The Pulpit Commentary — Amos — Section 102

is the act _or 'Yh\ch righteo~en~ee is ~he princi_Ple. God's righteou~ness, w~ethcr iu himself or in his Judgments, 1s hke a.n inexhaustible stream. (1) It is perennial. The righteousness of God's juclgments is a. constant quantity. It never intermits. Each it1 riahteous and all a.re righteousness. (3) It ia pure. Righteousness in God is neces- .ea~ily so. There is no foreign ingredient, no cloud of mixture in it whatever. It is ,righteous through and through. "There is," there can be, "no unrighteousness in him." (3) It ia cleansing. It purifies all it touches; the person it is laved on, the ,city it pa.sees through. ( 4) It ia irrigating. It waters the fields of human life. It makes the graces, like the grass, to grow in the desert, and withering things revive. The righteousness of God, like water-streams, is rich in every element of blessing for time, and is a benefactor for eternity as well. Vera. 25-27.-Truating in idols that cannot save. In these words, God'a case .against Israel just announced is strengthened. Their services now were hollow and insincere; their sacrifices formal acts in which the heart had no part. This, in itself, was ground of punishment even to destruction. But it is only a. portion of the iniquity -chargeable against them. In the wilderness the course had been already entered on. Appointed ordinances had been neglected. Idolatrous ordinances had been introduced. As now they were going on, so they had ·long ago begun. There was a diuturnity in. their wrong-doing which made the fall of destroying judgments a. foregone conclusion.. We see here- L lsRAEL'B PRESENT JUDGED IN THE LIGHT OF ITS PAST. What Israel in A.mos's time -was and should receive was affected by what Israel had been and don.a in the desert .of sin. This is according to principles universally received. 1. Eve:ry nation is held responsible for its own entire past. The England of to-day not only owns responsi- bility for, but is striving nobly to make compensation. for, errors of the England of .three hundred years ago. The prophet-killing Israel of our Lord's time a.re declared ,responsible for all the martyr-blood shed from that of Abel down (Matt. ix.iii. 35). The logic of this is unassailable. The national identity remains unbroken. The ,national policy remains unchanged. The national life maintains its continuity. And so among its heirlooms is the inherited responsibility for the sins of other days. 2. A nation is furthe:r responsible for its past, in that the present takes its tone from ii. A certain proportion of almost every evil is hereditary. From the past generations we .inherit evil qualities and learn. evil ways. The father's vices reapptar in the child. 'The present is the child of the past, begotten in its likeness, and liable as such for the evil it has taken. up and perpetuates. 3. The life of a nation, like that of an indi- ~dual, can be judged of only as a whole. If a nation from its birth to its death be one thing, so is a nation's life. Now, the glory of God's dealing is its perfect equity, -arising out of its exhaustive induction of facts. He leaves nothing out of account, n.o .smallest word, no slightest desire, no most trifling act. His verdict in. each case is based on the entire life of the party in court. The method is fair. No other method would be fair. Each part is modified by its relation to all the others, and canno, be .fairly judged unless in connection with them. II. 'l'BAT PAST PERSISTENTLY UNFAITHFOL. The interrogative form of ver. 25 ia equivalent to a strong negation. 1. They had neglected sacrifice in the wildernesa. "Have ye offered me sacrifices and gifts in the desert forty years? " Typifying the .atonement of Christ, through which men. draw near to Goel, sacrifice was the funda.- mental exercise of Old Testament worship. This was not abandoned by the priests (Numb. xvi. 46), but it was, like circumcision (Josh. v. 5), neglected by the people, '8nd superseded by sacrifices to idols (Deut. xxxii. 17; Ezek. xx. 16). In this neglect -or perversion were included the voluntary gifts (offerings) as well as the prescribed .sacrifices. 'l'hus early adopted, and long persisted in, was Israel's rebellious way. Emphasizing the pronoun, God says in effect of the whole run of Jewish national history," Ye either offered no sacrifice at all, or none to me." 2. Th"Y were at paina to make, and carry, idolatrous appliances with them. " But ye have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch." Divinely appointed sacrifice they found too burdensome to be followed. Of Divine worship in each of Its ordinances they said," What a weariness iis it I" But they thought it no trouble to make and carry a.bout portable shrines and 4>edestals for us1: in the worship of heathen idol.,. A man will do for his iuol what he, 102 THE IlOOK OF AMOS. [cII. v. 1-27.