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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Amos 2:6 - 2:6
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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 (Amo 2:6-8); and secondly, its scornful contempt of the benefits conferred by the Lord (Amo 2:9-12), and threatening inevitable trouble in consequence (Amo 2:13-16). Amo 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. Amo 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. Amo 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. בַּעֲבוּר, on account of, is not synonymous with בְ 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. Exo 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 Lev 25:39 (cf. 2Ki 4:1).
As a second crime, Amos reproves in v. 7a their thirst for the oppression of the quiet in the land. דַּלִּים, ταπεινοί, and עֲנָוִים, 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. Amo 5:7; Amo 6:3., 13, Amo 8:14), and also in other books (cf. Isa 40:22, Isa 40:26; Psa 19:11). In the present instance, the article before the participle points back to the suffix in מִכְרָם, and the finite verb is not introduced till the second clause. שָׁאַף, 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; 2Sa 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 (Amo 2:7); and the fourth, desecration of the sanctuary by drinking carousals (Amo 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. Lev 18:7, Lev 18:15, and Lev 20:11). Temple girls (qedēshōth) 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 (Lev 22:32) from which Amos took the words clearly shows (cf. Jer 34:16). By lema‛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. Begâdı̄m 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 (Exo 22:25), and a garment so pawned was not to be slept upon (Deu 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. עֲמוּשִׁים, 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.