<< Amos 1:2 >>

And he said, The LORD will roar from Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the habitations of the shepherds shall mourn, and the top {d} of Carmel shall wither.

(d) Whatever is fruitful and pleasant in Israel, will shortly perish.

Wesley's Notes

1:2 Will roar - Alluding to the roaring of an hungry lion for prey. Jerusalem - The city God had chosen where he dwelt, the seat of God's instituted worship, and the royal seat of the kingdom as God had settled it, from which in both respects the ten tribes had revolted. The habitations - Where the shepherds found pasturage they pitch their tents, and dwelt therein that they might attend their flocks. And this was the delight and wealth of these men; alluding to which Amos expresses the wealth and delight of the kingdom of Israel. Shall wither - Either blasted, or dried up with drought, and turned into barrenness. So the whole kingdom of the ten tribes, though as fruitful as Carmel should be made horrid and desolate as a wilderness.

Scofield Reference Notes

[1] roar

"Roar," etc. Cf. Isa 42:13 Jer 25:30-33 Hos 11:10,11 Joel 3:16. It will be found that wherever the phrase occurs it is connected with the destruction of Gentile dominion (see "Times of the Gentiles," Lk 21:24. See Scofield Note: "Rev 16:19" and the blessing of Israel in the kingdom. Without a doubt a near fulfilment upon Syria occurred 2Ki 14:28 but the expression, "the Lord will roar," looks forward to a vaster fulfilment. See Scofield Note: "Joel 1:4".

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2. will roar-as a lion (Joe 3:16). Whereas Jehovah is there represented roaring in Israel's behalf, here He roars against her (compare Ps 18:13; Jer 25:30).

from Zion . Jerusalem-the seat of the theocracy, from which ye have revolted; not from Dan and Beth-el, the seat of your idolatrous worship of the calves.

habitations . mourn-poetical personification. Their inhabitants shall mourn, imparting a sadness to the very habitations.

Carmel-the mountain promontory north of Israel, in Asher, abounding in rich pastures, olives, and vines. The name is the symbol of fertility. When Carmel itself "withers," how utter the desolation! (So 7:5; Isa 33:9; 35:2; Jer 50:19; Na 1:4).

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

1:18-21 There shall be abundant Divine influences, and the gospel will spread speedily into the remotest corners of the earth. These events are predicted under significant emblems; there is a day coming, when every thing amiss shall be amended. The fountain of this plenty is in the house of God, whence the streams take rise. Christ is this Fountain; his sufferings, merit, and grace, cleanse, refresh, and make fruitful. Gospel grace, flowing from Christ, shall reach to the Gentile world, to the most remote regions, and make them abound in fruits of righteousness; and from the house of the Lord above, from his heavenly temple, flows all the good we daily taste, and hope to enjoy eternally.

Matthew Henry's Whole Bible Commentary

An Exposition, With Practical Observations, of The Prophecy of Amos

Though this prophet appeared a little before Isaiah, yet he was not, as some have mistaken, that Amos who was the father of Isaiah (Isa. 1:1), for in the Hebrew their names are very different; their families too were of a different character, for Isaiah was a courtier, Amos a country-farmer. Amos signifies a burden, whence the Jews have a tradition that he was of a slow tongue and spoke with stammering lips; we may rather, in allusion to his name, say that his speech was weighty and his word the burden of the Lord. He was (as most think) of Judah, yet prophesied chiefly against Israel, and at Bethel, 7:13. Some think his style savours of his extraction, and is more plain and rustic than that of some other of the prophets; I do not see it so; but it is plain that his matter agreed with that of his contemporary Hosea, that out of the mouth of these two witnesses the word might be established. It appears by his contest with Amaziah the priest of Bethel that he met with opposition in his work, but was a man of undaunted resolution in it, faithful and bold in reproving sin and denouncing the judgments of God for it, and pressing in his exhortations to repentance and reformation. He begins with threatenings against the neighbouring nations that were enemies to Israel, ch. 1 and 2. He then calls Israel to account, and judges them for their idolatry, their unworthy walking under the favours God had bestowed upon them, and their incorrigibleness under his judgments, ch. 3 and 4. He calls them to repentance (ch. 5), rejecting their hypocritical sacrifices unless they did repent. He foretels the desolations that were coming upon them notwithstanding their security (ch. 6), some particular judgments (ch. 7), particularly on Amaziah; and, after other reproofs and threatenings (ch. 8 and 9), concludes with a promise of the setting up of the Messiah's kingdom and the happiness of God's spiritual Israel therein, just as the prophecy of Joel concluded. These prophets, having opened the wound in their reproofs and threatenings, which show all wrong, in the promises of gospel-grace open the remedy, which alone will set all to rights.

