LIFE AND TIMES OF
THE PROPHET AMOS
WILLIAM H. GILES, D.D.,
Presiding Elder of the Camden District of the New Jersey
Conference
published for
H. T. Kealing, 631 Pine St., Philadelphia.
1902
PREFACE.
This little book is written for the specific purpose of
setting before busy men, in the simplest and shortest way,
the character, works, times and mission of the Manor
Prophet whose name it bears. It is not exhaustive nor
excursive, but essays to give in outline and essense what
has been said in many large volumes. Still, one will be
greatly mistaken who takes it for a mere compilation. It
is an independent and original presentation of the author's
views and reflections based upon standard history as given
by the best authorities.
It is written, first of all, for studious men who are denied
the advantages of school training and who are unable to
purchase the large and expensive books treating upon
these subjects. The young minister in a small charge or
country circuit, even if his education be limited, can easily
read and understand, and feel that he has the essential
things often so much more stiltedly and technically set
down in volumes of portentous size. He can, because of
its convenient size and small weight, carry this book in
his pocket to use in filling out a long wait for breakfast,
or the time taken on a street car ride; and having read it,
he may test his mastery of the contents by quizzing him¬
self from the questions in the back of the book, which have
been carefully framed to cover the whole subject.
This volume is one of a series uniform in treatment, and
any person who finishes the series (to be issued by in¬
stallments) will be excellently equipped in the books of
the Minor Prophets. He will no longer regard them as
"Minor" in importance, but will understand that this rather
unfortunate designation refers entirely to their brevity.
In the hope that it will stimulate interest in one of the
most unique characters of Sacred Writ, and that it will
lead to powerful sermons from this Prophet's suggestive
texts, this little volume is presented to laymen and clergy¬
men alike.
H. T. KEALING.
THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET
AMOS.
CHAPTER I.
Explorers in their fruitful excur-
Preliminary sions to the time-worn cata-
Considerations. combs of the ancient world have,
by their diligent search and care¬
ful discrimination, discovered the ashes of those
holy worthies who, by their notable deeds and noble
darings, so left their impress upon mankind as to
give color and character to the civilization of their
own times and affected all succeeding generations,
and who, by their words and writings, became the
founders of that peculiar kind of literature and ex¬
position of religious truth known as prophecy, and
the precursors of that Gospel light which would
later in the days of the Messiah vivify and illumin¬
ate the world.
In those musty caves of the dead they have found,
among the many, one notable hero, who, by his
powerful words and boldness of spirit, stirred the
most mighty and cultivated nations of the ancient
world,—the prophet Amos, the life and times of
whom I present here for consideration.
To properly estimate a life which has had a great
purpose, and so wrought it out as to indelibly im¬
press itself upon the ages, we must enter into its
purpose, study its doings and discover those peculiar
traits of character, dominating principles and lofty
motives by which the individual was actuated. To
do this with any marked degree of satisfaction, when
we are so far removed from the scene of the activity,
6
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
we must know his ability, the work done, the diffi¬
culties surmounted, the dangers braved. We must
also study the political, social, moral and religious
condition of his times. To this task I now address
myself in seeking to arrive at a proper estimate of
the prophet Amos.
In his time the national,
Prosperity of political and material life of
Judah and Israel, the people was far in advance
of what it had been for many
years previously. It was all that a noble heart and
expanding mind could wish. For many years before
this Judah and Israel had been vexed and harassed,
despoiled and hated by the neighboring nations, but
the accession of Uzziah to the throne of Judah, B. C.
810, and Jeroboam II to that of Israel, B. C. 825,
brought a return of prosperity, so that both king¬
doms were in a flourishing condition and com¬
manded the profound respect and consideration of
the other nations.
Uzziah ascended the throne at the age of
Uzziah's sixteen years and was an enterprising,
Reign, aggressive and ingenious monarch. He
did whatever he could to insure the pro¬
tection and prosperity of his kingdom. In the early
part of his eventful reign he subdued the intrepid
Philistines and the bordering Arabs, and made the
Ammonites tributary to his kingdom; he recovered
the port of Elath, on the Dead Sea, which had been
taken by the King of Syria; fortified Jerusalem, the
sacred capital, with towers as protection against the
sudden approach of an invading foe; built towers
and wells in the desert for the benefit of the army;
strengthened his works by the invention and erec¬
tion of new and extraordinary engines of war for
the discharge of arrows and large stones; enrolled
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE RRGPHET AMOS.
7
a large army, and provided ample stores of armor
and weapons. He encouraged agriculture and all
crafts and enterprises which would aid and lend to
the peace and prosperity of his flourishing kingdom.
While Uzziah was pushing things in
Jeroboam's Judah, Jeroboam, his neighbor, was
Reign, doing the same in Israel. He
ascended the throne when but a
youth and reigned jointly with his father, Joash.
After the death of his father, he became the sole
ruler of Israel. In the commencement of his reign
he 'had the advantage of three victories gained by
his father in his last days as the result of the
promise of Elisha, the prophet. In; these victories
all the cities of Israel west of the Jordan which had
been seized by Hazael, King of Syria, were re¬
covered.
Jeroboam, like Uzziah, was an enterprising and
valorous monarch. He invaded Syria, the most pow¬
erful monarchy of his day, and met with most bril¬
liant success. In his victorious march he swept
everything before him. He recovered all the terri¬
tory east of the Jordan which had been taken from
Israel by Hazael and, marching his conquering
forces into Syria, recaptured Hamath and Damas¬
cus. Thus Israel regained all of her lost territory.
With these magnificent victories written to his
credit he lifted the olive branch of peace and the
God of battles, who* rewards His people for valiant
service, gave the land rest for nearly half a century.
Formal war ceased in Judah and Israel and both
kingdoms reached their highest stage of prosperity
and enjoyed the utmost tranquillity.
Those days of peace were not with-
A Golden out their fruits. An era of prosperity
Age. dawned. Ever-pressing famine gave
way before a tidal wave of material
8 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
prosperity which settled upon them, and as a result
wealth increased, lands were purchased, corpora¬
tions were formed and new and prosperous cities
and villages sprang up all over the dominion. Com¬
mon dwellings that were once the pride and delight
of princes were abandoned, torn down and stately
palaces and summer cottages erected in their stead.
So wealthy had they become that if any disaster, be
it earthquake, hurricane, or inundation, destroyed
their cities or villages they quickly repaired all
losses, replacing them with stronger, more beauti¬
ful and costlier buildings. Their popular saying,
as recorded by the prophet Isaiah, was, "The bricks
are fallen down, but we will build with hewn stone;
the sycamores are cut down, but we will change
them into cedars." Isa. 9:10.
The more they got the
Corruption and more they wanted, the
Oppression Creep In. heart of the nation was
set on money-getting.
This insatiable greed and hungering after material
things and the growth of wealth and refinement
among the people produced an artificial condition
which brought about thoughtlessness in the mind
of the rulers and multiplied cruelty and oppression
among the people.
The upper classes, who had been highly favored
by the fortunes of these times and who above all
others would be expected to sympathize in a sub¬
stantial way with those who had not been so highly
favored, grew cold and indifferent toward the real
wants and woes of the people. The painful result
was that the same dark figure of poverty which so
often cast its gloom amidst the most brilliant wealth
was made the darker as it appeared with shining
luxury at its side. Proud wealth grew more arro¬
gant and unsympathetic in the very shadow of suf-
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
9
fering poverty, hence came oppression and oppres¬
sion bred cruelty. The poorer classes were forced
to bear needless burdens, and to labor for little or
no wages at all.
The indictment of the nation by the
Amos Indicts prophet for their treatment of the
the Nation, poor contains the following specifi¬
cations : (a) Exacting from them
what is not their right to have, (b) Holding them
in contempt (for the Hebrew word used here
means to treat under foot.) (c) Subjective viola¬
tion of the Sabbath in their anxiety to sell their
cereals to the poor, (d) Giving short measure and
taking full price, (e) Buying from the poor with
heavy weight and selling to them with light weight,
(f) Having one scale light and the other heavy, one
end of the beam long and the other short, (g) Buy¬
ing the time of the poor and paying them just bare¬
ly money enough for their services to allow them
to eke out a miserable existence, (h) Making them
pay unjust and oppressive fines, (i) Selling bad
wheat and damaged flour as good, and making them
pay as much for it as they would for the best. See
Amos 8:4-6. In these specifications we have a pic¬
ture of our own times.
