CHAPTER VII

AMOS AND HOSEA

"IN the fifteenth year of Amaziah king of Judah began Jeroboam son of Joash king of Israel to reign in Samaria and he reigned forty-one years. He restored the boundary of Israel from the Entrance of Hamath to the sea of the Arabah, according to the word of Yahweh, God of Israel, which he spoke by his servant Jonah son of Amittai, who was of Gath-hepher. For Yahweh saw the affliction of Israel that it was very bitter, for there was none fettered nor free, neither was there any helper for Israel. And Yahweh resolved that he would not blot out the name of Israel from under heaven, and he saved them by the hand of Jeroboam son of Joash" (II Kings 14: 23–27).

This statement of the Hebrew author sufficiently sets forth the state of things when the prophetic movement took a new direction. There had been great distress in the northern kingdom under the persistent aggression of Damascus, the hereditary enemy. In the time of Jeroboam II a turn had come for the better. Damascus was occupied with a more formidable foe on its northern frontier, and this gave Israel an opportunity to recover its lost territory. Jeroboam did not hesitate to seize his advantage, and he was able to extend his frontier to the traditional boundary claimed by Israel. All the signs go to show that the people under Jeroboam's sway interpreted the success of their arms, as is, in fact, declared in the passage just quoted, as due to the direct intervention of Yahweh. Congratulating themselves that they were protected by their God, they observed the rites of the ancestral religion with zeal and

confidence. But their rejoicing was premature. Even before the death of Jeroboam a change set in, and within a few years of this apparent prosperity the kingdom of Israel ceased to be. The sister kingdom prolonged its existence more than a century longer, but at length it, too, succumbed. The question which confronts us is: Why did not the fate of the nation determine the fate of the nation's God? To the mass of the people Yahweh was a national God, more powerful, perhaps, than Chemosh of Moab, but in other respects like him. When Moab perished Chemosh ceased to be more than a name. But as Israel shrank in importance, Yahweh grew, and when his worshippers could no longer call themselves a nation he became to his worshippers, and later to all the civilised world, the God of the whole earth; and his religion made its way to people to whom Israel had been unknown even by name. As historical students, we must try to apprehend the process by which the God of Israel thus freed himself from the national bonds by which he had been held, and became the God above all Gods, the Creator and Ruler of the universe. This process was due in large measure to the men whose writings have come down to us in the books of the prophets. These writings are, to be sure, fragments only, and what makes them more difficult to understand is that they have undergone extensive revision by editors who were not always in sympathy with the original authors. The progress of criticism, however, has enabled us to trace an outline of the development with some confidence.

The first thing we discover is that the prophets build upon foundations already laid. This is inevitable. However convinced the reformer may be that a radical change is needed, no revolution ever makes a clean sweep of existing institutions. Moreover, man's inextinguishable idealism convinces him that the former days were better than these. The most powerful argument which the preacher can bring in favour of his message is that what is needed is a return to the better manners of the fathers. This explains

the attitude of the prophets toward tradition. They did adopt certain ideas which were current in their time, but they made use of them in a manner that was new and startling to their contemporaries. The people, as we have seen, were familiar with the idea that Yahweh was the God of Israel and that Israel was his people. The prophets assume this. They assume also the corollary—that Yahweh reveals his will to his people. Religion is knowledge and fear of Yahweh, and the knowledge must come from him in the first place, being made plain to chosen instruments who proclaim it to their fellows.

1

It was probably at the great autumn festival, when the crowds had gathered with sacrifices at the sanctuary at Bethel to eat and drink and rejoice before Yahweh, that "suddenly there appeared a man who checked the joyous celebration by the earnestness of his mien. It was a plain shepherd from the borders of the wilderness. Into the gay music of the revellers with their drums and harps he injected a discordant note, for he chanted the dirge which the mourners were accustomed to sing as they followed the corpse to the tomb. Through all the shouting of the crowd he heard the death-rattle: "The virgin Israel has fallen, no more to rise,' was the burden of his song." The priest in charge of the temple had no good opinion of the strolling prophets who thus disturbed the festivities, and he gave this one a warning: "Go, Seer, flee into the land of Judah and there earn thy bread, and there play the prophet. At Bethel you cannot prophesy any more, for it is a court sanctuary." As in duty bound the officer reported the incident to his monarch, and Amos was compelled to keep silence. His reply to the priest, however, has become classic: "I am no prophet nor prophet's apprentice, but a plain herdsman and a cutter of sycamore fruit. And Yahweh took me from following the flock and said to me: 'Go, prophesy to my people Israel"'" (Amos 7: 14 f.). It is plain that Amos wished to dissociate himself from the professional prophets