Chapter 1

In this chapter we have, I. The general title of this prophecy (v. 1), with the general scope of it (v. 2). II. God's particular controversy with Syria (v. 3-5), with Palestine (v. 6-8), with Tyre (v. 9, 10), with Edom (v. 11, 12), and with Ammon (v. 13-15), for their cruelty to his people and the many injuries they had done them. This explains God's pleading with the nations, Joel 3:2.

Verses 1-2

Here is, I. The general character of this prophecy. It consists of the words which the prophet saw. Are words to be seen? Yes, God's words are; the apostles speak of the word of life, which they had not only heard, but which they had seen with their eyes, which they had looked upon, and which their hands had handled (1 Jn. 1:1), such a real substantial thing is the word of God. The prophet saw these words, that is, 1. They were revealed to him in a vision, as John is said to see the voice that spoke to him, Rev. 1:12. 2. That which was foretold by them was to him as certain as if he had seen it with his bodily eyes. It intimates how strong he was in that faith which is the evidence of things not seen.

II. The person by whom this prophecy was sent-Amos, who was among the herdmen of Tekoa, and was one of them. Some think he was a rich dealer in cattle; the word is used concerning the king of Moab (2 Ki. 3:4, He was a sheep-master); it is probable that he got money by that business, and yet he must quit it, to follow God as a prophet. Others think he was a poor keeper of cattle, for we find (ch. 7:14, 15) that he was withal a gatherer of wild figs, a poor employment by which we may suppose he could but just get his bread, and that God took him, as he did David, from following the flock, and Elisha from following the plough. Many were trained up for great employments, in the quiet, innocent, contemplative business of shepherds. When God would send a prophet to reprove and warn his people, he employed a shepherd, a herdsman, to do it; for they had made themselves as the horse and mule that have no understanding, nay, worse than the ox that knows his owner. God sometimes chooses the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, 1 Co. 1:27. Note, Those whom God has endued with abilities for his service ought not to be despised nor laid aside for the meanness either of their origin or of their beginnings. Though Amos himself is not ashamed to own that he was a herdsman, yet others ought not to upbraid him with it nor think the worse of him for it.

III. The persons concerned in the prophecy of this book; it is concerning Israel, the ten tribes, who were now ripened in sin and ripening apace for ruin. God has raised them up prophets among themselves (ch. 2:11), but they regarded them not; therefore God sends them one from Tekoa, in the land of Judah, that, coming from another country, he might be the more valued, and perhaps he was the rather sent out of his own country because there he was despised for his having been a herdsman. See Mt. 13:55-57.

IV. The time when these prophecies were delivered. 1. The book is dated, as laws used to be, by the reigns of the kings under whom the prophet prophesied. It was in the days of Uzziah king of Judah, when the affairs of that kingdom went very well, and of Jeroboam the second kind of Israel, when the affairs of that kingdom went pretty well; yet then they must both be told both of the sins they were guilty of and of the judgments that were coming upon them for those sins, that they might not with the present gleam of prosperity flatter themselves either into an opinion of their innocence or a confidence of their perpetual security. 2. It is dated by a particular event to which is prophecy had a reference; it was two years before the earthquake, that earthquake which is mentioned to have been in the days of Uzziah (Zec. 14:5), which put the nation into a dreadful fright, for it is there said, They fled before it. But how could they flee from it? Some conjecture that this earthquake was at the time of Isaiah's vision, when the posts of the door were moved, Isa. 6:4. The tradition of the Jews is that it happened just at the time when Uzziah presumptuously invaded the priest's office and went in to burn incense, 2 Chr. 26:16. Josephus mentions this earthquake, Antiq. 9.225, and says, "By it half of a mountain was removed and carried to a plain four furlongs off; and it spoiled the king's gardens." God by this prophet gave warning of it two years before, that God by it would shake down their houses, ch. 3:15.

V. The introduction to these prophecies, containing the general scope of them (v. 2): The Lord will roar from Zion. His threatenings by his prophets, and the executions of those threatenings in his providence, will be as terrible as the roaring of a lion is to the shepherds and their flocks. Amos here speaks the same language with his contemporaries, Hosea (ch. 11:10) and Joel, ch. 3:16. The lion roars before he tears; God gives warning before he strikes. Observe, 1. Whence this warning comes-from Zion and Jerusalem, from the oracles of God there delivered; for by them is they servant warned, Ps. 19:11. Our God, whose special residence is there, will issue out warrants, given at that court, as it were, for the executing of judgments on the land. See Jer. 25:30. In Zion was the mercy-seat; thence the Lord roars, intimating that God's acts of justice are consistent with mercy, allayed and mitigated by mercy, nay, as they are warnings, they are really acts of mercy. We are chastened, that we may be not be condemned. 2. What effect the warning has: The habitations of the shepherds mourn, either because they fear the roaring lion or because they feel what is signified by that comparison, the consequences of a great drought (ch. 4:7), which made the top of Carmel (of the most fruitful fields) to wither and become a desert, Joel 1:12-17.