The patriotism of the people, even
The People's in these times, is worthy of men-
• Patriotism. tion. They were proud of their
standing as a political power. They
were ever willing and ready to defend their honor
as a nation against the insults and encroachments
of any hostile foe.
But this unswerving patriotism was no excuse for
their indifference to the social evils which were
rampant among them from the lowest to the high¬
est classes.
10 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
In their ever-increasing anxiety to get wealth and
their zeal for the preservation of their regal estate
the ruling classes lost sight of their social sins and
the wants of the poor who reaped their fields, while
the poor themselves were too miserable over ani¬
mal needs to regard moral defects.
Let us now turn the lens upon some
A Brighter other results of the reign of peace,
Picture. more bright and desirable than
those which we have just been con¬
sidering. This long reign of peace was favorable
to the cultivation of literature. Accordingly most
Biblical critics say that in these times the greatest
epics of Israel, the earlier parts of the Pentateuch,
the histories which make up the Books of Judges,
Samuel and Kings, were written.
CHAPTER II.
Such, then, were the condi-
Compared With tions and life of the times of
Our Own Times, the prophet Amos. It is in¬
teresting to observe that
these conditions are but the type of the conditions
of our own times. The nation is prosperous; wealth
is increasing; cities, towns and villages are spring¬
ing up in the wilderness; common cottages are giv¬
ing place to the stately mansion, and enterprises of
every kind and grade are coming into being daily.
The upper classes are so intoxicated with the spirit
of wealth-seeking that they stand aloof from the
poor, and disregard their claim to enjoy a just and
equitable proportion of all that God in His bounti¬
ful goodness has bequeathed to all mankind. In
this country one poor defenseless class of people
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS. II
who have felled its forests, built its cities, and made
its wildernesses blossoms as the rose, is ostracised
discriminated against in public affairs, unprotected
in their social, political and civil rights, severely op¬
pressed and cruelly treated. But the hand of Je¬
hovah is still stretched out against all unrighteous¬
ness and will not be withdrawn until all the wrongs
of this class are righted and it is permitted to enjoy
unmolested all of its God-given rights.
We now turn to the religious life of
The Religious the times of the prophet Amos.
Life. The devotional spirit of the people
was no less notable than their
eagerness to get wealth. Jehovah was worshipped
throughout the kingdom. These people held the
false idea that because they were God's "peculiar
people" He was under obligations to protect them
so long as they rendered to Him the letter of the
ceremonial law, hence they increased their dona¬
tions to the cause of religion and multiplied their
religious sacrifices and festivals, that they might
farther increase their claims upon His protective
care. As to the nature of the worship of the peo¬
ple at this time a very high authority in Biblical lore
says, "Israel of the eighth century was devoted to
Jehovah; and although passion of self-interest
might lead individuals, or even communities, to
worship other gods, He had no possible rival upon
the throne of the nation."
True to the statement of the
Great Centers authority quoted, and as evidence
of Worship, of its truthfulness, these people in
their zeal for the worship of Jeho¬
vah had established great religious centres
throughout the kingdoms. That they might more
easily enlist and hold the sympathies of all the
12 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
classes in matters of religion these great religious
centres were established in places where the most
notable deeds of their fathers had been performed.
Conspicuous among these were Bethel, where Jacob
the father of the nation, saw heaven open; Dan, the
first city captured by the tribe of Dan after they en¬
tered the Promised Land; Beersheba, the place
where Abraham, Isaac and Jacob dwelt, and where
Elijah rested on his way to Mt. Horeb; Gilgal, the
first resting place of the Ark, after the Jordan was
crossed, and of the anointing of the first king; Car-
mel, the place where Elijah won the decisive battle
for Jehovah over the prophets of Baal by calling
down fire from heaven, and Mizpeh, Shiloh and a
hundred other places. Like the Moslem in his pil¬
grimage to Mecca, the Jews made their pilgrimages
to these centres of religion to offer their sacrifices
and hold solemn festival to Jehovah.
These centres were not only "high places" for re¬
ligious worship, but also great market places,
whither the merchant and peddler gathered from all
parts of the kingdoms, and from foreign nations, for
the purpose of trade.
The religious zeal of the
A Lip Worship— family of Israel was made
Isaiah's Indictment, prominent in their un-
boundel liberality and un¬
stinted diligence in the performance of every detail
of the external duties of their religion. Their re¬
ligious service was highly ritualistic, and the hold
which the mania of wealth-getting had upon them
made it more so. The result of this was that they
lost the real spirit of worship and, in turn, religion
lost its hold upon their hearts and they only served
Jehovah with their lips. The prophet Isaiah, in the
first chapter and the ioth, nth, 12th, 13th, 14th and
15th verses of his writings, gives a true statement
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS. I'3
of the diligent, but heartless, services of the people
of these times in religion.
The nations around them
Idolatrous Practices were confirmed idolators, and
Engrafted. being near neighbors and hav¬
ing a ritual in many respects
like theirs, Judah and Israel introduced into their
service many of the abominable religious practices
of these heathen nations and, going from bad to
worse, they became confirmed idolators. Eventu¬
ally the idolatry of the'se nations, accompanied with
its filthy and obscene rites, was adopted : the heaven¬
ly bodies were worshipped, the powers of nature
were adored, sorcery and human sacrifice practiced,
and idolatrous altars built in the house of God.
These people had become apostate from God, their
cup of iniquity was full and their downfall was sure.
Such were the character and con-
Amos Appears, ditions of the times in the midst of
which the prophet Amos appear¬
ed as a mouth-piece for God and hurled the divine
judgments at the surrounding nations, and at Judah
and Israel, like repeated peals of thunder from a
clear sky. These repeated thunder-peals of divine
judgments were not without their human elements—
they were clothed in imagery of great beauty and
sublimity, taken from the familiar objects of rural
life, and were not without their effect upon those for
whom they were intended.
Ruckert, speaking of these judgments of God an¬
nounced by the prophet, characterizes them as a
thunder-storm which suddenly rolled over the na^
tions. He poetically says, "This thunderstorm, roll¬
ing over the surrounding kingdoms, touched Judah
in its progress, poured the fullness of its power on
Israel, and passed away with a bright rainbow on
its cloud."
14. LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
Israel and Judah had once been greatly oppres?e4
by these neighboring nations, but having been re¬
lieved of this and come into a high state of pros¬
perity, they soon became actuated, as we have before
said, by the same spirit, and like them they became
idolatrous, licentious, luxurious, avaricious, and op¬
pressive and cruel to the poor. This so provoked
the divine displeasure that Jehovah commanded
Amos to denounce judgments against all. Amos
appears higher in the prophetic heavens than any of
his predecessors and emits a kind of light that had
never before shone upon the nations.
Of the early life of this hardy, brave, conscientious
man of God, who dared to face the nations and most
powerful kingdoms of the ancient world, and arraign
them in a bill of charges before the bar of justice,
equality and moral and religious purity for their
political, social and religious crimes, but little is
known beyond what he himself says in the book
which bears his name. It is only through his writ¬
ings that his life is traceable.
CHAPTER III.
The book of Amos, as we
The Book of Amos, have it, contains nine chap¬
ters and one hundred and
forty-six verses, and may be divided into four sec¬
tions, thus:
I. Introduction of personal reference, relating to
the writer, his occupation, residence, time in which
he lived and his message received—Chap, i: 1-2.
II. The denunciation of the judgments of God
against the neighboring nations, namely: Syrians,
Philistines, Tyrians, Edomites, Moabites and Am¬
monites—Chaps, i :3- t5; ii:i-5-
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS. 15
III. God's judgments against Judah and Israel—
Chap, ii :6-i6; iii-iv. In this are portrayed the crimes
and doom of Judah, and the crimes and doom of
Israel, consisting of four discourses, giving warning,
reproof and lamentation and repeated calls to re¬
pentance.
