Amos 5:25-27 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Have ye offered unto me, &c.— See the note on Deuteronomy 12:8. Jeremiah 7:22. These verses have made some people think that the Israelites, in their forty years' wanderings through the wilderness, continued in a course of rebellion against God, nay, and in the practice of idolatry: but this is a thing highly improbable in itself, whether we respect Moses their leader, or God their supreme Governor, and the miraculous providences whereby they were all along fed and sustained in that wilderness; so neither do the words of the prophet carry with them any such import. The idolatry here mentioned is much more likely to have been the sin of the Israelites, who lived in Amos's days, than of their forefathers, who perished in the wilderness. For why should the prophet denounce this punishment of captivity upon them for the sins of their ancestors, at such a distance? and for a species of idolatry, too, of which there is not the least mention in the history?—Why not rather for their own sins? All that is here mentioned, relating to the Israelites in the wilderness, is the omission of sacrifices. Nor is this mentioned by way of reproach; for how should he reproach them for the omission of a thing, which, perhaps, was not in their power constantly to perform? Had the Israelites in the wilderness had plenty of sheep, and bullocks, and corn, so as to offer the accustomed sacrifices, there had been no need to feed them all that time by miracle. But if they had none, or not sufficient, they could not offer them; nor did God require it of them. And the design for which the prophet mentions this particular here, was evidently (as appears from the context) to let the people of his own time see how little God valued their sacrifices in reality, as to the mere worth of the thing; and how much he despised them, when offered to him by wicked hands, and with a vain persuasion that they would be accepted, instead of those other more substantial duties which they were bound to practise. Amos 5:21-25. I hate, &c. that is to say, "These things are much more acceptable to me, than the richest sacrifices that you can bring: for you know that I was not strict in exacting such things from your forefathers when they were in the wilderness, which was for the space of forty years. Why then should you think that I would accept them now, instead of that justice and judgment which you ought rather to have practised."—"But, to make your sacrifices still more unacceptable to me, (as it goes on, Amos 5:26-27.) you have added your idolatrous practices to my worship. You have carried about in procession the tabernacles of Moloch, &c." That is, "As you have carried about your idols in great pomp, so shall you yourselves be carried in triumph to a distant country, saith the Lord, the God of Hosts, the Creator and absolute Disposer of all the hosts of heaven, both visible and invisible; which you, in opposition to his declared will, so foolishly and presumptuously worship." See Peters on Job, p. 312.