1 Wellhausen, Israelitische und Jüdische Geschichte, p. 105.

of the guilds. Yet even in his denial he finds no word to designate his activity except "prophesy." He means that he was overborne by the will of Yahweh just as those prophets claimed to be. The irresistible nature of this impulse is indicated by his declaration: "When the lion roars who will not fear? When Yahweh speaks who can help prophesying?" (3:8.)

With reference to Yahweh's election of Israel Amos gives no uncertain sound: Yahweh had brought the people out of Egypt, had led them in the wilderness forty years, and had destroyed the Amorites before them (2:9 f.). "You only of all the nations have I known," says Yahweh (3:2); though later a broader view is intimated (9:7). Canaan is Yahweh's land, and other lands are unclean (7:17; cf. Hosea 9:3-5). As God of the land he gives or withholds the rain and sends blasting and mildew (4 : 6-9). It is evidence of his grace that he sends prophets and nazirites (2:11). In all this Amos stands on the same ground with the people at large. But on the basis of these received beliefs he builds up a very different theory. The people rejoiced at the outward prosperity which they enjoyed as evidence of Yahweh's being altogether favourable. Victories at Lo-debar and Karnaim were fresh in their minds and were taken to be the earnest of more to follow (Amos 6:13). They, on their part, were sure that they were gratifying Yahweh by their lavish sacrifices. Was not the covenant an agreement that he would help them against their enemies if he received the firstlings, the first-fruits, and the observance of the great festivals?

Amos answers by a flat contradiction, and by the unheardof declaration that Yahweh does not require sacrifice but righteousness between man and man. In the material prosperity on which the people laid so much stress the prophet saw only the social evils which prosperity had fostered. The sacrifices are to him not only something indifferent, they are even contemptible: "Come to Bethel and transgress! To Gilgal and multiply transgression! Bring your sacri

fices in the morning and your tithes the third day! Offer your thanksgiving sacrifice of leavened bread, and proclaim free-will offerings-this pleases you, O house of Israel!" (4:4 f.) The intimation is that all this is mere willworship, recreation and dissipation for the people, but of no value to Yahweh. And, thinking his irony might not be understood, the prophet tells in plain words what Yahweh means: "I hate, I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies; though you offer me your burntofferings and sacrifices I will not accept them, neither will I regard the peace-offerings of your fed beasts" (5:21). And, as if this were not enough, Amos goes the length of denying that the cultus was observed in the wilderness, the time when, according to common consent, the relations of Yahweh and his people were at their best: "Was it sacrifices and offerings that you brought me in the wilderness forty years, O house of Israel?" It is evident that a strong negative is implied in the question.1

Instead of being gratified by the lavish offerings, Yahweh is indignant at the sins of his people and is about to destroy them-such is the conviction of Amos. What rouses his indignation is the social condition of Israel. Yahweh is the protector of the poor and will avenge their wrongs. In a sense this was not new. By tradition, Yahweh, the tribal God, was brother and friend of every member of the clan. But Amos gave the principle a broader construction. Yahweh is the God of righteousness and requires right conduct even from men outside Israel: "For three crimes of Damascus or for four I will not turn back, because they have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron; and I will send a fire into the house of Hazael and it shall devour the palaces of Benhadad" (1:3-5). In like terms Amos threatens Ammon and Moab, and then turns to Israel: "Thus says Yahweh: For three crimes of Israel, or for four, I will not turn back; because they have sold the righteous

1 The intent of the verse (5 : 25) is plain, though the context is obscure and probably interpolated.