IV. A series of visions and revelations. These
are partly consolatory, partly threatening, closing
with the assurance of the final restoration of Israel
and the enjoyment of great prosperity in the latter
days under the blessings of the kingdom of the
Messiah—Chap, vii-ix.
The authenticity of the book as
The Authenticity a whole is beyond question,
of the Book. There are, however, several
passages which some critics
hold to be suspicious, or spurious. These are: (a)
Chap. 2: 4-5, in which reference is made to Judah;
(b) Chap. 6:1, where reference is made to those who
are at ease in Zion; (c) Chap. 9 :ii-i2; 4:13; 5:8-9; 9:
5-6, containing the three Outbreaks of Praise; (d)
Chap. 9:8-15, referring to the Final Hope; (e) Chap.
1:9-12; 5:1, 2 and 15; 6:2, and 14, which is sup¬
posed to contain clauses reflecting a later stage of
history than that of the times of Amos. The evi¬
dence in favor of verses 8-15 in Chapter 9, containing
the final hope of Israel, being spurious is very strong
and deserves careful study.
The literary character of
The Literary Character the book is worthy of
of the Book. special notice, for in this
alone are we able to trace
the intellectual qualifications of Amos for his work
and put the proper estimate upon his labors as a
messenger of Jehovah.
While the book of Amos is not very voluminous,
16 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
it is characterized by exquisite beauty and literary
finish. His style is simple, vigorous, and clear; his
diction remarkable for the purity of its sentiment
and elegance of expression; his images, or figures
of speech, gathered from rural and pastoral life, are
pure, abundant, magnificent and sublime; his rea¬
soning logical and artistically arranged, and his rea-
clusions, while correctly drawn, are positively pre¬
sented and applied in a tender and consolatory man¬
ner. As compared with the writings of the other
prophets, it is the equal of any of them in literary
finish.
It has been said that public men fade
His Fame rapidly from even contemporary
Permanent, memory. Only those who are so
identified with a great cause, or prin¬
ciple, that the man and the measure are one in the
popular mind, can hope to survive the tread of the
ever-advancing columns of the ambitious and suc¬
cessful. This rare distinction belongs to Moses in
the days of Egyptian slavery, to Elijah in the day of
Ahab; but in the days of Uzziah and Jeroboam II,
to Amos, the prophet of Tekoah.
This remarkable and inflexible character perme¬
ates every fibre of the cause he so nobly represent¬
ed. He is so interwoven and identified with the
great cause of religion, and the sufferings of the
poor which revolutionized the nations of the times
in which he lived, that it is not possible to read the
account which he gives of the nature and condition
of things and nations without reading in them the
life and doings of Amos. What the sun is to the
solar system, Amos is to the Book of Amos. He is
the center of it.
According to this book he was
Who Was Amos? a herdsman and gatherer of
sycamore fruits, at Tekoah, in
Judah. Tekoah was about twelve miles from Jeru-
17
salem and six miles from Bethlehem, the birthplace
of Him who was to redeem Israel.
Tekoah stood on a commanding hill, on the edge
of what is known as the Judean Plateau. To the
north, south and west stretched a range of lime-stone
hills; to the east the land was open and sloped away
to a depth of four thousand feet. In this vast slope
might be seen here a dense patch of bushes and
there a shallow vale. So desolate and gloomy
was the appearance of the place that it might well
be called the Wilderness of Tekoah. Here number¬
less herds of wild and ferocious beasts stalked by
day and by night, and their deep howl and thun¬
dering roars were frequently echoed by the hills of
Tekoah. "Here upon this unmitigated wilderness,"
says an eloquent writer, "where life is reduced to
poverty and danger ; where nature starves the imagi¬
nation, but excites the faculties of perception and
curiosity, with the mountain top's sunrise in his face,
but, above all, with Jerusalem so near, Amos did
the work which made him a man. He heard the
voice of God calling him to be a prophet ; and gath¬
ered those symbols and figures in which his pro¬
phet's message still reaches us with so fresh and so
austere an air."
While the prophet was so well
His Preparation, qualified, mentally and morally
for his vocation by his wilder¬
ness life, there is another qualification necessary
before he is fully able to take up the work among
the people for whom God had chosen him. He need¬
ed to know the social and religious condition of Is¬
rael. Being a gatherer of sycamore fruits and
grower of wool, he naturally sought the great mar¬
kets of the land for the sale of his commodities,
hence he made frequent journeys to Hebron, Beth¬
lehem, Jerusalem, Gilgal, Bethel, Be^rsheba, Da-
l8 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
mascus and Samaria. While in northern Israel he
had ample opportunity to become familiar with the
social life, commerce and the religious worship in
her magnficent sanctuaries and at her great altars.
On his journeys and at the market places he be¬
came intimately and extensively acquainted with
the customs, dialects and characteristics of the na¬
tions bordering on the two kingdoms. With these
opportunities before him he used them to marvel¬
lous benefit, making a careful study of the life and
character of these nations and becoming almost as
familiar with their thoughts and idiosyncrasies as
with that of his own community in Tekoah.
Thus familiar with the life of the nations,
Called, and convicted of their sinfulness and
crimes against the poor, he was called by
God to the prophetic office.
He himself recognized and acknowledged this in
the most beautiful and positive language, and the
only excuse which he gave for his occupancy of the
prophetic office was that God had called and put
him into it. For this reason he could not help pro¬
phesying. The record of this is as follows: "Surely
the Lord God will do nothing, but He revealeth His
secret unto His servants, the prophets. The lion
hath roared, who will not fear? The Lord God hath
spoken, who can but prophesy?"
Amos did not belong to any of
Belonged to No the schools of the prophets of
School. which there were several, but
was from the ordinary walks of
life. He who selects His ministers as well from the
tents of the shepherds as from the palaces of the
sovereign qualified him for the duties to which He
had called him. See i Cor. 12:29. He was in many
respects the most remarkable prophet of Old Testa-
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS. 19
ment times. He came' not from the schools of the
prophets, nor from the tutelage of the priest, as the
former prophets had, but from the wild desert with
no credentials of authority other than a deep inward
conviction, which he recognized to be the voice of
<jod to his soul, a powerful impression of the ex¬
ceeding wickeuaess of the people and an inward con¬
sciousness of the righteousness of the law of God
which eventually would be avenged by Him who is
its judicial executor. The judgment of God hangs
over all individuals and nations who disregard and
disobey His law. In Prov. 7:1-3, God has said by
the mouth of His servant, "My son, keep my words,
and lay up my commandments with thee. Keep my
commandments, and live; and my law as the apple
of thine eye. Bind them about thy fingers, write
them upon the table of thine heart." The principles
of this law wrought a deep and powerful conviction
upon the heart of the prophet Amos and condemned
in the most positive manner the moral and religious
life of the nations. These nations had forsaken their
God, turned away from His law and become a law
unto themselves.
That he was well qualified for the exalted position
to which he was raised by the Almighty, a careful
and impartial study of his writings will show. Bishop
Lowth, representing the best critics, and whose
statement I fully endorse, says of Amos and his
writings, "Let any person who has candor and per¬
spicuity enough to judge, not from the man but from
his writings, open the volume of his predictions, and
he will, I think, agree that our shepherd is not a
whit behind the very chief of the prophets (2 Cor.
11:15). He will agree that as, in sublimity and
magnificence, he is almost equal to the greatest, so
in splendor of diction and elegance of expression he
is scarcely inferior to any. The same celestial spir¬
it, indeed, actuated Isaiah and Daniel in the court,
20 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
and Amos in the sheep-fold; constantly selecting
such interpreters of the divine as were best adapted
to the occasion, and sometimes from the mouth of
babes -and sucklings perfecting praise—constantly
employing the natural eloquence of some, and oc¬
casionally making others eloquent."
CHAPTER IV.
Having considered the call and
The Nature of preparation of the prophet Amos,
His Message, let us take up the distinctive na¬
ture of his message. He prophe¬
sied between the years 810 and 784 B. C., during
the parallel reigns of Uzziah in Judah, and Jero¬
boam II in Israel, and was contemporary with Ho-
sea and Isaiah, prophets of the most high God.
