AMOS
INTRODUCTION
Amos, shepherd of Juda, called himself a
worker and He went to Israel as a prophet. He has a very background and he is a very courageous servant of
God to Bethel who preached against Israel 's idolatry of the golden cow. He
gave his life for this mission. Surely he will return home afterwards. He uses
a lot of popular sayings and field derived imagery. In the days of King Ozais in
Juda and Jeroboam II in Israel, bothering countries had a very great prosperity.
However, they gave themselves over to corruption especially the Israelites who
adored the golden cow believing it to be the only true service for God. God
gathered quite a bit of hate in His head due to this. The Book of Amos
comprises 9 chapters that can be divided into three parts : Introduction
(1-3), Israel's accusation by its neighbours (3-6), Visions of ruins and of the
reconstruction of the Kingdom (7-9)
God
roars from within Zion
Key
verse 1 : 2
In
the first two chapters, Amos writes about God's judgement on the countries
surrounding Israel. After that he goes on to talking about the judgement that
will fall upon Israel. God, He who judges these nations, ressembles a roaring
lion. The result of his roars on the Earth is the country's complete and total
devastation.
1. God's judgement on
the Syrians, the Philistines and the Phenecians.
They
are just the neighbouring countries around Israel. Amongst the three parent
countries (Edom, Amon and Moab) the Chapter deals with Edom and Amon at the
end. Amos writes in this way in order to highlight the universiality of God's
power and the fact that God's justice applies to all without any consideration
based on someone's title. This jugement will first fall on the Syrians. The
first verse of each sentence « 3-4 » refers to the fact that they
keep on sinning and becoming more and more wicked. Syria mercilessly crushed
Israel like a harrow ploughs the ground. Other meanings of the name of Damas
are House of nothing and House of pleasure. Qir is where Georgia is nowadays. The
Philistines comes thereafter and this group of people is based on the coming
together of fire different peoples. The first one of which is Gaza. They were
were responsible for carrying out a number of conquests on Juda and Israel
which ended in the captivity of many Jets. These Jews were later sold to the
Edomites and the Arabs. Then comes the Phenecians whose main city was Tyr and who
sold the enslaved Jews into captivity under the Edomites.
2. Edom and Ammon
(9-21)
The
Edomites are Esau's descendants and so they are one of Israel's close
relatives. However, history shows that they were one of the most persistent
hostile countries towards the Israelites. God will judge them like one who is
very irrated. The Ammonites are descendants of Loth so they are also one of
Israel's relatives. The capital city of Ammon is Rabba (12). In order to
decimate this people, there needs to be a war with a lot of violence and blood-shed.
This event is similar to the hurricane Maria that passed through the Caribbean
Islands this year (2017). At the end of this war, the King and his shall all be
deported. This judgement will be carried out by the Assyrian Kings who will
subjugate all of the islands in West Asia. Nowadays only the ruins of Rabba remain
and they are called Amman. This is the abbreviation of Rabbath-Ammon (Dt 3v11).
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