THE BOOK OF AMOS
LESSON 2
CHAPTERS 1-2
"Those who are suited
or can become suited should prepare themselves for the difficult ... without
regard for their own interests or for material advantages. With integrity and
wisdom, they must take action against any form of injustice and tyranny, against
arbitrary domination by an individual or a political party, and any
intolerance."
Vatican II, Gaudium et spes, 75
When the Kingdom of Israel split into two kingdoms in the late 10th century BC, Jeroboam I, the king of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, refused to allow his people to worship at Yahweh's temple in Jerusalem. He expelled the God-ordained chief priests descended from Aaron, the first High Priest, and established a different liturgy of worship that included worshiping the image of the golden calf at Bethel in the south and Dan in the north, along with other false gods. God sent prophets to denounce the idol worship of the people of the Northern Kingdom with warnings of His divine Judgment if they refused to repent (1 Kng 13:1-10, 33-34). In the 8th century BC, Yahweh sent Amos, a shepherd from Tekoa in Judah, as His oracle of divine Judgment. Amos prophesied the overthrow of the illicit sanctuary at Bethel, the fall of the ruling dynasty, and the captivity and exile of the population. However, Amos's last oracle offered the hope of restoration under a Davidic Messiah-king. It was a prophecy of the future Redeemer-Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth. Amos's question for the people of the Northern Kingdom concerning their loyalty to Yahweh is still relevant today: Where is your heart? Are you led astray by secular customs and idolatrous beliefs contrary to proper worship, or do you renounce them, giving God the commitment of your undivided heart and refusing to be led astray by the ways of the secular world?
The Book of Amos has five parts and includes an introduction and conclusion.
Part I: Title and Oracle Summarizing the Book (Amos 1:1-2)
Amos 1:1-2 ~ Introducing God's Prophet and the Theme
of the Book
1 Words of Amos, one of the shepherds [noqed] of Tekoa.
The visions he had about Israel, in the time of Uzziah king of Judah and
Jeroboam son of Joash, king of Israel, two years before the earthquake. 2 He said: Yahweh roars from Zion, and makes
himself heard from Jerusalem; the shepherds' pastures mourn, and the crown of Carmel dries up.
Verse 1 establishes the identity of Amos, a shepherd/herdsman/breeder [noqed] from Tekoa in the Southern Kingdom of Judah. The Hebrew word noqed only appears in Amos 1:1 and 2 Kings 3:4 in the Old Testament: Mesha king of Moab was a sheep-breeder [noqed] and used to pay the king of Israel a hundred thousand lambs and a hundred thousand rams with their wool in tribute. Instead of an ordinary shepherd, the word noqed can suggest the owner and breeder of sheep, as in 2 Kings 3:4.
Unlike the other books of four minor prophets (Hosea, Joel, and Micah) that open with "The word (singular) of Yahweh," Amos's book begins with the phrase, The words (plural) of Amos .... In the other books, there is an emphasis on the oneness and singularity of God's address and the book as one message from Yahweh. However, Amos's words are in the plural. The Book of Jeremiah also begins with The words of Jeremiah son of Hilkiah (Jer 1:1), but add in verse 2 that The word of Yahweh came to him in the days of Josiah son of Amon, King of Judah .... However, the book also repeatedly uses the phrase Yahweh says throughout the book (cf. 1:3, 6, 8, 9, 11, 13, 15; 2:1, 3, 4, etc.)
The Book of Amos alternates between prose and poetry, with all the oracles and visions rendered in poetic forms. An oracle denotes the words of God heard by the prophet, and a vision is what a prophet sees, although the voice of God can accompany a vision. Although the visions and oracles came from Yahweh, the book records Amos's words of judgment oracles principally set against Israel, resulting in their expulsion from the Promised Land by the Assyrians in the 8th century BC. Later, failing to learn from the Northern Kingdom's judgment, Judah was also expelled from the Promised Land in the 6th century BC by the Neo-Babylonians.
That Amos was from Tekoa is probably significant. It was a town south of Bethlehem where the great King David was born. Tekoa was also the home of Ira son of Ikkesh, one of David's great warriors (2 Samuel 23:26; 1 Chronicles 27:9). The town was known for its production of olive oil, and Scripture refers to Tekoa as a place of "wisdom." In 2 Samuel 12:1-33, David's exiled son Absalom was allowed to return to Judah because of the intervention of the "wise woman of Tekoa." She played the role of a mourning widow to convince King David to reconcile with his son and bring him back from exile, an event that suggests and places Amos's message in the framework of "exile and return."