The prophet being fully confident that-the inward
revelation was from God, enforces, with all the
energy of his being, his message of doom upon the
people as the judicial act of God. Amos said that
God said unto him, "In the day that I shall visit
the transgressions of Israel upon him, I will also
visit the altars of Bethel, and the horns of the altar
shall be cut off, and fall to the ground. And I will
smite the winter house with the summer house; and
the houses of ivory shall perish, and the great houses
shall have an end."
The prophet claims that there exists a perfect
harmony between his deep conviction of the moral
corruption of the nations and the revelation, from
without, to his soul. They both emanate from the
same source, and that source is God. It was He. that
sent the conviction to his soul and it was He that
spoke to him by His word. One has truly said that
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS. 21
"by the agreement between the inward convictions
of the soul and the outward events ot the day," the
prophet is made sure of his message—Jehovah is
the author of the inner voice speaking in the pro¬
phet's soul and of the events about to happen among
the nations. God was behind it all and induced Amos
to leave all and go at the peril of life and deliver the
message given him. When God gives the message
and calls the individual, man can but prophesy. He
cries out in unmistakable tones, "The Spirit of the
Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath
anointed me to preach," etc. It was in accordance
with the above that Amos, the herdsman of Tekoah,
was called to his high office of prophet in Israel and
rt^eived his message for the pe'ople. There was no
audible voice, no dream, no ecstacy, or vision, but
a real call and a real reception of the message. In
this Amos towers above all his predecessors.
Amos not only excels
How Amos Excels the his predecessors in re-
Other Prophets—Types spect to his call to the
prophetic office and the
manner in which he received his message, but in the
type of prophecy represented by him. The first and
oldest type of prophecy which the Bible gives ac¬
count of was that represented by the "seer," whose
business was to consult God for the people upon
the affairs of life. This custom was not original
with the religious economy of the people of God,but
was borrowed from the heathen. The means used
in this consultation, or prophecy as it was called,
were visions, dreams, signs or falling into ecstacies.
To authenticate his answer, the prophet was some¬
times required to do something wonderful in the
eyes of the people. Thus arose the necessity for
miracles. From this time until the close of the
Apostolic period the ability to work miracles was
22
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
bestowed upon the holy men of God as their cre¬
dentials of authority. In this type of prophecy there
were some dangerous elements. It could easily
have been turned into a mercenary vocation which
would enable its possessor to extort money and rob
the people of their earnings. On this account it
passed away, Samuel being its last representative.
The second type of prophecy was more extensive
and permanent and less dangerous than the first.
It began after Samuel and closed with Elisha. This
type was national in its scope and was character¬
ized by an infectious enthusiasm which fell upon
the individual and he went about from place to
place.
But Amos, the subject of this discussion, is the
representative and founder of a type of prophecy
which is universal and permanent. The others were
preparatory and were simply for the purpose of
carrying the mind forward to a certain degree of
divine truth. It was then to pass away; but the
prophet Amos' type of prophecy was to bring the
mind to those higher and more universal principles
of righteousness which should last for all time and
apply to all conditions in life. In his bold message
he makes no appeal to any oi the pet dogmas of the
religious leaders of his times, nor to the existing
institutions of his day, but, like a thunder-clap from
a clear sky, he promulgates his truth which is in
direct opposition to the existing dogmas and insti¬
tutions of his times. This course alone stamps him
as a man of unusual courage and indomitable pur¬
pose. In this the minister may learn the lesson of
profit, that when the dogmas and existing institu¬
tions of religion are wrong it is his duty to speak
against them in the most solemn and condemnatory
terms. He should lift up his voice like a trumpet
against wickedness in high places. In doing this
he has the assurance of the blessing and presence
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS. 2^
of God. God's words to Joshua are applicable to the
minister of the Gospel. Listen! "There shall not
any man be able to stand before thee all the days of
thy life: As I was with Moses, so I will be with
thee: I will not fail thee, nor forsake thee."
The two prevailing re-
Amos Strikes Down Two ligious beliefs up to the
Prevailing Beliefs. time of Amos were,
First, that Jehovah, as
the national God of Israel and Judah, was bound to
protect and defend their political and religious in¬
terests, irrespective of their morality or social deal¬
ings; Secondly, that ceremonial rites and sacrifices
were indispensable to religion. From the mutual re¬
lations existing between these principles or beliefs
the people reasoned that since Jehovah was bound
to succor them, so were they bound to supply Je¬
hovah with gifts, and the more of these they furnish¬
ed or brought the more they made sure His favor
and their salvation,- In strict accord with the state¬
ment just made they increased a hundred-fold their
religious worship and ceremonies and multiplied
their gifts a thousand times.
Amos, in his message, boldly strikes down both
of these beliefs and banishes them from the religion
of Jehovah. He denies that Jehovah was bound to
save His people and affirmed that ritual and sacrifice
were no part of the service which God demands.
Hear him: "I hate, I despise your feast days, and I
will not smell in your solemn assemblies. Though
ye offer me burnt offerings and your meat offerings,
I will not accept them; neither will I regard the
peace offerings of your fat beasts. Take thou away
from me the noise of thy song; for I will not hear
the melody of thy viols. But let judgment run
down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty
stream."—Chap. 5:21-24. This truth, enunciated by
24 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
Amos, was startling to Israel and one that had never
before been proclaimed in Israel's dominion. It
was really a shock. He substituted for their re¬
ligion of ritual and sacrifice the religion of purity
and absolute righteousness. It was this truth, and
put in this form, that the prophet Amos preached
to the people of Israel.
The prophet being zealous for Je-
He Goes hovah, and seeing the starving and
To Bethel, corrupt moral and spiritual condition
of the nation, was not satisfied with
preaching to the people round about the kingdom,
but determined, at a.ny legitimate cost, to go to the
very fountain head of the existing religion of his
times, for as a matter of fact, it was this existing
religion that was threatening the overthrow and des¬
truction of the kingdom; hence he-went to Bethel,
the chief seat of Israel's religious worship. Of the
determination of the prophet to go to this seat of
religious worship an eloquent writer says: "Amos,
having preached for some time to Israel concerning
the evil state of society, appeared at a great religious
festival in Bethel, determined to bring matters to a
crisis, and to announce the doom which his preach¬
ing threatened and the people's continued imperti¬
nence made inevitable.
"Mark his choice of place and audience. It was
no mere king he aimed at. Nathan had dealt
with David, Gad with Solomon, Elijah with Ahab
and Jezebel. But Amos sought the people, them
with whom resided the real forces and responsibil¬
ities of life; the wealth, the social fashions, the
treatment of the poor, th,e spirit of worship, the
ideals of religion. And Amos sought the people
upon what was a great popular occasion, one on
which was arrayed, in. all pomp and lavishness, the
very system he essayed to overthrow.
25
"The religion of his time—religion as mere ritual
and sacrifice—was what God had sent him to beat
down, and he faced it at its headquarters, and upon
one of its high days, in the royal and popular sanc¬
tuary, where it enjoyed at once the patronage of the
crown, the lavish gifts of the rich and thronged de¬
votion of the multitude."
It was here at Bethel, while executing in a bold
and courageous manner the functions of his office,
the prophet came in contact with Amaziah, the
•priest. The priest, having listened to the bold and
vigorous speech of Amos, twisted the words, en¬
deavoring to make them mean that Amos had spok¬
en against the king. The prophet proclaimed the
downfall of Israel, under the figure of a plumbline,
in these words: "And the Lord said unto me, Amos,
what seest thou? And I said, A plumbline. Then
said the Lord, Behold, I will set a plumbline in the
midst of my people Israel; I will not again pass by
them any more; and the high places of Isaac shall
be desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be
laid waste; and I will rise against the house of Jero¬
boam, with the sword." These were the real words
of the prophet, but Amaziah, the priest of Bethel,
reported to the king as follows: "Amos hath con¬
spired against thee in the midst of the house of Is¬
rael, the land is not able to bear his words. For thus
Amos saith, Jeroboam shall fall by the sword, and
Israel shall surely be led away captive out of their
own land." The words of the prophet being report¬
ed to the king in the distorted manner indicated
above, the king became wroth and the prophet was
officially rejected by the nation. Amaziah, the priest,
clothed with judicial power and authority from the
king, issued the following proclamation against the
prophet: "Amos, O thou seer, go flee thee away into
the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy
there; but prophesy not again any more at Bethel;
26
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
for it is the king's chapel, and it is the king's court."
