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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Amos 5:21 - 5:21
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This threatening judgment will not be averted by the Israelites, even by their feasts and sacrifices (Amo 5:21, Amo 5:22). The Lord has no pleasure in the feasts which they celebrate. Their outward, heartless worship, does not make them into the people of God, who can count upon His grace. Amo 5:21. “I hate, I despise your feasts, and do not like to smell your holy days. Amo 5:22. For if ye offer me burnt-offerings, and your meat-offerings, I have no pleasure therein; and the thank-offering of your fatted calves I do not regard. Amo 5:23. Put away from me the noise of thy songs; and I do not like to hear the playing of thy harps. Amo 5:24. And let judgment roll like water, and righteousness like an inexhaustible stream.” By the rejection of the opus operatum of the feasts and sacrifices, the roots are cut away from the false reliance of the Israelites upon their connection with the people of God. The combination of the words שָׂנֵאתִי מָאַסְתִּי expresses in the strongest terms the dislike of God to the feasts of those who were at enmity with Him. Chaggı̄m are the great annual feasts; ‛ătsârōth, the meetings for worship at those feasts, inasmuch as a holy meeting took place at the ‛ătsereth of the feast of Passover and feast of Tabernacles (see at Lev 23:36). Rı̄ăch, to smell, is an expression of satisfaction, with an allusion to the רֵיחַ נִיחוֹחַ, which ascended to God from the burning sacrifice (see Lev 26:31). Kı̄, in Amo 5:22, is explanatory: “for,” not “yea.” The observance of the feast culminated in the sacrificers. God did not like the feasts, because He had no pleasure in the sacrifices. In Amo 5:23 the two kinds of sacrifice, ‛ōlâh and minchâh, are divided between the protasis and apodosis, which gives rise to a certain incongruity. The sentences, if written fully, would read thus: When ye offer me burnt-offerings and meat-offerings, I have no pleasure in your burnt-offerings and meat-offerings. To these two kinds the shelem, the health-offering or peace-offering, is added as a third class in Amo 5:22. מְרִיאִים, fattened things, generally mentioned along with bâqâr as one particular species, for fattened calves (see Isa 1:11). In הָסֵר (Amo 5:23) Israel is addressed as a whole. הֲמוֹן שִׁרֶיךָ, the noise of thy songs, answers to the strong expression הָסֵר. The singing of their psalms is nothing more to God than a wearisome noise, which is to be brought to an end. Singing and playing upon harps formed part of the temple worship (vid., 1Ch 16:40; 1Ch 23:5, and 1Ch 23:25). Isaiah (Isa 1:11.) also refuses the heartless sacrifice and worship of the people, who have fallen away from God in their hearts. It is very clear from the sentence which Amos pronounces here, that the worship at Bethel was an imitation of the temple service at Jerusalem. If, therefore, with Amo 6:1 in view, where the careless upon Mount Zion and in Samaria are addressed, we are warranted in assuming that here also the prophet has the worship in Judah in his mind as well; the words apply primarily and chiefly to the worship of the kingdom of the ten tribes, and therefore even in that case they prove that, with regard to ritual, it was based upon the model of the temple service at Jerusalem. Because the Lord has no pleasure in this hypocritical worship, the judgment shall pour like a flood over the land. The meaning of Amo 5:24 is not, “Let justice and righteousness take the place of your sacrifices.” Mishpât is not the justice to be practised by men; for “although Jehovah might promise that He would create righteousness in the nation, so that it would fill the land as it were like a flood (Isa 11:9), He only demands righteousness generally, and not actually in floods” (Hitzig). Still less can mishpât ūtsedâqâh be understood as relating to the righteousness of the gospel which Christ has revealed. This thought is a very far-fetched one here, and is only founded upon the rendering given to וְיִגַּל, et revelabitur (Targ., Jerome, = וְיִגָּל), whereas יִגַּל comes from גָּלַל, to roll, to roll along. The verse is to be explained according to Isa 10:22, and threatens the flooding of the land with judgment and the punitive righteousness of God (Theod. Mops., Theodoret, Cyr., Kimchi, and others).