The visions he had about Israel, in the time of Uzziah
king of Judah and Jeroboam son of Joash, king of Israel, two years before the earthquake.
The visions he had about Israel were in the time of
Uzziah, king of Judah (790/81 " 740 BC), and Jeroboam son of Joash, king of
Israel (790/83 " 750/43 BC), two years before the earthquake. There is a
parallel reference to an earthquake during the reign of King Uzziah in
Zechariah 14:5. The time when God called Amos to his prophetic ministry is
based on the two ruling kings of the Northern and Southern Kingdoms and a
devastating earthquake two years before the beginning of his ministry. It was
such a catastrophic event that the prophet Zechariah mentioned it two centuries
later (Zech 14:5). Archaeologists have found evidence of an earthquake that
affected the Holy Land from northern Israel to the southern Negev, and date the
event to the mid-8th century BC, placing Amos's prophetic activity
to the later years of kings Uzziah and Jeroboam II. Another passage that may
help to date Amos's ministry appears in 8:9, which apparently refers to a total
eclipse of the sun that occurred in 763 BC. Using those events and other
historical information, the authors of the Anchor Bible section on Amos date
his prophetic career to 780-770 BC. See Amos's description of the earthquake in
Amos's final vision in 9:1.
2 He said: Yahweh roars from Zion, and
makes himself heard from Jerusalem; the shepherds' pastures mourn, and the
crown of Carmel dries up.
Verse 2 begins the poetry in the Book of Amos and states
the book's theme: Yahweh's coming divine Judgment. Zion was the original name
of the citadel of Jerusalem, taken from the Jebusites by David in c. 1000 BC (2
Sam 5:6-7). The name was later applied to the entire city and to the faithful
who worshiped in Yahweh's Holy Temple on Mount Moriah in Jerusalem (Ps 2:6;
147:12; Is 1:27).
Zion was also understood allegorically as Heaven itself (Heb 12:22; Rev 14:1) and is probably the understanding in this poetic verse.
Significantly, Yahweh's "roar" comes from Jerusalem and sets the tone of Amos's
message.
During his ministry, Amos's visions and oracles addressed:
The Judgment on Israel's Neighbors and Against Judah
and Israel
(Amos 1:3-2:16)
| 880-830 BC: | Sustained Assyrian military expansion. |
| 827-823 BC: | Rebellions in the Assyrian heartland. |
| 823-745 BC: | Period of Assyrian decline. |
| 745 BC: | Tiglath-Pileser III (r. 745-727 BC) carried forward the Neo-Assyrian kingdom's plan to dominate the world from Mesopotamia to Persia and Syria to Egypt. |
| 742/1 BC:* | The beginning of Amos's ministry to the Northern Kingdom. |
| c. 738 BC: | A major earthquake strikes the Levant. |
| 732 BC: | Neo-Assyrian conquest of northern Israel (Galilee) and Syria. |
| 722 BC: | Neo-Assyrian conquest of Samaria (Northern Kingdom's capital) and exile of the people of the Northern Kingdom of Israel. |
| *The ancients did not count years, months, weeks, or days as we do with the concept of a zero-place value but as objects are counted with the first as number one. This is why Scripture records that Jesus was in the tomb for three days, from Friday to Sunday, instead of two days. | |
The period of Assyrian decline ended with the rule of Tiglath-Pileser III (r. 745-727 BC). He re-asserted Assyrian royal power and more than doubled the size of the empire through wide-ranging conquests. The Neo-Assyrian Empire grew to dominate the ancient Near East throughout much of the 8th and 7th centuries BC, becoming the largest empire of its time. Because of its geopolitical dominance and goal of world domination, many researchers consider the Neo-Assyrian Empire as the world's first great empire. At the height of its power and influence, the empire was the strongest military power in the world, ruling over all of Mesopotamia, the Levant, Egypt, portions of Anatolia, Arabia, and areas in modern-day Iran and Armenia.
Yahweh sent Amos to the Northern Kingdom when Assyria was in decline and during a period of prosperity in the Levant. The people and their rulers found it hard to believe Amos's prophecies of doom during such peace and prosperity.
The Book of Doom: Yahweh's Judgment on the Nations
All the nations mentioned in the Book of Doom were part of the empire of kings David and Solomon (1 Kng 5:1; 2 Kng 14:25) when a standard of right conduct was expected not only in their relations with Israel but also with one another.
Amos 1:3-5 ~ Judgment on Damascus
3 Yahweh says this: For the three crimes, the four crimes of Damascus, I have made my decree and will not relent: because they have threshed Gilead with iron threshing-sledges, 4 I shall send fire down on the House of Hazael to devour the palaces of Ben-Hadad; 5 I shall break the gate-bar of Damascus, I shall destroy the inhabitants of Bikath-Aven, the holder of the scepter in Beth-Eden, and the people of Aram will be deported to Kir, Yahweh says.