In view of this the prophet delivered to Israel, in
fiery words, his final message, in which he portray¬
ed vividly and clearly her inevitable doom, under the
metaphor of a basket of summer fruit, closing with
these significant words: "Jehovah said unto me,
The end is come upon my people Israel; I will not
pass by them any more. * * * the songs of the
temple shall be howlings in the day. * * * their
feasts shall be turned into mournings and lamenta¬
tions, * * * many dead bodies shall be in every
place. * * * I will send a famine in the land,
not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of
hearing the words of Jehovah. And they ishall
wander from sea to sea, and from the north even
to the east, they shall run to and fro to seek the
word of Jehovah, and shall not find it." The reali¬
zation of this prophecy and all other predictions re¬
specting the nations mentioned in the book of Amos
were duly fulfilled and may be traced in the world's
history.
This brings me to consider the fulfillment of the
prophecy of Amos.
CHAPTER V.
The prophet in his indictment
Amos' Prophecies of the nations for their horrible
Fulfilled. crimes was bold in his predic¬
tions of their downfall, and ex¬
pressed himself with the air of absolute certainty.
By this he not only manifested his deep conviction
of the wrongs in the moral and religious life of the
nations, but also his insight into the future. There¬
fore, in order to sustain his untarnished honor as a
man, and his exalted character as a servant of God
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PPOPHET AMOS. 27
and prophet of Jehovah, there must be evidences of
the truthfulness of his message. For it these are
not found anywhere in the history of these nations,
he must go down upon the pages of history as an
impostor of the most dangerous type.
We who live in this, the meridian of the Messi¬
anic dispensation, and are enjoying the peculiar
blessings emanating therefrom, can, if we will, un¬
dertake the task, walk back carefully over the path
He spoke not for himself, but for Jehovah, and the
of ancient and modern history and trace to their
culmination all the predictions of the prophet Amos,
judicial acts following the words which he spoke
are Jehovah's. Jehovah says that when He sends
out His word it shall not return to Him void, but
shall accomplish that whereunto He sent it.
In chapters I and II the prophet charges the sur¬
rounding Gentile nations with national and frater¬
nal hatred, unjust alliances, slave-trading, cutting
to pieces of women with child, and sacrilege in the
desecration of the corpse of the king of Moab.
Judah and Israel he charges with luxuriousness,
licentiousness, sensuality, bribery of justice, seduc¬
tion of the innocent, pressure of the rich upon the
poor, personal impurity, corruption in religion, the
practice of the abominable rites of the heathen hy¬
pocrisy and unfaithfulness to God. For all these
things which they did habitually the prophet pro¬
nounced the sentence of Jehovah which resulted in
their final overthrow. The prophet having stated
the charges against these nations, let us now follow
in detail each nation to its doom.
Syria is the Greek name for the
The Doom of country known by the Hebrews
the Nations. as Aram. In its smallest sense it
only included the high lands of
Libanus and Anti-Libanus, but in its largest sense
28 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
it extended north to the Taurus mountains and
across the Euphrates river, east to the Tigris river
and the great desert and west to Phoenicia and the
Mediterranean Sea, being about 370 miles long and
150 miles wide. It was divided into three great sec¬
tions—Syria of Damascus, Syria of Zobah, and Sy¬
ria of the Two Rivers. It had several large and
important cities, and among them was Damascus.
The original settlers were the Hittites and other
races of Hamitic descent. In early times, this coun¬
try was divided up into several little kingdoms
which were governed by several petty kings. See 1
Kings x :2g; 2 Kings vii :6.
That part of the country known as Hermon and
Lebanon was subdued by Joshua and his victorious
army, and Damascus, the capital, was conquered by
David. See Joshua xi:2-i8; 2 Sam. viii:io; vi:i8.
These people remained loyal to Solomon, the son
and successor to David, during his long and event¬
ful reign, but a-t the end of this they threw off the
yoke of Israel and became an independent kingdom,
with headquarters at Damascus, their chief city. See
I Kings iv:2i; xi :2^-2^. This kingdom became a
formidable enemy to both Judah and Israel, and fre¬
quently engaged in war with them. At one time the
king of Syria and the king of Israel formed an al¬
liance with each other to conquer Judah and over¬
throw her kingdom, but Ahaz, the wise king of Ju¬
dah, obtained the aid of the king of
Destruction Assyria. The battle came off, the
of Syria, conflict was severe and the losses
many, but in the end Ahaz con¬
quered and when the spoils of war were divided be¬
tween the victorious armies, Syria fell to the king
of Assyria and became a part of the Assyrian em¬
pire. This empire was subsequently ruled by the
Babylonians and Persians, but in B. C. 333, it was
conquered by Alexander the Great.
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS. 2Q
Thirty years after this Syria again rose into
prominence and made the head of the great and
powerful kingdom, with headquarters at Antioch. In
B. C. 64, it became a Roman province and Christian¬
ity was spread through it by the preaching of the
apostle Paul. See Acts xv:23, 41; xviii:i8: xxi 13.
xxi 13.
It was of these people that the prophet of the
Lord had said: ''Thus saith the Lord, For three
transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will not
turn away the punishment thereof; because they have
threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron.
But I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, which
shall devour the palaces of Ben-hadad. I will break
also the bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitants
from the plains of Aven, and him that holdeth the
sceptre from the house of Eden, and the people of
Syria shall go into captivity unto Kir, saith the
Lordand according to the word of the prophet
and the records of history the Syrians met their
doom about sixty years after the tongue of the pro¬
phet Amos was silenced by death. Damascus was
taken by the king of Assyria and the Syrians were
carried captive to Kir and Rezin, their king, was
slain. See 2 Kings xvi '.9.
The prophet, bold and positive
Destruction of in his denunciation of the wick-
the Philistines. edness of the nations and his
threat of the impending judg¬
ments of God, said to the Philistines: "Thus saith
the Lord, For three transgressions of Gaza, and for
four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof;
because they carried away captive the whole cap¬
tivity, to deliver them up to Edom; But I will send
a fire on the wall of Gaza, which shall devour the
palace there. And I will cut off the inhabitants from
Aslidod, and him that holdeth the sceptre from Ash-
30 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
kelon, and I will turn mine hand against Ekron:
and a remnant of the Philistines shall perish, saith
the Lord God." The Philistines who are mentioned
in this threat were the most mighty and warlike
people of their day. They were the thorn in the
flesh to Judah and Israel. Several times they en¬
gaged in the fiercest wars with these nations. The
Philistines lived on a narrow strip of land to the
southeast, bordering on Palestine. It extended from
Joppa on the north to the valley of Gerar on the
south, being a distance of about forty miles; and
from the Mediterranean Sea on the west to the Ju-
dean hills, being about twenty miles in width. The
principal cities of this country were Gaza, Ashdod,
Ashkelon, Gath and Ekron. These cities were gov¬
erned by five kings. The history of the wars of the
inhabitants of either of these cities would furnish
interesting reading for any student of history.
In the time of Eli Israel was defeated by these
people at Aphek with thirty thousand slain and the
Ark of the Covenant captured; under David, Go¬
liath was killed and the rest of the Philistines were
pursued to the gates of Gath and Ekron with great
slaughter. According to Josephus, thirty thousand
of them were killed and sixty thousand wounded.
Read i Sam. vii:ii-i4; xiii:i4; 17; xix:8.
As these people lived on the great route between
Egypt and Assyria, they were often involved in
some of the fiercest wars between these great pow¬
ers of the earth. They were often successful and
sometimes defeated, but a century after the predic¬
tions of Amos the Philistines were deieated by Hez-
ekiah, and the kingdom of the warlike Philistines
soon disappeared from the catalogue of existing
kingdoms. See 2 Kings xviii :8.
