Amos7chapter 7

Amos 7:6

“The caterpillars were countermanded, were remanded; a stop was put to the progress of the fire, and thus a reprieve was granted. See the power of prayer, of effectual fervent prayer, and how much it avails, what great things it prevails for. A stop has many a time been put to a judgment by making supplication to the Judge.”

Amos 7:7

“Stood upon - (Rather “over” “a wall” made by “a plumbline;” lit. “a wall of a plumbline,” that is, (as our’s has it) “made” straight, perpendicular, “by” it. The wall had been “made by a lead” or “plumbline;” by it, that is, according to it, it should e destroyed. God had made it upright, He had given to it an undeviating rule of right, He had watched over it, to keep it, as He made it. Now “He stood over it,” fixed in His purpose, to destroy it. He marked its inequalities. Yet this too in judgment.”

Amos 7:9

“In the Hebrew here "Isaac" is written with s, instead of the usual ts; both forms mean "laughter"; the change of spelling perhaps expresses that their "high places of Isaac" may be well so called, but not as they meant by the name; for they are only fit to be laughed at in scorn.”

Amos 7:10

“Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel,.... The Targum calls him the prince or president of Bethel; and the word used signifies both a prince and a priest; and very probably this man had the care of the civil as well as religious matters in Bethel.”

Amos 7:10

“Not secretly, or in a corner, but openly, in the very center of the state, so as to upset the whole utterly. land is not able to bear all his words--They are so many and so intolerable. A sedition will be the result. The mention of his being "priest of Beth-el" implies that it was for his own priestly gain, not for the king or state, he was so keen.”

Amos 7:11

“For thus Amos saith - Amos had said, “Thus saith the Lord;” he never fails to impress on them, whose words he is speaking. Amaziah, himself bound up in a system of falsehood and imposture, which, being a creature-worship, gave itself out as the worship of the true God, believed all besides to be fraud. Fraud always suspects fraud; the irreligious think devotion, holiness, saintliness to be hypocrisy: vice imagines virtue to be well-masked vice.”

Amos 7:12

“That Bethel was not a proper place for him to exercise his ministry in, for it was the king's chapel, or sanctuary, where he had his idols and their altars and priests; and it was the king's court, or the house of the kingdom, where the royal family resided and where were set the thrones of judgment; and therefore prophesy not any more here.”

Amos 7:14

“I was no prophet - I am an extraordinary messenger of God. I am not called to the prophetic office but for this occasion. I have no message to Judah, and therefore need not go there. I have a message to Israel alone, and I must faithfully deliver it. For the account which Amos gives here of himself, see the introduction.”

Amos 7:14

“I am a shepherd (compare Am 7:15, "flock"; the Hebrew for "herdsman" includes the meaning, shepherd, compare Am 1:1) in humble position, who did not even think of prophesying among you, until a divine call impelled me to it. prophet's son--that is, disciple.”

Amos 7:14

“He did not run before he was sent, but pleads, as Paul, that he was called to be an apostle; and men will find it is at their peril if they contradict and oppose any that come in God's name, if they say to his seers, See not, or silence those whom he has bidden to speak; such fight against God.”

Amos 7:16

Amaziah then was in direct rebellion and contradiction against God. He was in an office forbidden by God. God’s word came to him. He had his choice; and, as people do, when entangled in evil courses, he chose the more consciously amiss. He had to resign his lucrative office and to submit to God speaking to him through a shepherd, or to stand in direct opposition to God, and to confront God; and in silencing Amos, he would silence God. But, like one who would arrest the lightning, he draws it on his own head. Amos contrasts the word of Amaziah, and the word of God; Rup.: “Hear thou the word of the Lord; Thou sayest; prophesy not against Israel. Therefore thus saith the Lord.” Not only will I not cease to prophesy against Israel, but I will also prophesy to thee. Hear now thine own part of the prophecy.” Drop not - The form of expression, (not the word) is probably taken from Moses. “My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distill as the dew; as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass” Deu 32:2. Micah speaks of the word as used by those who forbade to prophesy, as though the prophecy were a continual wearisome “dropping.” God’s word comes as a gentle dew or soft rain, not beating down but refreshing; not sweeping away, like a storm, but sinking in and softening even hard ground, all but the rock; gentle, so as they can bear it. God’s word was to people, such as they were toward it; dropping like the dew on those who received it; wearing, to those who hardened themselves against it. It drops in measure upon the hearts which it fertilizes, being adapted to their capacity to receive it. And so contrariwise as to the judgments with which God’s prophets are charged. : “The prophets do not discharge at once the whole wrath of God, but, in their threatenings, denounce little drops of it.”

Amos 7:16

“Now therefore hear thou the word of the Lord - While he was speaking in his own vindication, God seems to have inspired him with the awful prediction which he immediately delivers.”

Amos 7:17

“Thy wife shall be a harlot - These were, and still are, among the horrors of war. His own sentence comes last, when he had seen the rest, unable to hinder it. Against his and her own will, she should suffer this.”