Damascus is an ancient city in modern Syria, located on a plain fed by the Abana (modern Barada) and Pharpar rivers, on the edge of the Syrian desert (2 Kng 5:12). As the capital of the Aramean kingdom during the tenth to eighth centuries BC, its location on the major trade routes made it one of the region's most thriving commercial centers. It had many hostile encounters with the Northern Kingdom (1 Kng 15:18-20; 19:15; 20:22; 2 Kng 5-7; 8:7-15; 10:32-33). However, with the growing threat of Assyria, Damascus entered into an alliance with the Northern Kingdom of Israel and other Near Eastern nations. The Assyrian threat was temporarily stopped at the Battle of Qarqar in 853 BC. However, Damascus fell into the control of Neo-Assyrian King Tiglath-Pileser III c. 732 BC and was annexed into his empire (2 Kng 16:9; Is 7:8; 8:14, 17; Jer 49:23; Amos 1:5).
In Amos 1:3-2:16, Yahweh uses a repeated formula, "For the three crimes, the four crimes ... I have made my decree and will not relent" in 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 13; 2:1, 4, and 6. In some other translations, the formula is rendered slightly differently; for example, For three transgressions ... and for four I will not revoke the punishment (RSVCE). The progression of three crimes followed by four suggests a climax where one too many exhausts God's forbearance.
... because they have threshed Gilead with iron threshing-sledges, 4 I shall
send fire down on the House of Hazael to devour the palaces of Ben-Hadad; 5
I shall break the gate-bar of Damascus, I shall destroy the inhabitants
of Bikath-Aven, the holder of the scepter in Beth-Eden, and the people of Aram
will be deported to Kir, Yahweh says.
Gilead was a mountainous region in Transjordan on the east side of the Jordan River, named
after Gilead, son of Machir of the tribe of Manasseh
(Num 26:29; 36:1;
2 Chron 2:21). Hazael and Ben-Hadad were kings of the Arameans with their capital at
Damascus. God threatened to destroy and send into exile the Arameans for their
attacks on the Israelite towns in Gilead. He would use the Neo-Assyrians as His
instruments of Judgment.
Bikath-Aven means "valley of vanity/trouble," or "valley of wealth," or "house of wickedness." Two places were identified by the name Beth-Aven, but one probably gave the name to the other. One is a town east of Bethel, near the city of Ai (Josh 7:2), close to Michmash (1 Sam 13:5). The reference may also refer to Bethel, a town fourteen miles north of Jerusalem. Hosea warned his audience not to go there because the inhabitants had erected an idol to worship in the form of the golden calf (Hos 4:15; 10:5). The other place is the wilderness near the town bordering the territory of Benjamin in its northeast corner and probably named after it (Josh 18:12). Ben-Eden was an Aramean kingdom in upper Mesopotamia. Kir is an unidentified place in Mesopotamia where the Assyrians exiled the inhabitants of Damascus after the city fell to Tiglath-Pileser III in 732 BC (2 Kng 16:9). The name appears in Amos 9:7 as the original home of the Syrians.
Amos 1:6-8 ~ Judgment on Gaza and Philistia
6 Yahweh says this: For the three crimes, the four
crimes of Gaza, I have made my decree and will not relent: because they have
deported entire nations as slaves to Edom, 7 I shall send fire down on the
walls of Gaza to devour its palaces; 8 I shall destroy the inhabitant of
Ashdod, the holder of the scepter in Ashkelon; I shall turn my hand against
Ekron and the remnant of the Philistines will perish, says the Lord Yahweh.
The same formula of Judgment is repeated for Gaza and Philistia. Gaza was one of the five principal cities of the Philistines and occupied a strategic position on the southern boundary of the Levant, near the main road between Egypt and Asia. In Exodus, that road was known as the trade route called the "Way of the land of the Philistines" (Ex 13:17), and later as the "Way of the Sea" (Is 8:23). Gaza was captured by Neo-Assyrian king Tiglath-Pileser III of Assyria in 734 BC.
Edom was a territory stretching south and east of the Dead Sea to the Gulf of Aqaba. Its inhabitants were Esau's descendants, the elder son of Isaac, and brother of Jacob (Gen 25:30; 32:4; 36:1; 1 Chron 1:35), and became allies of the Assyrians. Edom was located on the other great trade route out of Egypt along the Jordan River into Mesopotamia, the "King's Highway," making it strategically and economically important in the region.