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS. 31
Tyre was a large, beautiful and
Mighty Tyre, most celebrated city of Phoenicia,
situated to the east of Palestine, at
one end of the Mediterranean Sea. It had an ex¬
tensive sea-front and was enclosed by almost im¬
pregnable walls which were double on the side to¬
ward the sea and triple on the land side. It was
a great seaport and the centre of commerce for the
then commercial world. Its potent influence and
power were felt far and wide among the other na¬
tions.
The merchant fleets of Tyre were sent out in ail
directions and they went to the utmost parts of the
then known world. It established flourishing colon¬
ies, at intervals, in the winding path of powerful
merchant ships, and thus protected itself against
the encroachments of its enemies and prepared the
way for future conquest. The Tyrians utilized all
the means in their grasp and concentrated every ef¬
fort of their life, making all contribute to the build¬
ing up of their commonwealth and the strengthen¬
ing of their social, civil and political power.
By a careful examination of the Phoenician and
Greek traditions it will be seen that they make this
a very ancient city. Herodotus says that when he
visited it he was told by the priest that it was found¬
ed 2750 before Christ. The first mention in the
Bible of this marvelous city was in the time of Josh¬
ua, the leader of Israel, and successor to Moses.
This was about B. C. 1444, and the record shows
that Tyre was at that time a strong and powerful
city. See Joshua xix 129.
In the time of the blessed Christ this city was
still populous and thriving, and is referred to several
times by him. See Matt. xi':2i, 22; Mark vii 124.
The apostle Paul spent seven days in the famous
Tyre. See Acts xxi :34. In the fourth centurv Jer¬
ome speaks of it as the most beautiful city of Phoe-
32 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
nicia, and as still trading with the world. The Ty¬
rians, that is the inhabitants of Tyre, were an intelli¬
gent, thrifty, skilful, enterprising and warlike peo¬
ple. During the reign of Hiram, king of Tyre, cor¬
dial and friendly relations existed between the Ty-
rians and Israel, under David and Solomon. It was
the inhabitants of this proud city who furnished the
timber for the temple and great buildings at Jeru¬
salem and the most skilful artist who worked upon
the finest parts of that magnificent structure.
^ As time passed the city continued
Its Destruction, to grow in wealth, prosperity,
power and influence, but many
changes took place in the social and religious con¬
dition of the people. Among them, the friendly re¬
lation which had been existing between the Tyrians
and Israel for so many years was completely sun¬
dered, and Tyrians rejoiced in the distress and dis¬
appointments of Israel, and secondly, the fatal in¬
fluences of idolatry exerted by the Tyrians upon
Israel had so corrupted them that they became
loathsome in the sight of Jehovah, the Almighty
Ruler, hence his prophet predicts that this beautiful,
this prosperous, this marvelous city shall be over¬
thrown and become utterly desolate; that it shall
become the place for spreading nets; that its colo¬
nies shall be taken away and given over to others;
its commerce shall be destroyed and ships swept
from the sea.
The first indication of the fulfillment of this re¬
markable prediction of Amos, the prophet, relative
to the destruction of this famous city, was in the
year B. C. 721, when Shalmaneser, king of Assyria,
besieged the city with a vast army. The siege last¬
ed five months, at the end of which the king with¬
drew his forces from the city without any favorable
results.
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
33
Nebuchadnezzar, the haughty monarch of Baby¬
lon, besieged the city at intervals with a vast army
for thirteen years, and history is not definite as to
the nature of the success of this long siege. How¬
ever, this much is certain, that some time after the
siege of Nebuchadnezzar Tyre passed under the do¬
minion of the Persians.
Alexander the Great, after besieging the city for
seven months, took it, and the victors set it on fire.
In the days of Christ Tyre was once more a flour¬
ishing city, but since that time has been experienc¬
ing misfortune after misfortune until to-day Tyre is
nothing but a heap of ruins.
Thus Tyre, according to the word of the Lord,
spoken by the mouth of Amos, His prophet, was
completely overthrown. History verifies the fact
in the most emphatic manner. If, to-day, one is
somewhat skeptical about this matter, in order to be
convinced of the literal fulfillment of this prophecy
concerning the city's fate and thereby be ridden of
his skepticism, let him ascend the hill of Birs Nim-
roud, and, standing upon its summit, with open
Bible before him, read the remarkable utterances of
the prophet, and see before his eyes the broken walls
and pillars—majestic ruins of the ancient city's once
magnificent temple, splendid buildings, and the few
fishermen "spreading their nets" over it, which the
prophet Amos saw more than a thousand years be¬
fore it came to pass.
The particular prophecy of which I am now speak¬
ing, and the one which the prophet hurled like re¬
peated claps of thunder in the ears of the Tyrians,
was as follows: "Thus saith the Lord, For three
transgressions of Tyrus, and for four, I will not
■turn away the punishment thereof; because they de¬
livered up the whole captivity to Edom, and remem¬
bered not the brotherly covenant. But I will send
fire on the wall of Tyrus which shall devour the
34 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
palaces thereof." Amos i :g, 10. He gave them to
understand that this word of threatening doom was
not his, but the Lord's.
Of the complete destruction of the city of Tyre a
modern writer and traveler has this to say: "The
traveler stands to-day upon the batiks and looks
down into the clear crystal waters, and sees lying
there broken columns and pillars from Tyre's an¬
cient temples and buried buildings, and he sees
among the dozen or score of fisherman who find a
habitation in that desolate town a few spreading
their nets over the rocks. The pride and power of
Tyre are gone. Nothing remains to make the city's
ancient grandeur save the ruins we find here and
there, that have been literally scraped from her
rocks and her soil and cast into the sea beneath."
As it was with Tyre, the renowned city, so will it
be with other great and proud cities if they persist
in dishonoring the God of heaven, licensing wicked¬
ness, oppressing the poor and ostracising certain
classes who are in no way responsible for their con¬
dition. National power, vast riches, social and poli¬
tical influence and material and civil resources are
no barrier against the judgment of God. Right¬
eousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to
any people.
The people of Tyre acted as if they thought be¬
cause they were isolated at one end of the Mediter¬
ranean Sea they were hidden from the all-seeing
eye of God ! How vain and delusive! Their sin
found them and God saw their wickedness and
punished it.
The prophet speaking for God
The Destruction continues his annunciations of
of Edom the judgment of God against the
neighboring nations, but this
time it is against Edom.
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
35
Edom, that'is the Edomites, werq the descendants
of Esau. They lived south of Israel in a fine and
fertile rocky country, about 125 miles long and 30
miles wide. Isaac, in his prophecy, calls this coun¬
try "the fatness of the earth." See Genesis xxvii 139.
These people were robust, hardy, stern, inflexible,
patriotic and the bravest and best warriors of their
times. What the Spartans were as warriors to their
times the Edomites were to theirs.
They were for a long time vassals of the kingdom
of Judah, but during the reign of Jehoram they re¬
volted and won their independence. They were
uncompromising in their opposition to the house of
Jacob. They were neighbors of the chosen people,
and whenever the attention of these people was di¬
verted from their usual watchfulness the Edomites
would hurry across the border and pounce upon
their harvest fields and vineyards, and the fruitage
of patient husbandry was at once destroyed.
As rich and powerful as this nation was it must
come to naught, for the mouth of the Lord hath
spoken it. Listen: "Thus saith the Lord, For three
transgressions of Edom, and for four, I will not
turn away the punishment thereof; because he did
pursue his brother with the sword, and did cast off
all pity, and his anger did tear perpetually and he
kept his wrath forever. But I will send a fire upon
Teman which shall devour the palaces of Bozrah."
You will see by this prediction that Amos states
not only the fact of Edom's destruction but also the
means by which this shall be accomplished. It is
called by the prophet "a fire." By that system of
interpretation known as parallelism we may learn
what and who is meant by this "fire." By turning
to the prophecy of Obadiah, who spoke of the same
judgments of God to be visited upon Edom as had
Amos, you have the following: "And the house of
Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame,
36 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
and the house t)f Esua for stubble and they shall
kindle in them, and devour them; and there shall
not be any remaining of the house of Esau; for the
Lord hath spoken it." Obadiah, 18th verse.
