AMOS.

(B. C. 790-780 probably.)

THIS prophecy dates itself and describes its author thus:

"The words of Amos, who was among the herdmen of Tekoa; which he saw concerning Israel in the days of Uzziah, king of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam, the son of Joash, king of Israel, two years before the earthquake."

Tekoa was south of Jerusalem. Here is a Judahite prophet, then, addressing the people of Israel.` A shepherd by education, he does not come from any "school of prophets" to the exercise of his office. He afterwards describes thus his call to the prophetic function (vii. 14, 15):

"I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's son;

But I was a herdman and a gatherer of sycamore-fruit;
And the Lord took me as I followed the flock,

And the Lord said unto me: Go, prophesy unto my people
Israel."

The earthquake in the reign of Uzziah is mentioned also in Zechariah (xiv. 5) as a well-remembered calamity: "Ye shall flee, like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah, king of Judah." It would appear (unless this dating by the earthquake has been inserted subsequently in the inscription of Amos's prophecy) that this prophet did not originally compose it in writing, but that it was written down afterwards, the earthquake having happened between the time of its delivery and of its being written down.

Amos is thus nearly contemporary with Jonah, perhaps about 790 or 780 B. C. The history of the kingdom of Israel under Jeroboam the Second's reign, quoted

in connection with Jonah, will serve therefore for Amos too; parallel to which we may here place the compendious account of Uzziah's long reign over Judah as given in the book of Kings (2 Kings xv. 1-7). He is called Azariah in the book of Kings and Uzziah in the Chronicles.

"In the twenty-and-seventh year of Jeroboam, king of Israel, began Azariah son of Amaziah, king of Judah, to reign. Sixteen years old was he when he began to reign; and he reigned two-and-fifty years in Jerusalem: and his mother's name was Jecholiah of Jerusalem. And he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his father Amaziah had done; save that the high-places were not removed: the people sacrificed and burnt incense still on the high-places. And the LORD smote the king, so that he was a leper unto the day of his death, and dwelt in a separate house: and Jotham the king's son was over the house, judging the people of the land. And the rest of the acts of Azariah, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the Chronicles of the kings of Judah? So Azariah slept with his fathers, and they buried him with his fathers in the city of David; and Jotham his son reigned in his stead."

The book of Chronicles gives a longer account (2 Chron. xxvi.), containing the following additional particulars: That Uzziah built Eloth (the port at the head of the Red Sea, on the eastern arm) and restored it to Judah (also mentioned parenthetically in 2 Kings xiv. 22);—that he warred against the Philistines and the Arabians with success,-received tribute from the Ammonites and fortified Jerusalem,-and gave great attention to husbandry, as well as to the improvement of his army. The contents of the prophecy of Amos are as follows: He threatens divine punishment against Damascus for its oppression over the eastern province of Gilead, and declares that the people of Syria shall be led captive to Kir, in Media (the fulfilment of which is recorded in 2

Kings xvi. 9). He threatens divine punishment against the Philistines;-against Tyre, which is charged by various prophets with selling Hebrew captives for slaves, and seems to have been in uneasy relations towards Israel since the days of Jehu, who had treacherously destroyed the worshipers of Baal, not a few of them probably Tyrians, or having Tyrian connections;—against Edom (at war with Amaziah and Uzziah), Ammon and Moab (probably allies of Edom);—against Judah ;—and most pointedly and fully against Israel, for their ingratitude, luxury, oppressions and idolatry. Bethel, on the confines of the two kingdoms, Gilgal in Israel, and Beersheba in Judah, are denounced as places of idolatrous worship, first in fine irony and then in solemn

remonstrance:

"Go now to Bethel and transgress!
At Gilgal multiply transgression!
Bring your sacrifices every morning,
And your tithes every three years!

And offer a thank-offering with leaven,

And proclaim and publish the free-will offerings;

For this liketh you, O ye children of Israel,

Saith the LORD God."

"Thus saith the LORD unto the house of Israel:

(iv. 4, 5.)

Lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph,

And it devour the house of Israel, and there be none to

quench it.

Ye who turn judgment to wormwood,

And leave off righteousness in the earth,

Seek Him that made the Pleiades and Orion,

And turneth the shadow of death into the morning,
And maketh the day dark with night,

And calleth for the waters of the sea,

And poureth them out upon the face of the earth;
Jehovah is his name!

That strengtheneth desolation against the strong,
And bringeth desolation against the fortress."

(v. 4-9.)

Hypocrisy is witheringly denounced; their idols, Moloch and Chiun, are pointed at by name, and captivity under the Assyrians is plainly hinted.

"I hate, I despise your feast-days,

And I will not smell (not notice) your solemn assemblies.
Though ye offer me burnt-offerings and flour-offerings,
I will not accept them;

Neither will I regard the peace-offerings of your fat beasts.
Take away from me the noise of thy songs,
For I will not hear the melody of thy viols.
But let justice run down as waters,
And righteousness as a mighty stream.

Did ye offer to me sacrifices and offerings,
In the wilderness forty years, O house of srael?
And do ye now bear the tabernacle of

And Chiun your image,

your Moloch,

The star of your god which ye have made for yourselves?
Therefore will I cause you to go into captivity beyond

Damascus,

Saith the LORD, whose name is the God of Hosts."

(v. 21—27.)

The sixth chapter denounces the luxury and oppression of the upper classes. The seventh contains several visions of judgments suspended and delayed; among them that of locusts devouring all the produce of the land, a thought which is worked up afterwards by the prophet Joel (according to the order here adopted), into

a striking and fearful picture, emblematic, no doubt, of the Assyrian invasion soon to be made under TiglathPileser. In this seventh chapter a short narrative occurs, to the effect that Amaziah, the idolatrous priest of Bethel, denounced Amos to the king, on the false charge of his having predicted the king's death as well as the captivity of the land, and artfully urged Amos to flee into Judah for safety, which the prophet indignantly refused to do. A vision of a basket of ripe fruits suggests the burden of the eighth chapter, that Israel is ripe for destruction. And in the ninth, their captivity is announced as impending, and their restoration promised.

Such are the contents of the book of Amos. His style is forcible. Some think they trace in it the rusticity of the herdsman; but this feature seems more fanciful than real. There is no more want in him of the higher qualities of Hebrew poetry, than of the high and pure morality which belongs to the Hebrew prophets in general.

Good morals are the general theme of the prophetic exhortations, sometimes in pointed denunciation of the superstitious abuse of ceremony, and often in connection with the predicted disasters of the Jewish people. This fine moral element we shall find prevailing at every step. Never let Judaism be disparaged as ceremonial, while the voices of its dead prophets yet speak.

HOSEA.

(About 783-727 B. C.)

HOSEA is dated, in the inscription to his book, as prophesying in the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and of Jeroboam II., the son of Joash, king of Israel. Partly contemporary with

T