8 I shall destroy the inhabitant of Ashdod, the holder of the scepter in Ashkelon;
I shall turn my hand against Ekron and the remnant of the Philistines will
perish, says the Lord Yahweh.
Ashdod was another Philistine city located in what was southwest Canaan (Josh 13:3).
Ashdod was an Assyrian possession until it revolted in 711 BC. The Assyrians
viciously put down the revolt, costing the lives of many of its citizens.
Ashkelon was one of the five major cities of the Philistines (Josh 13:3),
located north of Gaza. The prophets denounced it frequently
(Jer 25:20; 47:5, 7;
Zeph 2:4; Zech 9:5).
Ekron was another Philistine city condemned by Yahweh along with the remaining Philistines.
Amos 1:9-10 ~ Judgment on Tyre and Phoenicia
9 Yahweh says this: For the three crimes, the four crimes of Tyre, I have made my decree
and will not relent: because they have handed hosts of captives over to Edom,
heedless of a covenant of brotherhood, 10 I shall send fire down on
the walls of Tyre to devour its palaces.
Tyre was one of the principal seaport cities on the Phoenician coast, south of Sidon and north of Acco. The city's rulers formed an alliance/covenant treaty with kings David and Solomon (2 Sam 5:11; 1 Kng 5:1-12; 2 Chron 2:1-16). The city's decline began with the rise of the Neo-Assyrians. Eventually, the city fell to the Assyrians in 724 BC. Including Amos, the prophets Joel and Zechariah pronounced God's Judgment on Tyre several times (Joel 3:4-8; Zech 9:2-4).
Amos 1:11-12 ~ Judgment on Edom
11 Yahweh
says this: For the three crimes, the four crimes of Edom, I have made my decree
and will not relent: because he has pursued his brother with the sword, because
he has stifled any sense of pity, and perpetually nursed his anger and
constantly cherished his rage, 12 I shall send fire down on Teman to
devour the palaces of Bozrah.
As the brother of Jacob-Israel, the Edomites were "pursued with the sword" when they made an alliance with the Assyrians against the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. Teman (verse 12) was the son of Eliphaz, a descendant of Esau, son of Issac, and brother of Jacob-Israel (Gen 36:11, 15; 1 Chron 1:36, 53). It was also the name of a region in Edom (Ezek 25:13). Bozrah was a city in Edom and the seat of power of the Edomite king Jobab (Gen 36:32-34; also see Jer 49:7, 20).
Amos 1:13-15 ~ Judgment on Ammon
13 Yahweh says this: For the three crimes, the four crimes of the Ammonites, I have made
my decree and will not relent: because they have disemboweled the pregnant
women of Gilead in order to extend their own frontiers, 14 I shall
light a fire against the walls of Rabbah to devour its palaces amid war cries
on the day of battle, in a whirlwind on the day of storm, 15 and
their king shall go into captivity, he and his chief men with him, says Yahweh.
Yahweh's formula of Judgment continues with a decree against the Ammonites for their brutal wars and the slaughter of the pregnant women of Gilead. The Ammonites were the Israelites' eastern neighbors who occupied a part of the Transjordan (eastern side of the Jordan River) between the Arnon and Jabbok rivers. The Ammonites and Moabites were kinsmen of the Israelites.
Gilead was a mountainous region in the Transjordan named after Gilead son of Machir of the tribe of Manasseh, son of Joseph, son of Jacob (Num 26:29; 36:1; 2 Chron 2:21), and part of the kingdom of Israel. Rabbah was a town east of the Jordan River that was the capital of the Ammonite kingdom (2 Sam 12:26; 17:27; Ezek 21:20; 25:5). The rise of the Ammonites against Israel brought several prophetic condemnations in addition to Amos's oracle of Judgment (Jer 49:2; Ezek 21:25; 25:5).
Amos 2:1-3 ~ Judgment on Moab
2:1 Yahweh says this: For the three crimes, the four
crimes of Moab, I have made my decree and will not relent: because they have
burnt the bones of the king of Edom to ash, 2 I shall send fire down
into Moab to devour the palaces of Kerioth, and Moab will die in the tumult,
amid war cries and the blare of trumpets; 3 I shall destroy the
ruler there and slaughter all the chief men there with him, says Yahweh.
The Edomites were descendants of Abraham and, therefore, kinsmen of Israel. Kinsmen were supposed to be allies, not enemies. Kerioth is the name of two cities mentioned in the Old Testament. The name means "cities" and was probably a collection of towns that grew into one large city. One town was in southern Judah (Josh 15:25), and the other a capital city of Moab (named along with Beth-meon and Bozrah in Jer 48:24 and condemned by God in verses 40-44) where there was a sanctuary of the pagan god Chemosh.