Thus it is seen that this "fire" is the house of
Jacob, that is, Israel, the descendants of Jacob. It
was not until after the lapse of many centuries that
this prophecy was fulfilled. About one hundred and
fifty years before Christ, in the days of the Macca¬
bees, the Edomites were defeated by Judas Macca¬
bees and completely subjugated. They were given
the alternative of leaving their country, or sub¬
mitting to the rite of circumcision and conforming
to the law of Moses. They chose the latter and
thus, in the language of Josephus, "They were
henceforth no other than Jews." Their name was
destroyed, and that at the hands of Israel, the "fire"
spoken of in the prediction. But the complete and
finaj. overthrow of the Edomites as a distinct na¬
tional power was, in a great measure, delayed,until
the Mohammedan invasion, when it was soon after
complete.
The next nation against which
Destruction of the prophet directed the thun-
Ammonites. der-bolt of his message of doom
was the Ammonites, who lived in a
mountainous country to the east of Israel. They
were the descendants of Ben-Ammi, a son of Lot,
and were a cruel, remorseless and nomadic people.
They were gross idolaters, their chief idol was Mo-
lech. Time and again they had been visited by the
judgments of God for their wickedness, though
they were spared, by God's express command, when
Israel passed by them from Egypt, because Lot was
their progenitor. See Deut. ii: 19, 2 Chron. xx:io.
Several times they made war on Israel, but each
time were routed with great slaughter and signal
defeat. At one time, however, they seized and oc-
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROIMIET AMOS.
37
cupied a great part of the territory of Israel. For
this and other gross sins they were threatened with
the most dreadful judgments of God. The prophet
Amos says to them: "Thus saith the Lord, For
three transgressions of the children of Ammon, and
for four, I will not turn away the punishment there¬
of ; because they have ripped up the women with
child of Gilead, that they might enlarge their bor¬
ders. But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah,
and it shall devour the palaces thereof, with shout¬
ing in the day of battle, with a tempest in the day
of the whirlwind. And their king shall go into cap¬
tivity, he and his princes together, saith the Lord.''
See Amos i 113, 14, 15.
In the prediction it is seen that the judgments of
God are directed against the children of Ammon,
but it is clear that the most dreadful of these judg-
mens are against their capital city, their king and
their princes. And the fact is that all the prophet
said came to pass.
Rabbah, the magnificent city and capital of the
Ammonites' possession, stood on the bank of the
Jabbok River. It was the pride and glory of their
kingdom, but, after experiencing various fortunes,
was destroyed by Israel and their king's crown was
taken from his head and put on the head of David,
and their king and people reduced to a state of abject
servitude, as the prophet had foretold. Read 2 Sam.
xii :26~31.
The Moslems, when they went to the city of Rab¬
bah in modern times, found it in ruins. These ruins
are still remarkable, even in the East, for their ex¬
tent and desolation.
That these people met their doom the history of
nations will show abundant proof. I cite one pas¬
sage : "During the time of the Maccabees various
battles were fought between the Ammonites and
the Jews; and during the changes that ensued, first
38
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
under the Grecian, then under the Roman suprem¬
acy, the Ammonites lost their independent position
and gradually became amalgamated with the gen¬
eral Arab population/'
No nation bordering on Israel
The Destruction escaped the prophet's threat of
of Moab. the judgments of God. He says,
"Thus saith the Lord, For three
transgressions of Moab, and for four, I will not turn
away the punishment thereof; because he burned
the bones of the king of Edom into lime. But I will
send a fire upon Moab, and it shall devour the pal-
laces of Kirioth; and Moab shall die with tumult,
with shouting, and with the sound of the trumpet.
And I will cut off the judge from the midst thereof
and will slay all the princes thereof with him, saith
the Lord." Amos ii:i, 2, 3.
In this the message of doom is directed against
Moab, that is, the Moabites, Kirioth, one of their
strong cities, and their_ judge. Judge was the title
then worn to designate a class of magistrates.
The Moabites dwelt in the country which was
anciently occupied by the Ammonites between the
Jabbok and Arnon Rivers. It was among the best
pasture lands of that region. This is shown by the
enormous tribute which Misha, king of Moab, paid
to the king of Israel for the use of it. He paid one
hundred thousand lambs and one hundred thousand
rams, with the wool. See 2 Kings iii '.4.
The territory of Moab was a narrow rolling pla¬
teau 3200 feet above the sea level, fifty miles long
by twenty miles wide, and was divided into three
partitions called the "Land of Moab," the "Field of
Moab," the "Plains of Moab."
These people built up a strong and powerful king¬
dom, but the once flourishing and renowned king¬
dom is to-day a region of desolation. The ruins of
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHKT AMOS. 39
their great cities attest the long-predicted doom ut¬
tered many years before by the mouth of Amos, the
prophet of Tekoah.
Mr. Cyril Graham, who explored this region,
found cities with buildings in a good state of preser¬
vation, yet everywhere uninhabited. He says: "In
the whole of these vast plains, north and south, east
and west, desolation reigns supreme."
CHAPTER VI.
Thus we have followed the
Destruction of • path of history down to the
Judah and Israel, doom of the heathen nations.
iMow let us trace Judah and Is¬
rael. Following hard on the heel of the destruction
of these heathen nations was that of Judah and Is¬
rael. The standard with which God measured all
these nations was that of righteousness. He looked
not on the person, high favor nor position, but they
that did righteousness and feared Him were accept¬
ed of Him. Judah and Israel had failed to work
righteousness and fear Him, therefore they, too, must
be punished.
Judah was the richer of the two kingdoms, but
Israel possessed nearly four times as much territory
and a much larger population. Their continued
rivalry led to unholy alliances with Syria, Egypt and
Assyria, and were sure steps which led to the down¬
fall of the two sacred nations. Long before this the
ancient Seer of Jehovah had warned them of the
danger of mingling with the heathen nations. "No
one can take fire into his bosom and not be burned,"
is the axiom which Jehovah had stated for the guid¬
ance of the social life of His chosen people.
From the days of Moses God had always govern-
40 LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
ed His people according to the promises and threat-
enings which He delivered from Mount Horeb. If
they deviated from their allegiance He brought them
back by suitable chastisements; and the same course
was pursued in the government of the kingdoms of
Israel and Judah. If the monarchs of both these
kingdoms had viewed the sundering of the empire
as a* consequence of Solomon's idolatry and ming¬
ling with the heathen nations, and as a warning to
them to govern their subjects according to the book
of the Law, their kingdoms might have enjoyed un¬
interrupted prosperity. Even Jeroboam, who rent
the empire asunder and led off the Ten Tribes, had
been assured that if he kept the Law as David had
done his house should be equally sure with that of
Judah.
But the kings of both states rebelled against Je¬
hovah and worshipped other gods, and allied them¬
selves with their idolatrous neighbors, and after a
succession of prophets had reminded both rulers and
subjects of their duties to Jehovah, and threatened
them with punishment in case of disobedience,
there followed calamity after calamity to bring them
to reflection. When all means had been exhausted
Jehovah raised up Amos to declare to Judah and
Israel their inevitable doom. To them he says:
"Hear this word that the Lord hath spoken against
you, O children, of Israel, against the whole family
which I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying,
You only have I known of all the families of the
earth; therefore I will punish you for all your iniqui¬
ties."—iii :i-2.
In this is couched the doom of both Israel and Ju¬
dah. Israel, against whom the fullness of the power
of the thunderstorm of divine judgments was di¬
rected by the prophet Amos, was the first of the Is¬
raelite family to meet her doom. She enjoyed a long
period of peace and prosperity which she inter-
LfFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
41
preted to mean that the fearful judgments which the
prophet had announced had been averted. Hence
she went on her usual way increasing in luxurious-
ness, oppression and cruelty, and introducing still
viler types of idolatry with all its concomitant vices,
as if no prophet of Jehovah had spoken to her; but
alas! alas! Jehovah had spoken and her doom was
sealed; her moral and social life had been measured
by the plumbline of purity and justice and had been
found corrupt to the core; her religious life had been
weighed in the balances of righteousness and had
been found wanting; upon her national life was
written, in bold relief, "Mene"—"God hath number¬
ed thy kingdom, and finished it."
