). To take up (i.e. on the lips) is said regularly of a ‘ḳînâh’: e.g. Jeremiah 7:29; Ezekiel 19:1; Ezekiel 26:17; Ezekiel 27:2, &c. The ḳînâh, which the prophet has here in view follows in Amos 5:2.

Verse 1-ch. 6:14. - § 8. Third address: the prophet utters a lamentation over the fall of Israel. (Vers. 1-3.) He calls her to repentance, while he shows wherein she has declined from the right way. To make this plain, he contrasts God's power and majesty with the people's iniquity, instances of which he gives (vers. 4-12). The only condition of safety is amendment (vers. 13-15); and as they refuse to reform, they shall have cause to lament (vers. 16, 17). This threat is enforced by the two emphatic "woes" that follow, the first of which demonstrates the baselessness of their trust in their covenant relation to God (vers. 18-27); the second denounces the careless lives of the chiefs, who, revelling in luxury, believed not in the coming judgment (Amos 6:1-6). Therefore they shall go into captivity, and the kingdom shall be utterly overthrown (vers. 7-11), because they act iniquitously and are self-confident (vers. 12-14). Verse 1. - Hear ye this word. To show the certainty of the judgment and his own feeling about it, the prophet utters his prophecy in the form of a dirge (kinah, 2 Samuel 1:17; 2 Chronicles 35:25). Which I take up against you; or, which I raise over you, as if the end had come. O house of Israel; in the vocative. The Vulgate has, Domus Israel cecidit; so the LXX. But the present Hebrew text is most suitable, making the dirge begin at ver. 2. The ten tribes are addressed as in ver. 6.

Hosea 13:9 commences a new strophe, in which the prophet once more discloses to the people the reason for their corruption (Hosea 13:9-13); and after pointing to the saving omnipotence of the Lord (Hosea 13:14), holds up before them utter destruction as the just punishment for their guilt (Hosea 13:15 and Hosea 14:1). Hosea 13:9. "O Israel, it hurls thee into destruction, that thou (art) against me, thy help. Hosea 13:10. Where is thy king? that he may help thee in all thy cities: and (where) they judges? of whom thou saidst, Give me king and princes! Hosea 13:11. I give thee kings in my anger, and take them away in my wrath." שׁחתך does not combine together the verbs in Hosea 13:8, as Hitzig supposes; nor does Hosea 13:9 give the reason for what precedes, but shichethkhâ is explained by Hosea 13:10, from which we may see that a new train of thought commences with Hosea 13:9. Shichēth does not mean to act corruptly here, as in Deuteronomy 32:5; Deuteronomy 9:12, and Exodus 32:7, but to bring into corruption, to ruin, as in Genesis 6:17; Genesis 9:15; Numbers 32:15, etc. The sentence כּי בי וגו cannot be explained in any other way than by supplying the pronoun אתּה, as a subject taken from the suffix to שׁחתך (Marck, and nearly all the modern commentators). "This throws thee into distress, that thou hast resisted me, who am thy help." בעזרך: as in Deuteronomy 33:26, except that ב is used in the sense of against, as in Genesis 16:12; 2 Samuel 24:17, etc. This opposition did not take place, however, when all Israel demanded a king of Samuel (1 Samuel 8:5). For although this desire is represented there (Hosea 13:7) as the rejection of Jehovah, Hosea is speaking here simply of the Israel of the ten tribes. The latter rebelled against Jehovah, when they fell away from the house of David, and made Jeroboam their king, and with contempt of Jehovah put their trust in the might of their kings of their own choosing (1 Kings 12:16.). But these kings could not afford them any true help. The question, "Where" ('ehı̄ only occurs here and twice in Hosea 13:14, for אי or איה, possibly simply from a dialectical variation - vid. Ewald, 104, c - and is strengthened by אפוא, as in Job 17:15), "Where is thy king, that he may help thee?" does not presuppose that Israel had no king at all at that time, and that the kingdom was in a state of anarchy, but simply that it had no king who could save it, when the foe, the Assyrian, attacked it in all its cities. Before shōpheteykhâ (thy judges) we must repeat 'ĕhı̄ (where). The shōphetı̄m, as the use of the word sârı̄m (princes) in its stead in the following clause clearly shows, are not simple judges, but royal counsellors and ministers, who managed the affairs of the kingdom along with the king, and superintended the administration of justice. The saying, "Give me a king and princes," reminds us very forcibly of the demand of the people in the time of Samuel; but they really refer simply to the desire of the ten tribes for a king of their own, which manifested itself in their dissatisfaction with the rule of the house of David, and their consequent secession, and to their persistence in this secession amidst all the subsequent changes of the government. We cannot therefore take the imperfects אתּן and אקּח in Hosea 13:11 as pure preterites, i.e., we cannot understand them as referring simply to the choice of Jeroboam as king, and to his death. The imperfects denote an action that is repeated again and again, for which we should use the present, and refer to all the kings that the kingdom of the ten tribes had received and was receiving still, and to their removal. God in His wrath gives the sinful nation kings and takes them away, in order to punish the nation through its kings. This applies not merely to the kings who followed one another so rapidly through conspiracy and murder, although through these the kingdom was gradually broken up and its dissolution accelerated, but to the rulers of the ten tribes as a whole. God gave the tribes who were discontented with the theocratical government of David and Solomon a king of their own, that He might punish them for their resistance to His government, which came to light in the rebellion against Rehoboam. He suspended the division of the kingdom not only over Solomon, as a punishment for his idolatry, but also over the rebellious ten tribes, who, when they separated themselves from the royal house to which the promise had been given of everlasting duration, were also separated from the divinely appointed worship and altar, and given up into the power of their kings, who hurled one another from the throne; and God took away this government from them to chastise them for their sins, by giving them into the power of the heathen, and by driving them away from His face. It is to this last thought, that what follows is attached. The removal of the king in wrath would occur, because the sin of Ephraim was reserved for punishment.

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