Amos 2:4-5 ~ Judgment on the Southern Kingdom of Judah
4 Yahweh says this: For the three crimes, the four crimes of Judah, I have made my
decree and will not relent: because they have despised Yahweh's law and not
kept his commandments, since their Falsehoods, which their ancestors followed,
have led them astray, 5 I shall send fire down on Judah to devour
the palaces of Jerusalem.
In the following 12 verses, God used the same formula statement to declare that even the covenant people of the Southern and Northern Kingdoms would not escape His Judgment for their sins. The citizens of Judah had failed to keep their covenant with Him through obedience to His Law (Ex 24:3-7). Like their ancestors in the Exodus generation who turned away from Him to worship a golden calf, they have believed "falsehoods" (idols) and will be destroyed by purifying fire. They still had time to repent and return to their merciful God; however, when they continued in their sins, not learning from the destruction of the Northern Kingdom, Yahweh used the Babylonians to destroy Jerusalem and the Temple with fire in 587 BC. Yahweh is a merciful and compassionate divine Father, but He is not a permissive parent. He takes every opportunity to teach His covenant people about love, loyalty, and righteous living because His goal is to bring them to salvation in His heavenly Kingdom.
Amos 2:6-16 ~ Judgment on the Northern Kingdom of Israel
6 Yahweh says this: For the three crimes, the four crimes of Israel, I have made my
decree and will not relent: because they have sold the upright for silver and
the poor for a pair of sandals, 7 because they have crushed the
heads of the weak into the dust and thrust the rights of the oppressed to one
side, father and son sleeping with the same girl and thus profaning my holy
name, 8 lying down beside every altar on clothes acquired as
pledges, and drinking the wine of the people they have fined in the house of
their god. 9 Yet it was I who destroyed the Amorite before them, he
who was as tall as the cedars, as strong as the oaks; I who destroyed his fruit
above ground and his roots below. 10 It was I who brought you up
from Egypt and for forty years led you through the desert to take possession of
the Amorite's country; 11 I who raised up prophets from your sons
and Nazirites from your young men. Israelites, is this not true? "declares
Yahweh! 12 But you have made the Nazirite drink wine and given
orders to the prophets, Do not prophesy.' 13 Very well! Like a cart
overloaded with sheaves, I shall crush you where you stand; 14 flight
will be cut off for the swift, the strong will have no chance to exert his
strength nor the warrior be able to save his life; 15 the archer
will not stand his ground, the swift of foot will not escape, nor will the
horseman save his life; 16 even the bravest of warriors will
jettison his arms and run away, that day! "declares Yahweh!
The Lord condemned the abuses of the Northern Kingdom:
Verse 7 refers to a domestic servant used for sexual pleasure by a father and son and an outrage against a helpless woman. An outrage to human dignity is an outrage to God. In verse 8, according to Mosaic Law, clothes taken in a pledge from the poor had to be returned by sunset (Dt 24:12-13).
The political schism after the death of King Solomon became a religious schism. The people of the Northern Kingdom no longer worshiped at the Jerusalem Temple and established sites of false worship, like those at Bethel and Dan, and allowed their king to form a priesthood that did not descend from the sons of Aaron (1 Kng 12:26-33). The false worship site in Bethel was condemned in 1 Kings 13:1-10. Amos prophesied the overthrow of the illicit sanctuary at Bethel, the fall of the ruling dynasty, and the captivity and exile of the population of the Northern Kingdom.
However, Amos's last oracle would offer the hope of restoration under a Davidic Messiah-King. It is a prophecy of the future Redeemer-Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth. Amos's question for the people of the Northern Kingdom concerning their loyalty to Yahweh is still relevant today: Where is your heart? Can you give God the commitment of your undivided heart and not be led astray into the idolatrous ways of the secular world?
Questions:
1. How were the Moabites and Ammonites kinsmen of the
Israelites? See Genesis 11:27-31; 13:1-13; 19:30-38.
2. What oath did the Israelites swear at the covenant formation at Mt. Sinai? See Exodus 24:3-7.
3. We also take a covenant oath in our Sacrament of Baptism and the Sacrament of Confirmation. What did Jesus say about loving Him? See John 15:10. What was His final commandment at the Last Supper? See John 15:12.
4. What did St. John write about knowing and loving Jesus? See 1 John 2:3-4; 5:1-4.
5. Who were the Nazirites, and what vows did they make to the Lord? See Numbers 6:1-21.
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