Immediately after the death of Jeroboam, B. C.
743, unmistakable pointers to the impending doom
became visible. Internal revolt was prevalent
throughout the kingdom. The people lost confi¬
dence in their rulers and refused loyalty to their
kings; conspiracies, bloodshed, rapine, murder, high¬
way robbery, theft, cruelty and licentiousness were rife
in all the nation.
Added to this state of affairs was that Israel, the
once proud and victorious nation, had lost her self-
reliance and therefore sought aid and formed alli¬
ances with the neighboring nations. She now be¬
gan to realize the hopelessness of her national per¬
petuity and the withdrawal of divine protection,
hence, like a drowning man, she caught at anvthino
f">r safety.
The very throne itself was threatened and it be¬
came dangerous in the extreme for anyone to oc¬
cupy it. When Zechariah, son of Jeroboam, suc¬
ceeded to the throne he was assassinated within six
months by Shallum. Shallum ascended the throne
and in one month thereafter he met the fate of his
predecessor by the hand of Menahem, son of Gadi.
This haughty monarch held the throne for seven
42
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS.
years, only by paying an enormous amount of tri¬
bute money to the Assyrian government. The fact
that he exacted this large sum of money from the
wealthy nobles of his kingdom bred discontent and
he was dethroned and succeeded by his son, Peka-
hiah. In a little more than a year from the date of
his ascension to the throne he was assassinated by
one of his princes by the name of Pvekah. Pekah
took the throne and made a desperate effort to re¬
tain it. He succeeded in holding it for twenty years,
but was finally slain by Hoshea, who established
himself upon the throne. In the ninth year of his
reign the final crisis in the life of Israel came: Shal-
maneser, king of Assyria, besieged Samaria, and
after three years siege, took the city, threw the king
in prison and carried away Israel captive beyond
the Euphrates. See 2 Kings xvii '.5-23 ; xxxiii :g-i2.
Thus Israel met her doom in sixty-five years after
it had been vividly portrayed by the mouth of
Amos, the prophet of Jehovah. And the one unan¬
swerable question among scholars of all grades,
types and religions is, "What has become of the lost
tribes?"
Judah, though highly favored by the Almighty
by being the custodians of His special promises re¬
specting the Messiah and containing the tribe
whence He should come, also met her doom, for she
was included in the family that Jehovah had always
known and declared by the mouth of the prophet
Amos that he would punish for their sins. The
first intimation of Judah's downfall began B. C.
742, during the reign of Ahaz. This corrupt and un¬
godly monarch restored the worship of Baal and
Molech in his kingdom by adopting the idolatry of
Ahab and making molten images for Baal.
He sacrificed in the vale of Hinnom and in groves
on high places, and made his son to pass through
the fire in honor of Molech, and practiced all the
LIFE AND TIMES OF THE PROPHET AMOS. 43.
abominations of the heathen. He consummated his,
iniquity by removing the altar of Jehovah, and erect¬
ing an idolatrous altar in the temple, and by cutting
in pieces the oracles of the house of God. See 2
Kings xvi:i-4 Chron. xxviii:i-4.
Hezekiah, the good king, and son and successor
to Ahaz, tried to lead the people back to the wor¬
ship of Jehovah, but his son and successor, Manas-
seh, frustrated the hope which had arisen from the
prayerful and tireless efforts of his father, and made
Judah worse than the heathen.
All means after this to restore Judah were in¬
effectual. Her doom was sealed. Jerusalem, her
sacred capital, now tottered toward its fall. Nebu-
chadnezzer, the haughty monarch of Babylon, be¬
sieged Jerusalem B. C. 588, and on the 7th day of
the 4th month the city fell into his hands. Bedekiah,
the king, was captured and, in fulfillment of pro¬
phecy, his eyes were put out and he was carried to
Babylon in chains, where he died a prisoner of war.
The walls were broken down, the city and temple
were sacked and burned and the whole nation car¬
ried way captive to Babylon. See 2 Kings xxv:4;
2 Chron. xxxvi :i4--2i; Jer. lii:i2-23. Thus in 134
years from the captivity of the Ten Tribes, and 296
years from the prediction of Amos, Judah met her
doom. No historical fact recorded in the Bible is
more certain than the fulfillment of the prediction
of Amos as regards the downfall of Jerusalem and
the ruin of Judah as a nation. From the destruction
of these nations we may learn two very important
lessons:
First, that whenever the hand of God has been
stretched out against a nation on account of its ex¬
ceeding sinfulness, and these sins have been pointed
out to that nation by the mouth of His servants, and
the nation persists in its wickedness, He will not
44 life and times of the prophet amos.
withdraw that hand until that nation's destruction
is complete.
Secondly, that God deals with men, not according
to their nationality, but upon the principle of right¬
eousness. No sinner, be he Jew or Greek, Barba¬
rian, Scythian, bond or free, can escape the judg¬
ment of God. Notwithstanding Israel and Judah
were God's peculiar people He had somewhat
against them, too. He addressed them by the same
significant formula and in the same style as He did
the other nations, and portrayed by the prophet
Amos their awful doom with equally as much cer¬
tainty; and the painful fact recorded in the history
is that, like others, they met their doom also. Hence
it is logical to conclude that any nation in modern
times which follows in the wake of these nations will
surely be numbered among the nations that were.
QUESTIONS FOR SELF-EXAMINATION IN AMOS.
(The reader who can answer all these questions will be as
thoroughly grounded in the Book of Amos, in all essential
points, as if he had studied the Book in a theological school.
He will also be surprised 'to find what a clear insight he
gains into the mysteries of other prophecy.)
1.—What is necessary to estimate properly a great life?
2.—How can this be done by one remote from the charac¬
ter to be studied?
3.—Describe the conditions of life in Judah and Israel in
Amos' time.
4.—Who was king of Judah, B. C. 810? Describe his reign.
5.—Who was king of Israel, B. C. 825? Describe his reign.
6.—What did the era of prosperity lead to ultimately?
7.—What nine indictments did Amos bring against the na¬
tion?
8.—Did the patriotism of the people survive their social
corruption?
9.—What can you say of the literary activity of the times?
10.—Draw a comparison between those times and our own.
11.—Give some account of the religious life of the Jews in
A.mos' time.
12.—Where did they establish centers of worship, and what
led to the selection of those places?
13.—For what other purpose besides worship did they as¬
semble there?
14.—Was their service a heart or a lip service?
15.—What does Isaiah say of this service?
16.—What other evils gradually crept into their worship?
17-—What caused this?
18.—Who appeared at this stage of apostacy?
19.—What do we know of Amos' early life? His occupa¬
tion? His home?
20.—Where do we get our information?
21.—What opportunity had Amos to study the social and
religious condition of Israel?
22.—To what particular school of prophets did Amos be¬
long?
23.—What does Bishop Lowth say of his qualifications?
24.—With what Major and Minor prophets was Amos con¬
temporaneous?
25.—What was the nature of his message?
26.—Into how many sections is the Book of Amos divided?
Name them.
27.—What portions of the Book are of doubtful authentic¬
ity, according to the critics?
28.—What is said of Chapter 9, verses 8-15?
29.—What can you say of the literary character of the
Book?
30.—How does Amos excel the other Prophets? Describe
fully.
31.—What were the two prevailing beliefs up to the time of
Amos?
32.—What position does he take regarding them? Quote
him on it.
33.—Describe his trip to Bethel.
34.—What took place between him and Amaziah, the priest?
35-—What charges did Amos make against the surrounding
Gentile nations?
36.—What charges did he make against Judah and Israel?
37.—Show how Amos' prophecies were fulfilled:
(a) In the case of Syria.
(b) In the case of the Philistines.
(c) In the case of Tyre.
(d) In the case of Edom.
(e) In the case of the Ammonites.
(f) In the case of Moab.
(g) In the case of Judah and Israel.
38.—What two important lessons may we learn from the
destruction of these nations?
39.—Write a sermon or an essay embodying the most im¬
portant thoughts or reflections gleaned from read¬
ing this book.